On December 23 The Mellotones will celebrate their 20th anniversary. The eight-piece unit fuses soul, funk and R&B with an always-changing setlist. “The 20th-anniversary show stems from when Tony Smith was the leader of the band,” says lead singer and saxophonist Jeffery Mosher. “In the early days, we used to do a Christmas show at […]
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Feast on this
Dreams 2018 Sunday, December 31, 9pm Cunard Centre, 961 Marginal Road $35-$80 facebook.com/clubcouturetour Drag entertainment has a rich history in Halifax. From the early days of venues gone by like The Turret, to current nightlife staples such as Reflections, the pageantry, drama and comedy served up by drag queens is a staple in queer spaces. […]
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Voices carry
MO KENNEY Mo Kenney is reserved and unassuming, a quietly quick wit. She saves it for the stage, as the saying goes—her demeanour is not one of meekness or deference to any of the men in her band, but of a measured confidence that borders on laconic until she leans into her guitar, a 1965 […]
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Meaghan Smith wants to write your song
For singer-songwriter Meaghan Smith, the glamour of being signed to a major label and life on the road faded. Stepping away from music to start a family and focus on health, Smith missed the connection with her music and fans. Today she is back doing the music industry her own way with her Our Song […]
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The year in music
Anderson .Paak & The Free Nationals at Halifax Jazz Festival Watching Anderson .Paak, one of the hottest current R&B artists, alternate between jumping around the stage to hyping the crowd from behind a drum kit seemed too good to actually be happening in Halifax. The crowd ate it up, singing along with every word and […]
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The Weather Station’s different state of grace
The Weather Station w/Bernice Friday December 8, 7pm The Carleton, 1685 Argyle Street $20 Near the beginning of “You and I (On the Other Side of the World),” from her self-titled, fourth album as The Weather Station, Tamara Lindeman sings what could be taken as a distillation of her music: “I love because I see.” […]
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Zaum town
Zaum Saturday December 9, 8pm The Seahorse Tavern, 2037 Gottingen Street $12 The experimental doom duo Zaum is turning up the lights and bringing some friends on stage to wrap up a year of globe-trotting. Zaum has travelled the world in support of Eidolon, an album with two sprawling, dark, ambient and meditative tracks that […]
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Lido Pimienta returns to Halifax
The 2017 Polaris Prize winner Lido Pimienta is back in town tonight, six weeks after her Halifax Pop Explosion show—during which she made her standard request for women of colour to move to the front, followed by white women and then men—became national news due to some audience members’ reactions. Pimienta is here as a […]
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Playing somebody else’s songs
In whole acts of love and admiration, here are the tribute shows I have personally produced, played and sung in: Tori Amos, Under the Pink (May 9, 2014); Alanis Morissette, Jagged Little Pill (June 12, 2015, two shows); Tori Amos, Boys for Pele (January 20, 2016). These are three of the most important albums of […]
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Mauno brings it all home
Mauno w/Jon McKiel, Juice Girls Thursday, November 23, 8pm The Seahorse Tavern, 2037 Gottingen Street $10 Nick Everett doesn’t beat around the bush. The music he makes as a part of the band Mauno—with guitarist Scott Boudreau, bassist/vocalist Eliza Niemi and drummer Adam White—carries this same affects as his conversational style: Spry, thoughtful, quietly intellectual. […]
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Dinuk Wijeratne’s Masterworks win
Composer Dinuk Wijeratne could not believe it when he heard the news he’d won the Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia Masterworks Arts Award last week. “I heard wild ringing on my phone from a friend congratulating me,” says Wijeratne. “I thought it was a hoax for a moment, so I needed confirmation before I could […]
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Chudi Harris’ evocative Canvas
Canvas (film) and Pathway (EP) Thursday, November 16 on YouTube (Chudsic) and Facebook (chudiharrismusic) “For my records I like to have one-word titles, because that captures the motive or idea behind each record,” says Chudi Harris-Eze, the man who heads the Halifax R&B outfit Chudi Harris. “For Canvas the idea was a blank slate, a […]
