Scene and Heard with Will McGuirk

Zolas Live Stream

The Zolas are live streaming their drive to Oshawa. The band from Vancouver are playing with Hotel Royal tonight and it should be interesting. The Groove has changed things around inside, switching the stage and the DJ booth and moving the pool tables back. A more intimate setting has been created and at last night's gig with Jack DeKeyser the set up worked really well.

WEBSITE

LIVE STREAM

Neil Young Official Release Series - Vinyl 1-4

I think I'd like to go.... and buy this!

This is from Thrashers Wheat blog. Don't forget the Oshawa CD/ Vinyl Record show runs tomorrow at the CDN Legion on Simcoe. Lots of Neil Young paraphernalia there I bet.

D-Rock news roundup

Pete Carmichal of the Diableros is interviewed at Canoe. The band which we may see a whole lot of real soon have also released a video for Old Story, Fresh Road.

CANOE


NOW Magazine have video of Blue Rodeo's recent rooftop gig. Wayne Petti of Cuff The Duke joined the band for the free and fun outing. Blue Rodeo will play the GM Centre in March. I had hoped Cuff The Duke would open but its the Dustin Bentall Band. CTD are scheduled to play the Groove Lounge November 28th.

NOW TUBE

Brendan Canning of Broken Social Scene is the featured artist online at City Sonic. He speaks of his relationship with the Drake Hotel. The interview is part of a series involving artists and the spaces in Toronto that are meaningful to them. It is a fantastic ongoing visual documentary.

CITY SONIC

The Oshawa Record Show runs Sunday November 15 at the Royal Canadian Legion #43 on south Simcoe. Doors open 10am. Vendors from all over Ontario meet up here to buy and sell and for any vinylphile its a must.

Anyone in Hamilton can check out the CD release party for Design Hope on Sunday at This Ain't Hollywood on James Street. The disc features Winter and Christmas themed songs by many of the Hammer's finest songwriters. Bob Bryden is involved. Proceeds go to the homeless. The gig is all ages.

WEBSITE

Lake Ontario Waterkeepers have been working with some of Canada's finest musicians to bring awareness to their cause...the rehabilitation of Lake Ontario for fishing, swimming and as a source clean water. The SwimDrinkFish Music Club is their house online and this month's featured artist is Gord Downie of the Tragically Hip with The Sadies. They cover Randy Newman's Lousiana 1927.

WEBSITE

Which brings us to this... Andre Williams & His Sadies, Bloodshot Bill, CATL play the Legendary Horseshoe Tavern Thursday November 19. That is pure rock n roll mayhem right there ladies and gents....take the roof off right now. Tickets are $18 at the door. This is an ATG/ CTM Tag Team presentation. Nice work Mayor, nice work.

ANDRE WILLIAMS
BLOODSHOT BILL
CATL
COLETRAIN MUSIC

Alan Cross the once much respected musicologist of the once much respected CFNY Radio station will be coming to UOIT Friday November 27 for a special lecture.  Its at 10 am so I doubt any musicians will be there.
But seriously folks... Cross is one hugely important individual in Canadian and International pop music. He will be speaking on the uses of the new media for bands etc and as a chap who has parlayed his brand into radio, TV, print and online he is definitely someone to learn from. So his station plays lottsa crap and pays lip service to indie...you know whatever...get over it. We all have to pay the bills. Right.
The lecture is presented by Riot Radio.

ALAN CROSS

Audio Blood and Third Estate present Jingle Bell Rock (sounds familiar) at The Legendary Horseshoe Tavern December 12th. On No Forest Fires, Make Your Exit, Clothes Make The Man, The Balconies are booked. Door is $7

WEBSITE

Niki Andre is back (whoo hoo) with some new songs for everyone. There is a medley of them on her website. She has been working with Woto Nyomba, Jesse Bear, Roger Sader, Dan Reiff, Calvin Beale, Peter Jones and Ricky Tillo. I'm looking forward to that record.

WEBSITE

Also I have heard from another local fave Mr. Lee Mellor who informs me he has been down in Toronto working on his new record. Finally. He has roped Ms. Trish Robb in on a track or two.

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Mariposa Folk Festival will celebrate 50 years in 2010. The fest which runs July 9 - 11 up in Tudhope Park, Orillia will close out with Ian Tyson and Sylvia Tyson. Early Bird tickets are on sale already but the price will rise come December.

WEBSITE

Matt Dusk tonight at Class Act in Whitby

MATT DUSK WEBSITE

A new generation of leaders

Benefit for McLaughlin LEADERSHIP CAMP featuring

FRANCOIS CHOQUETTE
HOWIE SUTHERLAND
WADE MOSHER/ ROGER BRANTON
( With a little help from their Friends! )
 
Saturday NOVEMBER 14th / 7pm Door ( 7 - 1 am)
ISABELLA'S CHOCOLATE CAFE
19 Simcoe Street, South - Oshawa
www.isabellas.ca
$6. per ticket.
To register on the guest list & confirm your ticket e-mail
raise_a_leader@hotmail.com

 
All proceeds raised from the door to support The Leadership Camp which is four days of group activities, workshops and recreation time for students. Its quite popular at the school but the cost is prohibitive at $250 per student. Funds raised here will go towards offsetting those costs.

Oshawa's Wayne Petti joins Blue Rodeo for FREE gig

Blue Rodeo - FREE show....on the rooftop of the Diesel Playhouse in Toronto...2:30 pm... November 10. The Diesel is at 55 Blue Jays Way. The band will be joined by Julie Fader and Cuff The Duke's Wayne Petti who contributed vocals on Blue Rodeo's new double disc Things We Left Behind.

Oshawa Music Scene - R.I.P.

I posted last week as I said after spending sometime in Rileys and seeing how well they are doing. I think the closing of the Green Bottle supports my contention that there is no money to be made in our scene. Or at least not enough to support a seven day venue.
So now what? I guess each one of us will have to answer that for ourselves. Why do we need a venue? What have we been working towards and for? Does it help anyone when a band plays in a half empty hall for free.
Each band can play with any other band anytime they want to make it happen. They don't need a bar for that. Music is recorded so each of us can hear Jonas, Micronites, Jeff or the Stables anytime we like. We dont even have to pay for it. Its online.
So why do we need a venue?
Between us we can make the Shwaltz, Pellypalooza, Woodlawn so why do we need a venue?
What is it that we want? Is it just being lazy to want bands to play for us here when the Montreal House and the Horseshoe are just over half an hour's drive away. Are we being cheap? Poor? What did we want the Green Bottle to do for us that would have encouraged us to visit more? What exactly is it that folks want here? Convenience? Who benefits from a venue?
I've put on gigs. Baby Eagle for one. I sorted it so he could play Matt Holtby's open mic at Johnny Bs. Baby Eagle got paid. I didn't. I got to hear in person a pretty cool set from a pretty cool guy. But I could have just gone to the 'Shoe to see him. I didn't have to do all of that. A handful of folks came out so I'm pretty sure the bar lost money. Perhaps that's another loss for them leading ultimately to their closing. Am I helping anyone by putting on shows. Are you? So why did I do it? How did it help Baby Eagle or Matt or Johnny Bs. It didn't so what was the point?
Shotgun Jimmie gets a gig in Oshawa tonight. Its at the Diesel Room. BA Johnston is there too. Its a make-good for the cancelled Bottle gig. Who benefits? Does BA? I'm pretty sure Shotgun isn't thrilled on it.
Cuff The Duke have their make-good at the Groove. How will that be. I'm not looking forward to it I can say that for sure. What is the point of continuing to fool ourselves and our friends in local bands and other bands that's there's a reason to stop in Durham?
I think this is a very good time to look at ourselves as promoters and as an audience and ask ourselves what we are doing right and wrong? I think bands should be moving out of here if they are serious about being professional. There's no money here. Period. Its even crossed my mind that bands should boycott all local gigs until we prove ourselves a worthy audience.
We've lost the Green Bottle, the Dungeon, the Regent, Velvet Elvis, Chicago's, Hare n the Hound, Black Cup, Johnny Bs, Wingshack...all places for live music. We can't blame City Hall or bad management for it. We need to look at ourselves this time.
In real terms there are not enough like-minded music lovers in the area to support a venue. The Green Bottle was built specifically as a house for music. That was the business plan. They filled our need but we didn't fill their bar (except for that crazy drink 'em dry Shwaltz/Grand Opening PARRRRTY!!!)
I think if we really want to support our musicians we could save our dollars and carpool it to Toronto and be there for them in the Big Smoke. I'm pretty sure when Heather Luckhart plays the Liberty Bistro or when Bradley Boy plays the Dakota they would be thrilled to have a gang of familar Shwakats in the audience. I can fit seven in my van.

Life is Slim Twig Wailin'

Slim Twig who is just the most gone music kat out there is releasing Volume Two of his Mixtape series. Taking his cues from Lil Wayne and The Clips Slim Twig is moving in a mostly  hip-hop direction working with Toronto's D-Sisive as well as experimenting with an even more abstract approach than his Paper Bag Records debut Contempt!

All the details are at the Paper Bag Records site

The Wailin' Jennys (pictured) are busy working on a new record but fans can look forward to an early present from Heather Masse who will release her solo album Bird Song on Red House Records. Ruth Moody is also working on her solo record but the release date for that is February. The Wailin' Jennys record has a Spring release date.
The band issued their debut live album last July, a disc the Winnipeg Free Press describes as giving "their angelic harmonies full flight on covers of Emmylou Harris's Deeper Well, Gillian Welch's One More Dollar, even Gershwin's Summertime and the old spiritual Motherless Child.” Live At The Mauch Chunk Opera House is available on Outside Records.

MYSPACE WEBSITE

Our pals in Hostage Life are blogging that they are disbanding due to internal personal and personnel problems.

MYSPACE WEBSITE

Blue Rodeo/ Gordon Lightfoot gigs

Blue Rodeo have March 5 pencilled in on their website for a gig at the GM Centre in Oshawa. The band are touring their new double disc The Things We Left Behind.  Wonder who will open?
Gordon Lighfoot is touring...he will play the John Labatt Centre in London which may mean he will play their sister venue in Oshawa...but probably not. Lighfoot is at Massey Hall November 18, 19, 20 & 21.
Woodpigeon and Analog Bell Service have collaborated on Lightfoot's Summer Side Of Life....take it away boys (girls) ...

Download Summer_side_of_life

Exclaim mag is reporting Julie Doiron, Fred Squires and Daniel Romano (Attack In Black) have a new project recorded and set for release.

STORY HERE

On the Origin of the Species - Rockstar Canadianus!

Not sure if the BSS gathering at Harbourfront last Friday was a stich 'n bitch or a circle of jerks putting the BS back in but I did find it curiously smug. Kevin Drew, Brendan Canning, Stuart Berman, host Ben Rayner from The Star, producer Dave Newfeld and A& C founder Jeffery Remedios spoke and argued about the relevance of Berman's biography of Broken Social Scene...and it was noted that the Canadian scene is under-documented so that regardless of the value of the book as bio the fact that things were recorded in print was enough although Newfeld felt differently as he wasn't particularly happy with how he came across in its pages.
I have an issue with the idea that Canada's past music scenes are not documented. They are. Perhaps not in some corporate commercial manner which validates the work for some at some levels but there are hundreds of fanzines from the punk era and before all ably written and produced by folks who spent a whole lot of their own time and their own money turning folks onto what they believed folks should be turned onto.
Today blogging is all but free but back in the day one had to leave one's basement, buy records, go to shows, take photographs, talk to bands, type, cut and paste, print and stitch each individual element that went into those lost labours of love and then drive or walk or cycle to the few places that would take them including covering Toronto. And those folks will never be thanked and yes I speak of myself here and others from the ShwaRock scene who have contributed quite a lot to Toronto's present position as King Of The Hill.
Its become so easy today to be a fan that folks have chosen to forget what an investment being a fan of an unknown or indie band was even just a decade ago. Yeah it was work and while a lot of older bands are being thankfully re-issued and rediscovered musicians shouldn't forget the folks who were there when they started out. They owe them nothing but acknowledgement would be nice.
But its the way of the word that the backwaters of this country get slighted even as we continue to produce major talents. As I sat watching the proceedings I wrangled together how few degrees actually separated BSS from SHWA yet it's light years in physical terms as those who moved on from Durham Region rarely look back and visit less.
While there are many personal connections with the BSS crew and others on that stage lets just look at Remedios' Arts & Crafts label... Timber Timbre, Evening Hymns, Forest City Lovers. D'Urbervilles are distributed or signed by the label.
Fans get shortchanged enough by the music industry but I think its a bit rich that we get written out of the official story too. Each and every word ever written about a band is yet another step towards the goal of greater exposure for musicians, greater access and a greater piece of the pie. Berman's book is another document but its not the only one and even authorised by the band tag its not the most important one. The most important one will be the one written by the fans.