Remember Milk Bone dog biscuits? Those were cool. They were so cool, in fact, that I used to trick my little sister into eating them as though they were special kinds of candy. Those were good times. But, that was then and…
…this is about the time to kick right into timinganddelivery soundcheck #3:
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Radio Citizen (Berlin Serengeti) – what can I say about Radio Citizen? Niko Schabel is the guy behind the curtain and unlike Oz, this guy is legit. With more moving pieces than a Rubix cube, Schabel offers up killer grooves, dirty samples, trance like beat patterns, and the haunting vocals of Bajka. Radio Citizen’s ‘The Hop‘ absolutely blew me away at first listen and left me wanting more (like the Milk Bone example…but better).
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Wintersleep (Welcome to the Night Sky) – after I first laid my ears on Wintersleep, I felt like standing up and singing O Canada! Yeah, that’s right…Wintersleep is from Canada’s east coast (Nova Scotia, to be exact), and were 2008 Juno Nominees. I think ‘rock gospel’ (two words I bastardized from the itunes site) is a fair classification for most of the songs I’ve heard to date (Welcome to the Night Sky is their third album, released in October 2007) and probably belongs stapled to their front-runner from this album, ‘Weighty Ghost‘. Nice to see some hard working lads north of the 49th parallel (not this 49th parallel) make it! -
Stars (Set Yourself on Fire) – we’re going to stay up North (this time traveling to Montreal) and focus on another Canadian band that’s made some snow angels on the music scene, Stars. Again, another Juno Nominee (2005), Stars is a buffet of melodic and catchy musical anecdotes. I refer to their music in this way because the lyrics almost make one think of their own high school/university/community college/whatever romances. Set amongst hypnotizing melodies, Stars can get some pretty big messages out there and generate some powerful emotions: ‘Calendar Girl’ flirts with the issue of suicide whilst ‘Ageless Beauty’ will leave you in that happy, happy, joy, joy state of mind. Stars’ ability to change the channel and still pound out the material makes them great, in my view. C’est bon!
We stand on guard for thee..
darren
If you’re looking for some other great Canadian bands you’ll have to know about The Constantines, from Guelph, and The Wheat Pool, from Edmonton. Both will rock you socks.
And of course, you must already know The Weakerthans. If not, take a shallow breath and run yourself into the ocean at low tide.