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Recent Reviews
Braids
Native Speaker
Calgarians Raphaelle Standell-Preston, Austin Tufts, Katie Lee and Taylor Smith met up while still teenagers at Western Canada High School, allegedly forming the synth-pop quartet Braids in the cafeteria over a blueberry muffin. It wasn't long, however, before Montreal's thriving scene out east started to beckon. As the band's drummer Tufts told online mag Ca Va Cool, "Three of us wanted to go to McGill really badly, and that city is so incredible for music anyway. We thought we might as well...more
Dionne-Bregent
...Et le Troisieme Jour
Michel-Georges Bregent and Vincent Dionne never quite broke the sort of ground that, say, John Mills-Cockell did with his bands Interystems and Syrinx, but the Quebec duo's synth-prog opus, 1976's ...Et le Troisieme Jour, is gathering about as much dust as Mr. Mills-Cockell's sinewy synth work, with none of their records very easy to find on CD these days.
As Bregent, keyboardist Michel-Georges had previously teamed up with his vocalist brother Jacques, delivering the...more
The Ugly
Stranded in the Laneway (of Love) / To Have Some Fun - 7"
Though barely a footnote in the Toronto punk scene, the tragedy of leader/singer Mike Nightmare and his band the Ugly is hands down one of the most fascinating stories in the entire annals of popular music. That such a group of hoodlums and petty thieves could produce in the end a record of gleaming power pop is even more amazing.
Possessed of near-mythical good looks and charisma, Nightmare was the ultimate rock and roll bad boy, a flawed hero of Shakespearian proportions. ...more
Jolly Tambourine Man
Apple Strudel Man / Sweater in Sri Lanka - 7"
The mid-eighties in Toronto were a bit of a fallow period for angry youth. Punk was definitely dead, despite all those mohawk-quaffed kids and their slogan-covered leathers. The promise of new wave was being buffed and sanitized by the folks over at MTV, while the dance floors were filled with pasty fashionistas playing with their bangs and swaying to the Smiths' 'How Soon is Now?'.
For Stewart Black, Steve Rhodes, Ian Blurton, Caroline Savage and Mike Armstrong, the voi...more
Teenage Head
Picture My Face / Tearin' Me Apart - 7"
In the spring of 1977, when Frankie Venom (ne Kerr), Gordie Lewis, Steve Mahon and Nick Stipanitz, all long-haired rockers from nearby gritty Hamilton, managed to talk their way into a gig at Toronto's first punk bar, downstairs at the Colonial Tavern on Yonge Street, the big-city punks were a tad suspicious. But what Teenage Head may have lacked in style, they more than made up for in talent. Lewis recalls in Treat Me Like Dirt, "...it was an urban...more
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