Jeffrey Lewis
Rickshaw Theatre, Vancouver
September 28th, 2009

To get it out of the way, “…And Don’t The Kids Just Loathe It” is
the new name of my regularly irregular reviews here on Kingfisher
Bluez.  I wasn’t going to give it a name, because I don’t name
something that I don’t want to get close to, but seeing how making
doodles, snapping photographs and droning on and on about how amazing
musicians are comes rather naturally to me, I guess I should probably
make them all into a focused commitment.

Onto the review: Jeffrey Lewis, for those that don’t know, is one of
the players of the anti-folk genre, acting as a kind of folk/punk
historian with humour, great songs and a Jonathan Richman-like
earnestness.  He also writes comics (as if he weren’t awesome enough
already).

Tim and I saw on the posters that the doors opened at 8pm and the show
started at 9pm at the Rickshaw Theatre down in the always lovely and
laid back neighbourhood of Main and Hastings.  In case you’re not a
Vancouverite, Main and Hastings is a fantastic area to go to.  With
the lovely stench of urine following your every step and heroin
addicts and crackheads in their usual rampant whimsy, it’s hard to
pass up going to this cross-section of human misery.  Ahh.  Dig that
city livin’.

Anyways, we got there at around 8:30, and sure enough, not even the
doors were opened.  We asked a guy at the door when Jeffrey would be
on, and he said probably not until TEN MINUTES AFTER 11.  Now
normally, we’d love to stay in Main and Hastings for the next couple
of hours, but we felt like a change from the junkies asking us for
money repeatedly, so we got something to eat instead.

We got back at 11pm and one of the opening acts (Ora Cogan, who Tim accurately described as, “someone who listens to PJ Harvey a lot) was still
playing.  We went up to the merch table which Jeffrey’s bass playing
brother Jack was running and got Jeffrey Lewis’ fabulous comic “Fuff”,
issue #1. I also managed to snag a copy of Jack Lewis’ 7 inch, “Hero
Worship And The Animals That We Love” which has already been subjected
to repeated plays.

After a little bit, Jeffrey Lewis started playing, and the audience
got up from their seats to the front.  There was, and I’m
not exaggerating, only twenty people.  Twenty!  I knew the show wasn’t
really advertised, but I thought more people would be coming,
especially since the theatre has the capacity for, according to their
site, 1,000 people.  Such a huge theatre made the small crowd stand
out more.  Jeffrey himself compared the venue to a “post-apocalyptic
landscape”.

The show, however, could’ve easily attracted 300 if people knew what
they were missing.  Jeffrey, with his trademark weak, raspy voice
serenaded us with songs which included gentle acoustic numbers and
energetic pop-punk anthems (have you ever seen someone make his
acoustic guitar feedback?  It’s a great sight, let me tell you).  He also preformed a folk cover of “End Result” by UK punk anarchists Crass, did a rap about mosquitoes and played his “movies”, which were series of drawings that he made with narration and musical accompaniment, including “A Detective Story” and a fantastic horror film called, “Creeping Brain” (the theme of which has been stuck in my head ever since).

The twenty people that were there were made up a nice little crowd.  A
little mosh pit of seven guys started up during the last song, and
Jeffrey went down into the audience to perform three more songs for us
(including a preview of his new “documentary”, “The Mayflower”).  It
was 1:05am when it ended, on a Monday night no less, but nobody made
any bones about that.

It was an amazing show.  I made the comparison to Jonathan Richman
earlier, and seeing Jeffrey gave me the same feeling as when I saw
Jonathan.  His endearing stature and charming quirkiness made me feel
quite warm and fuzzy and his school boy crush for punk rock is
infectious.  This may be a stupid analogy, but it was a concert that
felt like a delicious meal after a long day.  There was just a variety
of flavours, all complimenting each other and even the spicier stuff
settled nicely, giving that warm, satisfying feeling just before
taking a nice nap by the firepla–OH, GOD, CAN’T IT JUST BE
THANKSGIVING ALREADY?

-Julian “Hungrier Than He Realizes” Bowers

Jeffrey Lewis

This is how many people there were!

Jeffrey performs his mosquito rap!

Pauly Shore is an asshole

A review of Pauly Shore’s stand up comedy show on September 12th 2009

By Amanda Lily

For my birthday this year I was gifted with two tickets to see Pauly Shore do stand up comedy at the Vogue Theatre. I was excited… very excited. I have been a Pauly Shore fan for a while now and actually own (and watch) several of his movies. I invited Steph to come along with me, and the excitement level went from high to abnormal. We even made our own t-shirts proclaiming our admiration for Mr. Shore and his silly flicks. Most people, when I tell them I like Pauly Shore, either laugh at me or don’t know who he is. Fair enough on both counts. After the show on Saturday night, I may have to laugh at myself as well.

Steph and I arrived at the Vogue, settled into our second row seats, and struck up a few conversations with fellow show goers. The guys beside us had received free tickets from a friend. They weren’t very big fans and said they thought they may have seen Encino Man once. The guys in front of us had also somehow procured free tickets, and thought they may have seen “that one movie where he is on the farm” once. Okay… sweet, we are probably the biggest fans here! Pauly is gonna love us! We’ll at least get a picture right? On with the show. There were three opening acts, none particularly memorable. One guy took his shirt off, and one guy talked about Ed Hardy clothes. Then it was time for Pauly! WooooooOOooooOoOoOoh! Steph and I cheered, laughed at every joke, cheered more and had a great time. Pauly was actually fairly funny (if not memorably funny) and we had a great time.

After the show ended we got in line at the merch table so that we could meet Pauly and hopefully get a picture. The girls ahead of us loved our shirts and let us go to the front of the line since we were “obviously pretty big fans.” Sweet. Here comes Pauly Shore! Wooo! Steph goes to take a picture of him and he BLOCKS HIS FACE. Then he requests that the lights get turned down around the merch table (thus preventing any good photos). We ask him to sign our shirts, which he didn’t even look at or comment on while scribbling on them with a sharpie. We ask if we can take a picture with him, and he tells us that if we aren’t buying anything that we have to get out of the merch line, and that he might take pictures later on the other side of the lobby. We were then shooed away.

Wow. What a dick. Needless to say we didn’t stick around, and I think it’s time to start laughing at myself for liking Pauly Shore in the first place.

Amanda plays in the band Sticky Silver

I have been aware of Shiloh’s existence for a while now. A 15 year old, Canadian pop singer birthed about 6 years too late from the slightly-less worn yet similarly modeled canal of the American Music Industry into an internet age that doesn’t seem to offer much in the way of long-term career options. Even less so for a bubblegum artist who is perhaps peaking before filling in her A-cups. Her (Canadian) hit singles were called “Goodbye, You Suck” and “Operator (A Girl Like Me)” and both videos revealed a slightly odd-looking, not-rail-thin, and pink-and-black-hair-dyed girl of a headache-inducing youngness who is apparently shilling the same product that Avril Lavinge was back when I was 14 and still a bit old to be buying it. Now, I know that I’m hardly the target audience of Shiloh’s record label, lawyers, managers and marketing team, but how is anyone supposed to understand the nowhereness that plagues her ever-confusing image?

Relocating from her birthplace of Abbotsford, BC, Shiloh started as a country musician in Alberta and Saskatchewan before meeting her hefty team of managers and heading back to Vancouver to strike it (Canadian) big-time with a glossy pop sound that shows nary a trace of her country background nor her punk-rock clothing combinations and piercings. Her heavily-processed voice possesses no character, save a slight nasal aftertaste and the music might as well be made by the same computers that keep Britney in a job between court cases. I don’t buy her look. I don’t get it. I mean here’s a girl who looks like she’s being marketed as a bratty, pop-punk princess. Okay I get that. But her music sounds like a prepubescent and somehow castrated version of P!nk if P!nk was Avril Lavinge and didn’t have Tim Armstrong or Chantal Kreviazuk (respectively) writing for her. It’s not even a bit alternative! It’s just straight-up bubblegum pop music. Now, there’s nothing wrong (in theory) with that, but why all this confusing mall-punkness? Is it her weird little face? Is she not classically pretty enough to be the next Christina? I don’t believe that nose rings and hair dye are really that cool right now. I don’t believe her over-the-top, feel-good videos with too-enthusiastic dancers and her silly sort of don’t care attitude.

Which begs the question, what exactly is Shiloh the alternative to? Because at first glance it appears to be the Britney’s and Christina’s of yesteryear, but even as a younger pre-dress-wearing Avril, she still sounds cleaner. Is she the alternative to Feist? To Beth Ditto? To thoughtful, intelligent singer-songwriters that would make actual good role-models to twelve year old girls?

Here is Shiloh’s newest video. Now 16, she has moved into the inadvisable genre of radio friendly white-girl pseudo-reggae that encourages you (again, probably not you nor I) to “Believe in yourself” and “Keep your convictions strong” just before the head-scratching proclamation “Life is but a melody”.

Strangely, I am quite amused by this song/video. I am even all-but convinced during the uplifting chorus, despite copious amounts of lyrical wince-factors. The “popular kids” in the video are punished in later life by becoming normal people, and the “alternative to something, poorly dressed sort of punk kids” somehow become cancer researchers and marine biologists and all sorts of hoopla. Around the end, my heart is truly warmed. They really look like they are having a good time. Shiloh even seems to have found a bit of soul, and for a second you get the feeling like she’s forgotten she’s on camera and all of the young actors around her that really want to be in movies, they really are her friends. And for a second they really just are a group of best friends having fun and goofing around so glad to be out of school for the day and to not have to deal with their teachers and parents and those popular kids that will one day be plumbers and soccer moms and just finally breathe because Summer is infinite and Love is still new and Life is but a melody.

-Tim

Big News!

Count Oak’s new album “Depression Has Brought Me A Great Pelt” is released on Kingfisher Bluez today. The album is now available on our webstore for purchase or free streaming. Check it out here!

Directed by Kingfisher Bluez’s own Jainy Lastoria, our first big-budget music video is sure to clean up at the muchmusic video awards this year!

Enjoy!

Jainy’s account of the filming can be read at her blog, 30 Days In The Hole

Damo Suzuki at The Biltmore
August 8th, 2009

While Defektors were providing the solid opening act of the night, Tim
and I arrived to see that Damo Suzuki was sitting behind the merch
table striking up a conversation with some random person.  There he
was!  Right there!  In all his small Japanese man with long hair
glory!  The frontman of Can, one of most crucial bands to come out of
the Krautrock scene and which had a major influence on dance and
post-punk bands to follow, had nothing better to do than try to sell
off his own t-shirts, buttons and one hundred dollar box sets.

We immediately shook his hand, got pictures with him and got him to
sign our stuff (I had a rare Can single, Tim had a poster of some
unrelated band he snatched off the wall just seconds before).  He was
very endearing, kind and a bit on the tiny side.  If my pocket were
slightly bigger, I would’ve shoved him in and and taken him home to
display on my mantel.

Then we went to be a part of the audience and noticed that there was
hardly anyone there.  Probably at its peak, there was 80 people.  And
some of those people were probably just there for the DJ night that
was to come immediately after.  Evidently being a frontman for Can,
having Mark E. Smith write a song about you, having The Mooney Suzuki
name their BAND after you, have Kanye West sample you and influencing
JOHN LYDON AND FUCKING RADIOHEAD can only get you a crowd about the
size of a good turnout at the bingo hall.

Anyways, Defektors left and after a bit of waiting around, Damo went
on stage and was joined by the members of everyone’s favorite local
noisemakers, Sex Negatives.  I should take the time to explain here
that Damo brings local musicians from wherever he’s playing to be his
backing band, which is not only cool and inventive, but easy on the
wallet as well.  They started quite suddenly and blasted solidly for a
full hour, if not more.  Damo made his patented pseudo-language
singing overtop, while the band was playing around the E note with a
fast, repetitive beat.  I would compare most of the set to Sonic Youth
doing a hardcore punk cover of Neu!’s Hallogallo, or the heavier
moments of Boredoms’ Super Roots 7.  There was some grooves and
stretched out drones that interrupted some of it as well, but it
mainly followed around the blaring use of EEEEEEEEE.

The audience weren’t much in a dancing mood.  I understand that we
were watching a German performer, but they didn’t have to act like a
German audience.  Some, however, were clapping along and it was a
rather pitiful sight.  Tim and I played a game which I made up right
there and then, “Drunkenness or Polyrhythms?”  I think you can guess
what our choices were.

After one hell of an hour (and a bit) of the repetitive assault, a
girl went up to the guitar player and gave the “cut it off” signal
(I’m sure some drunk girls in the back were getting antsy at this
point).  They ended, Damo thanked us, we thanked him and then out of
nowhere, dance music came on and these girls drunkenly flailed around
with each other in the middle of the dance floor, as if any sign of
what just finished seconds ago vanished in an instant.

I went to see Damo in Victoria two years ago (footage of that
performance HERE

hey tim

Pains Of Being Pure At Heart

Saw Pains Of Being Pure At Heart yesterday. The doors opened at 8, but POBPAH didn’t play until past midnight! I couldn’t believe it. Also they played for just over a half hour, which was also disappointing. They also didn’t play “Contender”, my favourite song by them. Besides all that though, they were a great little band who put on a great little set and they were very nice and polite people it seemed. Excited for Virgin Fest tomorrow (Sonic Youth, Jarvis Cocker, De La Soul, Thermals, Metric, Gomez etc.). That’s a lot to get excited for!

—–

The Shiny Diamonds

So if you read this blog, I’m sure you’ve noticed that The Shiny Diamonds have been in the studio recording the demos/beginnings of our new album. We have a title, a cover, a producer, an engineer, a studio and pretty much enough songs to feed an army. (A giant army of ears that eats music?)

I’ve been in the studio with Spencer all evening, mixing down some tracks and playing Hell’s Kitchen on my ipod. I must say we’re all very proud of our new material and we can’t wait to get it out to our tens of fans that are spread in groups of 3 or 4 across the entire world.

Stay tuned for the debut of our new music video, some new songs, upcoming KFB releases and all sorts of really super exciting stuff. We are going to try to make the recording process totally involving and entertaining for you, one of the several people who has heard of us. If you haven’t, then move along- nothing to see here.

-Tim

Got home around 4am last night/this morning. A good time was had by us all in The Shiny Diamonds camp, though Spencer was looking a bit haggard by the end of the night. We recorded FIVE new songs and shot a music video. Yes, we were extremely productive.

Thought you’d like to know that Jainy Lastoria of The Lion In Love posted her own account of the session on her blog 30 Days In The Hole. She shot our new video for “Cop Killer” and recorded backing vocals on a song called “The Company Doesn’t Care”. Read her thoughts HERE.

-Tim

—-

Molten Lava Tour Dates!

Shiny Diamonds affiliate Liam Bryant’s fantastic band Molten Lava is going on tour this Summer. Try to catch them if they are playing in your city!

Complete list of dates:

08.14: Regina, SK @ The Exchange
08.15: Calgary, AB @ Dicken’s Pub
08.17: Nanaimo, BC @ The Cambie
08.19: Victoria, BC @ Logan’s Pub
08.21: Gibsons, BC @ BOAB JAM SPOT
08.22: Kelowna, BC @ Kelowna Club
08.25: Saskatoon, SK @ Le Relais

Molten Lava on myspace