ESB PLAYLIST 4/22/05

Apologies for not posting the playlist sooner. I have no excuses. But I'll make it up to you this Friday with a dynomiiiite show at noon ET on CIUT 89.fm.

And now, "Live Notes" part two (apologies to Zoilus for stealing the name...mea culpa)...

LENIN I SHUMOV - Sebya v Sebe
* I'd have played some new stuff from their EP, but the band took the sample mp3s down before I had a chance to download them, but keep checking their site for an update, which hopefully will resotre these tracks and inspire you to pick up the disc, which they released on Apil 16th at the Dovercourt House to a full ballroom-sized crowd.
NO DYNAMICS - I've Got You On My Mind
NO DYNAMICS - A Paradox Wrapped in a Contradiction (apparently not the actual title of the song)
* Both of these tracks were recorded live at their "breakout" gig at Sneaky Dee's this past January. Unlike the Shumov tracks, I was able to download these before they were taken down due to web traffic limitations. They'll be releasing a new EP soon on Rob Gordon's new label engineered by Jeff McMurrich, who also worked on the aforementioned Shumov disc.

COUGAR PARTY - Who Knows What Would Have Happened Had Their Van Not Blown Up in the Desert
COUGAR PARTY - Disconnect
COUGAR PARTY - People Shouldn't Be Mean to Me Now That I'm In a Band
COUGAR PARTY - Lakeboat Fantasy
* Another local group who just put out an EP. Download all these tunes here.

RYU vs. KEN - Chun Lee is the Gurl 4 Me
RYU vs. KEN - At the Club with M. Bison
* Skitransit and Numba One Stunna's have combined efforts to drop odes to Street Fighter 2. Look for live gigs in the future, most likely in the Kingston area.
SIKTRANSIT - Future Sack
SIKTRANSIT - All Your Bass Are Belong to this Song
* This guy moves back to the city in August, so you can bet your milkshakes he'll be playin gigs, and he'll tear down the fabric of the silk house. The last time he played in Kingston, it was so hot that someone yanked the fire alarm at the Grad Club when his set was over.

OF MONTREAL - Sad Love
THE BOOKS - A Little Longing Goes Away
I CAN PUT MY ARM BACK ON YOU CAN'T - Air Brakes
REPUBLIC OF SAFETY - The Roaches Won't Survive
* A preview of the Over the Top Festival happening May 5 - 9 in Toronto, featuring local and international acts alike. Perhaps I'll do another feature on this fest when the time comes.

INDIAN JEWELRY - Going South
* Nothing like ending a sow with a 10 minute droning epic. Supposedly these dudes played a raucous set at Sneaky's a couple weeks back. Download tunes here.

If you'll excuse me, I'm off to enjoy some classics. My new roommate who works at Soundscapes just lent me On The Beach and Live 1966. Can I resist? I think not.

BALLROOM DAYS

another No Dynamics show, this one at the dovercourt house. the crowd was interested but largely lethargic, save for a few knuckleheads at the front and their lacadaisical mosh dances. the band reflected the low energy state of the evening by playing a rather withdrawn set, but musically it was perhaps their best effort to date. once they'd kicked into a new number written only that day, people perked up a little and gave the band some fuel to work with. those guys give it their all, no matter what the conditions, and their low key sensibility grounds them in such a way that differentiates them from most bands in this who city mimic one another and play as if in tribute to their idols. but with no dynamics, there are no such postures.

what i enjoy about their show is their death-zombie sort of tip. carl didur slouches over his organ as if undead while daniel allows those scarier, muddier twangy sounds ring out from his guitar in a rocky horror. vanessa on vox showed her herself in commanding form, even if she might have come off a slight more reserved than usual. no matter what energy level the room might be at, finklestein will always flex his jones for knockout drumming to the utmost.

i didn't stick around to watch Lenin I Shumov, but they brought out a rather sizable crowd for their EP release. the band had sent out an invitiation just before the show over the message boards calling for folks to come down early and help package the disc before showtime in exchange for no cover charge. it's little things like that which show that toronto has its friendly side, our own version of the westerner "c'mon over neighbour" kinda vibe. the Ep was available for an additional 6bux on top of cover, also 6bux. not a bad deal...

Grasshopper informed me that last night's Fantomas gig featured The Locust as one of the supporting acts, and maybe i'm late to the punch but i really have to go see this band. they're like villains from a Shaymalan film...and they have this fantastic video that you should watch.

and while we're at it, i should mention that there's a stunningly excellent offbeat record label of the same name. it's run out of chicago and there's a tonne of sweet mp3s on their music page. if you like droning violins and ethereal guitars, and hell, even some minimalist electronic soundscapes, this is your kinda thing. they like to put out many many many compilations, which in my opinion shows their approach takes on an air of totality and commulaism. i'll look into this scene further and maybe put together a feature for the show. god knows there's enough material to choose from. only wish these guys could have been around during the winnipe high school years, i coulda used these tunes over my headphones as i watched detritus float down the red river during flood season.

here's some samples, but do some browsing of your own here:

HENRY FLYNT - Purified by the Fire
JOSEPHINE FOSTER AND THE SUPPOSED - Jailbird (Hero of the Sorrow)
JOSEPHINE FOSTER - Crackerjack Fool

tune in next friday at noon, 89.5 fm in toronto, or stream it live on our website for part two of our "Live Notes" special, featuring two live tracks from No Dynamics, some new Siktransit bombs and some cuts from his new side project with Numba One Stunna called RYU vs. KEN.

ESB PLAYLIST 4/15/05

a year ago today was a victory day for me. it was the last Dance to the Underground of the year, featuring FUN! (my own band) and Grand Theft Bus. the show sold out and i passed the honour along to my good friend Mike Sallot, current outgoing Business Manager of CFRC and co-founder of DTTU. he's done a tremendous job and he's even written into the job description a requisite for the next Business Managers to keep the series going. it went from a weekly groove/jam oriented show to a monthly display of hyperactive, explosive indie/dance fanaticism that shook the foundations of Kingston music this past year under Mike. he's booked some Canadian acts i never could have thought would come to Kingston, let alone to play our little night: The Creeping Nobodies, Uncut, Kids on TV, Death From Above, controller.controller, Kid Koala and Magneta Lane. but the best is yet to come on the 26th, with Caribou, The Junior Boys and The Russian Futurists hit the Elixir...for $8!!!!

read about why Dance to the Underground is the only worthwhile underground alternative in Kingston at the Queen's Journal.

Mike Sallot is a name you should look out for. i once ran into John Caffrey from the Kids on TV, and i mentioned that Mike and i had been business partners at one point, to which he replied, "He's a very very good name to have beside yours, my friend!" it was a rare moment of pride for this blogger / radio host.

catch Mike's show while you can. he most likely leaving Kingston soon and taking Fever Pitch (also bloggified), with him. we hope he continues on with the C/C radio tradition in Ottawa, Montreal or Toronto, all places he's likely to end up in soon. tune in to the show until May every Wednesday night at 10pm ET (click on one of the Real Player streamlinks atop the homepage), or at the CFRC Weekly Archives.

now, on with the show! this week was a series we like to call "Live Notes", the first of two parts. basically, we check out the state of live music at this current point and play some of the cats that have played recently or will play in town in the near future.

MAYOR MCCA - Funky Fresh Beats (download here by looking for the link in the left hand frame)
* unless his April 1st goodbye to Canada show was a big April Fool's joke, C.A. Smith, the legendary one man band singing sensation from Steelcity Hammertown, will be leaving Canada for an indefinite period. he's off to the British Isles and we'll miss him terribly. but when he comes back, we'll have a welcoming party ready on the tarmac. chris, thanks for all the killer shows and nice chats.

HELLA - I'm Quitting the Cult
HELLA - W
OUT HUD - Dear Mr. Bush...
* both of the groups played The Horseshoe on April 10th, but i wasn't abe to attend b/c of a sellout at the box office. but i can guarentee you that despite the poor reviews their new albums got, the bands remain full throttle live acts that never fail to satisfy (or so i've been told). thse tracks were made available by 20JazzFunkGreats.com, but the site is handling some technical bugs right now (by the fault of Apple, not their own). keep checking out the site and look for the donloads, which you can find grouped together.

and while we're at it? what's with all the shows in Toronto selling out faster than you can say "Arcade Fire at the Danforth Theatre"! some say it's a prblem, symptomatic of the saturation and overconsumption of every aspect of Toronto life, but i look at it differently. i'd venture to say that it's indicative of a healthy scene, and a testament to the work that everyone's put into this city for the past 20 some years to make it the live music hub that it has become. so maybe it wasn't such a bad thing that i didn't get into the Regina Spektor show last week.

REGINA SPEKTOR - Your Honor
* this girl blows me away! she has charisma and energy that is largely absent from indie music at the moment. she's full of life and vibrancy and doesn't need to posture and prance to prove her point. and remember, that's quite the feat, considering she must have had such close proximity to the hype train when she toured with The Strokes. it's tough to keep your head ins ituationslike that, but she's totally herself and that's cool with me. i hope the sho went over beautifully. i also love how she make s her name look lik i says RESPEKT on her splash page. brilliant!


NO DYNAMICS - Josphine Baker (new higher quality download)
* if you missed these dues at Santa Cruz last weekend, you can catch them again as a supporting act at the Dovercourt House (805 Dovercourt Rd. near Bloor St.) tomorrow (saturday) night for the Lenin I Shumov EP release party. bring $6 and you're in. bring another $6 and you get a copy of the Shumov disc at the door. they're also scheduled to release an four song vinyl only EP on Rob Gordon's new label. maybe we'll get a couple of the members to come on the show when the record comes out. there was a great article on them in NOW mag last week. but despite all the press, they've been playing it smart and avoiding playing too many shows to prevent everyone from gouging them out of existence with the hype machine. it's one of theone of the reasons i love this band and i hope they keep it up like this for a long time.

DEAD MEADOW - Sleepy Silver Door
DEAD MEADOW - Everything's Goin' On
* according to the band's touring schedule on their site, it looked like they were booked the same night as Santa Cruz. does anyone know why they never played? was it a double booking mishap? if anyone has any info, i'd like to know whether they did play at another venue that night or they've been rescheduled for another date. plenty more downloads are available on their mp3 page.

BLACK MOUNTAIN - Heart of Snow
BLACK MOUNTAIN - Drugnaut
CRYSTAL SKULLS - No Room for Change
* another show i could have attended, i even had tickets to see these two groups last week a the 360, but i was kidnapped by an old high school friend for a roadtrip to Montreal.

and you know, my friend and fellow blogger Gabe Knox at Amphetamine Blues said to me recently that "no matter what Spin and the New York Times say, Montreal does not have a scene like we do in Toronto." and he's right! not much was going on mid week, in comparison to here a least. but i think that's one of Montreal's strengths. in Toronto it's gotten to the point at which it's becoming more and more difficult to do and see something new. weeklies and monthlies come and go like lovers, and good underground quickly gets swallowed into the "aboveground" scene. but in Montreal, underground really is underground, and more or less always has been. indie music there does not retain the same kind of popularity in Quebec, where ska and latin music prevail in the relaxed, euro-canuck climate of style and living inherent to the city. there's less impetus to one-up someone lse like there is in toronto, less hostility and cynicsim, so there's room for new movements to pop up. the Unicorns broke up, Arcade Fire found some wings and AIDS Wolf are attracting audiences elsewhere, yet there's enough artists to step into their place. the audiences there will grow, no doubt about it, and maybe we'll have to give that NYT article some credit after all?

GOLDKIXX is a great blog with which to check up on the Montreal scene. i hasn't been updated since Purim, but if you're passing through Montreal it's a great resource to track the undercurrents in la belle provence's most wonderful city.

tune in again next week for part two of "Live Notes". we'll have some live cuts from No Dynamics, but they won't be available for download next week on this site as i i can only play it over the radio, so be sure to tune in. as well, some new side project acion from electroguru Siktransit and mashup master Numba One Stunna. they've combined their skills to form Ryu vs. Ken. here's Hally's desrition of what it's all about:

"streetfighter themed. i'm RYU, basically i'm quiet and reserved, while KEN is hardcore metal FUCKEVERYBODY kinda dude."

they'll be sure to start playing live gigs soon, hopefully in Toronto. keep your ears open.

PS - go and see the aforementioned Gabe Knox, who'll be playing keys tonight with a group called Civilian for a good cause at the El Mo.

FUNDLAZING

so i guess we reached the fundraising target, or at least came close, but i must say, i'm disappointed in my listeners for not calling in and at least donating something. in any case, i'd like to thank the following people for contributing:

Lauren Speers aka DJ Chocolate from Scratch Free Press and CKLN (see, even peeps from other radio stations pitched in!)

Angela Besharah

Sam Pettite

The Birek and Aitken Family


as a result, the low turnout means that no one will be awarded with the prize pack of the "Best of the Eclectic Sound Basement Vol. 1 and 2" mix albums. you'll have to do better next time.

new downloads of some Siktransit tunes that will be up for a week:

SIKTRANSIT - All Your Bass Are Belong to This Song
SIKTRANSIT - Future Sack! (Elongated Turd Mix)

tune in over the next two weeks for two specials on recent and upcoming live music in toronto, featuing new tunes from No Dynamics, Hella, Black Mountain and Regina Spektor, all garnered from the blogosphere.

ESB PLAYLIST 4/1/05

whew. what a show today. made up for the blunders last week.

next week is our fundraising show (see previous entry for details and hearty begging), but in two weeks, we're gonna do a two show special on the upcoming live gigs in toronto. LCD Soundsystem / MIA? check. Black Mountain? uh-huh. Dead Meadow and No Dynamics at Santa Cruz? believe it. Out Hud and Hella? you got it. Regina Spektor? oohh baby, we love her! we're going to try and attend all of them and bring you frontline reports of the carnage. in the meantime, go to the horseshoe tonight and see Mayor McCa's farewell Canada show. he's moving to England for a while and we'll miss him dearly. he hits the stage at 9:30, so come early.

on with the playlist!

GLASS CANDY - Brittle Women
RACHID TAHA - Rock El Casbah
RACHID TAHA - Tekitoi
RACHID TAHA - Ya Rayah
* this guy has been all over the blogosphere after a profile in the New York Times. i would love to hang with him in the levant and drink some flavoured coffee while discussing his self-professed (and not unfounded) influence over the Clash.listen to some tunes here.

RUSSIAN FUTURISTS - Our Pen's Out of Ink
CARIBOU - Barnowl
* these guys are going on tour this month with the Junior Boys, and while they're at it, they're both releasing new albums. gotta love our canuck solo electro musicians for their ability to crank out the tunes.

FEIST - Nothing in This World Can Stop Me Worryin' Bout That Girl
FEIST / ALBIN DE LA SIMONE - Elle Aime
FEIST / JANE BIRKIN - The Simple Story
* hot off the trail of some really important gigs over the past week in the States, Leslie Feist gets two nices profile from The Tofu Hut(scroll down until you see a pretty lady with black hair playing guitar).

MINIBOSSES - Castlevania 3
MINIBOSSES - Megaman 2
* huge huge thanks to steve kado fro introducing me to this band on a lonely wednesday night at sneaky dee's about a month back. these gusy rework video game soundtracks into prog rock anthems.

SIKTRANSIT - Hey You Listen Here Buddy
* another new one from the genius. he'll be posting his latest material on his blog real soon.

REMEMBER TO PLEDGE A DONATION NEXT WEEK!!!