Lights will guide you home.

Date: 17 April 2012
Venue: Rexall Place

Guests: Scott, Angela, Patrick and Madeline
(and Melissa, a few days later, in Vancouver)

Rexall shows are a little more impersonal that I typically like, but I've heard such great things about Coldplay in concert, we simply had to go. From my sister, who has made the arduous and expensive trek to Vancouver twice to experience them in the past few years, and Angela, who said they did an amazing job at engaging the audience in such a large venue, I couldn't ignore the recommendation of two of the people whose opinions I value most highly in all things relevant (life and music). Yet again, they were both right. 

The opening band and the set up of the venue went well. The Pierces, two sisters from New York started the night off. They have a beautiful 70's vibe with their sound and style.  Metronomy, a British electro-disco band continued the warm up with interesting tap-light type lights attached to their bodies that lit up and went along with the music. Some of the music was a little too experimental for my tastes, but they played with great energy and I always am a fan of a girl rocking the drums well. This song is accompanied by one of their more strange videos... but I liked it. Because I am strange. 

Coldplay took the stage by force to launch their world tour from our great city.  They came on stage, and called out to the crowd , “Is there anybody out there?!”, then exploded into Mylo Xyloto where our light up bracelets went bananas, all in rhythm to the music depending on what colour bracelet you had. A few songs later, during the first few notes of "In My Place" whilst the Confetti cannons blanketed us with with paper snow. For Yellow, 100 giant balloons floated down from the ceiling. Thousands of voices echoed: “I wrote a song for you, and all the things you do, and it was called Yellow.” The chanting crowds in "Viva La Vida". 
In a word: Epic.

I think that being early in the tour, Chris did quite well in terms of energy and vocals. They really give their all up there, and by the end of the show, you could see how tired they all were. There were a couple mistakes, (intro to God Put a Smile on Your Face), but in the classic English, Hugh Grant style, the cleverly befuddled Chris came off as even more charming... if that is possible.

There was a good balance of the heavy hitting power ballads with the quiet contemplative songs through the set, which I think helped the boys catch their breath a little. There was a long outcropping of the stage where a day-glow graffiti-ed upright piano popped up from for Chris to do a great Linus impression for The Scientist (naturally, my fave song of the night)

       Setlist: 

(Back to the Future Theme intro music)

Mylo Xyloto
Hurts Like Heaven
In My Place
Major Minus
Lost!
Yellow
The Scientist 
Violet Hill
God Put A Smile Upon Your Face
Princess of China
Up in Flames
Warning Sign 
A Hopeful Transmission
Don't Let It Break Your Heart
(Live premiere)
Viva La Vida
Charlie Brown
Paradise
Us Against the World 

Encore:
Clocks
Fix You
(with Happy Birthday to Guy Berryman)
M.M.I.X.
Every Teardrop is a Waterfall

The Princess of China performance was disappointing... I understand it;s difficult to get RiRi to come on tour for months on end for one song a night... really puts a kink in the social life.... but really, i think a decent female vocalist could have easily performed that part... and it wouldn't have felt so much like a really big 1998 Much Music video dance party with the whole crowd staring at a giant screen for most of the song. The Moby show does this well, as many of his more popular tunes involve collaborations... this video is a little distorted, but that girl had awesome pipes and did the song justice.  I also was a little sad they didn't play "Don't Panic", but I GUESS you can't have everything you want all the time.  
 
The band did a great job of engaging the crowd, moving around the stage the right amount, and popping out in the crowd for the encore. I still love my small venue shows, but floor seats for Coldplay was a fantastic experience that I would recommend to anyone.

 

Goodnight, California

Kathleen Edwards

Date: 26 March 2012
Venue: Belly Up Tavern, Solana Beach California

Tickets $20

On a recent work trip, I was pleasantly surprised to find I wasn't the only Canadian girl in southern California that week when flipping through the local events. The venue was in a quaint little beach town 30 minutes north of San Diego by car. The walls were lined with artistic posters from previous shows, including Andrew Bird, Neko Case, Pinback, Colin Hay, Iron and Wine, Xavier Rudd and M. Ward. Sure signs that if I were a resident of southern California, the waitresses would know me by name. 

I settled into a set to the right of the stage about an hour before the show and sunk myself into some delicious fish tacos.  I started chatting with the most wonderful audiophile, Chip, a retired teacher from San Diego who shared my taste in both music and podcasts. We swapped favorites and expanded our musical horizons a little.

Hannah Georgas:

Hannah Georgas, a fellow British Colombian, opened up for Ms. Edwards on this tour. I have seen her twice before: The first opening for Said the Whale at the Bricks (under the Starlite room), the second open for Royal Wood at Myer Horowitz. The first show in November 2008, was a very special show for me. I had heard a clip of her singing "The Beat Stuff" on CBC that morning, and couldn't get it out of my head all day at work. I luckily rounded up two tickets and Steph was gracious enough to humor my crazy sporadic concert. She warmed up the room well with backing from Jaycelyn, Peter and Spencer from Said the Whale. The show was amazing, and I still love the 6 album sampler that I got at that show. That was my first exposure to Said the Whale. I had seen flyers around for them the last few times they were in town, but never pursued it further. Four years later, Said the Whale is my favorite band, so sweet and personable. I've seen them more times that I can count on my hand now, and they never disappoint. 

Hannah flew in that morning and got the night started around 9 with a collection of her most recent album and few new tracks she's been working on. She didn't play a couple songs that I really wanted to hear. She didn't play anything from the first album, namely The (aformentioned) Beat Stuff, The National and Let's Talk. She also didn't play Drive from the CBC song quest: Road Songs, which a great traveling song. Neither This is Good nor Lovers Breakdown from the most recent album were performed, my two favorite songs from that album. I was a little disappointed that she didn't play more songs I was familiar with, but I liked the new material she's been working on.  Enough about what she didn't play, this is what she did play:

Elephant

Somebody

Enemies

Chit Chat

Waiting Game

Millions

Shine

Fantasize

She definitely earned a few more fans in that room tonight. She played with good energy and the sounds was great from where I was sitting. The I ran into another couple there form a marathon from the interior of BC. She worked the room a little after the set, meeting and greeting before she nipped back to change into her back-up singing outfit for Kathleen Edwards.


Here's a little video for Bang Bang You're Dead:

which she didn't play. Okay, okay. I'll move on...


Kathleen Edwards: 


Kathleen took the stage with a keyboardist, drummer, bassist and guitarist as well as Miss. Georgas at about 10. Her banter between the songs was incredibly endearing and you really got the sense she was a total sweetheart. She discussed a little about the personal struggles she went through in the last couple years, going through a divorce with her former collaborator Colin Cripps and her budding new relationship with Justin Vernon (frontman from Bon Iver). I find that Voyageur, her most recent album really speaks to me. To me, you can tell there is a lot more emotion and depth in the songs over her previous three albums.


Kathleen is  from Ottawa, and has been foraging her way through the music scene since 1999. Her album Failer from 2002 put her on the radar of Rolling Stones as a promising  new artist, playing on David Letterman and making the press in Billboard and Blender who felt Failer's songs possess "an indefinable pull that makes you love the characters they describe, no matter how fucked up they are." Her follow up albums, Back to Me and Asking for Flowers showed her progression into songwriting and built on her early sucess. The first song that I heard from Kathleen was "I Make the Dough, You get the Glory" from Asking for Flowers last year on CBC 2, and thanks to shazam, I was able to pursue my ear worm to get the whole catalog. Her style is a little more country than I typically listen to, but I really like the narrative style of her songs, and maybe it's the Alberta influence, but I am allowing myself a little room for genre-ical growth.  

The set was great, the band had great chemistry on stage and the energy was both honest and positive. I was thoroughly impressed with the skills of Gord Tough, the guitarist in plaid that I had a great view of from my perch. The set had a good mix of songs from the past four albums and good pacing from slow to upbeat. My favorites she played were Empty Threat, Six O'Clock, Change the Sheets and House Full of Empty Rooms.

Empty Threat

Asking for Flowers

Goodnight, California

In State

Sidecar

House Full of Empty Rooms

Going to Hell

Back to Me

Soft Place to Land

Mint

Change the Sheets

Encore: 

Six O'Clock News

For the Record

My favorite song from the new album is Chameleon/Comedian, which I thought she played on this night, but didn't have it on the setlist. I would have liked to head "You Make the Dough" also. House Full of Empty Rooms and Chameleon/Comedian have been the soundtrack to my inner monologue on and off since March. I work up this morning singing house full of empty rooms, so I figured it was time I sat down and finally talked about this event. It was a great concert, I would have liked to visit with her afterwards and wish her hell on her tour, but after waiting around for 15 minutes after the show, I decided to should call it a night and get back to San Diego. I highly recommend seeing this national treasure if you have a chance.

Happy 2012!

I just saw this wonderful video that has made me think about how we expose ourselves to new music and the constant reshaping of our musical libraries into interesting directions.

Off Book: The Evolution of Music Online from PBS Arts on Vimeo.

I thought I would start off the New Year with something a little different: What channels do you look for new music? I find that I go through fits and spurts with seeking out new music. Suddenly I will get onto a trail that leads me to song after song, or I'm just loving a lot of the music that I'm hearing around me. I try to constantly expose myself to new music from the Zunior playlists and the wonderful Edmonton Public Library system, but it takes a few months to compile playlists and actually get them into regular rotation on my iPod unless I'm planning a long road trip.

One feature of iTunes that I really love is the Genius function. You pick a song that you like, and Genius formulates a playlist of songs that are similar to that song in the same style and genre. This is great to incorporate songs you love with new music that is already in your library, but not in common rotation. There is also the genius sidebar (a little play arrow on the bottom right corner next to the genius icon) that will show you bands that you may like that you don't yet have. When you are perusing the iTunes store, often there are playlists from other users that that song is on, which is useful to find other artists similar in style that you may enjoy.

Outside of the iTuniverse, I love listening to CBC Radio 2 to get new Canadian music into my library, and also watching the local venues to see who is coming to town in the next few months, as seeing live music performed is an awesome way to get to know a band. There are a also few Podcasts that are around as well that broaded the auditory horizons, like CBC Radio 3 R3-30, Zunior and Under the Radar. Another wonderful revolution in this digital age are the internet playlists that you can create like Grooveshark, which you can then pick other playlists much like in iTunes. I also love the Shazam app, picking songs off the TV and radio, which is useful for more well known songs.

Last but not least, my friends! Let me know what you are listening to, what you like, and where you find your new music. I'm loving all the end of the year lists favorite songs that show up in the dead of winter when we all need something to get excited about. I love talking about music with people; I find it's such a personal thing, and you really get to know what a person is like from what music makes them happy. 

Here is a list of 15 my favorite songs from 2011

Hummingbird: Imaginary Cities

About As Helpful As You Can Be Without Being Any Help At All: Dan Mangan

Merry Happy: Kate Nash

Black Creek: Valery Gore

Change the Sheets: Kathleen Edwards

Bambi: Tokyo Police Club

Horchata: Vampire Weekend

Sweet Things: Danny Michel 

Stadium Love: Metric

Pumped Up Kicks: Royal Wood

Incredibly Drunk on Whiskey: Memphis

Emerald Lake, AB: Said the Whale

Emerald Isle: Whitehorse

Harmonizin: Dehli 2 Dublin

Why We Fight: Decemberists

There are many other songs I could add... but I think this sums up 2011 for me. Please comment with your favorite songs at the moment, or locations that you use to find new music.