Fembots/ Wendy McNeil

 

Calling Out
Fembots
Weewerk

I'm a big fan of Toronto's Fembots and their piecemeal approach to the rock'n roll, using instruments that can best be described as castouts from Tom Waits' boneyard. Junkstruments, they call 'em. Their last album, The City, still finds its way onto my player. Gilded Age in particular and its jaunty gospel overtones rawks!
Their latest, Calling Out, also rawks! It's a much tougher record, meaty, beefy. The track, Hand Print In Wet Cement, cuts through on a swirling groove. What the band hasn't lost in this louder-than-bombs approach is its gospel leanings. The vocabulary of spirituality is constant and religions are examined.
The duo Brian Poirier (brawn) and Dave McKinnon (brain) are joined by some familiar to the Durham scene... Nathan Lawr, who was in at one of the last shows at the V'Elvis, Bryden Baird, ex-Oshawa, is on horns here and Paul Aucoin also appears.

A Dreamers Guide To Hardcore Living
Wendy McNeil
Six Shooter

The title is a clue to the verbosity and vivacity of the transplanted Edmontonian now with a Swedish address. Think Emily Haines' solo work but substitute that tinkling piano for an accordion, celesta, toy piano, drums... toss in some tack piano, pump organ flutes and zithers and the resemblance blurs somewhat. But this is an artist reared on an avant garde diet as was Haines, daughter of poet Paul, so I'm sticking with it. Like Mark Berube, recently reviewed here, those poets have a certain affinity for Parisian cabaret and warm orchestral wood. Her nursery rhyme rhythms belie the complexities in the lyrics... "She cries for the animals, sings for the boys/ inhales disparity, chokes on the choice." from Lutetia.