BDK Update

So I just got back from a two-week tour (hence the no posting) and I'm still getting settled so give me a few more days to get some stuff up. In the meantime, we filmed a bunch of stuff on the road and you can check it out while I sort myself out.

First off we filmed a spoof episode of MTV Cribs in Waterloo.

And here are a series of short blogs from our trip.

There that should keep you occupied for a while.

Malajube - Trompe l'oeil

When I was in Notre Dame-du Lac, Quebec with a broken down van and a group of frustrated people, I purchased a number of Quebec exclusive "big beers" and along with my band mates proceeded to drink until I didn't care about our predicament anymore. What followed was a night of billiards, poutine, and at some point, my first actual exposure to the television channel Musique Plus (I may have watched it once, briefly, while on a high school trip to Quebec City, but I was probably too busy looking at french girls' bums to pay attention). At one point, when the seven of us were crammed in our hotel room, this video came on :

It was nice and unexpected to see a video that not only in itself was visually interesting, but the song was extremely well written, catchy and poppy with enough noise and odd parts to catch the ear of anyone who was looking for more. I guess I was just used to the onslaught of garbage transmitted by Musique Plus' english counterpart. We have long stopped being able to get anything decent broadcast into our living rooms during the regular hours of the night. We promptly bough their album while in Montreal and listened to it approximately thirteen times before we arrived back to Halifax.

What Malajube proved with the success of this album is that great songs will always transcend language barriers as long as everything else is done properly. To be honest, I never used to put much stock into French music (and I'm French), but this album instantly struck a chord with me, the intention of the songs comes across even if you don't understand what he is saying. Growing up I had heard a lot of french music, but it was all mostly about girls and fishing. I had never really been exposed to much coming out of Quebec and France other than Celine Dion and Daft Punk, and really, for a French record to have much chance of success internationally is fairly slim, both Celine and Daft Punk sing in english. Thankfully, people are starting to acually listen to music now, and bands like Sigur Ros and Laakso are doing fairly well all over the world.

The drums on this album can only be described as fat. They sound thick and precise with a very room-y and huge presence, like a Flaming Lips record. Francis Mineau does a great job of playing off melodies and vocal lines but keeping everything rooted with the bass. He plays with a real sense of urgency and power, it feels like he's hitting really hard even in the quiet parts. Songs like Pate Filo and Montreal -40 keep a nice steady rock beat with lots of huge cymbals and some rave ups, while songs like La Crabe and Fille a Plume have loud and deep tom rolls and lots of strict timekeeping.

If I had any money at all to bring a band to the East Coast, it would definitely be these guys. It would give me a chance to just sit on the side of the stage and watch Francis play*. I could also get them to bring me some big beers and some poutine on their way.

*I once had the chance to see Malajube in Hyacinthe, Quebec, while on my way home from a tour. I had even contacted them, told them I was on the road and really wanted to see them but I had no money and they put all of us on the guest list, along with their cell phone number in case anything went wrong, which was super cool. Alas the day came and we were so exhausted from the previous two weeks that we drove straight home to our beds. It was definitely the right thing to do, but I haven't had the chance to see them live since, and every time I think about it, I piss myself off.

BDK Interview - Brad Weber

Brad Weber is fast becoming one of Canada's most inventive and talented drummers. Most often he is on the road playing with Dan Snaith's Polaris-prize winning project Caribou (whom I previously wrote about here). Any down time is put towards his current multi percussion juggernaut Pick a Piper (whom I also wrote about, here). PaP recently completed an eastern Canadian tour before Weber shipped off to the UK to begin rehearsals for the next Caribou outing. With Pick a Piper, Weber breaks songs down to their rhythmic core and builds them back up with layers upon layers of tribal beats, tambourines, shakers and multiple drum kits. With Caribou, he blazes a trail through the schizophrenic patterns and melodies planted by Snaith, something that requires a deeper understanding of rock drumming than most care to explore. He is a master of dynamics and an engaging performer, someone that really displays the capacities of the instrument while still having a good time.

I met Brad after I shared the stage with Pick a Piper for two shows in Halifax. I knew he was going to be a decent drummer, but I didn't expect him to be as theatrical as he was. He struck me as someone who can remain extremely focused amidst musical chaos, someone who never loses his place or his cool. I've always been interested in people who can still have fun whilst taking their art seriously. I asked Brad if he would be interested in doing an interview. He's a pretty nice guy, so he said yes.

photo: F. Yang

1. Your approach to percussion in Pick a Piper seems influenced by tribal/polyrhythmic drumming. When did you begin exploring the potential of multiple drummers?

I started exploring multi-drum rhythms a lot in solo recordings of mine, perhaps starting 6 or 7 years ago. It was just so interesting how rhythmic layers could play off each other in an intriguing way. I've always been into various hand percussion, shaky items, pots and pans, etc... anything I can toss into a track I will.

I didn't start to play with another drummer live until I joined Caribou in 2007. After a year of touring with such a setup I was fascinated to try out a similar incarnation of my own. I had started collaborating a lot with Angus and Dan Roberts (second drummer and bass player in Pick a Piper respectively) and everything we completed just begged for at least one more kit on stage. Then we added hand percussion and points in the set when the four of us would play drums together.

2. Walk me through your songwriting process, do drums come first?

So far that has mostly been the case. We'll start with a rhythmic idea and base the song around that. We've been setting out to make dance music by organic means. Incorporating lots of percussion and building songs around those rhythmic origins has been a good way so far.

3. How did you become involved with Caribou?

My old band Winter Equinox saw Caribou back in 2004 and gave them our demo CD at the time and kept up communication with Dan Snaith over email. Near the end of The Milk Of Human Kindness tour, we emailed Dan and asked if we could open a show in Hamilton. To our excitement, he said yes! A year and a bit after that show Dan was still living in London UK and sent me an email about possibly joining Caribou in the future. He said he had remembered my drumming from that show and asked if I could record an audition. Coincidentally enough I happened to be in London on holidays at the time and met up with him and Ryan for lunch. We seemed to hit it off well and I went back to Canada and bunkered up for a week learning short loops of some of the more challenging Caribou drum parts. In the end he was happy with the audition and asked me to join. Definitely a highlight of my life so far.

4. Has drumming for Caribou influenced your playing in Pick a Piper, or vice-versa?

Playing with Snaith and the guys has taught me a lot. I've really learned to be a lot more dynamic drummer and very aware of space in my playing -- knowing when to keep it simple and when to release the gorilla! Snaith has turned me on to tons of amazing records that have totally broadened m style and given Pick a Piper a much larger palette of influences to draw from. Other than a few frantic moments in the PaP set, I generally try to lock onto the rhythmic foundation of the song and play out that particular groove in an almost hypnotic fashion. I think it's really important as a drummer to know when to just hold down the fort, especially making dancier music with Pick a Piper.

5. You have a very huge presence on the drums (mouth open, arms up in the air), is this something that just happens naturally?

I think it's just a matter of really really enjoying playing music live. I can't help but physically ebb and flow along to what I am playing.

6. What are some of your favorite independent Canadian drummers who should get more attention?

Mark Gaudet -- Elevator/Eric's Trip

Liam Epps -- What's He Building in There/ Ace Kincaid

Mike Bond -- Bocce

I don't really think of drummers in terms of their nationalities, so I'm having a tough time figuring out who is Canadian or not! Those guys are all really good though and there are tons more that I'm definitely missing.

Elevator - maritime psych rock wunderkinds

7. Do you have any specific gear you can't go on the road without?

I'm not much of a gear head really. I feel like it's easy to spend more time obsessing over gear than actually making music. I really enjoy making the most of whatever equipment I have at the time. Right now I'm playing on a really small Gretsch jazz kit that I really like, but with Caribou I play with Dan's kit, which is totally different. I've been incorporating midi triggers and foot pedals connected through a laptop lately and really enjoy the freedom and spontaneity those allow us. I've always used Vic Firth 5A sticks. I guess that's the one thing I can't go without, I'm pretty picky about it. Although I've never used anything else for most of my drumming career, so maybe I should force a change at some point!

8. What are your intentions with drumming for the future?

I'd like to continue playing with Caribou as long as I can and then work on my own music whenever we have breaks. I'll be touring with Caribou for the rest of the year, so we're hoping to finish writing and recording a Pick a Piper full length sometime in 2011. I just always want to be playing with other people and so far it's working out pretty well!

photo: Carl w. Heindl

You can catch Brad on tour with Caribou for the next while. The Halifax show on June 11th will be supported by two great acts, Rich Aucoin, who is a one man dance party, and Tomcat Combat, whom I've previously written about here. It's the must see show of the summer.

Bad Brains - Bad Brains

To say that Bad Brains were one of the fastest punk bands for their time would be stupid, they are probably the fastest punk band period. Punk music was never really about being a good musician, it was more about the power and the attitude, but Bad Brains took things a little further.

With a background rooted in Jazz and Reggae* they took all of the skills they had acquired to be able to play intricate, technical parts as fast as they fucking could. Every drummer worth a damn today has given some respect to Earl Hudson of Bad Brains, the machine behind it all. Dave Grohl, Questlove, Josh Freese, Chad Smith, Jimmy Chamberlain, hell I bet even Phil Collins listens to Bad Brains.

When you hear songs like Pay to Cum or Don't Need It for the first time, it can be hard to discern what the hell is going on, but if you listen to Earl's drumming, you'll notice that he is on top of everything. Every chord change, every melody, every scream has Earl behind it with a snare roll or a cymbal shot or a high hat smash or something. The end of Don't Need It is an insane tom/snare pattern, and it's probably the most raw, powerful drums I've ever heard.

I seem to remember a road trip from some time back where we only had two cassettes in the car and I'm pretty sure one was Springsteen and the other was Bad Brains live at CBGB's. I would say that for every time we heard Born to Run we heard the entire Bad Brains show three times.

Sorry Boss, but Weinberg ain't got shit on Earl Hudson.

* I am aware that part of this album is made up of Reggae music, but here's the thing. I don't like Reggae music. I also don't know how to write about it without sounding like a dick. I understand it's importance and it's impact, but I haven't been able to get over the fact that it spawned all this rich suburban white boy funk bullshit. I understand that Bad Brains had a whole lot of influence in that realm as well, but until someone apologizes for 311 I probably won't give it another chance.

Post #100 - BDK Anniversary

Tomorrow will mark an entire year since my first post upon the creation of this blog. This is also my 100th post (including a few news/update posts) which makes it really easy for me to do the math and say I average a post roughly every 3.65 days or so. I'm happy with that. I never really had much intentions for this other than to practice writing in a forum that was comfortable and familiar, and sort of give a little justification and reasoning behind why I love certain records. You see, I have a tendency to lose interest in things. Lack of self discipline along with laziness and a short attention span don't really pave the way for a lasting relationship with writing an online blog. But I didn't think anyone would actually read it either. Sometimes I get to the point where I haven't really heard anything that I found interesting enough to write about, or I'm getting tired of trying to explain the same things in as many different ways as possible. I get frustrated. I get tired. And I'll leave it for a week or so and go onto other things. Then I'll get a little e-mail or Facebook message from someone (sometimes I know them, sometimes I don't), or someone will come up to me at a show and say "hey man, I like your reviews. good stuff."

That's all it takes. My neurons kick into gear and music sounds the way it's supposed to and I can hear the little things I like to hear again. Soon enough there is a few more posts walking out the front door and onto the front page, on their way towards the archive like a cowboy in a sunset.

My point is that it's you guys that decide how much time I put into this, and so far, you've all kept me above water. Good job. In one year I've managed to write pages and pages of reviews, some good, some bad. I interviewed someone I genuinely respect and listen to often. I guest-wrote for another local blog. I had a pretty good year. I did a few things that were out of my comfort zone, and it didn't go so bad.

Now, you might be wondering how much traffic I actually get. According to my counter I have 2645 hits. That counts actual hits to the main page and, I think, people who read it in an RSS feeds (I haven't really gotten the hang of it yet). Now, that's not a whole lot. but what I do know is that it took roughly 8 months to get 1000 hits, which means the next 1645 came in the last four months. That's progress.

The truth is, I have no legitimate way to gauge how many people actually read this. Facebook hits don't get counted, and I know I get some readership there but whenever I see a hit from anywhere overseas I just imagine it's one of those bots that combs through thousands of websites a day searching for e-mails to send spam to. So I need your help.

For this next year, I would like to get a greater understanding of my readership, however little it may be. Is it only drummers who find this interesting? Do you want more interviews or should I stick to albums? Should I pack it up and call it a day?

Any interest at all is motivating to me which will in turn breed content, so without trying to self promote too much, but also not really giving a shit, I have created a Bloody Drum Knuckles Facebook Page for those interested enough to join. This will be used more for having an easy way to interact with everyone, and not so much for sending out mass messages and status updates. I'll probably update it every time there is a new post, or anytime something newsworthy pertaining to the subject matter comes up. I'll try not be too bothersome.

Join up and tell me, what would you like to see over the next year?

Come, sit with me,

let's talk.

MGMT - Congratulations

It seems every summer of my adult years has an album that sort of encapsulates the whole season. It makes its way into every party and onto every iPod playlist with infectious songs that cause everyone to go "Who is this? Why don't I know about this?". In 2007, that album for me was MGMT's Oracular Spectacular (and if you want to keep track St Elsewhere was Summer 2006, 2008 was Daft Punk's Alive 2007, and this past summer was Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix which I wrote about previously, here). I could get specific about Oracular Spectacular, but let's just say it's an album that makes you feel nice.

2010's early onset of warm weather has also brought the new album of the season, and it seems that MGMT have regained their summer throne (which I assume looks a lot like a lifeguard high chair). I like it when bands realize that the best follow-up albums sound nothing like the first. This record definitely has more of a live feel than Oracular, and a big part of that is the drums. I will argue this until my death, but raw sounding drums that are well played will always make a record sound better than cool parts loaded with tons of effects. they worked for The Flaming Lips, they made In Utero sound awesome and they helped Wilco gain respect. Raw drums played well. Remember that.

When MGMT recorded their first album, it was basically the brainchild of two people, Ben Goldwasser and Andrew VanWyngarden (which, to me, sound like fake names I would give interrogators if I was drunk and British). For Congratulations, they brought their live band into the studio with them, drummer Will Berman shared percussion duties with VanWyngarden, which seems to have been a fantastic idea. What I hear in Congratulations, is a band who already knew their way around a studio re-discovering themselves as a live band and instead of going the route of the big budget big sound sophomore album, they stripped the songs down to their core, brought in some friends, set up in a room, snapped on the microphones and just played.

The drumming on the first album sounded like it was from the future and the drumming on this album sounds like it wasn't influenced by any record that came out after 1981. It goes from hypnotic kraut-rock beats like the last few minutes of Siberian Breaks, to garage-y psych drums on Brian Eno (which has huge snare and tom rolls scattered throughout) to sort of a southern rock sway and swagger on Congratulations. Songs that are fast enough to dance too are slow enough to walk to, which makes it perfect for walking around outside or going apeshit on someone else's coffee table. That's a fine line.

I can't wait to listen to this, sit outside, drink beer and barbecue.

Bloc Party - Silent Alarm

I always found Matt Tong's playing on Silent Alarm far surpassed his actual ability at the time, and it used to piss me off. One of the first things I did after hearing this was look up videos of them playing live, hoping to see him blasting through these songs with precision and endurance. Unfortunately some of the songs on youtube were slower than on the record, and Matt seemed uncomfortable, always trying to catch up to himself. It was very hit and miss. For example, this is their first television appearance.

Matt is really tight, everything is crisp and played almost exactly as the record. He feels a little rushed at times, but the song is crazy fast, so thats understandable.

Now, this is later on, on David Letterman.

In essence, this is a much easier song to play, but it's slower than on the album and his time is all over the place. Sometimes he rushes the hits, sometimes he lags on them. I can tell by his look that he's uncomfortable, and it comes through in his playing.

Now, this used to piss me off because I used to think it was unfair to your audience, you were misrepresenting your ability. It's easy to lay down incredible drumming when you can do take after take or take a break when you get tired, it's another thing to play those songs for two hours straight and maintain your ability.

Now I have a different point of view, mostly because I myself have put things on albums I could not play live. Matt was setting a bar for himself, giving himself a challenge and a goal within his band and within his own playing. I respect that. Sometimes it's not about the crowd, it's about your own feelings towards your playing. If you don't have any way to measure your progress it starts to feel as if your at a stalemate.

Future Bloc Party releases didn't impress me nearly as much with regard to their drumming, but I think it has more to do with the direction of the songwriting than Matt himself. By the time Bloc Party came to Halifax and I got to see them, Matt played everything almost picture perfect. A few time issues, a few dropped hits, but nothing that made me think that the show wasn't worth the forty dollars I spent on it.

The drumming on this album is fast, probably faster than 90% of other rock records, and it set a bar for everyone in terms of how fast you can play pop songs and still keep them precise and coherent. I'm sure that the transition of these songs from studio to stage took a larger toll on Matt, endurance is something that takes a long time to build up, and he's a tiny dude.

This is a great album to play along to. I like seeing how far I can get before my vision starts to blur.