Canada
Tallies, Old Blue Last review - Canadian quintet rejuvenates indie prototypesWednesday, 18 May 2022
Toronto’s Tallies have acknowledged their fondness for Aztec Camera, The Smiths and The Sundays. Add Cocteau Twins into the building blocks, too. Encountering a band so strongly immersed in the back catalogues of familiar names can obscure what’s... Read more... |
Clubbing with the Stones: Live at El MocamboWednesday, 11 May 2022
In a little over two week’s time, the three remaining ones will kick-start their 60th year as The Rolling Stones by taking to the stage at a stadium on the edge of Madrid on June 1, around the same time that Elizabeth Windsor marks her own @70... Read more... |
Album: Arcade Fire -WEThursday, 05 May 2022
When the pandemic closed in, Canadian experimental indie rock troupe Arcade Fire were on the cusp of heading into the studio to record their new album. COVID had other plans. But rather than pause, the husband and wife duo of Win and Regine... Read more... |
Album: Plastikman & Chilly Gonzales - Consumed in KeyWednesday, 30 March 2022
The three Canadians Richie Hawtin (Plastikman), Jason Beck (Chilly Gonzales) and Tiga Sontag (aka just Tiga, who exec produced this album) are each so laden with image and persona it is easy to forget they are musicians sometimes. Hawtin has since... Read more... |
The Weather Station, Scala review - communion achieved against the oddsThursday, 24 March 2022
Acknowledging the contrast between personal and public situations, The Weather Station’s Tamara Lindeman says “I have a lot of songs about not being heard, yet I’m holding this microphone.” An individual’s voice can be ignored, but if it’s given a... Read more... |
Album: Basia Bulat - The GardenThursday, 17 February 2022
On her sixth album, Basia Bulat re-records 16 of her own songs with specially created string arrangements. The Garden isn’t a best-of, more a recalibration of how the Canadian singer-songwriter sees herself through her music and how the meanings of... Read more... |
Album: Le Vent du Nord - 20 PrintempsThursday, 03 February 2022
What a joyous album for a grey winter’s day, any day in fact – a celebration of 20 springs by Le Vent du Nord, a wonderful five-piece band that hails from frigid Quebec and who make it their business to explore and collect the folk music of French-... Read more... |
Memory Box review - exquisitely made drama set in LebanonFriday, 21 January 2022
Memory Box is that rare thing, a glimpse into a lost world from its traumatised inhabitants. Made by the Lebanese artist-filmmakers, Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige (a husband and wife team), it’s an intergenerational drama split between Beirut... Read more... |
How to Survive an Apocalypse, Finborough Theatre review - millenarian millennialsMonday, 04 October 2021
Despite its painfully relevant title, How To Survive An Apocalypse was written in 2016. If only Canadian playwright Jordan Hall knew, eh? The end times aren’t just creeping but hurtling towards us, these days. Luckily for those weary of Covid... Read more... |
Album: BADBADNOTGOOD - Talk MemorySaturday, 02 October 2021
Jazz’s most popular expressions today stand on or just over its borders: Thundercat’s rubbery bass virtuosity and dreamy laptop soul, Robert Glasper’s improv R&B, Squarepusher’s spontaneous electronica, Snarky Puppy’s jam-band anthems, GoGo... Read more... |
Mouthpiece review - double entendre in TorontoWednesday, 10 March 2021
Cassandra and her sister – or perhaps they’re friends or lovers – seem extraordinarily in tune. Like choreographed dancers, they move precisely in unison, down to tripping over their scarves at the same moment or flopping drunkenly into bed together... Read more... |
Album: The Besnard Lakes - The Besnard Lakes Are The Last Of The Great Thunderstorm WarningsFriday, 29 January 2021
The title is in keeping with those of previous portentously handled albums from the Montréal art-rockers. There was their breakthrough 2007 set The Besnard Lakes Are The Dark Horse and 2010’s The Besnard Lakes Are The Roaring Night. The latter’s... Read more... |
- 1 of 14
- ››
