Presented by The Halifax Pop Explosion, The Halifax Film Explosion announces its 2009 schedule (click for full schedule and trailers). This is the Halifax Film Explosion’s first year and coincides with the final two days of the Halifax Pop Explosion, taking place on Friday, October 23 and Saturday, October 24 at Empire 8 Park Lane. […]
Music Festivals
Full Halifax Pop Explosion schedule now online
Ladies, meet Barn Burner Why don’t you peep the heck out of the Halifax Pop Explosion full schedule? Who are you most excited for? I’m stoked to see Dog Day (with new drummer Rob Shedden from Beat Material and The Got To Get Got), Bike Rodeo with the Pack A.D. and The Memories Attack with […]
Sappyfest Day Three
Sunday at Sappy had a slow start, we were pretty partied out after Saturday’s hijinx. I was pretty impressed when we spotted a group of musicians and volunteers playing baseball at 10:30; we thought about stopping by and hitting some dingers but we decided to skip out on the action and head to the performers’ brunch. No other festival treats musicians as well Sappy does, they pay well, they give performers a pass for the entire weekend and they also provide a musicians’ free brunch and dinner every day of the festival. The Sunday brunch took place in the university
Atlantic Jazz Festival Shortlist
Valery Gore is not a pseudonym. At 26, the Fort Erie native strives for creative purity and truth. But it wasn’t always this way. “Coming from where I was at when I went to school, I was classically trained and I didn’t know anything about jazz,” she says, calling from her home in Toronto. “Maybe […]
Burning questions for Granelli about Spontaneous Combustion
Last October, a reed-thin, restlessly imaginative, master percussionist approached the Atlantic Jazz Festival’s new artistic director Lulu Healy with a concept for a scintillating festival event. He proposed matching up musicians—all renowned for their musical jouissance (over-the-top enjoyment and pleasure), whiz-bang inventiveness and a no-self-doubt command of their instruments—to create music without preordained strictures. In […]
Bell Orchestre says it out loud and clear
Though quantifiable or measurable, loudness isn’t a skill used rightly or wrongly, nor a right held by some and not by others. Really, all music can be, and perhaps should be, played loud. True, when KISS alights on the Common next week they may try to light up the crowd with “Shout it out Loud” […]
Sometimes bandages are for show and sometimes it’s just tendonitis
I headed out to the Music Room in the far reaches of nowhere last night to see Basia Bulat. It was my first time at the Music Room, which is the most beautiful little venue in Halifax. It says it fits 110 people, though it doesn’t actually look like that many, the acoustics are terrific, […]
Pop n fresh
I was curious about Kill Krinkle Club–a lo-fi Irish-Swedish duo from Dublin, and I always try to see as many of the intenational bands as possible (will anyone ever match Zoobombs, and the Moist Towelettes’ version of “We Are Ninja”? Yeah, yeah Monotonix. Not to be all jealous, but no one who watched that go […]
I think we’re just about done here.
I was going to write about White Cowbell Oklahoma but I think I’ll just post photos instead: The Jagerettes bring treats for the band. We did not get any of these treats. So this was not really a night for women’s lib, etc, unless you enjoy dirty, objectionable comments and being sprayed by pumpkin seed […]
Monotonix did not set anything on fire tonight.
I was going to write about some other bands, but then I went to the Monotonix show. I was having a hard time deciding if I’d stay at the Marquee for The Inbreds or head up to Gus’ and hope they weren’t at capacity, but I feel fairly confident that while The Inbreds were on […]
Monotonix Video
I saw Monotonix last night. I don’t really have many words to describe what happened, but I did take a video. It’s a bit dark but you get the general jist of what’s going on, I think: It’s all shaky at the end because I fell off the stage. More photos & blather comin’ atcha […]
Wednesday Night, Part 2: Bands that didn’t take the show on the road
I headed to the Marquee to see a couple stylish indie bands in Hell’s Kitchen, and generally stray back and forth between floors showing off my press pass. I caught the last couple songs of The Love Machine, who’ve got this sort of timeless movie credit thing going on with their music, that sounds like […]

