Back when Pearl Jam was at their height, they had the clout to do anything they wanted. Anything.
On September 26, 2000, the band released 25 double CD live albums—what they referred to as “official bootlegs”—featuring performances from virtually every show they played on European tour in support of their Binaural album. Of those 25, five immediately made the top 200 album chart. This was the first time any act ever saw more than two new albums show up on the chart in the same week.
Two other sets just missed the cut. Had they made the charts that week, Pearl Jam would have joined The Beatles, The Monkees, and U2 as the only acts to that point with seven albums on the charts at the same time.
A question from new parents: “Should I expose my baby to live music?” The answer is “yes.”
A recent study at the University of Toronto revealed that infants have longer attention spans when experiencing live music. Sure, you might want to give them an iPad to stare at, but that apparently doesn’t work as well as live music. Videos don’t captivate them a whole lot but live music elicits physiological changes like a synchronization of heart rate to the music.
The final conclusion? “Findings suggest that performer–audience interactions and social context play an important role in facilitating attention and coordinating emotional responses to musical performances early in life.”
The big caveat? Volume. The live music cannot be too loud for those delicate little ears.
The Flaming Lips are certainly unconventional and experimental. One of their weird projects was a very, very long song called “7 skies H3” which, in its original form, ran for 24 hours.
It consisted of several separate pieces, each running anywhere from 25 minutes to seven hours. If that wasn’t enough, just 13 copies were released on flash drives that were encased in actual human skulls. They went on the market (appropriately) on Halloween 2011 and cost $5,000. And yes, they sold them all. If you can’t find your own copy—imagine that—they also set up a website with the song on a continuous loop.
And if you would rather have a physical copy, there is an edited version that runs 50 minutes and was released for Record Store Day 2014.
Back in the 1930s during the Great Depression, there was a phenomenon known as the dance marathon. Basically, couples would take up a challenge to see who could remain dancing longer than anyone else. They were held in ballrooms and auditoriums and could continue for not just hours, but days and even weeks.
Spectators paid to watch, too. The longer the marathon went on, the higher the admission price. Couples had to stay in motion continuously resulting in blisters, injuries, and collapse from exhaustion.
Why would anyone subject themselves to such a thing? Like I said, it was during the Depression. Many people signed up for these marathons because it meant food, shelter, and a place to sleep, even if it was just a few minutes an hour. Those who won were given a cash prize. Hey, the Depression was rough. People were willing to do anything to survive.
All the original Ramones are no longer with us. While Dee Dee died of a heroin overdose, his three bandmates suffered from different forms of cancer. Joey died of lymphoma. Johnny? Prostate cancer. Tommy suffered from bile duct cancer. Coincidence? Maybe not.
Some suspect these cancers are the result of the conditions of a loft on East 2nd Street where the Ramones rehearsed and printed t-shirts. It was the former home of a plastic flower factory and some believe that the toxic residue left over from the chemicals used in their manufacture. They permeated the entire building.
Oh, and one more thing: Arturo Vega, the Ramones’ art director and the guy who designed and pressed up all those t-shirts in that loft? He also died of cancer.
It must have been so easy to write about rock back in the 1950s. Well, comparatively easy to today, I mean. Everything was so new that that’s all you had to pay attention to. There wasn’t exactly anything called “rock history” back then because the music had no history.
What began as a spark in the early 50s turned out to be the musical equivalent of the cosmological Big Bang. And as the years and decades passed, this music—which began as a fresh take on the 12-bar blues template—separated, segmented, stratified, mutated, evolved—with increasing speed.
New genres began to appear yearly, monthly, and sometimes even weekly. Today, it seems like every single day results in some kind of derivative spin-off sub-sub-sub-sub-genre.
The new sound and approach may gain traction and stay with us for some time, perhaps even carving out its own permanent space in the rock universe. More likely, though, a new genre will have a half-life shorter than hydrogen 7. And to save you from looking that up, that’s a tiny, tiny fraction of a second: a decimal point followed by 23 zeroes.
But there’s no stopping the fission and fusion of rock. We’re always going to get new sounds…keeping up with them all is another matter.
This is part of what makes writing a musical history of the 2010s so challenging. The number of iterations rock went through in that decade was insane. But if we’re going to understand what happened to rock during that time, we’re going to have to at least try.
The third week of September is traditionally be a busy time for new releases and 2023 is no exception. Here’s a dozen releases out this New Music Friday. Note the heavy Canadian representation.
Singles
1. City and Colour, Hard, Hard Time (Still/Dine Alone)
Dallas Green’s mellow Alexisonfire side project is about to set off on a European tour before he returns to Canada for a cross-country tour with Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats and Ruby Waters. This is the latest single from his seventh album, The Love Still Held Me Near.
2. Steve Miller Band, I Don’t Mind (UMe)
Yes, that Steve Miller. And yes, it’s box set season. This is a previously unreleased song from the sessions that date as far back as The Joker album from 1973. Called J50: The Evolution of The Joker is a sprawling re-releases that includes 26 other unheard recordings.
3. The Breeders, Divine Mascis (4AD)
Not only is it box set season, it’s also the time for anniversary re-releases. The Breeders are in that category with a new version of Last Splash, the band’s big hit from 1993. This previous unheard song (one of two on the record and taken from the original analogue tapes) features J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr, a guy revered by the Deal sisters.
4. Econoline Crush, Locked in Your Stone (Independent)
The return of Trevor Hurst and Econoline Crush continues with yet another single from his When the Devil Drives album, a record that also comes with a documentary film about Hurst’s time as a psychiatric nurse working with First Nations patients in Manitoba. Both will be out later this year. The video for this single was created using AI.
5. Phil Selway, Picking Up Pieces (Bella Union)
Since there’s no sign of a Radiohead album (although we have been promised one “in a couple of years”), each of the members are off doing their own thing. The includes drummer Phil Selway who released a solo record called Strange Dance back in February. This song is from a companion piece entitled Live at Evolution Studios that features Phil collaborating with a string quartet. The entire collection of recordings will be available December 8.
Albums
1. Arkells, Laundry Pile (Universal Music Canada)
After dripping out a series of singles since the beginning of the year, Arkells have finally released what frontman Max Kerman calls “our most raw and intimate record yet. There are imperfections on the album, but that was kind of the point. We wanted to make the album simply feel as honest as possible.” It’s an accidental record, too. The band never really set out to make another album, but it just kind of…happened. Hey, when the songwriting muse visits, you welcome it with open arms. The new single is the album’s closer.
2. Will Butler + Sisters Squares, Will Butler and Sister Squares (Merge)
It was about a year ago that Will Butler announced that he was leaving Arcade Fire. Shortly after that, the sexual allegations scandals around his brother broke, sending the band into a weird kind of limbo from which they’ve yet to recover. Will started releasing new material back in the spring and the full album is available now. This is the latest single.
3. Kevin Drew, Aging (Arts & Crafts)
Speaking of bands with no plans to record anytime soon, Kevin Drew has taken time away Broken Social Scene–I mean, why not?–to release an album recorded at The Tragically Hip’s Bathhouse studios back in 2021. Working with collaborator Nyles Spencer, Kevin thought he was going to record a children’s album. It didn’t quite work out that way. Physical versions of Aging are available now. A digital version will appear on November 3.
4. Teenage Fanclub, Nothing Lasts Forever (Merge)
This is the 13th album from the Scottish alt-rock darlings. The last record (2021’s Endless Arcade) had a melancholy tinge since the record came in the wake of the dissolution of frontman Norman Blakes marriage and his attendance at too many funerals. This one, says Blake, is far more optimistic, and is centered on accepting life as it comes.
5. Andy Taylor, Man’s a Wolf to Man (BMG Rights Management)
And on the topic of accepting what life gives you, Duran Duran’s Andy Taylor is still battling a serious case of prostate cancer, although at last word, the prognosis had improved. This is his third solo album and his first in 30(!!!) years. Given the circumstances, Durannies are most interested in what he has to say.
6. Sierra Pilot, Phantom Pains (Independent)
Sierra Pilot has been teasing this debut album for some time now with several advance singles that show guitar rock is alive and well and living in Canada. They thought they were going out on the road with Skid Row and Buckcherry next month, but that has been pushed to March because of health issues within Skid Row. This creates an opportunity for some solo headliner gigs this fall.
If you go back to the turn of the millennium, you’ll run across a band called American Nightmare who released some pretty powerful punk and hardcore material, largely written by vocalist Wes Eisold.
When the band broke up in 2004, everyone, including Eisold, thought that was it. But in 2007, stories began to circulate about a weird relationship involving Fall Out Boy. Eisold found out that the band used some of the lyrics he wrote for American Nightmare for their album Infinity on High and had failed to ask permission.
This resulted in some behind-the-scenes legal action that ultimately saw Eisold receiving writing credits on three songs on the album. He now receives a stream of revenue courtesy of Fall Out Boy and has allegedly made over a million dollars.
Georgie the cat went missing from her Victoria, B.C. home on Sun. Sept. 17, 2023, and her owner says she was contacted by a possible scammer who claimed to have found her.
Courtesy: Jacqui Loughton
A Victoria woman is warning others about possible scammers after her cat went missing and she sent money to someone who claimed to have found it, but lied.
Jacqui Loughton’s five-year-old feline, Georgie, disappeared on Sunday night.
“She must have slipped out when we put the dogs out,” the pet owner told Global News.
Loughton said she and her family put posters up around the neighbourhood and canvassed passersby, hoping to locate the beloved furry friend. The posters contained all the information to contact the family, in case Georgie was found.
The next morning, Loughton said she got a text that read, “Hi, I know where your cat is.”
When Loughton asked where, the texter replied that a good friend had actually found the cat and would not provide other details, such as that friend’s address.
After few more texts back and forth, Loughton said she became suspicious.
“I said, ‘I’m going to call the police,’ and they said, ‘Go ahead.'”
Because the texter said someone else had the cat and didn’t actually ask for any money, police reportedly told Loughton that the exchange fell just short of what’s required in order to obtain a warrant.
“I would say they knew what they were doing,” Loughton said.
Lesli Steeves, co-founder of Victoria’s ROAM — Reuniting Owners with Animals Missing — called Loughton’s experience “really frustrating.” She said ROAM receives between 20 and 30 found pet scams every day.
“We say, ‘Okay, thank you. Can you send a picture?'” she said of the group’s typical response.
“Then they ask us to send them a six-digit code of some kind, or they’re going to send us a code and we’ll send a code back to them — so, you know immediately then, that something is going sideways.”
While this specific scam has not yet been reported to the Better Business Bureau in B.C., the non-profit consumer support organization said it’s well aware of it.
It said scammers are targeting pet owners at their most vulnerable.
“They’re looking for any way to find an ‘in,’ and so, this is the ‘in’ for them,” explained Simone Lis, president and CEO.
“You have to protest yourself … to make sure that you’re dealing with someone who is legitimate.”
Despite the ordeal, Loughton said she’s not giving up on finding Georgie — and instead, is doubling down on the search. She’s working with ROAM while looking for the cat independently as well.
“It would mean everything,” Loughton said of recovering Georgie.
“We need that part of our family back. It’s not whole without her.”
The Summerland Legion has been closed since July due to extensive water damage from a leaky roof. As our Taya Fast reports, the legion is facing a hefty bill for repairs and have turned to the community for donations.
Following back-to-back rainstorms, the 20-year-old roof began to leak resulting in damage to the lounge and Rosedale Room. The ceiling then partially collapsed and soaked the carpet.
“July 11th, we had a rainstorm, and we had a leak and I discovered it the next day. It was not big, it was a minor one, so I went up on the roof the next day and thought I patched it. Which worked fine because we never got any rain until the 24th of July,” said Summerland Legion second-vice-president and house and grounds committee chairperson, Pat O’Sullivan.
“The evening of the 24th … got a really good rainstorm, some wind and I thought in the morning, I’ll just come and check on it to see how my patch did and I walked in the door… and there were tiles all over the place. There was water everywhere in about five different locations, it was just a mess.”
According to legion members, insurance will only cover damages to the building but not a new roof as the roof is 20 years old.
The estimated cost of the roof repairs, however, is around $75,000.
“The Legion does take in a lot of money in both our gaming accounts and with the poppy fund. But we’re not allowed to use them for everyday operations,” said Summerland Legion past president John Dorn.
“So, we have a little bit in the reserve fund but nowhere near the $75,000 that we need.”
It’s already been a tough couple of years for the legion — first pandemic closures and just hours after Remembrance Day last year, thieves broke in and stole poppy fund donations and caused extensive damage throughout the building.
The legion received an outpouring of support back then and has once again turned to the community for help.
“We have been soliciting direct donations from the community and the Summerland community has been very generous,” said Dorn.
“And we’re at about $30,000 with people waiting in the wings for us to finalize some things.”
Several events are scheduled to help raise funds for a new roof, including a parking lot rummage sale and BBQ this weekend at the legion.
The sale is expected to run from 9 am-3 pm on Saturday and will also include live music, and tattoos for kids.
“Then the next weekend after that at a local wine Ve Oh Lay Acres Winery, we’re having what we call Sip in Support, where 25 per cent of all receipts for both wine and food are donated to the Legion,” said Dorn.
“And they have a petting zoo there and any donations to the petting zoo, the animals are giving the donations to the Legion as well.”
Although there is no exact timeline as to when the legion will reopen, there is hope that repairs will be finished by mid-October.
“We have a new chef, Chef Andy, and the meals are spectacular, and he’s just been able to do a pop-up tent around the around the back. There are numerous clubs that use this facility for their meetings and we always have events like dances, music bingo nights, that sort of thing and we’ve just had to shut them down,” said Dorn.
“The very important thing is that we have to be open by Remembrance Day because that’s the most important day of the year here at the Legion.”
Information on ways to donate or about the upcoming events can be found on the Summerland Legion website.
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