BeatRoute Magazine BC Edition March 2019

MUSiC CONCERT PREVIEWS
SPASTIC POP
LO-FI HYPNOTIC WAVE
SHE’S A
WORKING
CLASS HERO
Marie Davidson lightens the mood on
Working Class Woman By GRAEME WIGGINS
FREE AT LAST
Devours let go of any lingering traces of internalized
homophobia and passionately embraces their queer
identity By JOEY LOPEZ
Vancouver avant-garde pop artist
Devours has been pushing boundaries
since the release of his last record
Late Bloomer, a massive-sounding
album with studio quality recorded
in his own apartment. With his upcoming
album Iconoclast, Devours
took the approach of being wholly
and completely himself: dramatic,
honest and queer.
“The last three years have been
extremely transformative for me,”
he says. “The emotions are pretty
raw and intense on Iconoclast. I
was in a significant relationship that
came to an end during the songwriting
period, so there are a few breakup
songs on the album. Iconoclast
is not an album about relationships
with other people, though. It is
about my relationship with myself.
The album is also about masculinity
and queer identity. I
dealt with a ton of shame
and insecurity growing
up about my sexuality
and issues surrounding
my body image. This album
is about letting go
DEVOURS
Friday, March 15
Red Gate Arts Society,
1965 Main Street
Tix, $10
of any lingering traces of internalized
homophobia inside of me and finally
embracing who I am.”
For Devours, creating Iconoclast
has been a journey of self-exploration.
On it, he discovers who he is
not just as an artist, but as a person.
Most of this trip through the inner
workings of himself comes from his
experience within the gay community,
trying to fit into particular roles in
a bid to find a sense of belonging. To
liberate himself, he created an iconic
look that contradicted his masculine
features, instead presenting Devours
as something feminine.
“Aside from my friend Joel Gomez
lending his amazing falsetto
to some of the tracks, I wrote, recorded,
mixed, and mastered this
album by myself in my tiny apartment
in Mount Pleasant,” he says.
“The process lasted several years,
so my feelings towards the album
have had time to shift around. My
breakup was hard, and my journey
of self-discovery isn’t
over, so the album still
feels pretty raw. I was
also pushing myself
to make a Vancouver
album that
was both DIY
and huge-sounding, weird
but catchy, honest to my
own experiences but still
relatable. One big thing
that drove me with this album
was my desire to write
about male body image – mainly
because of my struggles with it, and
because I know a lot of fellow gays
who are wrestling with the same
demons. Also, I’m at a place in
my life and career where I only
want to write queer lyrics. No
more pandering to the mainstream.””
,
Humour and Emotion are two
things not typically associated
with electronic music to
most minds. This makes Marie
Davidson’s most recent album
Working Class Woman that
much more refreshing as it combines
both with club-friendly,
danceable tunes.
MARIE
DAVIDSON
Thursday, March 21
Fortune Sound Club
Tix, $15, Ticketweb
“It was important for me that there would be a lot
of different emotions and subjects that I wanted to
touch,” explains Davidson. “Of course humour is
very present because I went through dark times
in my 20s and humour was something that
helped me a lot to address things, it makes
it easier. There’s not only humour on the
record there are some dark moments on
the record.”
Working Class Woman is a biographical
trip for Davidson, that reflects on the duality
of what brought her to her current level of
success: work.
“I’m a workaholic. Sometimes
it can become a
problem. That’s why I
talk about it. I kind of
knew I was for a
few years but
in 2017-2018
I started to
have health
problems
related to
working too
much, traveling
too much, playing
too much, partying
too much, everything.”
In keeping with this she is
planning on taking some time
off shortly, so catch her while
you can.
JOHN LONDONO
22 BEATROUTE MARCH 2019