Sweet Chin Music - The Golden Age of Wrestling
Musicians hold multitudes in them. In some cases, you might find an artist is a member of wildly different acts. Perhaps they have an alternative creative practice that they devote themselves to just as much as music. And in the case of Jeff Cancade, one might say that they hold two wolves inside of them… okay, more like a gentle delicate cat and a rowdy wolf inside of them.
Aquakultre - 1783
Aquakultre is the musical alias of Lance Sampson, an artist based out of Halifax, Nova Scotia. His newest album, 1783, is an astounding work of art - a multi-genre concept album chronicling the history of his ancestors, Black Loyalists who were promised freedom after fighting for the British during the American Revolutionary War.
Bluebløøds - Discount Everything
Bluebløøds is a small posse of Winnipeg hitmakers who craft such devilishly clever house-infused pop bangers, you will no doubt be scanning the physical landscape of our frozen crust-belt, scratching your head as to the source of their magic. Such a seamless blend of house, funk, soul, RnB, hip hop, glitch-pop, with the lyrical sensibility straight outta…Portage Place, Flin Flon, Cross Lake? Huh? How did our local MLAs not warn us of this? How did the security guards at Portage Place not take notice? How did they pull this off?
Significance, Otherness - Burs
At its core, Significance, Otherness works its way through an underlying philosophical question: How are the ways in which we find meaning / significance / purpose tied to what is other than ourselves? Today, there is a pervasive individualistic outlook that suggests that meaning is self-made, so letting the other in becomes a compromise to its authenticity. However, Burs offers a musical challenge to this contemporary inclination by suggesting that significance and otherness are in fact two sides of the same coin.
Home Front - Watch It Die
The beauty of the record is the sense of catharsis and community Home Front creates. We’re all suffering, and there are injustices everywhere. There’s a lot to grieve, and a lot to be angry about. But by embracing the anger and the loss, and treating it with equal parts tenderness and frustration, Home Front offers maybe a place to belong and create something beautiful in the cracks of all that’s crumbling.
Hobby - Clear Blue River
Hobby’s third album is a refreshing collection of tunes that pay homage to and expand upon the long line of Canadiana music that has come before it. Dive into it and let it wash over you. When I listen to this record, I’m transported. All of a sudden, I’m right there with the band, and they’re right there with me on a summer day in the back of my best friend’s car as we head towards the Clear Blue River.
Austra - Chin Up Buttercup
Austra has certainly proven to make excellent music across the board, Chin Up Buttercup taps on an element of her music that makes this album so special: her intimate emotionality and vulnerability.
Heaven for Real - Who Died & Made You the Dream
Who Died & Made You The Dream? is as eccentric as it is authentic, with lots to chew on through repeat listens. It’s an album that shines bright in an already dazzling catalogue, and one that just might entice you to feel your weirdest feelings, blessed with a newfound assurance that surely you’re not alone in it.
Living Hour - Internal Drone Infinity
Internal Drone Infinity, from beloved Winnipeg shoegaze band Living Hour, is a thoughtfully crafted and deeply moving album, from the electronic fake-out opening of “Stainless Steel Dream” to the folky equanimity of “Things Will Remain.” By turns plaintive, tender, and playful, the album engages with the passing of time, the processes of healing, and the beauty preserved in the particularities of everyday life.
The Flower Painters - The Flower Painters
The lyrics pick up on familiar themes from both Davies’ and Vallentin’s solo works, emphasizing love, grief and slices of rural life, which given their history from small towns in PEI should come as no surprise. These are not city songs, but it’s definitely not country music.
Leanne Betasamosake Simpson - Live Like The Sky
The album kicks off with “White Kites and Blue Sky,” driven by a lofi drum machine progressively adorned by a clean guitar riff and Simpson’s lush vocals lyrically building a sense of being captive as the song progresses in complexity. Slowly, this gives way to those elements of moccasingaze with layers upon layers of guitars, vocals, synths, and percussions amping up the tension of the song intensifying as the drum fills hit harder leading up to the outro.
The Blue - So Look at the Bright Side
This new album by The Blue is an absolute and communal tour de force, one which captivates the bright side that The Blue performs at his live shows — perhaps it has a brightness of its own. The cabaret of features really brings together some of Calgary’s best into a shared spotlight of their own making, and you get to learn how they made that spotlight themselves through hard work and looking out for each other.
Robert Adam - Governed by the Seasons
In spite of the adversity of living in a world with rampant queerphobia and transphobia, the resilience in Adam’s work shines, not just through the mix, but through their invigorated direction for their career. Coming back from a first-ever Japan tour and gliding on the heels of a CCMA nomination, Adam is one of those musicians who is ripe for a wider audience that is ready to welcome them.
JANE INC - A RUPTURE A CANYON A BIRTH
A RUPTURE A CANYON A BIRTH has an emotional gravitas and consequentiality that punctuates it perhaps as Jane Inc.’s most significant record to date. Not just as a testament to the life that was, but to the life that is now along with the death that will be next however symbolic or real it may be.
POP POP VERNAC - A SENSE OF HUMAN
Pop Pop Vernac’s newest EP, A Sense of Human, is what you remember the morning after your 18th birthday: a few songs, lots of yelling, and a good fuckin’ time.
Sloan - Based on the Best Seller
All four members, Chris Murphy, Patrick Pentland, Jay Ferguson and Andrew Scott have such distinct voices, not just as singers but as songwriters. Their compositions are instantly recognizable, and Based on the Best Seller almost plays like a latter-day greatest hits album because of it.
Fencing - Fencing Wikipedia
In the end, Fencing Wikipedia isn’t some grand reclamation of the past, and maybe that’s the point. Its nostalgia doesn’t feel clean or comforting—it’s messy, conflicted, more about disillusionment than escape. The record captures what it means to live in a digital landscape that’s too fast, too curated, too numb, yet still find yourself longing for sincerity inside it.
Smokey - Bleak Heritage
I once described Smokey as sounding like a “railroad worker on a mushroom trip,” and reductive though that may be, there’s something about the combination of his choice of subject matter—coyotes, religion, unemployment, death—that paints a decidedly midwestern gothic picture. And yet it’s tinged with an almost spiritual quality, something ethereal that lingers, prodding you to remind you that not everything is as simple as it seems.
Absolute Losers - In The Crowd
With tattoo-like melodies, cleverly crafted riffs, and three-part harmonies to write home about, In the Crowd perfectly captures the Absolute Losers at their best, and makes it easy to see why they’re quickly becoming one of the Maritimes’ rising stars.
Fredy V & The Foundation - No Tribe, No I
Imagine this: you are at their live show, the opening song would have you wanting to clap along immediately, then when the beat comes in and the vocals start, you have the urge to get out of your chair and hit the dance floor, then the whole show, you just cannot sit back down. Yes, that was me in my bedroom listening to this.
You can catch Fredy V & The Foundation live at their album launch party tonight at 8:00pm at the Turbo Haus in Montreal.