Cultural Festivals

Heather Rappard’s video pieces are like looking through psychedelic goggles, they swirl and glide, take dark turns and make you want to adjust your visual tracking. This love of video carries over to her OBEY Convention offering—under the name Chromatic Visions, Rappard curated a visual mixtape, full of analog warmth, sleek digital, local artists and […]

In a city of artistic jacks-of-all-trades, Jess Lewis is working to be the queen. With credits in technical theatre and performance art accompanying collaboration credentials in a number of Halifax bands (Brent Randall and his Pinecones, Hymm, Church of Satan, The K-Tels), Lewis is becoming more bride and less bridesmaid. Of course, it wasn’t always […]

If Tonka War Cloud sounds a little chilly, “it’s because a good part of it was recorded at The Old Confidence Lodge in the dead of winter with no heat,” says Jon Mckiel. “Maybe it’s just my own recollection of how cold it was then, but I think you can feel it through the album.” […]

Poor little pennies don’t get a lot of love. They’re brushed aside, left behind, tossed and forgotten. But Becky Siamon sees worth in the often-disrespected coins. To her, they’re little bits of a bigger picture. The copper-haired singer-songwriter’s love of pennies has proven to be what she calls “elemental” to the concept of her debut […]

I like the smell of the railroad tracks I like the taste of not going back I’d like my troubles before they hatched I’m goin’ my way and I ain’t changin’ that A bespectacled and be-scarfed university crowd is crammed into a normally spacious south end cafe on open mic night. The air smells like […]

A few things have changed for Martha Wainwright since her 2008 album, I Know You’re Married But I’ve Got Feelings Too. A couple of years ago, two major events in her life occurred in close succession: she became a mother, and her own mother passed away. On Friday, Halifax audiences will be treated to some […]

DAN MANGAN w/The Crackling, The Daredevil Christopher Wright Thursday, October 20, St. Matthew’s United Church, $20/$25, 7:30pm People talk about record ‘cycle,’” says Vancouver’s Dan Mangan in a tone that suggests he finds the concept a bit odd. “There’s this idea that you tour your album, then lay low for a little while and take […]

JENNIFER CASTLE w/ The Belle Comedians, The Weather Station, Spring Standards Saturday, October 22, The Company House, 8pm, $10 Many of the songs on Jennifer Castle’s major-label debut Castlemusic are unadorned; tunes like “Powers” make their mark with delicate strumming, spare, rattling percussion and whispers of flute. Though the music is low-key, an enormous strength […]

It’s kind of hard to fully grasp how a band with a swear word in its name could become one of the biggest punk bands on the planet. But that is exactly what happened to Fucked Up, a Toronto six-piece that has gone from relative obscurity to the most important punk group of its generation. […]

This weekend at the Pop Explosion, Wendy Day wants to tell you exactly how to make it in the music biz. And right now you’re going to read some of the best advice she has for struggling musicians living in Halifax. First: her bio. Twenty years ago, disgusted by record labels mistreating musicians in the […]

Bruce Peninsula was supposed to be on this tour last March. The record was done, the dates were booked, the celebrations had happened. And then frontman Neil Haverty was diagnosed with leukemia. After a hard winter, and teasing fans with videos for B-sides and covers (better known as the Bruce Peninsula Fire Sale) BP back […]

Olenka Krakus says she writes more when she’s alone. So on this eastern tour with her Autumn Lovers, new songs might not come as easily as they did the last time she was in town when she wrote a one while walking through the north end. But that’s OK, the once literature student has a […]