By David Nowacki

Calvary (August 1)

Director John Michael McDonagh hopefully continues his winning collaboration with actor Brendan Gleeson after their excellent last effort together, 2011’s The Guard. Sure to be as dark as it is funny, Calvary costars charming Irish schlub Chris O’Dowd, who’s likely best known for Bridesmaids and The IT Crowd.

Frank (August 8) 

August appears to be the month for Irish directors. Lenny Abrahamson of the Emerald Isle presents Michael Fassbender as the titular Frank, an eccentric musical genius who hides in a large paper mache head. The story is told through the eyes of a young musician (Domhnall Gleeson, son of Calvary’s Brendan), who finds himself flabbergasted by Frank and his weirdo bandmates (Maggie Gyllenhaal, et al). 

The Expendables 3 (August 15)

Sylvester Stallone pushes his muscles and machismo to the point of bursting via copious amounts of HGH… For your entertainment! Joining him, as with previous entries, are Jason Statham, Dolph Lundgren, Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Terry Crews, Randy Couture and Jet Li. New to the franchise are Harrison Ford, Mel Gibson, Wesley Snipes, Antonio Banderas, Ronda Rousey and Kelsey Grammer. I’d include a plot summary, but the cast takes up too much space. Things go boom.

VANCOUVER EVENTS

Film Noir 2014 at Cinematheque (August 1-28)

Including new restorations of uberclassics Double Indemnity, Lady Shanghai and Gun Crazy, Film Noir 2014 at the Cinematheque looks equal parts excellent introduction for the uninitiated and fun revisit for aficionados. On August 3rd, you can get a mean bang for your buck with a killer triple bill of Double Indemnity, The Maltese Falcon and Mildred Pierce.

Info at http://www.thecinematheque.ca/film-noir-2014

Wild Style 2014! An Evening With Charlie Ahearn & His Films at the Imperial (August 23)

‘OG’ ‘80s hip-hop film director Charlie Ahearn is showcased all evening, featuring some lesser-known short films and some ‘choice cuts.’ You get all this plus the chance to get some autographs, see whatever a ‘break battle competition’ is and the perennially fun costume contest.

Score some tix/info at http://northerntickets.com/events/wild-style-2014/

By Legs

VANCOUVER — When I used to work at Budgies Burritos, Theo Goutzinakis from Langley, B.C.’s Gob would come in and I’d whisper to my co-workers, “We gotta put on ‘Soda,’ Theo from Gob is in the store!” Recounting this to him, he said he’d probably just feel embarrassed. Meeting up with Goutzinakis and bandmate Steve Fairweather on a warm summer night in the basement of the local vegetarian restaurant, we discussed what the band has been up to over the past few years and their new album, Apt. 13, which is set for an August 26^th release from New Damage Records. The album was recorded without any label pressure, which Goutzinakis says made the process a lot looser, but also took a lot longer.

“A lot of stuff happened to us during that period of recording. My dad passed away, there were break-ups, a marriage, all these different things, all in a couple years. We’re pretty tight, as a band and as friends. It was just life, you know, you gotta get back up.” The band recorded most their new album at Fairweather’s parents’ house in White Rock, using a walk-in closet for a sound booth and waking up to romantic walks on the beach before getting to work.

Gob has just returned from playing several festivals and smaller shows across Canada, with the most recent being Amnesia Rock Fest in Montebello, QC. With 100 bands in two days, Goutzinakis explains the insanity that went on.

“We’re looking at it like, Misfits is playing, and Danzig? Black Flag and Rollins Band? It was like the ‘90s was back. Guttermouth played right before us and Fishbone played right after us, it was a crazy lineup. There were probably 100,000 people there. Like Weezer is playing the small stage? We’re at the hotel and I looked at the sign-in sheet, next to Gob it said Danzig. The hotel we stayed at was so close to the fest, we woke up to a French-Canadian version of Oh Canada being sung in death metal vocals for sound check,” exclaims Goutzinakis with a laugh.

He continues, “It was weird to see all our friends we hadn’t seen in so long. A band we toured with on Warped Tour, 88 FINGERS LOUIE from Chicago, they just walked up and they were like ‘Hey Theo!’ it was like, ‘I haven’t seen you guys since 1999!’ But it was 100 bands in two days, that’s too many bands… The kid doing it is a huge metal and punk rock fan, and he had a bunch of money he won from the lottery or something, so he just spent his winnings on that I guess.”

After taking a hiatus from shows in their hometown, Gob are back and playing an album release show at the Imperial Room in Vancouver on the 22^nd of August, with Living With Lions and Jiffymarker. The art for the album was done by local artist Jeff Lee, who also plays in Jiffymarker, and Fairweather says has been old friend of Gob’s for years.

On how the band operate nowadays, Fairweather as well as singer/guitarist Tom Thacker both live in New York, so the band communicates sending new material back and forth over the Internet.

“Yeah, actually Tom just got his citizenship, him and his partner got married, and the New York Times did an article on them,” says Fairweather. “Tom’s wife grew up with really strict parents and wasn’t allowed to go to shows, so she created this Interview Club at school, and would be like, ‘I have to go to this show, it’s for Interview Club,’ so that’s how she got to go to shows. Her and Tom met at a Mr. T Experience show at this old venue called The Gate on Granville Street.”

Don’t miss Gob returning home with Living With Lions and Jiffy Marker @ The Imperial Room, Vancouver, August 22^nd 2014. For more info on the new album check out http://gobband.com. For the full unabridged interview go to http://thenthecopsshowup.blogspot.com.

By Jamie Goyman

VANCOUVER — “There’s an incredible thrill about doing what I’m doing, carting a violin around and hoping people show up, and when they do and I really nail a song.”

Owen Pallett has been divvying out his knockout musical talent for 10+ years, not only on his violin strings, but with pinpoint vocals to match, and from the way things have been going it doesn’t look as if it’s going to stop anytime soon. Which is, of course, no problem as musical stylings by Pallett are always appreciated. “I’m really happy with how the A-side of In Conflict turned out all the way to ‘Chorale’. I think that’s some of the best recording material I’ve done.”

Coming off the release of In Conflict back in May, he found himself doing back-to-back tours with Arcade Fire and on his own. The man literally has spent around 10 days in his own bed this year. This lack of downtime may worry fans into thinking there will be a slow start to new material, however Pallett has made sure to keep up with song structure and lyric writing while on the road.

“Something I’ve actually done with what’s coming up after In Conflict is I’ve laid it all out already. I know how I want the songs to behave and interact with each other and I know how I want them to be structured. I have no idea how I want the harmonic or melodic material, but give me a couple hours at a piano and I can have that figured out pretty easy.”

There is a mood of excitement around this tour and there is good reason for it. Not only has it been four years since Owen Pallett’s last album, Heartland, but also there are two new names joining the band – those of which have surely aided in the growth of the music.

“I felt discouraged after a year of touring Heartland and I knew I wanted to get a band together because I think that discouragement was coming from the feeling that for the first time I made an album I couldn’t live up to it in a live context. I wanted to put together a band that was going to be amazing and blow every single part of Heartland out of the water and any other earlier Final Fantasy songs and make them sound amazing.”

Joining the roster are collaborators Matt Smith and Rob Gordon, which help bring a whole new aspect to the live shows, bringing a bit more energy with live drums and guitar. “I wasn’t sure if I loved my own music, my album In Conflict, wasn’t feeling secure about the live show,” explains Pallett, “and now I’m basically only thinking about making a new record, going on tour with my band, and playing those songs.”

This September Pallett will be going on tour, coming through Vancouver, and will wind it all down at The Polaris Awards, where he is not only performing but nominated as well. This is some Grade A talent coming through the city and time should really be set aside for this one and hell, wish him luck on hopefully taking home a win.

What about the show in Vancouver? “…It’s gonna be fucking awesome! We’ve been playing a lot over the past year, haven’t done a proper tour yet and I’m really excited about Avi Buffalo and Foxes In Fiction, its a really stacked bill.”

Owen Pallet performs at The Imperial September 9.

By Jessica Brodeur

Photo: Sarah Whitlam

VANCOUVER — September 20^th will kick off Oktoberfest in Munich, Germany and at The Imperial in Vancouver, thanks to beer and party expert James Foran at Steam Whistle. The perks of being a beer rep range from watching shows to researching local bands to sponsor, to delivering beer to thirsty customers and more. BeatRoute sat down for a cold pilsner on a hot day with Foran, who even sported his jolly lederhosen in anticipation of next month’s Oktoberfest festivities. Prost!

BeatRoute: How long have you been working for Steam Whistle?

James Foran: I’ve been with them for about six and a half years now, about three in Toronto and three and a half in Vancouver.

BR: How did the Oktoberfest event start?

JF: A few years ago Steam Whistle recognized anyone who had been at the company for five or 10 years of service. For anyone who’d been there at least five years got a trip to the following Oktoberfest in Munich, Germany, and a tour of breweries through to Prague. After the first trip the guys came back and had an amazing time and decided that it would be awesome to bring that experience back to Toronto. We started it at the brewery in Toronto. We have a beautiful beer hall with a capacity for 600 or 700. That was a success and we extended it to other provinces. 2013 was our first Vancouver Oktoberfest and now we’re in our second year at a bigger venue, we outgrew it in our first year! We’re at The Imperial now; it’s such a beautiful old building. We’ve got a band, a DJ, a German dance troop, and we’re going to decorate the whole thing and turn it into a bierhalle.

BR: Did you go on the Germany trip?

JF: No, for me that’s this year. I go just after the Vancouver Oktoberfest event.

BR: What’s your favourite German food?

JF: Definitely any kind of sausages. We’ve got Bestie from Chinatown doing traditional German fare for us. Nice to work with a local company onboard!

BR: What’s the best part of the job for you?

JF: Besides having awesome beer – which helps to sell it if you really enjoy the beer – we get a lot of freedom at our company. It’s not really regulated as day to go days, so we work with our strengths and work towards each market. The brewery has been really great at figuring it out for ourselves.

BR: What is the “Vancouver market”?

JF: There’s a lot of ales here, it offers a unique opportunity for us as a pilsner among the various other IPAs and ales. There’s a lot of good breweries out here, but we have a different approach. There are challenges as people often ask if we have an IPA or pale ale… but we are Canadian and putting out a premium product and Vancouver has been very receptive to us.

BR: Is there a worst part of the job?

JF: I guess in B.C., and this isn’t even a worst part, it comes with the job, but there’s only three of us out here. We just brought on a third rep about a month and a half ago. Friday night or Saturday night if a bar runs out of beer, that falls to us. There are worst things to have to do than hop in a cab and deliver some beer. It’s not always the most enjoyable, but people are usually happy to see you in that circumstance.

BR: Do you collect beer steins?

JF: I have a few, and my collection has certainly grown over the last few years as Steam Whistle has put them out.

BR: What’s your best stein?

JF: When I was there in Germany I got a couple, a glass one that represents Hamburg; it’s a pretty fun one. My buddy and former colleague Elton Clemente does all the designs for [Steam Whistle steins.] It’s really neat to be able to have a piece of art that my buddy has made. Every year they change so it’s starting to be a collector’s item. Each ticket comes with a half-litre stein that they can take home at the end of the night with them.

Vancouver Oktoberfest presented by Steam Whistle happens at The Imperial on September 20th, see http://steamwhistle.ca/ for details.

By Stephanie Nazywalskyj

Photo: Michal O’Neal

VANCOUVER — Nils Frahm is a German musical genius (read: musician, composer and producer). His original and innovative mastery of the piano combines classical and music of the electronic variety, taking the everyday term “mixing” to a whole new level. Using a grand piano, upright piano, electric piano, 61-key polyphonic and foot-operated analogue synthesizer, and a drum machine, without any loops or playbacks, Frahm executes the unimaginable, resulting in an uber mind blowing live performance. At the ripe age of 32, Frahm has nearly a dozen and a half EPs, solo recordings, and compilation albums circulating and being listened to on earphones worldwide.

Despite Frahm’s increasingly renowned success around the globe, he didn’t always dream of being a musician. As a youngster, he wanted to be “a photographer (like his father), a jet pilot, Superman, an ice cream sales man, an astronaut, a balloon pilot, a painter, and maybe after all of this, a musician.” Fortunately for Frahm, he was reared “in the spirit that no matter what you want to do, with the right amount of attention and care, it would probably be the right thing, and that life is rewarding to those who do that. It feels like [my parent’s] were right so far. But I mean, my life is not over yet. I’ve always told myself to stay awake and watch myself from the outside – to age with grace. I’m totally open for a Plan B and I hope to have the courage to drive my own ice cream truck.” Perhaps an ice cream truck sales man who composes his own tunes to lure the people out into the street – with a talent like his, one only hopes.

Spending his brief return to the motherland in the studio, before setting off on the North American leg of his tour, Nils assertively proclaims that “right now seems to be the time to work.” And hard at work he is, not only creating music, but customizing and designing new instruments to boot. The UNA CORDA, a collaborative project between David Kalvins and Frahm, is the first comparably-weightless, petite piano with only one string per note. “We pitched in all of our ideas and designs and talked about every little part of it together. It took Kalvins only half a year to prototype the thing. I am utterly excited about having the first one and being able to play this beautiful instrument – a pure labour of love and proof that you just have to be confident and try to do something spectacular. Every guitar player wants to have his own guitar, and then it gets built precisely made to his hands. This is very uncommon for pianist. I want different things out of the piano and it’s nice to meet people who help you meet that vision.” Clearly hooked on the idea of making and building more interesting instruments that sound different, Nils divulges having just returned from a visit with his organ builder. “I am building a transportable pipe organ, which is very exciting as well. It’s very different with a wide range of octaves, funky features, and sounds really beautiful.”

The set that Frahm is currently touring with has evolved over many years, “slightly shifting and expanding, with each new idea an old idea being let go,” but generally his shows are spontaneous and soul-exposing: “I’m just fighting to not play it safe, and sometimes when I feel like it, I really try new things because it’s the most natural way to progress as a musician. Sometimes you plan a set or show to play, but you’re jet lagged or in a horrible mood, and you can’t really imagine that it will go well. Then, while you’re doing it, all of a sudden, it feels so nice to play music and in that moment, you come up with ideas, do what comes to your mind, and just follow your intuition. I really enjoy these unfathomable moments. You learn to stay open for these kinds of surprises and to react in the moment rather than deciding beforehand what to do.”

Frahm’s latest album, Spaces, directly epitomizes and exhibits his improvised approach to shows and consists of pieces written while touring. “I was afraid of the idea that I might stop playing that kind of show and never hear these pieces again. I needed to capture the same sound and energy that comes from a live concert, so the idea was simple, I would have to bring the studio on the road and as a bi-catch play and record the shows. I listened back to them, noting and reflecting on which pieces were interesting and which worked on record, as well as the arrangement of the pieces themselves and surprised my label with the album and the idea of releasing it, which they loved, even though it was a pretty geeky album. It seems like it’s the most successful album to date, and I surprised even myself a bit.”

Here’s to Nils Frahm surprising himself more and ever-so-kindly taking us along on the ride.

Nils Frahm performs at the Imperial November 7.

By Kristie Sparksman

Broods’ Georgia Nott opens up about the intensity and beauty of emotions.
Photo: Kyle Dean Reinford

VANCOUVER — Brutal awareness is weird, right? One day you feel on top of everything, and then one little disruption causes you to reflect on all of your life plans. The path you carve, while wading through the toxic people and situations, glimmers with shiny distractions all the while promising you the answers. There is a heavy disparity in the world of emotion, with some merely grazing the surface of its depths. While this is a perfectly satisfying place to stop and set up camp, there are those brave enough not to see the bottom of the pool and still dive right in. These people are stung with every feeling they can fathom, and yet drink in each drop without need for justification. Broods are some of these brave people, and you know what? They are thriving.

“I feel everything!” Georgia Nott exclaims, with a laugh, “A lot of people think that’s weird, and that they should be worried about that, but its totally normal. That’s what humans are supposed to do, they’re supposed to feel things, they’re supposed to be empathetic, and it’s normal!” New Zealand Nott siblings have balanced the heart with the break, while maintaining their desire to press on. Caleb and Georgia have been on the stage together since childhood, both dropping out of university to pursue their band. Selecting the name Broods as their identity, both fitting for its family definition and musical mood of their sound, was the first step in a whirlwind opportunity to live out their dream. “We really wanted to get across [with our album], that feeling everything really intensely is actually quite a beautiful thing.”

Evergreen was the result of equal parts dreamlike production from Caleb, and Georgia’s ability to cast her illustrious emotion-packed lyrics upon the world. Being that New Zealand has had some serious talent escape from the little island as of late, there seems to be a tremendous eye on Broods so early in their booming career. “Being apart of the whole music industry is terrifying but in a good way,” Nott explains, “It’s hard not to be satisfied when you’ve exceeded every expectation that you set for yourself. We never expected to be paid to do what we love. It’s such a fortunate thing to have people believe in what you’re doing as much as you do.”

The world got a glimpse under the veil of Broods with the release of relentlessly catchy “Bridges” in 2013. Their range of melancholic melodies and, well, brooding lyrics were felt like a wave directly from the Nott’s hearts, a triumphant start for the duo. With help from the same producer who undertook Lorde’s “Royals,” Broods hit ground running. “Sometimes you feel the need to create something, and its just kind of something that you can’t not do,” Nott reveals, “Once you start creating, it becomes apart of you, and you need to keep doing it to stay sane.”

Pop albums with these kind of carefully crafted stories embedded in their core, are not to be taken lightly. Evergreen stirs up every emotion from irrecoverable loss in “Never Gonna Change,” to finding a special someone even just for the night in the song “L.A.F.’” Although the theme of love is arguably the go-to for songwriters, Broods remain altruistic in their intentions with Evergeen. “I get to see what it [our music] does to people when I’m performing, and the things that people I don’t know tell me, like that it’s really affected their lives in a good way,” Nott sighs. “There’s nothing that can ever really beat that.”

Broods perform at the Imperial on March 11.

By Jennie Orton

Electric Six’s sexy, sweaty disco and garage music laden tunes have carried them through a whirlwind decade.
Photo: Frank Nash

CALGARY — Electric Six have been a throbbing and swaggering garage disco firestorm of testosterone run amok for the last 12 years. In an era when such brazen masculinity is enough of a gamble that any project embracing it is dissected in favour of understanding the true intent behind the boldness, this band shrugs and promises it is what it is and nothing more.

“I’ve been dissected my whole life,” says dynamic frontman and Electric Six mastermind Tyler Spencer, a.k.a. Dick Valentine.

“People trying to cut me open and see what’s inside. I mean that figuratively and literally: I wake up in bathtubs all the time.”

When a band decides to put real work into its musicality and then promises you lyrically that “I’ll be there in a jiffy with my stiffy” it causes a flux in the brain. Are they pulling my leg? Are they saying something deeper? Are they for real?

Electric Six released their 10^th studio album Human Zoo in 2014 (it points to their shocking consistency: it’s their 10^th since 2003). The album meanders through a variety of styles and approaches but essentially comes up with the same aura of jackassery the band has established thus far in their career.

“We aren’t taking ourselves too seriously with this one,” Valentine observes.

Characteristically, there are songs within that sound like Trey Parker and Matt Stone may have written them. Case in point: “Gun Rights” which theatrically establishes right wing penis-on-the-table aggression overtop of a Wild West villain style Latin beat. Electric Six, though astute with their punch lines, don’t want to make a big thing of it; like that friend you have who is known for partying but occasionally blows your mind with profound societal and philosophical observations before doing a keg stand.

Aside from the occasional line-up change, the band hasn’t undergone a very substantial evolution in the last decade, simply flitting focus from electronica to grunge to Motown with ease; something Valentine says is fairly intentional.

“We’re pretty happy with what we are doing which is putting out an album every year and touring a lot of the same venues the same time of year,” he says. Indeed, they’ve been doing it a LONG, LONG time, making fans at venues nation wide walk home sweaty, sticky and elated.

This sense of immovable objectivity is something Valentine is planning to ride like a galloping bull well into his twilight years. The Human Zoo track “I’ve Seen Rio in Flames” is an early glimpse into a project Valentine has already started working on for his Septuagenarian years. A song Valentine couldn’t wait 30 years to get to; the track stands alone as an ballad-esque, surprisingly simple anomaly on the record with understated, synth laden lines alongside bombastic vocals, showing the long-term vision of a man who never wants to stop.

“It’s a job but it’s a great job. If you treat this as a job and realize what a great job it is, you won’t have any problems. I think it’s the people who think that they’re here from a higher power to make rock and roll music and it’s really important, those people get into trouble.”

It is this realization that inspires Electric Six to rock out with its cock out despite attempts by critics and pundits to analyze, mature, or soften the project. Even while enjoying a day of domestic bliss with his wife and daughter, Valentine admits needing the road to remind him of what he is doing.

When we suggest that maybe you need to wake up in a bathtub every now and then to remember you’re still kicking, he cleverly closes with, “Absolutely, that’s why you have two kidneys.”

After all, a man only needs one to keep the aforementioned stiffy.

See Electric Six on March 17 at the Imperial in Vancouver, on March 19 at the Gateway in Calgary, or on March 20 in Edmonton at the Starlite.

By Frederick Kyhn

Photo: Malin Johansson

VANCOUVER — On a rooftop in some European location, unbeknownst precisely to this contributor, sits Jose Gonzalez. Through the fuzzy Skype-line across the Atlantic Ocean he seems free from any contemplation, post-tour, as he explains how the sun is setting over the final date of his two-week-long European tour. A seemingly strange behaviour taking into account the fact that his latest album, a release called Vestiges and Claws was well over eight years in the making. Not resting on the laurels between solo releases, Gonzalez has been working with Swedish three-piece Junip, contributing music in commemoration of cellist Art Russell and making the soundtrack for the critically-acclaimed movie The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.

Going almost a decade without releasing any material would for most acts mean passing into obscurity. However, the production of a solo effort is a deliberately intricate process for the Swedish resident. “The funny thing about my recordings is that until they’re done, they sound pretty crappy. The way for me to write is to do a lot of demos and find out ways to play and find the right lyrics. Many times it’s mostly about figuring out the small details.” With a fondness for intimate, unvarnished, even angular productions, those small details are evident as an ever-present fetish throughout his discography.

This time around Gonzalez took his album down a different path by focusing on acoustic sounds and playing with new production techniques: “I had a collection of demos and song ideas. Listening through them I wasn’t sure which direction to choose. After a while, I decided to go for the songs that were mainly guitar and vocals. After that I allowed myself to produce slightly more than usual. It’s pretty similar I guess but with a slightly new direction.” What has not changed for the singer in the making of his newest release is the artistic connection he has to working in confinement. “Thinking about the aesthetics of my first album I really considered what makes me feel musically interesting, which is partly being alone and recording. Ever since Veneer I’ve been recording at home.” A choice with its own challenges that Gonzalez himself recognizes… “When you’re on your own and you get stuck it can be difficult to get around it. Even though it was a part of the plan to work alone and work on sounds and lyrics by myself.”

Deliberately choosing the raw sounds of home recording makes Gonzalez’s records stand out in a sea of other new releases. A sound so distinctly his own is not lost on the songwriter. It’s a process not only concerned with aesthetics but also deliverance: “What I think people react to with my music is the simplicity. It’s partly what I like to do and what I feel comfortable doing. But I also think about what it’s like to hear the music, I think about them too. Which is why I like having a live set that feels coherent. So I don’t suddenly start to rap, just because I like hip hop.”

Reflecting on his involvement with more corporate projects like the production of the Walter Mitty soundtrack, Gonzalez is learning how to balance the relationship between his work as a live musician and these commercial gigs: “I usually think about bands like Dinosaur Jr. or Slayer, if they changed their sound too much, it would be weird. I realized that I might do something that I like playing and just know it might not work commercially.”

This, in turn also has Jose thinking about how he interacts with his audience. “Whenever I’m touring I usually enjoy playing songs that are more upbeat. So I wrote those songs with the live performance in mind.” When he lists his inspirations for the album as delicate songwriters like Arvo Pärt and Julianna Barwick, tunes for dancing are far from the first thing a one would expect. But when listening to upbeat tracks like “Leap Off/The Cave,” it’s not a farfetched idea to imagine a bit of rummaging going on when Gonzalez hits the stage in Vancouver on April 25th at The Imperial. The cracky Skype-line breaks up just in time for me to ask him how he likes the view. He says he can’t wait for spring to finally show its true colours. From my foggy, drizzling window seat, this comment is duly noted.

Jose Gonzalez will be coming to The Imperial on April 25th. His full-length album Vestiges and Claws is available now.

By Paige Paquette

Photo: Retrieved from Best Coast Facebook page.

VANCOUVER — Heavily influenced by ’60s pop, Best Coast is known for their signature sound which amalgamates high energy surfer rock with dark and shadowy lyrics. In their most recent release California Nights, they have let themselves go in a bit of a different direction, exploring a safari-city rock style. Back in late 2013 Best Coast, comprised of duo Bethany Cosentino and Bobb Bruno, released their EP Fade Away through Cosentino’s label, Jewel City. Cosentino created Jewel City at the time because it didn’t seem smart to sign to a major label. After finishing their third full-length album they met with Harvest Records who Cosentino explains “Seemed really, really excited about the record and didn’t have any sort of intention of changing things.”

With a new label and a couple years since their last release, Best Coast went into the studio with the same intentions but came out with a new and different product. They evolved from a genre that could once be leisurely listened to on a sunny Saturday at the beach to a musical style that demands recognition.“I don’t think it was necessarily a decision we consciously made to sort of change our sound, it’s just the production of the record is totally different.” The songs on California Nights chronicle Cosentino’s journey as she comes into herself, with the subject matter oscillating from resistance to acceptance. “There’s a song on the record called ‘When Will I Change’ and another called ‘Feeling Okay’ that are a sort of yin and yang – like they belong together in this way where I feel like this record is a coming of age story which talks a lot about all this shit I had to go through to get to this point on the record with the song ‘Feeling Okay.’ It’s really just about trying to come to terms with the fact that you don’t have to be your own worst enemy and life doesn’t have to be as hard as you make it.”

Photo: Retrieved from Best Coast Facebook page.

Attracted to the imperfections of the night, Cosentino wanted to use the record as a metaphor for the idea that there’s a lot of contrasting shades in California, especially L.A. “It’s like everyone sees it as this picturesque place where there’s palm trees and blue skies, everybody is beautiful and walks around in short shorts, but there’s also a lot of darkness and grittiness to it,” she explains, “L.A. is a city that has so much poverty, a ton of crime and a lot of sketchy shit that goes on. A lot of people aren’t necessarily familiar with this unless they’re in the entertainment industry or live in L.A.” With their new found confidence as people and musicians the two parts of Best Coast felt more empowered to explore influences they felt were out of reach before because they wouldn’t ‘fit’ what their fans expect from them.

Taking an almost two-year break from touring consistently has allowed the group to re-centre and decompress without the intensities of touring. This fostered an internal growth and stronger personal connection with themselves – one that is clearly portrayed through the more optimistic version of Best Coast that appears on California Nights. For the upcoming tour they’re playing as a five piece with an added member, a guitar player named Joey. “I get to stand there and explore this idea of being a front woman without a guitar. Singing for me is what I feel is my strong point so it’s nice to have those moments and breaks in the set where I can just kind of be a little bit of a show off for a second.” At the beginning of June, Best Coast will rock Vancouver with engaging, positive vibes that are sure to leave everyone ‘feeling okay.’

Best Coast’s new full-length album California Nights hits the shelves on May 5^th. Catch them live at the Imperial on June 3^rd.

By Tiina Liimu

Photo: Danny Hole

VANCOUVER — The acronyms JSBX and NYC have always had a synonymous kinship. Once again Jon Spencer, Russell Simins and Judah Bauer hop the train with another other full-length LP just outta the bag. With their favorite ingredients of loud and noisy Freedom Tower sounds just like a JSBX sonic salute that paints a portrait of NYC, their favourite place. It’s jumpin’ from station to station with a high velocity turnstile hop deep into the underground, inside that city that just never sleeps.

Like daydreams and legends they dip into the past with both subject and music. “We are taking a lot of the influence for the music and bands that have worked in New York City,” says Spencer as this album goes deep into the rap and hip-hop history of the town. “This is a tip of the hat not only to the city, but this mythological place,” he adds.

This album has been recorded like they’ve always done, but this time think magnetic tape, think mix, with hip-hop legend Alap Momin at the infamous Daptone House Of Soul. “The music just comes,” says Spencer. “The lyrics are always kinda my department. The theme emerged later. It’s not like we had this concept laid out before hand. It became clear once we had all those songs grouped together.” With more material than could fit on a record, when it came down to choosing a sequence, they chose the ones that stuck to a theme.

Photo: Danny Hole

“It’s about our home, it’s New York City, the city as it is now, as it was. The places that are gone and the ways that are lost to us,” says the front man and “We’ve been livin’ and workin’ in New York City for over a quarter century. The time that I’ve been livin’ in NYC still carries a lot of weight. But there are influences from times and places before I was even around. That I didn’t experience first hand. Like the South Bronxs and the birth of hip hop or the early and mid-70s when New York City was a very different place. For an example there was a time [near the] making the record, I read Patti Smith’s book, Just Kids and Richard Hell’s, I Dreamed I was a Very Clean Tramp. Both of those books paint a very vivid portrait of a city that is just gone. It’s not here anymore,” explains Spencer.

“This album pays homage to punk rock, free jazz, free love, beat poetry. There’s a lot of things in there, you can throw them into the kitchen sink, and you can throw in the kitchen sink as well. That’s one of the cool thing’s about were we live, there’s a lot goin’ on and there is a lot to soak up.”

The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion’s bringing freedom to North America tour has commenced. So now just one question remains. Are you ready to party?!

The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion performs at The Imperial Theatre, May 13.

By Sebastian Buzzalino

VANCOUVER — As the North American landscape for festivals becomes ever more cluttered, a tension between monolithic, corporate-festooned mega-events and tightly curated, community-minded line-ups has emerged. On one side, we have the Coachellas and SXSWs of the festival scene, big-name mammoths that are unabashed in their willingness to aim for the lowest common denominator, branding hype and bands in all manner of advertising dollars in the desperate hope of transferring bands’ cultural capital into brands’ cultural capital. On the other side, smaller, more-community run festivals, like Sled Island, Music Waste and Austin Psych Fest, now known as Levitation, focus on giving their patrons a carefully crafted experience, often putting emphasis on music discovery and expanding one’s own tastes and horizons. The distance between these two philosophies to putting on a festival has become so large that they can hardly be considered the same beast, joined together only in category, but not in substance or style.

In Austin, far from the litter of the Sixth Street district where the bulk of live music and SXSW takes place, The Black Angels started their own little event, Austin Psych Fest. Its inaugural year was in 2008 and the festival was a small-scale affair, a one-day gathering of likeminded artists interested in upholding and maintaining the psych community at large. That year featured a fun line-up of mostly local artists, including Ringo Deathstarr, The Strange Boys and, of course, The Black Angels. APF quickly grew in size and scope since then, taking over an entire weekend and spanning multiple stages, bringing legendary acts to the festival’s marquee, such as The Brian Jonestown Massacre, The Dandy Warhols, The Zombies and Graveyard. As APF grows in notoriety and prestige, one thing remains constant: each year features a stacked lineup by and for psych music lovers, with additional sonic explorations for those looking to test the edges of the genre.

This year marks the first expansion of Austin Psych Fest — now Levitation — into Canada. To hear frontman Alex Maas describe it, Levitation Vancouver is a natural extension of the work they’ve been doing in Austin, bringing the best and brightest psychedelic artists to the stage. “One of the things we’re trying to do with this festival is throw cool, fun, different parties in all these cities,” he says from Austin, excitement lacing his every word. “When we started thinking of cities in North America, like Chicago, Vancouver or Seattle, we thought we should go to Canada and do it in Vancouver… we saw a lot of support and help out of Vancouver and it made sense, beyond it being one of our favourite cities. We’re stoked to come out there and start doing it, looking forward to seeing how it all takes shape.”

The inaugural Levitation Vancouver continues APF’s mission to book deep, committed, curated line-ups. This year not only features a headlining performance by The Black Angels themselves (though Maas is quick to admit that “the goal from the beginning was for The Black Angels to not headline every year. We kind of had to do it, which is good and bad, to anchor a festival in the city, but we had to start somewhere and get the festival off the ground”), but also includes favourites such as Black Lips, Black Mountain, Anciients, King Tuff, Dead Meadow and Dead Moon, among many, many others. “We like to bring our favourite bands to a city… it’s a bunch of killer bands, I’m really stoked for the show,” enthuses Maas.

“One of the things I’m most stoked about is working with people on the ground in Vancouver,” he continues quickly. “It’s a cool concept to bring a bunch of Austin bands to Vancouver, but I’m really stoked to work with people there and getting help with regulations, getting permits and everything. I’m excited to build relationships with people in Vancouver and this is a long-term thing: I like to look at Levitation/Austin Psych Fest as a cultural thing.”

At the centre of it all, Maas and the rest of The Black Angels and Levitation organizers are aware of the need to keep the festival’s aesthetic consistent as a whole, balancing forward-thinking, progressive bookings with the needs of the psych community at large. In part due to the more underground nature of the bands playing Levitation — it’s hard to imagine mega pop stars fitting on the same line-up — Maas is confident that the festival continues to serve its community first and foremost, making a festival for attendees not necessarily conglomerate brands.

“We’re not throwing a Coachella-sized event,” he laughs. “I guess we kind of step outside of that because we’re doing something different. It’s all about the curation of the music and that’s what the focus has always been. There’s a cool vibe on the ground, I think that goes a long way. I’ve been to Coachella a couple of times and it’s just tough to see things, tough to always stand in lines. Something with us is that we want to make sure you don’t do that, that things aren’t a big commercial, in-your-face type thing.

“Maybe festivals will continue to grow, getting bigger and more tacky, but hopefully some will find more creative ways of being successful. That’s the goal, being more creative, not having to wear it on the sleeve of the festival. We want to support local, bring in local chefs, local restaurants, have it all work on a micro level, have the focus be on supporting small businesses… I want to keep it as a tight-knit community.”

Levitation will take place from June 5-7 at various venues across Vancouver, including the Rickshaw Theatre, Malkin Bowl Theatre, Electric Owl, The Cobalt and Imperial. More information and tickets can be found at levitation-vancouver.com. Find the festival pullout guide in BeatRoute B.C.’s May 2015 print edition or online here.

BeatRoute May 2015 B.C. print edition cover

By Austin Muirhead

VANCOUVER — The story of why the band calls themselves the Wombats is pretty dull — you’ll find it in every music publication after a quick Google search — luckily for us the third effort, Glitterbug, by the Liverpool indie-pop trio is anything but boring. The band consists of native Liverpudlians Daniel Haggis (drums) and Matthew “Murph” Murphy (frontman), as well as Norwegian-born Tord Øverland Knudsen (bass). Since forming in 2003 during their time together at the Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts, the three have never really stopped to take a breath. “Playing live is probably what we enjoy the most about being in a band,” explains Knudsen. “It just gives you this energy. Even though you get really knackered and really worn out, you’ve still got this extra layer of energy somehow, because we’re doing something we love.”

Glitterbug was released on April 13^th, and accompanying it was a full-scale tour of Europe, which turned into their current tour in North America. “In the U.K., doing the tour and having the whole thing sell out is just incredible, and the fact that people still are coming back… it’s amazing that we can still do this right years on since we first got signed,” says Knudsen. The Wombats’ upcoming show in Vancouver will be their second time playing the city. “We’d never played there before and I remember being really positively surprised by the fact that it was sold out and the fact that people knew our songs, it was really great,” Knudsen tells us about their last show in the city. “It’s going to be really nice to come back because I really like Vancouver. It seems like a really nice city, it has this a bit of a European vibe to it.”

The process the band went through to write and record Glitterbug was an unusual one, with a lot of transatlantic collaboration. “The main thing that we did different on this album was the fact that we weren’t all together at all times. Murph was in L.A. and Dan and I were in Liverpool, which meant that the music was created in Liverpool and Murph was working on lyrics in L.A.,” Knudsen says. The band decided to work with producer, Mark Crew, for their third album, lengthening the recording time considerably. “It took a long time because he is a busy man and instead of doing the whole album in one go we had to do one week here, one week there, wait for a month and then do another few weeks.

“To really understand and appreciate the band I think you need to see us live. When you listen to the recorded stuff it’s one thing, but when you see it live it makes even more sense.” Knudsen says about their vibrant live shows. You can get a feel for the Wombats by downloading Glitterbug, which is available online now, but to get the full monty make sure you’re front row for their Vancouver show in late May.

The Wombats are set to return to Vancouver on May 20^th finishing up their North American tour at The Imperial with Cheerleader and Life in Film.

By Joshua Erickson

Will Butler at The Imperial.
Photo: Lisa Wu

May 21, 2015

VANCOUVER — “Does anybody know where I can get some heroin?” That was Will Butler onstage at the Imperial, a venue which is half a block down from the Vancouver’s infamous corner of Hastings and Main – an area well known for its heroin users. A large laugh erupted from the audience, as Butler smiled goofily. “Anybody? No? Well, I guess you guys at least have these beautiful mountains and the ocean.” For those that don’t know, Will Butler is a member of Arcade Fire and younger brother of frontman Win Butler. The former being known for his onstage antics and big, dumb, infectious smile, the later being known for his stupid haircuts, dour appearance, and stadium rock aspirations.

The Will Butler that took the stage at the Imperial was not much different than that of his personality in Arcade Fire, as the singer-songwriter ripped through a set in support of his debut solo album Policy, as well as a number of non-album tracks. The four-piece band took the stage in matching sweaters that had each band member’s name printed in bold on it and launched into a set that was high energy and fun, and was peppered with some weighty ballads that held their own. The songs translated better live than on the album and Butler proved this is his own thing outside of Arcade Fire.

The second act of the co-headlining bill was Seattle’s Mike Hadreas, better known as Perfume Genius. Taking the stage in an all black woman’s style pant suit – complete with shoulder pads – and bright red lipstick, set to music which can best be described as an industrial drone and holding a sullen glare which seemed to pierce straight through the audience itself, Hadreas proved to be a counterpoint to Butler’s guitar-jangle optimism. Performing songs from all 3 of his albums, Hadreas possessed a magnetic kind of stage-presence that held the audience captive. There were genuine looks of wonder and awe in the crowd as he performed and the band fed off this energy through the set.

While a sensible bill on paper – two accomplished contemporary singer-songwriters who are known for their stage presence – the pairing couldn’t have been more contrasted in reality. In the end though, the audience was treated to two top-notch performances from two very stylistically different, but equally wonderful songwriters.

By Kaelan Unrau

Ben Frost continues his voyage through sonic space.

VANCOUVER — Born in Australia but currently based out of Iceland, Ben Frost has spent the last decade cultivating a powerful blend of noise, classical and drone. For some, his menacing, distortion-tinged compositions evoke the desolate vistas of his adoptive home. Yet in reality, Frost has been most informed by inner geographies.

“The kind of music that I’m drawn to tends to be far more about emotional spaces than physical ones,” explains the composer, speaking from his home in Reykjavík. “I’m interested in specific relations between objects – sonically, the way a combination of elements moves together and reacts with one another.”

“And that’s part of the frustration in this work: trying to realize something in the outside world that I can only really see in my mind’s eye. But as far as trying to convey a predefined image like a fucking landscape or something, I think that’s just something thought up by lazy journalists.”

Back in 2009, Frost gained widespread acclaim with By the Throat, an astonishing and often terrifying work of dark ambient. Since then, he’s released several additional records, written more than a few film scores and collaborated with the likes of Colin Stetson, Tim Hecker and Swans. For 2014’s A U R O R A, Frost teamed up with drummers Greg Fox (Liturgy, Guardian Alien) and Thorr Harris (Swans), along with musician-extraordinaire Shahzad Ismaily, to create a punishing slab of synth-based distortion.

When asked about his use of instrumentalists, Frost immediately turns to cinema for an analogy. “With a film,” he explains, “you might have a character in a story or a script, and you need to find an actor to portray that person. You have a predetermined idea of what that person should be – the sort of look and feel of that person. But once you start talking to actual people, you find that everyone has their own personality, that they bring certain things to the table. And those aspects of personality start to intertwine with your preconceived image and it becomes something else. It’s not a dissimilar process for me.”

Photo: Börku Sigthorsson

More than anything, Frost comes across as an artist for whom complacency isn’t an option. “I feel pretty strongly about upping the stakes,” he says, describing his approach. “I don’t want to be in this comfortable relationship, where I’ve been playing with the same people for 20 years. I’m more interested in the science-lab, Petri dish variety of music making. I never start out with a rulebook. The rulebook gets written along the way. But by the time I’m talking to a journalist or an interviewer, the rules can feel quite formulated. There’s a physicality to the whole thing. It seems like a self-regulating system with some sort of top-down mode of creation. But really, it’s more chaotic than that.

“The way it all comes together,” he says. “We’re talking years, right? I don’t sit down at the beginning of April and say, ‘I’m gonna write a record now,’ and then by the end of June it’s done. I don’t go into the studio and book time the way a band does: give myself 14 days to work on something. The process for a record like A U R O R A probably stretches back a solid two years before the release date. I mean, when astronauts land on the moon, they don’t walk around the place for days on end and then put the flag down. The flag goes down first. And that’s kind of how it’s worked for me with the release of an album; the process has been going on for a while.”

Like Brian Eno and Lee “Scratch” Perry before him, Frost uses the studio as an instrument, crafting albums of astounding detail and cohesion. But as he explains, the live performance represents an essential part of his artistic process. “Look, I think there’s a common misconception about the nature of my work,” he says. “For an audience, it often represents the culmination of an idea, the finished product of what was presumably the process that preceded it. But for myself – as the person who made that record – it’s more like a midpoint.

“I’m putting a flag in the sand,” he adds. “I’m claiming this spot on the ground here, but the exploration of that surrounding area is far from done. Maybe that’s a shitty metaphor, or maybe it’s a perfect one. When I’m touring and performing, it’s like I’m trying to exhaust a resource. I mean, if I had to get onstage every night and play everything as written – delivering a predetermined performance – I’d get extremely bored.”

Frost is quick to clarify his point. “That’s not to say I’m getting up there and improvising it completely,” he says. “It’s the same music. But somehow, I’m still finding new things inside of it, finding new ways to make it interesting for myself. With the very nature of this kind of live setup, there’s a lot of very intricate relationships – lots of dynamics and proportions in there – so to change one thing is to 20 things. It’s an ecosystem, really.”

Ben Frost performs alongside Tim Hecker at The Imperial (Vancouver) on June 22. In Calgary during Sled Island, catch him at The Commonwealth on June 24.

By Joshua Erickson

Tinariwen at The Imperial.
Photo: Tiina Liimu

August 4, 2015

VANCOUVER — Tinariwen might be the most rebellious group making music today. This Taureg rebel group has a long, storied history – the beginning of the collective dates back to 1979 with most of the members of the group participating in several rebel uprisings in Mali, Libya and Algeria, surviving abductions and more – but their modern story is one of victory and the indomitable human spirit. Taking influences from Western African assouf-style guitar, Algerian Berber music, and mixing it with style and spirit of American blues, Tinariwen have arrived at a sound that can be confused with no other band on Earth.

The group has since come to world wide acclaim and Tinariwen have been bringing their desert rebel soul music to the world for the better part of the last decade and a half. As such, it was a real treat to host the collective of Taureg rebel musicians in our fair city for the evening, and based on excitement from the crowd before the band hit the stage, people have an almost religious sort of reverential respect for the band.

Tinariwen at The Imperial.
Photo: Tiina Liimu

Let me just get this out of the way. Tinariwen’s recorded music is beautiful, soulful, and inspiring, but it simply cannot capture the dynamic and kinetic energy of their live show. In no uncertain terms, Tinariwen is an otherworldly and transcendental live experience. The vocals are simultaneously strong, fragile and entirely haunting, the bass pops with a lively step, the minimal percussion moves the music towards either sombre or uplifting, and then there are the guitars. The glorious guitars. Dancing and swirling around each other, reaching dizzying heights, recalling the vastness of the great Sahara desert from which they are based.

Speaking of dancing, some of the elder members of Tinariwen can move! The age members of the band range from 20s to 70s (an age range similarly reflected in the crowd), but it was band’s eldest, Alhassane Ag Touhami, who was most active on stage. Dancing with a giant smile on his face in euphoric state of glee, he would encourage the crowd the join him, and would smile all the larger when they did.

Tinariwen don’t need to sing in English for their message to get across. The story of the Taureg’s is an old one – a displaced group of people looking for their home. Through their music you feel their pain and the sorrow, hardships and fears, and their sense of longing for a place to belong. But you also feel their strength, their hope, and all the joy in their lives. In the live setting, this is all enhanced to the nth degree and is a truly transformative experience.

By Lily Keenan

BeatRoute.ca is proud to premiere The Ropes, the sophomore effort by Vancouver folk rock troubadours Good For Grapes. The Ropes releases October 2^nd via Pheromone Recordings. Listen to the album in full below and scroll down for upcoming dates for their fall tour.

VANCOUVER — Strength in numbers seems to be the answer for folk rock troubadours Good For Grapes. The Vancouver based collective has welcomed three new members in the recording of their new album The Ropes, which is set for release on October 2nd via Pheromone Recordings.

The result is a compelling, full-bodied record that weaves the infectious folk sounds that turned heads with their first album, this time also accompanied by elements of trombone, cello and violin. Known for their charismatic energy onstage, The Ropes captures that punchy, toe-tapping live feeling with the addition of brass and electronics to give it a more modern, rock ‘n’ roll-meets-country element.

Photo: Braeden Klassen

Tracks like “Gethsemane Blues” beautifully traverse the multiple genres, journeying from folk to rock, and strikingly punctuated with soaring violin. “Waiting on a Ghost” uses a punchy kick drum that will invigorate any stagnant crowd while the “who-hoos” heard in “Faces in the Sand” will surely propel the track to festival anthem status.

With the additional expertise of producer Howard Redekopp (Tegan and Sara, The New Pornographers, Mother Mother), The Ropes is a smooth flowing, mature follow up record for the young Vancouverites. But most of all, it captures a feeling, the kind of excitement and anticipation embodied by a group of musicians who are at the brink of a long musical career. And we can’t help but be excited too for all that lies ahead for this young, talented band. Check out the album in its entirety above and purchase it for your home listening enjoyment when it drops next week!

The Ropes album cover.

The Ropes releases Oct. 2 via Pheromone Recordings. Fall tour dates include the Webber Academy (Calgary) Oct. 31, The Imperial (Vancouver) Nov. 12, Upstairs Cabaret (Victoria) Nov. 14, the Starlite Room (Edmonton) Nov. 17, The Capital (Saskatoon) Nov. 18, the Pyramid (Winnipeg) Nov. 19, O’Hanlan’s (Regina) Dec. 1, and the National Music Centre (Calgary) Dec. 3. Check the band’s website for complete tour stops. 

By Chyl Weaver

Neon Indian at The Imperial.
Photo: Justin Uitto

September 20, 2015

VANCOUVER — It felt a lot like 2009 in Vancouver this month, as reformed chillwavers Neon Indian and Toro y Moi performed shows on back-to-back nights. While the latter artist has shifted to psychedelic pop-rock as of late, Neon Indian has transitioned into banging, glitzy electro-pop, and his performance gave Vancouverites a taste of what to expect from his forthcoming album VEGA INTL. Night School.

Project leader Alan Palomo was joined by four backing players, who helped to give his electro tunes an organic live-band boost. This left the frontman free to indulge his Sunday night fever and bust out some energetic dance moves while sweating up a storm in his gaudy button-down shirt. The couple of hundred fans gathered on the floor also danced appreciatively, but a little less rapturously than the frontman.

The best parts of the show weren’t Palomo’s quickly-forgettable songs — many of which bore traces of reggae or Chromeo-esque funkiness — but rather his freaky synth experiments. From time to time, he would turn to the keyboard set up a few feet to his left, and the extraterrestrial sounds that he coaxed from the instrument were far more memorable than his pop melodies.

The main part of the set wrapped up with a couple of old faves: “Deadbeat Summer” from 2009’s Psychic Chasms and “Polish Girl” from 2011’s Era Extraña. The earlier single was especially well-received by the dancing crowd, proving that while Palomo may be interested in exploring new sounds, his audience is happy to keep on riding that chillwave a little longer.

By Jonathan Crane

VANCOUVER — Bob Moses is an electronic duo originally from Vancouver, but it wasn’t until they relocated to Brooklyn that they really started turning heads and moving feet on the dance floor.

Jimmy Vallance and Tom Howie have been touring internationally for the entire year, playing locations like SXSW, WMC, and Ibiza. Last month the duo released their debut full-length, Days Gone By, on Domino Records and things aren’t slowing down for them any time soon.

On this day in particular, they were back home in New York preparing for Burning Man. I asked them about the alleged bug infestation that the festival is rumoured to be threatened with.

“Yeah it’s not true,” says Howie. “Every year there’s some big crisis that they put in the news and it’s always blown way out of proportion.”

“I’m bringing a flamethrower,” says Vallance.

The duo’s gradual rise to notoriety has been resonating in Western Canada, as they are both products of different pockets of the Vancouver music scene.

“Well, we both started in our younger years making rock, punk, and stuff like that,” says Howie. “As we both got a bit older we got sick of having bands, so I went to do more acoustic guitar stuff. And then Jimmy started DJing trance stuff.”

After high school the pair moved separately to New York, unbeknown to each other. Soon after, Vallance went to Berlin with the aims of furthering his electronic music career. Once there, he began working with producer Matthew Dekay.

“I spent a couple months [in Berlin], and we were making tons of records, and just trying to find cool songs and make headway over there,” says Vallance.

Back in New York, Vallance and Howie encountered each other by chance in a parking lot one day on the way to the train. By this point, Howie was already an accomplished recording artist, having released a solo EP mixed by Sarah McLachlan’s drummer Ashwin Sood in 2010.

This experience, combined with the knowledge Vallance gained through working with Dekay, gave the pair a solid foundation from which to launch a new project.

“It helped me to push myself as a producer, and engineering and making really good sounds, so then when Tom and I started to link up I had kind of been to university of how to make beats, and how to do all that sort of stuff,” says Vallance.

Their combined mastery of both electronic production and live instrumentation gives them a dynamic that sets them apart from other current electronic acts and serves to fuel the off-kilter sounds heard in their records.

“We always try to make certain things that would typically be electronic with a sort of live start, like maybe recording something, and then messing it up in the computer to make it sound very electronic,” says Howie. “We try to like switch it up a bit, and keep things interesting, and combine [sounds] in ways that keep people guessing when they’re listening.”

For this duo, achieving this effect means continuing down a path of experimentation that was inspired by artists like James Blake, Nicholas Jaar, and Radiohead.

“There’s one [track] where I’m playing drums on the floor, on a mic stand, and we just put some effects through that and put that on the record,” says Vallance. “If we don’t know how to get things we hear in our head, we’ll try a bunch of stuff until we get there.

The forthcoming release is both a culmination and continuation of this experimentation.

“Sonically, it’s kind of like we felt really comfortable with the sound we found over the last few EPs, and so it’s really kind of stretching the boundaries of that, and pushing the boundaries of songwriting within that sound,” says Howie.

These attributes, along with lyrics that speak on their own experiences with relationships, careers, and life, are ultimately what have allowed Bob Moses to carve away from being grouped with other contemporary electronic duos.

“We don’t really think of ourselves as deep house or anything like that,” says Howie. “We like making deep music.

Bob Moses will be performing on October 14 at the Imperial (Vancouver).

By Lily Keenan

VANCOUVER — There’s no rest from the mess of contradictions that define life in the 21^st century, especially when “a refugee crisis takes up about as much space in your newsfeed as your friend’s birthday party.” At least, that’s what Zachery Grey of Vancouver indie rock group The Zolas is trying to describe in the latest EP Wino Oracle, a small four-track offering that precedes the release of their third album next year. The Zolas is comprised of Grey on guitar/vocals and Tom Dobranski on piano. This time around, Cody Hiles and DJ Able also join the duo. Wino Oracle is a thoughtful collection of songs that mosaic feelings of loneliness and friendship, of euphoria and disgust. “It’s about being single and how great it is, being single and how much it sucks, finally realizing what you want to fight for and then getting distracted.” These insightful musings are conveyed via Grey’s honey-smooth vocals and layered under catchy synth hooks and tin box pop beats to create a noticeably more upbeat sound than their previous records, it’s a confident stride in a slightly new direction for the Zolas.

BeatRoute: What excites most about this EP? It’s quite a different sound from your last two albums.

Zachery Grey: People have been telling me that it’s a new sound and we actually never thought about it that way at all. I feel like this is the music we’ve been trying to make for a long time but we never had the skill to actually do it. Our previous albums were just stale attempts at this type of thing. Everything you write is a failed attempt at something and then in that failure is originality. And that’s the basis of our sound. I think it goes like that for a lot of musicians; we just don’t like to talk about how much we fail.

BR: You were quoted saying that the album is about going outside for a cigarette and scrolling though your news feed, looking at disasters on the news and finishing your cigarette to go back inside and keep dancing. I thought that was a really interesting summary of the way that we live and consume, and the contradictions of that. What exactly fuelled your writing in that sense?

ZG: I wanted to write about that experience, the experience of being among the luckiest people in the world at a time when there is so much bad luck and misfortune going on and how that creates empathy but you still have to live the life that you’ve been dropped into. And I don’t know how that doesn’t fuck all of our minds up. It fucks my mind up. And I’m pretty sure that to me, that seems to be the predominant conflict in most people’s lives these days.

BR: How does the title Wino Oracle relate to those ideas?

ZG: The title is a line from the lead single ‘Fell in Love with NY’. And—this is going to get nerdy—but I’ve always been interested in the Shakespearean character archetype of ‘The Fool,’ who’s always the lowest status person in the play and always comes across as a buffoon but they’re always saying the most insightful things; they are always an oracle figure. To me, ‘Wino Oracle’ is a recognition of all this low culture that we consume just for escapism, all the Netflix we watch and all the crap—it says the most about us. And it sort of tells our future.

BR: What is different about this record?

ZG: We produced it ourselves, which we never had the confidence to do before. And we were really happy with the result. Usually a record can feel imperfect because you run out of time or you have to make compromises in production. But by doing it ourselves, we finished this album completely satisfied. There are a lot of new instruments in this album too, especially synth. We used this old school synth that Prince would’ve used.

BR: What are you looking forward to next year? What’s next for The Zolas?

ZG: We will be touring for this EP. And our album comes out next year, which is really exciting—and we will be touring again for that. We’ll basically be touring as much as possible!

The Zolas perform on November 5 at The Imperial with Fine Times.

By Maude Langzine

One Night Stand VIII at The Imperial.
Photo: Jessica Brodeur

December 31, 2015

VANCOUVER — It might be called One Night Stand, but this annual New Year’s Eve concert is turning into a long-term relationship for Vancouver concert-goers. This was the event’s eighth year, and it featured the same concept as always, as a backing band played a string of well-known cover tunes with vocals provided by a rotating cast of singers drawn from the PEAK 102.7 playlist.

The Imperial appeared to be a touch below capacity, but it was nevertheless a mostly full house of partiers that enthusiastically sung along with every word. The more famous the songs were, they better they were received, and the house band followed the original arrangements as closely as possible, making the night essentially a top-notch karaoke session. Hannah Georgas nailed Hall & Oates’ “You Make My Dreams” and TLC’s “Waterfalls,” Yukon Blonde’s Jeff Innes got smooth on Lionel Richie’s “All Night Long,” Brasstronaut’s Tariq Hussain embraced the cheeseball factor of the Verve’s “Bittersweet Symphony,” and Louise Burns showed off a silky deep range on Drake’s “Hotline Bling.” House band member Peter Carruthers (the former bassist of Said the Whale and a member of Dralms and Siskiyou) even proposed to his girlfriend while singing Bruce Springsteen’s “Born to Run.” (She said yes!)

One Night Stand VIII at The Imperial.
Photo: Jessica Brodeur

On most nights of the year, this cookie-cutter selection selection of predictable tunes would have made for dull listening, but on New Year’s Eve, it was the perfect recipe for a good time. The joyful mood in the room during classics like “Common People” or “(I’ve Had) The Time of My Life” made it clear that populist pandering was the right choice.

There was just one obligatory cover song missing from the setlist: “Auld Lang Syne.” Instead of that, we got a post-midnight rendition of Counting Crows’ “A Long December,” which didn’t quite hit the spot. Still, aside from that disappointment, this night gave reason to believe maybe this year will be better than the last.