Once more, I've fallen out of practice of writing in my free time. The 40-hour week will do that to you. 9-5 in front of a computer every day has a way of melting your brain and spending more time on a computer is generally the last thing that I want to do when I get home.
This all being said, it has afforded me to listen to a lot of music, so I'll you this post to talk about a few things I'm really into.
During my golden years of Ontario punk, !ATTENTION! quickly became my favourite of all the bands I was seeing at every show. They moved from "Hey, that band was pretty good." to "I can't wait to see !ATTENTION!" to "!ATTENTION! is THE BEST." I placed a lot of importance on collecting everything they put out and listened to Another Year constantly while living on Dublin St. in Guelph. Towards of when they were still playing shows regularly in Southern Ontario, they had started putting new songs into their set that were going to be on their upcoming full-length. I couldn't wait for it. I would listen to Four or Five Ways to Play These Chords, the demo, Another Year, and their blink-182 cover all in row to pretend it was a full-length. Time started to pass and I figured that it was never going to come out.
Then, apropos of nothing, they announced in 2016 and put it out in October. Though I didn't listen to it tonnes when it came out, for some reason, it is absolutely great. I love the band and am so so proud that they are a product of the scene that I'm a part of. Please support this band however you can, because if there was ever a band that deserves it, it's !ATTENTION!
Oso Oso put out an album called Real Stories of True People Who Kind of Looked Like Monsters in 2015 that was one of my favourites from that year. It's really good!
When I saw them play in October, they played a few "joints" and it was that perfect type of live experience where it makes you so eager to listen to their stuff as soon as you get home. The new songs sounded really good and I was really excited to hear them when they came out.
In a nice turn of events, they announced on twitter that were going to do a surprise release of their album the next morning, so I made sure to download it as soon as I woke up. The album, The Yunahon Mixtape, proved to be AMAZING and has stayed in constant rotation since then. It's a great progression in their sound that subtly adds complexity to the compositions while retaining everything that made them awesome in the first place (re: extremely catchy hooks and riffs). Oso Oso has now put out two very strong albums and that is something rare and is much harder to do than it sounds. The band seems to be on an upward trajectory and is getting more attention. I'm really happy for them, as their music deserves any and all attention it gets. I may expand on why I think this album is really special in the near future, but for now, all I can do is recommend jamming this.
YO:
Showing posts with label Ontario. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ontario. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 7, 2017
Friday, June 24, 2016
Sovereignties
Shortly after we put out Ecotone, Beat Noir started to kick around ideas for new songs. We started with three acoustic skeletons and then gradually added more and more until we had 11 full songs. Then we went to Niagara-on-the-Lake and started recording them with Davis. Considering that I didn't know Davis before, it was amazing that he turned out to be a great friend and amazing adviser on what we were making. In my mind, Davis is a member of the band and I'm sure that Mark, Duff, and Colin would agree. Once we started recording, we added even more to each of the songs. We took our time and wanted to make sure it came out sounding the way we wanted it to.
We spent about a week and a half and during that time crashed with Davis. We'd wake up, start making a record and then go to sleep. If you weren't recording, you were sitting with Davis and giving input and hanging out. We ate cereal out of the same bowl for breakfast every day and then ate breakfast for dinner at Silk's Diner down the street every day. Then we would fall asleep on couches and start the same process the next day. It was probably the most fun I've ever had in my life.
We wanted to take a long time mixing and we did. The idea wasn't to put down each track and then level it and put it out, the idea was to make the mix sound like we imagined being while we were writing the songs. I think we got there.
When we put out Ecotone, we got it out pretty quickly and then it just sort of disappeared after a little bit. I got tired of some of the songs pretty quickly. With Sovereignties, we waited and sat on it until we knew it should come out. We wanted to see how much we could do with it. I guess I don't what we ended up doing with it or what we were thinking, but I do know that waiting on it was the right decision. Absolutely the right decision.
So now, Sovereignties is out. Actually, if you were hip to the links that I add to words on this blog, you could have gotten it months ago. It pays to read this blog.
I am very proud of this record. I think we made a big progression from the last record and I think it is a much better showcase of what we are able to do as musicians, the influences each of us want to bring to the band, and, really, Duffer's strength as a songwriter.
I've got a sort of liner notes that I've been writing to exapnd on the songs that I'll put up here once I finish them, so keep an eye for that, but in the mean time I guess that all I can say is listen to the fruit of our labour and enjoy.
We spent about a week and a half and during that time crashed with Davis. We'd wake up, start making a record and then go to sleep. If you weren't recording, you were sitting with Davis and giving input and hanging out. We ate cereal out of the same bowl for breakfast every day and then ate breakfast for dinner at Silk's Diner down the street every day. Then we would fall asleep on couches and start the same process the next day. It was probably the most fun I've ever had in my life.
We wanted to take a long time mixing and we did. The idea wasn't to put down each track and then level it and put it out, the idea was to make the mix sound like we imagined being while we were writing the songs. I think we got there.
When we put out Ecotone, we got it out pretty quickly and then it just sort of disappeared after a little bit. I got tired of some of the songs pretty quickly. With Sovereignties, we waited and sat on it until we knew it should come out. We wanted to see how much we could do with it. I guess I don't what we ended up doing with it or what we were thinking, but I do know that waiting on it was the right decision. Absolutely the right decision.
So now, Sovereignties is out. Actually, if you were hip to the links that I add to words on this blog, you could have gotten it months ago. It pays to read this blog.
I am very proud of this record. I think we made a big progression from the last record and I think it is a much better showcase of what we are able to do as musicians, the influences each of us want to bring to the band, and, really, Duffer's strength as a songwriter.
I've got a sort of liner notes that I've been writing to exapnd on the songs that I'll put up here once I finish them, so keep an eye for that, but in the mean time I guess that all I can say is listen to the fruit of our labour and enjoy.
Tuesday, January 19, 2016
Four or Five Ways to Play These Chords
A while ago I wrote a post about the Ontario Punk scene at the time that I was most involved in it and going to a lot of shows. Consequently, that was also when I wasn't in an Ontario punk band. Funny how life works that way.
So, yesterday I was wearing my !ATTENTION! hoodie and listening to the whole !ATTENTION! discography, as well as Our Fathers by Wayfarer and This Month's Rent by The Decay and I was filled with the same feeling of nostalgia and and local pride that I was when I was writing the aforementioned post. It just seemed like every band who formed in that time and every band that I saw was just amazing and had this knack for writing songs about exactly where I was from and exactly what I was doing.
No song better fit this mold than "Basements" by Junior Battles from their Self-Titled EP, which is one of my favourite releases ever.
This is the first song I can remember hearing from Junior Battles and is the one that stuck out most when I saw them for the first time, opening for Shook Ones, Make Do and Mend, and We Are the Union. They immediately became one of my favourite bands and this song kind of became the Ontario song. Now, to be sure this song is much more about their group of bands/friends at the time, that was mostly made up of the bands that I linked to above, and I knew that, but still felt that I was part of all of that by going to shows. It really felt like I was part of something and I'm not sure that I really feel that way anymore. Maybe I just need to go to more shows? Who knows?
But this song remains as the signifier of that time. This song is that time in Ontario and I know that I'm not the only one who thinks so.
I saw Junior Battles in April of last year (shameless plug, Beat Noir opened that show) and they played a ton of older deep cut songs, highlighted by "Basements", though they still usually play it. I spent almost all of the set in the embrace of Erik of The Decay and that feeling I was talking abour came back in spades. It's cool that this whole thing; the bands, the songs, the people, the feelings, the experiences; are still there, if they aren't always there. Sometimes you just need the right thing to stir them up.
So, yesterday I was wearing my !ATTENTION! hoodie and listening to the whole !ATTENTION! discography, as well as Our Fathers by Wayfarer and This Month's Rent by The Decay and I was filled with the same feeling of nostalgia and and local pride that I was when I was writing the aforementioned post. It just seemed like every band who formed in that time and every band that I saw was just amazing and had this knack for writing songs about exactly where I was from and exactly what I was doing.
No song better fit this mold than "Basements" by Junior Battles from their Self-Titled EP, which is one of my favourite releases ever.
This is the first song I can remember hearing from Junior Battles and is the one that stuck out most when I saw them for the first time, opening for Shook Ones, Make Do and Mend, and We Are the Union. They immediately became one of my favourite bands and this song kind of became the Ontario song. Now, to be sure this song is much more about their group of bands/friends at the time, that was mostly made up of the bands that I linked to above, and I knew that, but still felt that I was part of all of that by going to shows. It really felt like I was part of something and I'm not sure that I really feel that way anymore. Maybe I just need to go to more shows? Who knows?
But this song remains as the signifier of that time. This song is that time in Ontario and I know that I'm not the only one who thinks so.
I saw Junior Battles in April of last year (shameless plug, Beat Noir opened that show) and they played a ton of older deep cut songs, highlighted by "Basements", though they still usually play it. I spent almost all of the set in the embrace of Erik of The Decay and that feeling I was talking abour came back in spades. It's cool that this whole thing; the bands, the songs, the people, the feelings, the experiences; are still there, if they aren't always there. Sometimes you just need the right thing to stir them up.
Monday, November 2, 2015
Basements
There seems to be an inevitable lifecycle as a punk where you go from curious to nervous to invested to jaded to bitter. We all try to avoid this as much as possible, but it is apparently failsafe. If you've been interested music and ever involved in a particular scene, there is always a certain time period or group of bands that evoke the most nostalgia. You start to think "Back then, it was different. It mattered", but in reality everybody thinks that about something. The punk kids older than you thought that about what came before you and the kids younger than you think about right now. Life, of which punk is of course a part, is always changing
It's really easy to look back on a certain time period as the "Golden Age" of a scene simply because you were there to experience it. Maybe just being there is what really matters.
For me, that time was about 2005-2012 or so (or maybe now? I guess?) in Ontario. I went to a lot of shows, though more importantly I went to a lot of shows that featured local bands from Ontario. I have vivid memories of the first times I saw Junior Battles, !Attention!, and The Decay and when I think about that now, it's more or less like there's a rose-coloured lens over the whole thing. I couldn't believe how good the music and bands around me were. I made unforgettable memories in weird and awesome places. It mattered more than anything to me.
With that, I give you this collection of music made by my peers that affected me in a major way. I have strong memories tied to all of these releases and the people who made them. I tried to limit it to one release per band for the sake of it not being overwhelming and tried to go for 7"s or EPs when I could. It can sometimes be a little daunting to jump into a giant collection of music, or at least thats the way I find it, so I tried my best to curb that as much as possible. I hope you like these songs, because they were a big deal for me.
The Essential Ontario 2008-2012.
It's really easy to look back on a certain time period as the "Golden Age" of a scene simply because you were there to experience it. Maybe just being there is what really matters.
For me, that time was about 2005-2012 or so (or maybe now? I guess?) in Ontario. I went to a lot of shows, though more importantly I went to a lot of shows that featured local bands from Ontario. I have vivid memories of the first times I saw Junior Battles, !Attention!, and The Decay and when I think about that now, it's more or less like there's a rose-coloured lens over the whole thing. I couldn't believe how good the music and bands around me were. I made unforgettable memories in weird and awesome places. It mattered more than anything to me.
With that, I give you this collection of music made by my peers that affected me in a major way. I have strong memories tied to all of these releases and the people who made them. I tried to limit it to one release per band for the sake of it not being overwhelming and tried to go for 7"s or EPs when I could. It can sometimes be a little daunting to jump into a giant collection of music, or at least thats the way I find it, so I tried my best to curb that as much as possible. I hope you like these songs, because they were a big deal for me.
The Essential Ontario 2008-2012.
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