vintage

I’ve decided to change my review format for the rest of the folk fest stuff, because quite frankly, I like making lists and you probably like reading them. If not, tough luck: here’s the Folk Festival List of Lists, Part I!

For those of you who are unaware, the festival’s all-day portions (Saturday and Sunday from 10:30 until 5:30) are made up mostly of workshops, which throw together a few different artists and make them play together for an hour or so. They are by far the most interesting, intriguing, and often surprising parts of the festival, and all of them have a theme attached to them which the musicians can draw from as much or as little as they like. To convey the theme, the clever festival staff assign them really great names. I went through them all and picked my favourites.

Best workshop names

Some Country for Bold Men
Start Making Sense
All Rebel Rockers
The Harder They Strum
and the crowning glory: Strum und Twang!

In that vein, my list of best workshops (at least out of the ones I managed to take in: the schedule is a real feat of organization!):

Some Country for Bold Men
(Danny Barnes, The Deep Dark Woods, Luluc, The Good Lovelies)
As you might expect, a whole heck of a lot of country. Danny Barnes’ blazing bluegrass was a major highlight, as was the fact that all the musicians actually joined in everything — sometimes workshops turn into awkward “you play a tune, now I’ll play a tune” sessions, and then the whole point is lost. Thankfully, none of these musicians could keep themselves from playing along, and it turned into a pretty boot-stompin’ party, tempered by the occasional downtempo folky tune in exactly the right places. The final jam tune, “I Saw The Light,” not only had everyone on stage singing but everyone in the audience too. Not bad for a Sunday morning!
(I actually bought CDs by both Luluc and The Deep Dark Woods purely on the merit of this one workshop — I hadn’t seen either before, but their measly three songs each convinced me. It was that good. I’d have bought the Good Lovelies’ CD too, but my sister beat me to it!)

Cooking With Brass
(Tarhana, Bell Orchestre, Mirah, Bellowhead)
This stage contained everything from fiddles to Sousaphone to saxophones to accordions. It was like Broken Social Scene if they had gone through high school band together or something — I think I counted twenty musicians stuffed onto that little stage. Tarhana led everybody in raucous Turkish folk jams with a ridiculous amount of groove, and Bellowhead reviewed a few of the previous night’s mainstage favourites. It was loud, brassy, and a hell of a lot of fun. The “dancing section” along the side was hopping, which is a good a sign as any that you probably picked the right stage.

The Yonge & The Restless
(Sarah Harmer, Steven Page, The Good Lovelies, Justin Rutledge)
A Toronto-centric workshop in Alberta? Potentially risky, but it just seemed to justify everybody making jokes about the garbage strike and constant rainstorms. The musical combinations of all those voices was, however, totally fantastic. Steven Page was awkwardly on edge, although not as badly as he was during his later mainstage performance — he even broke out “Jane” later in the session! Justin Rutledge led everyone in a singalong of his adorable “Don’t Be So Mean, Jellybean”, which never gets old.

Another World
(Pacifika, The Acorn, Tarhana)
Pacifika’s members come from Peru, Barbados and Canada. The Acorn is an Ottawa mainstay, and Tarhana base themselves in Amsterdam and play Balkan and Oriental folk music. The sheer number of different folk traditions included in this session is astounding, and I’m sure you can imagine the sounds that emanated from the stage once things got cooking. The afternoon was just full of infectious groove and danceability … is that even a word? To be honest, I think this session created it. That was a combination I would love to see happen again.

Guided By Voices
(Akron/Family, The Good Lovelies, Umalali, Dry Branch Fire Squad)
Again, as you might expect from the clever titling, this one was meant to be voice-guided. I don’t think they even needed to prompt them with that, though, because the voices in this combination of artists are so strong that it would have been the standout point anyway. The Good Lovelies are just, well, lovely — their Boswell Sisters cover was delightful — and Umalali are one gigantic party. Pair the latter with Akron/Family and you get something fairly out of this world. Since this one was in the festival’s final round of workshops, it was especially difficult to leave: I could have listened to that for days!

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Coming tomorrow: List of Lists Part II, featuring the best mainstage performances and new musical discoveries of this year’s festival. Complete with tunes for your auditory enjoyment! See you tomorrow.

All done for another year!

I’m sorely lacking in sleep, so there won’t be a full review until tomorrow, but I do want to mention a few things while I’m here.

First things first: Bellowhead are your new favourite party band. If they are ever in your neighbourhood (if you live in the UK, the chances of this happening are far greater), see them. You will not be disappointed. They tore up the mainstage crowd on Saturday night and promptly sold out of CDs at the record tent before I got to it.

Australian duo Luluc are among my favourite discoveries of the festival; I believe they are playing in Toronto and Montreal shortly, although they haven’t posted the dates on their websites, so it might just be up to chance. If you live in either of these cities and see them on a poster, check it out. More about them soon.

Another favourite discovery is Toronto’s The Good Lovelies, who are exceptionally good and, yes, really lovely too. More about them soon too; they’re just such a fun trio that I will probably spend pages talking about how great they were this weekend.

I’d say everything added up pretty well today too. Overcast skies and a perfect temperature, no rain, and magnificent workshops. Justin Rutledge and Carolyn Mark rode gaily by me in a golf cart during the evening mainstage performance; Mavis Staples played her cover of “The Weight” and closed with the Staple Singers’ “I’ll Take You There”; Loreena McKennitt played “The Mummer’s Dance” and “The Lady of Shalott”, and Bellowhead’s John Spiers, Jon Boden, Gideon Juckes and Brendan Kelly treated us a second time to their version of “London Town”, the one that had turned Prince’s Island Park into a 12,000-strong dance party on Saturday night. Not bad for a lazy Sunday.

Full recaps, lists, and a handful of mp3s to follow! But first … to bed. Ahhhh.

(Addendum: I just had a look and my top search hit since this post is “michael franti appendix”. I’ll leave you to think about that one yourselves.)

I’ll keep this as short as possible. My bed awaits, and so does the 9:30 gates time for tomorrow’s workshops …

Highlights of the night:

- The Decemberists performing all of The Hazards of Love front to back, full of theatrics and soaring melodies and crescendos — AND THEN coming out for an encore to play “Sons & Daughters,” also known as the one song that I was absolutely dying to hear them perform. It ended with a beautiful singalong of the final refrain, all twelve thousand of us breaking the noise bylaw with great joy and gusto.

- Arrested Development making the entire park into a big dance party. Never mind that most of us can’t actually pull off the dance moves they encouraged us to imitate; it was still fun.

- The millions of adorable festival babies, including one who was propped up on his mommy’s shoulders “dancing”. Aw. Death by cute.

- Gomez, just in general. An excellent set by a group of guys who were obviously just having a great time onstage. And they played the one song I actually know, which was nice.

Bell Orchestre and Lee Harvey Osmond (not Oswald!) were also marvelous, including the trumpet player from the former playing into the bell of the French horn. Nice move.

Greatest number of toonies carried on my person at one moment: 8

Celebrities I thought I spotted in the crowd before I realised the heat was probably just making me hallucinate: Cameron Diaz, Lindsay Lohan, Emma Watson (what was in my dinner?)

Two more days to go!

Let’s hear it for the Calgary Folk Music Festival! Faced with an eleventh-hour cancellation by tonight’s headliner Michael Franti, who was suffering a ruptured appendix (and apparently was heading for surgery this evening), the festival went on remarkably smoothly. Iron & Wine, the second-to-last act of the evening, was bumped up to the prime slot and Toronto’s Woodchoppers Association, founded by original Rheostatics drummer Dave Clark, was brought in to fill the gap. It went off without a hitch, except for a few disgruntled Spearhead fans’ complaints, but nobody can really fault Franti for not being able to play.

I missed the first act, Los Misioneros del Norte, but I made sure I was back at home base for one of my most loved musicians these days, Justin Rutledge. He graced us with a bunch of gooders from Man Descending (including “St. Peter” and “Greenwich Time,” two of my favourites!) as well as “The Suffering of Pepe O’Malley, Pt III” and “Lay Me Down Sweet Jesus” from No Never Alone. It was curiously satisfying to see the latter at the folk festival, because although I’ve seen him perform it a few times, the first time I ever heard the song was when legendary Canadian blues guy Jim Byrnes covered it at the festival in 2007. Ah, the circle!

Greatly enjoyed the fusion stylings of Umalali as well — what a groove! — and the Woodchoppers really upped the ante with their genre-bending, joyful mayhem on stage. (Not bad for a last-minute mainstage addition.) And of course, Iron & Wine … I can only imagine how intimidating it must be to be on a stage that enormous by oneself, let alone perform with such a casual, familiar attitude. Perhaps it’s just the atmosphere of the festival itself. At one point, the crowd cheered and yelled after a particular song and he quipped “Is this a Canadian riot?” Oh, very funny. Welcome to the land north of the 49th.

I’ll keep this brief, but before I sign off I wanted to point out something awesome: Glen Campbell’s latest record, Meet Glen Campbell (released August 2008). He’s a mainstage act on Saturday night, and I’ve heard many an interesting tidbit about this record, so I investigated. Well, not only is it an album full of covers, but the list of artists whose songs he borrows is pretty incredible: Travis, Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, Foo Fighters, Jackson Browne, The Replacements, U2, Velvet Underground, Green Day, and John Lennon. Yeah — Glen Campbell covers “Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)”, that song that’s been played at every high school grad since 1997. And I really want to hear him do Tom Petty and Jackson Browne. It could be awful, a product of an old star trying to connect with the whippersnappers, but I have a feeling that it’s probably awesome. I mean, “Wichita Lineman”. Do I have to continue?

I’ll try to check in daily to let you know how things are going, but it’ll be a quick turnaround between night and morning for the next two days, so updates might be scarce. You can always check out my Twitter, though — I’ll be updating “from the field” every day. And if that’s not enough, the Twitter hashtag #cfmf will provide you with posts from all folk festival Tweeters using the tag!

See you tomorrow — Bell Orchestre, Gomez, Akron/Family, Chad VanGaalen, and the Decemberists (!!!), and more besides. Whew!

I’m in the land of a stable internet connection again (for a few weeks) so posts will be a bit more frequent. Hooray!

So I had the pleasure of taking in all three WestJet-sponsored gala events for the Toronto Just for Laughs festival last week. I am a terrible comedy reviewer, but I’ll list some highlights:

• Louis CK bashing the city of Buffalo and then launching into a tirade about milk cartons.
• John Cleese coming out on stage to a standing ovation and then repeatedly insulting the city of Toronto (and, once, Hamilton).
• John Mulaney’s bit about chasing a woman down a New York subway tunnel. “I’m not going to rape you! I’m a little boy!”
• The dry humour of Jimmy Carr. “When the Iraq war started, little did President Bush know.”
• David Cross‘ sketch about “If You Care” plastic wrap and the ensuing New York Jewish accent.
• Danny Bhoy writing a letter to the Royal Bank of Scotland (“one of the ones in the real shit”) informing them of being £500-billion overdrawn. “Perhaps we can come to some kind of compromise!”
• Ross Noble stopping in the middle of a sketch to stare in shock at a man in the front row who was wearing flip-flops (“At the nicest theatre in the city!”) and then proceeding to steal them and use them in his entire act. And the second show was completely different!

Someone needs to tell John Pinette and Gina Yashere that they can actually base their act around more than one subject. Pinette’s jokes were all self-deprecating lines about how overweight he was, and Yashere’s jokes were all about black people. Sure, some of them were funny, but it gets old fast — just because you are one of those things doesn’t mean every single other subject is barred!

Gearing up for the Calgary Folk Festival! Things kick off on Thursday evening with Los Misioneros Del Norte, Justin Rutledge, Umalali, Iron & Wine, and Michael Franti & Spearhead, as well as emcee Carolyn Mark. Should be a great time — look for reviews very shortly!

Classical piano phenomenon Lang Lang and jazz piano legend Herbie Hancock will be coming to Massey Hall on August 5 for their now-famous duel of the keys — Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, which they performed at the 50th Grammy Awards. They’ve taken their show to the Royal Albert Hall, and now they’re coming here; take a look at what’s on the programme:

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart — Overture to The Marriage of Figaro

Ralph Vaughan Williams – Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra

Maurice Ravel — Ma Mère L’Oye

Leonard Bernstein — “Mambo” from West Side Story

George Gershwin — Rhapsody in Blue, arranged for two pianos & orchestra

Franz Liszt — Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2, arranged for two pianos

Both performers will also play one solo piece each, to be announced from the stage. Tickets are available from Massey Hall. See you there?! (I can’t wait!)

It’s here!

Chad VanGaalen – Soft Airplane
Elliott Brood – Mountain Meadows
Fucked Up – Chemistry of Common Life
Great Lake Swimmers – Lost Channels
Hey Rosetta! – Into Your Lungs
Joel Plaskett – Three
K’Naan – Troubador
Malajube – Labyrinths
Metric – Fantasies
Patrick Watson – Wooden Arms

I’m so excited about Elliott Brood. So excited. I don’t think Patrick Watson will take it, just because he’s already won and the Prize is so new; it’s pretty exciting to see Chad VanGaalen and Joel Plaskett on that list, though. The winner will be announced September 21!

I’m finally enjoying a somewhat stable internet connection … if it lasts a few minutes, you might even read this. TECHNOLOGY!

The marvelous Toronto Fringe Festival has been underway for the better part of a week now, and I am throwing myself headfirst into the fray. This year’s lineup features 150 performances of all stripes by both up-and-coming and established performing acts — comedy, drama, musical theatre, improv, kids’ theatre, you name it. Tickets are $10 maximum, and a jaw-dropping one hundred percent of the proceeds go directly to the performing artists. Now that’s a festival. Fringe, of course, is left with empty pockets, and instead runs on donations and grants. So if you see a play and like it, donate — it’s the only way to keep the festival coming back!

I’ve seen three Fringe performances so far (not bad for thirty bucks); in case you’re planning to head out into the madness, here’s how they turned out.

The List (directed by Becky Bridger), running at the Helen Gardiner Phelan Playhouse at the University of Toronto, is magnificent. Over 40 women were interviewed about their list of qualities they look for in a partner; these interviews were then turned into a play. Four actors — Sara Beck, Jennifer Kenneally, Amy Symington and Chloe Whitehorn — play all of these women, sometimes in monologues, sometimes interacting with one another. The result is a very powerful and very personal collection of snapshots. There’s a lot of humour involved, and a lot of moments where you look around and see various audience members nodding their heads in knowing agreement. Everyone at this show is able to relate to at least one of the characters, and that’s probably what makes it the most interesting to watch — sometimes it’s like looking in a mirror.

Sara Hennessey Town (written by and starring Sara Hennessey), at the Theatre Passe Muraille backspace, was a little less magnificent. It starts off hilarious and sort of ends with a whimper. The whole show is a collection of stand-up routines, sketches, videos, and other little morsels to make up a one-hour show. Some of them are fantastic — Hennessey’s stand-up is by far the best part of the show — and some of them are a bit bewildering, like her ending sketch of a girl going to a job interview on the subway. Maybe I just don’t get her humour; more likely, maybe I should just see her do stand-up. Hennessey is a major player in the Toronto comedy scene and runs shows at the Ossington and the Rivoli (the popular Hour of Power at Laugh Sabbath). Sara Hennessey Town wasn’t the best show I’ve seen at Fringe so far, but I had a good time, and the sketches that were good were really good.

But even Hennessey’s best can’t compete with what might be the best thing at the Toronto Fringe Festival this year: Parker & Seville, otherwise known as Dave Barclay and Matt Kowall, supported by the curmudgeonly talents of Tim Gilbert. They’re playing every day in the illustrious venue of Honest Ed’s — the grocery area in the basement, to be exact — and it’s a perfect venue for the over-the-top vaudeville act they put on. The show is supposed to be a retrospective of the lives of the duo, narrated after their deaths by their grumpy old ex-manager, Mr McGudgeon: as the program says, the audiences watches as they “go from rags to rags and back again”. In between, there are as many politically incorrect, offensive, and/or ridiculous jokes as they can fit. Mothers in law, death, Randy Jackson, barfing, prostitutes, the Queen’s nether regions, ghosts, and just about every other subject imaginable are all treated with the same irreverence and occasionally ill-fated ad-libbing. I don’t think I’ve ever laughed so hard in my life (not even at The Hangover, and that movie literally almost broke me) … and I saw the show twice.

Maybe it’s due to their willingness to be sloppy and turn the preposterous factor up to 11. There are moments where Kowall laughs so hard that things have to stop for a second; other times, Barclay starts ad-libbing and momentarily loses his assumed accent. And Gilbert steals the show nearly every time he steps on stage — if there were awards for funniest people in Toronto, it would be a crime for him not to head the list. If you see one performance at Toronto Fringe, see the Parker & Seville Show; if you see two, see it twice.

Remaining performance times for all shows after the jump. Thanks for being patient with Vintage — we’ll be back to normal someday …

(Also, briefly in case I have no internet for another two weeks: the Zunior 5th anniversary bash at the Tranzac on June 27 was amazing, and Sonic Youth at Massey Hall on June 30 was also amazing. Reviews to follow eventually, whenever they make it onto the web.)

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