By Dustin Danyluk
The Pyramid Cabaret was sparsely populated when Hildur Guðnadóttir, cellist and vocalist of Mùm, took the stage alone with her cello and laptop. Her freeform, ambient cello-based music reflected both her classical musical training (an experimental consciousness that seems to be common within Icelandic music circles). Guðnadóttir’s set was reminiscent of performances given by fellow Icelandic experimental musicians Leanne Zacharias, Borgar Magnason and Kippi Kaninus this past May at the St. Boniface Museum for the bargain price of $5. Guðnadóttir’s music differed in that while that performance was meditative, dissonant and droning, Guðnadóttir chose to insert very melodic and shifting passages, which were later given more breadth by the accompaniment of fellow Múm members Eiríkur Orri Olafsson on synths and trumpet and Gunnar Örn Tynes on bass. Typically for the Pyramid, the crowd was backed far away the stage, but you could still feel the swells in dynamic and the intent that had been put into writing and playing the music. The modest crowd showed all the appreciation their limited numbers could convey.
Fortunately, by the time the quirky indie folk singer Sindri Már Sigfússon and his latest project, Sin Fang Bous, took stage, the crowd had grown to a less-embarrassing size. The brand of eclectic folk pop he and his band unleashed was a delight to experience from one song to the next. Sigfússon’s live vocals were much more rough and energetic than the mellow and smooth delivery on his albums, and hints of ambient textures and novel rhythms kept the crowd on their toes. And though the band were just backing him up, you could tell there was enough groove and texture in the songs for them to really grab hold and have fun with.
By time the headliner Múm took stage, the Pyramid had mercifully filled up enough to balance out the unsightly bare spots in front of the stage. Múm’s energy and instrumentation was hard to resist (regardless of whether you prefer Kristín Anna Valtýsdóttir-era Múm or their more recent poppier, folkier sound). Most the songs they played were off of their most recent two albums, Go Go Smear the Poison Ivy and Sing Along to Songs You Don’t Know. Fans of the bands earlier output might have found their new vocal approach a little underdeveloped, but the band as a whole more than compensated for that. Múm’s live instrumentation sounded fantastic. Their drums triggered glitched creaks as well as producing traditional acoustics, adding a dynamic to their electronic sections that just can’t be programmed into a loop. Múm’s energy peaked when they returned for an encore with a track from the acclaimed Finally We Are No One.
Being Gate Night, there was something of a weird atmosphere in the room. While the band played, a man in the front row fainted and fell straight backwards to the floor and, for a second, the shadow of his head cast onto the floor looked like a pool of blood. (Only for a second though.)
>>>www.myspace.com/sinfangbous
PHOTOS BY SAMANTA KATZ
Like some kind of ZZ Top fundamentalist doppelganger, 
There aren’t a lot of bands who can hop from playing a gig in the dingy nonchalance of the Times Change(d) to a children’s festival, or from a wedding reception to a university restaurant. But local band the F-Holes, who have a versatile sound that could be called jazz or blues as much as it could be country or swing, are doing just that. 
From the ashes of Alberta punk act Bogart comes a deadly duo of potent garage rock and country soul. The combination of Miesha Louie’s fearsome guitar work and earnest, heartbreaking cries, combined with the hammering drums of Justin Landstorfer, is something of a Canadian rock ’n’ roll revelation. Tackling issues of personal loss, love and lust, they bring a level honesty that lends itself to the ferocity of their approach. Their live garage-rock confessions have already garnered quite the following their hometown of Calgary. Now the duo is hitting the top 20 on the Canadian college charts and receiving positive reviews for their first ful-length, MMMade for Me, just released on Winnipeg label Transistor 66. Stylus caught up with Miesha Louie before their Albert gig at the halfway point of their lengthy coast-to-coast tour. 
Canadian consciousness. Yes, there have been the rowdy shows at the now-closed Collective Cabaret, and equally rowdy shows at the Royal Albert, with lead singer Becky Ninkovic making everyone twist and clap and yell “Cold Hands! Hot Bodies!” But Canadian bands, even inciting ones, do come and go. YSP!’s legend has so much more attitude than that.
When Braxton isn’t completely rewriting the math-rock playbook in Battles, he’s busy composing music for an orchestra and, well, playing with himself. As a solo artist, Braxton creates music using live loops. Handling all the instrumentation and vocal duties, Braxton’s solo work is at once complex, colorful and experimental. Central Market sees Braxton move away from a strictly loop-based, 100 percent Braxton-performed outing, to seven tracks composed for New York City’s Wordless City Orchestra. The combination of Braxton’s electronic tendencies and the acoustic element of the Orchestra makes for a record that is multi-dimensional and varied yet sonically cohesive. The first few tracks are purely cinematic—if the film imagined is a twisted, Technicolor children’s cartoon that takes place on the rings of Saturn. Strings swoop and swirl amidst marching, syncopated percussion, constantly shifting melodic motifs, jagged loops and Braxton’s trademark, pitch-shifted “munchkin” vocals. It sounds bizarre, and it is. Yet despite the seemingly chaotic shards of instrumentation within this album, Central Market is an impossibly interesting, engaging and enjoyable listen. (Warp Records, 
Combining country twang, garage fuzz, and rockabilly squeak, Bloodshot Bill manages to make vintage sound new in Git High Tonite! Montreal’s answer to Hasil Adkins, the one-man band sensation returns with 12 greasy, rockin’ numbers guaranteed to get you moving. Combining crazy barely audible Trashmen-esque voicework, jingly-jangly guitars, and raw classic rockabilly instrumentation, Bloodshot has perfected a sound very few can match. Standout tracks include “Leave Me Alone,” “Outta the Rain” and a great Steve Alaimo cover “She’s My Baby.” The album closes out with a devastating rockabilly ballad “Oh Honey Doll Baby Doll” and a fantastic acoustic bonus track. (Transistor 66,