Milk & Bone, a thirst for coconut water, and a climate warrior pop star at the SAT

    Montreal’s Milk & Bone, an electro-pop duo integral to the local music scene, celebrated the 10 year anniversary of their debut album Little Mourning at the Société des Arts Technologiques (SAT).

   To open the show Lia Kuri brought us to a scientific conference on environmentalism, climate change, and humanity. Dressed in an oversized blazer over a tiny crop top and sitting at a desk with piles of books and notepads, Lia addressed the crowd regarding our shared issues of overconsumption and mistreatment through a language of ethereal left-field pop music. Kuri’s debut album Motherland released last fall functions as a letter of love and regret for our Earth and the humanity that lives on it. With environmentalism and grief as leading themes, the album is surprisingly upbeat, though I would not go so far as to say that it's a happy album. The poetic lyricism, sultry vocals, and grandeur of the electronic music inspire a sense of hope and wonder bordering on desperation; Kuri’s work is asking, begging us, to take a breath and realign with our values, how do we want to live on this Earth together? And what do we need to do to get there? I was thoroughly impressed by her performance, every move seemed planned and practiced with her climbing over rolly office chairs and the beat-matched PowerPoint showing climate-related graphs and maps, memes about recycling, and photos of nature. She asked us to think about destruction and natural regeneration, wondering what the world would be like after humans are gone, and how she hopes that won’t happen. I find her art and her performance so courageous in a culture that feels like it’s avoiding the large and increasingly hot elephant in the room, especially when the audience is loudly chatty during her set. I really appreciate when artists imbue their politics and values in their work, and I’ve struggled with the lack of vocal climate consciousness in music. I hope that Kuri’s music will inspire more to address the existential threats we collectively face.

    Milk & Bone’s show was both a celebration of 10 years of working together and a retrospective of their debut album Little Mourning. The dark and dreamy synths and textured electronic music followed Lia Kuri’s opening set beautifully, but I found Milk & Bone’s energy to be less captivating after being enraptured by Kuri’s PowerPoint performance. The duo was very cute and happy to be on stage together, giggling after telling the audience they hadn't performed some of these songs in 8 years. I was impressed by how well they mixed their voices together and navigated the layers of synths and beats and autotune, but I couldn’t get drawn in by them standing behind a folding table with an array of electronic musical appendages. About 15 minutes into their show I started to get incredibly overheated. The audience was very crowded, with the low ceiling of the SAT and complete lack of air circulation, I got frustratingly hot and thirsty during the song ‘Coconut Water’. It took me a ridiculous amount of time to push through the audience from the front of the crowd to the bar in the back of the room. Further into their set the two came in front of their table and danced together, and I was grateful to have found space to breathe and dance. At the end of Milk & Bone’s set, they gave a little speech about their 10-year journey as a band but I struggled to hear any of it because the neighbouring Cafe SAT venue had a very loud and bassy DJ that even through the concrete walls was overpowering the low-quality speakers at the SAT. I would love to see Milk & Bone at a larger venue that can comfortably accommodate the large crowds that inevitably show up to their shows and has an architecture that can accentuate the complex depth of their music.

Jasper Cobb is the host of The Castle, on air every Friday 1-2pm