Grizzly Bear is Amazing: A Concert Review.

I didn't know it was possible. My appreciation for Grizzly Bear has doubled since I saw them last Friday (June 5th) at the Phoenix in Toronto. Here is why.
The Opening band Here We Go Magic from Brooklyn New York were damn good themselves. Normally openers for an $18 concert aren't the best. Typically some semi-okay local band good enough to pass some time. But Here We Go Magic played a really solid set, with great energy. Their songs ranged from up beat and poppy to more mellow and experimental. It was a really pleasant surprise given my past with sucky Toronto openers (a few being The Beauties at Broken Social Scene, not bad but totally not suited for the concert. Grouper at Animal Collective made people sleep, and one I still can't forget: Viva Voce from Portland Oregon because they announced who they were after EVERY SONG from The Shins 2007 concert ). Another good news item: set change didn't take too long. They were pretty dang efficient.
Grizzly Bear themselves were awesome. They played a solid set of Veckatimest and Yellow House songs mixed with a few older and rarer songs. It was such an enjoyable concert; such a relaxed atmosphere, no insecent pushing or violent crowd. It was the most beautiful concert I've ever been to, the music was such a high caliber and so dreamy. Some of my personal highlights would include: Colorado, Knife, and While you Wait for the Others. Another big highlight was a guest performace by Leslie Feist. Feist came to perfom Service Bell (off of Dark was the Night) with Grizzly Bear and also Two Weeks off of Veckatimest. I think everyone in the crowd was happy about that, but I'm sure at least half had entertained the possibility (come on, it's Toronto, anything can and will happen). I left the concert in a great mood. Really happy about the whole thing and kind of wished I knew them better when they played 2 summers ago at LOLA fest (maybe a repeat performace this summer?! Hopefully but probably not). It was simply a fantastic show.

If you haven't heard Veckatimest their latest release (came out a few weeks ago) you really ought to at LEAST check it out on their myspace and if you haven't even heard Grizzly Bear (where have you been?), same thing.

Oh! Bringing art and music home since 2009

Things happen where you make it happen. To anyone who has ever thought 'my town is boring' or 'this place isn't big enough for cool things to happen' OH! is proof that this is not true.

Open House Arts Collective (Oh!) "is a group of musicians, artists, and art enthusiasts based out of London Ontario Canada, working together to motivate, support, and inspire the London arts community and to promote the community's endeavours within the larger Canadian arts scene." Their mission is to promote "the London art community through music and art events. Oh! shares ideas and creates partnerships with the London community to raise awareness of local culture".
Recently Oh! participated in the Indie Media Fair held at the London Public Library. This also launched the Oh! Compilation One album.
The album has 12 tracks from 12 different artists (well, some overlap between acts), and since I procured this album from Grooves on Monday (for the too low price of $5.99), it has not left my ears. Well, ok that's not true, I bought Dark Was The Night at the same time, so I've been alternating. On first listen I was astonished. Astonished that this whole production came out of London, astonished because of how quickly this has all happened, and astonished because of how good all the music is.
Time for an anecdote: I was sitting in my living room with Andrew (roommate), playing every other track from Dark Was the Night (basically 31 songs from the most well known indie artists of our time), and every other track from Oh! 1, and during an Oh! song he asked "still dark was the night"? Every track is so well done, who knew all this talent existed in London?
Back to the music. There's a great range of styles on the album, folk, indie-rock, to more electronic music. Here's a little about some of my favourite tracks (sorry too hard to profile them all! Maybe later):

Sidewalks is by A horse and His Boy, a five piece band, it's layered with lots of different sounds and textures mainly by synth and vocals, with drums and guitar added. For some reason to me it's like what would happen if Wolf Parade and MGMT got together.

Tidal Wave is by The Whipping Wind. I actually... can't find anything about this band, but it's one of my favourite tracks. Maybe it's the horns, strings, the bells, the ukulele (or is it banjo?) and hand-clapping bridge, or the way the voices blend so beautifully together. It's a really well constructed song, with great lyrics.

The Decline is by Olenka and the autumn lovers, it's very melodic, the vocals blend really well together and has a great build up filled with horns. It's a really interesting and catchy song. Olenka and the Autumn lovers also put on a great show, they played at LOLA last year, go see them if you're lucky enough to be in an area where they're playing sometime. They also won CHRW album of the year.

There are so many more great tracks on this album, I wish I had time to profile them all (this has already taken me an hour and a half) but I urge to to check out the Oh! myspace to hear some of this incredible work. They truly are proof that you don't have to be signed, or even well known to make incredible music for people to hear (The album was also reviewed in London Free Press). It's really impressive, and if you like what you hear, support it! Without support things like this would never happen. Watch out for big things in the future from Oh! It's just a matter of time before you'll be hearing about them everywhere.

Dark Was the Night

Dark Was the Night is a compilation album released on February 17, 2009. Now, I'm not usually one for compilation albums, if I like an artist I'll get the whole thing. I don't want bits and pieces, thats why I use hype machine, to see if it's worth listening to (I'll also go on friend recommendations). I have only heard a few songs off of Dark Was the Night, but I already know I have to go buy it. Why?
Well here's a little background info. Dark Was the Night was assembled by Aaron and Bryce Dessner of The National for the Red Hot Organization (an organization fighting HIV/AIDS through pop culture and raising awareness) so you already know it's a worthwhile cause. Furthermore, it's been two years in the making because, and here's the kicker, it features new (and a few covers) songs by (here are SOME of the artists):

Andrew Bird
Antony + Bryce Dessner
Arcade Fire
Beach House
Beirut
Blonde Redhead + Devastations
Bon Iver
Buck 65 Remix (featuring Sufjan Stevens and Serengeti)
Cat Power and Dirty Delta Blues
The Decemberists
Dirty Projectors + David Byrne
Kevin Drew
Feist + Ben Gibbard
Grizzly Bear + Feist
Iron & Wine
My Brightest Diamond
My Morning Jacket
The National
The New Pornographers
Spoon
Sufjan Stevens
Yo La Tengo

All I can say is... nothing. It is bound to be 2 cd's of gold. In particular some of these collaborations are looking pretty good, Feist alone is good, but with Ben Gibbard (of Death Cab for Cutie, and The Postal Service) or Grizzly Bear, amazing. There are so many reasons to buy this album, I don't think it's avoidable.