Major Label Respect

When I interviewed Mastodon drummer Brann Dailor prior to the release of Blood Mountain a couple years ago, I asked him, "Now that you're on a major label, do you think people will finally figure out how to spell your band's name?" (I can't remember his response; it was probably as lacklustre as the rest of the interview. Neither of us was on his game that day.)

After picking up Crack the Skye, their second album on Warner/Reprise, last week, I found this flyer tucked inside the jewel case:

Jeff Younger Roundup

It's high time we caught up with the one-man jazz/noise juggernaut that is our Jeff. In addition to his steady string of live dates in the feast/famine dichotomy that is the Vancouver scene, his sick mind and fleet fingers have produced two recent releases I'd like to highlight here. Both of them serve as snapshots of a couple of his more difficult, freewheeling, ever-morphing projects.

First up, Jeff Younger's Sandbox's debut release The Nudger (Now Orchestra Records). The Sandbox are a five-piece jazz-type ensemble who team up to play Jeff's game pieces and cartoon scores. Actually, I have no idea what they do, but each gig is an off-kilter musical feast, as well as an exhibition of human frailty and emotion as the performers grin, grimace, try, fail, surrender, thrust, parry, and, I think, grow as people through the experience (as does the audience). The Nudger captures them on a couple 2007 dates at The Cellar running through seven Sandbox selections. I found it interesting to come at this purely as a listener instead of as an audience member. With nothing but the music before me, I felt more like a passenger, able to focus on and enjoy the "scenery" rather than worry about keeping tabs on the surrounding traffic. Nuances emerge; subtleties that get lost in the distracting (for me) flurry of onstage activity. The band's range is impressive. At one end, "Rug Stain Saint" is the kind of improv blowout you might expect when you unleash five monster players such as these. At the other extreme, "Silt" is a gentle, almost post-rock, meditation that, like its title, drifts and gradually settles into a heap. I don't know what it would be like to come at this music without having seen the Sandbox live, but I will say that it makes perfect sense once you've seen what they can do on stage.

Next, we have another debut artifact, volume one from Jeff Younger's Devil Loops. Devil Loops is Jeff's solo guitar project, and it's pure improv, on-the-fly, off-the-cuff, seat-of-the-pants, spur-of-the-moment stuff. In the liner notes, Younger claims he avoids thinking about what he'll play until he takes the stage for a Devil Loops set. It takes a brave performer to step into the abyss, not knowing whether he'll take flight or plunge to his death. Each of the five tracks is a single unedited performance, stretching from the moment Younger puts fingers to string or foot to pedal, to the moment he decides that the piece shall live no more. As the project name states, looping devices are employed, but the looped passages are lengthy enough that the music isn't overtly repetitive. Younger brings in some nimble jazz licks at times, but his diabolical nature ensures that they'll be buried by waves of abstract sound soon enough. It's not quite ambient, not quite jazz, and definitely not a Saturday night album, unless you spend your Saturday nights animating your own Quay Brothers-inspired puppet masterpiece, clawing at imaginary insects beneath your clothing, or imagining what it would be like to die in outer space. After listening to Jeff playing with himself for 70 minutes (hey, we've all been there), I now feel armed with enough gumption to revisit that soul-sappingly terrifying Cluster album a friend gave me a couple years ago. This release invites you to peer into a black, possibly bottomless pit...just don't be startled by the strange emanations from its depths. It's only Devil Loops. Show no fear, listen in the moment, and you'll do fine.

Musk Ox – s/t (Absurdist)

Musk Ox is one Nathanael Larochette, a young man from Ottawa who’s devoted himself to classical guitar in pursuit of bleakly pastoral sounds and atmospheres. Neofolk, I guess is the neogenre, but really, the sparse nature of Musk Ox’s music makes it a blank canvas onto which you can project your own sensibilities. Even before I saw the influence list on the MySpace page, I heard post-rock (Sigur Ros, Mogwai), prog rock (Anthony Phillips, Steve Howe), and moody black/death metal (Ulver, Opeth, Agalloch). If you’re attuned to any of that lot, you’ll find something to enjoy in Musk Ox. The epic song structures are quite metal—it strikes me as an all-acoustic variant on Opeth’s Morningrise—and the meticulous approach to performance and arrangement is very metal as well. Larochette finds the ideal mix of somber sonorities by mixing his guitar playing with other acoustic instruments: piano, flute, glockenspiel, cello, and voice. He might gild the lily a bit adding rain, birdsong, babbling brooks, and other “sounds of nature,” but it all works to emphasize the music’s connection to the landscape—specifically the vast empty spaces of Canada (as noted by Adrien Begrand in his Decibel review). Larochette definitely has a talent for creating substantive melodies that resolve perfectly, and after talking to him last January at The Energizer's memorial event, it sounds like he has some firm ideas about how Musk Ox will evolve. If he can expand his palette to include some full band arrangements, the results should be even more majestic. For now, for all its soothing qualities, I’m pretty excited about this flat-out beautiful record.

Abercrombie/Holland/DeJohnette—Gateway (ECM)

This is a great fusion album from 1975, recently reissued as part of ECM’s Touchstones series. I found it at HMV under "A" for Abercrombie, but never mind the billing—all the players seem to be equal partners on this album. Although Holland is credited with four out of six tracks, he doesn’t dominate the album. Everyone gets a fair shake. In fact, I detect a conscious effort to establish parity across both sides of the album. Side one is mostly Holland’s, while side two gives the guitarist and drummer the spotlight. The opener, “Backwoods Song” is about the tightest, most straightforward thing here, an easy rocking number on which Holland (who plays double bass throughout) produces a fantastic elastic tone. “Waiting” is a brief solo piece for bass; for balance, it’s countered on side two by “Unshielded Desire,” which amounts to a fierce drum and guitar battle by DeJohnette and Abercrombie. The lengthy “May Dance” sees the group locked in an intense conversation, while the album closer “Sorcery I” begins with a loose, improvisational opening, then coalesces into a slightly menacing lope in 7, giving Abercrombie some space for some wild soloing. And if that doesn’t jangle your pleasure centres, DeJohnette wallops the thing home with his own solo spot. Whew. This is an easy recommendation for anyone easing into jazz fusion after, say, discovering Mahavishnu. It’s a less regimented sound than McLaughlin’s outfit, but this versatile trio clearly had no difficulty igniting its own inner flame.

These Were the Week that Was

Samurai (Esoteric) were an odd duck of a band who did one album in 1971 before packing it in. Their sound blended some jazz, soul, and progressive, ending up somewhere in the vicinity of Gentle Giant's departure point. With sax and vibes to colour the guitar/organ foundation, it's a fun listen, and the songs are mighty catchy. Songwriter, vocalist, and keyboardist Dave Lawson went on to Greenslade, whom I have no idea about.

I'm really into Popol Vuh at the moment. I guess they're best known for their Werner Herzog soundtracks, and their non-soundtrack work is definitely "cinematic" as well. I have three of their albums now, and they all sound completely different while retaining similar atmospheres, which is something I admire. Letzte Tage-Letzte Nachte (1976, reissued by SPV) is supposedly their hardest-rocking release...it's certainly the most guitar-based of the three I've heard. What amazes me is how contemporary this sounds. If you'd told me this album was recorded by some cool Mount Pleasant kids who played the Biltmore last week, I'd be impressed, but I wouldn't doubt you at all.

A new Zombi album is cause for celebration. This Pittsburgh duo gets better and rocks harder with every release. They hit some amazing grooves in 7 and 5, and of course it's a tone picnic from beginning to end. Steve Moore's bass tone alone brings a big grin to my face, never mind that he's got a ruling drummer to play along with. Seeing them with Isis a couple years ago was a treat, and I hope they come back while touring for Spirit Animal (Relapse).

It's high time I picked up No Pussyfooting (DGM), which I did at Soundscapes in Toronto last month. Originally composed of two side-long pieces of tape-manipulated guitar and synthesizer drones, this two-disc edition also features each selection in reverse—exactly the way the album was aired (mistakenly) on BBC Radio in 1973.

Saxondale: Rage Hero

My friend Super Robertson introduced me to the notion of a “rage hero.” I’ve never had the term formally explained to me, but I take it to mean someone who’s not afraid to express the anger that we all feel from time to time—anger at the annoyances that can accumulate during a typical day: lousy service, pushy salespeople, navigating automated switchboards, international students, and so on. The rage hero says the things we’re too inhibited, for want of self-preservation, to say. We may be afraid to cause a fuss or spark a confrontation, but the rage hero has no such hangups. In the face of stupidity, hypocrisy, or insincerity, he’ll let loose and take one for the team.

Tommy Saxondale is a rage hero. The title character of Steve Coogan’s latest series is an ex-roadie who’s gotten off the tour bus and settled down in suburbia (Stevenage, to be exact). He’s now an exterminator, trapping vermin wherever they may roam. He does have anger management problems—exacerbated by thoughts of his ex-wife, banks, DJs, and animal rights protesters—for which he attends a men’s encounter group at the local library. Each episode opens at one of Tommy’s anger management sessions, where he inevitably disrupts the session by calling bullshit on the therapist, or mocking his fellow classmates and generally giving the impression that he’ll be going for counselling for some time to come.

So he can be a dick (and is frequently called out on it), but Saxondale is basically a happy guy. He loves his girlfriend Magz (Ruth Brown), proprietress of an anti-establishment t-shirt boutique, and he loves his Boss 351 ’72 Mustang. He seems to enjoy his work, even though he'll seize any chance to talk about his old life in the rock & roll circus. Coogan’s last TV character, mediocre chat show host Alan Partridge, was driven by unhappiness and self-doubt that revolved around his god-given right to a second series of “Knowing Me Knowing You With Alan Partridge.” However, Saxondale has no overwhelming drive to transform himself or his life. He's got more than enough self-assurance. His primary struggle is to keep a lid on his anger, and live a life free of idiots and the institutions that house, employ, or produce them.

One thing I like about Coogan's approach to his characters is how he defines them by their taste in music, movies, and culture in general. Alan Partridge admired Roger Moore, Wings (“the band The Beatles could have been”) and, of course, Abba. Saxondale lives and dies by the heavy rock of the ’70s, namechecking Ritchie Blackmore, Tull, and Brian Eno. And whereas Partridge’s über-middlebrow sensibilities were played for laughs and emphasized what a shell of a man he was, Tommy wears his tastes like a cloak of superiority. He’ll quote a Rush lyric at someone who threatens to shatter his integrity, or he’ll lecture his young charge Raymond on the finer points of Pink Floyd while out on a pest control job.

The humour on Saxondale is more gentle than the sometime excruciating travails of Alan Partridge. Perhaps resentful of his more popular character, Coogan heaped indignity and humiliation on Partridge over the course of three series. This time around, Coogan seems to genuinely like Saxondale and relishes simply having him interact with his nemeses in minor skirmishes during his daily rounds. One such annoyance is Vicky, the blonde, tanned receptionist at the pest control dispatch office, whose faux-chummy repartee is a machine-gun spray of thinly veiled insults that leave Tommy little with which to fire back. Where Partridge’s struggles encompassed his livelihood and, eventually, his sanity, Saxondale’s trials aren’t so severe. That’s not to the show’s detriment at all; it’s hilarious just to spend time in this guy’s company and watch him go off at whatever pests come his way.

This three-disc DVD set includes both seasons of this superb series plus your standard array of extras. Season one sees Coogan playing Saxondale with a moss-like fake beard and a twitchy demeanor. Each episode is named for the pest that he’s assigned to eradicate. In season two, Coogan tones down the facial ticks and sports a more convincing, if less comedic, beard. Perhaps in an effort to get away from the “pest of the week” premise, the second season introduces a few new characters to tear at Saxondale's hard-fought serenity, including Jonathan, a neighbour who plagues Tommy with petty residents’ association matters, and Keanu (also played by Coogan), a more realized version of an emo/junkie youth featured in series one. Having just finished watching all 13 episodes, I think I’ll watch ’em again. Saxondale’s my kind of guy, and long may he rage.

For whose is the kingdom?

Millions—Gather Scatter (Seventh Rule)
Considering their label (Seventh Rule is home to Wetnurse and Light Yourself on Fire), I expected Millions to deliver a high level of intensity on Gather Scatter. Millions also features Seventh Rule founder Scott Flaster on guitar/vocals, so again, I expected to hear the label's aesthetic of no-nonsense, hard-hitting musical intelligence in full flight. Expectations are fully met as “Lest the Professor Catches Fire” bursts out of the gate, jarring, dissonant, yet still rocking a bunch. Unlike a thousand other tech-punk bands disappearing up their own arseholes with shrill, soulless études, Millions manage to sidestep everything clichéd and “core”. I can’t point to anything that’s “metal” about their sound, other than the sheer volume and aggression. They don't gum up the works with secondhand At the Gates riffs and rehashed Maiden harmonies. Such boyish pursuits won't do here. Millions are taut and relentless, yet they rejoice in rock ’n’ roll riffs and churning bass lines that doff the cap to The Jesus Lizard, Black Flag, and Nomeansno. They’ve got the approach, the mixture of elements, fully sussed. What makes Millions special is their ability to temper the clamour; mainly with those big riffs, yes, but also with twin guitars that do battle masterfully, peeling off and converging like a formation flying team. The action never flags. Sure, I might need some quiet time after noisefests like “Saddle Up and Ride” and “We Make Poor Decisions,” but fully functioning songs like “Getting the Last Word” and “Life is Satisfactory” pulse with hooks and urgency. What's a little turbulence when the trip as a whole is so enjoyable?

A Memorial Event for Adrian Bromley (Part 2)
It’s going to be difficult for me to adequately describe this amazing event. It wasn’t a gig, it wasn't a wake; it was simply a perfect gathering of friends, many of whom would have been strangers on any other occasion, but who all shared a bond with Adrian. I’m not a spiritual person at all, but the energy in the venue did make me feel that our Mister Pink Bunny was there, somewhere, working the room, keeping us all entertained and laughing. He was always at the centre of whatever was happening.

The Opera House is a decent-size concert hall. The closest Vancouver venue might be The Vogue. I don't know the history of the place, but it was definitely a seated theatre at some point. Now with the seats removed and a bar on each side of the floor and a appealingly tarnished ornateness, it's a great place for a mid-size rock show.

The first person I spotted was Martin Popoff, to whom I gave my spare pair of earplugs (I also scored a couple of his books from the silent auction), and from there it was a constant stream of familiar faces—Chris Bruni, U! staffers Laura, Brian, Adam, and Kevin, David Gold from Woods of Ypres, Gino from Chronicles of Chaos, and so on. It was like being in a Robert Altman movie—everywhere you looked, there was someone I recognized.

Then there was the music. Into the Void kicked off the evening with a three-song tribute to Sabbath. Starring Braveboarder Fatal if Swallowed as "Ozzy", they performed "War Pigs," "Into the Void," and "NIB". Great fun, and to misquote Neil from Freaks and Geeks, Saturday night—always a good night for some Sabbath.



Endorphins, who released an album on Adrian’s Urgent Music imprint, were on next, declaring this was their “real” farewell show, as they had broken up prior to this without any fanfare. Detsorgsekalf, another band of Braveboarders, scorched us with their blackened humour and drum machine-backed metal frenzy (complete with an outro cheekily nicked from Entombed).



Piledriver entertained with their unruly thrash, including “Metal Inquisition,” the namesake of an already legendary blog. They have indeed stayed ugly. Because they had been working with Adrian on their "comeback" as The Exalted Piledriver, they dedicated the song "The Things I Give" to him, renaming it "The Things He Gave" for the occasion.



Between sets, several people took the mic to pay tribute to Adrian: his twin brother Winston asked us for a moment of silence while we all threw the horns; Drew Masters from M.E.A.T. magazine talked about Adrian's beginnings as a metal writer; Adrian's fiancée Renee got up on stage to say a few words as well, so brave in the face of her tremendous loss.

And the music played on. Eclipse Eternal tore it up with some keys-and-corpsepaint black metal...



Musk Ox travelled five hours from Ottawa to play a set that was probably the most emotional of the night. As they said, their music had helped Adrian mourn the death of his father earlier last year, and now they were helping us mourn as well. With guitarist Nathaneal flanked by a cellist and oboeist, they sounded beautifully sombre.

The penultimate tribute of the night was a slide show of Adrian’s life, with hundreds of pictures set to the tune of Green Carnation’s "Light of Day, Day of Darkness." (Green Carnation headlined the Day of the Equinox fest I mentioned in my last post.) I’ve always found this to be a moving piece, but now after having seen Adrian's life unfurl while it played, it’s even more so.

Lastly, Woods of Ypres played a three-song set, including a favourite of Adrian's that they'd relearned for the event, "The Looming of Dust in the Dark," and closing number "The Thrill of the Struggle."



So this memorial event was many things. It was a place to laugh and cry. It was a reunion of old acquaintances, and a meeting place for new friends. It was a chance to celebrate, and rock out as The Energizer would have. It was a testament to healing power of music. It goes without saying that Adrian would have loved it.

A Memorial Event for Adrian Bromley (Part 1)
A few days after Adrian passed away, his friend Noel Peters at Inertia Entertainment announced a memorial event for January 17th at the Opera House, the same venue that hosted the Day of the Equinox Festival that Adrian and Noel masterminded in 2005. Admission would be pay what you can with all proceeds going to charity, and a clutch of Adrian’s favourite local bands would be playing. I didn’t think twice about it—I bought a plane ticket and was off to Toronto at dawn last Friday.

Days prior, I'd been getting a little nervous about the trip. I’m not a gung-ho traveler, and I hate flying. Going solo isn't my favourite option either. Then a few days before the trip I was in the lunchroom at work, and, lost in my thoughts about the day at hand, I had a vivid flash of expectation in which I imagined going back to my desk, sitting down and seeing an MSN message from Adrian that said, “You coming to Toronto this weekend?” That was when I knew I’d made the right choice to go.


Toronto was having a nasty cold snap, and a good portion of downtown was blacked out when I arrived. Thankfully my hotel was outside the blackout zone, and a couple short, frigid sprints from the airport terminal to the bus and from the bus to the hotel were all the hardships I had to face. That night I met with my friends Adam and Rain for drinks, dinner, and jazz at The Rex. Great company, great music, and a nice way to ease into the weekend.

Saturday I took the streetcar across College to Soundscapes, where I hauled a fistful of really upsetting CDs. Man, I love that place.

Another friend had invited me to an all-ages show (dapslove ALL AGES Vol. 1)at Rolly’s Garage, so that was my next stop. Rolly’s Garage is exactly that—a working garage-cum-weekend gig/art space for the kids. The concession sold candy and pizza and hot chocolate. It was adorable. I caught three bands on a five-band bill.

The first band was Tonka and Puma, a bass/drums duo who punk-rocked their way through some joyously ragged material with great spirit.



Next up, The Bicycles smacked me upside my head with their harmony-packed ’70s-style pop overload. Brilliant.



Skeleton Me, who followed, were a little more subdued and rootsy, and, in an effort to keep us warm, played three Bruce Springsteen songs with “fire” in the title.

I had to jet after that to get back to the hotel in time for dinner with my good pal Joan, who went to high school with my wife and is cooler than just about anyone you or I know. I hadn't seen her since our wedding, so we had a lot to catch up on. Then it was time to head back out to the Opera House to give Adrian a proper sendoff.

Kayo Dot—Blue Lambency Downward (Hydra Head)
After one album each on Tzadik and Robotic Empire, Kayo Dot lands on Hydra Head for their third full-length. Blue Lambency Downward is their most concise, consistent and enjoyable album. They've always operated on their own plane of weirdness, and the metal roots they uprooted after their incarnation as Maudlin of the Well have dispersed and dissolved into a vat of ethereal rock/jazz/prog styles. While making notes for this review I jotted down moments that reminded me of Talk Talk, Queen, Henry Cow, Ulver, and Sigh. Although your collection of rock vanguard touchstones may vary, you'll probably hear them here. Their second album, Dowsing Anemone with Copper Tongue, tended to sprawl, but band leader/guitarist/composer Toby Driver has wisely reined this in—the album consists of five short tracks book-ended by 10-minute epics. He's also stripped down the core lineup to himself and violinist Mia Matsumiya, creating a more intimate listening experience. Bombast does erupt occasionally, as on the Neurosis-calibre opening of "Clelia Walking," but this is largely a soothing listen, full of space and loose, rolling rhythms. Guest drummer Charlie Zeleny, who recently left Behold...the Arctopus, shows a more subtle side to his playing, although such is the scope of the material that he also gets to flex his chops on some technical weirdness at the end of "The Awkward Wind Wheel." This album also features Driver's best vocal work to date, both in his actual singing and in the melodies he's wrested from lyrics like "It fell in the shape of a bifurcated ammonite shell." Kayo Dot's peculiar logic still rules over every aspect of the album, but I found it to be a much easier listen, producing a low-level, attention-grabbing anxiety rather than an all-out panic attack. How's that for an endorsement?

Warpig—Warpig (Relapse)
My wife told me today that a local record store has an original pressing of this album that can be yours for just $800. Fortunately, Relapse reissued it a couple years ago, making it a little more affordable to fans of musty old hard rock like myself. Warpig came charging out of Woodstock, Ontario in the early '70s, obviously inspired by overseas bands like Deep Purple and Uriah Heep. Warpig’s own interpretation of this nascent sound is pretty bang-on the money (maybe a little too accurate in the case of “Speed King” doppelganger “Rock Star”), while approaching the style with a certain Canadian deliberation compared to the balls-out boundary pushing of their more regal British counterparts. While Dana Snitch is no Jon Lord (his somewhat prissy Clavinet sound can’t compete with Lord’s roaring Hammond) and Terry Hook is no Ian Paice, the band as a whole can certainly play—Rick Donmoyer in particular is a first-class guitarist, and as a singer can hit high notes to rival Heep’s David Byron (even, at times, King Diamond!). The songs are impressive in their riffcentricness and speedy pace, as well as their eccentricity. Warpig obviously recognized that the pop song form had by then become an infinitely malleable entity, filling their songs with strange twists and turns to augment basic verse/chorus structures. A song like “Melody with Balls” manages to fit some early metal riffing, slide guitar solos, freeform descents into noise, and a lot of pace changes into six minutes. Or “Advance Am,” an downright barmy instrumental led by Snitch’s harpsichord-like riffs. The opening of “U.X.I.B.” features a similar keyboard sound before diving into a blues-by-way-of-Black-Sabbath groove. I’m happy Relapse unearthed this one; it slots in nicely along with their two Pentagram compilations in putting the spotlight on North America’s neglected proto-metal heroes. If there’s someone out there who wants to drop $800 on an original copy, more power to them, but $20 for this lovingly packaged and annotated version is an excellent value.

21 Tandem Repeats—No Junk Mail Please (Canada Lynx)
I must tread carefully here because our man Super Robertson has taken an occasional drubbing with this here album, and I feel some pressure to weigh in and save the day by bestowing album of the year honours upon No Junk Mail Please. It's difficult to review friends' work. I mean, if I didn't know these people and this crossed my desk, would I really give it a chance? If I did throw it on, I'm sure I'd quickly appreciate its spirit and lack of pandering 'n' posturing and clichéd boy/girl angst bullshit. And I'd dig the marauding, smoke-laced vibe of "Heidi Stopover." Yeah, lots to like in these 36 minutes.

However, I'm not some distant pair of impartial ears. I've seen 21 Tandem Repeats play, on average, every month for the last three years. I know what they're capable of on stage. Based on that, and based on what I hear on No Junk Mail Please, maybe it's time to don my picky pants and administer some tough love. I've often thought that past Robertson releases had production that was a little too polite for the music at hand. While this sometimes suited the jazzier, busier moments of his former band Roadbed, it stamps down the dynamics of 21 TR's more direct, groove-based sound. This isn't much of a problem at the album's outset—the first four numbers whiz by enjoyably—but the trio of songs in the middle takes the album down a sleepy little path. "The Key of 5," with its skittish rhythm section and wandering lead guitar, feels like it was still being worked up in the studio. (Although I don't advocate the band redoing old tracks, I'd like to hear them take another crack at this one—the song has a solid hook that needs to be exploited.) "Mr. Greenie," the last of this trio, should have been the song to take the album to a new peak. I've seen the band rip this number up live many times, but here it merely grooves along amiably, in a situation where the stomping of distortion pedals is required—which Robertson’s old foil Shockk could have supplied if this was a Roadbed track. A new, twangified recording of SUPERSIMIAN's "On Frozen Pond" helps put the band back on track, but the odd choice to follow it up with a cover song featuring a guest vocalist only reveals another pothole to negotiate. While I have nothing against the song (Roger Dean Young is godhead in my book) or Rebecca Till's voice, the sudden shift of style and tone makes it feel like the band have left the building.

So, I think this album features a few missteps from our heroes. That’s how it goes sometimes. Knowing how hard Robertson works to keep music in his life, he’s to be saluted, not belittled, and if you drop by the Supper Show and like the band, then you should pick this up. But now I want to hear the “rage hero” in Robertson's music. I know he’s got it in him. I hear a hint of it in the tense edge to his voice on “Disappear.” And if he wants to balance that sort of crankiness with jubilant expressions of hope along the lines of “Robertson’s Dream Orchard” (track 2), that would suit me just fine.

Ah, Jex Thoth. You are moss-smothered and messed up, conjuring proto-doom hymns by the light of a dying candle. You are not made for these times. You are overheated tubes and saturated tape, muddied signals on frayed cables. You are held in high regard by The Energizer and myself, and slated to appear in the next issue of Unrestrained! You are Julian Cope's Album of the Month. You are, in his words, "currently Sat In The Lap of the Motherfucker!" Yep.

My friend Adrian 'The Energizer' Bromley passed away suddenly on Sunday morning. I've been absolutely gutted for the last couple days with shock and heartbreak. For the last nine years, Adrian was a presence I could feel vibrating all the way across the country, an embodiment of enthusiasm and humour and love of life.

The Energizer was, of course, a co-founder of Unrestrained! magazine, the publication I've been copyediting (and occasionally writing for) since issue #8. The magazine was Adrian's chief passion, and it's been a thrill watching it grow and improve over the years. My first issue was the first with a colour cover; the issue after that had all glossy pages, and then colour gradually spread across the magazine until it reached the full-colour thing of beauty it is today. Adrian spearheaded each little improvement. He was justifiably proud of it.

He approached each issue with the same excitement. It usually started with a phone call. "Are you at your computer? Hold on, I'm going to send you something." An email with a mocked-up cover attached would arrive. He'd want my opinion right then and there. That cover's first appearance, to me, was the kick-off to the next few weeks of work—a flurry of interviews and emails and phone calls and editing and proofing, followed by a two-week pause for breath before the finished issue arrived. Adrian immediately wanted to know what I thought of it. He was always looking for ways to make it better.

I've been reading a lot of tributes to Adrian lately—dozens and dozens, hundreds probably. Everyone has Energizer stories, even people who never met him in person. They all marvel at the positive outlook he had, his generosity, and his energy. It's clear that he treated everyone the same way, and he gave everyone his best.

Nothing got Adrian down...for very long, at least. I remember he was between music-industry jobs a long time ago, and he'd taken a job with a debt-collection agency. When he told me where he was working, I think I audibly blanched at the idea of dealing with angry people on the phone all day long. Adrian jumped in and reassured me that he was having some really good conversations with a lot interesting people. It was all good. I'm sure he was a kick-ass debt collector. And when he had to leave his job doing PR at The End Records in New York and had to come back to Canada and start over again, he set up his own PR business, Ixmati Media, and was soon doing better than ever.

He was unfailingly kind and generous with his time. Whenever I was in Toronto he'd take me out for lunch on the U! tab (i.e. the bank of Adrian) and take me around to all the worthy record stores to haul some vinyl. He played a big part in helping Toronto become one of my favourite cities. And I remember when I flew to Montreal for Voivod's Katorz listening party/press day, after I arrived at the hotel he made sure I got something to eat and found my bearings before he had to attend to Jason Newsted's arrival. (That was the only time I've seen Adrian nervous. "Rock stars" of Newsted's stature didn't usually enter the underground metal realm Adrian was so ultra-comfortable in. Newsted was way cool, though, and he and Adrian hit it off right away, of course.)

And his nickname wasn't 'The Energizer' for nothing. As so many others have noted, the guy could do a dozen things at once—he'd be firing off IMs and emails while on the phone, writing press releases, reviews, articles, interviews. He loved to be connected to people—truly a man for these high-speed wireless times. He was raving about Facebook the last few times I talked to him and was a constant presence on the Brave Board, a place where so many people are mourning his loss right now.

He could write 18 articles for Unrestrained! in a single day. The first email with, say, eight Word documents attached would arrive on a Saturday morning. The subject line: "I'm on a roll!!"

Everyone mentions The Energizer's phone calls. They were quite something—one-sided affairs during which you'd be lucky to squeeze a syllable betwixt the Energizer's conversational bursts. After you'd hung up you could only shake your head and chuckle.

Then there were the extra-excited calls after he'd heard something amazing.

"Dude. The new Witchcraft album is amazing!"

Or the extra-extra excited calls when simply telling you wouldn't suffice; he would have to play it to you over the phone. I remember a few minutes from Agalloch's The Mantle, the resurrected Voivod, and the second album from some band called Woods of Ypres echoing, barely discernible, down the line. But they were all amazing!! (especially when I got to hear them properly!)

He loved vinyl, Cheap Trick, John Candy, Amy Sedaris, stoner rock, PJ Harvey, his cat, and his fiancée Renee. He was the genuine article, a true one-off, and we're all going to miss him terribly.

Although I can devour 33 1/3 books like so many Kit Kats, I’ll admit they’re not all created equal. I’ve preferred the nuts ‘n’ bolts “behind the scenes” volumes to the ones that attempt to capture an album’s appeal in fictional or personal essay form. The last two 33 1/3 books I’ve read have won me over to the latter approach, though.

First, there was Mountain Goats mainman and Decibel magazine columnist John Darnielle’s novella concerning Black Sabbath’s Master of Reality. Through his narrator, a troubled youth confined to a psych ward (and having had all his tapes confiscated, to boot), Darnielle manages to capture the appeal of Sabbath and their heaviest album, as well as depicting exactly how, for some of us, music functions as a stabilizing, essential constant in our lives. It’s a moving little book.

The last 33 1/3 I read was one I’ve picked up many times in stores, wondering exactly what its deal was. Author Carl Wilson’s choice of subject jumped out at me as surprising, if banal—Céline Dion’s Let’s Talk About Love. Was he kidding? This wasn't exactly up there with The Velvet Underground and Nico or Unknown Pleasures in terms of albums with rock crit credibility. The book’s subtitle helped to clarify the author’s intentions a little bit: “A journey to the end of taste.” Well, that was nearly enough to sell me on it.

Instead I checked it out of the library. It was better than I could have imagined. Wilson picks up and connects many threads in his very personal exploration of Céline Dion’s appeal—notions of kitsch, schmaltz, “lowbrow” art, Quebecois culture, the talent show as genre, and so on—but the question this book really seeks to answer is “Why do we like what we like?” And that’s a big question, comprising personal decisions and impulses both conscious and unconscious.

It’s a small thrill when a writer connects their subject matter to something I enjoy. Wilson, bless him, does it here:
“As her songs rocket to their predestined apexes, she does not resist, she goes along for the ride, leaning on the accelerator and seldom the brake, emphasizing intensity not difference. It reminds me of nothing so much as current ‘underground’ metal, which has thrown out the spare musical parts of past hard rock and pared down to loud guitars, drums and screaming. Today’s metal has no power ballads, no more Nazareth doing ‘Love Hurts,’ no more Kiss doing ‘Beth,’ no more Guns N’ Roses ‘Sweet Child o’ Mine.’ So Céline is singing them instead. It’s been said that ‘pro wrestling is soap opera on steroids,’ so maybe Céline Dion is metal on estrogen.”

I stumbled upon this article about double albums in the Guardian right before I interviewed John Cobbett of Hammers of Misfortune this afternoon. The new Hammers release (out this week on Profound Lore) is a double too. Although I can discern a theme in the artwork and lyrics for each half of the album, I wouldn't call it a concept album à la The Lamb... or The Wall. As the band themselves say, it's more like a split release with themselves.

I reviewed it for the last issue of Unrestrained!, so I won't rehash that here. Listening to it again now, I hear a lot of Blue Oyster Cult and Heep in it, along with the expected Lizzyness and Maidenisms. The singing throughout is also amazing, considering the tossed-off grunting that a lot of metal bands proffer. They've clearly put a ton of work crafting melodies and harmonies to carry the songs along. Hammers of Misfortune are doing remarkable things on a shoestring, and have earned the right to unleash a double LP. It's well worth forking out for.

You might also want to read this post on their blog for some defiant, inspiring words.

Anekdoten—A Time of Day (Virta)
The latest Anekdoten album contains a golden moment in the form of a jarring musical event that almost made me fall off my chair the first time I heard it. This moment occurs during the album’s second track, “30 Pieces,” a jagged waltz that gets more and more intense, building up to a crazed unison passage before releasing, suddenly and gloriously, into…a flute solo. And not just a flute solo, but a flute solo introduced by an almighty whack from a vibra-slap. Two good things that go great together. I believe the band were trying to kill me with coolness.
A lot of fans still cling to Anekdoten’s earlier albums, where their King Crimson influences were more blatant, but over the course of five studio full-lengths they’ve refined that style to become very much their own thing, and that thing is still compelling to me. Their sound is anchored by Anna Sofi-Dahlberg’s vintage-sounding keyboards and the raspy, stealthy bass lines of Jan Erik Liljeström, both of them combining to infuse the songs with overarching melancholy. The songs themselves are pretty economical by prog standards. Never ones to solo at any length, Anekdoten prefer to steer verse/chorus structures towards mini-instrumentals before returning to a previously established part. It’s often these detours that produce the most thrilling, dark moments, such as the monolithic riff that erupts in the midst of “A Sky About to Rain” or the ethereal drone section that bisects “Prince of the Ocean.” Sometimes I think I should change the name of this blog, because music by bands like Anekdoten is such an effortless pleasure. Whatever further refinements they make to their material in the future, as long as they retain their solid songwriting and—most importantly—their sound, I’ll be listening.

I've never actually tried concocting recreational hallucinogens (those long DIY articles in Flipside involving morning glory seeds, acetone, and cold medicines always sounded to me like a surefire route to brain damage and/or third-degree burns) but I happened upon an effective recipe last Wednesday night.

1. Come home unexpectedly tired after having downed a couple pints at a book launch.
2. Lie on couch, close eyes, and drift in and out of consciousness while this album is playing:

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Missing: Sigur Ros, October 7 at the Chan Centre.