Tag: Folk Rock

Categories
Live music galleries

Live music galleries: Mumford & Sons [2013]

(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.)

Mumford and Sons @ Osheaga 2013

Artist: Mumford & Sons
When: August 4th, 2013
Where: River stage, Osheaga, Jean Drapeau Park, Montreal
Context: Ten years ago this summer, I attended Montreal’s Osheaga arts and music festival with my good friends Tim and Mark. It was an unforgettable weekend and we saw countless amazing performances over the festival’s three days. I’ve already posted photos* from some of the weekend’s sets and plan to share a few more of these in the months leading up to this year’s edition, which I will sadly not be attending. Some of these posts will have fewer photos than my normal galleries, including today’s, but this should not be taken to be indicative of the quality of the performances, but of the difficulty of obtaining quality pics while being so completely in the moment.

If I am being completely honest here, we didn’t stick around for Mumford and Sons’ whole festival-ending set. After all the excitement of New Order just beforehand and all the rest of the great sets we had seen that weekend, the British indie folk outfit felt a bit anticlimactic. They had just released their second album and were still on top of the world so they had amassed a huge crowd for their set and they were right into it. Live, the group really does the high energy thing well but they sounded just a little too slick. As Tim quipped: “They’re pretty good. They sound just like they do on the albums.” After the first few songs, though, the allure of sitting down in a pub and drinking something other than Molson Canadian or Coors Light was just too great.**
Point of reference song: “I will wait”

Winston Marshall on banjo
Ben Lovett and Marcus Mumford
Ted Dwane and Winston Marshall
Marcus Mumford

*Past galleries from this festival weekend have included the following:

**I’ll be getting a second chance at catching a whole set by Mumford this summer at this year’s Bluesfest.

Categories
Tunes

Best tunes of 1993: #20 Spirit Of The West “And if Venice is sinking”

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Three important life events happened in the fall of 1993 and they will be forever linked in my thoughts and memories. First, after taking a year off after high school, I started my first year of post-secondary education at York University in Toronto. Second, I finished my road lessons with Young Driver’s of Canada and passed my road test in the sleepy town of Port Hope, Ontario, beating the implementation of the new graduated licensing rules by a mere two and a half months. Finally, I purchased a CD copy of “Faithlift”, the sixth and most recent (at the time) album by Canadian alternative folk rock band Spirit of the West.

The reason they are linked for me is because I decided to continue living at my parent’s home in Bowmanville while attending that first year of university to save money. And after getting my driver’s license, I switched my mode of travel from the long and tiring GO transit bus voyage to a sturdy and slightly more comfortable Chevrolet Chevette borrowed from my mother. It was a trek I made three times a week and took more than an hour each way by car, so almost 20 hours of music listening time. That CD was pretty much immediately recorded to cassette tape to be played on the deck in my mother’s car and it was on many of those trips in October and November that I fell in love with “Faithlift”.

My introduction to Spirit of the West came with their previous album, 1991’s “Go figure”, an album that saw the group add a drummer and transition from a mostly folk-influenced outfit to something that blended the sound with rock. “Faithlift” completed their transition to a rock band with only some hints of the folk sound remaining. It became the group’s best selling album and this, mostly off the back of least rocking tune on the album: “And if Venice is sinking”. It is their highest charting single, is these days runner up to their best known song*, and also happened to be my fifth favourite song when I counted down my favourites by the group on these pages back in 2017.

As I mentioned in that post, “And if Venice is sinking” is a joyful tune, perfectly reflecting the elation and wonder frontman John Mann and his new wife, Jill Baum, must have felt as they explored the winding laneways and bridges of Venice for their honeymoon. I can certainly attest to this feeling, given that my wife and I also spent part of our honeymoon there, exploring that living museum and falling in love with the galleries, the churches, and the piazzas – the trifecta of art, history, and food. Just like Mann and Daum, we didn’t want to leave, believing we might never see it again.

“And if Venice is sinking
Then I’m going under”

The song is as much a carnival as its subject. It dances and prances along the cobblestone streets, a parade led by the pace-setting tuba, but followed closely behind by Linda McRae on the accordion and Hugh McMillan on the mandolin. The rest of us just gather in behind, joining our voices to that of the incomparable and unforgettable John Mann.

*At least, here in Canada.

For the rest of the Best tunes of 1993 list, click here.

Categories
Vinyl

Vinyl love: The Rural Alberta Advantage “The wild”

(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)

Artist: The Rural Alberta Advantage
Album Title: The wild
Year released: 2017
Details: Yellow vinyl, limited to 200, signed by the band, OBI strip

The skinny: So this impromptu mini-series showcasing the vinyl releases of Toronto-based indie folk rock trio, The Rural Alberta Advantage, comes to an end at four posts (so far). In 2016, it was announced that founding member Amy Cole was replaced by Robin Hatch and the group immediately went on the road to tour new material. “The wild” is the result of these road-tested tunes and though you can hear more polish, with Nils Edenloff’s raucous strumming and hollering and Paul Banwatt’s ever present drum-pounding, these ten tracks are no less ‘wild’ than the band’s previous work. I admit that I was a bit apprehensive at the personnel change but found that Hatch was a worthy replacement when I heard advance singles on YouTube so I jumped all over this second pressing by Paper Bag Records. As usual, the Canadian label’s packaging is fun, complete with an OBI strip, a signed cover, and a pretty yellow disc. (As a post-script: It’s been four years since this album was released, Amy Cole has returned to the group, and given the activity on social media, I expect I’ll have to add a fifth instalment to this series at some date in the not-too-distant future.)

Standout track: “White lights”