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Best tunes of 2010: #14 Diamond Rings “Wait and see”

<< #15    |    #13 >>

Number 14 on this list marks the third artist, following P.S. I Love You at #30 and Library Voices at #25, that I discovered at the 2011 edition of Ottawa Bluesfest. Like the two others, Diamond Rings, one of the many performing names for John O’Regan, hails from Canada. His set that year was part of his tour supporting his debut album, “Special affections”, and took place early on a Sunday afternoon on the festival’s smallest stage. I had heard the album in advance, which was the only reason I had made such a special effort to be there so early in the day, but I wasn’t at all prepared for the Diamond Rings experience.

I’m also reasonably sure the early, sun-baked crowd weren’t sure what to make of the skinny white dude with bleached blonde hair and a swath of rainbow coloured makeup swiped across his eyes. And the confusion likely increased when he started, using loops, drum machines, programming, and other trickery while strutting and dancing across the stage with his guitar, brimming with all the confidence of a glam rock hero performing in front of a stadium of adoring fans rather than a handful of people scattered around on the hill facing him. His performance was infectious, though, and he had the crowd, which grew substantially, by the end and it turned out to be one of my favourite sets of the year. Two years later, when he returned to the festival in support of his sophomore album, it was also on a Sunday but this time, it was the headlining set on the medium sized stage. And now, he fittingly had a full band backing him, smoke machines, cool lighting, and a bigger, more adoring crowd.

“Wait and see” is the second track from that debut album, which I went out and bought for my vinyl collection early on. It’s a phenomenal track that you really have to listen closely to in order to guess that it’s a one man show. The sensibility is post-punk revival with a touch of darkness and a whole load of glam. The guitars are like chain saws messing with the industrial beat but it’s O’Regan’s silky baritone vocals that raise this track up to the rock heavens. You can hear and almost taste his persona in the song. He’s like a time traveller from the eighties, a forgotten rebel that had fallen asleep behind a stage, waking up almost thirty years later, and decided to wreak havoc on his new reality.

I loved this song and album and even the next one but lost track of O’Regan, and his Diamond Rings persona, after hearing he was touring with OMD in 2013. It seems like I wasn’t the only one because putting his name into google resulted in a handful of articles titled “Whatever happened to…” and one by Exclaim from last year that talked about a newish, yet still mysterious, project that had nothing to do with Diamond Rings called JG Ballad.

It is a bit of an unfortunate and unfinished story, but I feel like Diamond Rings was never really meant to be anything more than an experiment for O’Regan. Whatever he had to prove, though, I’m sure he did… and then some.

For the rest of the Best tunes of 2010 list, click here.

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Best tunes of 2010: #15 LCD Soundsystem “Drunk girls”

<< #16    |    #14 >>

There’s not too many bands or artists out there right now that are as well-respected and well-reviewed or have as much indie rock cred as James Murphy’s dance punk collective, LCD Soundsystem.

I couldn’t tell you how I heard about them originally but my first exposure was their self-titled debut LP, shortly after its release in 2005. I loved that album from the first and how it seemed to traverse pretty much every musical genre within its nine songs, from classic rock to glam to post-punk to techno, and at the same time, name check pretty much any influential musical artist ever. On the other hand, I wasn’t quite as enthused with their sophomore release, 2007’s “Sound of silver”, given its solid push into dance territory (I was likely alone with this sentiment) but there were still some great tracks within. In 2010, the band released their third record, “This is happening”, and then, called it quits, performing one ‘last’ show at Madison Square Garden that famously became the subject of the documentary/concert film, “The long goodbye”. But as we all know now, that show in 2011 wasn’t truly the end and Murphy and friends reunited for more shows and have released yet another well-reviewed album, titled “American dream”, last month.

“Drunk girls” was the second single released from that third (and ‘final’) album back in 2010 and incidentally, appears second in the track order. Murphy has called it a ‘dumb song’ and I suppose it is somewhat nonsensical, but it’s far from dumb. Maybe he considers it so because of its accessibility. It’s the shortest song on the album and yet, perhaps the rowdiest of the bunch, proudly living up to its name. With the repeated line, alternatively “drunk girls” or “drunk boys”, it’s an easy song to shout along with and gather up steam on the dance floor. But the intermingling lines are the real gems, often hilarious observations on societal absurdities, poking fun at clubland mating rituals. At the same time, the beat and Murphy’s brilliantly off-kilter delivery make for good times indeed, often conducive to another round of Jaegermeister or tequila shots. Played at exactly the right time at a packed club on a Saturday night, it could make things very messy indeed.

For the rest of the Best tunes of 2010 list, click here.

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Best tunes of 2010: #16 Wolf Parade “Palm road”

<< #17    |    #15 >>

Wolf Parade is a Canadian indie rock quartet that formed in Montreal in 2003 from musicians that were all from around the Vancouver area. They are kind of like a supergroup in reverse. All four members have always been highly involved and visible in the Canadian indie music scene, but most of their activities occurred after Wolf Parade’s formation. Spencer Krug, who started the band initially, has also fronted the bands Frog Eyes, Sunset Rubdown, Swan Lake, and Moonface, while Dan Boeckner, his musical partner in crime, has been involved with a number of other groups, including Handsome Furs, Divine Fits (with Britt Daniels of Spoon), and most recently, Operators. Second guitarist, Dante DeCaro was a founding member of Hot Hot Heat and has another project called Johnny and the Moon and drummer Arlen Thompson has done production and session work with a host of fellow Canadian bands, including Boeckner’s Handsome Furs and Arcade Fire. Yeah, I’m out of breath just typing all that.

I got into this talented bunch of guys upon the release of their brilliant debut album, “Apologies to the queen mary”, in 2005. Their jittery, frenetic blend of power pop and post-punk drew me in right away, each song a revelation wrapped in a riddle, with Boeckner and Krug tag-teaming the mike like it had offended them in some way. Their second and third albums were unleashed with just as much thunder and then, in 2011… they dissolved. Each member returning to or starting up the aforementioned projects as if Wolf Parade was only ever meant to be just one of their passing fancies.

Fast forward to the early days of 2016 and there were rumblings from their website that appeared to be more than just empty winds. An new EP followed in the spring, as did a triumphant resurrection tour (one stop of which I happily caught), and now, there’s a brand new full-length due out this coming Friday.  But back to the matter at hand.

“Palm road” is the second track that appears on “Expo 86”, Wolf Parade’s third album and the last to be released before the hiatus. It’s a Dan Boeckner track. Driving guitars mixed with Krug’s wonky, extraterrestrial synths, Thompson’s punishing drums and Boeckner’s vocals like an unpolished Springsteen, all rough and tumble after a night of playing for drinks at a dive bar, whose stage is more broken glass than wood. It’s raw and fist pumping and a crowd of like-minded fans shouting along at the chorus line as loud as their lungs will allow. Yes indeed.

For the rest of the Best tunes of 2010 list, click here.