Anneke HymmenMontrealer Mike Feuerstack isn’t anything resembling a household name but if you’ve got records from Belle Orchestre, Angela Desveaux or The Wooden Stars in your collection – and you probably should – then you’ve got his name in your liner notes. But if not, then you probably don’t have anything from his solo project Snailhouse and that’s a shame – but one you can easily rectify with his new album Sentimental Gentleman when it’s released on May 24.

In his other bands, it’s his virtuoso musicianship that’s on display but with Snailhouse, his songwriting chops take centre stage. There’s still plenty of tasty guitarwork throughout, but it’s largely of the laid back variety as it’s in support of his gently rootsy tunes. Thoughtful and introspective, it’s not the sort of record that attracts your attention with frantic arm waving, but an easy demeanour and welcoming smile. And while there’s plenty other shinier and more immediate roadside attractions on the musical landscape, those who take the time to investigate Snailhouse’s low-key charms will be rewarded with a thoughtful and understatedly witty collection of songs that won’t necessarily change your life, but will certainly make it more pleasant for a half hour or so, and moreso with each visit.

Exclaim is currently streaming the whole of Sentimental Gentleman. Snailhouse is just wrapping a tour of Europe and will kick off a North American leg next week with a date at Toronto’s Dakota Tavern on May 26.

MP3: Snailhouse – “I Never Woke Up”
MP3: Snailhouse – “Sentimental Gentleman”
Stream: Snailhouse / Sentimental Gentleman

Joel Plaskett has announced the released of a rarities compilation entitled EMERGENCYs, false alarms, shipwrecks, castaways, fragile creatures, special features, demons and demonstrations, due to hit stores on June 14 – Chart has details and as a teaser, here’s one of the tracks from it. Plaskett will play a free show June 10 at Metro Square as part of the LuminaTO festival.

MP3: Joel Plaskett – “When I Go”

The release this week of Diaper Island, the latest from Calgary’s Chad Vangaalen, has brought the media a-calling. Check out features at The Globe & Mail, NXEW, Paste, The Calgary Herald and Exclaim. Van Gaalen headlines The Great Hall on June 18 for NXNE and a new MP3 and video from the album have just been released.

MP3: Chad Van Gaalen – “Peace On The Rise”
Video: Chad Van Gaalen – “Peace On the Rise”

Austra is getting similar attention for her just-released debut Feel It Break. There’s interviews at NOW, hour.ca, Resonancity, Clash, aux.tv and Chart. Austra has a sold-out show at Lee’s Palace tonight.

Timber Timbre have released a new video from Creep On Creepin’ On.

Video: Timber Timbre – “Black Water”

Also with a new video – Montreal’s No Joy, from their debut Ghost Blonde. Their NXNE showcase is June 17 at The Horseshoe.

Video: No Joy – “Maggie Says I Love You”

Little Scream gets in on the “hey I have a new video” meme with one from The Golden Record. hour.ca has an interview with the artist, who plays The Mod Club on June 14 opening up for The Antlers.

Video: Little Scream – “Red Hunting Jacket”

And from The Wilderness Of Manitoba is a new clip from When You Left The Fire.

Video: The Wilderness Of Manitoba – “Orono Park”

Great Lake Swimmers’ Spinner about his contributions to The National Parks Project, the documentary film which pairs Canadian musicians with Canada’s national parks. A release show for the soundtrack, featuring many of the artists who contributed, happens tonight at The Royal – tickets are $15. Here’s one of the performances from the film, featuring Cadence Weapon, Woodpigeon’s Mark Hamilton and Laura Barrett in a teepee in Waterton Lakes National Park in Alberta. Click through to video number four. Also check out interviews with the film’s directors at NOW and Torontoist.

Video: Laura Barrett, Cadence Weapon, Mark Hamilton – “The Humble Fawn”

And similar-sounding but not at all related is The Parks Canada Experience, which is notable because a) it’s funded by our tax dollars and b) it will be throwing a party at the foot of the CN Tower this Saturday, May 21, which will feature free performances from Malajube and Apostle Of Hustle, amongst others. It runs from 11AM to 7PM. For more specifics on the what and the when… I don’t know, contact your local MP.

MP3: Malajube – “Synesthesie”
MP3: Apostle Of Hustle – “Perfect Fit”

I’ve been waiting ages for a Kathryn Calder live date in support of her excellent solo debut Are You My Mother and when one is finally announced – it’s in conflict with not one but two other must-see shows. Which is to say that when she’s playing The Tranzac’s Southern Cross Lounge on June 10, I will be at Okkervil River at The Phoenix having already given up seeing Weeping Tile at Lee’s Palace. Life is so unfair.

MP3: Kathryn Calder – “Arrow”
MP3: Kathryn Calder – “Slip Away”

Fucked Up have been added to the NXNE lineup with two shows on June 16 – one free engagement at Yonge-Dundas Square early that evening and another late-nighter at Wrongbar. They’re also opening for Foo Fighters at The Air Canada Centre on August 9. David Comes To Life is out June 7.

MP3: Fucked Up – “Ship Of Fools”

Also added to the NXNE lineup, despite having just announced their own August 1 show at The Horseshoe, is Handsome Furs. They will preview new record Sound Kapital at The Garrison at 1AM on June 18.

MP3: Handsome Furs – “Radio Kaliningrad”

And in addition to his set at Yonge-Dundas Square on June 17, Diamond Rings will be at Wrongbar at midnight on June 18. This, of course, is all in addition to his set opening up (again) for Robyn on June 3 at Echo Beach.

MP3: Diamond Rings – “Something Else”

Diamond Rings has also started up a remix series wherein he’ll release a new remix each Tuesday leading up to the June 21 US major label reissue of his album Special Affections. The first entry is a track from Miracle Fortress, whose own Was I The Wave? just came out Stateside this week – there’s a new MP3 from it available to download to mark the occasion. Spinner talks turkey with Graham Van Pelt.

MP3: Miracle Fortress – “Miscalculations”
MP3: Miracle Fortress – “Raw Spectacle” (Diamond Rings remix)

Sloan’s 20th anniversary video back-pat series rolls on, now including installments for “Underwhelmed medley”, “Your Favourite Sloan Lyric”, a rendering of “People Of The Sky” by Owen Pallett and “Sloan’s influence”. Sloan play The Mod Club on June 22.

Rolling Stone is streaming an unreleased Neil Young song circa the mid-80s, due to appear on the Archives release A Treasure, out June 14.

Sean PecknoldWe’re a week out from the release of one of the most-anticipated records of the year – Helplessness Blues by Fleet Foxes – and as has become commonplace, the album is available to stream a week before it goes on sale at NPR. A couple of listens in and all the key ingredients that made the debut a smash are still in place: Robin Pecknold’s otherworldly voice, the ridiculously lush and immaculate harmonies, the blankets of reverb imported from some Pacific northwest mountaintop, but Blues also sounds more confident and dynamic than its predecessor, perhaps a sign that the songwriting is now more up to par up with the immense musical talents of the band. I liked but didn’t love Fleet Foxes and am cautiously confident that I’ll like the new record more. I am certain, however, that they won’t alienate any of their fanbase with it.

Exclaim and Spinner have conversations with Pecknold, the former about the process of writing the new record and the latter about the general awfulness of Myspace. Meanwhile, over at We All Want Someone To Shout For has a session the band played for BBC Radio 1 last week available to download and if you like Fleet Foxes but hate their songs, You Ain’t No Picasso has collected a decent-sized archive of covers they’ve performed.

Fleet Foxes are at Massey Hall on July 14.

Stream: Fleet Foxes / Helplessness Blues

Yours Truly has got a video session with The Head & The Heart which I’m sure is great, but can’t watch to confirm since it’s restricted to the US only… but they’re working on it, I’m told. In the meantime, read this interview at LAist.

Prefix talks to Charles Bissell of The Wrens about the state of their new record which will not actually be called Funeral and should be out someday. Maybe.

Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy talks to both Spin and Rolling Stone about their new record which may but probably won’t be called Get Well Soon Everybody and may be out come September. Know what would be awesome? If Tweedy gave completely contrary information to both publications. But he didn’t. More certain, as Exclaim reports, is the first release on the band’s new dBpm label – a 7″ single due out sometime in July A-sided by new song “I Might” and backsided by a cover of Nick Lowe’s “I Love My Label”.

NPR has a World Cafe session with Bright Eyes.

Spinner, Paste and Clash talk to Steve Earle about his just-released new record I’ll Never Get Out Of This World Alive, acting and the Gulf of Mexico (song and region), respectively. He also sets up behind a Tiny Desk for NPR. Earle is at the Molson Amphitheatre on August 20.

PopMatters catches up with The Thermals on tour in Germany.

PO Box 607 gets to know Anna-Lynne Williams of Trespassers William about a new solo record coming out as Lotte Kestner and her new label Saint-Loup Records.

Blurt profiles Buffalo Tom while Bill Janovitz contributes a piece on being both rocker and realtor to Boston Magazine.

PopMatters tries to extract an interview from J Mascis.

The Chicago Tribune talks to The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart. They’re at The Opera House on August 2.

Comic artist and musician Jeffrey Lewis is in town for the Toronto Comic Arts Festival and will be whiling away the evening by playing a solo show at The Dakota on May 8, tickets $10 at the door.

MP3: Jeffrey Lewis & The Junkyard – “Slogans”

Back for like the third time in less than a year, Robyn is back on June 3 with this past Winter’s tourmate Diamond Rings in tow and they’re playing an actual new venue in Toronto. It’s called Echo Beach and it’s an approximately 4000-capacity general admission outdoor venue at Ontario Place, on the water, not far from the Molson Amphitheatre but far away in time. Tickets for the show are $39.50, on sale Friday.

MP3: Diamond Rings – “All Yr Songs”
Video: Robyn – “Dancing On My Own”

New York’s Gang Gang Dance will have a new record out in Eye Contact on May 10 and be at The Horseshoe on July 10 to support.

MP3: Gang Gang Dance – “MindKilla”
Video: Gang Gang Dance – “MindKilla”

Warner Bros.Or at least we are the first batch of acts officially announced on Tuesday for this year’s NXNE festival, running June 16 through 19 around Toronto. It’s certainly not all of them, but there’s some moderate to big names in there and perhaps most key, the headliners for the free shows at Yonge-Dundas Square that have become the centrepiece of the fest have been revealed.

While there’s no one quite of the stature of last year’s Saturday night marquee of Iggy & The Stooges, New Wave legends Devo have certainly got the pedigree to act as a worthy centrepiece for this year’s event. They and their energy domes and jumpsuits will be headlining the YDS Stage on the Saturday night, closing off what will likely be a full day’s slate of acts. They were here in Fall 2009 offering full-album performances of Q: Are We Not Men and Freedom Of Choice, but have since released their first new album in forever with last year’s Something For Everybody. Which, I’m sure, the masses will want to hear lots of material from at this show. Mm hmm.

And while there’s enough tapped for the free stage that you could have a fine weekend just camped out in front of the Eaton Centre, NXNE is still a club-level fest and there’ll be hundreds more artists from near and far vying for your attention. The schedule won’t be out for a while yet but I’ve managed to cobble together a very early list of who will be playing where and when – obviously all subject to change – and while some of this was previously announced, a lot of it is new:

Thursday, June 16, 2011
The Descendents, OFF!, Rusty, Metz @ Yonge-Dundas Square
Evan Dando & Juliana Hatfield, The Luyas @ Lee’s Palace
Snowblink, Forest City Lovers, Evening Hymns @ The Music Gallery
The Dodos, Deerhoof, Gauntlet Hair @ The Phoenix
Ty Segall, The Dig @ The Garrison
Woodsman @ The El Mocambo

Friday, June 17, 2011
Stars, Land Of Talk, Diamond Rings @ Yonge-Dundas Square
Suuns, No Joy, PS I Love You @ The Horseshoe
Bouncing Souls, Anti-Flag, The Flatliners @ The Phoenix
Art Brut @ The Mod Club
Braids @ The Garrison
Dum Dum Girls, Cults, Superhumanoids, Writer @ Lee’s Palace
Ty Segall, Julianna Barwick, Daniel Pujol, Secret Cities @ Wrongbar

Saturday, June 18, 2011
Devo, Men Without Hats, Cults, Writer @ Yonge-Dundas Square
Twin Shadow, Wild Nothing @ Lee’s Palace
Foster The People @ The Mod Club
Hot Water Music, A Wilhelm Scream, Mockingbird Wish Me Luck, Sharks @ The Opera House
Talk Normal, Prince Rama, AIDS Wolf, Grimes, Doldrums @ 918 Bathurst
Chad Van Gaalen, Braids, Jennifer Castle, Duzheknew, Grimes @ The Great Hall
The Balconies @ Sneaky Dee’s

Sunday, June 19, 2011
Wild Nothing @ The Garrison
The Pharcyde, Digable Planets @ Yonge-Dundas Square

And some of the acts who don’t have any more specific information available besides “they’ll be there” are Crocodiles and Lower Dens. Yeah, I think I can find enough to occupy myself for four evenings or so.

MP3: Art Brut – “Lost Weekend”
MP3: Julianna Barwick – “The Magic Place”
MP3: Braids – “Lemonade”
MP3: Jennifer Castle – “Neverride”
MP3: Cults – “Go Outside”
MP3: Deerhoof – “The Merry Barracks”
MP3: Diamond Rings – “Something Else”
MP3: The Dodos – “Don’t Stop”
MP3: Evening Hymns – “Broken Rifle”
MP3: Forest City Lovers – “Light You Up”
MP3: Foster The People – “Pumped Up Kicks”
MP3: Grimes – “Vanessa”
MP3: Land Of Talk – “Quarry Hymns”
MP3: The Luyas – “Tiny Head”
MP3: No Joy – “Hawaii”
MP3: OFF! – “I Don’t Belong”
MP3: Prince Rama – “Lightening Fossil”
MP3: PS I Love You (featuring Diamond Rings) – “Leftovers”
MP3: Ty Segall – “Girlfriend”
MP3: Snowblink – “Ambergris”
MP3: Stars – “We Don’t Want Your Body”
MP3: Suuns – “Up Past The Nursery”
MP3: Talk Normal – “In A Strangeland”
MP3: Chad Van Gaalen – “Sara”
MP3: Twin Shadow – “Castles In The Snow”
MP3: Woodsman – “Insects”
Video: Devo – “What We Do”
Video: The Descendents – “I’m The One”
Video: Digable Planets – “Rebirth Of Slick”
Video: Men Without Hats – “Safety Dance”
Video: The Pharcyde – “Drop”

If you prefer your festivals a little more rustically-set, Exclaim has the lineup announcement for this year’s Hillside Festival, happening in Guelph from July 22 to 24. The roster reads like a who’s who of up-and-coming Canadian talent, including The Rural Alberta Advantage, Dan Mangan, Karkwa, Little Scream and really too many more to list. Tickets go on sale May 7 at 10AM at $110 for a weekend pass and these sell out quickly every year so don’t dither too long if at all.

And while talking Canadian fests, it’s worth noting that Montreal’s Osheaga added a bunch more acts including Janelle Monae and Broken Social Scene among them, and broken things down day by day.

In other live music news, Steve Earle will be at the HMV at 333 Yonge for a signing and in-store on April 28 at 6PM – you’ll just have to buy a copy of I’ll Never Get Out Of This World Alive when it comes out next Tuesday for tickets. Or wait for his show opening up for Blue Rodeo at the Amphitheatre on August 20.

San Diego’s The Donkeys are in town at a venue to be determined Sneaky Dee’s on May 21 in support of their new record Born With Stripes, out on Tuesday.

MP3: The Donkeys – “Don’t Know Who We Are”

The Baseball Project – aka Scott McCaughey, Steve Wynn, Peter Buck and Linda Pitmon celebrating America’s pastime in song – will bring their second album Volume 2: High & Inside to Lee’s Palace on June 1. And yeah, the Jays are at home that evening against Cleveland. Oregon Live has a feature on the band.

MP3: The Baseball Project – “1976″

Louisiana’s Givers, just here supporting Wye Oak a couple weeks ago, will return for their own show at The Garrison on June 21. Their album In Light is out June 7.

MP3: Givers – “Up Up Up”

With their new record D due out May 24, White Denim have announced a date at The El Mocambo for June 28.

MP3: White Denim – “Anvil Everything”

Antony & The Johnsons have released a new video from last year’s Swanlights

Video: Antony & The Johnsons – “Swanlights”

Spinner reports that one of The National’s next projects will be curating a Grateful Dead tribute album for charity. I can only hope that everyone involved covers “Touch Of Grey” because that’s about the only Dead song I know.

Exclaim talks to Explosions In The Sky guitarist Munaf Rayani about their new record Take Care, Take Care, Take Care, out on Tuesday.

My Morning Jacket frontman Jim James goes over some of his influences for Spin. Their new record Circuital comes out May 31 and they play The Kool Haus on July 11.

Titus Andronicus discusses his love of Fucked Up and plans for following up The Monitor with Spinner.

NPR has a World Cafe session with Iron & Wine while The Washington Post and Boston Herald have interviews with Sam Beam.

Spectrum Culture and Spin interview Michael Benjamin Lerner of Telekinesis. They’re at Lee’s Palace on May 27.

Bon Iver has declared their intention to make the Summer solstice a little more wintry by releasing their new self-titled album on June 21. Details at Pitchfork.

And finally, sympathies to family, friends and fans of TV On The Radio bassist Gerard Smith, who lost his battle with lung cancer yesterday morning. Fuck you, cancer. Just fuck you.

Canvas MediaThere’s records that you hear and, regardless of how you personally feel about them, you know that they will be a big thing, that their contents will resonate with the masses and will prove to be game-changers for the artist who created it. Timber Timbre’s 2009 self-titled album was not one of these, or at least I didn’t hear it. Building swampy textures and tempos around Taylor Kirk’s low, drawling Randy Newman-ish vocals, it didn’t seem the sort of record with a lot of crossover appeal and yet it did find an audience beyond lo-fi folk/blues enthusiasts and would be one of the most highly-regarded Torontonian and even Canadian releases of the year. What can I say, I’m wrong a lot. I’m okay with that.

And so I’m not at all surprised that people are rubbing their hands together in anticipation of Timber Timbre’s new record, the marvelously-titled Creep On Creepin’ On, which is out on April 5. It keeps much of the dark, out-of-time atmospherics of its predecessor, but with Kirk’s live band Simon Trottier and Mika Posen now full-fledged members, offers a more dynamic sound with some rather rich-sounding instrumental passages. I already like it more than Timber Timbre, so everyone else is probably going to love it.

Exclaim thinks enough of it to put the band on the cover of their new issue with accompanying feature story. The record is streaming in whole at Spinner and they’ve just released a video from it as well. Months of touring begin in earnest this weekend and include a sold-out hometown show at Trinity-St. Paul’s next Friday night, April 8.

MP3: Timber Timbre – “Black Water”
Video: Timber Timbre – “Woman”
Stream: Timber Timbre / Creep On Creeping On

PS I Love You have released a new video from Meet Me At The Muster Station and support for their April 7 show at The Garrison has been revealed as Matters. Whom you may have known better as The D’Urbervilles. Which you may know as John O’Reagan’s – aka Diamond Rings – rock band. Exclaim has some info on the change in identity, both sides of their new single – which is out next week and already has a video – is streaming at Bandcamp and NOW has a chat with the director of the last Diamond Rings video.

Video: PS I Love You – “Get Over”
Video: Matters – “Get In Or Get Out”
Video: Diamond Rings – “It’s Not My Party”

Creative Loafing and Ca Va Cool check in with The Rural Alberta Advantage, who will be at The Phoenix on April 29.

Spinner and Simcoe.com talk to Tokyo Police Club.

A new MP3 from Sloan’s forthcoming The Double Cross is up for grabs. The record is out May 10.

MP3: Sloan – “Unkind”

Matablog announced that the lead-up to the June 7 release of Fucked Up’s new record David Comes To Life would consist of four digital singles, the first of which is already up for grabs. Exclaim also reports that the band will put out a compilation of fake ’70s-era punk bands as part of Record Store Day on April 16, and are offering a track from that to wrap your head around.

MP3: Fucked Up – “The Other Shoe”

Apparently coming out of SxSW as one of the buzz bands, Austra have scheduled a hometown show at Lee’s Palace for May 19 to go with the May 17 release of Feel It Break. The Guardian declared them “New band of the day” last week.

MP3: Austra – “The Beat & The Pulse”

The Meligrove Band have released a new video from last year’s Shimmering Lights.

Video: The Meligrove Band – “Really Want It”

The National Post chats with Basia Bulat.

Stars have released a new video from last year’s The 5 Ghosts, and congratulations to Amy Millan and Evan Cranley on the birth of their daughter last week.

Video: Stars – “Changes”

PopMatters talks to Natalia Yanchak of The Dears while The Village Voice chats with Murray Lightburn.

NYC Taper is sharing a recording of Godspeed You! Black Emperor’s show in Brooklyn in mid-March. Their sold-out three-night, four-show stand at Lee’s Palace runs April 22 to 24.

Exclaim talks to Little Scream, whose debut The Golden Record arrives April 12. She opens for Antlers at The Mod Club on June 14.

Exclaim has details on Miracle Fortress’ long-awaited second album Was I The Wave?, due out April 26 and previewed impressively (though in the dark) back Canadian Musicfest. A track from the record is available in exchange for your email address.

Ottawa post-pop instrumentalists My Dad Vs. Yours have released a video from their gorgeous new record Little Symphonies. The Link has an interview with guitarist Jose Palacios.

Video: My Dad Vs Yours – “Happy Wanderer / Carry The Weight”

The Take talks with Juno award winner Shad, who by way of thanks is giving away a new track recorded with Skratch Bastid. There’s also a video interview with Shad from the Junos by the Province of Ontario. Our tax dollars at work!

MP3: Shad & Skratch Bastid – “Give You All I Can”
Video: Shad & Skratch Bastid – “Give You All I Can”

eye, The Chicago Tribune, The Riverfront Times and Austinist talk to Dan Bejar of Destroyer, who are playing a sold-out show at Lee’s Palace tonight.

Frank YangSomeday, possibly not too far in the future, I will have to either admit that Canadian Musicfest begins in earnest on Wednesday nights now, and not Thursdays as it has in the past, or begin ignoring it completely. It’s currently even odds as to which it’ll be. But either way, the 2011 edition started for me on Thursday evening at Lee’s Palace, which would be my only stop for the evening. Hey, it’s not my fault that the programmers put together a bill worth staying put for. Though it is my fault that I’m lazy. Anyways.

I’ve seen The Wilderness Of Manitoba a number of times, most recently last November. And while the intervening months have been eventful for the band, most particularly in the form of a US release for their debut When You Left The Fire come May – their live show continues to be refinements of that with which they’ve been building their audience for the last while. Which is to say, pretty harmony-laden folk-pop that served as a welcome acoustical blanket on a damp, cold night as this one. It was good to see that when obliged to fill the largest room I’ve seen them in, at least, there were not only able to embiggen their sound to fill it out, but they did so by adding some instrumental breaks that introduced a welcome little bit of darkness and/or even chaos to the edges of their sound. Given how good and versatile players they all are, it’d be nice to see the musicianship of the band be given as much weight as their vocals. Or they should go completely post-rock their next time out.

Torontoist and Toro have interviews with the band and a new video has premiered over at Paste.

Photos: The Wilderness Of Manitoba @ Lee’s Palace – March 10, 2011
MP3: The Wilderness Of Manitoba – “Hermit”
MP3: The Wilderness Of Manitoba – “Mother Song”
Video: The Wilderness Of Manitoba – “Orono Park”
Video: The Wilderness Of Manitoba – “November”

At first I thought it was odd that I hadn’t seen Miracle Fortress since Summer 2008, but while Graham Van Pelt hasn’t been completely in hiding since then, he hasn’t provided a lot of opportunities to see his solo project live. Partly because he was concentrating on his disco-rock outfit Think About Life and partly because, apparently, it takes a while to completely deconstruct and reconstruct yourself creatively. This, at least, was what could be inferred from his set, which completely eschewed his 2007 debut Five Roses in favour of new material from his second album which is being teased with the acronym WITW? and is due out in April. The My Bloody Beach Boys ’60s/’90s dreampop of the debut has largely been checked in favour of a sleeker, more synthetic ’80s-ish Depeche Shop Boys sound – albeit more guitar-heavy – and while the aesthetic shift take a moment to adjust to, what matters is that Van Pelt’s impeccable songcraft still underpins it all and it sounds fantastic. In addition to the stylistic shifts, Miracle Fortress has also shed the conventional band configuration that it grew into circa Five Roses and this time out, was just Van Pelt on guitar and synths, a drummer basically doubling the pre-recorded rhythm tracks and a laser-light show which probably could have used some smoke machine support for full effect. Still, for such a limited setup, the show had a lot of physicality and energy and affirmed that if you’d forgotten about Miracle Fortress and their greatness over the past few years, prepare to be reminded.

Spinner and eye also have reviews of the performance.

Photos: Young Galaxy @ Lee’s Palace – March 10, 2011
MP3: Miracle Fortress – “Have You Seen In Your Dreams”
Video: Miracle Fortress – “Maybe Lately”
Video: Miracle Fortress – “Have You Seen In Your Dreams”

Winnipeg’s Imaginary Cities must have felt like they won the lottery when tapped to open up for Pixies on their upcoming North American tour, but judging on their Canadian Musicfest set if they’re going to make the most of the opportunity, they’ve got a little more work to do on their live performance. What they can’t do much about, and probably shouldn’t, is their material, which is solid if not overly remarkable pop-rock – it’s not their fault that it’s rather conventional-sounding next to the Pixies’ genre-bending/defining body of work. But the delivery of said material could be improved; while it certainly looked like they were having a good time, with bandleaders Rusty Matyas and Marti Sarbit looking all smiles on stage, they moved and performed with a decided stiffness and self-consciousness, like when Matyas went for the foot-on-the-monitor move at a moment when not only was he not taking a solo, but his guitar wasn’t even audible in the mix. But to their credit, the show and the material both improved as their set progressed and it became clear that they excelled at the mid-tempo pop numbers rather than when trying to rock out.

Spinner and The Montreal Gazette have interviews with the band.

Photos: Imaginary Cities @ Lee’s Palace – March 10, 2011
MP3: Imaginary Cities – “Hummingbird”

The rehabilitation of Young Galaxy around these parts has come a long way thanks to their latest album Shapeshifting, but that re-appraisal hadn’t yet extended to their live show. A poor first impression in early 2007, wherein they seemed to be some combination of bored and stoned, was mitigated somewhat in Summer 2008 opening up for Death Cab on the Islands and I was hoping that this outing, bolstered by the best material they’ve had to work with, would move them firmly into the plus column.

About midway through their set, Stephen Ramsay apologized to the audience for not being “slick” yet with regards to their show, and it wasn’t unjustified – there were some sound issues, the four-piece band had a lot of gear to wrangle and they weren’t going to be mistaken for a well-oiled machine. But despite the hiccups, it was impressive how well they were able to find the right balance of organicness and synthesis, maintaining the studio-ness of the recordings’ while giving them the humanity necessary to make them come along on stage. And it had the desired effect on the audience, as the well-filled room was dancing – or at least swaying – with the pulse of the music and it didn’t go unnoticed on the band. Ramsay and the decidedly pregnant Catherine McCandless were clearly pleased with the turnout and the response, appearing more engaged and probably feeling pretty validated in the risks taken to get to this point – clearly the critical rebirth of Young Galaxy extended to themselves.

NOW has a feature interview on Young Galaxy while Panic Manual and Spinner were also in attendance.

Photos: Young Galaxy @ Lee’s Palace – March 10, 2011
MP3: Young Galaxy – “Peripheral Visionaries”
MP3: Young Galaxy – “We Have Everything”
MP3: Young Galaxy – “Cover Your Tracks”
MP3: Young Galaxy – “Long Live The Fallen World”
MP3: Young Galaxy – “Outside The City”
MP3: Young Galaxy – “Come And See”
MP3: Young Galaxy – “Swing Your Heartache”
Video: Young Galaxy – “We Have Everything”
Video: Young Galaxy – “The Alchemy Between Us”
Video: Young Galaxy – “Outside The City”
Video: Young Galaxy – “Come And See”

A little bit of sleuthing my Exclaim has revealed a June 7 release date for Fucked Up’s new record David Comes To Life. They also reported last week that the band would be performing a live soundtrack to the 1928 silent film West Of Zanzibar as part of the Images Festival. It’ll happen on the closing night of the festival, April 9, at the Toronto Underground Cinema and cost $12 in advance.

Diamond Rings has released another video from Special Affections.

Video: Diamond Rings – “It’s Not My Party”

Southern Souls has a video session with Land Of Talk, filmed in Toronto’s Kensington Market.

TV On The Radio have made a track from their forthcoming Nine Types Of Light available to download. The album is out April 12 and they play The Sound Academy on April 18.

MP3: TV On The Radio – “Caffeinated Consciousness”

For Folk’s Sake and The New Current interview Nicole Atkins. NPR is streaming her recent WXPN session while NYC Taper is sharing a recording of the homecoming finale of her recent tour.

J Mascis lists his favourite guitarists for The Guardian. His solo record Several Shades Of Why is out on Tuesday.

The Chicago Tribune profiles Warpaint, in town at Wrongbar on March 26.