Halifax Pop Explosion 2014
Weekend Edition
Weekend Reviews The HPX homestretch
Most People at Olympic Hall
Bry Webb at Olympic Hall
Jonathan Briggins
Jonathan Briggins
For starters, I got a lot of mileage out of jokes about Most People. For example, I tweeted “Most People are at Olympic Hall, where are you?”. Ironically, Most People is two people from Toronto. Through looping a variety of instruments, they cheated the senses, making it sound like they were a full band. For the last song, the band brought out a floor tom drum with a changing light in the middle. The drum was wrapped up behind the band until needed, although I’m not sure why really. Why not unleash the light the whole show?
Bry Webb is a dynamic musician. He seems equally comfortably playing with the Constantines, playing quiet solo shows and rocking out playing his solo material with the Providers. I guess technically, you could say Webb, along with Providers Nathan Lawr and Rich Burnett, played a set of dad-rock. “This section of the set is dad heavy,” said Webb referring to the songs “Asa” and “Fletcher”, the first name and middle name of his son. Friday night at the Company House, Webb was heckled by Chad VanGaalen about being a father. VanGaalen continued with his heckling, and naturally laughter occurred both on the stage and in the audience.
Mozart’s Sister at Olympic Hall Jonathan Briggins Mozart’s Sister started the show by creating a wall of electronic bleeps and bloops, transforming the Olympic Hall from a building in Halifax to some strange place where nothing is normal. There were no real vocals for the first few minutes, with sounds from voices being used as instruments rather than lyric delivery. Mozart’s Sister distorted and reverberated vocals worked together with a mixture of calm and abrasive electronic sounds. “I get bored easily. It’s a curse, but tonight it could be good,” said Caila Thompson-Hannant, the brains behind her solo project, before playing new material. She created new world that was chilling with organic life evolving then decaying with the pressing of a synth key. 2
Cousins at Olympic Hall Jonathan Briggins
Halifax grunge-pop/garage-rock duo Cousins were the secret guest at Olympic Hall, which makes sense considering touring mate Chad VanGaalen headlined the show. While the guitar sounds and energy of “Body” didn’t start a mosh pit or set off a wave of crowd-surfers, it did get heads bobbing. Some people even danced. At one point, drummer Leigh Dotey commented on how quiet the crowd was, not knowing if that was a good thing or a bad thing. It was surreal seeing so many people listening to a louder band, quietly sipping on Molson,
MIXTAPE HPX 2014
Badbadnotgood at the Seahorse -
rather than hearing the usual crowd noise from disinterested people that happens so often at shows. Their set ended with unreleased jam “Nothing” with some extra noisy guitar help from VanGaalen.
Photo by Evan McIntyre
year-old daughter making eggs and taking eggs up mountains on a hike like the good old days. After all this, he opened the set with “Cut Off My Hands”, the same song that opens his most recent album Shrink Dust. He proceeded to play a fairly normal show, featuring lots of guitar and strange
Chad VanGaalen at Olympic Hall
and hilarious stories.
Freelove Fenner at Gus’ Pub
Jonathan Briggins
Jonathan Briggins
Chad VanGaalen’s last few shows with Halifax Pop Explosion have been rather strange. Last year,
If you’ve been attending HPX all week long,
he played a Saturday afternoon show that was
things start to get a little hazy by Saturday night as
originally just for early-bird wristband purchasers
all the nights blur into one musical mess. The last
but was later open to anybody with a wristband.
band I saw during the festival was Freelove Fenner.
A few years before that, he played a secret show
I’d seen them the day before at an afternoon show
in the afternoon followed by a show later in the
and really liked them, but was unsure how the
day at Olympic Hall. At that show, him and his
pie chart was divided between happiness from
band basically played improvised noisy stoner jams
listening to live music and happiness from eating
leaving those expecting to hear all the classics
a delicious burger at Ace Burger. The Montreal
disappointed. During this year’s show, he started
band’s jangle pop set Saturday night confirmed
off by talking for a long time. It was a Kanye
that yes, I truly do enjoy their music even while
Westesque rant in terms of length and variety
not eating a burger. “Vicky’s Day” is about as
of topics covered. Canadian indie music love,
perfect a song as you can get. Jangled guitar hooks,
Cousins, heckling Bry Webb, loving eggs, his six-
catchy lyrics and a nice blast of sunshine.
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Moon at Gus’ Pub -
Sheer Agony at Gus’ Pub -
Photo by Ming Wu
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Photo by Ming Wu
Gianna Lauren at the Marquee -
Photo by Ming Wu
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The Wooden Sky at Taz Records -
Photo by Ming Wu
Freelove Fenner at Gus’ Pub -
Photo by Ming Wu
PS I Love You at Olympic Hall -
Photo by Ming Wu
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PS I Love You at Olympic Hall -
Photo by Ming Wu
Cousins at Olympic Hall -
Photo by Ming Wu
Bry Webb at Olympic Hall -
Photo by Ming Wu
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Cousins at Olympic Hall -
Photo by Ming Wu
Chad VanGaalen at Olympic Hall -
Photo by Ming Wu
MIXTAPE HPX 2014
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Ain’t No Love at the Multi-Purpose Centre -
Photo by Evan McIntyre
Badbadnotgood at the Seahorse -
Photo by Evan McIntyre
MIXTAPE HPX 2014
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MIXTAPE HPX 2014
Mozart’s Sister at Olympic Hall -
Photo by Ming Wu
Twin Shadow at Olympic Hall -
Photo by Ming Wu
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Ryan Hemsworth at the Multi-Purpose Centre -
Photo by Evan McIntyre
Danny Brown at the Multi-Purpose Centre -
Photo by Evan McIntyre
MIXTAPE HPX 2014
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Cold Specks at the Marquee -
Photo by Ming Wu
Cold Specks at the Marquee -
Photo by Ming Wu
jackpine is a design studio. it’s a studio full of creative people who go the extra mile (or in some cases 594 miles) to help make cool projects come to life. thanks for the good times, halifax. drop by the studio next time you’re in ottawa. jackpine.co
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