Aug / Sept 2014

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Stylus

Aug/Sept Issue4 2014 Volume25

Production Team Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sheldon Birnie Art Director . . . . . . . . . . . . Andrew Mazurak Assistant Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Gil Carroll

On the Cover

MAHRI WHITE is a student returning to Winnipeg after two years in Halifax where she studied at the Nova Scotia College for Art and Design. She is hoping to continue her career with a focus on printmaking and eventually become a high school art teacher. She loves her Pilot Fine Liners with her coffee on the side (three creams, five sugars).

Check out more of her work on Instagram at mahriwhite or buy loads of prints from her at mahri.white@hotmail.com

Advertising Managers . . . . Birnie and Maz editor@stylusmagazine.ca, andrew@mazmedia.ca Cover Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Mahri White Printed by JRS Print Services: 204-232-3558

Contributors Shanell Dupras Nick Van Doeselaar Kacey Fields Anastasia Chipelski Mike Chiasson Martyna Turczynowicz Harrison Samphir Danielle Marion Daniel Emberg Scott Wolfe Victoria King David Tymoshchuk Kaitlyn Emslie Farrell Michael Elves Phil Enns Meghan Mast Devin King

Stylus is published bi-monthly by the University of Winnipeg Students’ Association, with a circulation of 2,500. Stylus serves as the program guide to 95.9FM CKUW and will reflect the many musical communities it supports within Winnipeg and beyond. Stylus strives to provide coverage of music that is not normally written about in the mainstream media. Stylus acts as a vehicle for the work of new writers, photographers and artists, including members of the University of Winnipeg, of CKUW and of the Winnipeg community at large. Stylus reserves the right to refuse to print material, specifically, that of a racist, homophobic or sexist nature.

All submissions may be edited and become the property of Stylus.

All opinions expressed in Stylus are those of the contributors and do not necessarily reflect those of the editors. Contributions in the form of articles, reviews, letters, photos and graphics are welcome and should be sent with contact information to:

Stylus Magazine Bulman Student Centre, University of Winnipeg 515 Portage Avenue, Winnipeg, MB, R3B 2E9 Phone: 204-786-9785, Fax: 204-783-7080 editor@stylusmagazine.ca www.stylusmagazine.ca Contributions will be accepted in the body of an email. No attachments please. All submissions may be edited and become the property of Stylus. Unauthorized reproduction of any portion of Stylus is strongly discouraged without the express written consent of the editors.

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TableofContents Blah, Blah, Blah Events Around Town . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Live Bait Winnipeg Folk Fest // TD International Jazz Fest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 CKUWho Femisphere . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 CKUW Program Guide . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 NonStopHipHop Open Mike Eagle and the LA sound . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Local Spotlight Dub Rifles // Surprise Party // Vampires . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 Root Cellar David Vest // Rex Weyler // Chuck Ragan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 Iconoclast Bison // Malachai . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 Mental Notes Open Mike Eagle // Lee Fields & the Expressions . . . . . . . . . 21 All That Jazz! BADBADNOTGOOD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 Ulteriors Young Magic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 Under the Needle Pink Mountaintops // Ben Watt // Owen Pallett . . . . . 22 Fear of Music This Stephen Patrick is No Morrissey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Features BADBADNOTGOOD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 The Washups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Scott Nolan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 The Harpoonist & the Axe Murderer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 MEME 2014 Local DJ John Norman to be artist ambassador . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Aug/Sept 2014 Stylus Magazine

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LOAD CODE OF OUR AUG/SEPT TIME FIND A REISSUED COPY OF STYLUS FOR YOUR DOWN PLANET, HALF PINTS, AND THE UW. WILD , MUSIC THE INTO AT S TUNNEL TAPE ON STAND ZINE -PRESENTED BY THE UWSA, CKUW, AND STYLUS MAGA

Blah, Blah, Blah Oh god, the days are getting shorter! Soon, the sun will retreat completely & we’ll be faced with yet another neverending winter apocalypse. Get ye outside, friends and neighbours, and enjoy some live music at one of the many festivals going down, or just bike to your favourite venue and take plenty of smoke breaks. The time is coming when the Great Cold will again descend. Enjoy it while you can. Mondays check out J.Williamez at Shannon’s Irish Pub *** Wednesdays, Andrew Neville & the Poor Choices play the Cavern *** Thursdays, 555 Osborne hosts a weekly jam with the Sawat Team *** Danny Brown hits the Union Sound Hall August 7, while Bend Sinister gets into it at the Pyramid *** Aw yeah! Arsonfest is back August 8-9 at the Frame Arts Warehouse.

With loud as fuck performances from Achagathus, Enabler, Plague, Throatslitter, and many more *** Quique Escamilla takes to the Times Change(d) stage for rare Monday show on August 11, so don’t miss that or bacdafucup the Onyx is heeeere at Pyramid *** MEME gets going August 14, through the weekend, with performances from Blond:ish, Mich EP, Rick Logic and many more at venues throughout our beautiful city [pg. 17] *** Aug 14 Son of Dave plays the West End and Real Love Winnipeg presents TWIN North Americana album release at the Purple Room while Arcade Fire, tUnE-yArDs and Dan Deacon fuck around at the MTS Centre all dressed up like *** Fast Romantics get hot and heavy down at the WECC August 15 with The Hours, and Romi Mayes is over at the Times *** August 15-17 out in Kelwood, check out the Harvest Sun Festival, featuring the Noble Thiefs, JD Edwards, and Scott Nolan [see pg 08]. Or heck, head to St Malo instead and catch the Rainbow Trout Music Fest, featuring Surprise

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Party, Wizards, Smoky Tiger, and many more *** If yr in the city then you’ll def be at Distances, Haymaker and Harley James Flett at WECC on August 17 *** Boyy Oh boy, Cam’ron is at Union on Aug 20 *** Naysa, the Unbelievable Bargains, Palm Trees, Hana Lu Lu and many more will be out at Shine On! August 21-23 out at Beavercreek Park, while Aboriginal Music Week gets going at the Windsor *** That Banjo Guy is at the Times August 21 *** Wax Mannequin will be getting weird down at the Cavern August 22 with Cheering for the Bad Guy. At the same time, the Matlock Festival of Music, Art and Nature gets cranking up for the weekend, with Greg MacPherson, SolHounds, The Crooked Brothers, and more *** Saturday August 23, good buddies Greg Arcade and the Reverend Rambler get it going at the Times *** August 27 the Mowglis play the Pyramid and Linkin Park, 30 Seconds to Mars and AFI play to die-hards at MTS Centre *** Get your Friday going big time with Chivas & Kream video release down at the Park Theatre August 29, *** September 2, Albatros and 1971 descend on the Garrick Hotel *** September 3-5, our good buddies down at the UWSA are throwing their annual O-Week party on the University of Winnipeg front lawn. Featuring performances from ATLAAS, Eagle Lake Owls, Greek Riots, JR Hill, Human Music, Mama Cutsworth’s DJ Academy, Pip Skid, the Lytics, and many more, you do not want to miss out on the fun. So don’t, ok? Good. *** Don’t forget your earplugs on Friday, September 5, as Mobina Galore, Bearfight, Lone Wolf, and Union Stockyards rip it up down at the Cavern, Snake River and Palm Trees space out The Handsome Daughter, or head out to the Assiniboine Park and see those old so-n-sos in

Blue Rodeo and Spirit Of the West get into a massive yawn fest *** Joe Pug plays the Park Sept 6 *** September 10 Daniel Champagne at the West End oh ya buddy *** September 1214, don’t miss the Harvest Moon Festival in the beautiful Pembina Valley community of Clearwater.

Performers include Ridley Bent, Royal Canoe, Del Barber, and many more *** But if you’re stuck in Winnipeg, don’t miss Real Love Winnipeg at the Cavern on the 13th and JD Edwards at the Times Change(d) *** Tiësto is headlining UMSU’s Frosh Music Festival on Sept 14. That one will be wild. *** Sept 15, Architects, Stray from the Path, Being As An Ocean, and My Ticket Home rip the roof off the WECC, and over at the Garrick Hotel Shockload, Ellesmere, and Elder Abuse get loud *** Chet Faker is at Union on Sept 17 *** Sept 19, the Slackers play the West End *** Zeus is back at Park Theatre on Sept 20 *** Holy shit! Nik Turner’s Hawkwind are at the Pyramid September 22! Smoke ‘em if you gots ‘em! Good idea to keep smokin’ em if your headed to Com Truise at Union this night *** Fucked Up is FUCKED at West End Sept 23 with Alvvays *** Don’t miss Young Jibwe at the Pyramid September 24 *** Watch Glass Tiger dust off the cobwebs at the Regent Casino September 26, while Martin Howell, the Blisters, and Cheering for the Bad Guy play at the Garrick Hotel That same evening and that of the 27, the Times plays host to Keith Hallet *** Whoa! Beach House is at Pyramid September 30!!! *** October 1, the legendary Fred fuckin Eaglesmith takes to the Park Theatre stage. Get ready for a good one, you guys *** And, of course, our 25th Anniversary Issue drops on Winnipeg streets October 2nd!!!

Keep posted for more Anniversary Events, and we’ll see you soon! Party on!

Aug/Sept 2014 Stylus Magazine

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BY SHANELL DUPRAS // ART BY NICK VAN DOESELAAR

Positive. Moving. Vibe. These are the three words Ontario jazz trio BADBADNOTGOOD (BBNG) – Alex Sowinski (drums and sampler), Chester Hansen (bass), and Matt Tavares (keyboards) – used to sum up their new album, III. “All we wanted to do was to make an album that was front to back truly what we wanted to do and that we had the time and the ability to execute it the way we wanted to,” said Matt. “Maybe it’s not a record you would play all the time, but when you put it on it went somewhere.”

BBNG started when Alex, Chester, and Matt met while in college studying music. Alex said they bonded over their love for hip hop. The three started playing together and released their first self-titled album, which was a compilation of different – mostly hip hop – covers from artists like Gucci Mane, Kanye West, My Bloody Valentine, and Tyler the Creator. But these aren’t your typical covers. BBNG rearranges the originals into a kickass modern twist of jazz infused with hip hop elements. The three dropped out of college to pursue a music career with BBNG when their first album of cover songs started to take off online thanks to the help of Tyler the Creator, who met up with them and shared their video on Twitter.

“School would always be there and we could always come back to learning and studying, but you don’t always have opportunities to travel all these different places, so we all left school and tried to take the band idea and push it as far as we could,” Alex told Stylus.

BBNG keep pushing the band forward, with III being their first album on a record label, Innovative Leisure, and the first with all original material. With Innovative Leisure, BBNG decided to take a risk with putting out all original material, and not the covers they’ve become widely known for.

“We were like, ‘Cool, let’s try and do this. See if we can progress as a trio and explore some different ideas, experiment, and create an album that’s a representation of where we’re at musically.’ It was a push to keep going and step forward,” said Alex.

Being on a record label gave BBNG the time they needed to come out with an album they were truly happy with, without any constraints.

“All of the other albums, we just borrowed free studio time from friends,” Matt told Stylus. “We couldn’t put a whole bunch of time in the physical recording and execution because we didn’t have

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badbadnotgood enough money. For this one, we had our own studio rehearsal space, so we were able to rehearse a ton before we even went in and recorded it.”

III has been in the works for nearly two years due to changes in rehearsal spaces and a long recording process. The band originally started rehearsing in Alex’s dad’s basement, but couldn’t stay there because it was an apartment building and the band often got too loud. BBNG ended up splitting a studio space with a friend, and then took time to renovate the space. After that was all said and done, BBNG still had to write and record the new album. III made its way into stores on May 6 and was the first BBNG album to be released with physical copies.

Since releasing the album, BBNG have left Canada and are now touring around the world, visiting places like Japan, Russia, and Ireland.

“Any new place that we go to that we’ve never experienced before is always awesome,” Chester said.

“Just to be over there and just be amazed that all of these people in this city where we’ve never thought we’d be are coming to check out our show because they like our music. It’s just really, really cool.”

Of all these experiences, the band couldn’t decide on one favourite moment. Matt said that although there are some downsides, they’re engulfed by all of the great things and opportunities that have come with being in BBNG. “There are just so many fucking amazing things.

Each month there’s a new best thing. This month we got to play a show with Ghostface Killah. That was pretty amazing being his backing band. We just like meeting a lot of our heroes.”.

BBNG have also been the backing band for Frank Ocean and Odd Future at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in 2012.

The band will be heading back to Canada in August to play shows in Saskatoon, Edmonton, Calgary, Vancouver, and Winnipeg. They’ll be playing at Union Sound Hall on August 6 [and we sincerely hope you didn’t miss this show]. Matt also said to keep your ears open for some new projects in the near future.

“There’s a bunch of different little tidbits of music we’re working on that should be released soon. Can’t really talk about a lot of it. It’s all under wraps.”

Aug/Sept 2014 Stylus Magazine

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BY KACEY FIELDS

What happens when old school punks grow up, get

married, have a few kids, and decide to start making music again? The Washups, that’s what. They describe themselves as “washed up punk rock dudes making music,” and that’s about as accurate as you can get (although I would add that they make damn good music).

These guys are a local duo who forge their music in a long distance kinda way. The process begins with Tyler Mauws – a talented and prolific songwriter, mentor to youth, and spreader of kindness – who composes and records all of the guitars, bass, and drums, in Portage la Prairie. Then he sends it off to Mike Braconnier in Winnipeg – a radio nerd, unicyclist, and successful podcaster – who then writes and records all of the vocals. This process has generated their first self– titled album, four more singles, and a brand new EP titled Hugo.

Stylus had the chance to sit down with Mike, ask him some questions, and let him tell me some stories.

Stylus: Tell me about Tyler, since he’s not here.

Mike Braconnier: Tyler and I have known each other for almost 20 years.

We were putting together this thrash band called “A Few Pennies Short.”

We had heard about this dude who had just moved to Brandon who could play it all – all the 90s old school punk that we all listened to, Ten Foot Pole, Good Riddance, NOFX – all those Fat Wreck Chords and Epitaph bands. Immediately he was the most talented guy in the band. There was Valcourt who could really shred on guitar, and Adam was learning the bass as we went. I was on drums.

Tyler was really the anchor for that group. We lived together for quite some time. We stayed friends and he contacted me in February, emailed me a song, and here we are. It’s cool because there is no collaboration really.

We technically are a studio duo, but I get these songs blind, and I don’t know what they’re going to be. Tyler has no idea what I’m going to send

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back either. That’s probably why we have such a throw back sound, because we aren’t pushing each other to sound different or progress. Our best songs were written by Tyler in ten minutes, tracked in ten minutes, sent to me, and I wrote the lyrics in ten minutes. They are our most catchy tunes. That is purposely what we are trying to do. He’s the talent, and I’m just really happy to be involved.

Stylus: Tell me about Hugo. Why Hugo for the EP title?

MB: Way back in the day, this must have been about 17 years ago, I was in A Few Pennies Short with Tyler. We had this cat, Hugo, who had a few litters

of kittens while she lived with the band in this crazy house, and nobody would get her fixed. It says that in the song “no one could fix you, your kids were driving us insane.” I think at this point we had about seventeen cats and kittens. It was absolutely irresponsible. If Bob Barker would have known about our house he would have kicked in our front door and kicked the shit out of all of us for not spaying and neutering anyone including ourselves. We took Hugo and all the others out to an abandoned school in Brandon that was overrun with mice and left them there with a giant bag of cat food.

The good thing was that right away we started hearing about other guys who were taking all the cats from the building and were finding them homes.

I felt really good about that, but there was neither hide nor hair of Hugo. A year later I was out with friends and Hugo just walked right up to me. She would have had to cross the Assiniboine River to get back. It’s this epic Homeward Bound story! She came back home with me and she was my cat. I wrote a song and I named the record Hugo. The five songs on our EP are considerably harder than the first album. I screamed and bellowed a lot, and that was like our old group. It was a throw back, and it ended up being a good song, and I’m happy about it.

After our interview Mike hooked me up with an unreleased song called “Blue Notes,” in which he criticizes auto tuning, shares his respect for musicians that aren’t afraid to show their flaws, and the sheer joy of hearing honest music. Look for it on their next album! Follow The Washups on Twitter, download their music for free on Bandcamp, and go listen to Mike’s podcast, OneGoodWheel Radio (Episode 37) for the full interview where Mike gives advice to young musicians, talks about his tribute song to Felix Baumgartner, and what he would do with a time machine!

Aug/Sept 2014 Stylus Magazine

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Deep in the American south lies the small commu-

nity of Silverhill, Alabama. Lush, green foliage surrounds a cabin in the woods. Dogs lie in the shade during the heat of the day, and howl by the light of the moon. Silverhill is a place where “moonshiners still bootleg whisky” from 106 year old recipes; a place where they don’t call the cops, and fire wood is hewn by hand. A beautiful place, at once captivatingly unique, and yet also just like any other stop off a remote backroad.

Winnipeg’s long time ambassador out on the Hillbilly Highway, Scott Nolan, found himself in Silverhill one dark evening a short time ago, while touring with the legendary Mary Gauthier. They were performing at the Frog Pond at Blue Moon Farm, a concert series in the tradition of Levon Helm’s Midnight Rambles.

“Every so often you’re in these moments where there’s so much happening,” Nolan recalls, as we sit in his sunny St. James studio, listening to the album he recorded this past spring with Willie Sugarcapps in Silverhill. “If you can tap into it at the right time, the job really becomes tapping into it as it’s happening.”

He’s talking songwriting, generally. But the story in particular relates to the title track of his new, as yet unreleased record. The song is a beautiful ode to the community, with many locals name checked throughout the little five minute ditty. The album itself is, appropriately, titled Silverhill.

“I wrote [“Silverhill”] very quickly after the first concert I did at this farm,” Nolan explains. “I stayed up late, got caught up in the moment, partied with some of the people who put it on. At some point in the night, it all started happening so fast I was like, I gotta get outta here! I grabbed a beer and went to my van and tried to get it as quickly as I could.”

Many of those locals name-checked are also those who make up the “supergroup” of sorts that backed Nolan on Silverhill. A veritable Alabama who’s who, Willie Sugarcapps formed after a particularly off-the-hook Frog Pond session where all the players had been on stage together. As local legend has it, someone in the audience was so impressed by the way they all worked together that they shouted out, “You should form a supergroup!” And so, they did just that.

Made up of Anthony Crawford, Savanna Lee, Will Kimbrough, Corky Hughes, and Grayson Capps, Willie Sugarcapps came together with Nolan and recorded all 13 tracks of Silverhill in two days. Such an endeavour might daunt many artists, but Nolan was excited about the prospect.

“There was such depth there. Their combined musicality was ancient,” he says, not without a touch of awe in his voice. Determined to get as far out of his comfort zone as possible—and recording without his musical partner Joanna Miller for the first time in 15 years—Nolan went down to Alabama armed only with the songs and an old Martin guitar that once belonged to his former road manager, Ernie Blackburn.

“I always have these conversations with songwriters, and we always lament the same records,”

Scott Nolan mining Silverhill for solid gold

BY SHELDON BIRNIE

Nolan explains. “If we talk about Neil Young, we most often talk about Tonight’s The Night. Or a lot of what the Band did, those Basement Tapes. Just the beauty in that. The musicians really doing it the way that musicians want to do it. But even when we have budgets and stuff, we often shy away from that chance for some reason.”

And so, with the exception of a few string parts overdubbed later on by Anthony Crawford, Silverhill was put to tape just like those old sessions: live off the floor, warts and all. Nolan would distribute lyric sheets, then sit down and play the song once through. Then they’d hit record.

The result is Nolan’s strongest record, one that certainly captures that vibe of musicians making a record and having fun while doing so. And as the record is tracked from the first song they recorded through to the last, you can hear the band loosening up and growing closer as the record progresses.

“There were definitely things fueling it,” Nolan recalls with a wry smile. “I mean, we didn’t go bananas. But by track six,” the infectious “When Can I See You Again,” a song about letting go, “which was the end of the first day, I can hear what’s changed in me. A little bit of moonshine, a little bit of this or that.”

And Silverhill also contains some of his best songwriting to date as well. Nolan told Stylus when he was preparing for the record, that he wrote over 40 tunes, and whittled that number down to ten that he intended to cut. Then, he added three more, all of them co-writes; something he’s not necessarily known for.

“The first one is called ‘When You Leave This World,’ which I wrote with Hayes [Carll] at the end of that tour a few months ago,” explains Nolan.

Manitobans should be familiar with Carll at this point, seeing as he’s a favourite of both the Winnipeg Folk Fest and Dauphin’s Countryfest. The Austin, TX based country singer had a bit of a hit with Nolan’s “Bad Liver and a Brokenheart” a few years back. He and Nolan have toured a few times together now.

“When You Leave This World” is a fine example of a character study of a loser “with no plans worth making.” The song provides for an introduction to the world the characters of Silverhill inhabit; a world of hard choices and heartbreak where beauty

abounds in the small details.

“Trouble and Love,” written with Mary Gauthier, is the second co-write, and makes its appearance on Silverhill early on, at track five. Nolan and Joanna Miller spent over a year touring with the Louisiana based singer, who is a powerhouse among songwriters (check out “I Drink” if you’d like your heart ripped from your throat). Gauthier liked the collab so much that she chose it as the title track to her excellent new record.

“That was an interesting one to in that it was very personal for her, and very observational for me,” says Nolan. “When we finished writing it, I wasn’t sure I would ever do it. But then I realized it was different for me, [and] I wound up cutting it.”

The final co-write, and the final cut of the album, is “One Little Spark.” A collaboration between Nashville’s Jaida Dryer and Nolan, this tune is as catchy a songwriter’s song as can be. Detailing a botched attempt at co-writing between Dryer and The Only Guy Clark, the track at is once a hilarious account of the encounter and plain old elegant songwriting.

“When Jaida showed up [to write], we went into the backyard and had coffee, and she told me this incredible story,” Nolan recounts. “When she finished the story, I said, ‘That’s it. That’s the song.’ It was a very rewarding experience. Now, it’s her job now to get [the song] to Guy Clark.”

The other tales that populate Silverhill include a reworked version of “Twister,” from 2013’s North/ South as a duet with Savanna Lee; a country noir portrait of the American dream in “Easter at the Waffle House”; and “The Last One,” which features perhaps the “most Winnipeg” opening line I’ve ever heard.

“Jets jersey and a Trans Am,” Nolan sings. “Season ticket and a flat tire.” The tale of “city punks in country bars” details how, all too often, “every other day is like the last one.” In his trademark observational manner, Nolan goes on to provide as much insight into the character of this town as the Weakerthans’ “One Great City.”

And while Nolan does not, as of yet, know just when the world will get to visit those and the other songs on Silverhill, he is very pleased with the result, and itching to get the songs out. He tells Stylus that “it feels like the records I’ve been waiting my whole career to make.”

And just like the apple moonshine, made from the 106 year old family recipe that helped fuel the sessions, Silverhill, is a fine piece of craftsmanship.

It holds both the power to warm you up, and to intoxicate you with its musicality.

“This stuff you could drink pretty easily,” Nolan said of the moonshine. But he may as well have been talking about the songs themselves. “It was well made, real smooth.” Amen, brother.

While you can’t get your hands on Silverhill just yet, Nolan has been performing the bulk of the songs live as of late. Catch him this summer as he performs at Harvest Sun in Kelwood August 15-17, and Matlock Festival August 22-24.

PHOTO BY DUSTIN LEADER

BY ANASTASIA CHIPELSKI

hile they trade in the haunted howls of the blues, W the Harpoonist and the Axe Murderer are not the doom-soaked reapers one might expect. “We’re not a dark band, it just sounds like a dark name. We’re jovial people, really,” asserts Shawn Hall, aka the Harpoonist.

Hall is one half of the duo that is becoming known for their gritty, stripped-down blues. He carries a case of harmonicas, while Matthew Rogers – his partner in crime and the so-called “Axe Murderer” - holds down the beat while also tearing up his Telecaster.

Winnipeggers got a taste of the Harp/Axe combo at last year’s Winnipeg Folk Festival, including a slightly raunchier than usual workshop with Hayes Carll and Jason Collett.

Before the workshop, Shawn woke up under a tree after sneaking into the Festival’s infamous campground (“trust me, no one wants artists to go into that campground for good reason”), and then joined the other songwriters on stage to swap dirty stories.

“I showed up at the workshop with wine on my shirt and blood – my own blood, I wasn’t sacrificing animals or anything,” explains Shawn, “but I changed halfway through the workshop. I put on a new shirt ‘cause that’s what you do.”

As they were travelling back and forth across the country (keeping clean shirts handy), Shawn and Matt were inspired by the many other talents they shared the stage with. Shawn recalls opening for the illustrious Taj Mahal on a floating stage, while also playing creepy and “exotically Canadian” venues such as a converted old movie theatre in rural Saskatchewan. While they didn’t share songwriting responsibilities on previous albums, they decided that they had to up their game.

“We needed to do it to have better songs.” Shawn tells Stylus. “We

10 Stylus Magazine Aug/Sept 2014

ILLUSTRATION BY ANDREW MAZURAK

decided to combine forces, so we sat down and just jammed this stuff out.”

The biggest challenge in putting together A Real Fine Mess – their latest offering, released June 17 – was writer’s block. The economy of words necessitated by a genre like the blues is “challenging for wordy, chatty people, especially like myself. But it’s a good thing,” claims Shawn. “It’s tougher to tell stories when you’re paired up with another performer that’s got 20 verses. How do I tell stories using this form of music?”

The stories of the blues are as well worn in

words as they are in the growls, howls, and winding wails of the Harp and Axe. The video for their latest single, “Shake It,” tells a story of a rag-tag group of hard-luck folks being won over by the band’s impromptu performance on a stage built of pallets, and coming together to shake it in all their worn glory.

The video was set in the back area of an actual trailer park that was reserved for abandoned motor homes, some still full of people’s belongings under a thin layer of moss. “It was absolutely straight-up creepy,” said Shawn, as he wondered about the circumstances that would drive people to live there in the first place, and then walk away from their lives entirely.

Matt may have been contemplating the surroundings a little less, as he spent most of the shoot day passed out in a tent, recovering from the revelry of International Tequila Day. “You could have done anything to him, you could have drawn on his face [..] a mustache, and all that stuff,” but as you can see in the video, he emerged relatively unscathed – proof of the true jovial nature of his travelling companion, perhaps.

The Harpoonist and the Axe Murderer haven’t held an official release party for A Real Fine Mess just yet, but they promise that We’ll celebrate the album, just let us know when and where”. They’ll be stopping by the BBQ and Blues festival this August, so grab yourself a deep-fried pickle and brace yourself for some hard-rocking greasy (and maybe slightly creepy, but still fun) blues tunes.

Catch the Harpoonist & the AxeMurderer at the Winnipeg BBQ & Blues Festival August 16 at CanWest Park, home of the Goldeyes. If you can’t make it then, keep an eye out for their return to Winnipeg in October.

Book a consultation: 204-770-2204 urbaneatin@gmail.com Also vote for us in the 2014 National Co-op Challenge! (see our website for details)

We imagine a Winnipeg where food, herbs and native plants grow here, there and everywhere.

We’ve worked with residents to design and establish new culinary and herb gardens, and always love working with youth and community groups. If you’d like a a raised bed or a salvaged-wood compost bin, we build those too.

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SHARON VAN ETTEN WINNIPEG FOLK FESTIVAL

PHOTO BY ANDREW MAZURAK

BEN HARPER

WINNIPEG FOLK FESTIVAL

PHOTO BY ANDREW MAZURAK

CORB LUND

WINNIPEG FOLK FESTIVAL

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PHOTO BY ANDREW MAZURAK

BUFFY SAINTE MARIE WINNIPEG FOLK FESTIVAL

PHOTO BY ANDREW MAZURAK

THE WILDERNESS OF MANITOBA WINNIPEG FOLK FESTIVAL

PHOTO BY ANDREW MAZURAK

THE DEEP DARK WOODS WINNIPEG FOLK FESTIVAL

PHOTO BY ANDREW MAZURAK

KILLER MIKE

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PHOTO BY ANDREW MAZURAK

THE BOTH

L3IF

PHOTO BY ANDREW MAZURAK

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WINNIPEG FOLK FESTIVAL

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Femisphere

Thursday 8:00am to 9:00a.m. on CKUW 95.9 FM or ckuw.ca

Femisphere is the CKUW Women’s Radio Collective run by volunteer hosts Jen Unwin and Anna Sigrithur.

They broadcast every Thursday from 8:00am – 9:00am on CKUW 95.9FM. Stylus had the opportunity to chat with Anna and Jen about Manitoba’s only feminist radio show!

Stylus: How has Femisphere developed as a show since the first show aired on CKUW? Jen Unwin: In a way, the show was already developed. As far I know, the CKUW Women’s Radio Collective functioned for about eight years before I became a CKUW volunteer, they produced Say It, Sista. I was a guest on that show in August of 2012. At the time the show was short on hosts and the idea of exploring radio appealed to me. Not long after, I met Anna! This is where Femisphere began.

The show’s growth in content and structure is more of an upgrading of the original feminist premise set out by the Women’s Collective. For a time Anna and I simply had the luxury of being a collective of two.

We produced a show a week for a year before we realized that we could take time off. When you get into that demanding rhythm of creativity, well you get creative. This necessitated a strong mandate and format. Working under clear guidelines of production has allowed Femisphere to maintain integrity and continuity of content.

Anna Sigrithur: I was also a guest on Say it, Sista in 2012 and was inspired by the potential of the program. At that time, there was just one woman who was running it and it is a lot of work to do by yourself, so myself and some other people including Jen joined on, and a few months later it was just the two of us! We realized that we wanted to tighten up the content, and create a place for Winnipeggers to find reliable information on reproductive rights, local women’s issues and issues affecting marginalized people in the city and around the country- and so in early 2013 we began creating the framework for what Femisphere turned into.

Stylus: Was there a specific moment that inspired you to start Femisphere?

JW: I wanted to change the name from the beginning, Say It, Sista seemed outdated and somehow off track from what I saw as the purpose of the show.

By rebranding the show we were able to become the CKUW Femisphere Radio Collective and modernize our Terms of Reference.

AS: Jen and I had been doing the show by ourselves for about six months (in July 2013) when we finally came up with

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a new name that we thought would better reflect what we had been doing: creating a world where feminist discussion and all its intersections have a place to grow. That’s why we call it Femisphere.

Stylus: What is the most memorable show you have hosted?

JW: Well, I have many favourites. We’ve had the privilege of interviewing truly amazing women. I know the ones that I mangle the pronunciation of famous people’s names are Anna’s faves. [ha,ha,ha] AS: We’ve had the privilege of showcasing a lot of young women doing really interesting and amazing things. One example is Inuk artist Kelly Amaujuk Fraser who is a rising star in Nunavut for pop music in Inuktitut and an activist for traditional cultural renaissance. We’ve also had some youth from Sanikiluak come on and share some throat singing with us, and have had a fiery show surrounding abortion rights where an anti-choice spokesperson phoned in and gave us an earful. Lots of exciting times!

Stylus: What is the aim of the show?

JW: To provide a feminist perspective on current issues. Here is our Mission Statement: promote a

Tune into Femisphere on CKUW 95.9FM in Winnipeg every Thursday from 8:00am – 9:00am, or listen online at ckuw. ca

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diversity of topics affecting women, especially marginalized women. To promote the voices and experiences of women from all backgrounds. Support and be an ally to groups such as healthy masculinity groups and LGBTQ* groups. To fill a need in the community for women-specific current affairs, cultural, and political reporting. Promote diversity through common media as a social act of anti-discrimination, hoping to break down injustices on the lines of gender, sexual orientation, race, class, age, and ability. Be a voice for the reproductive rights of women, and the rights of women to control their bodies. To highlight local voices and issues, and bring in national and international perspectives. To acknowledge and remember that we are privileged to produce on First Nations Treaty 1 territory, and to work for justice for our Indigenous sisters and brothers.

AS: The purpose of the show is to raise up voices of women and/or marginalized folks who otherwise wouldn’t have the opportunity to create media.

We hope to continue growing our ability to do that through involvement of more contributors who can share their experiences and perspectives that do not usually make it to mainstream media.

Stylus: Is Femisphere involved in the community in aspects outside of the radio world?

JW: Absolutely, it’s a talk show, we want to talk to everyone!

AS: Jen and I (and our new cohost Angie St. Mars) are pretty involved in a lot of communitybased work outside of the show and I personally like to use the show as a way to explore and highlight interesting people that I meet and stories I hear while doing my food security work in Manitoba. We try to stay connected to current events in Winnipeg, so that means FemFest, Sarasvati’s Cabaret of Monologues, the Fringe Festival, the Folk Fest, Pride Week, and a lot of the stuff going on at the U of W. We can only hope to do more of all of this and use radio as a megaphone for all the awesomeness that gets overlooked.

Andrew Dunn, Winnipeg 18 April 2012

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KBialous-110323-35.tif LOCATION British Columbia 2012 U OF WINNIPEG HANDBOOK Kamil Bialous 4438_E_2012_Stylus_Winnipeg

LANGUAGE SIZE COLOURS DESIGNER

English 3.875in x 5in CMYK Norman.Coloma@mec.ca

Aug/Sept 2014 Stylus Magazine

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Local DJ John Norman to be artist ambassador

BY MARTYNA TURCZYNOWICZ

Winnipeg-based John Norman has played every-

where from Toronto to London to Ibiza and major festivals like Detroit Sound. Last year, he signed to KMS records. Kevin Saunderson and Carl Cox have been playing his mixes internationally. Now, the homegrown DJ is back for a stint as artist ambassador for the 2014 MEME festival.

“I was making music, but started taking it more seriously about five years ago,” the Winnipeg based DJ told Stylus. “I was playing hard house music back then,” he says with a laugh.

Norman started collaborating with local DJs Phosphor, Justrich and Freaky Alien. “They were doing bi-weekly shows and there would be new artists coming in every month there along with at other venues,” he says. One of those artists was DJ Preach who encouraged him to focus on his craft.

“He gave me some advice and said ‘you’ve got something, if you wanna do it you should take it a little more seriously and put more focus into it. So I did.’”

Norman has since played at clubs in Ibiza and, most recently, at the Movement Festival in Detroit in May. Sitting backstage at the Movement Festival was surreal, he recalls. The sheer talent hanging out backstage is what blew him away. “Seth Troxler shows up, Kenny Larkin, Jeff Mills, Kevin Saunderson was there. Kevin’s mom is there, the kids are there, everybody’s there.”

Hanging out backstage felt a lot like walking into a family barbeque, Norman says. “All those DJs know each other very well,” he explains. “They’ve been working together and going through the Detroit scene for many years.” At the same time, he says, it felt a little bit like “walking into someone’s house, invited, and you made it but you’re the new guy in the room.” Meeting those big industry names, he continues, is very humbling, because “it’s a reminder of who you are and where your potential is.”

Another experience that resonated Norman was when DJ Richie Hawtin dropped his track “Stuck In My Mind” at TimeWarp Festival in Manheim, Germany, arguably the biggest technoonly festival in the world.

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PHOTO BY CORY ARONEC

“Richie Hawtin drops your track and some guy’s got a nice clean recording and I’m sitting there, watching it, going Whoa. If I turned around, there’d be another 4000 people all enjoying the same experience. It’s very humbling to know that it’s happening, not a lot of artists get to experience that on that kind of a level.”

International recognition is a big deal for any artist, but it’s especially huge for DJs because other artists are always spinning each other’s tracks.

“For a producer and DJ of electronic dance music your music is probably being played more by other people than it is by yourself,” Norman says.

But regardless of the world travels and crazy experiences, Winnipeg will always be home for Norman.

“There’s that saying, you can take the Winnipegger out of Winnipeg but you can’t take Winnipeg out of the Winnipegger.”

Being chosen as MEME Ambassador Norman says, is an honour. “For a local artist, who’s doing so much internationally, it’s a good little tip of the hat.

It’s good to be back.” As ambassador for MEME, Norman will be getting other DJs and producers in the know about what’s going on in Winnipeg.

“Since I do travel a lot is to bring that message from MEME to artists around the world that I interact and collaborate with. My role as ambassador is to tell them that there’s something going on here in Winnipeg.”

Norman believes that MEME pushes the envelope in a lot of ways for a music festival because of the artists it brings in every year.

“There are artists that are quite big elsewhere that aren’t so well known here. I think any good festival needs to take a little bit of risk.” Norman will be playing at MEME this year, along with Kevin Saunderson, and Blond:ish among others.

For Norman, it’s the people that set Underground Revival’s afterhours shows apart from other shows. “I’ve played there a few times and the crowd is always really, really up for it. Back in the day, there was sometimes only one type of crowd that would come. It’s not that there was a need to fit in, you just went and expressed yourself.

Now, he says, when you go to the warehouse the people showing up to this event are so diverse and “they’re all wanting an experience and having that in a little tight space like Underground Revival is awesome.”

He goes on to say that “everybody, who’s anybody who enjoys this is going here. There’s no guess game anymore ‘oh hey what party are you going to?’”

“I’m going to the party.”

MEME festival will be held August 14-17 at venues throughout Winnipeg. For more information visit www. memetic.ca

Aug/Sept 2014 Stylus Magazine

17

nonstophiphop Open Mike Eagle and the LA sound

by Harrison Samphir In 2008, Ava DuVernay’s documentary film This Is the Life chronicled the rise of LA’s alternative hip hop community from the vantage point of the Good Life Health Food Centre’s weekly open-mic night. Founded in 1989, the event attracted emcees, poets and heads alike. It was a place to freestyle (cuss-free), practise the art of rap and celebrate hip hop culture with the serious disposition of an aspiring artist. Jurassic 5, Del tha Funkee Homosapien, Skee-Lo and the Pharcyde were all schooled at Good Life.

Around that time, West Coast hip hop was also dominated by a singular aesthetic: gangsta rap. For a period, artists like Snoop Dogg, Ice Cube and Cypress Hill practically typecast the city. It was GFunk or bust. Yet the characterization faded with the downturn of mainstream West Coast rap in the late-1990s and early-2000s. The emergence of hyphy club music – originating in the Bay Area – and other new forms of electronic-influenced hip hop drove artists like E-40, Lil B and Too Short to

18 Stylus Magazine Aug/Sept 2014

unprecedented levels of recognition.

Interviewed in the film, rapper P.E.A.C.E. of the Freestyle Fellowship reflected on this particular historical moment. “At that time all we had was N.W.A, and everybody thought everything coming out of L.A. [was] gangsta rap... We don’t got to do that, you know? Let them do that, and let us do something else.”

It took many years for LA to outgrow the “hood culture” stereotypes passed on by artists like Dr. Dre and MC Eiht, but its maturation has resulted in a homegrown hip hop renaissance. Over the last decade, the Big Orange has produced some of the most successful independent rap artists in the United States: Busdriver, Nocando, Subtitle and Melo, to name only a few. Each have played a role in enlivening the left-field rap movement, an earlier stage of which was captured in DuVernay’s film.

Today, the Good Life Health Food Centre has morphed into Project Blowed (established 1994), an expanded workshop and open-mic platform celebrating its twentieth anniversary this year. Among its disciples are familiar names – Pigeon John, the Nonce, Self Jupiter, Adlib – and a host of others

with talent, style and acclaimed records to their credit.

One of these is 33-year-old Michael Eagle II, a Chicago native turned Angeleno who performs under the moniker Open Mike Eagle. Once a student of Project Blowed, Mike infiltrated LA’s alternative hip hop scene in the mid-2000s. He launched albums with local groups Swim Team and Thirsty Fish before the release of his solo debut Unapologetic Art Rap brought listeners closer to his idiosyncratic, humorous yet tactful delivery, and a brandnew sub genre.

Mike’s “art rap” fuses thoughtful, reflexive meditations on topics from the creative process to pop culture with a sharp wit and ear for poetry, rhythm and harmony. It’s partly a response to the commercial rap pervading mainstream radio waves, but also an opportunity to carve out a lasting place among the local hip hop artists with whom he so often collaborates.

Speaking with Stylus on the phone from Los Angeles, Mike reflected on the experience of building an alternative hip hop community and his latest (and greatest) record, Dark Comedy.

“LA is a very disparate place,” he begins. “Everything is very spread out, so the way things work organically in the city is that there are all sorts of pocket movements going on. Project Blowed was a very important place because it created a space for many people to come together and share styles, share influences, share fans.

“On an even more basic level than that, it was always good to just have a place to go and rap… No matter how big your career had become – whether you were signed to a major or just got off work – the place was there for everybody.”

Mike is an occasional mentor to some young people who come through Project Blowed, but the workshop has long connected him with LA’s diverse hip hop minds. He’s appeared on Busdriver and Nocando records, Myka 9’s 2012 album Sovereign Soul, and worked with dozens of California producers from Exile to Ras G. On Rappers Will Die of Natural Causes, his second solo effort, he collaborated with more than ten trackmasters over 14 songs.

His latest work, Dark Comedy, features a remarkable 11 producers. It’s a far-reaching collaborative process Mike orchestrates his own way.

“When we talk about the ‘core elements of hip hop’ or ‘hip hop song structures’ or whatever makes a hip hop song a hip hop song,” he says, “I look at that differently than other people. I don’t I think I look to hip hop and expect it to do the things other people expect it to do.”

“A rap beat to me is just whatever somebody wants to rap over. I’m not very concerned with what I’m starting to understand is the traditional idea of a banger or a big hip hop beat. I write raps to whatever I want to rap over and let the music inform what I write about.”

If Ava DuVernay ever made a sequel to This Is the Life, continuing the narrative of L.A.’s alternative hip hop community into the present, it would have to include Open Mike Eagle. From Project Blowed to indie success, he’s become an essential artist in West Coast hip hop. Dark Comedy is just further proof rap music needn’t conform to a singular aesthetic; art, after all, shouldn’t simply represent outward appearances, but their inward significance.

Don’t sleep!

Local Spotlight

DUB RIFLES No Town, No Country: EPs and Rare Recordings 1981-1984 If you’ve never seen a Dub Rifles show, don’t feel bad but don’t hold your breath either: they last graced a stage just over 30 years ago and there are apparently no plans to reunite.

However, we can all be thankful that new Winnipeg label Sundowning Sound Recordings decided to announce their presence with No Town, No Country, a compilation of Dub Rifles’ EPs (No Town and Boom!) interwoven with live cuts that bring the disc to a just-right 55 minute length.

The No Town tracks are remixed from the original masters, while the Boom! offerings are pulled from the original vinyl. But don’t fret over quality: the disc sounds just fine, and such concerns are thankfully washed away by the content. “Production of Funds” is one of the funkiest—and best—to be heard here, both studio and live versions. The song has the most cracking bass/sax interplay on the entire disc, and visions of James Chance will enter your head even before a twitchy guitar lead gives way to a speedy sax lick. “Stand” deserves a spot in the canon of propulsive, singsong punk tunes that become rallying cries for frustrated youth. Most lines feel widely applicable, but upon perusing the extensive and personal liner notes from Colin Bryce (vocals/guitar) you will discover “Stand” was inspired by outrage over factory farming practices. Inflections of power pop, ska, and old-timey swinging rock n roll are all over this disc, suggesting Dub Rifles took cues similar to those of their contemporaries on a few different branches of the punk tree. “Punch” and “Over the Top” are among the best songs that appear here only as live recordings, serving as a pretty solid argument for the very release of a CD filled with songs that nearly predate the format itself. Highly recommended. (Sundowning Sound Recordings, sundowningsoundrecordings.bandcamp.com) Daniel Emberg

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THE STURGEONS This is The Sturgeons The second album from Manitoba folk/roots band, The Sturgeons, is filled with the well crafted harmonies and catchy hooks that fans have come to expect from twins Calan and Lucas Hamilton. Although not filled with the kind of light, upbeat songs you might expect from a summer release, the album still manages to capture the experience of a Manitoban summer.

Whether it is “Hung Up to Dry,” a love ballad infused with rural domestic imagery, or “Roll On,” a song that explores the camaraderie of a campfire, the Sturgeons have taken a subtle and specific approach to portraying summer in our province. Crediting Winnipeg and Falcon Lake in the liner notes, their connection to their home is quite clear throughout the album, but the broader themes they touch on and the tight arrangements of each song will appeal to a wider audience as well. Overall, The Sturgeons have certainly continued down the already promising path they laid for themselves with The Wood Shop with the warm, refined sound of this album. (Independent, the-sturgeons. com) Danielle Marion

VAMPIRES Every Kind of Light These Winnipeg dudes released their self-titled debut in 2012 and it straight up kicked ass. Now we are treated to the awesomeness that is the four song EP Every Kind of Light. The EP opens with some nice

post-rock airy guitar followed by a crushing blow of crunchy guitars and relentless drumming on “Not Waiting ‘Till Fall.” The catchy shoegaze elements and full on noise are present in spades on epic instrumental track “Riff Rise” and in the distorted album closer “There’s No Kissing Anymore.”

The highlight of the album for me is “Winnipeg Song,” musically it is broken into these slower segments that erupt into Vampires signature distortion soaked sound, and then back into the cooing vocals and slow rock, and on top of it add some captivating lyrics. The instrumental track and the shifty “Winnipeg Song” really make for a great and diverse listen, yet somehow the EP flows really nicely yet at no point is the listener left idle.

An excellent teaser by a great local band, look for them live August 6th at the WECC! (Independent, vampiresband.bandcamp.com) Scott Wolfe

EAGLE LAKE OWLS Eagle Lake Owls Though this is the first release from Winnipeg trio Eagle Lake Owls, these kids are playing like pro’s and they’ve hit home with this one. An album that speaks to the vulnerable moments in life and on the prairies, it’s full of quick insights and witty lyrics, stories of independence and selfrevelation. These are clean-cut and sharp-tongued folk tunes that come together consistently and cohesively on the whole. Lead singer and guitarist Andy Cole is a poetic sharp shooter, singing a bit like an alt-folk Jeff Mangum. Cellist Nathan Krahn and multi-instrumentalist Dominique Lemoine complete the ensemble, combining incredible musicianship to make simple folk tunes complex and interesting. Opening track ‘The Dust Storm” crashes though your speakers with hard-blowing harmonica and sets the pace for the rest. “Eagle Lake Owls” is wonderfully vibrant and curious and if I could pick a favorite, I would but I can’t. It is just really really

good. To say it simply and honestly, I was having a really bad day when I listened to this - I felt a bit better afterwards. (Eagle Lake Owls) Victoria King

SURPRISE PARTY Heart of Love Kyle Loewen : “The worst part about being a Winnipeg band is that we have to be compared to Royal Canoe.”

- Stylus Interview January 2014.

Well, first off like Royal Canoe, Surprise Party are from Winnipeg. And obviously the members of Surprise Party are not the members of Royal Canoe. But, Royal Canoe, Royal Canoe, ROYAL CANOE. I just had to make that comparison. But comparisons are an apples and oranges thing, or maybe Surprise Party is more like hamburgers (all beef, sometimes vegan). They could easily fit on the Burger Records roster. The label they have joined is Shake! Records, which put out this record as a cassette. If you’re a vinyl snob, as of July you can get it that way as well. Surprise Party is formed by well practiced members of bands past and present: The Hoots, Summer of Legs, and Mahogany Frog.

The influences of these projects (pop, garage and psych, in different combinations each time) make for some really interesting tuneage, and Heart of Love proves very catchy. It starts to play in my head at any given moment. I’ll assume this is a good thing.

The album is never so monotonous to be cookie cutter boring, but not so disjointed to be mood destroying. It is summer after all and this came out at just the right time. On “It’s Okay,” perhaps you notice the coughing in the background on this cut, is it a happy accident or intentional? Whatever it may be, it punctuates the carefree vibe. It’s just pure fun.

P.S. If you’re a Baroque music/Metallica purist, this album is probably not for you. (Shake! Records, surpriseparty420.bandcamp.com) David Tymoshchuk

Aug/Sept 2014 Stylus Magazine

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Root Cellar

CORB LUND Counterfeit Blues The dozen tunes on Corb Lund’s latest, Counterfeit Blues, will be familiar to anyone who has been following Corb’s career since the demise of the smalls. But they may be unfamiliar to new fans, especially those who are turning on to the Hurtin’ Albertan(s) act down in Red Dirt country. As such, this is a beauty primer of some of the band’s live staples. But rather than just assemble a “best of ” from those early albums, Corb and the boys went into historic Sun Studios in Memphis and cut them all live off the floor.

That’s right, live off the floor in Sun Studios, the same way Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Carl Perkins done it. And while the live sound lacks the studio precision Corb’s albums hold, for the most part the songs come off sounding better for it. “Good Copenhagen,” “Hurtin’ Albertan,” and “Five Dollar Bill” are even more rousing than the originals, and the other nine aren’t far behind.

“Big Butch Bass Bull Fiddle” even sounds like it could have been cut

by Carl Perkins on the flipside of his original “Blue Suede Shoes.” And to make the pot even sweeter, the collection comes with a DVD of the Corb Lund Memphis Sun CMT special that was filmed at the time of recording.

If you caught Corb’s act at the Winnipeg Folk Fest this year, or Dauphin Countryfest a year back, but haven’t jumped into album ownership just yet, Counterfeit Blues is a great place to start. And if you been following the Hurtin’ Albertans all up and down the Hillbilly Highway for years, well, you won’t wanna miss this, either.

Giddyup! (New West, corblund. com) Sheldon Birnie DAVID VEST Roadhouse Revelation David Vest is an award winning jazz/blues pianist currently living in Canada, and we are lucky to have

20 Stylus Magazine Aug/Sept 2014

him! David comes from Alabama, has a history with some of the big names in blues like Big Joe Turner and Bo Diddley. When it comes to the piano, this guy is the real deal.

David’s most recent album, Roadhouse Revelation, has a ton of piano packed with a variety boogie-woogie, rock and roll, jazz, ragtime, blues, and country. There are some especially catchy and energy filled tracks on this album worth mentioning, “Streetcar” is an amazingly strange and haunting ragtime tune about a lost love and ghost streetcar. “Santa Fe Steamer” is a really great boogie piece with a ton of energy. “Crooked Politician” (my personal favorite), co-written with the late Paul deLay, is a timeless, entertaining, and highly memorable commentary on political corruption.

This is an all-around great album that definitely won’t be collecting any dust on my shelf. (Cordova Bay, davidvest. ca) Kacey Fields REX WEYLER Catch the Light This is the debut album by respected author, journalist and co-founder of Greenpeace International, Rex Weyler. Weyler has made his foray into music relatively late in life, and perhaps this accounts for the wide variety of influences that seem to be in play here, in terms of both style and content throughout the album.

While some of the songs follow fairly traditional country/roots structures, others, such as the opening track “I’ll Wait” abandon a chorus/verse structure altogether, becoming a more continuous narrative. He also showcases the range of his vocals throughout. In his higher registers, his voice is light and fluid amongst the instrumentation, such as on “If You Came By,” the first of many songs about love on the album. This is in sharp contrast with the grittier nature of his lower register, as heard on “How Do I Love You.” While love and nature are both recurring themes, Weyler does not shy away from politics either, with “Fallen Soldiers,” “Damascus Dawn,” and “Fifth of May” being the most clear examples. Despite the wide scope of the album, Weyler manages to achieve continuity between songs by focusing on the individual, even when he is talking about something as politically charged as the Troubles in Northern Ireland (“Fifth of May”). Catch the Light proves that Weyler still has a lot to say, and with the quality of this

country/roots release, we are lucky that music has provided another outlet for him. (Salmonberry, rexweyler. com) Danielle Marion

ROSIE JUNE Listening Post Listening Post, Rosie June’s debut album, was originally independently released in 2013. Inspired by what he heard, Brendan Canning of Broken Social Scene fame signed June to his independent record label, Draper Street Records, calling it one of his favourite albums of the year. June’s album certainly does fit into a similar aesthetic as Canning’s own work, and her work hopefully sets the tone for the type of music we can expect from his label. The album opens with “Broadway,” a standout track that signals to things to come as June’s vocals float over seamless synths and gentle, but bright, percussion. The first half of the album remains similarly upbeat, before tracks such as “Airport Lines” and “Lion on Your Side” reveal the more melancholic side of June’s voice. Here, percussion is pared down and the listener is invited into her reflections on relationships and loss amongst whimsical and lush arrangements. While comparable to other Canadian acts such as Montreal’s Stars or BSS, Listening Point remains unique and deserves the second chance that it will hopefully receive with Draper Street Records’ re-release. (Draper Street Records, rosiejune.com) Danielle Marion THE OTHER BROTHERS Everything Can Change After five years off The Other Brothers (Chris Neufeld, Donovan Giesbrecht, William J. Western) have released their second album. Everything Can Change is a quality roots/folk album, pure and simple. There’s some sweet pedal steel, acoustic guitar, and unique vocal harmonies throughout the entire album. A few notable tracks are “Many Ways To Love”, which

sounds like it has just a touch of Deathcab to it, and “3/4 Time,” which is catchy as hell, and has been stuck in my head for weeks. The only song on the album that is not an original is “Lady, Your Words Do Spite Me” (1598, No. 18 from the first set of Madrigals), which really shows off Chris and Donovan’s ability to harmonize. In fact, the only thing better than the album itself, is the clay art on the cover (which you can find more of on their website). To be honest, this album far surpassed any expectations I had when I first opened it. These guys are seriously talented. I fell in love with their simple and genuine sound and it hasn’t left my car stereo in a month. I’m definitely going to be keeping an eye out for when and where they are playing next. (Independent, theotherbrothers.ca) Kacey Fields CHUCK RAGAN Till Midnight When one thinks of Chuck Ragan, almost immediately Hot Water Music comes to mind. And rightfully so: that band fucking rules. However, Chuck’s signature rough growl not only has its place in punk, but also in the folk-rock and Americana stream, a genre that his solo offerings explore.

On his fourth release, Till Midnight, things seem a lot more upbeat than his previous releases. An all around fuller sound is present on this album, primarily due to heaps of musicians, from the likes of Lucero and Social Distortion to name a few, that aid in the rich sound. “Non-Typical” just oozes passion and the backing vocals and melodies from Revival Tour’s Jenny O make this a definite high point.

“Revved” keeps the intensity rolling and makes for one hell of a back-toback listen on the first half of this album. The back half of the album is just as great but the vibe seems to shift slightly, with the record’s potency focusing more on the theme of love (see tracks “Wake With You” and “You and I Alone”). One of my favorite numbers, “Gave My Heart Out,” creates a perfect transition from the fiercer initial half of the record to the more down tempo B-side. Regardless, Ragan owns all of these songs, from the intense anthems to the slow burners, and this makes for a dynamic and enjoyable summer listen. (Dine Alone, dinealonerecords.com) Scott Wolfe

Iconoclast

BISON One Thousand Needles The Vancouver juggernauts of metal are back and they have released their stellar new EP through the good folks over at War on Music. Though the EP only consists of two songs, each

clocks in at over nine minutes and is the first new material to surface since 2012’s pummeling Lovelessness. The songs are in true Bison form, each song being a living breathing dynamic beast, but the songs are a little toned down from Lovelessness. This is still Bison we are talking about though, so these songs could still melt your face, vaporize your eardrum and turn your cranium to dust, but clearly the extreme anger and darkness of Lovelessness has been turned down. As a result this EP is a far more accessible offering from the band. I honestly can not pick a favorite between the two tracks. “One Thousand Needles” has an awesome build and goes for the throat when the band unleashes and

vocalist James Farwell begins belting, but the main riff in “Calm, Friendly and Euthymic” absolutely slays. Either way, this band is super underrated and a great local label put this EP out, stop by the bands bandcamp or War on Music to get yours. (War on Music, waronmusic.com) Scott Wolfe MALACHAI Beyond Ugly You’ve got a certain type of music you listen to when you’re having a bad day, a certain type when you’re trying to get pumped up, and a certain type when you wanna lash out. This is one of those albums that is so versatile you can listen to it any time and

it will likely satisfy whatever audible cravings you are seeking. Beyond Ugly is this duo’s third album and their tunes are composed of electronic samples riding an indie bull through the streets of the 1960s, which are on fire. I listened to it while washing my dishes and now those dishes are awesome. Malachai takes the listener on a journey full with beginning, middle and end, but I won’t ruin it. So whether you’re doing drugs with your friends, punching holes in the walls, or skipping down Portage, press play on Beyond Ugly. Who knows? Maybe I’m not lying. (Domino Recording Co. dominorecordco.com/artists/ malachai/) Kaitlyn Emslie Farrell

Mental Notes OPEN MIKE EAGLE Dark Comedy If Open Mike Eagle’s self-coined “art rap” designation means anything, it’s that the same reflexive musing and deprecatory tone which often typifies stand-up comedy can also apply to hip hop music. Dark Comedy is the 33-year-old’s fourth full-length album and first in a three-record deal with Mello Music Group that sees him continue a streak of successful releases dating back to 2010’s Unapologetic Art Rap. Mike is a central member of LA’s strong independent rap scene (think Busdriver and Nocando) and, like his contemporaries, blends conventional hip hop elements with topical subject matter and idiosyncratic delivery. Opener “Dark Comedy Morning Show” is a mission statement and manifesto all in one.

Lamentations about the modern condition, internet “privacy” and the digital age rarely hit home so effectively:

“Cause Google knows what’s in my cabinet/And Facebook logs all of my favourite sandwiches/And what they need the damn data for/To analyze the shit they’d need a whole ‘nother labour force.” Mike’s rapping purposefully avoids fever pitch, but his deliberate tonal fluctuations and discreet melodies invite listeners to pay careful attention to what’s being said. The effect couples nicely with high production value from eleven different beat makers, and the heavy bass lines and swelling electronic effects provide a balance to more traditional sampling and cutting. Despite features from popular comedian Hannibal Buress (who supplies a hilarious verse on “Doug Stamper (Advice Raps)”) and Kool A.D. (formerly of Das Racist), Dark Comedy sounds and feels like a bold individual statement. It’s cleverly written, intelligently relevant and also one of the best hip hop albums of 2014. (Mello Music Group, mikeea-

gle.net) Harrison Samphir LEE FIELDS & THE EXPRESSIONS Emma Jean Listening back to Fields’ all-too-brief modern catalog, I’m left to marvel at how we’ve moved from the swagger of My World’s “Ladies” to the surrender of Emma Jean’s opener “Just Can’t Win.” Is this the same Lee Fields? The one once called “Little JB”? The one who owned the stage and wowed the crowd at Jazz Fest last year?

Yup. There were hints of this in the plaintive desperation of “My World Is Empty Without You” (and consider the fact that this title track was shortened to My World to hide said desperation). Two years after that record, Fields was “Still Hanging On” to hope on Faithful Man, but now we find the man pleading “Don’t Leave Me This Way” as Emma Jean draws to a close. I don’t know if Fields conceived of these three albums as a song-cycle,

but taken together they make a fascinating study of a lovelorn protagonist, baring his soul and burrowing deeper into his pain. While the cover art of Fields standing in a barren wintry field suggests he’s all alone, the singer is once again ably backed by The Expressions who – in the grand tradition of Motown’s Funk Brothers – show brilliance without overshadowing their frontman. Consider the organ that echoes Fields’ mournful moans on the J.J. Cale cover “Magnolia” and the way the guitar line nearly weeps with his sorrow. Love isn’t always happy, but Emma Jean serves as a reminder of the value of slogging through the sadness. Fields and his love can’t see “Eye To Eye” but he’s still “the man you made me.” There’s hope for him yet. (Truth & Soul, truthandsoulrecords.com) Michael Elves

All That Jazz!

BADBADNOTGOOD III Dark smokey clouds twist and contort as ‘Triangle’ introduces BADBADNOTGOOD’s lastest release ‘III’.

The clouds open to reveal a fresh take on the soundscape of your father’s

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swanky cigar-smelling jazz. Winding piano guides you through the opening tune, as eerie sinister tones are braided throughout with deep, tangible, soft ones. Its full of lush curves and an entrancing snare-synth rhythm. This music is moody - dark

but not bleak, hazy and not foggy, ‘III’ is affecting and striking. ‘Confessions’ is a favourite on this release. Leland Whitty plays sax and does it just so damn good. This is the third release from BBNG. Recorded at their home studio, the Toronto 3-piece fit ‘III’

snugly into their discography – full of hip hop beats, hypnotic and enticing jazz. Overall the whole sound of the album is gorgeous and instrumentally articulate. (Pirates Blend Records/ badbadnotgood.bandcamp.com/) Victoria King

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Ulteriors YOUNG MAGIC Breathing Statues Picture a bunch of Buddhist monks at a party, breakdancing to 70s urban hip-hop samples. Now imagine that all of this is taking place at the bottom of the ocean (like, in one of those futuristic underwater domes) and you might begin to get an idea of what this album sounds like. Re-

corded in Morocco, France, the Czech Republic, Australia, Iceland, and New York, Breathing Statues truly is a unique cross-cultural musical experience. On “Fall In,” short bursts of sitar mingle with Harlem-style bass and drums. Bookended by lush solo harp, “Holographic” transports the listener to a paradisiacal Eastern waterfall scene. “Waiting For The Ground To

Open,” with its odd-meter djembe and wood block accompaniment, elicits an ancient taiko drum circle.

There are many more exotic sounds to experience on this sonic travelogue.

Young Magic proves to be capable of producing highly listenable – often melancholic – electronic music, and the beats will find even the most obstinate opponent to electronic music

bobbing their heads in wonder. Perhaps one drawback of the album is that the vocals are often incomprehensible, but this nevertheless adds to the “aurally aquatic” atmosphere. (Last Gang Records, youngmagicsounds. com) Phil Enns

changing/Yeah, once you got it, you want something else.” A balanced pop record with R&B inclinations “What Is This Heart?” achieves unlikely clarity amid deeply personal reflections. By opening a window into his intimate, subconscious spaces, Krell guides listeners to confront their own innermost being. The results are unashamedly beautiful. (Domino/ Weird World, dominorecordco.com) Harrison Samphir

and listen to this on a boombox?

(Outside/Jagjaguwar, outside-music. com) Sheldon Birnie

Under the Needle

OWEN PALLETT In Conflict Unsettled strings introduce the first song on Owen Pallett’s second solo album, a decidedly more autobiographical collection of songs than his first.

He even mentions himself by name several times (“Owen where were you to stop the fire?”). It’s full of wistful violin, contrasting playfulness with grittiness. In the title track he sings of black hearts, a shadow of violence and an inverted car.

Pallett wanes angst, singing of being childless at 30 and never having children (“I would bear them and confuse them, my children”). And he seems haunted by his own childhood, “a kid without a heart my chest an empty cavity a hole to be filled by the multitudes around me,” he sings.

Instrumentals weave through staccato strings (“Soldiers Rock”), faraway vocals (“The Riverbed”) and are sometimes even reminiscent of a Disney princess movie soundtrack. But you won’t find yourself slipping into “happily ever after” too quickly. As soon as Pallett opens his mouth he reminds us where we really are—his black and bloody, though beautiful, inner world.

This Polaris short-listed album is versatile, perfect for a frantic bike ride or evening of soul searching. (Domino Recording Co, owenpalletteternal. com) Meghan Mast

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HOW TO DRESS WELL “What Is This Heart?”

How to Dress Well is the musical project of Tom Krell, a former PhD philosophy student with an elegant falsetto and a fixation on difficult emotions – especially those dealing with loss, death and heartbreak.

In 2009 Krell began issuing digital EPs and singles until the release of his first record, Love Remains, a year later. His debut full-length was an ambient/electronic outgrowth of the (dubious) PBR&B genre, a classification meant to encompass contemporary acts like the Weeknd, Frank Ocean and Miguel. Now on his third album, “What Is This Heart?” – in quotes like Bowie’s “Heroes” – Krell has opted for a more traditional pop aesthetic that sees the evolution of a previously minimalist sonic palette into one with more rhythm and less fuzz. What hasn’t changed, though, is the songwriting. Krell’s devotion to airy vocals about relationships, passion and deceased best friends shifts from ruminative to painfully fatalistic. On “Repeat Pleasure,” a standout single, stirring chants about lost love build to a powerful chorus over staccato guitar: “Oh if you want it, guess you want it all baby/But once you got it you want something else/Even if you’re holding out for something un-

PINK MOUNTAINTOPS Get Back Brainchild of ex-pat Vancouverite Stephen McBean, Pink Mountaintops’ latest, Get Back is a tidy little package of glam inspired, vaguely psychedelic pop nuggets. Like, if you dig T-Rex, Berlin-period Bowie, Roxy Music, and Lou Reed (obvs), then this could be right up your alley.

Despite wearing these influences on his sleeve, McBean does homage up the right way, making unmistakable allusions throughout, yet never just aping the greats. The lead track, “Ambulance City,” is a perfect example of this; a compact yet sprawling sounding pseudo-krautrocker with repeat reference as the song closes to “Station to Station,” one of Bowie’s best (in my humble opinion). “The Second Summer of Love” is an ode to getting stoned in 1987, listening to “Dayglo tapes” in Oak Bay and fucking shit up.

With only one misstep (“North Hollywood Microwaves”), which may not even be a misstep if you’re high on the right mix of whippets and downers, Get Back is a great little album from an artist who just keeps pumping out the goods. This one is going to see a lot of play on the campus/community charts, and rightfully so. Now, who wants to go get weird under a bridge

KUATO The Great Upheaval In 2014, if a band allows itself to be marketed as “post-rock” a few assumptions are natural. The band name will be weird, they will play lots of driving instrumentals, and they are probably confident enough to write a concept album without any words.

Kuato, a quintet hailing from hailing from Halifax, ticks off all the boxes mentioned above but that is not a dismissal. Their debut full-length effort, The Great Upheaval, is a set of instrumentals inspired by the story of the Acadians being expelled from the band’s home province. Virtually all of the seven tracks feature a gradual build to a boisterous crescendo.

However, most get there by way of distinct paths so there is a fair bit of range here. Tones amble from surfy to sludgy to sparse, often all in the same track. Many listeners will lack the synesthetic wiring to piece together the underlying narrative without big clues, but this record seems to make the most emotional headway in its darkest corners. The closing outburst of “Groundwork” is one of the highlights of the entire disc, though it takes a little while to arrive. Later on,

the furious “Ripped From the Soil” helps explain the cover imagery, while “Battle of Bloody Creek” follows with just the violence it suggests.

Kuato does not seem to be reinventing any wheels, but they can hardly be accused of merely spinning them either. If modern instrumental rock is your bag, make some space for this one. (Acadian Embassy, kuatoband. com) Daniel Emberg

FROM FICTION Bloodwork This pop rock album is just that, pop rock. Bloodwork is From Fiction’s only release thus far. It’s not like they’re bad musicians but frankly I’m not drawn in. If I had to place this album on a life timeline I think it’d best fit into a lonely 14 year old boy’s MP3 player. He’d tell all his friends of this great band. When he stopped talking

about them and listening to them it wouldn’t be because he realized how terrible they are, it’s just that he forgot. I don’t blame him. If you were to dissect Bloodwork you’d probably just leave it dissected. It’d be guitar, drums, bass and vocals. No surprises. It’s not all bad though. If you’re looking for aggressive although tame, study or house cleaning music, something you can listen to without getting caught up in, Bloodwork is probably a top pick. They’re just not my thing, ya know? (Last Gang Records, lastgangentertainment.com) Kaitlyn Emslie Farrell

LEE BAINS III & THE GLORY FIRES Dereconstructed “Real Alabama rock n roll” is how the Glory Fires describe themselves, and they’re spot on with that. Raw, rollicking riffs and driving rhythms, with a bit of punk rock grit thrown in for

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good measure, form the backbone of these ten tunes. Bains’ lyrics are in the southern tradition of rock n roll storytelling, much like the rawest moments in the Drive-By Truckers catalogue.

From the anti-authoritarian rantings of “Company Man,” to the damning take on America’s colonial history in “What’s Good and Gone,” Bains’ lyrics are delivered from the heart, over a wall of squealing guitars, with the aplomb of a southern preacher. Religious imagery itself makes its way into the lyrics throughout the entire record, as though Bains & the Glory Fires are either driven by demons, the Holy Ghost, or some unholy combination of both. The closing number, “Dirt Track,” is a rollicking peaen to redeeming nature of southern rock and stock car racing. If you’re standing around this summer, drinking cold ones with the sleeves cut off your shirt, and you’re looking to crank the party into rowdier territory, consider throwing on Dereconstructed and turn her up to 11. See you out on the dirt track, buddy. Cheers. (Sub Pop, thegloryfires.com) Sheldon Birnie BEN WATT Hendra Best known for being one half of the breezy 90s dance-pop duo Everything But The Girl, Ben Watt’s first

solo album in over thirty years marries dark themes with a mix of ethereal folk-rock and riffs grungy enough for the likes of Neil Young & Crazy Horse. Lyrically, the album wrestles with themes of regret, the death of loved ones, and the unrelenting passage of time on tracks like “Forget,” “Matthew Arnold’s Field” and “Young Man’s Game.” However, this is not to say that Hendra is without its bright spots. “Golden Ratio,” one of the album’s bouncier tracks, finds Watt grasping for life’s seemingly unattainable beauty atop a smooth, jazzy bed of Fender Rhodes, upright bass, and congas. Hendra’s tasteful use of Moog and ARP synthesizers, among other electronic sounds, could draw comparisons to the more gentle moments of post-Syd Barrett Pink Floyd. It’s fitting, then, that Floyd’s own David Gilmour makes a guest appearance playing slide guitar on the track, “The Levels.”The album ends on a decidedly hopeful note, with Watt urging the listener – and perhaps himself – not to lose sight of life’s simple beauty when faced with ordeals: “Open up your arms tonight/ Open up and hold her tight/ Because most of this stuff/ Is just happening in your own head.” (Caroline, benwatt.com) Phil Enns

Aug/Sept 2014 Stylus Magazine

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fear of music

This Stephen Patrick is No Morrissey

by Devin King

July 2014 sees the release of Morrissey’s latest and

perhaps most Morrissian-titled album to date: World Peace is None of Your Business. Morrissey the Performer has always demanded a closer critical review, as his actions and words – both in his music and outside of the music itself – are a closely scripted characterization of Morrissey the Character.

More than ever, with this latest release, there is an evident slipping of the curtain to reveal Morrissey himself rather than Morrissey the Character. This later period Morrissey seems to be, intentionally or not, dropping many of the idiosyncrasies that define the Morrissey character.

Without making this a review of the latest album, it is worth noticing some of the changes between the Morrissey of The Smiths and his early solo output. These changes appear most evidently in the lyrics to these latest songs as well as in Morrissey’s mannerisms themselves. Any analysis of Morrissey should refer to Gavin Hopps’ work on the subject, Morrissey: The Pageant of His Bleeding Heart, a masterful work that clearly illuminates the very things that make Morrissey Morrissey.

Hopps applies a quote from Henry James regarding Oscar Wilde to the work of Morrissey: “the singer’s lyrics are a trap for the literalist.” Traditionally, this has been true in Morrissey’s work. Using “Sweet and Tender Hooligan” as an example, Hopps describes how the narrative voice is complicated by the lyrical content, the ironizing accents of an exterior perspective. Which is to say, the ironic way in which the lyrics are sung are contrary to the subject matter which seem more sympathetic to the “old man” written in the song. A literal reading of this song is thusly complicated.

An important aspect of Morrissey’s early work is its sense of play, with words, sound and meaning.

Even if Morrissey isn’t trying to have a uniform message he’s trying to get across to the listener, he can often be characterized as seemingly toying with the listener’s sense of meaning or expectation. Though not universally true (“Meat is Murder” is a good example to the contrary) we find that this latest album has Morrissey dropping some of this sense of play for a more literal approach to songwriting.

The opening track, “World Peace is None of Your Business,” details several atrocities committed by governments and informs the reader that “every time you vote you support the process.” Like the Old Man Yelling at a Cloud, in his age Morrissey seems to have become more blunt in his politics. That is most evident in his strongest political passion, animal rights, which inform several of the tracks here.

“The Bullfighter Dies,” includes the lyrics “the bull-

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fighter dies / and nobody cries / because everyone wants the bull to survive,” which seems especially lazy in contrast to other Moz lyrics, not simply for its obvious and approximate rhymes. Had “Cemetry Gates” been written this way, it would have went “I stole the words from Wilde / because his diction drives me wild.”

More than just lyrically, the sense of play from Morrissey’s utterances seem more absent here than before. The groaning, altering, yodeling, sarcasm and interjections are largely abandoned on this record. That is, the “staged ineptitude” of his singing is gone, in favour of a more straightforward singing style (matching the straightforward, modern rock production.) Hopps provides the “sacrificial” nature that Morrissey sings the words “live or die” on “Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now,” in contrast to how the rest of the lyrics are sung. The melisma-byway-of-yodelling that is a signature way in which Morrissey has sung (think “what difference does it

may-ay-ayyyke”) is almost completely absent. Both lyrically and in performance, a consistent trend on this album is a shying away from a sense of play or camp and towards the literal voice which he has rejected so often in the past.

This too is perhaps in line with critical evaluations of Morrissey. Hopps notes that “writing about Morrissey feels a little like Monty Python’s ‘Spanish Inquisition’ sketch, as one is forever having to back up and begin again to take in some additional, often contradictory perspective.” And so it may be that the Morrissey of 2014 isn’t so interested in the projection of a character that he has been presenting in the past. Largely, the Morrissey that we all know and many love is a finely honed series of idiosyncrasies through the lens of a playful spirit. The Stephen Patrick of World Peace is None of Your Business is not Morrissey, or at least the Morrissey we have always loved. Which perhaps makes it the most Morrissey album of all.

95.9 FM CKUW CAMPUS/COMMUNITY RADIO TOP 30 ALBUMS (May 23, 2014 – July 28, 2014) !=LOCAL CONTENT * =CANADIAN CONTENT re=RE-ENTRY TO CHART

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Artist The Zags Vampires Dirty Catfish Brass Band Dub Rifles Surprise Party Chad VanGaalen Potatoes Fucked Up Corb Lund Mariachi Ghost Pink Mountaintops Tanya Tagaq Thievery Corporation Shelley Harland Greys tUnE-yArDs Kristy Thirsk Steven Vitali Owen Pallet Laura Sullivan Blisters BADBADNOTGOOD Psychotic Gardening The Fresh and Onlys London Grammar Poemss Mogwai Treeline & Shaela Miller Ought Ema

RECORDING

Album Stop The World Every Kind Of Light Brass Riot

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Label Self-Released Self-Released Self-Released No Town, No Country: 1981 - 1984 Sundowning Sound Heart Of Love Shake!

Shrink Dust Flemish Eye Cut Self-Released Glass Boys Arts & Crafts Counterfeit Blues New West The Mariachi Ghost Self-Released Get Back Outside Animism Six Shooter Saudade Eighteenth Street Lounge The Girl Who Cried Wolf Self-Released If Anything Buzz Nikki Nack 4AD Phoenix Self-Released Language Of The Soul Self-Released In Conflict Secret City Love’s River Self-Released Are You Awake Self-Released III Pirates Blend Hymnosis Self-Released House Of Spirits Mexican Summer If You Wait Columbia Poemss Planet Mu Rave Tapes Sub Pop Curtains Self-Released More Than Any Other Day Constellation The Future’s Void Matador

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