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By Comma Chameleon - Semicolon Cancer; - 12/07/2007

I went into Club Soda with, admittedly, slightly raised expectations. OK granted, there are few seats at the Club; if you want to go upstairs to the mezzanine and claim a seat that's a treat, but you have to snag it fast. The two consecutive nights that Two Hours Traffic opened for the Pascale Picard Band were complete and utter sell-outs. I was somehow tricked into thinking that it was reversed: Pascale Picard opening for THT! Who did this!? I had seen THT play before... and as I came in late (no excuse), I caught the second half of their set, chocked with perfectly scream-worthy (self-proclaimed) "power pop" melodies that people seemed to catch like The Cure, and sort of had taken it upon themselves to bop around liberally within their confined space.

Where did these young guns pop up from? They're good ol' boys -- the last thing I'd seen of theirs was their music vid for “Jezebel.” I had heard nothing directly off of their latest studio album, Little Jabs (are they pulling a few punches?), but regardless, lordy, colour me impressed. Appreciate the well-adjusted sound? I applaud the venue. Kudos and three thumbs up to the sound tech at C-Soda for bringing out the rhythm section and high fives to THT guys for pumping up and filling out their eager chant and stomp breakdowns, and a free whistle on a gold keychain for bringing front guy Liam Corcoran's melodic, but not overwrought huff-and-puff delivery to the fore. Thanks guys -- nice set.

Here came the mind-boggler: a good 20 minutes later, Ms. Picard hopped up onstage and the crowd went temporarily primal. This is batshit insane. These people are bloody Thai stir-fry crazy -- this woman just popped up, and people screamed, like someone hit the panic alarm button. I have to give props and accessories to Pascale Picard's band, they're quite talented and I think the show was a fine testament of that. I had a few winces when Picard opened the set screaming like the devil, and then throughout the rest of the night like a girl who found out her band had taken a shit on her pumpkin pie after eating everything else on the spice rack. People seemed to like this woman; the middle-aged Joe and his woman next to me were having a great time.

I saw Picard as an Ani DiFranco type, without the element of strong song writing or charmingly quirky vocal capabilities. I wanted to see into the depths of her lyrical jabs that the crowd was applauding but I couldn't make out a word she was saying. I was unable to shake the feeling that I was unwillingly undergoing an aural hysterectomy. Borrowing a line or two from The Big Lebowski, I feel like a small child who walked into the theatre in the middle of a movie. There has to have been something I missed here.

Tune in to Semicolon Cancer; with Comma Chameleon every Sunday from 9am - 10:30am

By Mike Bresciani - The Lonesome Strangers - 10/27/2007

How biased can a review of a Rogue Wave show be? Let’s find out…

Rogue Wave was back at the Cabaret Juste Pour Rire music hall after having played a split-bill with Nada Surf on their 2006 Winter tour. This time around, as headliners, the draw was significantly smaller, with the top half of the Cabaret being closed off. It didn’t matter, anyhow. The concert floor was full of eager fans waiting to hear their favorite Rogue Wave tunes.

A lot has changed for Rogue Wave since their 2005 sophomore release, Descended Like Vultures. For starters, there’s yet another new bassist in the band, as Patrick Abernathy took Evan Farrell’s place in the lineup in early 2007. Along with a new member, the band had just released a new album, Asleep at Geaven’s Gate, while switching over from Sub Pop to Jack Johnson’s Brushfire Records. Asleep…’s sound doesn’t stray from their signature dreamy, introspective pop, and while Descended Like Vultures might’ve caught your ear upon first listen, their latest release may take a couple trips to sink in.

One has to wonder: when was the last time you went to a show, eager to hear some "new stuff"? Really, think it over. Although we look forward to hearing new material from our favorite artists, we seldom want to hear it performed, since we look forward to hearing our desired songs. Tonight was no exception, as people in attendance were calling upon Zach Rogue to perform their personal favorites. "Eyes" and "California" were probably the most anticipated songs of the evening, as members of the audience kept screaming out one or the other. The band did play a hearty selection from their entire catalogue, providing an obvious emphasis on the new record. Songs like "Lake Michigan" and "Harmonium" stood out, while "Chicago X 12" took special notice, as it was introduced as a song about drummer Pat Spurgeon’s need for a new kidney (which he did, thankfully receive).

Older songs like "Every Moment" and "Bird on a Wire" were given a live makeover, as they were played in a more up-tempo manner, while the rest of the Rogue Wave catalogue remained rather intact. This reviewers’ personal highlight of the show would be hearing the whimsical "Sewn up" from 2003’s Out of the Shadows, while the low-point was leaving the show not having heard "Love’s Lost Guarantee" after hearing the song over and over in the Wristcutters: A Love Story movie trailer.

How many times have we come across Rogue Wave without ever owning one of their albums? When one thinks of cross-marketing music with film and television, it’s easy to jump to a band like Rogue Wave (in a good way, of course). Their songs are everywhere, from blockbusters like Spiderman and Napoleon Dynamite, to television shows like Weeds, Heroes, and the defunct O.C. This is where the lines between "selling out" and "earning an honest living" become blurred; however, most fans and critics would presume the latter of the two. With this in mind, it’s fair to believe that a good chunk of their fan base was introduced through one of these many mediums, though there’s no shame in admitting it (yours truly downloaded "Bird on a Wire" years ago, assuming it was a tribute, and was pleasantly surprised…).

And so, for fans and newcomers to Rogue Wave, please note: even though the O.C. has always sucked, Rogue Wave’s music is still wonderful, and they remain at the top of their game.

Tune in to The Lonesome Strangers with Mikey B every Wednesday from 3pm – 5pm

By Josh Mocle - The Kids Are So-So - 11/17/2007

It was bound to happen eventually. In fact, I’m surprised it’s taken this long for me to write a Dropkick Murphys review. The effect this band has had on me, the music I choose to listen to and in some ways the way I live my life in general, is immense (and slightly pathetic). This could either be the easiest review I’ve ever written or the hardest. That having been said, I’m committed to not letting this thing spiral into a mindless love-fest, however, I’m entirely incapable of judging whether it does or not. That one’s up to you.

Chicago’s The Tossers opened the show and to be honest, I can’t remember a band who made me physically yawn more (my lack of sleep the night before had NOTHING to do with it.) I’ve never seen a band who seems to solely exist in order to open for Flogging Molly (thus, them opening for Dropkick is also acceptable…I guess). However, unlike Flogging Molly, there really isn’t anything original about The Tossers. The potential for greatness is definitely there, what with the violin, tin whistle and electric mandolin, but they just don’t pull it off. Their stereotypical Celt-Punk really fell flat for me and just came off as a watered-down version of the band they were warming the audience up for. However, the (I can only assume) mostly Irish crowd loved it, so to each their own.

Next up were The Briggs out of Los Angeles who thoroughly disappointed me when I saw them open for Bad Religion earlier this year but who managed to completely turn it around for this performance. Taking the stage not unlike The Bouncing Souls (which makes sense given they’re pretty much the same band from the opposite coast), they roared through about forty-five minutes of aging pop-punk goodness. Like many of their contemporaries (the aforementioned Bouncing Souls, but also the Street Dogs and to an extent, Rancid), they deliver the same played out method of songwriting and performance but still manage to keep it interesting and fun; certainly not the greatest of all performances, but definitely not the worst.

Which brings us to Dropkick. The situation almost felt like a déjà vu (probably since this was my fourth time experiencing it) as the crowded room darkened, the “let’s go Murphys” chants began and the traditional Irish folk tune that I still haven’t been able to identify began playing on the house speakers. A moment later the band entered and ripped into “Famous for Nothing,” the first track on their new record, The Meanest of Times. While this made perfect sense given that this was the album release tour (dubbed, probably un-ironically, “the meanest of tours”) for that record, the fact that they didn’t open with “For Boston” was slightly disappointing. What followed was an hour and a half of Dropkick classics, ranging from their street punk songs like “The Gang’s All Here” to their traditional Irish-infused punk tracks like, amongst others, “Fields of Athenry.” Peppered in between were tracks off the new record, all of which managed to translate well live, as most Dropkick songs tend to do. A personal favorite was their performance of “Flannigan’s Ball,” which featured Spider Stacey of The Pogues and the mighty Ronnie Drew on vocals on the record. It still maintained its intensity when sung live by only Ken Casey and Al Barr, Dropkick’s usual mouth pieces. I have to admit though, while the band was still as tight as ever, other than the new stuff there really wasn’t anything else, well, NEW about their performance. While some bands manage to keep themselves consistently relevant and entertaining performance after performance, I’ve found that after a while (a.k.a. four shows over the course of two years), Dropkick kinda become slightly stagnant. Given my stance as a New England exile in Montreal, I’ve often equated Dropkick shows with a sense of “going home again.” However, much like actually going home, it does get boring after a while. Although there certainly were highs (which were very high) during the performance, the lows were also incredibly low.

But in the end none of that really matters because after three performances they finally got around to playing “Tessie,” which is enough to make the night a resounding success in this Red Sox fan’s head.

Go Sox.

Tune in to The Kids Are So-So with Josh every Tuesday from 2pm - 4pm

By Simon Howell - A Listening Ear - 12/06/2007

It’s funny how expectations work. A couple of years ago, I went to a Libertines concert -- not to see them specifically (I thought they were over-hyped and undercooked), but instead to catch a rare stateside appearance by Wales-based post-punk band Mclusky. Most of the audience didn’t seem to agree, but I thought their taut menace and sly wit easily outpaced the more popular headliner.

So it’s perhaps understandable that I sympathized with seven-strong opening act, Los Campesinos!, even secretly expecting them to show up the national juggernaut that is Broken Social Scene with their youthful vigor and caffeinated tunes. I greatly enjoyed their sole release, the Sticking Fingers Into Sockets EP, plus, well, they’re Welsh. The record is an ebullient collection of spiky, lightly-orchestrated pop with a refreshing sense of humour. Unfortunately, their relative inexperience was readily on display at Le National -- no thirty-five-minute set should feel as repetitive as theirs turned out to be. While the band’s songs feel reasonably distinctive from each other on record, their live renditions melded together into a trebly, vaguely irritating mass -- even their cover of Pavement’s “Frontwards” was seamlessly assimilated into the cheery blur. By the time they played their best song, “You! Me! Dancing!”, I found myself imagining a mash-up of every other song they’d played over the course of the evening (all of which were almost identical in arrangement and tempo). This is really too bad, because they had stage presence and charisma in spades, with all seven members contributing shouts, hand claps and even, by the set’s end, synchronized dance moves. They definitely show heaps of promise for a new band, but their songwriting needs work. Let’s hope they have some new tricks up their sleeves for their forthcoming full-length debut. (A specific note, guys: take it easy on the glockenspiel -- it gets awfully grating when you use it for nine tenths of your set.)

Unlike Los Campesinos!, Kevin Drew and his pared-down Broken Social Scene more or less conformed to expectations. While I enjoy Spirit If…, it lacks the spark of the “regular” BSS records, preferring to languish in more blessed-out, mid-paced rock songs that often overstay their welcome. Accordingly, when they surprised just about everyone by opening with Broken Social Scene standout “Ibi Dreams of Pavement” -– apparently not played by the band in over a year –- a level of excitement was reached that would not be matched again over the next two hours of the band’s set. By the end of the song, they had switched up their overwhelmingly dense four-guitar lineup (a mainstay throughout the evening) with a trio of horns for a truly show-stopping ending. The excitement generated from that stellar beginning was more than enough to propel the set’s first half, which was made up mostly of Spirit If…’s better songs, including “Lucky Ones” and “Safety Bricks”, as well as a pair of well-loved, older BSS songs, “Cause=Time” and “Stars and Sons.”

After a promising Brendan Canning-led song from his forthcoming album, there was a palpable dip in energy and excitement for a good chunk of the evening. The set’s last truly exciting moments were both derived from Broken Social Scene: Amy Millan of Stars subbed for Leslie Feist on “7/4 (Shoreline),” with the horn section once again providing a wonderfully cathartic close. This was followed by a particularly tedious near-ending segment, with an overlong take on “Farewell to the Pressure Kids” and two renditions -- one right after the other -- of “Major Label Debut (Fast).” It’s one of my favorite BSS songs, but when you’re nearing the two-hour mark and you have at least two dozen other songs to choose from, it’s a little hard to justify. Indeed, by the time they’d finally wrapped up the second version and its extended, blissed-out coda, many of the balcony-dwellers had already left. The other highlight came from the set’s last song, “It’s All Gonna Break.”

Surely knowing that it was a bit of an obvious choice for a closing number, Canning and Drew mixed it up a bit by performing the song’s first half by themselves, with their guitars harmonizing beautifully. It was a breath of fresh air, given the sheer bombast of most of the set’s arrangements. When the inevitable moment of reunion came, they had some fun with it, drawing out the moment and building anticipation as the other seven players rushed on stage. They paused, with Drew even sharing a few words with his bandmates, before picking the song up where they left off and immediately ratcheting up the energy.

While I enjoyed their set a good deal, I felt as though there was an unmistakable gap between the quality of Drew’s “solo” work and that of the group as a whole (with the exception of the lush single “Safety Bricks”), and I think that sense was palpable in the audience’s reaction. There was a feeling of anticipation after every few Kevin Drew song where we wondered: when would we hear another classic? Which would it be? I think I can safely skip out when they tour in support of Broken Social Scene Presents Brendan Canning and, instead, wait for the undiluted form.

Tune in to A Listening Ear with Simon every Tuesday from 1pm - 2pm