If you hadn’t noticed, we at Stylus like to get out, go to shows, and sometimes even take pics for you wonderful readers.
Now that the year is done, as is the tradition, a handful of our writers picked their favourites, and some even wrote about their very favourites. This is our way to let you know what’s been hip in the indie world, big arena world, and which holes-in-the-walls we’re frequenting, but this is all subjective of course and you’re always more than welcome to volunteer for Stylus yourself.
Stay tuned tomorrow for everybody’s top albums!
The Magnificent 7s – Making Friends and Getting Mean across the Continent
illustration: Natalie Baird
By Sheldon Birnie
By Sheldon Birnie
Winnipeg’s Magnificent 7s are a hard traveling, hard rocking bluegrass band. Preparing to release their sophomore album for local imprint Transistor 66, Matt Magura and Andy Bart recently sat down with Stylus to chat about All Kinds of Mean over a couple pitchers of Two Rivers. Continue reading “The Magnificent 7s – Making Friends and Getting Mean across the Continent”
BIG FUN FESTIVAL
photo: Silas Chipelski
By Kaeleigh Ayre
By Kaeleigh Ayre
Winnipeg music fans will be able to shake, rock and roll off the snow this January with the inaugural Big Fun Music Festival. Continue reading “BIG FUN FESTIVAL”
Austra + Young Galaxy + Tasseomancy // 11-24-11 // LIVE @ WECC
Photo by Andrew Mazurak at the WECC in Winnipeg.
By Andrew Mazurak
Toronto’s Austra came to town in late November expecting colder weather than that which welcomed them. Despite our less than wintery wonderland of a city being unseasonably warm, the WECC warmed up damn quick as the sold out crowd danced their asses off for opener Young Galaxy who just came through town a few months earlier with Junior Boys:
Continue reading “Austra + Young Galaxy + Tasseomancy // 11-24-11 // LIVE @ WECC”
Hillbilly Highway – Prairie Roots Revue rolls into Winnipeg
by Sheldon Birnie
On Monday, December 12, four prairie songwriters will descend on the Park Theatre to pick some tunes for all of y’all. The Prairie Roots Revue is cruising the Highway from Saskatoon to Winnipeg, then back across Saskatchewan, hitting smaller towns like Dauphin, Gravelbourg, and Swift Current along side larger centers like the ‘Peg. Continue reading “Hillbilly Highway – Prairie Roots Revue rolls into Winnipeg”
Krafty Kuts // 11-25-11 // Wheelies
By DJ Stone
Instead of blasting music at my house last Friday night I decided to go to Totally AWESOME! BASS!! featuring Krafty Kuts. It was on Friday, November 25th at Wheelies Roller Park. I was kind of amazed that we got a big-time DJ/producer on a Friday night in Winnipeg.
It was the same crew that brought Dieselboy for the epic Zombie Apocalypse, Jsquared Entertainment and DV8 Audio/Visual. It ran from 9-6am and was a 16+ event. It was nice to finally go to a party where you don’t have to go home at 2 a.m. because the bar was closing.
A little background on Krafty Kuts; like most killer DJs, he is from the UK and has been spinning since the late ’80s. He also has his own record label Finger Licken’ Funk, was voted by DJ Magazine as one of the top 100 DJs in the world and voted #1 breaks DJ in the world! When I arrived Coda & Pucona (Pantohms Sound System) where playing some old-skool speed garage, with some nice rolling bass lines that brought me back to old days. There were lots of people dancing on the dark fogged up dance floor, where people had their glow sticks and hula hoops and fun fur pants, lol.
Next up to the decks were The Funk Hunters, based out Vancouver, BC, who mashed up funky disco, drum n bass and pretty much everything in between. They were very energetic and got the crowd moving.
Around 2 a.m. Krafty Kuts went on. He started off with some heavier drum and bass. He seamlessly mixed in some Red Hot Chili Peppers, and my personal favorite was the DnB mix of Wu Tang Clan’s “Bring da Ruckus,” which was just deadly. He even did a House of Pain remix, and a remix of Flux Pavilion’s “Bass Cannon,” which I thought was going to blow up the speakers. Oh yeah and did I mention he was mixing on four decks (yes, I said FOUR) the whole time? To top it all off, Mr. Krafty Kuts played us a new unreleased, never-before-heard dubstep track, which was pretty sick.
Overall, a pretty good show, I give it 7 out 10 dubs. I think the sound could have been better if it was at a smaller venue and it would have been nice if there was a licensed area for the 18+ crowd. The next time Krafty Kuts comes back I recommend going to see him, amazing scratch artist.
Breath Grenades – 25 years of Blowing Minds and Bewildering Audiences
By Kent Davies
I wanna play this song but the radio just won’t play,
We’re going to play it now. Hell… we’re not gonna go away.
– Breath Grenades song “Blasting Pad” from CBC radio’s Brave New Waves in 1996.
No one sounds like the Breath Grenades. No one acts like the Breath Grenades. These legendary space rawkers are so far gone from anything resembling a conventional band that they often defy logic. Beginning with their uniquely destructive bass-snyth sound, they do things their own way. In their decades of playing they have only released one rare album. They don’t play out very often, having a sincere hatred for most venues. Few bands stay together for more than a few years let alone a band that has had staple members pass away. But despite the hardships this groundbreaking punk act has managed to stay a band for more than 25 years. Now with the inclusion of drummer/sound/visual arts genius Richard Altman a.k.a. Vinegar Rich, the Grenades: Don Bailey a.k.a. Vom Doom and Al Conroy (Not Half) a.k.a. Vortexo are coming out from the basement to play shows again. On the eve of the first Breath Grenades show of 2011, Vom and Vinegar gave Stylus a history lesson of the Breath Grenades past, present and future. Continue reading “Breath Grenades – 25 years of Blowing Minds and Bewildering Audiences”
James Struthers + Tyler del Pino // 11-25-11 // Winnipeg Free Press News Cafe
by Megan Carlson
Local Winnipeg artist James Struthers (left) played the Winnipeg Free Press Cafe this Friday November 25, 2011 with opening act Tyler Del Pino (right). The packed cafe enjoyed the upbeat pop styles of these singer-song writers and listened attentively as James played a “dead” Ukulele unplugged standing on top of a chair. Both artists can be found playing all over Winnipeg unplugged and rocking out with a band. James next show is at the Park Theater on December 19th for the Third Annual Acoustic Christmas and Tyler will be rocking out with his band next Friday December 2nd at the Kingshead.
Hillbilly Highway – Let’R Buck with the Poor Choices tonight
by Sheldon Birnie
If you’re looking for a good time on a Wednesday night in Winnipeg, book your ass down to the Standard Tavern on Sherbrook. Continue reading “Hillbilly Highway – Let’R Buck with the Poor Choices tonight”
Tasseomancy – More than Just Music
By Jesse Blackman
Question: What do you get when you creatively combine the linguistic genius of one sister with the visual genius of another sister? Answer: a musical experience unlike any other.
Tasseomancy refers to the Lightmans’ great-great-grandmother who was a Russian Jew who lost her entire family in pogroms and fled to Canada; to help make ends meet during the Great Depression, she read tea leaves. Tasseomancy is a fancy name for that gift. Romy relates this to seven generations of mysticism in both First Nations and Jewish traditions–these ideas mirror the belief that “your actions will affect seven generations ahead” and “with every accomplishment you are looking back seven generations in order to” understand “the sacrifices” that were made. The sisters are “fans of tea and also anything else that can kind of bring people together… It’s less about stuff weighted by fate, and more so about maybe being honest with yourself in a certain situation–what would you see?”
Tasseomancy, the band, was born out of the desire of sisters Romy and Sari Lightman’s to expand the range of sound they could produce. “There’s like always threads,” Romy explained. “It’s a continuation of where we started with Ghost Bees,” but the sisters realized that when they only “play an acoustic guitar and a mandolin there is only so much tonality – and you can only be so dynamic. That music was really contained.”
Ghost Bees came out of the sisters’ time living out in Nova Scotia but when they moved home to the urban environment of Toronto the writing of folk songs felt “insincere.” Romy couldn’t “write songs on [her] guitar by the ocean anymore, living in downtown Toronto.” Before adding amplification, Ghost Bees could play anywhere, even on “lakes and haunted basements.” Romy feels that they cannot play in as many places anymore “because they aren’t as mobile now. Before we had a real nomadic spirit of like picking up an instrument and playing acoustic with no microphones, and like the sky’s the limit.” Continue reading “Tasseomancy – More than Just Music”