Tag Archives: toronto

My favourite album of 2009 is “A Mountain is a Mouth”

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Why do we bother with lists? I think it has to do with taste, as if when we collectively choose the same items, it means we all have highly developed critical faculties. These days,  I see “best-of” lists as being pointless. Yes, there are “good” movies and “bad movies,” and “popular” doesn’t always equal good. Instead,  I’ve abandoned “best” for “favourite,” because things that make an album or record “good” goes way beyond the aesthetic qualities, and extends to how it interacts and influences life itself. Your life.

In some ways, it’s like the band “The Editors.” They’re not a great band, but there’s something in their spirit I connect with, and find  compelling. Critically I can’t defend everything they do, especially their new record, “In This Light and on This Evening,” which at times is downright embarrassing.

Or U2. Sure, some people loved the band when they were good (when they were teens/adults listening to half-decent music in the eighties), but a lot of people love the band now, despite Bono and co. being a dreadful foursome these days.

So here goes my theory:  if you are checking out the band on their “Blackberry” tour (or whatever it is), you may go and think it’s the greatest concert in years. I won’t disagree with your feelings (because doing that is pointless and stupid), because odds are it might be the only concert you have been to in years. But like I said, I have no qualms with anyone who enjoys U2 or Nickelback, because your thing is your thing and that’s cool.

And that’s why I like to stick with “Favourite.” Because in the age of the internet, all anyone needs to do is download a best-of list of whatever Pitchfork posts online, and BAM, they have “good taste.” Which is why there are so many frat boys at National concerts.

So anyways, here’s the list of albums I loved and listened to this year that were “new,” in 2009. If you haven’t heard of them, check out their myspace, or hit up a record store like Rotate This, Soundscapes or Sonic Boom in Toronto, and grab any of these albums. I’m kind of curious what I’ll go back and listen to 10 years from now (Hello, “Kid A” and “Things We Lost in the Fire”).

  1. “A Mountain is a Mouth” by Bruce Peninsula
  2. “In Deference to a Broken Back” by The Daredevil Christopher Wright
  3. “Merriweather Post Pavilion” by Animal Collective
  4. “Bitte Orca” by Dirty Projectors
  5. “Now I am Champion” by Sister Suvi
  6. “The Life of the World to Come” by Mountain Goats
  7. “Beware” by Bonnie “Prince” Billy
  8. “Dragonslayer” by Sunset Rubdown
  9. “Farm” by Dinosaur Jr.
  10. “Embryonic” by The Flaming Lips
  11. “Music for Men” by The Gossip
  12. “Begone Dull Care” by Junior Boys
  13. “Born on Flag Day” by Deer Tick
  14. “Heavy Ghost” by DM Stith
  15. “Potential Things” by Canaille
  16. “Gospel” by the Schomberg Fair
  17. “Phrazes for the Young” by Julian Casablancas
  18. “Pegatively Nositive” by Blankket
  19. “Mating Calls” by Eatoin Shrdlu
  20. “Other Truths” by Do Make Say Think

Day-trip in the city: Spots to visit in Toronto’s Junction neighbourhood

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Sitting inside Crema with a Clover coffee. Photo by Tyrone Warner.

Usually about once a month, I like to take a Saturday to explore a part of the city that I don’t usually get to visit: basically anywhere way West, way east or way North. Last Saturday was my second “official” trip to the hood, but my first real chance to walk around.

The neighborhood, which as you might have guessed by it’s name, has an abundance of two things: old warehouses and rail-yards, which as you can imagine, has attracted the creative-class and those who follow. Yet despite the huge presence of artists, the strip is maturing at a nice, gradual pace, unlike the mess at Ossington and Queen.

The neighborhood more or less starts at Keele and Dundas West, north of Bloor Street, and extends west (though there are a few hidden gems to the east). To get there on TTC, you can get on the 40 Junction bus at Dundas West, or board a 107 Northbound Keele bus up to Dundas West.

First off, four places make the trip worthwhile: Smash (2880 Dundas West), an industrial-vintage place that I’ve raved about before, the “Pure Scandinavian” design shop Mjolk (2959 Dundas West) which I wrote about yesterday, the Electric Revival Antique Lighting store (3075 Dundas West) and home to one of the city’s other $12,000 dollar Clover coffee maker, Crema (3079 Dundas West).

A few other places worth visiting include Pandemonium, a used book/vinyl/CD shop (2862 Dundas West) that while small, and maybe a little pricey, has a great vibe and lots of obscure gems. I picked up a signed vinyl copy of “A New Celebration for All to Sing” (1972) by The Toronto Mass, and spotted one of the greatest album covers on “Gospel Guitar” by Joe Maphis… as you can see, it has a pile of technicolor squares framing a photo of Joe’s double-neck guitar, what I think is an old delay/reverb unit, an old Fender Bassman amplifier, and a copy of the Bible. Sweet.

There’s also another cool diner/coffee shop called “Cool Hand of a Girl” (2894 Dundas West) which I didn’t get a chance to visit, but I’ve heard good things about. Same goes for Rawlicious (3092 Dundas West), an all raw food restaurant that I was going to visit before getting called away for some urgent business during my day-trip. One of the city’s finer selections of DVDs can also be found at Big Daddy’s DVD Shop (3044 Dundas West), which should be seen just for the sweet sign-age outside.

As for bars, because the Junction enduring several years of modern prohibition, they’ve only recently come up to speed, and now count Axis, The Troubador and Margaret as great places to grab a pint. Otherwise, there’s lots of other interesting stores to browse, including lots of furniture places, thrift and vintage stores and various health food joints.

“It’s like the Watchmen logo, but opposite”

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SPADINA_STATION

Truer words have never been spoken.

Okay, yeah they have.

Spadina station, like basically every other station is getting oppressively groady. Is it mold all over the place? What is it? Even the so-called nice station, Museum, is getting crud all over it’s fresh paint job.

It may be called Hogtown, but our TTC stations make us look like pigs.

Do Make Say Think at the Enwave Theatre, Sunday Dec. 13

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dmst

Years ago I saw my band-mate and sister-in-law perform here with the Children’s Choir of Canada (“The Hobbit” and “A Christmas Carol”)… but my seats were never as good as they were last night. I don’t know why we had lousy tickets before, but my opinion of the venue has changed, because the sound was incredible, the rows of seating spacious, and the irritated ushers trying to stop somebody in the front row from doing something hilarious.

As for the band itself, Do Make Say Think have a lot of history in Toronto, from the famed recordings at CIUT, to their involvement with Arts & Crafts and Broken Social Scene. Last night, they were at the top of their game; noisy, elegant and exploding with cheer.

After the show, and after having a super late dinner at a lousy Chinese place on Spadina, we saw Charles Spearin just riding the streetcar with us, all by his lonesome, meandering down onto the subway. He congratulated him on the show, he thanked us, and that was it. It was a great night.

TTC: Please go back to splitting up the 501

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Now, I’m pretty sure I’m not a minority on this one, but the October/November experiment of “splitting” the 501 Queen Street car was a resounding success… and now it’s gone.

In the past, the TTC has tried lots of different experiments, some of which were very successful, and yet seemingly dissolved into nothing… like many people, I’ve assumed it was just the Kafka-esque bureaucracy of the TTC at work (on not at work as it were). However, with the recent “crowd control” experiment at Yonge station on the Bloor-Danforth subway line, the TTC has somehow managed to turn their experiment into a full-time rush hour implementation.

How is it then, that another successful experiment like the streetcar split seemingly dies in the water? Is it union issues? Red tape? Political reasons?

I’ll admit, my evidence of the streetcar split working is anecdotal at best: I regularly take the streetcar from Woodbine to McCaul and back again, with the occasional trip from the core to out west. And during the time of the “split,” I have to say that it was the fastest, most efficient traveling experience I’ve had on the TTC in a long time.

Sure, when I was trying to catch a trip home, I’d have to wait for a Neville or Victoria Park car when it seems like only Parliament cars were passing by, but at the same time, I was almost never “Short-turned” once I got on the car headed east. Unlike now, when streetcars are routinely shafting it’s passengers at say, Greenwood or Kingston road.

The split just made sense: The Queen line is just too long to expect regular service from one end to the other. All you have to do is take the streetcar out to Long Branch one day, and you’ll understand how they can get so delayed. Same goes for the beaches.

As for the people who for whatever reason live in Parkdale and take the streetcar out to the Beaches during rush hour; I wonder where you get four hours every day to make the trip.

On another note; nothing bugs me as much as the TTC’s “average wait time” stats system: The way they figure this out, is that they calculate the number of “Seats” that pass by a certain point per specific amount of time. That’s great and all, except for the fact that streetcars work like this: They almost always travel in packs of threes, with the first one going really slow because it’s stuffed with people who take forever to get on and off because of the packed nature of the car. It’s usually tailed by a second car, which has easily caught up because it hasn’t been picking up any passengers 1 minute after the previous car arrived. So as the second one catches up and slows down, you’ll likely see a third. You’ll wait for that one and get on because it’s always empty, and you can get a decent seat… but without fail, that one will short-turn and dump you on the street about 4 stops away from your destination. So when you average it out like the TTC does, let say when 3 streetcars pass a certain point in half an hour, they will report that you only wait 1o minutes for a car, when in reality, those three cars likely passed you all at once, and if you missed it, you’ll probably wait 25 minutes for the next set.

Apparently riding the streetcar for Toronto city councillor Sandra Bussin (yes that Sandra Bussin, *sigh* my representative at city hall ) was such a unique, once-in-a-lifetime experience for her she decided to tweet about it. This is a good example of why the TTC sucks: our city leadership doesn’t ride it. (Noted from her twitter: 10 people traveling from the Beaches to Long Branch at 1:30 in the afternoon? Really?)

If you agree with me, please call and let the TTC know! Here’s the number: 416-393-3030. They’ll “report their findings” at a future meeting, which means they need to hear from us!

Abraham’s Antiques expands… enjoy the room, for now!

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550_ABRAHAMWith my Christmas shopping underway, I began scouring Queen Street West for gifts, and as I headed east, I wandered to Bathurst. There, I spotted what looked to be a brand new antique store… but inside I realized I had been there before.

Unlike many of my favourite spots at Queen and Bathurst that have long since disappeared (Zap Records, Travel Cafe, Suspect Video), Abraham is still going strong with his amazing collection of totally random techniques.

300_abrahamNow, he’s renovated his shop, and it appears to be over three to four times the size it previously was… and I suspect that it won’t stay that way for long. The main thing I like about the reno is that the space looks far more composed than it ever has before… you have always been able to tell he arranges his shop like a giant living art installation, but with the revamp, you can take in the giant canvas far more easily.

While I’ve only ever bought vintage art pieces from his shop, I’ve always been tempted to find out what he charges for his music equipment: there’s walls and walls and walls of guitars, guitar bodies, guitar necks, and a massive shelf of vintage microphones available for rent.

Abraham himself is a stand-up guy himself, with extensive knowledge about his stuff, and is more than willing to work out a good, fair price for it. I know that some people find him intimidating to approach, but once you get him talking, you can tell that he takes a lot of pride in what he does.

I love Leslieville and it’s quaint little mid-century modern stores like GUFF and Ethel, I wish the east side had a shop like Abraham’s, the kind of place you can get lost in (and not think that everything is junk).

(Read more about Abraham in this City News piece from last year… some great photos there too)

The worst feature of the t.o.night newspaper

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200907tonight

Being a print-based outlet is a tough slog these days, and I don’t want to heap undue criticism on any publication in particular (considering I also work for an online media outlet).

But…

The free afternoon glossy “t.o.night” has a simply terrible feature. The last few times I’ve picked it up from a faux newsie at Osgoode station to read on the subway ride home, I’ve noticed the most peculiar self-promotion sitting on the paper’s back page.

Instead of say, a scantily clad woman barely wearing American Apparel, “t.o.night” likes to show off an “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery” type ad, where they show how a daily paper publishes a similar story that “t.o.night” ran the afternoon before.

Now, I won’t pretend to know any more about the print process than I do (like I said, online is my world), but first of all, I doubt that Metro is looking at t.o.night for story ideas, especially since I expect they’re likely halfway finished laying out the paper before the glossy even hits the streets. The other beef I have is that some of these simliar stories are all basically based on the same wire put out by news wire services like Reuters or Canadian Press. (And the free dailies are heavily bolstered by wires… that’s what keeps costs down, and why they are free).

It works like this: in the morning, the wires (think of them like a borg-like news entity) push out the latest news stories. Actually, they push them around the clock, with constant updates all the time.  So at say, 6:30am or 9:30am or 11:30am, whenever the latest story moves, any organization who subscribes to their feed will see the updates.

So your favourite online news outlet (like CTV.ca News), which updates the news all the time, will have the latest, updated news stories. So if a story moves at 11am, you’ll see it at 11am.

Then, six hours later, that same news will show up in “t.o.night.”

Then, the next morning, that same news will show up in “Metro” or “24 Hours.”

Sure, “t.o.night” will have the story on dead trees well before someone else will have it on dead trees, but that doesn’t make their reporting or presentation any better (if there’s any original reporting going on at all). If I were them, I’d look for more interesting features and commentary and build the paper with more of a voice… since Blog.TO is already giving them content, and Torontoist has had ties to other outlets, maybe Toronto Mike or the Martini Boys are willing to sell them some content.

Despite my problem with their practice, I’ll still probably read an issue of “t.o.night” when it’s handed to me. But once the TTC finally puts some cell phone service underground, I think I’ll stick with browsing the latest news on my iPhone instead.

Don’t let it bring you down: Nuit Blanche 2009

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So I managed to make most of my must-catch exhibits, and waiting till after 1 to go out helped, but I really should have just waited till after last call. This was the first time I did “Zone A” and while it would be easy to complain about all the idiots/jerks/whathaveyou out for the night, basically getting blasted, yelling at the top of their lungs and making fun of projects, I decided to stay positive and enjoyed myself, without getting too mushed in human traffic along the way. Here’s a few of my photos of the exhibits I saw.

Wasted Breath: Awesome. I don’t think those who were wandering by noticed they were moving.

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No: Yes.

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Bay street midway: Popular, probably because it was a ride. The Seven Eleven nearby also had quite the draw.

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Monopoly with real money: Nice, concept, but hard to watch for more than 5 minutes.

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Lights at city hall: Probably the biggest and best of the night.

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Big inflated silver bunny: Hopefully less of this next year.

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Steel cage match at the bus terminal: Nice setup, lame wrestling.

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Random band in the atrium: Noise, but a welcome break.

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Massey Hall: Wonderful, but it must be so tiring for the performers.

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The moon: Perfection.

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Mercy and sausage: Wonderful way to end the evening out in Liberty village.

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After getting home around 7 and sleeping to noon, I’m feeling pretty off, but overall it was a great night, and I’m looking forward to next year! If you want to weigh in with what you saw, leave a comment!

Put Yr Heart Into It 036

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sufjan_medium

When it rains it pours: despite not many concerts this summer to get excited about, I’ve found myself in the middle of a pretty dense run of amazing shows this month. So far I’ve seen Stryper @ the Reverb Sunday night, Thursday night I caught Sufjan Stevens at Lee’s Palace here in Toronto, Sunday night I’ll check out Andrew WK doing his experimental solo piano thing at the music gallery, then Wednesday night Daredevil Christopher Wright is back in town at Free Times Cafe. And there’s still Dave Bazan and more to come! (Even Transiberian Orchestra!)

This week’s podcast includes: Ryan Dahle, Dan Mangan, Sea Wolf, Yukon Blonde, Ox, Taken by Trees, Shannon Stephens, Racoon Bandit and Schomberg Fair.

They stacked bibles on top of a black-and-yellow bass amp

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500_stryper

Christian Metal. It’s hard to take seriously, though if any genre is compatible with the Christian church, it’s metal’s ornate virtuosity, the anguished cries, and front-men who can’t resist a messianic pose or two.

So with that said, the pinnacle of this particular genre is Stryper. Always has, and always will be. But I’m not here to give you a history lesson, which you can just wiki for yourself if you like.

First off, I have to say that I don’t like being negative when I write about music, especially Christian music, because I’m sure these guys are totally earnest and honest with what they are doing, so I don’t want to come across like I’m disrespecting that, nor do I want to disrespect the Sweet family in what has been a tragic year in their lives, and in that regard, my thoughts and prayers go out to them.

But ultimately, Michael Sweet and his band are the ones going out there on the road (for several weeks of shows) and asking people to buy tickets and other paraphernalia, so to that extent, I feel like it’s fair game to give my honest thoughts about my experience.

Which brings us to Sunday night, when Stryper came to Toronto on their 25th anniversary tour, which while a fun time, also smacks of being a real-life Spinal Tap (Spinal Tapian?) adventure.

Though this is the band’s 25th anniversary tour, and is touring with all four original members, it wasn’t exactly envisioned out that way. A “new” version of Stryper just put out an album called “Murder by Pride” and apparently they were going to do a split set, one with the “new” band doing the new stuff, then the “old” band doing classics for the anniversary. However, somewhere along the line the new bass player decided that he couldn’t take the time off of work for the tour. It was good news for fans anyways, because that means the original four members are doing a 90 minute set with no break.

For fans with deep pockets, the band has also been selling “backstage passes” for 50 bucks which lets fans check out the band’s soundcheck, a free copy of “Murder by Pride,” get 1 piece of Stryper gear signed, and I quote from their blog, “Get your picture taken with the band, using your own camera.”

Apparently for their stop in Toronto, all the passes were sold out, so obviously the demand for this kind of thing is there. However, it seems like anyone who went to this, didn’t write or post any of it online… I wish I knew someone who did, because it sounds so deliciously awkward.

Opening for the band that night were local Christian metal rockers Forevertree, who actually had a pretty decent modern rock/metal kind of sound, with some explicitly Christian lyrics, which I ultimately have to give them respect for. Despite being unknown by the older crowd there that night, they rocked excellently and won over as much of the audience as they were going to. If you’re curious, please give them a listen here.

Following them was one of the regular opening acts on this tour, a band called Flight Patterns, which you’ve never heard of before. Why? Because from what I can tell, is that their first official show was opening for Stryper on the first date of this tour, beyond that, the band has no official bio, just an EP on iTunes, a Tumblr photo blog (started a few weeks ago), and zero plays on last.fm.

So why are they on tour with Stryper? It turns out Flight Patterns features the guitar work of one Michael Sweet, Jr., son of the lead singer of Stryper. You can read Michael Sweet, Jr.’s first ever interview here if you’re curious.

Unfortunately, Flight Patterns is just not my kind of music… it’s more like a rock-jock emo kind of thing, and I’m not their target audience by any means (think Saves the Day or Hot Rod Circuit). Their singer Max Prussner was enjoyable, and I like his own recordings, but as for Flight Patterns, they were just not a good fit for the night.

If anyone from the band is reading this, please do the honourable thing and offer to go first for the rest of the tour… you seem like cool guys and I wish you the best of luck with your career, but please respect the other hardworking bands on your tour, bands like Forevertree, and offer to take the first place spot. Pay your dues.

Anyways, on with Stryper. They did indeed bring with them their classic stage setup to tiny Reverb at Queen and Bathurst (probably the grossest venue I’ve been to in a while), complete with Stryper banner and loads of black and yellow striped guitars and various “cabinets.” Though they were stamped with “MESA” logos, part of me suspects that some of them were dummy amps, meant to look impressive — not necessarily to push some air.

(Earlier that day the band’s massive van and trailer was clipped by a streetcar and blocked traffic for a while, which also sounds like a Spinal Tap like adventure, but I haven’t heard too many details about that).

Shortly before the band took to the stage, one of the crew came on stage to tell people that because of their “record label,” no one could take photos at all, except people with media passes, and only for the first three songs. This was pretty weird, not because of the media thing, because that’s actually a pretty common practice (thought not at the Reverb I imagine), but the fact that someone had to come on stage to announce this. Even worse, is that the band had a surly roadie that spent the entire set telling people with compact point-and-shoots to stop taking pictures. Nope, I’m not even kidding.

Worst of all? This apparently worked, because no photographic evidence of the band’s visit to Toronto seems to exist at all. Good for the band, I guess. As another aside: they seemed to have a disproportionately large crew for a venue that only holds 400 people, but I’m sure they were playing much larger venues other places on tour.

I also have to comment on the crowd: It seemed like the fans gathered were either 35 and up or 20 and under, and not really a lot of people aged in between. I even saw two teenagers that looked like they stepped directly out of “Heavy Metal Parking Lot,” complete with long, feathered hair and tight black-and-yellow leather jackets. There was also another elder metalhead who wore skull rings on every finger, an upside-down cross around his neck and bright orange and yellow bellbottoms. He looked famous, but I wasn’t quite sure who he was. I would have also bought a T-Shirt, but they were only selling the “anniversary” shirts and they cost 30 bucks. Yikes!

But I digress.

When Stryper finally came out (with a path cleared through the crowd by security guards) and took to the stage wearing their custom black and yellow outfits, when it came to the music they did not disappoint . Everything was flawless, from the solos to the singing: the band had stage presence, and rocked so much harder than anyone their age has the right of doing. I was too young to enjoy the band when they were at the height of their popularity, but I recognized in them during that performance everything that made them great, and why people were so dedicated to them, and why they even had a number one video on MTV. I could have done without the Boston cover, and more of “Breaking the Law,” but they were simply fantastic. I’m very glad and very thankful that they brought their tour through Canada, and if they ever came back for a 30th anniversary tour, I wouldn’t hesitate to go again.