Christo Graham, Eye of Newt, Big Evil Rat, and The All Margarines and Spreads Blues Band
Christo Graham - Clown Riot
If you read the Wikipedia articles for enough bands, you inevitably come across stories of abandoned albums with outrageous concepts that the band simply could not talk the label into. Well, fear not: Christo Graham’s rock opera about a genuine, real life brawl between a travelling clown troupe and a group of volunteer firefighters in 1850s Toronto has arrived.
The resulting mega-length LP, Clown Riot, is, appropriately, a total fucking riot. It comes less than a year after Graham’s excellent 2024 LP Music For Horses, and sees the southern-Ontario based songwriter exploring the full range of his folksy power-pop palette, with a winking bit of Broadway musical flair. The LP is a precursor to a real life actual musical that was developed alongside the songs with Graham’s collaborator Tyrone Savage, and rumour has it there’s still more to come from Christo before the end of the year.
Eye of Newt - Work Perks
I hadn’t yet listened to the debut album from Calgary’s Eye of Newt before I saw them at Sled Island this year, but you can bet I listened to it after. It’s weird, it’s noisy, it’s melodic and groovy and arty and most of all, it’s really, really fun to listen to. There is limitless ear candy on display, with Chris Dadge’s ever tasteful drumming and production work complimenting maestro Nate Waters’ songs and arrangements, which have a quality that can best be described as landing somewhere between playful and severe, with a psychedelic sheen cast over the proceedings. Waters plays most of the instruments of the LP himself, with Dadge also featuring heavily and bandmate Brock Geiger on backups (Samantha Savage Smith also appears as part of the live band).
BIG EVIL RAT - BIG EVIL RAT
BIG EVIL RAT have become something of a hot commodity in the Edmonton music scene; the garage-rockers have been around in some form or another since at least 2018, but the post-pandemic years have seen the band have something of a resurgence, after growing to a 6 piece and making appearances at Sled Island and Purple City in Edmonton. This new self-titled EP with their new lineup boasts more of the wall-of-noise that Rat-heads know and love, landing firmly in the Lou Reed — Iggy Pop cinematic universe. While the three song EP is a blast to listen to, the BIG EVIL RAT live experience is pretty unbeatable— it’s hard to communicate how fucking rad it feels to see six people chugging away on-stage playing songs like these, but hey, come see it for yourself this Saturday at Bent Stick Brewing if you’re in Edmonton (details here).
The All Butter and Spreads Blues Band - All Hail Lactantia
The All Butter and Spreads Blues Band is a collaboration between Matthew Sweeney from The Elwins and Eric Warner of We Are Busy Bodies. “Can I Get Your Number” and “Undone (Sore)” but have a naive quality to them that is sweet without ever being cloying, with some subtle choices in instrumentation on both tracks that just make both songs feel so goddamn pretty. You got a harmonium on your song (I think)? With some cutesy cascading piano lines? Are you kidding me? Of course I’m gonna like it.
