Show Alert: That's Just Swell

Current Swell
Fri., Nov. 25 - London Music Hall Lounge
Sat., Nov. 26 - Villains Beastro, Windsor
Sun., Nov. 27 - Paddy Flaherty's, Sarnia
*All shows with Michou

Currents in a river can run stronger than the surface suggests, until you wade in and find yourself going for a ride. Fans of Victoria, B.C.'s Current Swell have been flowing along to the band's eclectic rootsy rock music for more than five years. Now, after winning the top prize of $100,500 last week in Vancouver's PEAK Performance Project and with a month-old album that reached #1 on iTunes Canada singer-songwriter charts, Current Swell is poised to break the surface. And that's just swell with them.

"We're pretty stoked," said vocalist and lead guitarist Scott Stanton about winning in an interview with N2DS2W on Sat., Nov. 19. "There's an insane amount of buzz in town. I haven't stopped smiling."

That buzz hits London, for the first time ever Windsor, and Sarnia this weekend as Current Swell play back-to-back shows with Windsor's Michou (who took home Artist of the Year from the 2011 Verge Music Awards). "We're really excited for our first Windsor show and playing with Michou," said Stanton. "Sarnia has drawn the biggest crowd for us out east, almost like a hometown show. We played a smaller bar and it was packed with fans who knew all the words to our songs."

Stanton said fans were already singing along to songs off of the band's fourth album, Long Time Ago, at shows immediately after its release in Canada on Oct. 25 (U.S. fans will have to wait until January). "The response has been unbelievable," he said, even though despite its title, Long Time Ago is a departure from its predecessors. "In the past, we jumped all over the place as far as genres, reggae, blues, folk rock," Stanton explained. "This one is different in that it's very cohesive. We wrote a lot of songs, then distilled them down to five we knew had to be on the record, and then picked the rest to make it the most cohesive. We're very proud of it."

As they should be; the album is thoughtfully and beautifully crafted, with a mellow front porch-music vibe that sheds the surf-rock label frequently used to describe their earlier work. Stanton said he and songwriting partner Dave "Davers" Lang are most partial to the emotionally-charged "Brad's Song" (see video below) written in memory of a friend who passed away. "Family and friends remember a loved one who's died by looking at pictures," Stanton said. "I get to remember Brad every time I sing that song."

Veterans of Canada, U.S. and Australia tours, Current Swell has opened for Bedouin Soundclash, K-OS, K'Naan, Ron Sexsmith and even the Beach Boys. They've played on stages at the Ottawa Bluesfest, the 2010 Olympics, Junofest and Rifflandia. Far from peaking, Stanton says "We put tons of thought into what we'd do with the money" from the Peak Performance Project. "It was simple for us. We knew we wanted to invest it back into the band and push our music around the world."

Current Swell is: Dave "Davers" Lang (guitar and vox), Scott Stanton (guitar and vox), Aaron "Ghosty" Wright (bass), Chris "Chrispy" Petersen (drums) and Dave St. Jean (percussion, trombone; not touring with the band due to other commitments). Additional tour dates: Nov. 30 @ Nicky Zee's, Fredericton, NB; Dec. 1 @ Baba's Lounge, Charlottestown, PEI; Dec. 2 @ Pavilion, Halifax, NS; Dec. 3 @ Manhattan's, Moncton, NB (all shows with Michou).

Show Review: Wax redux

We enjoyed Wax Mannequin's show at the Phog so much in February, we decided to make a run up to Narnia, uh, Sarnia at the end of May to see him again at Paddy Flaherty's. Unfortunately, a cool, rainy night kept us indoors, but then again, if we'd been outside on the patio, we wouldn't have gotten to see Wax bring down the house.

We jest about the whole Narnia/Sarnia thing, but a Wax Mannequin performance is a little like being in a fantasy land, between the handfuls of crystals, dark fairytale and fairytruth music and body bags full of balloons. Except this time, as Wax was hanging the bag, the shelf over the stage area he tried to affix it to split and gave way, and a treasure trove of bar bric-a-brac crashed down.

The rest of the show was anything but anticlimatic, as Wax delivered a jaunty set that included hits from his latest album, Saxon, plus, to the delight of the audience, "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" and "The Log Driver's Waltz." Even Paddy's sound man seemed to enjoy himself, despite the bag of ice on his head from the wreck of the shelf.

Photos: Russ Gordon/N2D Images

Show Review: East Meets West

You couldn't see the forest for The Mountains & The Trees and Treelines on Thurs., Mar.10, as East met West at Paddy Flaherty's in Narnia, uh, Sarnia.

Treelines, from Vancouver, BC, and Jon Janes, the man from Corner Brook, NL behind The Mountains & The Trees, recently completed their "Lessons in Geography" cross-Canada tour. Luckily for us, it included the stop in Sarnia, where the Detroit Radio 3 blogger contingent--N2D, Wapuche and jojodillon-- got to meet fellow bloggers cacophonously (of Petrolia, ON) and photographer extraordinaire Christine McAvoy of Vancouver. Word to the YVR3.

This was our first visit to Paddy's, but it definitely won't be our last. Although the stage is a little awkwardly placed (it's set deep enough that the view from the left is disadvantageous), the sound was excellent, the atmosphere authentic and warm (first venue where Yort took her coat off all winter), the food, although a little pricey was satisfying (Guinness poutine, anyone?) and the hard cider (Magner's) delicious. We're looking forward to catching a show there on the patio in the summer-- we were sorry to miss Elliott BROOD there last year.

This was not our first time seeing Jon Janes (here's our post from his show in Aug. 2010 at Windsor's Phog Lounge). We'll never count the times we've seen him because we could never get tired of his gentle, intimate songs and that floral suitcase kick drum. Fortunately, Janes is a songwriting machine: "I just wrote this song a half hour ago," he'll announce, and then play it as if it was an old friend. Expect a new album to complement I Made This For You in the near future.


Treelines-- brothers Matt and Steve Lockhart, Matt Kelly and Grant McKinnon at the kit-- have the look, assurance and sound of a mature band. We had to keep reminding ourselves that they've only been around for less than two years and released one full-length album (self-titled, 2009) and one EP (Young Man, July 2010)

Matt Lockhart, who began the evening with a solo set (and has a solo effort in the works), gets frequent comparisons to Bruce Springsteen. Even playing sans electricity by Paddy's decree ( "Acoustic shows are fun," says Steve, "because they allow us to showcase a different side of our band"), Lockhart and Treelines are less gritty and more green than blue-collar. Instead of a sensibility rooted in a microcosm, their folk-pop-rock speaks to a more national state of mind.                Photos: Russ Gordon

Matt Kelly at the pedal steel.

While Christine McAvoy films...

The Mountains & The Trees (left) and
Matt Lockhart create an on-the-spot
video for a song Janes wrote less than
24 hours before.

Lessons in Geography

When we started this blog last year, the Windsor/Detroit area's three main venues for Canadian indie bands were booking so many shows neither our schedules or budget could keep up with them all.

What a difference a year makes. Of those three venues, only Windsor's Phog Lounge is still consistently showcasing Canadian indie music. Because our passion for this music knows no boundaries, we're enlarging the blog's boundaries. We've already been listing shows at the Ark in Ann Arbor; we'll be adding Sarnia (just over an hour's drive from Detroit) and some significant festivals coming up this summer in London (ON) and Toronto, focusing on bands either from Windsor or who have come through the Windsor/Detroit area. Of course we'll continue to seek out new worlds and boldly go-- oh wait, that's been used. We'll continue to find Canadian indie in Windsor/Detroit and work to bring bands to the area.

There are many stories of Sarnia. The first are about to be told.

As you drive through the mountains and the trees, across the prairies and over the bridge you will see it.  There, just past the treelines, it's the magical place known as...
Sarnia.

Thursday, March 10  @ Paddy Flaherty's, Sarnia, ON

Vancouver, BC's Treelines and Cornerbrook, NL's The Mountains and The Trees bring an exquisite collaboration of local yokel folk-pop and an acoustic version of ballads, rockers and anthems that can only be described as Canadian indie music at its very best.








Treelines with Indiana Avent - Giants of the Forest - Episode Three from Amazing Factory Productions Inc. on Vimeo.

The Mountains And The Trees video was filmed, produced and directed by Martin Cathrae.
Here's his link.  You may also listen to The Moe and Martin Show here.