The first full-length record from Calgary’s extra happy ghost!!!, Modern Horses was produced by Chad VanGaalen and takes its title from the story of nine horses that jumped off a bridge in downtown Calgary in 2005. The title track, the final track of the album, and its antecedent “Haunted House” are the strongest tracks, balancing […]
Laura Kenins
Posted inArts + Music
Dog Day
After lineup adjustments, Dog Day settled into life as a two-piece of Seth Smith and Nancy Urich, but the sound doesn’t lack for the reduced size. Opening on the lush, heavy “Daydream,” it’s still the same Dog Day. “Part Girl” has mournful verses paired with a catchy chorus that will stick in your head for […]
Posted inArts + Music
Hermoddities’ oddfellows
A big-eyed figure with a troll-style shock of white hair hides behind a tree in a dark wood. A group of medieval dwarf-like creatures rows a boat obliviously as another one drowns. Identically dressed women erect a smiling canopy over a circus tent. These are just some of the bizarre creatures to be encountered in […]
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Charles Spearin’s Happiness Project
Charles Spearin and the Happiness Project band The last night of the jazz festival featured the final of drummer Jerry Granelli’s four 70th-birthday shows and Toronto musician Charles Spearin’s The Happiness Project at St. Matthew’s. I caught the last few songs of the Jerry Granelli Trio’s (Granelli, Dani Oore, Simon Fisk), which were accompanied by […]
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Keren Ann at the Lord Nelson ballroom
Keren Ann and the haunted chandelier I first heard French/Israeli/Dutch/New Yorker/globetrotter singer and guitarist Keren Ann in my little sister’s bedroom while home from university one time, so it felt odd seeing her live for the first time in such a comparatively refined atmosphere as the Lord Nelson ballroom Thursday night. I walked in a […]
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Elisapie Isaac’s makeshift cabaret
Elisapie Isaac Performing to a sold-out Company House, Montreal-based singer Elisapie Isaac seemed even more soft-spoken onstage than in our interview, but no less charming and engaging. Speaking in mostly Franglais to the audience, with the occasional Inuktitut term thrown in, she played two sets with a break in between (I hear this is how […]
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The Pigeon Project pops up
If you’re not looking for them, you might miss most pigeon roosting spots, and likewise, you might miss the Pigeon Project —an installation devoted to the humble pigeon, in a Granville Square-facing window at NSCAD’s main campus. Morag Schonken, an interdisciplinary student focusing on installation art, put together the project out of her long-time interest […]
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Crofts/Adams/Pearse and The Unsupervised at 1313 Hollis
Crofts/Adams/Pearse Local experimental whizzes Norman Adams, Tim Crofts and Lukas Pearse performed as their trio Crofts/Adams/Pearse at a calm and only slightly overheated 1313 Hollis, performance space of the Jazz Festival’s home base, on Sunday night. Though sometimes an acoustic piano/cello/bass trio, the set was electronic this time, creating an ultra-minimal sound much of the […]
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Haligonians mourn Neskie Manuel
Known to many in the cycling, radio and activist communities in Halifax, one-time Haligonian Neskie Manuel disappeared on a camping trip on May 8 on the Neskonlith First Nation in BC, near Kamloops. Manuel lived in Halifax in 2007 and 2008 and was involved with developing aboriginal programming for CKDU, helping to develop the Dalhousie […]
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Colin Stetson’s lonely sax
Colin Stetson’s solo sax brought loneliness to a busy St. Matthew’s
Posted inArts + Music
The Bad Plus: Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring
The Bad Plus incites riotous applause with a cover of Stravinsky’s riot-inducing Rite of Spring
Posted inArts + Music
The Crofts/Adams/Pearse Trio channel the unknown
Norman Adams, Tim Crofts and Lukas Pearse are all fixtures of the local jazz and experimental scenes, seen doing everything from concerts to experimental electronic accompaniment to theatre to live film scores. They’d played together before but formed their trio about five years ago with the suddenlyLISTEN new music concert organization (which Adams is director […]