A power trio gone rogue, Montreal-based Just Got Death (JGD) matches the ingot-hard guitar flanges of Sam Shalabi with the surging bass thumps of Jonah Fortune and the nimble percussion accents of Michel F. Côté in a program of seven originals that ricochets between punk-metal energy and sophisticated improvisation. Like a lapel flag-pin that subtlyContinue reading “Just Got Death. Miella Totomi.”
Genre Archives
Sixth Dither Extravaganza.
Despite its name, the guitar quartet Dither means business. The New York-based group made waves with the 2015 Tzadik release John Zorn’s Olympiad Vol 1: Dither Plays Zorn, with the foursome playing some of Zorn’s less-heard game pieces. But even before that, they were hosting an annual, daylong festival of spirited and eclectic music. TheContinue reading “Sixth Dither Extravaganza.”
The Musical Worldview of Nick Dourado
IT’S A DREARY WINTER NIGHT IN TORONTO. It’s already super late—the last of four bands has already played, and the makeshift bar within the makeshift venue has been closed for a good half hour. Although things are winding down, a healthy crowd is hanging out, chatting, and enjoying the warm, dry indoors. Suddenly, there’s aContinue reading “The Musical Worldview of Nick Dourado”
New Stages For New Music
Intense purple LED light washes over the Thin Edge New Music Collective (ABOVE PHOTO) as they scramble to soundcheck, seeming to heighten the chaotic mood at Long Winter, Toronto’s monthly interarts festival series during the coldest season. Two different sources of electric guitar bleed into the room from other performance spaces inside the historic, ramblingContinue reading “New Stages For New Music”
APA / JØ. Der Stromausfall / Cloudbursting.
For the first half of this collaborative noise performance that took place in a pop-up storefront gallery in the Dundas West area of Toronto, JØ (Johann Diedrick, NYC) and APA (A Pure Apparatus, aka Xuan Ye, Toronto) perform entirely without electrical power. An outage during Diedrick’s micro-residency show led to a last-minute improvisation in aContinue reading “APA / JØ. Der Stromausfall / Cloudbursting.”
Jerusalem In My Heart. If He Dies, If If If If If If.
Jerusalem In My Heart’s second album bristles with all the forward momentum that was lurking just below the surface of its debut release. Noted producer Radwan Ghazi Moumneh is in charge of the sonic aspect of the Montreal-based audiovisual duo, and his work digests a number of startlingly heterogenous elements. As If He Dies . . .Continue reading “Jerusalem In My Heart. If He Dies, If If If If If If.”
Manticore. Universal Time / Nebulous Pink Cloud.
On its second EP, Toronto duo Manticore continues its exploration of song on the cusp of improvisation and utterances verging on language. The duo’s rather commonplace instrumentation (you guessed it: guitar and voice) may offer a certain familiarity, but its conventional frame still manages to accommodate experimentation. Rather than singing recognizable lyrics, Zoë Alexis-Abrams stringsContinue reading “Manticore. Universal Time / Nebulous Pink Cloud.”
FAT and the Masters of Haha.
Formed in 1982 in Montreal, FAT features Eric Rosenzveig on guitar, Jeff Noble on bass guitar, and Phil Giborski on drums and samples. The trio was influenced by the era’s DIY-punk aesthetic, as well as the musics of Ornette Coleman and Cecil Taylor, but remained distant from both those scenes, freely improvising textural noise ratherContinue reading “FAT and the Masters of Haha.”
JOYFULTALK. Muuixx.
Muuixx recalls that fecund period during the 1990s when some notable electronic music was celebrated for its eccentric intrepid quality. But JOYFULTALK, the latest project of Nova Scotia resident Jay Crocker, isn’t nostalgic; rather, it leans toward creating something indelible. What the album does share with the aformentioned ’90s electronic music is a bric-à-brac soundContinue reading “JOYFULTALK. Muuixx.”
Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville
In 2014, FIMAV celebrated its thirtieth edition—a testimony to founder and artistic director Michel Levasseur’s vision and pragmatism. He has built a loyal audience, secured firm community, government, and industry support, and developed a team that year after year delivers musicians from around the world to this hamlet midway between Montreal and Quebec City. HavingContinue reading “Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville”