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Empress Of’s birthday-eve show at Bar Le Ritz closed out the North American leg of her tour for her newest album For Your Consideration. The show was opened by Casey MQ, a former Torontonian DJ turned Los Angeles producer, whose soft vocals cooed into the microphone and coaxed the dispersed audience toward the stage. In the crowd of 30- to 40-something-year-olds I could hear whispers about his Club Quarantine project, a Zoom-based nightly club created by a group of Torontonian hyperpop-y artists in the early days of COVID lockdown. Club Q’s popularity grew exponentially, starting in March of 2020 with ‘crowds’ barely passing 100 screens, to hosting big-name artists like Charli XCX and Alice Glass in April, capping out the Zoom attendance limits at 1,000. As one of the early attendees of Club Q, it helped buffer the adjustment from partying five nights a week as a first-year university student to staring at a screen for any form of social engagement. It's been really heartwarming to see Casey MQ go from being a shy DJ partying online with his friends to living in Los Angeles as a producer and releasing his own music. Though I’ve never been a big fan of his music, which feels too much like Taylor Swift’s 1989 era to me, I appreciate seeing how far he's come. In his performance, Casey repeatedly switched from standing with the microphone to sitting next to his laptop playing a keyboard. This felt sweet but a bit awkward, to constantly be shifting positions; and while he didn’t have much to say he was very appreciative of Empress Of for being brought along on this tour In my opinion, sometimes it's best to stay quiet rather than repeat oneself when on stage. 

    Once Empress Of came on stage, in a matching plaid top and side-split pleated skirt, the audience was full and concentrated in the front. Unlike many concerts I’ve been to there was no weird two-foot space between the stage and the first row of onlookers. Perhaps it was Bar Le Ritz’s layout or the quality of fans present, either way, it was refreshing to not have to awkwardly shuffle forward when the performer asks you to come closer. Empress Of immediately jumped into playing songs from her newest album, For Your Consideration, released this past spring, and the remix album at the beginning of October. She only stopped to greet the crowd and introduce her multi-instrumentalist behind her after her second or third song, as if she wanted to slam us into dance rather than build up anticipation as some artists do. Her one-woman band was Cecilia, one of the most beautiful people I’ve ever seen. She stood to the side of center stage and created the entire sonic landscape by playing keyboard, Moog, guitar, looping vocals and controlling drum backing tracks. Empress Of declared herself a yapper, and when Cecilia found her talking too much between tracks she would just start playing the next song. It was a really cute dynamic, and I couldn’t tell if the sexual tension was between Cecilia and Empress Of or the audience collectively thirsting over the two beautiful and talented women on stage.

    This was the last set of the For Your Consideration North American tour, and the night before her 35th birthday, she made this clear by going hard. She had a plethora of self-choreographed dance moves and would repeatedly pick up a fan on the floor and raise it up above her head to blow through her hair before setting it back on the stage to blow her skirt up, Marilyn Monroe-esque, showing off her leather underwear. The set list for the show was wonderfully inclusive, with lots of songs from the newest album, her hits from the past that transported me back to high school feels; and songs from her 2020 album I’m Your Empress Of. These included her “theme song” as she described it, along with audio clips of her mother, during which she would raise her hands up in gratitude towards the hanging speakers. One thing I found exciting was her inclusion of songs she had recently featured on like Shygirl’s 4eva and Kito’s Wild Girl. I’m not used to artists performing songs they feature on without the main artist and I really like it, especially since I’ve seen Shygirl perform 4eva at the Charli XCX x Troye Sivan Sweat tour this past September. 

    I enjoyed thinking that I may have been the youngest person in the audience, it felt nice to be in a friendly crowd with no need to fight to keep my spot in the front. There was a gay couple in front of me, who would occasionally turn to each other to make jokes and giggle, very adorable; and an older woman in her 50s next to me who, during her favorite songs, would reach her arms up and lose herself in dance. It was a really sweet crowd of fans who knew the lyrics to everything, from newer songs to hits from 2017. However, in recent female-fronted concerts, I’ve noticed an uncomfortable trend of one normal-looking guy (ie. not one of the girls or the gays) standing in the dead center of the front row, holding a phone out and recording the entire concert. I don’t want to assume anything but I do find it strange, like, if you’re so obsessed with the artist, why don’t you put your phone down and enjoy the concert in the moment? I’ll never understand behavior like this, but I’m biased, I even feel embarrassed to pull my phone out to take the picture that is required for these write-ups. 

    David Cross Band’s performance at Club Soda was one of the most alienating evenings of live music I have ever endured. It was in most ways, objectively lame, but much of it was so endearing or otherwise strange that this feeling of inadequacy was easy to forget about. I have seldom felt so out of place in my entire life. I went expecting some great music and left satisfied in the part of my brain that loves not knowing what is happening. 

    I found out about the show a week before it happened through one of the poorest Instagram advertisements I’d ever seen. It was a fuzzed-out video with the words “David Cross Band plays King Crimson’ over it. It was the kind of thing I could have made on my iPod in three minutes at age ten, and I didn’t even know who David Cross was. 

David Cross was the violinist for the legendary King Crimson between 1972 and 1974, which in my young opinion is their greatest run of records. King Crimson is a band that’s extremely hit or miss for me, but some of those songs are worth any opportunity to see played live, due to their grandiosity alone. I’d pay money to see any group of guys play “Starless”, and David Cross himself being there was just a plus. The post’s description promised King Crimson alumni playing Larks’ Tongues in Aspic (1973) front to back, as well as ‘most’ of Red (1974) and Starless and Bible Black (1974). The word ‘most’ frightened me, as this is prog rock, so even one song each from those other albums would add a good 30 minutes to the show minimum. I was in for a long one.

    My friend who’d agreed to come cancelled on me last minute, and after 20 minutes of calling people with invites, I gave up and just went alone. This actually added to my experience, as sitting through the four-hour show without anyone to quip at was maddening to the point of hilarity. 

    When I arrived at Club Soda, I realized I was in for something new. The floor where I’d planned to stand was full of little lounge chairs and beer tables. People were sitting around, chatting and drinking as if in their own backyards. They had successfully turned Club Soda’s energy into that of an indoor cookout. I was an outlier in the audience by having hair. The distilled culture of aging Quebecois prog-heads all washed over me in an instant, in all its tough love glory. The audience was filled with wives and sons dragged by weirdo fathers proclaiming, ‘I know you don’t like my music, but you have to see this.’ I wasn’t sure yet what being there said about me, but I wasn’t about to be the only one without a beer. 

    I got a nice seat in the upstairs section. It was the first time I’d ever poked around up there. The openers were a band called Miriodor, from Quebec City, who announced that they don’t play very often anymore and that this was a special occasion. It was soon obvious that for those in tune with Quebecois prog-rock, (a deceptively large community outside of Montreal) these guys were the real deal. I wouldn’t doubt it if you told me half of the audience was there simply to see Miriodor, who’ve had an active, however aging, cult following for over 40 years. It’s a great thing when a band achieves perfect morphological homogeny with their audience. If any player swapped with an audience member while I wasn’t looking, I’d never notice. They all had that rough-edged but quiet barbecue swagger about them. 

    Miriodor’s music was about what you’d expect from a niche band stuck in the 70s. Apocalyptic, multiphase riffing. Quirky, shifting melodies and rapid chord changes. Some long droning passages with synthesizers. One song opened with a bizarre series of samples including opera singing and a car crash. The crowd seemed to love it and that’s what’s important, this never could have been my scene. A man screamed out so loudly and inappropriately during one of their songs that I saw him being scolded by his wife in the audience. Based on their music alone, you can tell Miriodor are King Crimson worshippers, and that this self-proclaimed rare appearance of theirs is a big night for them. I can’t imagine what it’s like to finally open for your heroes at such an old age. Their teen summer flick had its credits roll in their 70s. It’s possible that makes the payoff even more worth it, and that is a beautiful thing, even if it also took them this long to get the girl. After playing their final song, a perk to a seated audience revealed itself, and the band got a standing ovation. 

    Between acts, I went for a little walk to catch my breath and mentally prepare for another three hours of music. As I walked, I immersed myself in some of the drunkest people I have ever seen. Nobody’s wives looked impressed. Back inside, the venue played both a song with the Soviet Union’s anthem as a guitar solo, and Pink Floyd’s Animals, which people sang along to. There was weight to the culture I had accidentally barged into, and the people were ready for some prog.

    The David Cross Band stepped onstage and immediately carried on the feeling of the openers. David himself was elegantly suited and wearing a fedora. A real bloke. He was slightly hunched over but looked very good for his age overall. The man is a 75-year-old rock violinist, and that is something I’m sure the world is quickly running out of. After playing an original song that I didn’t recognize, he announced the names of every member of the band. They looked very thrown together, all being of different ages and dressed for different eras of rock music. I’m sure every one of them has an interesting story as to how they ended up playing with this band, but here it just seemed like a jumble of random folks plus a former King Crimson member, whose presence added more absurdity than star power.  

    David Crossed off the center square of Montreal concert bingo by attempting to speak French and thanked us for giving them our ears before getting into the King Crimson stuff. First, they played The "Great Deceiver", the opener from Starless and Bible Black, which he announced by saying he couldn’t remember the name of. I couldn’t tell if that was meant to be a little nudge to the superfans in the audience to call the name out or a genuine admission of a mental blank. Next, they played Red’s first track, and I started to really get into it. Despite having 3 alternating vocalists, their singing was always the weakest part of the performance. Every time they’d play a purely instrumental track, I found myself appreciating it a lot more, Red was the first of these moments.

    They announced that they’d play one more non-King-Crimson song, called "Calamity". David Cross explained the song’s metaphor before even playing it, likening a relationship to a shipwreck. The song was terrible, and, along with the beer-foamed cheer the relationship joke got from the audience, really made me question what I was doing at this show. The fact that I’d frantically looked for somebody to bring along became absurd. They were losing me again.

    David Cross then announced that it was time for us to go on a journey, unambiguously calling for the beginning of Larks’ Tongues in Aspic. On record, the album starts with a hypnotic Mbira (Kalimba) symphony. When every member pulled out a tiny thumb piano and awkwardly played it into their singing microphones, I was overcome with joy. Two hours deep, I felt that I could sit through another two. 

    Everything they played off the full, central album was gold. Many of the heavy parts involved wild, distorted playing from David Cross and his tiny green electric violin, and he could really play. His playing peaked on "Exiles", the album’s third track, with its beautiful sun-touched string leads and slow melodic builds. Mick Paul, the bassist, with his often-dull singing voice did a very good job on this track as well. I was able to immerse myself in the drama of it. A lot of King Crimson’s music walks a delicate line of trying hard to sound grand, beautiful and baroque without crossing over into sounding stupid and pretentious. This line is sometimes crossed even on their albums. That tightrope is much thinner at what amounts to a glorified cover band, which makes the moments where they do pull it all off all that much more impressive. Between passages of songs, there were several moments of sprawling improvisation. These were the moments when the tightrope snapped, and what they were trying to accomplish was never possible. They simply didn’t have enough chemistry as a band, and it always brought me back to the small-town local cookout vibe of the whole thing. 

    After "Larks’ Tongues in Aspic, Part Two", the album’s chaotic final track, the band all joined hands and bowed as if on their opening night for a high school play. They didn’t bother with waiting for the audience to urge an encore, as the flyer had promised a lot more music. I was quite tired by then and decided that I would stay until they inevitably played "Starless", which is by far my favourite King Crimson song, and one that nails that mysterious, larger-than-life alien creep so effortlessly, it never bothers me how full of itself it really is. I imagined that they’d save this song for last, which they did, but I did not expect it to be up next. When the opening strings welcomed us to its desolate sound, I felt a genuine rush of excitement. Robert Fripp’s iconic guitar tone on the recording has always been one of my favourite aspects of the song, and I, unfortunately, cannot say that John Mitchell had the same majesty in his performance. His vocals sorely lacked in the same way. Luckily, these were my only complaints about their performance of "Starless", and those only affect the first section of the song. The slow, anxiety-inducing climb toward the song’s climactic breakdown was something of awe, and people cheered throughout anticipating its release. That final burst of energy could never disappoint. I closed my eyes for a short while during the apex and was taken away from the barbecue and towards my idea of seeing the real King Crimson live back in the 70s. This was, after all, the closest I’d ever get. They even managed to nail some grinding, heavy improvisations before their grand finish.

    After the band bowed again, and I headed outside, I witnessed a concertgoer in such a furious argument with his wife that he pulled his pants down and mooned her publicly. It was the final piece clicking into place to reveal the true nature of this strange subculture I’d naively peered into. My place in it all still leaves me wondering. 

For his first time in Montreal, Sueco took the stage at Le Studio TD for a roaring Tuesday night on The Attempted Lover Tour: The namesake of his most recent album.

William Schultz grew up playing the guitar and writing his own songs, before beginning his career producing beats, then inevitably, releasing his own music. Adopting the name Sueco, his career took off five years ago and the passion of his fans has not dwindled. As soon as the doors opened at 7 pm, the line of fans that had gathered on the block eagerly stormed to the stage, no barricade in sight (which did become an issue later on). 

It was my first time attending a show at Le Studio TD and I wasn’t expecting it to be such a small venue, especially given the closure of the balcony that night. Sueco was able to interact with fans, which made for a more intimate experience. Accompanied by his band, Jumbotron James on guitar, Christian, or Dr. Zombie on Drums and Jordy the Blond on Base. 

While most people I had met around me were friendly, by 8:30 pm the tension had risen within the crowd in anticipation for the start of the performance. People were feeling angsty, so much so that a fight broke out a couple of feet from me. Luckily, all was forgotten by 8:45 pm, when Sueco opened with “Bathroom Floor” and “Anastasia”, two songs from his newest album, followed by a throwback single, “Story Of My Life (feat. Trippie Redd)”. The crowd was going feral, pits were moshed, heads were banging so much that I can only imagine the pain they’d feel the next morning, and let me tell you; there was a lot of surfing. Sueco even brought out his CROWD SURF 9000, a board designated for surfing the crowd. Lifted by his fans, he moved through the room, all while performing his breakout single “Fast” which blew up on TikTok in 2019. 

Fans followed by example, and many surfed their way to the stage throughout the rest of the show. It was definitely the most energetic concert I’ve been to, with fans putting their all into every song that was performed. During Sueco’s interaction with the crowd, fans were often trolling, yelling unique profanities, but the artist took it with grace and played along. He was just happy that his “beautiful family was getting bigger every day.” Lost in a sea of white, red and black, there were fans of all ages — from middle-aged rockers, young adults, and a couple of parents with their gangs of kids. Two of them were Johnny and Sadie, who were attending their first-ever concert, with a front-row view. Their names were chanted in celebration, which made their night all the more memorable. 

During his last song, “Paralyzed”, Sueco separated the crowd and started his own mega-mosh pit, giving us rules to make it both as safe and as crazy as possible. At the end of the show, when everyone began chanting for an encore, some of the audience (which snowballed into the whole crowd) began asking for two songs. Sueco came back to the stage for an encore, “Mulholland Drive”, and finally closed the night with “Motel 666”.

Overall, I enjoyed the show and its contagious energy. The size of the venue contributed to that as it felt more like a small community, and fans were able to connect with the artist, especially in comparison to much larger venues. It was beautiful being an outsider of this hardcore fandom; enjoying the music, but being able to watch a crowd sing with their artist and feel their feelings.

Drop Nineteens is a band you’ve only heard of if you can define the word shoegaze or can at least give it your best shot.  Some shoegaze adjacent bands manage to escape that whole zeitgeist, but Drop Nineteens are one you stumble upon if you’re specifically looking into the genre and its roots. There is often disagreement over the boundaries of the term and defining it without a sigh beforehand is rare. I can do it, however, because I live and breathe this stuff. Shoegaze is 90s-flavored alt-rock with a lot of guitar effects. It often, but not always, evokes a sense of melancholia and longing and is usually in some way inspired by the legendary My Bloody Valentine, despite nobody ever really sounding quite like them. Drop Nineteens is a band that checks all these boxes and is a prime example of the distilled shoegaze sound for those in the know.

Up until 2024, the band had yet to tour since before their breakup in 1995. I only get to see this band now because of the immense popularity of shoegazing on the internet that reunited them as fully formed adults. (Knowledge nugget: Back in 1992, Drop Nineteens played a show in Bristol with Radiohead as the opener.) I’m often skeptical of seeing reformed bands as adults, especially ones with music so quintessentially teenage, but their 2023 revival album Hard Light was leagues above what I had anticipated. Still, the music I love by the band is no doubt off of their first record, Delaware, which I discovered on my first shoegaze binge back in high school. The album’s unquestionable centrepiece, Kick the Tragedy, is a drawn-out instrumental that washes you away with soaring noise and gets you so high on its melodrama that by the time the spoken word passage hits in the back quarter of its 10-minute runtime, it’s impossible to still have the heart to call it corny. It shoots you through a tunnel of memories, letting you know that while there’s no going back from here, there is always hope in the future. This is the feeling I turn to shoegaze for. An embrasure of teenage wonder and confusion, and the sentiment that everything is different now, but somehow that’s okay. 

But how do you dance to music best experienced staring longingly out the window? I’ve been to a few concerts like this one in the past and the answer is that you don’t. Some people sway, or bob, or jump a little, but mostly you stand still and let the musical current take hold of your body.

I arrived just as the opener, Olivia O. (who the band kept referring to as Olive) stepped onstage. She was alone up there and at Le Ritz that can lead to a pretty intimate atmosphere, which really suited her moody songwriting. Every song was punctuated with giggles and thank yous to the crowd, who were wildly diverse in age and style, but all shared some unspecific thing that made them obvious shoegaze concertgoers. She’d spend a whole two minutes creating ethereal vocal and flute loops that she’d go on to play her acoustic guitar and sing over. Her songs were equally angsty, vulnerable and fairylike. It was surprisingly captivating for a one-person show but still lacked that intoxicating feeling you get from a whole band playing in front of you. If I’d been more familiar with her songs in advance, maybe it would’ve felt less like somebody else’s friend ripping it at the back of a party. She mentioned being a citizen due to having Canadian parents and claimed that meant we liked her by default. From the back, I shouted, ‘Where from?’ and her reply was a word nobody has ever been happy to hear outside of a geography quiz; Ottawa. People cheered, but there was reluctance in their pitch. 

Drop Nineteens stepped onstage, wearing their 30-year hiatus on their faces. These are not rockstars, they’re people who made some cult-followed music in their 20s and have been living completely ordinary lives since. They more resembled people you’d see taking their kids to the movies or complaining about local politics on cable TV. Vocalist and guitarist Greg Ackell’s awkward delivery in between songs turned that ‘regular guy look’ into something they’re taking on the chin. It was refreshing to see them not trying to be anything but what they are now, because what they are now is a group that was never meant to be famous.

I wasn’t sure what material they’d be playing, since they had just last year come out with a new project. When the first song they played was Delaware’s self-titled opener, I knew we’d be in good hands. The band had six members onstage and shifted between having either four guitars or two basses. Either way, their sound was undeniably huge. That classic fuzzy bliss pulled a curtain over everything else in the dim red lighting of Le Ritz’s stage. The two vocalists’ quiet harmonizing was warm under blankets of shimmering tone. When they played their third track, “Mayfield”, off an unreleased record from the band’s early years, Paula Kelley’s voice finally cut its way through the mix, showing off that her talent far outshined Ackell’s quiet rambling swagger. She sounded 17 years old as she pulled out her star-shaped tambourine and the slight wobble when hitting the high notes only added character. During sections of swelling guitars, every member would stare down at their feet, focusing on the various pedals. I kept thinking to myself ‘They’re really doing it.’ When they played “Winona”, another highlight from their debut, they renamed it Raquel, for a fan in the front row celebrating their 19th birthday. I’m almost sure I heard Raquel scream that it was their favourite song when they began playing. Their setlist did not overstay its welcome and was complete with both a cover of Lana Del Rey’s “White Dress” and a cover of Madonna’s “Angel”, which finished off the show pre-encore. They let us hang onto our cheering for longer than I’m used to until they finally stepped back into the light. After tying his shoe onstage, Ackell let us know that ‘they don’t call it shoegaze for nothing.’

The band returned to play one more favourite from the old catalogue, “My Aquarium”, before announcing that we knew what was coming next. Before “Kick the Tragedy” started, they talked about how that song is bigger than the band themselves. They told us that they dropped an official music video for the 30-year-old song only last week. The video is made up of hundreds of clips of fans dancing, enjoying themselves, seeing the world, or just hanging out, which the band had requested. The comment section underneath is filled with people pointing themselves out and gushing over this video immortalizing an experience they’ve had with a loved one. Ackell expressed gratitude that there were so many people who seemed to love the song so deeply and could not believe the staggering number of clips that had been sent in. There’s something about the homemade nature of the video that perfectly captures that transcendent feeling of the track, their combined emotional impact is something every fan of the band will feel. Before the first kick drum, Ackell announced that tonight, “Kick the Tragedy” was our song. 

When the long haze was over, and the musicians departed from the stage one by one, we were left with nothing but Pete Koeplin’s steady drum beat to reflect on how it had all gone by so fast.