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[Dr. Drum]

A get together sounds good, guys. We're well past due. Now just as long as the old man can keep up with you young gaffers.

Tunes – Neko's only got two real star turns on the new one (the title cut and "Go Places") but yeah, she nails 'em both.

[tuneschick]

docdrum said:

Tunes – Neko's only got two real star turns on the new one (the title cut and "Go Places") but yeah, she nails 'em both.

Only two, really? Damn. The record store guy said she led "a few" of them, which I figured meant at least three. I'm so literal.

'Go Places' was one of the ones we heard though, and yeah, it sounded pretty fantastic.

The cover still throws me off though. I don't know why, but everytime I see it I think of Duran Duran.

[Dr. Drum]

Colour scheme, perhaps?

Record store guy may be thinking of "Failsafe" as a Neko-led song, tunes. It's sung by keyboard player Kathryn Calder. She does sometimes sound like Neko in passing.

[Dr. Drum]

Echo Prize – vote for the best Canadian indie song:

www.echoprize.ca/echoen/index.jsp

These are all good with the Chad VanGaalen, Feuermusik and Abdominal cuts being the strongest, IMHO. Went with "Pedal Pusher".

[phil]

I don't think anybody here
will mind me posting
this article in its entirety ...


Confessions of a feisty choirgirl

Quirky Canadian Feist's third album has been one of the pop gems of 2007.
And to think she used to rap with sock puppets ...

Alice Fisher
Sunday September 16, 2007
The Observer


OK, cool Londoners - we're going to sing together!' For a moment, the cool Londoners are undecided. They shuffle in the sweaty darkness of King's Cross's Scala. The small woman in lacy white doesn't look much of a match for their ambivalence, but she cheerfully rattles off instructions. After an ominous pause, the venue fills with a warm three-part harmony that holds until everyone's breath runs out. Leslie Feist - known simply as Feist - beams from under her thick fringe and launches into the wistful 'So Sorry', carried there by the audience's dying harmony.

Feist has a knack for this. The 31-year-old Canadian, touring her third album, The Reminder, follows that July gig with more hotly anticipated UK dates later this month. She is being borne from continent to continent on a wave of critical adulation and the adoration of her fanbase. The tone of her album stands out in a year that, while defined by female singers, has been dominated by the brash Allen, Winehouse and Nash. Feist sings about parks, but old ladies don't get mugged in them. She compares her man to a Brandy Alexander. Her videos - for singles 'My Man My Moon' and most recently '1234' (which has just been picked up by Apple for an iPod promotion) - are exuberant, slightly nerdy dance numbers. Her songs are musically complex; the words sound pretty and mean whatever you want them to.
It's all rather grown up, and so it should be. Feist's been performing and writing since she was 15. She's already been part of a defining musical movement, as a collaborator with Nineties electroclash dance music titans Peaches and Gonzales. She seems quietly pleased by the response to her mature new sound. 'The vibe is positive,' she says when we talk before the Scala gig. 'I feel benevolent safety.'

Feist really does talk like this, in an energetic, upbeat way, like a Canadian tourist trying to make friends on the tube. It takes a while, sat in her rather messy London hotel room, to get used to her rambling , but the circuitous style suits her story. Her parents (dad an abstract painter; mum a ceramicist) divorced when she was young and she lived with her mother. Her earliest musical memory is 'listening to "Strawberry Fields" on a red plastic Mickey Mouse record player' aged five. She started singing in the school choir and continued for the next 10 years. 'Choir is the purest introduction to harmony because you feel it physically. You're tucked inside something enormous.'

As a teenager her shaved head and Doc Martens led girls at school in Calgary to ask her to join their punk band, Placebo, which played for five years until Feist damaged her vocal cords and was forced to quit. She quit Calgary, too, heading to Toronto to stay with her father. There she recorded her debut album, Monarch, with a grant from the Canadian government. 'It was so much work and not much fun,' she recalls. 'I wasn't proud of the music and I felt too alone.'

Life changed in 1998 when she moved into a flat above a Toronto sex shop with friend-of-a-friend Merrill Nisker, internationally known as Peaches. 'She was a very responsible roommate,' says Feist. 'She paid the phone bill. She dealt with groceries.' But this is not how Peaches will be best remembered. She was the first lady of electroclash, and dildos are an integral part of her stage act. Feist joined her, rapping with sock puppets, dressed in a leotard, under the stage name Bitch Lap Lap. Feist also met musician/producer Gonzales, appearing in his Electro-Cabaret show, and joined Toronto indie supergroup Broken Social Scene, a roster of 19 musicians from local bands (her partner is Kevin Drew, one of the band's founder members). By 2001, Feist was in the coolest band in Canada and making an international name for herself.

When Gonzales and Peaches emigrated to Berlin, Feist soon followed. They were the vanguard of a Canadian invasion that's since brought Arcade Fire, Metric and the Dears to European attention. Feist started to write her own, very different, songs, and Gonzales asked if he could produce them. 'It was a spontaneous decision to fill up a week off in between concerts,' he says. 'For me, it's like putting on plays with the talented little sister I never had.'

The resultant Let It Die, recorded in Paris in 2003, started her on the road to solo recognition; one track, 'Mushaboom', is familiar from Lacoste's fragrance TV ads. McDonald's tried to buy the rights first. She refused.

After 33 months of touring, Feist finally recorded Let It Die's follow-up, The Reminder, in 2006, in a manor house just outside Paris. Despite her career having already spanned continents, genres, bands and even stage names, Feist says this feels like a beginning for her. 'This is a different thing. There's a residue of the electroclash mixed with the Social Scene sound. I'm bringing it all together. I can pick from all the things I've done.'

And she does it very well. As Gonzales says: 'She sold half a million Let it Die albums in three years and almost the same amount of The Reminder in three months.' But not everyone is pleased with her new direction. Electroclash was one of the last truly independent youth movements, never subsumed by the mainstream, and some of those who remember Bitch Lap Lap fondly have been hurt to find her renamed and relaunched by a major record label, singing about parks and cocktails. 'I've had questions from indie journalists - "how do you feel about your record selling in Wal-Mart?" But it's selling in indie stores, too. I feel comfortable with my decisions.'

Feist still doesn't see herself as a solo artist: 'I feel like I'm in a band [she tours with a regular backing band] - if I didn't, it would just be a yucky commercial exercise and the gigs would be less emotional.' But ask her what she's most looking forward to right now, and after fiddling with her water bottle for a while, she decides that it's the Police's invitation to sing with them on an MTV Unplugged session and having her photo taken by Annie Leibovitz. She shakes her head at how tiring and difficult Leibovitz's job must be. I point out that Leibovitz is not touring with four guys and playing until 11pm every night. Feist sits up straight and stops fiddling. 'Actually I tour with 11 guys and work until 3am.' A rare moment of pride. She should feel it more often - she deserves to.

· Feist plays at Nottingham Social, 23 Sep; London Shepherds Bush Empire, 24 Sep; Dublin Tripod, 25 Sep; Glasgow Oran Mor, 26 Sep; Bristol Trinity Arts, 28 Sep

[Dr. Drum]

Surprise, surprise – I don't think anyone was picking these guys to win this one. I figured they had less chance than Plaskett and I didn't give him much chance either. I actually thought it would be either the Junior Boys or Miracle Fortress. Good on 'em though, sounds like they can use the cash.

Kind of cool that they actually sit the jury down in a room, during the awards gala, to make the final decision.

tinyurl.com/2vcuf4

[phil]

Top Ten from the "Top 100 Canadian Albums"

1 - Neil Young - Harvest
2 - Joni Mitchell - Blue
3 - Neil Young - After The Gold Rush
4 - The Band - Music From Big Pink
5 - The Tragically Hip - Fully Completely
6 - Alanis Morissette - Jagged Little Pill
7 - The Band - The Band
8 - Arcade Fire - Funeral
9 - Rush - Moving Pictures
10- The Guess Who - American Woman

The guy who put this together should have mentioned that the list would
(almost completely) ignored Québec francophone artists/bands ...

The fact that such artists as Robert Charlebois, Diane Dufresne,
Beau Dommage, Offenbach and even bloody Céline Dion(!!)
have been excluded is just a fuckin' joke !

[phil]

Complete list ...

www.canada.com/globaltv/globalshows/et_story.html?id=981a7cd4-4a31-4c0a-a024-0ffd50445df4

The best, eh: top 100 albums, according to Bob Mersereau's book

1. Harvest, Neil Young (1972)
2. Blue, Joni Mitchell (1970)
3. After the Gold Rush, Neil Young (1970)
4. Music From Big Pink, The Band (1968)
5. Fully Completely, The Tragically Hip (1992 )
6. Jagged Little Pill, Alanis Morissette (1995)
7. The Band, The Band (1969)
8. Funeral, Arcade Fire (2004)
9. Moving Pictures, Rush (1981)
10. American Woman, The Guess Who (1970)
11. Songs of Leonard Cohen, Leonard Cohen (1967)
12. Reckless, Bryan Adams (1984)
13. Five Days in July, Blue Rodeo (1993)
14. Twice Removed, Sloan (1994)
15. Up to Here, The Tragically Hip (1989)
16. Everybody Knows This is Nowhere, Neil Young with Crazy Horse (1969)
17. 2112, Rush (1976)
18. Court and Spark, Joni Mitchell (1974)
19. Whale Music, Rheostatics (1992)
20. Acadie, Daniel Lanois (1989)
21. Day for Night, The Tragically Hip (1994)
22. Rust Never Sleeps, Neil Young & Crazy Horse (1979)
23. Gord's Gold, Gordon Lightfoot (1975)
24. You Were Here, Sarah Harmer (2000)
25. Fumbling Towards Ecstasy, Sarah McLachlan (1993)
26. Road Apples, The Tragically Hip (1991)
27. Gordon, Barenaked Ladies (1992)
28. You Forgot it in People, Broken Social Scene (2002)
29. I'm Your Man, Leonard Cohen (1988)
30. Tonight's the Night, Neil Young (1975)
31. Decade, Neil Young (1977)
32. Miss America, Mary Margaret O'Hara (1988)
33. Surfacing, Sarah McLachlan (1997)
34. One Chord to Another, Sloan (1996)
35. Songs of Love and Hate, Leonard Cohen (1971)
36. Cyborgs Revisted, Simply Saucer (1989)
37. Ingenue, k.d. lang (1992)
38. Melville, Rheostatics (1991)
39. Love Tara, Eric's Trip (1993)
40. On the Beach, Neil Young (1974)
41. Not Fragile, Bachman-Turner Overdrive (1974)
42. The Best of the Guess Who, The Guess Who (1971)
43. Let it Die, Feist (2004)
44. The Last Waltz, The Band (1978)
45. Night Train, The Oscar Petersen Trio (1963)
46. Down at the Khyber, The Joel Plaskett Emergency (2001)
47. Harvest Moon, Neil Young (1992)
48. Cuts Like a Knife, Bryan Adams (1983)
49. L'heptade, Harmonium (1976)
50. Teenage Head, Teenage Head (1979)
51. High Class in Borrowed Shoes, Max Webster (1977)
52. Hejira, Joni Mitchell (1976)
53. The Goldberg Variations, Glenn Gould (1955 and 1982)
54. Forgarty's Cove, Stan Rogers (1977)
55. Wheatfield Soul, The Guess Who (1968)
56. Si on avait besoin d'une cinquieme saison, Harmonium (1974)
57. Dancing in the Dragon's Jaw, Bruce Cockburn (1979)
58. Frantic City, Teenage Head (1980)
59. Hymns of the 49th Parallel, k.d. lang (2004)
60. Hot Shots, Trooper (1979)
61. Robbie Robertson, Robbie Robertson (1987)
62. The Trinity Session, Cowboy Junkies (1988)
63. Ron Sexsmith, Ron Sexsmith (1995)
64. Nothingface, Voivod (1989)
65. Come on Over, Shania Twain (1997)
66. Everything I Long For, Hayden (1995)
67. Outskirts, Blue Rodeo (1987)
68. Joyful Rebellion, k-os (2004)
69. Sit Down Young Stranger/If You Could Read My Mind, Gordon Lightfoot (1970)
70. Love Junk, The Pursuit of Happiness (1988)
71. Jaune, Jean-Pierre Ferland (1970)
72. Somewhere Outside, The Ugly Ducklings (1966)
73. Electric Jewels, April Wine (1973)
74. Sundown, Gordon Lightfoot (1973)
75. Left and Leaving, The Weakerthans (2000)
76. Clumsy, Our Lady Peace (1997)
77. Harmonium, Harmonium (1974)
78. Share the Land, the Guess Who (1970)
79. Greatest Hits!, Ian & Sylvia (1970)
80. Steppenwolf, Steppenwolf (1968)
81. Ladies of the Canyon, Joni Mitchell (1970)
82. Bud the Spud and Other Favourites, Stompin' Tom Connors (1969)
83. Shine a Light, Constantines (2003)
84. Shakespeare My Butt, The Lowest of the Low (1991)
85. Clayton Park, Thrush Hermit (1998)
86. Smeared, Sloan (1992)
87. Living Under June, Jann Arden (1994)
88. The Hissing of Summer Lawns, Joni Mitchell (1975)
89. Bad Manors, Crowbar (1971)
90. Official Music, King Biscuit Boy With Crowbar (1970)
91. Lightfoot!, Gordon Lightfoot (1966)
92. Mad Mad World, Tom Cochrane (1991)
93. Rufus Wainwright, Rufus Wainwright (1998)
94. Face to the Gale, Ron Hynes (1997)
96. Hobo's Taunt, Willie P. Bennett (1977)
97. Cowboyography, Ian Tyson (1986)
98. Favourite Colours, The Sadies (2004)
99. The Way I Feel, Gordon Lightfoot (1967)
100. A Farewell to Kings, Rush (1977)


Looks like Harmonium ENTIRE discography made the list ...!

Their three albums plus J.P. Ferland's JAUNE
are the only francophone albums on that list !

This is ridiculous ...

Nevermind !

[Dr. Drum]

He probably would have had to do a book with separate French and English lists to get a properly representative sampling of Quebec and other French Canadian artists, Phil. A little more crossover there than there once was but still not a whole lot, the Junos or the odd Malajube Polaris nom notwithstanding.

FWIW, I don't think the list is all that hot on the English side of the ledger either, even without getting into MIAs. I mean, I love my Neil and Joni as much as the next guy but c'mon – over a dozen records between 'em on a 100 album list! Whatever the stature those two artists or the arguments in favour of any of their albums individually, there's no way they should monopolize the whole list like that. Also, what's with the greatest hits albums? There are more than enough albums worthy of a placing on a list like this without having to resort to greatest hits compilations.

[phil]

He probably would have had to do a book with separate French and English lists to get
a properly representative sampling of Quebec and other French Canadian artists

Well... That's the point ! He should have but he didn't ...
And he ended up ignoring(almost)everything that doesn't come from english Canada.

Which is to be expected most of the time ...

[Dr. Drum]

I wouldn't look at it as some kind of snub, Phil. More a lack of competence on the part of the author and/or the 600 middle-aged FM radio and record company guys he surveyed to talk about music from Quebec. On the other hand, if you look at current magazines or blogs it's been all Montréal for the last two years now. And despite what I said yesterday, there is more back and forth between language communities – e.g. DFA1979, Chromeo, Montag, etc.

[ScottsyII]

I confess to no very little to absolutely nothing about Canada and its music, other than that its not far from where I live now, it has somme connection to the commonwealth, Phil lives there...

But its also home to Devin Townsend, one of my favourite artists, so it can't be all bad up there!

[Dr. Drum]

2007 Cancon Top 50

1. The Acorn – Glory Hope Mountain
2. Rush – Snakes and Arrows
3. Apostle of Hustle – National Anthem of Nowhere
4. Jim Bryson – Where the Bungalows Roam
5. The Arcade Fire – Neon Bible
6. Handsome Furs – Plague Park
7. Tegan and Sara – The Con
8. Orillia Opry – Lighthouse for Stragglers' Eyes
9. We Are Wolves – Total Magique
10. Nathan Lawr and the Minotaurs – A Sea of Tiny Lights

11. Weakerthans – Reunion Tour
12. C'mon – Bottled Lightning (of An All Time High)
13. Do Make Say Think – You, You're a History in Rust
14. Miracle Fortress – Five Roses
15. Leslie Feist – The Reminder
16. Diableros – Aren't Ready for the Country
17. Immaculate Machine – Fables
18. A Northern Chorus – The Millions Too Many
19. Dog Day – Night Group
20. Kill the Lights – Buffalo of Love

21. Two Hours Traffic – Little Jabs
22. Sandro Perri – Tiny Mirrors
23. The Most Serene Republic – Population
24. Amos the Transparent – Everything I've Forgotten to Forget
25. New Pornographers – Challengers
26. United Steelworkers of Montreal – Kerosene and Coal
27. Montag – Going Places
28. Abdominal – Escape from the Pigeon Hole
29. Fond of Tigers – Release the Saviors
30. Stars – In Our Bedroom After the War

31. Carolyn Mark – Nothing is Free
32. Holy Fuck – LP
33. Young Galaxy – s/t
34. Wintersleep – Welcome to the Might Sky
35. Christine Fellows – Nevertheless
36. Frog Eyes – Tears of the Valedictorian
37. Rufus Wainwright – Release the Stars
38. Corb Lund – Horse Soldier! Horse Soldier!
39. Andy Swan – Andy Swan's Ottawa

40. The Besnard Lakes – Are the Dark Horse
41. Kevin Drew – Spirit If...
42. Timber Timbre – Medicinals
43. The Sadies – New Seasons
44. Joni Mitchell – Shine
45. Spiral Beach – Ball
46. Mother Mother – Touch Up
47. Great Lake Swimmers – Ongiara
48. Cuff the Duke – Sidelines of the City
49. Chromeo – Fancy Footwork
50. The Superfantastics – Pop-Up Book

Bubbling under:

Buck 65 – Situation
Basia Bulat – Oh My Darling
Caribou – Andorra
Holly Cole – s/t
Giantess
Hot Little Rocket – How to Lose Everything
Matthew Good – Hospital Music
Letters Letters
Ohbijou – Swift Feet for Troubling Times
Raising the Fawn – Sleight of Hand
Small Sins – Mood Swings
Wax Mannequin – Orchard and Ire

EPs:

The Blankket – Be Your Own Boss
Emily Haines – What is Free to a Good Home?
Plants and Animals – With/Avec
Ford Pier – Organ Farming
Jason Collett – Prodigals
Tim Hecker – Norberg

Misfires/discs that didn't take:

Joel Plaskett Emergency – Ashtray Rock
The Luyas – Faker Death
They Shoot Horses, Don't They – Pick Up Sticks
Wooden Stars – People Are Different
Neil Young – Chrome Dreams II
Payolas – Langford, Part One (EP)
Hey Rosetta! - Plan Your Escape (EP)

Live discs:

Neil Young – Live at Massey Hall
Cowboy Junkies – Trinity Revisited

Au revoir:

The Secret Sessions Rheostatics Tribute


Happy New Year everyone!!

[Meursault]

Hey fellow Canadians.

Drum, Riley, I didn't see you at the GrandMaster Flash show. I even wore my puffy coat with the fur Riley.

[phil]

Shane ... If I was you, I'd try to reach
the former residents at their new address ...