Search Results - "Film School Horseshoe Toronto May 19, 2006"

Saturday, May 20th, 2006

11:11

San Francisco’s Film School were a little behind the eight-ball with me before last night’s show at the Horseshoe. A very long and rainy day/week combined with a late scheduled start time wasn’t exactly getting my gig-going heart aflutter, but I managed to haul my ass down to the ‘Shoe just in time for their midnight set (apologies to Uncut and The Anti-Q’s for missing their sets). And thank goodness I did.

I’ve seen them live and have been living with their self-titled full-length for a few months now, but somehow they managed to surprise the hell out of me with the intensity of their show. Compact, taut and powerful the five-piece tore through much of their album as well as a couple of older songs from their Alwaysnever EP and a new one to cap off the encore. The band may be insisting they’re not part of any shoegazer revival (at least that’s what they told The Boston Globe) but there’s little question what sort of audience their stuff appeals to. Take the drive and aggression of Swervedriver, who themselves never quite fit into the “shoegaze” tag, and the atmospherics and vocal traits of The Cure, throw in a touch of American hardcore and UK post-punk danceability and you’ve got a pretty damned good sound. The crowd was smallish for the band’s first Canadian show (and only one of the tour since the Montreal date for tonight has been cancelled) but seemed totally into it from my vantage point and were even dancing by the end. Dancing. In Toronto. Think about that.

Gig photos here. Got to try out my new Sigma 30mm f1.4 and am quite pleased with the results – hooray for more light! Check out one of the tracks from Film School and the new video for “11:11”. And there’s also the requisite MySpace account.

MP3: Film School – “Pitfalls”
Video: Film School – “11:11” (MOV)

Starting Sunday night, Film School will be teaming up with Indianapolis’ Margot & The Nuclear So And So’s for what should be two weeks of a stupidly good bill. Coincidentally, I saw both Margot and Film School back to back at SxSW in March – of course, I had to run across halfway across downtown Austin between their sets, but whatever. Half of Margot recently stopped in at AOL Music for an acoustic session/podcast/Q&A/thingee.

Another band in the “we are NOT looking at our shoes!” genre are Norway’s Serena Maneesh – though rather than take Film School’s tense, tightly-wound approach they instead infuse it all with a healthy dose of glam. They’re offering a free MP3 of a remix of “Sapphire Eyes” which originally appeared on a limited-edition Insound-only split 7″, but you have to sign up to their official mailing list to get it. The band’s self-titled album came out domestically either two weeks ago or on this coming Tuesday, depending on who you ask. Either way, it’s available over here – if you’re looking. Check out some audio at their MySpace, download a track and watch a new video at Insound:

MP3: Serena Maneesh – “Un-Deux”
Video: Serena Maneesh – “Drain Cosmetics” (YouTube)

Sigur Ros tells The Independent about a recent close encounter of the Tom Cruise kind. And while you’d generally figure them to be one of the great, uncoverable bands – New York’s We Are Scientists (not We Are Scientologists) gave it a shot anyway with a rendition of “Hoppipolla” off of Takk. Stereogum’s got it and you know what? It’s… actually quite good. Huge props for trying and not failing – if you want my respect and admiration (for whatever it’s worth) by covering some Sigur Ros, I’ll send you here first. We Are Scientists will be in town June 17 at the Kool Haus supporting Arctic Monkeys.

Everyone wants to talk to Tom Verlaine. The New York Times (Bugmenot) gets a pretty good piece – The New York Post does not. Verlaine is in town as a keynote speaker the second weekend of June for NxNE and will saddle up with Television for a hugely anticipated show (by me) at the Phoenix June 9.

Elvis Costello is (almost) coming to town. He’ll be at the Fallsview Casino in Niagara Falls on July 7 and 8. A casino, Declan? I think you might be taking this namesake thing a little far. A line has been crossed. His new album with Allen Toussaint, The River In Reverse, will be out June 6.

np – The Like Young / Last Secrets

Tuesday, April 4th, 2006

Bandwitch

So while tonight’s Flaming Lips show at the Phoenix is obviously the hot ticket of the early Spring (mandatory media coverage courtesy of The Toronto Star and The Toronto Sun and AP), one of the hot shows of last Summer (which I didn’t attend but was told was great), the Broken Social Scene fete at Olympic Island, is getting a second go-around.

This year’s edition, which will take place on June 24, will again feature some BSS family acts, in this case Feist and Raising The Fawn, and some impressive imported talent – Bloc Party and J Mascis – with more to be announced. Interesting to note that J is being billed simply as J, not Dinosaur Jr or Witch. Will he be doing Fog material? Or maybe he hasn’t decided exactly who he’s going to anger the Toronto Islands residents with.

Tickets for the to-do will go on sale on Thursday for the CFNY presale price of $38.50, plus $6 for the ferry to and from the islands. After that the price goes up, though I don’t know by how much. BSS also made some news backstage at the Juno awards after taking home a Best Alternative Album paperweight for Broken Social Scene, slagging off the Canadian Idol machine. JAM! and Chart dish dirt. Damn you, Kevin Drew. Damn you for making Kalan Porter cry.

Some other just-announced shows meriting varying degrees of excitedness: The Guillemots return to Toronto for a show at the Mod Club on May 4, SF shoegazers Film School have a date at the ‘Shoe on May 19, Greg Dulli brings his Twilight Singers to Lee’s Palace on May 27, the same night Imogen Heap returns to the Mod Club. Snow Patrol are at the Kool Haus June 7 and Vancouver’s Pink Mountaintops, who were such a hit that SxSW that I had to stand on the street for two hours to get into the venue, are at the Horseshoe June 11.

After being delayed for, uh, 7 years, the Big Star tribute album Big Star Small World will finally be seeing a release on May 23. More than a quarter of the contributing artists are now defunct, one broke up for an extended period of time only to actually become half the band they’re saluting (who also themselves appear), several are a decade or so removed from their heyday and one is Wilco. I’ve already posted three of these tracks in the past, but this should still be worth possessing since I don’t actually have any more of them.

Chart and NOW stir some interest for Centro-Matic’s show at the Horseshoe tomorrow night.

The CBC has named me one of Canada’s best arts and entertainment blogs. Well thank you, Ceeb. You’re my second favourite crown corporation. Canada Post still wins because they bring me things.

np – Neko Case / Fox Confessor Brings The Flood

Tuesday, March 14th, 2006

Winged Life

I’m on a plane to Austin this morning, and one of the bands I’m likely to see an awful lot of whilst there are locals Shearwater. In addition to their slot in the Misra showcase at Maggie Mae’s on the 17th, they’re playing three other day shows over the course of the week. This is all to build up excitement for their new album Palo Santo, which is out May 9 and if it’s a patch on Winged Life, will be excellent. They’ve released the first MP3 from the album below and there’s more to listen to on their MySpace. 2005 was the year of Okkervil River – 2006 may well see Jonathan Meiburg and Will Sheff again put out one of the best albums of the year.

MP3: Shearwater – “Seventy Four Seventy Five”

As the festival draws nigh, there’s lots of tips, guides, suggestions, etc for the SxSW punter, newbie and veteran. Pitchfork and Drowned In Sound have some suggestions of hot acts worth the attendee’s attention (and all of those showcases just got 200% harder to get into… thanks…) and The Star-Telegram rates the buzz bands of SxSWs past. Central Village has some excellent day party suggestions including hard-to-find set times, Crackers United has some festival-going tips, (via BrooklynVegan, whom I probably won’t be running into around ye olde BBQ pit) as do Depraved Fangirls (re: band t-shirts… but I don’t have any other clothes!).

Festival sponsor Yaris (as in the Toyota) has set up a really nice guide with maps, schedules, music and tips and for those of us who didn’t have the foresight to book a hotel with free internet access, here’s a map of free wifi points around Austin. And WhereAustin has a terrific Google Maps app for finding all the night showcases.

For my part, here’s an idealized list of where I’ll be during the evening shows. Probably won’t shake out that way, but I’m avoiding a lot of the bigger shows so maybe I’ll get lucky and make everything I want to.

Wednesday, March 15:
Page France @ Emo’s Annex, 8PM
Luminous Orange @ Habana Calle 6 @ 8PM
Headlights @ Emo’s Jr, 9PM
Voxtrot @ Emo’s, 9PM
Field Music @ Emo’s, 10PM
The Czars @ Fox & Hound, 10PM
Serena Maneesh @ Emo’s, 11PM
The Octopus Project @ Emo’s Jr, 12AM
Monsters Are Waiting @ Nuno’s Upstairs, 1AM
Saturday Looks Good To Me @ Emo’s Jr, 1AM

Thursday March 16:
Margot & The Nuclear So And So’s @ Nuno’s Upstairs, 8PM
Belaire @ Emo’s IV, 8:30PM
Film School @ Club DeVille, 9PM
Mazarin @ Buffalo Billiards, 10PM
Some By Sea @ Redrum, 11PM
The Hidden Cameras @ Molotov Lounge, 12AM
Levy @ Nuno’s Upstairs, 1AM

Friday, March 17:
Ambulette @ Red 7, 7:30PM
Dirty On Purpose @ Spiro’s, 8PM
The Mendoza Line @ Maggie Mae’s, 8PM
Isobel Campbell @ Dirty Dog Bar, 9PM
Eric Bachmann @ 18th Floor At Capital Place, 10PM
Gemma Hayes @ Soho Lounge, 10PM
Sarah Hepburn @ The Drink, 10PM
The High Violets @ Molotov Lounge, 11PM
Hopewell @ Bourbon Rocks, 11PM
Shearwater @ Maggie Mae’s, 12AM
Centro-Matic @ Maggie Mae’s, 1AM

Saturday, March 18
Decoder Ring @ Red 7, 8PM
Bedroom Walls @ Habana Calle 6 Patio, 8:30 PM
Rainer Maria @ Karma Lounge, 9:30PM
Superchunk @ Antone’s, 11PM
I Love You But I’ve Chosen Darkness @ Emo’s Annex, 11:15PM
Camera Obscura @ Antone’s, 12AM
Okkervil River @ Emo’s Annex, 12:15AM

So you can see there are heavy periods and light periods. Saturday, in particular, is rather barren – I don’t even have a 1AM show picked! I can’t close out the festival sitting on a street corner narfing down pizza… though I bet that’ll sound like a pretty damn good idea by that point. But suggestions for filling in the gaps are welcome. Also, I will be photoblogging this week for Scene From My Life. One photo a day from Toronto and Austin. Hopefully I will manage to document something worth seeing.

Glide puts the spotlight on Centro-Matic, who will be playing the Misra evening showcase at Maggie May’s on the 17th and their day party at Red Eyed Fly on the 18th.

Notes from the UK – Doves will release a live, e-EP on April 10 consisting of five songs recorded during their 2005 Some Cities tours and Primal Scream tell NME about their new album, still untitled but due out June 5 across the pond.

Shows news – the Death Cab/Franz Ferdinand has been moved from The Docks to the Ricoh Coliseum. This may be the first time anyone has celebrated a show being moved into a bigger arena. The Strokes will also be at the Ricoh on May 6, presale starts today, and Architecture In Helsinki will make up their cancelled Fall date with a show May 20 at the Horseshoe.

The Asheville Citizen-Times stands up for vinyl (via Coolfer).

Oh look, I lost at the Bloggies again. 0-for-4. I rule. Congratulations to Photojunkie on the win.

24: The lifeboat episode! Chloe sheds a single tear! Lynn gets dressed down by an anonymous security guard. Jack plays Macgyver and holds his breath! But really, wouldn’t any nerve gas worth its salt affect any mucous membranes, like his eyes or his nose? Not that I wish severe hemmorhaging on Jack, but come on. Don’t know why the security guy was so upset about dying, surely he knew when he put on that red shirt he was a goner? Hasn’t he ever seen Star Trek? Poor Bill, he’ll never get to stay in charge. Collette? Who’s Collette? WE WANT MANDY. Oh, and who wants to bet that Kim gets caught in the martial law crackdown? No one? Smart. Not like Tony. Tony is stupid. Stuid and dead. And as a chaser – The Toronto Star has a requiem for dear, departed Edgar.

Hey, question – yesterday afternoon my MSN crapped out. Like the application itself crashed, and would do so any time I tried to log in. I uninstalled and reinstalled, same thing. I can login via web and through Windows Messenger fine, but MSN Messenger? No dice. Now this wouldn’t normally alarm me that much, but the exact same thing happened on my laptop install as well – the program crashes the exact same way. So, uh, WTF? Anyone having this happen to them?

np – Okkervil River / Black Sheep Boy

Thursday, January 12th, 2006

Decoration Day

The University of Georgia’s Red & Black tells of Professer Patterson Hood teaching Drive-By Trucking 101 at the school while fellow DBT Jason Isbell cut class to hang out with The Chatanooga Pulse. Luckily, Billboard was in the front row taking notes and learned that their new album, A Blessing And A Curse. will be out April 25. And he’s willing to share the tracklisting, but that’s all.

While the official website for the new album used to have a download of the leadof track, “Feb 14”, it’s now only got that streaming in the background as a soundtrack to a shot of the new album art, photos (from their Flickr group) and videos of recent DBT live performances.

Paste has a pre-independence interview with Nellie McKay.

The Toronto Sun catches up with A Northern Chorus, who are at the Lula Lounge with Sianspheric tonioght. And if that doesn’t satisfy your space-rocking joneses. come see Bluescreen at the Horseshoe tomorrow night. Their/our new album A Survival Guide To Mishaps And Losses got a shiny 4-star review from eye.

I was supposed to go to the Over The Top Fest launch party last night with Final Fantasy, Akron/Family and Great Lake Swimmers, but alas – something came up and I had to bow out. It’s no biggie – I’m sure the opportunity to see FF and GLS will come again soon enough, and Akron/Family are already due back in town on March 21 for a show at the Music Gallery with Deep Dark United and Laura Barrett (tickets $12).

But I will still put forward this question: How has Owen Pallett managed to not get sued by Squaresoft (now Square-Enix, apparently) yet? When he first began performing under the moniker of Final Fantasy, I assumed it would be a temporary, low-profile creative outlet that wouldn’t attract the attention of anyone’s lawyers… but now, as official Arcade Fire alumnus and New York Times profilee, surely someone has taken notice? Or maybe they’re just not saying anyting to avoid anyone remembering their megabomb film of the same name?

The final nominees for the New Pantheon awards are out – the short list (can I call it that?) is up at Billboard. If I were a betting man, and I’m not, I’d have to say it was between Sufjan Stevens and Arcade Fire (say what?). Because that’s what bloggers like and bloggers are never wrong. Except a lot of the time.

What Would Jesus Blog, a fun new blog with delusions of grandeur, has compiled some 1-star Amazon reviews of otherwise critically lauded indie rock albums… Jesus vs sacred cows. There’s a joke in there somewhere.

Because no one demanded it – Degrassi: The Comic Book. I just don’t get the Degrassi thing. Never have, never will.

np – The House Of Love / Days Run Away