I Heart the Music: Your Online Source for Live Music Reviews and Interviews in Toronto!

Sunday, traditionally the day of rest, but there is no rest of the wicked during NXNE. Fantastic photographer Joyce and I managed to hang in there for one last night of musical merriment.

First stop of the night was the Rivoli for Rueben deGroot. Don’t let this cowboy-hatted hottie fool you, he ain’t just country. DeRoot infused his tines with elements of folk and jazz to create music that most country nay Sayers could enjoy. In fact, this Kingstonian supposedly likes to describe his sound as “swamp-swing”, a name I quite enjoy and think expresses the sense of toe-tapping fun. If this sounds like this might be your cup of tea (or your looking for a way to transition into liking country), check out deGroot when he returns to Toronto on July 24 to play at the TRANZAC.

Next up at the Rivoli were The Gertrudes. And goodness gracious they were ginormous! In fact, they barely all fit on stage. I couldn’t count them all, but according to their MySpace there are a dozen. It wasn’t just the magnitude of the members, but the instruments they trucked up with them that was interesting. In addition to the usual suspects (like guitbox, sticks and violining) I spotted a banjo (or banjer), accordion (squeeze box), and ukulele (ukalucas). When The Gertrudes initially took to the stage the sounds that emanated were not at all what I was expecting. I had in my head barn dancin’, foot stompin’ hootenanny fair. Instead it was atmospheric indie folk. Very cool. Then, as the set progressed, more of that country-dance vibe I was expecting filtered in. There was a real sense of fun as the large familia seemed to enjoy the show as much as their audience.

Joyce and I then took leave of the Rivoli to venture up to the El Mocambo for what we expected to be Oh No Not Stereo, a pop rock band from Hollywood. However, that was not what we got. Not even close. Instead we walked into The Hank and Lily Show. How to describe the experience that was Hank and Lily? I think goth rock would best describe the genre. I believe the name of the song which we walked in on was aptly titled “Don’t Be Afraid”… and we tried not to be even though it sounded like the soundtrack to a B straight to video slasher flick, which was appropriate considering the costumes. The woman I assume to be Lily was a blonde wearing horn-like antlers who played the saw while the man I assume to be Hank looked like he fell out of a dark western remake of My Bloody Valentine. However, there was a positive note among all the shrieking ones, they had a song about David Hasselhoff, and I do love the Hoffmeister!

With the ringing still in our ears from Hank and Lily’s piercing wails, Joyce and I jumped over to Rancho Relaxo where our auditory vessels were comforted by the sweet sounds of Dan Griffin. Not only was the change of decibel refreshing, but so was seeing the simplicity of an acoustic set. It was interesting because earlier in the evening Joyce and I discussed what a rarity is seems to see a solo show these days when there seem to be so many massive groups a la Broken Social Scene and the like. But I digress and return to the musician at hand, Dan Griffin. He had a smooth and mesmerizing voice that was super easy to listen to and sang lyrics you could not only hear but really listen to. There was once exception and that was when he struggled through the Tokyo Police Club cover “Nature of the Experience.” However, he was humble about the stumble and was ultimately saved by stage manager Cam and his handy iPhone (and if you want to hear him get through the song without any trouble check out his MySpace).

Concluding the 2009 NXNE experience for Joyce and myself was the Toronto-based band bellewoods. A full sounding indie rock band that infused folk and had soul. There was a nice robustness to their music and I enjoyed that it was occasionally accented with church organ sound. The lead singer has a great voice and if you followed it on some of the slower tracks you felt like you could fall right into the song (…or perhaps that was the fatigue… or beer…). Despite it being a Sunday night after almost a week of music and extended last calls there was quite a crowd drawn out to see bellewoods, and rightly so. They had a good solid sound and clearly have potential.

And that was that. Another year, another group of musicians to add to the roster to follow and another NXNE in the bag.

Words by Emer Schlosser

Photographs by Joyce Wong

When iheartthemusic heard that Chicago math rock band Maps and Atlases was hitting up Toronto, we knew it was a show that could not be missed. Having already followed this band for quite some time, we were excited to see that Toronto-based group (and friends of iheartthemusic) Arietta was set to open the show. Arietta never disappoints their fans, but sadly (for us) we ended up missing their set as we were busy entertaining members of Maps and Atlases at Sneaky Dee’s for a quick bite before the show. To hold you Arietta fans over in the meantime, here are some shots from their album release party at Horseshoe a few weeks back!

We arrived back at the El Mocambo just in time to see the last few songs from St. Louis, Missouri’s So Many Dynamos. This young band is currently on tour with Maps and Atlases and, if the response from the crowd was any indication of what’s to come for this band, we are happy to have caught some of their set! Signed to Vagrant Records and about to drop their latest album entitled The Loud Wars (their third, might we add), So Many Dynamos blew us away. The crowd ate up their pop/punk sound, but for us it was Aaron Stovall’s voice and keyboarding skills that really stood out as he actually played (fairly well) with his chin at points throughout their set. It was also interesting to see the punk influence of his voice mixed in with such an indie pop vibe, which worked to their advantage quite well. These guys just seemed to be having a great time onstage, which only pushed the crowd even further to participate in the fun.

It was finally Maps and Atlases’ turn to take the stage. We spoke with them earlier about what makes their live performance so appealing to fans, and lead vocalist Dave Davison assured us that it is the crowd that gives them the energy to put on a good show. This is probably one of the most technical bands we have seen in a while with their signature finger tapping on the guitar and almost trance-like state while they are onstage. We have to add that there was a group of (underage) fans at the front who were clearly enjoying the sound and talent as they each sang along and appeared to be trying to get up onstage with the band. The rest of the crowd overall didn’t seem as enthusiastic as they did for So Many Dynamos’ set, which was surprising to see since they were the headliners for the night. It might have to do with the fact that this was their first time playing in Toronto, or perhaps that the crowd interaction was lacking, either way, they played all the favourites seamlessly. “Israeli Caves” started off the show with it’s incessant finger tapping by guitarist Erin Elders and Davison’s mellow voice that never fails to disappoint. Near the end of their performance they pulled a Broken Social Scene-esque manoever and had So Many Dynamos up on stage playing with them for a few songs. When they were finally finished their set, the chants for an encore began almost immediately and miraculousy Dave appeared on stage sans band to play a personal favourite, “Pigeon”. If you haven’t already picked this album up, then we suggest anyone hoping to get into the music industry get it, study it and let it blow you away.

Bell Orchestre’s six members came together through various musical backgrounds – including via Arcade Fire, The Luyas and Snailhouse (to name a few) – but first and foremost through their love of music. Roughly translated to “beautiful orchestra,” Bell Orchestre are an instrumental band hailing from Montreal who are creating beautiful music. They’re known to retreat to the woods to make and write music together and to take their influences from not only different musical genres but everyday sights and sounds; these elements culminated in March with the proud release of their sophomore album, As Seen Through Windows. Their live show is both soothing and inspirational, allowing the music to speak for itself. iheartthemusic sat down and spoke with Sarah Neufeld (violin) and Mike Feuerstack (lap steel guitar) as they explained their origins, musical influences and how they are making a name for themselves without any words.

iheartthemusic: You’ve all come from such different backgrounds musically, how did this unit get together?

Sarah: It sort of slowly but surely all came together. It started off a little bit smaller with Richie [bass/keyboard/percussion], Stef [drums/percussion] and I doing some stuff for dance. 

Mike: Very gradually.

Sarah: Very gradually! It was just kind of object-based at first and then about five years ago we started playing shows and having a record as a band. That’s also when Mike got on board, who is a friend of Richie’s.

iheartthemusic: How do you approach composing music with six members?

Sarah: It is really collaborative.

Mike: It truly is. It’s hard for a lot of people to understand that.

Sarah: It’s very natural to us.

Mike: It’s very long though, but very natural. The biggest hurdle for us with writing is making time when we can all come together and work on stuff.

Sarah: It comes out of this organic process of living together and seeing what works and then crafting it from there.

iheartthemusic: Well you all must really get along then!

Mike: We do! We also know how to fight too. We are good that way.

iheartthemusic: I read in a previous interview that you are really inspired by your surroundings.

Sarah: Because we don’t write lyrics, the music tends to observe a little bit more from the physical space. However, it’s not like this song is really inspired by mountains so we think about mountains, it’s more like happenstance. We are drawn to writing in natural settings. Like Kav’s [trumpet/medodica] family has this beautiful place in Vermont and we spent a lot of the first album there and then we wrote a bit of this second record there as well. Friends of the family of Richie’s have this incredible house in the country as well, so we’ve spent a lot of time in the country doing “record retreats” and it’s also an effective way of getting manageable hours.

Mike: We can get together without distractions for days in a row and it’s really productive.

Sarah: And then it ends up evoking the surroundings, but maybe you wouldn’t notice if you weren’t there.

Mike: One of the fun things about it is watching the music respond differently when you listen to it in different surroundings. Even though our environment may have inspired us when we wrote the music, I think we would all hope that the environment of listening to the music would inspire the listener as well.

Sarah: Basically it is a sponge.

iheartthemusic: I love that!  You guys recently released an album. Prior to that one it had been a couple of years since you released anything, do you notice any difference in sound or mood from the last album to this one?

Sarah: The sound and the mood. [laughs] We recorded it mostly in one location in this studio in Chicago with John McEntire. His stuff has a trademark sound and that kind of combined with our aesthetic and also helped us push it further as well.

Mike: The combination of us doing what we wanted to do along with his common technique is what makes it fun for us. He does really clean stuff, but also really dry, precise detailed stuff.

Sarah: He just makes things sound really artful and he really did that for us. We wanted to experiment with a lot of percussion and he made all that come alive.

Mike: There is a lot of ambience in the recording, which again is not something that he usually works with.

iheartthemusic: You guys probably fed of each other.

Mike: That’s what was neat about the combination.

Sarah: We had this one time where Richie and I recorded in the hallway, not in the studio, with mics and were listening to all the traffic going by. We were able to work differently within that space.

Mike: That is a literal example of the environment affecting the music!

Sarah: Exactly.

iheartthemusic: Being an instrumental band, what is the crowd like at your shows?

Sarah: It really depends on the situation. When we are playing at a more artsy centre then it’s more of a classical crowd, but a lot of the times it is a combination of indie rock kids that have really open ears.

Mike: One of the exciting things about it is that it totally appeals to lots of different people. A wide variety of different musical backgrounds are attracted to it. Same with other languages, we can travel to other places and our lyrics aren’t an impediment because we don’t have any.

iheartthemusic: Yeah, I was watching your video blogs from your trip to the Baltics. It looked incredible!

Sarah: The response we got over there was amazing. People were really appreciative and really wanting to discuss a lot after; people really wanted to share what they had just experienced and tell their stories as well.

iheartthemusic: How did you end up there?

Sarah: This journalist, who actually does more political stuff, invited us there. She found us on the Internet through Arcade Fire. So she actually came to us for Arcade Fire and then spoke to Richie about Bell Orchestre and made some jab about us never coming to the Baltics and he was like, “well invite us, we’ll come”. She did and she made the whole thing happen on her own.

Mike: She isn’t even a promoter or booking agent.

Sarah: She works in radio so she knows a lot of people and the whole tour was set up more DIY then you can imagine. People just taking a week off work to make it happen. It was really beautiful.

iheartthemusic: From a performance perspective, what do you hope that people take away from your shows?

Mike: A CD! [laughs]

Sarah: I would say getting fueled by a show. Coming away feeling energized and just inspired. I think any artist hopes for that.

Mike: Some affect beyond just aesthetically pleasing; something deeper and harder to describe.

Sarah: A lot of people don’t know what to expect when they come to our shows, so if they are new listeners, a lot of the times if they like it, they come away feeling really surprised and then inspired. They think this is not what you hear everyday and then there is a door that opens for them.

Mike: If we can open that door and they walk away and we can leave the door open for a little while, then we’ve done our job!

iheartthemusic: I have yet to see you guys play live, but am anxious to be able to see how it all comes together without vocals. Has it been tough to market yourself due to the fact that you are strictly instrumental?

Mike: We don’t really market it. You use the same tools, but it’s an art project and we are fond of it. If it finds an audience then we will be really happy. We use the tools that pop acts do, but we are also exploring the tools that the jazz and classical world implement. All styles of music have their avenues and we have some sort of legitimacy on all of them. So what we lack in one area we can make up for in another.

iheartthemusic: Was it a conscious choice to not have a vocalist?

Sarah: Yeah, I mean it just kind of organically came together that way. We got together and started to play music for theatre and dance and when we came together to chat about what kind of music we wanted to make, we spoke about how we were inspired by classical music, as much as electronic music. It definitely wasn’t supposed to be a rock band with a singer and it still isn’t!

photography provided by Kristin M.

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