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The
Summerlad |
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THE
SUMMERLAD Yes, the line-up has been the same since our formation in 1999. Sometimes we use the names our mother gave us (Arran [Fisher] and Garrett [P7]). We live in Calgary and try to practice three times a week. Calgary is a nice city with enthusiastic rock fans, which we like. One thing we do not like about living in Calgary is that it takes about 45 hours of driving to get to Toronto, which we find to be a little tiring. The music industry seems to encourage your disdain. This is probably a good thing. What do you have to say about it now? Is there such a thing as a necessary evil? Evil is never necessary. Profiteering off artists is probably evil, but that does not exclude mutually-beneficial business relationships, a division of the labour so the artists can do the art and the business folk can make the phone calls. Unfortunately for us, we still spend a lot of time making the calls. In your music, I detect Fugazi-by-way-of-The Constantines. The end of "Monoculture" (from your debut Distance Will Be Swept Up CD) is lifted directly from Bossanova-era Pixies. (i.e. "The Happening"). The last song(s) on your CD, the epic "Foot And Mouth" Ñ especially when it turns seamlessly into the instrumental "In Dritten Marsk" Ñ sounds like every song Mogwai has ever written... These comparisons seem too blatant not to bring up. Address these accusations! You mention all the bands that we loathe. Just kidding. Actually, the accusations are valid, but you forgot to mention that the drum beat from "Foot and Mouth" is lifted directly from Talk Talk, or that the "HEY!" yelled in "Comet Premium" is obviously a nod to The Great Muppet Caper. It is true these are not supremely original musical ideas, but I doubt there exist such things. For instance, you could take any of your examples and analyse them to see where they got their influences. Really, it is about finding a voice that fits you, and for a band starting out, it is unusual and difficult for that voice to be distinct right from the start. A lot of bands go through this phase by learning covers or by writing songs that might as well be covers (see current fad bands). That album represents our first forays into writing songs together, and we are still feeling out the potential of our songwriting. Our identity is constantly shaping itself and becoming more recognizable as being just The Summerlad. We are more concerned with being interesting than with being unique, because uniqueness in any art is myth. Creating something that is unfamiliar to the listener is one way of many to make the listening experience interesting. What have you been doing since the debut CD? By the time you play Wavelength, you will be in the midst of a comprehensive tour. What's going on? Is a follow-up CD in the works? This is our fifth tour since the release of Distance Will Be Swept Up, and our second visit to Central Canada. Our time at home has been spent writing new material in preparation for our next recording, which will likely begin this fall. The money that we could have spent to go in the studio this summer was used to put a new engine in our van, since we thought there was not much point in having a shiny new recording but not to be able to promote it. Early Primrods material was compiled and released on a recent CD. What do you have to say about this? Is the Summerlad tired of mentions of the Primrods? P7 [the seventh Primrod]: what are your feelings regarding this? P7 is currently asleep but he would say this: On one hand, we are getting a bit tired of the Primrods references because there is a lot of difference between them and The Summerlad, so there is really not much to say. On the other hand, more people outside of Alberta still know about the Primrods than those that know The Summerlad, so at least it is a way for them to access our music and develop an interest, which is good. The recent Primrods reissue is a great CD, but all the material is from before P7 joined the group, so it is a half-sibling kind of connection we have to that. As long as the Primrods are a known band, there is no harm in stating the connection to us, just as long as people realize that the other two-thirds of The Summerlad were in other earlier bands that were not so well known, but that also influence our current sound. Seriously, what is the title "In Dritten Marsk" a reference to? The truth of that one is much less interesting than the answer you came up with the last time we were asked. Many of Garrett's lyrics have literal meaning only to himself and it really is a matter of subjective interpretation for everyone else. Dritten Marsk is a mis-remembering of the name of some place in Europe. There is really nothing to figure out here, it is just a name, the same way a novelist might give a name to a character in a book. Ñ
Interview by Paddy O'Donnell
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CUFF
THE DUKE
Three Gut Records' braintrust Tyler Clark Burke and Lisa Moran, with much coaxing, successfully quizzed their newest signees, party band Cuff The Duke: If you had to fight another band on Three Gut (you are, after all, from Oshawa), which band would it be? Provided you won, how would you torture them? Did we really just ask that? Wow, fighting: now we're in! Pain is the new "stock ale" of Cuff The Duke. Open your minds to the blood-fest that would be the Duke vs. Jim Guthrie, or even the pesky mishap we call the Duke vs. Royal City. No, for a fight to remember, we'd have to fight a band at least from Wawa, or maybe even Lindsay, one of those "no-tooth bands." Three Gutters aside, we may have to go as far as Meaford to find a band to grapple and hate enough to torture. Tell us an embarrassing story. Embarrassment? NO DISASSEMBLE! Which celebrities do you most resemble? Wayne: The A-Team.
Do you get nauseated every time you hear the Three Gutters say "community-this" and "community-that"? "Community of Oshawa"=oxymoron. This "community" is a whole new bag of potatoes. Why does Jeff call Tyler "Sunshine" and Lisa "Dakota"? Dakota? Hrmmmm, it's actually Toledo... and Sunshine, the story is so sappy that I won't dare tell it. So the story of Toledo... Jeff wanted to call Lisa "Knuckles," but "THE BAND" told Jeff to "cool off" for a little while. Rumour has it you will be playing a square dance with The Silver Hearts in some barn in S-W Ontario this fall. The real question: can Cuff The Duke dance?? I mean it's a bitch, but we can't stop watching Paul "Bass Dance" Lowman float across the stage... such a nimble step. What do you want the world to know about Oshawa, Ontario, Canada? It can be the greatest and worst place in the whole world all at once. I guess it's home... I'll never forget anything that Oshawa taught us. It was a mean, dirty place. Shit never smelled as sweet. We love Oshawa. What propels y'all to march throughout clubs, saloons and bar-rooms chanting and singing? Is this an every show occurrence or do particular factors need to be in play? Do tell. It isn't every show. It has often enough backfired hideously, and hatefully, in our young unruffled faces. Peoples' parents and relatives have often enough seen bare Duke chest, and sticky-sticky smelly-smelly beer-soaked stage participants. Some of our dads can understand; others' fathers just can't. It's okay -- it's a way to get the heebie-geebies out, sucka! Country is the new loud. Discuss. I mean, it's hard to talk about country; it's too much. Everything is soooo country these days......Sooooo country...... Aaaaaaaaalt-country....It's all just good songs, or shit; most of it's shit and doesn't deserve any piece of -- Shut up, Jeff! |
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THE
WEIGH DOWN The Weigh Down is a post-rockin' young quartet based in New York City and Connecticut. They have a new record out called Good People In The Making. Jonny Dovercourt finds out what it's all about. Rumour has it The Weigh Down was accidentally conceived in a moving vehicle. Would you care to explain these sensational circumstances in more lurid detail? We really don't like to kiss and tell, but let's just say it was magical, like a summer night in Guam. On your website (which is quiet attractive, by the way), you have posted some member biographies which own up to childhoods consisting of "uncool" influences like D&D, Rush and the theme music of rightfully obscure Ô80s movies like Iceman. Some would argue that this sort of "full disclosure" takes some of the mystery out of being in a band. What would you say to that? Oh, those. Yeah, those were all fakes. You see, we had just received the newest edition of the "Do's and Don't's of Cool" handbook and constructed the perfect ironic biography for each one of our personalities. You know, it's just like one of those wretched nights in ÔNam when Charlie's all over your six, the fire's flying, the trench you're in just isn't deep enough for all the men in your platoon, and the only man not to make it in time is your buddy Charlie. Also, Trevor plays the 7-string guitar, which others might argue is an utterly indefensible affront to good taste, especially in the Fender/Gibson/Rickenbacker-centric, anti-session-guy world of indie-rawk. What value does the extra string hold for Trevor, and what role does it have in The Weigh Down's music as a whole? Well, the best way to answer this question is by using a math equation. If six strings equals 100%, then adding a seventh string equals 116.66%. So, if another band is gauged at 73% and we're gauged at 81.6%, then we are really playing at 65.5%. So, that additional 18.1% is really an illusion. Unless, of course, we're up against KoRn, in which case 27.1% is automatically subtracted due to the intimidation factor. Seriously, Trevor is a curious fellow and enjoys the possibilities that the seventh string brings to the music. On our newer songs, Trevor enjoys the possibilities of a six-string Gibson ES. Your song titles ("Finally Quit the Big Time," "Goodbye Panaphobia"), as well as your band name, indicate a theme of loss and perhaps a sense of satisfaction in failure. In what sense is this an accurate reflection of your individual lives? And by the way, I can't find "panaphobia" in any dictionary Ñ care to define it for us? Well, we'll start by saying the definition of panaphobia is the fear of everything and basically embodies what Good People In The Making is all about lyrically. Our band name and song titles reflect the fear that leads to failure. It's not that we're satisfied with failure, we just know it needs to be dealt with. If you could take the middle slot in a dream three-band bill, with any two bands you wanted, from the past, present or future, who would they be and who would go first and last? First on the bill would be John Lennon and Neil Young as a duet playing songs off Lennon's Plastic Ono Band and Young's After The Gold Rush. It would be so heartbreaking we would all explode with sadness. Then after us would be the almighty Led Zeppelin. It would be so exciting that all of our pieces would come back together. |
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FROM
FICTION
ADHEM |
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HEIMLICH Heimlich's brand of rock espouses a kind of enthusiasm we just don't see enough of these days. The Creeping Nobodies had the daunting task of sharing the stage with these upstarts twice on our recent tour. They left their mark on us, to be sure. We hope they give you a welting/whalloping of your own. Who are you? Where are you from? We are the rock'n'roll band Heimlich, from Moncton N.B. What was it that first made each of you want to play in a band? John: I always wanted
to play live shows, but mostly to express myself. Do you think growing up in Moncton has influenced how and why you make music? Matt: Growing up in Moncton was, and still is, a big influence on me making music because I grew up on mostly local music only. Give us Heimlich's recipe for a band/song. John: For the last album, most of them were written on acoustic guitar, and then I brought them to the boys. You're on a short tour now; where have you been so far? Any tour shenanigans you'd like to share with us? Ya, Matt Heimlich got really drunk one night at an after-hours and started humping the kitchen stove. It ended up tipping on him, so the (Peter) Parker boys had to lift it off of him. Soon after meeting you boys, it became clear that you are rather exuberant in your, ahem, "partying". Please rate the following items from 1-5 (1 being lame-o, 5 being rockin'). Give explanations where you feel the urge: Caffeine pills Ñ 1
interview by Chuck Skullz & Julia Muth |
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CELESTINO
Celestino in August has become a Wavelength tradition for three years running. Can you tell us what you've been up since your last WL appearance, on Aug. 5, 2001? Celestino has actually been in hibernation for a little while. Earlier this year, we had a few really nice shows with White Star Line, but lately we've all been really busy -- Yvan with school, Craig with smallsingles and his ever-growing collection of bands, and myself with The Creeping Nobodies. We hear Yvan will be away and someone else will be filling his spot on the drum stool. What's architect-boy up to, and who's the lucky replacement? Yes, our lucky little friend is in France for the summer, apprenticing as an architect. For this show, we are happy to have Dean Wales filling his shoes. Any word on that sponsorship from the Celestino shoe store on College? It's funny, a couple of people have said, "Hey, do you know that there is a Celestino shoe store on College?" Yep, I know. I chose the name Ôcuz I really like the font on the sign. If you could take the middle slot on the dream bill of your choice, who would the other two bands be and in what order would they play? Do I have the power to bring broken-up bands back to life? If so, Bedhead and Rex. I would be more than honoured to open and it really wouldn't matter in what order they played. If not, Smog and Freakwater (Hmm... maybe that would be my choice anyway). Again, happy to open and they can duke it out for the headlinin' spot. Celestino remains the only band for which Craig hasn't fled the stage during the set. Again, how do you do it? I have yet to comprehend the mysteries of Craig Fraid. Does working for a scholarly book company give you song ideas all day long? Yeah, I have a great new song called "Joycean Temporalities", and I've been working on another one called "Northern Naval Superiority and the Economies of the American Civil War"...Actually, that sounds like it could be a Currently In These United States song. Who's the sassiest? In the band? In the world? I used to love Sassy magazine, and always wanted to be "the sassiest girl in America." What was the craziest thing that happened on your tour as a member of The Creeping Nobodies? I had to promise never to speak of the "craziest" things ever again. I still think it's hilarious, but Marco and Eric have been scarred for life. (I can just see them shaking their heads while reading this.) Where will Wavelength be three Augusts from now? More importantly, where will World Youth Day be in three years? Those kids are SCARY--marching around in their Nazi-esque sash/backpack uniforms acting like they own the place, singing their God-cheers at 8-freakin'-30 in the morning. Why have we let these little fascists-in-training take over our city? And when will it end? Ñ Julia Muth interviewed
by Jonny Dovercourt |
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SAINT
DIRT ELEMENTARY SCHOOL What do you do when faced with a particularly stubborn stain? Seek refuge in a bath house. What do you do when faced with a particularly prurient proposition? Accept. What does "prurient" mean? What do you do when faced with a particularly bad case of soil erosion? Make a mental note to call my local MP. What do you do when faced with a particularly hot piece of gossip? Why, what have you heard that I'd do? What do you do when faced with a particularly outspoken rap artist whose aliases include Big Baby Jesus, Osiris, and Ason Unique? Would that be the Osiris/Big Baby Jesus/Ason Unique from the East side, or the Osiris/Big Baby Jesus/Ason Unique from the West side? [Guitarist Myk Freedman (he of the guitar without tuning pegs and dry sarcasm without an "off" switch) has been most recently known for his leadership of the charmingly neurotically youthful jazz woodshedding ensemble Quartet Quartet. The past few months, however, have seen Myk all but dissolve that group, only to resurface as bandleader of the similarly absurdly-titled Saint Dirt Elementary School, which just so happens to include two (two-two?) Quartet Quartet alumni in attendance. Fraid evidently simultaneously managed to get both a lot of Ôdirt' and no dirt whatsoever on the matter. Figures.]
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MACH
TIVER
Mach Tiver is a bass-and-drums screamy hardcore ("screamo"?) brother-and-sister duo from Trenton, Ontario, consisting of Adam Goodwin on bass and vocals and Shannon Goodwin on drums and vocals. Their Aug. 25 Wavelength sees them coming home from a cross-Canada tour. Buddy of the Pines sent the questions, as answered in sweltering heat with roadie extraordinaire Kyle Kline, and doing almost nothing to dispel the stereotype of hardcore kids as completely humourless. What raises your standards? Trying to respond to an interview of such a low calibre as this one makes me wish that there were general standards which all interviews must meet. What raises your temperature? It is the end of July, it is 35 degrees, and my brain is fried from trying to come up with witty responses to these "witty" questions. What raises your dander? There are times in my life when I find it hard to make the time to clean myself in a proper fashion. These are the moments of life in which my dander is definitely raised. What raises your overhead? It cost me a good amount of money to buy this computer, and it costs me in the area of $40 a month to be able to connect to the internet. Taking these costs into consideration, do they count as overhead which facilitates the process of responding to these inanities? What raises your arms? Listening to certain bands that rock, most notably The Creature Ñ totally awesome dudes Ñ and occasionally Judas Priest. What raises your eyebrows? Well, my eyebrows definitely raised in disbelief upon reading, for the first time, the questions we were given for this interview. What raises your ante? Well, my great ante passed away years ago, so I suppose it would take quite a lot to raise her. What exactly it would take a lot of, I'm not quite sure. |
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DALE
MORNINGSTAR
Wavelength and No Beat Radio put together an extensive budget to send me to an exotic locale in order to interview Mr. Dale Morningstar. After being greeted by Mr. Morningstar and his sidekick, CJ the Cat, we opted for an interview with a view. The following is an excerpt from an interview to be aired on No Beat Radio August 19 [10pm-12am, CIUT 89.5FM, www.ciut.fm] in advance of Dale's homecoming show at Wavelength on August 25. Are you a storm watcher? This area is such a buffer zone for the city. Sometimes storms just come across this lake, which is thirty miles wide to the other side, so you can imagine the velocityÉ the power of the clouds and the storms that come here Ð it's beautiful. I keep thinking it would be fun to live on the island! If you like the elements and having epiphanies, the island is for you. It's always changing. You come here and it's not just the grey of a city, which a lot of it is, shadows and grey, right? So I'm never boredÉ You don't strike me as the kind of person that gets bored that easily. I just figure you've only got X amount of time for this go-around. I don't have nine lives, like CJ The Cat, so the worst thing I think one could be is kinda boredÉ When you're on your deathbed you'll look back and say "FUCK, I was BORED??!! MAN! Oh, what a fool I was to be bored!" I know this probably sounds like a really pretentious question, but have you read any Carlos Castaneda? When I was in grade 12 or 13 we had to write some English essay, and Rolling Stone magazine (in the days when it was hip and cool) had a short story by Carlos. The night before I was supposed to hand in that short story I basically copied it word for word and handed it in! I got an A minus, and the teacher Ñ her name was Miss Moist Ñ M-O-I-S-T Ñ she would circle different paragraphs or phrases and say "this could be better" or whatever, but I got an A minus! A couple of doper high school friends of mine were always up on him, but I'm more into Thoreau. Henry David Thoreau Ñ he didn't really believe in the work ethic of slavin' every day so you could have maybe one day off, or be able to buy a bag of potatoes. You seem to constantly surprise yourself and your audience with your music. It seems like there's a lot of joy and excitement in playing music for you. What do you suppose has kept it that way for you? Looking at the mistakes and ways that elder musicians just didn't retain that spirit that they had, and why BOTHER if you don't have that? I mean, why play music? I don't pick up the guitar or whatever unless I'm inspired, right? So does that mean you might sometimes go for a couple of weeks without picking up the guitar? Oh, yeah! And go on a trip somewhere? For sure! But I know I'm going on tour in a couple days and I'm geared upÉ I've read Bruce Springsteen interviews, and such, where he comes out sayin' he doesn't know how many more times he's ever gonna be on stage again, so he damned well better put out what he's got Ôcuz he doesn't know if he's gonna be on stage tomorrow, the next night, whateverÉ I've had a few bummer gigs in my day Ñ there's nothing worse than that! You just feel like shit and you feel like you've squandered an opportunity, Ôcuz not everyone can get on a rock'n'roll stage and play music, right? It's greatÉ It's a gift, right? That's such a good point. Last time I had a shit gig and just DIDN'T enjoy myself, I let the band down and I knew it, but I WASN'T havin' fun. I just said "FUCK! That's not gonna happen again! Never!" You seem to have this uncanny ability to integrate whatever's going on around you, like a heckler in the audienceÉ (Laughs) Yeah! Bring Ôem on! ÉOr trumpets in another room... Well, yeah, it's like it adds something to the mix, whether it's someone heckling, or someone droppin' a beer, or, y'know, breakin' up with their girlfriend and cryin' or something at the front table during the show. It's like if you're drivin a car, right? Someone runs out in front of you, well, you don't just keep on going, right? Hopefully, you step on the brakes. You react to it. That's a really good analogy. [A final note on musical education] The problem in school or with young people is, when they start playing an instrument or singing, the worst thing is for people to say: "Oh! You're terrible!" or to laugh at them. Think of how many people have been just devastated by that. Or, "You don't have a sense of rhythm". And so they become very aware of that and they don't experiment. They just zip their mouths shut and don't sing anymore for the rest of their lives. My mother always used to say (you know, I was 15 or something) "ÉYour brother, he's a real musician, he's a natural musicianÉ You'reÉ Y'know, you're tryin'É You're tryin'." And I was always like: "But you don't understandÉ It's PUNK ROCK! ANYONE can do this! It's just like ÐÐ it's energy!" And she didn't grasp that. But it stuck in my mind that she would say that. Well, I think that's the way it works for people, sometimes. They need to be pushed into that corner and come out fighting, y'know, "This is my way of doing it"... Yeah, they're gonna come out fighting and say "FUCK YOU! I've got an idea and I'm gonna stick with it! I'm gonna work it out!" Or else they'll think, "Ah, yeah, you're right", and stay in that cornerÉ And that's a sad thing, Ôcause, yeah, they don't need to be in that corner! Ñ interview by Gidget Adams, transcription by Lucky Staghorn |
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August 4 DJ Moutray MC Tyler Clark Burke
August 11 DJ Weasel MC Crazylegs August 18 DJ Lo End MC Dee August 25 MC Savage
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