Tag: toronto

LISTEN: Julian Taylor, “Seeds”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Julian Taylor
Hometown: Toronto, Ontario
Song: “Seeds”
Release Date: June 24, 2022

Editor’s Note: “Seeds” was inspired by a text that Taylor received from his cousin the morning after it was announced that 215 uncovered remains of buried Indigenous children had been discovered at a former residential school in Kamloops, British Columbia. The message simply read: “They tried to bury us, but they didn’t know we were seeds.”

In Their Words: “Seeing and reading messages from members of my family felt crushing because genocide has and continues to be attempted where me and my loved ones live and it’s happening all over the world. When I look at my family I see a group of undeniably strong people with stories to share and that also gives me hope and that’s when I started to write ‘Seeds.’ I hope that this song touches people’s hearts in some way and makes them think. Think about their lives in a different way. One that brings them closer to the natural world and the universe. I hope it makes them feel the need to help others and see just how important and special the teachings of the ancient ones truly are.” — Julian Taylor

Photo Credit: Lisa MacIntosh

WATCH: The Slocan Ramblers, “Won’t You Come Back Home”

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Artist: The Slocan Ramblers
Hometown: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Song: “Won’t You Come Back Home”
Album: Up the Hill and Through the Fog
Release Date: September 10, 2022

In Their Words: “John Hartford has always been a huge influence on me. I remember watching an interview with him where he talked about putting a strong emphasis on the sound of words and how they fit together. Knowing we’d need new material for our next album, this concept stuck with me. While on tour we played in a town called Athabasca in Northern Alberta. Everyone had fun saying the town name out loud, and all of us thought it would make a good reference in a song. No one acknowledged it, but I knew the race was on for who would be the first to have a workable song having to do with Athabasca. I beat them all to the punch. It’s funny how songs evolve when you’re writing them. I imagined Athabasca being a prominent word in the chorus. Ultimately, it ended up making a small cameo in the line: ‘You’re halfway to Athabasca / I haven’t noticed in a week.’” — Frank Evans, The Slocan Ramblers

Photo Credit: Jen Squires

WATCH: Jeremie Albino, “Acre of Land”

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Artist: Jeremie Albino
Hometown: Toronto
Song: “Acre of Land”
Album: Past Dawn
Release Date: April 1, 2022
Label: Good People Record Co.

In Their Words: “Wrote this one with my pal Khalid Yassein (Wild Rivers) at a summer BBQ and my pal Michael Trent (Shovels & Rope) helped bring it to life via the power of the internet. At the time I wrote this song, I was stuck at home and all I seemed to write about was missing tour and at the same time missing home haha. Seems like there’s always a battle of wanting to have the stability of finding a partner, a home and settling down, and the pull of being out on the open road. I’m hoping I can find a balance in both one day. I guess this song leans more on the ‘yearning for a love and home’ type of song. I feel pretty grateful right now to have both those things but for some reason I have a feeling I’ll still be writing songs about missing something in years to come. Hopefully it’s just about missing my keys or misplacing my wallet haha! This song actually ended up being my favourite of the bunch of songs on my new EP, Past Dawn, in many ways. I especially loved making the video in one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. That deserted space between Nevada and California really helped capture that feeling of being free and wild roaming the highways of America!” — Jeremie Albino

Photo Credit: Colin Medley

BGS 5+5: Wild Rivers

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Artist: Wild Rivers
Hometown: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Album: SIDELINES
Personal nicknames or rejected band names: We were very close to being called Wolf Island. Someone else unfortunately snagged that Facebook page in 2015 so we decided against it.

Answers provided by Khalid Yassein of Wild Rivers

Which artist has influenced you the most … and how?

Very tough one. We all have many different influences for our songwriting, singing, playing, recorded music, live performances, they’re all different things. I’m going to go with Paul Simon. He’s probably my favourite songwriter, and over the course of his career he’s made so many incredible records with entirely different sounds. He has somehow found a way to have such depth, while sounding so light and casual. Love us some Paul.

What rituals do you have, either in the studio or before a show?

We all have been doing vocal warmups which has been awesome. It’s basically buzzing our lips for 20 minutes and it’s kind of silly and fun. Then we huddle up and someone does a pre-show speech and we bonk heads and say “TEAM!”

What other art forms — literature, film, dance, painting, etc — inform your music?

Probably movies and TV are the main ones that inform our music. Character studies and stories about people are so inspiring. Recent ones that come to mind are Call Me By Your Name, Nomadland, and Minari. All kind of slow burns about people just getting through it. There’s no better feeling than connecting to someone’s emotion. I think that’s what we try to do with our songs — pursue being as honest as we can with ourselves and dig into how we really feel. And then hopefully someone will connect with that.

What’s the toughest time you ever had writing a song?

One of our latest songs, “Long Time,” was a tough one to crack. I took breaks from it and came back to it throughout a year to really carve out the melody and find the lyrics that fit. Sometimes it’s fast and sometimes it takes a really long time (sorry).

What was the first moment that you knew you wanted to be a musician?

I think the moment I fully decided in my mind that this is what I wanted to do for my life was when we were making our first record. Going into the studio and crafting this big piece of art bit by bit was such an ambitious and exciting process. Everything coming together in real time. We had no idea what we were doing, and it was the best.

Photo Credit: Samuel Kojo

WATCH: Clever Hopes, “Made You Mad”

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Artist: Clever Hopes (Andrew Shaver & Eva Foote)
Hometown: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Song: “Made You Mad”
Album: Artefact
Release Date: January 20, 2022

In Their Words: “With a tip of its cap to the great rock duets that gave it life, ‘Made You Mad’ is the phoenix that soars out of love’s fiery demise. A reminder that, even when it is your fault, it’s going to be ok. It’s the kind of brokenhearted love song that might come too late to fix it, but just in time to try again. This is the song that documents the catalyst for the breakup and, as such, the album. It’s also the first song Eva and I worked on together. We had sorted out harmony lines for her, but it was originally written just from my perspective. We were days away from recording before we realized that we needed to divvy up the verses to really tell the story properly. We switched the pronouns and it came to life in a whole new way. I can’t imagine it otherwise now. It became the blueprint for how we approached the rest of the album in-studio.” — Andrew Shaver, Clever Hopes

Photo Credit: Ian Lake

WATCH: The Lonesome Ace Stringband, “The Hills of Mexico” (Live)

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Artist: The Lonesome Ace Stringband
Hometown: Toronto, Ontario / Horsefly, British Columbia
Song: “The Hills of Mexico”
Album: Lively Times – Live at the Anza Club
Release Date: November 26, 2021

In Their Words: “We recorded ‘The Hills of Mexico’ on our first album, Old Time. Since then it’s become our most requested piece. Although the original version of this song comes from Roscoe Holcomb, our version owes more to the band The Renegades, which featured the singing of Carol Elizabeth Jones. Our interpretation has evolved in the ten years since we recorded it, so it was great to capture it in this live performance from back in 2019. The new album, which will be streaming on November 26, was recorded at a live show in Vancouver, BC. It features some of our favorite songs by artists such as John Hartford, Gus Cannon, Bill Monroe, Marty Robbins, and The Stanley Brothers.” — Chris Coole, The Lonesome Ace Stringband

Photo Credit: Jen Squires

WATCH: Colin Linden, “Honey on My Tongue”

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Artist: Colin Linden
Hometown: White Plains, New York; Toronto; Nashville since 1997 and as long as they let me.
Song: “Honey on My Tongue”
Album: bLOW
Release Date: September 17, 2021
Label: Highway 20/Thirty Tigers

In Their Words: “Roots music and blues do speak to a lot of people right now. Much of the healing and release you get from listening to this music, the power and form of expression, has shown itself to be so vital in these times. It feels timeless because it’s such a raw nerve. I hope the memories of every soul who has loved and been loved are like honey on our tongues.” — Colin Linden

Photo credit: Laura Godwin

WATCH: Field Guide, “Tupperware” (Live at Monarch Studios)

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Artist: Field Guide
Hometown: Winnipeg, Manitoba; now Toronto
Song: “Tupperware” (Live at Monarch Studios)
Album: Make Peace With That
Release Date: September 17, 2021
Label: Birthday Cake

In Their Words: “Once in a while if you’re open to it, the universe may use you as a vehicle. This was the case with ‘Tupperware’ which came bursting out of me in a cool 20 minutes. I love that feeling and I really love this song. It’s about my early days living in Winnipeg; it’s about Tuesday nights in Osborne Village where a couple of wicked soul bands play weekly; it’s about my favourite restaurant which has since closed its doors; it’s about the beautiful parts of life that aren’t meant to last forever, and that’s okay.

“I wrote this album while swimming through a sea of change. ‘Tupperware’ came to be as my life in Winnipeg was coming to a close. I’d just moved out of my house, ended a relationship and was set to move to Toronto as soon as a cheap sublet surfaced. In September 2019 I finished mixing my previous release You Were just outside of Vancouver. I jumped on a plane and flew straight to Toronto to move into a little basement apartment at Crawford and Harbord St. in Toronto’s West End. For the next few months I wrote songs, put together a band and started to play around town, and then I met someone who made the songs come out even faster than before. The world shut down and I started looking inward, writing and writing some more. In the summer of 2020 I rented a van and drove back to Manitoba to make this album with my dear friends. I hope you like it!” — Dylan MacDonald, Field Guide

Photo credit: Joseph Visser

WATCH: Chris Coole, “My Name Is Lie”

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Artist: Chris Coole
Hometown: Toronto, Ontario
Song: “My Name Is Lie”
Release Date: August 13, 2021

In Their Words: “I guess this song is a banjo-y meditation on the post-truth era we seem so hopelessly bogged down in. It’s sung from the perspective of the lie itself. I was inspired by the Dock Boggs song, ‘A Conversation With Death’ or ‘O Death,’ where death is given a voice. So, if a lie could talk, ‘My Name Is Lie’ is what I imagine it might be saying in today’s world. I’m not sure how obvious it is, but the last two verses deal with the Pandora’s box that is social media and how it has allowed lies to access ‘light speed’ so to speak.” — Chris Coole

Photo credit: Tyler Knight

LISTEN: Adeline Stringband, “Hickory”

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Artist: Adeline Stringband (L to R: Chris Coole, Mark Kilianski, John Showman, Adrian Gross, Sam Allison)
Hometown: Toronto, Ontario
Song: “Hickory”
Album: Adeline
Release Date: July 23, 2021

In Their Words: “This session was definitely one of the loosest, most off-the-cuff, and most creative I’ve been a part of, and I’d hazard to say the same is true for the other guys. Smack dab in the middle of the pandemic — when none of us had really seen anyone besides immediate family for about a year — we holed up in a cabin in the woods and recorded old time tunes for three days and three nights. Seeing as it was -20º and there was a blizzard outside the whole time, there was nothing to do but pick tunes and roll the tape, and that’s exactly what we did. We learned “Hickory” from the great fiddler Earl White, and you can really hear the group interplay on this track.” — Adrian Gross

Photo credit: Chris Coole