Tag: Alternative

Categories
Live music galleries

Live music galleries: Fanclubwallet [2024]

(I got the idea for this series while sifting through the ‘piles’ of digital photos on my laptop. It occurred to me to share some of these great pics from some of my favourite concert sets from time to time. Until I get around to the next one, I invite you to peruse my ever-growing list of concerts page.)

Fanclubwallet at Ottawa Bluesfest 2024

Artist: Fanclubwallet
When: July 14th, 2024
Where: River stage, Ottawa Bluesfest, Lebreton Flats Park, Ottawa
Context: Just over a month ago, I was deep into the enjoyment of attending the local music festival, Ottawa Bluesfest, and as I often do, I spent more time at the side stages than I did partaking the main event on each night. In fact, some of my favourite sets were not just native to Canada but were local to the city I currently call home. And I thought I might like to give props to some of these over the next few weeks, starting with local indie pop outfit, Fanclubwallet. Hannah Judge originally started making music in her bedroom during the pandemic, got some attention on the streaming services, and after a full length album and a couple of EPs, put together a full band to collaborate with on her latest outing. She had said band with her when she performed on the River stage on the last day of the festival, a set I had penciled in the moment I purchased my pass. I had enjoyed pretty much everything by her project that I’d heard thus far, a quirky brand of dream pop with plenty of hooks, and it was just as fun live. Hannah and her crew obviously felt comfortable on the stage, perhaps emboldened by the family and friends and hometown built fan club (not intended to be funny). The frontwoman was just as novel as I had imagined, playing her guitars by times and at others, a toy apple. And still others, dancing like no one was watching and singing in those cheerful tones that help make Fanclubwallet’s tunes so bright and full of sunshine. Perfect for a warm summer evening.
Point of reference song: “Band like that”

Hannah Judge aka Fanclubwallet
Eric Graham playin’ guitar
Luka Malatestinic also playin’ guitar
Nat Reid the bass man
Michael Watson banging on drums
Hannah playing the apple
Hannah and her band
Categories
Tunes

Eighties’ best 100 redux: #87 Wall of Voodoo “Mexican radio” (1982)

<< #88    |    #86 >>

At song #87 is Wall of Voodoo’s hit “Mexican radio”, easily the most accessible track in the band’s early catalogue.

Wall of Voodoo was an American New Wave band whose beginnings in film scores informed the band’s early spaghetti western-infused sound, along with original frontman, Stan Ridgway’s dark lyrics and easily recognizable droll vocals. “Mexican radio” took the band’s normal dark and unique sound further, almost to an oddball or kitschy place, and produced for Wall of Voodoo their only radio hit, boosting record sales of their second album, 1982’s “Call of the west,” to their highest charting. Ridgway left the band shortly afterwards for a solo career, was replaced by Andy Prieboy, and the band’s unique sound was lost to a more conventional New Wave sound. The group would release two more albums before disbanding for good in 1988.

I discovered/rediscovered “Mexican radio” on a retro compilation I purchased in 1999 called “Retro 80s volume 2: Rare and brilliant” and it quickly became a favourite of mine. It’s quirky and vibrant, and has inflecting lyrics that drum up images of picking up foreign language radio signals, a repeating chorus line that you really can’t help but digest and join in. I distinctly remember drunkenly dancing-slash-stumbling and shouting along to this song one Sunday retro night at Studio 69, a long-defunct downtown Toronto bar with my old housemate, Ryan. This one’s for you, buddy, wherever you might be.

Sing it with me: “I’m on a Mexican whoa-oh radio”

Original Eighties best 100 position: #95

Favourite lyric: I wish I was in Tijuana / Eating barbequed iguana” That’s some serious rhyming…

Where are they now?: The last we heard from Wall of Voodoo was in 2006 when Stan Ridgway resurrected the name, put together a band that included none of the other original members, and toured in support of Cyndi Lauper. No other real reunions have been serious discussed, especially since Marc Moreland, the other founding member died in 2002.

For the rest of the Eighties’ best 100 redux list, click here.

Categories
Tunes

100 best covers: #39 Great Big Sea “Run runaway”

<< #40    |    #38 >>

Great Big Sea has long since been a household name here in Canada and is relatively well-known elsewhere as well, counting amongst their fans actor Russell Crowe. They are likely the most famous band to come out of Newfoundland and for a while during the late 90s and into the 2000s, were one of the best-selling groups here, their high-energy folk and updated interpretations of traditional sea shanties obviously finding a home in the hearts of good Canadian youth.

It certainly found me on first listen with this very cover of Slade’s* “Run runaway”. I remember catching the video at some point in the summer of 1995 or 1996 on MuchMusic, right around the time their video for “Mari Mac” also caught my attention. It wasn’t long at all before these two songs could be heard from open residence room doors and through the open windows of student apartments all around Toronto. Both are excellent tunes but it was this re-interpretation that first sold me.

Slade’s original came out around the time that I was just finding my own feet with music, branching out from my parents’ oldies radio listening in the car and regularly watching the chumFM top 30 countdown on CityTV. I didn’t, of course, know this at the time, but this was Slade’s second go round and comeback venture, their biggest inroads into the North American market. They had been flirting with glam rock throughout the 70s and were quite popular at home in England. It took a cover by metal band Quiet Riot of their 70s hit “Cum on feel the noize” to finally drum up interest in the US, leading to a signing with a US label, and the first single released was, of course, “Run runaway”.

Recorded for their 11th studio album, “The amazing kamikaze syndrome”, “Run runaway” was very much of its time. It has soaring guitars that put together a stadium-ready hook and there’s those shout-along vocals that had me along for the ride, even though I didn’t understand them. But it was far from a sellout. Slade didn’t stray far from their roots, employing electric violin and adapting traditional Scottish jig elements for a hard rock world.

Then, more than a decade later, Great Big Sea, removed the rock and upped the traditional. Their cover has flutes, accordions and fiddles and is sung like a shanty. They even made it more upbeat, which I wouldn’t have thought possible as a pre-teen.

And though the original has the nostalgia factor going for it, I gotta give the edge to the cover here.

Cover:

Original:

*This is, I believe, the second cover of a Slade tune to find its way on to this list.

For the rest of the 100 best covers list, click here.