Feist on TV

Got a surprise last minute invite to Feist's performance last night at the Church on Berkley for the Beautiful Noise show set to air in the US on, uh, the RAVEHD network. Apparently Sarah Harmer was in the same space the night before for her very own special, and Ron Sexsmith and other talents have done the show as well. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that so much Canadian talent is getting filmed right now, but it's sort of unfortunate that Canadians won't get to see the final product.

Feist herself was excellent, of course, and ending up playing for about 2 hours-save for a number of stops-the show really sort of drew itself out a lot longer than necessary. It's of course hard to complain about a free, exclusive, show, but a similarly formatted taping that I was at recently went much more smoothly.

We did get to hear some new songs, which were really, good, and alternate takes on Mushaboom and Let it Die demonstrated the not-surprising desire for her to breathe new life into songs that may be a little too familiar for her by now.

boo!

mushalligator

So the LaCoste cologne ad featuring Feist's Mushaboom has hit the airwaves here after playing in the UK for a few months now, as I've seen it the last 2 nights on Showcase.

Such a song does certainly catch my attention, and hey, I'm talking about it right now so I guess it was effective. My friends who were watching with me last night was also sort of unsettled by it, as we tend to be when our favourite artists' music shows up in unexpected places.

For perspective, there were reports last year that she turned down McDonald's (for likely way more money) for the very same song. Think about Feist selling your kids happy meals (Mushaboom does have that sort of ring to it...) and maybe LaCoste doesn't seem so bad. Or is it even intrinsically a bad thing? Feist should and deserves to be a major star, I'd just prefer that doesn't happen thanks to fast food.

last night

we did our first 'real' podcast studio session and interview, our premiere guest being... should I reveal? the fan-tabolous Jon-Rae Fletcher.

IT WAS SO AMAZING.

I was dancing in the kitchen, as he thrilled us in our dining room studio.

awesome awesome awesome.

look for it mid-december!

thanks again to producer man Ben!

"It's easy not to care

what people say
It's harder to pretend and try
Cuz they can only love you from yesterday
I'm looking at them now they pose high

I'm just a man who's walking
They stand around and keep talking
They tried to clip my wings
But wisdom fills so many things"
- K. Brereton

You live out

where the street ends
In a basement apartment
With one of your friends
And the tap drips all night
Water torture in the sink
The furnace is burning
But it's still cold I think

I can smell the bleach
That they use in the hall
But it can't clean the dirt off of me
It's seeping under the door
In across the floor
It's starting to hurt

Everytime I breathe
Everytime I try to leave
Everytime I breathe

Now the toaster sticks
And the empties are piled
I haven't been up the stairs in awhile now
I gotta wash the sheets on my bed
Gotta watch the things that go unsaid
God I wish we'd leave it at this

And every evening you open the door
You come down
There's nothing like watching tv all night underground
And no one is watching me slide
Below street level
Barely alive

Now we live out where the street ends
In a basement apt. Just like our friends
We always said that we were different
But you know now that we weren't
'Cause there's holes in all the bottles
And my lungs hurt

rehearsal

sat in last night for the taping of BC: Live at the Rehearsal Hall, which will go to air sometime in January (and hence, kinda really sorta isn't 'live', in the television sense)

the Hall itself is really cool, what with its chandeliers and wrought iron trusses and windows and the like. naturally, the place is way smaller than it looks on tv, and far more brightly lit than the end product turns out. though I sometimes rag on television as being a very superficial industry, it's hard not to get caught up in the energy of a live show taking place. BC's performance was totally great, and once again he demonstrated that he's a far funnier guy than his eco-conscious image sometimes lets him be. his solo acoustic performance of 'If a tree falls' was particularly amazing.

after, went to the shoe to check out Sylvie, the ladies and gentlemen, and wintersleep. Sylvie will be getting a feature in the first issue of tnp, so you can read all about them then. In fact, all 3 bands may very well be covered in the coming months, so stay tuned!

when does a hunter...

...become a MURDERER?

last week a skinned and decapitated body was found in the basement of my parent's house.

the victim was a common field mouse, and the prime suspect was the family cat, who is normally a very lackadasial middle-aged diabetic, but has a knack for finding mice when they're in the house.

previous instances (it's happened maybe 2 or 3 times in her 11 years) involved a nearly perfectly intact dead mouse being 'presented' at the bottom of the basement stairwell. icky yes, but nothing terrible.

this latest grizzly homicide suggests the family pet is taking a mean twist in her older age...and I'll never see her the same when I'm back for the holidays. could a human be next?

oh and the mouse head has yet to be found...

...TWICE!

My expectations for Art Brut last night were not super high, as I'd only had the album for a little over a week now and suspected their jokey rock anthems could come off with even more humour than on the record, or it could fall flat on its face.

As it turned out, the antics of singer/lyricist/humourist Eddie Argos worked really well, with him putting the audience into laughter quite a few times-especially when a small bass amp fire caused an awkward 5 minute or so delay. Argos used that time to solicit questions from the audience and detail how he had sabotaged most of the gear in favour of more attention for him. The band opened with the riff from 'Back in Black'-and with that, proved that they have the key to my heart! sigh.



Granted, the hazy sunday night audience was a little slow to respond, but everyone made the best out of what quickly became a memorable show.

Not sure if I can totally say the same for Bell Orchestre back on friday night at The Music Gallery. As the shyer portion of Arcade Fire, they are technically very proficient and are skilled composers, but have a live show that is not very involving.

Though there were moments of Arcade-like ferocity, things with this group are easily more into a abstract instrumental vibe, and though I did enjoy them quite a bit, I wonder how far they can take a project like this. At one point Sarah sort of scolded the crowd for not being up and into it, but you sort of have to give them a reason!

acknowledgements

ran into a former student at the show last night where I found out he's a pretty big lurker at the hangout. he even went to the indie rock rave a little while back, and is well versed in all things stille. he pointed out that the love-in hype for last night's show was too much, from his perspective, but we were both more than overwhelmed by the resulting performances, for sure! I replied to his beef that I'll take a too-positive board over a too-negative one any day, and things have gotten a little sour lately anyways.

after making it in on a L-O-N-G lineup (and avoiding any directly confrontation related to rampant cutting), the Adorables brought their embassy residency party vibe and filled the Boat right up with it. things slowed down for the newly-minted-fabulous Laura Barrett, solo on a Kalimba, debuting her extremely recently recorded material. My only wish was shhhh! as the crowd was getting way too talky towards the end of her set-it was only like 20 minutes, people! shut the eff up!

then came the somewhat surreal experience of seeing Final Fantasy's video, as it was shot in the Boat. Owen himself was just dripping with talent as always, and as I've said here before on at least one occasion, the world is his to take over, if he wants to.

finally, Ninja High School exploded onto the stage and the floor literally was jumping up and down with its occupants above it. this was so nuts! NUTS! a thrilling end to an amazing night. up there in the 'shows of the year' file, madness.

spades (again!)

After stopping by the harris student night at reverb, I headed over to the Boat where the Just Ace of Spades Red Cross fundraiser was still trucking along.

A handful of diehards remained, and it was with great pleasure that I was able to take in play #100 of the night, and quite a few beyond. With every show and its aunt nowadays technically being a fundraiser for something or other, it was great to see something a little off the beaten track. There was some word around the room last night that this may develop into a series...Just Livin' La Vida Loca anyone?

illuminated

Caught Everything is Illuminated this weekend at the Carlton-it's the story of a young jewish compulsive collector who travels to Ukraine to figure out the story of his recently deceased grandfather. Elijah Wood is intensely restrained as Jonathan, a rather shy yet curious individual who gradually builds confidence as his adventure with his guides (an amazingly authentic grandfather and grandson team, played by non-actors) winds further and further out of control.

Adapted and directed by Liev Schrieber, the film has a fairly distinctly non-hollywood feel to it, both in the setting (actually the Czech Republic and not Ukraine), and pacing (which at times, is a little slow maybe-or is it careful?). Definitely off the beaten track, and in a rather dismal year of movies, worth checking out.

Later in the weekend brought A Night Of Colouring at the Drake cafe, which was just that-crayons and various pieces of local art ready to be filled in by those in attendance. Everyone got 12 pieces of art, the choice of 3 colours and a 4th alloted by the event director. Said elements encouraged crayon trading and discourse, from which the following was discovered:

1) there were an inordinate number of former colouring-contest-winners in attendance, including yours truly
2) colouring is very therapeutic
3) though generally seen by adults in black in white terms, there were actually a few people who were kinda into it, but not really-so it's not as polarizing as I thought

next month's event involves custom fridge magnet construction, which stands to be as, if not more interesting.

whoop!

what's your favourite colour?

if you think this is even a remotely interesting night, you belong at this.

the jpeg's a little hard to read, so to summarize:

it's free
the last one at the Cameron House was an enormous success.
you get to colour in the works of a bunch of awesome local artists.

yeah!