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Your guide to Montreal’s boot-stompin’ bluegrass scene

July 21, 2011 – 7:07 pm | 2 Comments

This city has a boot-stompin’, bango-twangin’ bluegrass scene, and at its core are some extremely talented musicians. “Bluegrass?” you may question, with a blank look or slight disdain. Your wavering knowledge of this sprightly music is understandable, but no longer acceptable. Not when you can hear bluegrass filtering out of a different venue almost any night of the week! I first discovered bluegrass as a kid, when my dad would blast the Osborne Brother’s version of Rocky Top on Saturday mornings while making breakfast, but it wasn’t until I moved to Montreal…

Festival International de Jazz de Montreal is back: Where’s the Jazz?

July 1, 2011 – 3:24 pm |

Another year, another Festival International de Jazz de Montreal experience. Thankfully this year I spent less time being detained by security for smuggling in contraband beer and more time listening to some really good tunes – but seriously, I have to ask this question every year: where is all the jazz?

Every year, I expect to hear some bebop or post-ragtime jazz – it is the type of jazz I play all the time in my head, the kind of jazz played on vinyl (with cracks, pops, imperfections and all) – but mostly I really appreciate music that makes me feel like I am marching in a New Orleans funeral procession. Is that so wrong?

Day 3 Sasquatch 2011: Noah and the Whale, Chromeo, Guided by Voices, Wilco and more…

June 5, 2011 – 12:57 pm |

I stepped outside of my tent and instantly noticed how many cars had disappeared from the campgrounds. People traveled from far and wide to attend Sasquatch, so it seemed as though everyone need a day to return to work on Tuesday, and with the exception of the select group of Wilco fans, every stage was fairly barren and open to easy front row access. Dressed in suits and tuxes, Noah and the Whale came out with a set up equally polished with their well-orchestrated mournful and occasionally inspirational pop tunes…

A Devil’s Din: A Psychedelic Cheerfully Mellow Trip

June 2, 2011 – 1:26 am |

Psychedelic Rock and Roll is what A Devil’s Din is all about. After performing with numerous local bands like the Mongrels, Test Pilot, and The Mother Funkers, ace keyboardist and longtime underground musician David Lines finally took the reins and formed his own project: A Devil’s Din. With this new project, Lines’s freedom to explore his eclectic, yet exotic, musings leaves him boundless…

Preview: Pirates of the Lachine Canal

May 20, 2011 – 1:42 pm |

What can you expect at a Lachine Canal Pirate Party? Maybe a few pirates prancing around with loot, eventually forming a conga line and dancing off the plank?

Ahoy Matey! These are not your father’s scurvy ridden, sea motion addled pirates. These pirates like to party-down!

The Healing Power of Half Baked live in Montreal

May 11, 2011 – 10:34 pm |

Well, before I saw them play at Esco Bar on Friday, I was coming down with an atrocious spring flu, green gunk and all. Ill, tired, and a little sad and weak, unable to enjoy a cigarette without that awful smell caused by having a blocked nose (and yes, I need to smoke when I’m sick because it makes me fell better!); I was in desperate need of a shaman…

Half Baked and Right By Midnight

May 6, 2011 – 12:53 pm | One Comment

This Friday Night get ready for one very strange trip to the realm of Half-Baked. They’ll be playing live, live, live! For one night, and for one night only! Are you sick of your parents not letting you eat your breakfast with a fork? Are you tired of the government telling you to pull up your pants?

“YOU ARE EXPERIMENTAL!”: Acid Mother Temple live in Brooklyn

April 19, 2011 – 7:33 pm |

The night could best be summed up by two sentences overheard between the stage and the audience during the Acid Mothers Temple (AMT) set. After the first jam, better classified as an eruption of noise (or chaos ignoring any traditional song structure or melody), guitarist Kawabata Makoto looked across the mostly hallucinogenic experimenting audience and asked in broken English, “By the way, have you seen a flying saucer?” His question was met with…

Israeli Art-Rockers Eatliz at Toronto’s Rivoli

April 14, 2011 – 1:14 pm |

Eatliz (Hebrew for “butcher shop”) is a six-piece progressive art-rock band from Tel Aviv, Israel. On Wednesday I had the chance to check out their act at Toronto’s Rivoli. It was the last stop of a four-week North American tour, which included Canadian Music Week and SXSW dates. I was expecting to see a very tired, worn-out band. That band didn’t show up on the other hand, Eatliz did…

PREVIEW: The Black Angels at Sala Rossa

April 11, 2011 – 9:05 pm |

Where do you even start with a band like The Black Angels? I caught their show in October, 2010 when they opened for Black Mountain and the whole thing simply melted my face. Why? And how will you know when your face is melted? Well, let’s see here…Take a song like Bad Vibrations, the first song off their newest album Phosphene Dream. Close your eyes. Turn it up. Loud

Site Gurls behind the scenes: Baby and/or Scary whispering in a library

February 9, 2011 – 12:00 am | One Comment

As most Montrealers can probably tell, the bulk of our video for the Stop the Meter Campaign was shot in the Concordia University Library. This meant one thing: Quiet on the Set!

In this video, our Baby Spice (or is it Scary?) mouths the lines of the song between rows of books as a whisper is heard. Enjoy…

Comparable, Compatible Hourray for Earth LIVE @ Sala Rossa Montreal

January 26, 2011 – 10:09 pm |

New York-based tansparent grunge 3-piece Hourray For Earth performs Comparable, Compatible live at Sala Rossa in Montreal January 19th, 2011. Hourray for music!

Video by Chris Zacchia

Read the full review by Cassie Doubleday here

The Roads talk about uniting & their album “Remember Today”

December 1, 2010 – 5:36 am |

A little while ago we introduced you to the Montreal band, Roads. They had recently signed to indie label Indica Records and had debuted their first album Remember Today. We had a chance to sit down with the band and talk to them about their beginnings as well as what the new album really means to them.

Interview by: Cassie Doubleday

Video by: Chris Zacchia