Magazine

Independent, provocative, now! The CJLO Magazine is the resource for features, reviews, and interviews. Established in 2004, and run by dedicated CJLO volunteers, the magazine covers the latest and best in local and international music, art, theatre, film, festivals, and more!


2006 CJLO Staff Picks

Once again, CJLO grew this year and if anything, it grew even more diverse judging by the staff picks below. Besides perhaps Ghostface Killah's Fishscale and Return To Cookie Mountain by TV On The Radio, there weren't many albums that found themselves repeated often among the different lists. It's a testament both to the goldmine of releases this year and to the eclectic tastes of the boys and girls that entertain you night and day on the ol' dot com.


2007 CJLO Staff Picks

As expected, CJLO’s third annual Staff Picks is a mixed bag of musical goodies from across the map. So much so that out of the thirty-one DJs who submitted their lists, no two #1 albums were alike. Of course, several of the year’s powerhouse releases resonated with the staff. Radiohead’s In Rainbows reigned as the most popular album, with The White StripesIcky Thump, The Arcade Fire’s Neon Bible and High On Fire’s Death Is This Communion not too far behind.


2008 CJLO Staff Picks

Well another year has come and gone and that means it’s once again time for the annual CJLO Magazine Staff Picks Round Up. It’s been an absolutely stellar year for music and our DJs here at CJLO have been eating it up. It seems Montreal’s own Wolf Parade may be the most represented band on this year’s lists, but New Brunswick, New Jersey’s The Gaslight Anthem, New York’s Vampire Weekend and Vancouver’s Bison B.C. and Black Mountain were also well liked by many.


NoMeansNo: Flaunting the New School

Playing Montreal for the first time in three years for the Suoni Per Il Popolo fest, NoMeansNo are perhaps Canada's greatest still-standing punk institution, a testament to the enduring partnership of its key members, brothers Rob and John Wright (along with estimable guitarist Tom Holliston, who joined the band in the early 90s following the departure of Andy Kerr), and the singularity of their sound.


Jimmy Smith (1929-2005)

 Jimmy Smith, a one-man revolution in jazz, passed away on February 8th, 2005. Words cannot describe the singular impact that this man had on the history of modern music. Back in 1955, according to Ira Gitler, pianist Freddie Redd barged into the Blue Note offices in Manhattan with a "mouthful of something elses" about this guy in Philadelphia doing crazy things with the Hammond organ in jazz.


Nomo + Turtleboy

So I'm thirteen years old, chilling out to Dark Side of the Moon in my parents' basement and generally being a weird little creep. Oddly, I don't gravitate towards the 7/4 cockrockery of "Money" or even the Oz-bait wail of "The Great Gig in the Sky" nearly as much as I do the eight-minute centerpiece "Us and Them", largely due to its soaring chorus, languorous pacing, odd spoken asides and lush arrangement. The key to that arrangement, of course, is Dick Parry's mournful sax wailing throughout.


Santigold + Trouble Andrew + Amanda Blank

Even though I'm a born and raised Montrealer, I have always had a special place in my heart for Brooklyn, New York.  Memories of travelling to get there for shopping and visiting family are as vivid to me as if they happened yesterday. That said, I identify vicariously with any hip hop song or artist that makes reference to Brooklyn. 


Steve Earle

Right now the popular music scene has seen a revival of country and folk acts. Oddly enough, a few older punk rockers are making some interesting strives with the likes of Drag the River, Tim Barry, Saw Wheel, Wayne the Train Hancock & Hank Williams III leading the way. Ask anyone of them who have influenced their music, and I’ll bet dollars to donuts, they’ll say Steve Earle.


Heaven and Hell

It is often hard to come up with the right words to describe heavy metal music. The words 'crushing', 'brutal' and 'dark' are often conjured up from the heads of writers… they are the go-to choices that evoke cheap imagery and simple cop-outs. Sometimes, though, these words are necessary evils that genuinely reflect the music, and in The Devil You Know's case, these words also manage to reflect the package as a whole. The word dark, in particular, matches the thematic qualities of the album.


The Streets

 Everything is Borrowed is the fourth album from Mike Skinner aka The Streets. I actually heard about The Streets last year through a guy I worked with. He gave me a copy of “The Hardest Way to Make an Easy Living”, The Street's third album released in 2006. I immediately became a fan of this UK rapper and producer. I was excited to get my hands on his new album. It is definitely different from the last one. “The Hardest Way to Make an Easy Living” had a Hip Hop sound.


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