Space Jam Sweeping

In a two-story house on a quiet street in Osborne Village live Lucas Nixon, Ben Adolph, and Aidan Klapprat. When these housemates duck under a large, metal “No Trespassing” sign and descend into their basement, they enter the domain of Sweeping, an up-and-coming post-rock group. This house they moved into at the end of October has proven to be not only a convenient jam space for the trio but crucial for the development and connection of the band.

“It’s easier to get into each other’s heads – in a good way,” says Aidan, the band’s bassist. “Even just understanding how we live together, that really brings a whole lot more to this space. We’re kind of intertwined a lot more now.”

It’s been a huge step up from their previous situation – lugging all their gear back and forth between their parents’ houses. They agree that the past couple of months have felt much more natural and cohesive than ever.

Sweeping’s instruments are situated in a circle around a large, soft rug, guarding socked feet from the frigid concrete floor. “We split it,” says Lucas, vocalist and one of the guitarists. “We were all so stoked, like, ‘we have to get the nice rug.’” “We all wanna be touching the rug when we play,” adds Ben, the other guitarist.

A drum kit sits in the corner, the kick drum covered in stickers, and the rest of the drums covered in shirts, mats, and a toque – anything to keep the noise down.

“Even though we have the drums,” Lucas explains, “we don’t want to play them too much because we don’t want to get noise complaints” – the absence of which is necessary for Sweeping’s jam space to remain in the house. “It works that we don’t officially have a drummer.”

“It definitely feels funny trying to store other things here, where it’s just such a musical space,” says Lucas. “The basement before was just a lot of stuff.”

Most of this stuff – cans of paint, various screens, a couple boards, standard rental basement fare – has been distributed between the junk corner next to the furnace and the slightly unsettling root cellar, which they generally avoid.

“We were thinking of hiding a friend in there to jump out at the end,” Aidan tells me, the other bandmates laughing.

One of the sole non-musical items in the Sweeping jam space is a VHS box set of the second season of The Sopranos. “It’s the best thing we have in this basement,” declares Ben. “Someone could come and steal all of our gear, and as long as they left that, we’re ok.”

Lucas’ guitar pedals are laid out on an old beat-up skateboard deck. “I’ve been wanting to upgrade it to an actual pedalboard for a while, but I get a lot of compliments on it at shows,” he says.

As may be suggested by the skateboard, Sweeping is by no means made up of gear purists – they play what sounds cool, and whatever gets them there is more than adequate for them.

“My pedal setup is really stupid,” Ben laughs. “I don’t even really know what I’m doing, but I like the way it sounds.”

His Roland FC-200 MIDI foot controller is perhaps the band’s pride and joy.

“This thing’s sweet for live shows because I have the MIDI hooked up to my sampler, so I can just hit one of these when I want the drums to kick in,” he explains. “Instead of hitting a button and then getting ready to play, I can just go right into it.”

Sweeping has been focusing on live shows as of late, but they’re hoping to begin recording music beyond their several existing SoundCloud demos and the one-ofone 4-track tape they gifted Chad VanGaalen last winter. Whatever the band ends up doing, as they continue to sweep the Winnipeg music scene, their basement will undoubtedly keep playing a foundational role.