Beatroute Magazine BC Print Edition November 2017

MUSIC
BRIDAL PARTY
A PERFECT MARRIAGE OF INDIE-POP AND SOUL
JOVANA GOLUBOVIC
Bridal Party are unlike anything in the local music scene. Granted,
they are from across the water. The Victoria-based group balances
between a vintage and modern sound, fusing plush jazz stylings
with playful indie-pop. Somewhere between the hooks of Hall and
Oates and the ambience of Broken Social Scene lies Bridal Party. Each
soul-drenched track is instantly captivating with exquisite chords and
undeniable groove. Sensitively and proficiently performed, each player
Bridal Party show unbridled talent on new EP.
compliments each other like curtains to a rug of a luxurious boudoir.
Bridal Party consists of vocalist/guitarist Suzannah Raudaschi,
guitarist/vocalist Joseph Leroux, drummer Adrian Heim, keyboardist
Sean Kennedy, and bassist Lee Gauthier. Recorded at Tugboat Studios,
the band employed a more collaborative writing approach on their
latest EP, Negative Space, than on previous releases. “This is the most
cohesive thing we’ve ever done,” says Leroux, “It feels like the beginning
of something bigger.” Still taking on the bulk of the writing, Leroux
and Raudaschi now present their material to the band deliberately
unfinished, allowing room for synergy. “When you have [a song]
written on guitar for one person, it’s hard to distribute that and make
it sound like a song for a five-piece band,” explains Leroux, “Everyone’s
writing in a more similar sound now. We now know what we want to
sound like.”
Inspiration for Negative Space came largely from coping with the
difficulties of human relationships or, as Leroux puts it, “trying to be
a good and kind person in an increasingly strange world.” Pleasantly
obscure lyrics depict bittersweet themes and everyday interactions.
Citing TOPS and Homeshake as musical influences, Bridal Party is
equally inspired by their robust local music scene. “Victoria is so lush
and diverse for how small and isolated of a place it is,” says Leroux. “It’s
a blessing.”
The band left their island city this summer to embark on a cross-
Canada tour, honing their live set while enchanting anyone within earshot.
“You spend most of your time in car, you don’t know where you
are,” says Leroux as I wonder if he will use the rhyme for a future lyric,
“in the evening you get to play your songs and it becomes grounding.”
“It becomes not a routine,” chimes Raudaschi. “But second nature.”
With only a couple EPs under their belts, Bridal Party are proving to
be serious songwriters and a memorable new act.
Bridal Party perform at the Waldorf on November 11.
ISCM WORLD NEW MUSIC DAYS
BRINGING A MESSAGE OF PEACE THROUGH MUSIC AND CULTURAL EXCHANGE
MAT WILKINS
The year is 1923 and Austrian composer
Arnold Schoenberg, along with his students
Alban Berg and Anton Webern, have created
a method of musical composition that
has effectively flipped the entire world on
its head. The music flies in the face of its
melodic, classically-influenced predecessors,
with complex and challenging notation and
theory like nothing the world has ever heard
before. But what do these three humans and
their art have to do with the World New
Music Days? Well, they started it.
“Schoenberg wanted to find a way to bring
peace through music… He made this very
intellectually challenging music with the
idea of getting rid of the kind of hierarchies
we know of” says David Pay, current artistic
director of the International Society of
Contemporary Music (ISCM) World New
Music Days, now in its 94th year.
This philosophy thrives through the
festival’s performances each year. Composers
from 50 countries around the world are asked
to submit six of their compositions to the
ISCM a year before the festival. From here
they are selected, not by a committee or
Photo by Elijah Schultz
panel, but by the host nation’s participating
ensembles themselves. Not a hierarchy in
sight.
Music that is submitted to and played
at the festival will be naturally varied by
virtue of its worldliness, but simultaneously
carries on Schoenberg’s tradition of “stuff
that went weird in the Twenties” according
to Pay. Besides breathtaking concerts played
by traditional ensembles of diverse sizes and
configurations, performances will also include
an improvised adaptation of audience-led
“graphic scores,” a composition played on an
amplified household sewing machine, and
other events that stretch the boundaries of
contemporary music in delightfully creative
ways.
With more than 90 participating
composers, 30+ events and around 20
ensembles, the breadth of the festival is
vast. Those curious about this exceptional
experience can visit the ISCM World New
Music Days 2017 website for full concert
listings and descriptions.
ISCM World New Music Days runs from
November 2 to 8 at multiple venues around
Vancouver.
ISCM offers a rare experience for contemporary classical enthusiasts.
YOUNGBLOOD
KEEPING THE MOMENTUM GOING
TOM PAILLE
Anything goes for Alexis Youngblood when she’s onstage.
Alexis Youngblood bounces into the coffee shop an hour
late, all apologies and smiles. The lead singer of Vancouver
pop outfit, Youngblood, she has just returned home from her
second European tour and immediately has plunged back into
the recording studio for some pretty long days. “No rest in
between, really,” she says. “My manager phoned and we were
like in the next morning.” Even exhausted, she exudes energy
and passion. When asked if her daily life is anything like her
onstage persona, she laughs. “Pretty much, just way more
obnoxious! Anything goes up there!”
According to Youngblood the Europe tour was a success
— sold out shows in old historic venues, rockstar VIP
treatment behind the scenes and audiences eager to show
their appreciation and respect of the arts and live music. She
gushes about their fan’s reaction, “I wish some of the North
American crowds would react more like how the Europeans
celebrate live music and don’t just go to shows with a reserved
kind of ‘sit back and watch’ mentality.”
Youngblood definitely knows a thing or two about getting
the crowd involved with her interactive performance style and
is looking forward to again having the crowd in the palm of her
hand. Energetic and cheeky, Youngblood keeps you guessing
as to what’s coming next onstage, and sometimes, even she
doesn’t know. “Keep ‘em guessing, right?” With new music not
officially to be released until “spring...ish of 2018,” we’ll have
to rely on some of the earlier hits like the Bond-theme-esque
“Easy Nothing” or the band’s most recent bi-lingual single,
“Laisse Tomber les Filles,” either of which could have rolled off
a ‘60’s jukebox.
Youngblood’s website claims they are “what the ’60s thought
the future would sound like.” When asked if maybe she was
born in the wrong era, she laughs, “Realistically, if you look at
what was going on in the ’60s, I would have had a hard time
being a woman in both the music industry and in society in
general. So much has changed for the good now but I would
have had a lot of issues with civil rights, women’s rights...but
the style and music and art were just so amazing and, yeah,
I take a lot of that with me into my music and life.” For a
modern rock band, that can be a very cool thing, both visually
and musically.
Youngblood perform at the Biltmore Cabaret on Nov. 25.
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