Someone recently introduced me to 22 year old, Lykke Li’s debut album. I had heard good things, but had not had a chance to listen. When we listened to the album together (which is amazing btw, in its entirety), there was one beautiful stand out track, different from the rest of the songs on the album. The rest of the songs are sort of upbeat dance tunes, whereas this one’s more of a ballad. Still, this song makes great use of percussion, which sounds great alongside the piano. The song is called ‘Tonight’ . Not to be confused with the Stars‘ piano ballad of the same name.
Strangely, I visited her website for the first time today, and there’s a ‘Secret Chapter’ tab, where she offers this song to her fans as a free download. She says: ‘This track ‘Tonight’ was one of the first demos I put up for the world to listen to on my Myspace site. It means a lot to me. So I thought I should share the finished recorded version with you too’.
We can all stop wondering who will win this year’s Polaris Music Prize, awarded to the top Canadian album of the year. It has been announced today that Dundas, Ontario native, Dan Snaith, known to most as Caribou, has won the 2008 Polaris Music Prize, and the 20,000 big ones that go along with it. Readers of newspapers all over Canada will now know the name of Caribou, and hopefully most will go out and buy his excellent, now award-winning album, Andorra. I have been a fan of Caribou for awhile, falling firstly in love with his The Milk of Human Kindness album, and then falling in love with the rest of his music, including his work under his first moniker, Manitoba. I was lucky enough to see him in concert a few years back, opening for the Super Furry Animals in Montreal, and was blown away by his performance. It comes as a little bit of surprise to me that he won, not because his album isn’t great, but because of how many good artists he was up against. Personally, I thought the award would go to Plants & Animals, whose debut album, Parc Avenue, has been on repeat for me for some time now. Deep down I wanted the award to go to Oh, My DarlingBasia Bulat, who I saw in concert last week in NYC, or Stars, who I also saw play in NYC last week. Both shows were amazing, and both of their albums were deserving of this Prize. But as we know, not everybody can win, and Andorra is a beautiful album, definately deserving of this prize. I hope this will bring Caribou all the fame he deserves. If you don’t already listen to Caribou, you should probably get on that.
So I saw Stars last night at Terminal 5 in New York City. This was my second time seeing Stars and my first time at Terminal 5. When we got there, the opening band was still on the stage. They were called Bell X1, and since I only heard them play a couple of songs I can’t really judge whether they were something I would want to listen to on a regular basis. The crowd seemed really into them though, so you may want to check them out.
Before Stars’ set they had guys putting red roses all over the stage. The flower theme went really well with the music that was being played, which was like sad piano music, reminding me of Erik Satie. If anyone knows what it was please let me know because it was lovely. When Stars finally took the stage I knew that I was in for a much different experience than when I saw Stars the first time in Montreal. When I saw them in Montreal it was this secret show at an art gallery in Old Montreal, in which there were only 150 tickets for sale. I managed to get one of them and was treated to one of the best shows I have ever seen. There was no stage, no crazy lighting, no banner, nothing fancy. Just the band and their instruments. Last night at Terminal 5 in NYC was a much different sort of party. Besides the thousands of people in attendance, this show was not just a concert, it was like a show on steroids. This show had huge projections and an insane light show, that went along to the music. It was pretty insane, I have to say. Especially for me who is used to shows with minimal lighting effects. The lighting was almost too bright at times, making it impossible to even see the band. But overall it was pretty amazing.
Lead singer Torquil Campbell got the crowd on his side right away when he said that the first Stars song ever written was in New York City on 58th and 10th. And before launching into “Window Bird” he said, “here’s to Hell’s Kitchen”. The love affair with the fans didn’t end there. The crowd went crazy when Torq had a few thoughts about how Barack Obama should be the new President of the United-States. And if that wasn’t enough, the band continuously threw bundles of red roses into the crowd throughout the set.
As for the set list, I couldn’t have asked for a better one. It was expected that they would play a lot of new songs, but they surprised me by playing more old songs than new ones. We were lucky enough to hear them play “Look Up”, “Elevator Love Letter”, “Your Ex-Lover is Dead”, “Ageless Beauty”, “Soft Revolution” and “Reunion”. For the encore they played “Take Me To The Riot” and then went back to the old stuff, finishing off the night with “One More Night”, “Calendar Girl” and “Heart”. I was more than happy with this set list, a tribute to the Stars fans who have been there since the beginning. They also played two songs off of their new EP, entitled Sad Robots. Before playing these songs, Torq said that you could either buy the album here, buy it online or steal it off of your friends. He said he didn’t care how you got it as long as you listened to it. It’s nice to hear bands that care more about people hearing their music than hearing about how much money they made.
In the end it was an excellent set, by an amazing band, at a pretty mediocre venue. Terminal 5 is far from my favourite venue, but it didn’t ruin my night. Any night with Stars is a night to remember.
It all started on a fateful rainy day in Montreal. It was the summer of 2006, and YBP had just launched itself at the Osheaga Music Festival in Montreal. We were there to sell t-shirts, and to unleash YBP onto the people of our home town, but we were also there two support two of our YBP contributors who were performing that weekend - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, and Joseph Arthur. In the background, we heard a sound that was all too familiar; the genius indie folk ballads of The Magic Numbers. At the time they already had huge success and big respect in the UK, but they were only just beginning to pave their way into North America with a cross country tour in support of The Flaming Lips.
After their set, sibling pair Romeo (Guitar, Lead Vocals) & Michele (Bass) Stodart decided to take a walk around Park Jean Drapeau, to meet the people and enjoy a cheeky beverage. We lured them into our booth, explained our concept, and told them that we would love for them to be be a part of our project as well. Well, Romeo bought three t-shirts - can you guess which ones..? They then told us that they would definitely be in touch. Well, here we are now presenting to you this amazing design, created by their brother, Mark Stodart, who is a very talented visual artist. Their design is printed onto a black organic cotton American Apparel tee, with silver ink. It’s available in all sizes (men & women).
A special thanks goes out to Michele, for helping us get this together. The Magic Numbers have chosen to donate all of the profits from the sale of this t-shirt to the AIDS Society - a cause which Michele explained is really important to the band.
I have finally returned from my week in London. I would like to first and foremost apologize for my lack of bloggage last week. Internet in London was mucho expensive and to be honest I was quite busy seeing the sights. The good news is, the music did not stop! (does it ever?). Don’t worry I didn’t just listen to the Sex Pistols the whole week. The first thing that I found cool was on my hotel TV. On the second night in London on this random channel, there was this show that caught my attention because I heard them talking about Annie. And then to my surprise and delight there was a performance by my fellow Canadian Crystal Castles. So right away I was thinking, “London rocks!”. This was only the beginning.
One of my biggest musical highlights of the week was my trip to Rough Trade Records East. This store kinda blew my mind. I have never been to a record store with like 95% good music. Usually there’s a fair amount of shit music in every music store, but at Rough Trade this wasn’t the case. I made a list of bands that I discovered at the store to check out when I got home and I am in the process of doing so. Out of the bands I have checked out so far, Bodies of Water are really impressing me. I’m a little upset right now because I just saw on their myspace page that they played at Divan Orange in Montreal 3 hours ago. Oh well, I guess I’ll have to catch them the next time around.
As for shows in London, my luck wasn’t so great. I went to see Noah and the Whale play at Rough Trade, but we only got there for the last song! In London, when they say a show starts at 8:00, they mean it starts at 8:00! By 8:25, when we got there, they were just wrapping up. It’s too bad because I have been hearing some good things about this band.
The next show I went to see was Holly Throsby playing at this pub called The Slaughtered Lamb (or something like that). This time we were told she was playing at 10:00, but by the time we got there she only had 4 songs left, so obviously there were some communication problems there. I nevertheless got a good taste of Holly live, and I am glad for the 4 songs I did get to hear. Her voice is so soft and lovely on her albums, but live it’s just a whole new level of amazingness. I really can’t wait until I get a chance to see her play live again. Here is a pretty terrible quality video of Holly performing “The Shoulders and Bends”, a song from her album, Under the Town. The sound quality is pretty decent however. Check it out:
And finally I had a musical revelation in that I fell in love with Radiohead’s In Rainbows.
So what did I learn on this trip? Firstly, to listen to lots of Radiohead, always. Secondly, to go to shows EARLY (as if I have more important things to do). And finally, to return to London as often as possible, because it is a really great city.
In other news…
Have you seen what Torquil Campbell of Stars (not THE stars) had to say about his band’s nomination for the the 2008 Polaris Music Prize? Not only is he ultra talented…he’s funny too!
Well, that’s all for now…I must now get back to studying for my 2 final exams on the 15th and 16th. Wish me luck!
And stay tuned next week for a YBP exclusive interview with one of my favourite new artists, Birdie Busch! It will be a blog to remember!
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One of our mandates is to spread the word about music that we like. This blog is a way for us to do that. Any mp3s which are posted here are for your sampling pleasure. If you like what you hear, then go buy the CD! If you are the owner of a sound file and would like it removed, then please let us know.
