September was a good month for indie rock. A lot of cool stuff came out – good timing too, cuz it gave me all kinds of cool new stuff to listen while starting school work again :$ So yeah, likewise I think the month’s mix turned out well, got some big poppy bouncers on there, some nice little lo-fi stuff – it’s cool.

1. Summer Camp – Better Off Without You

2. Pterodactyl – Nerds

3. Regina – Haluan Sinut

4. [Bird]bones – Meet Me There, On A Hill

5. Gathered Ghosts – Feels Like Nothing

6. The Rest – Always On My Mind

7. The Morning Clouds – A Walk Home

8. Seoul – Know Your Boyfriend

9. The Rapture – Children

10. Winter Family – Shooting Stars

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So, this is the first monthly mix. I noticed that a lot of blogs I like do mixes, which are cool and also nice for people who don’t check the blogosphere constantly. They can just come by, grab the mix, get the skinny on some cool musics being made – right? Admittedly some of the stuff on this mix is pretty popular (Fucked Up, TV On The Radio, Panda Bear) but there’s also a bunch of up-and-comers for peeps to discover. It’s just some of the cool stuff that’s come out in the last month of so, or maybe I just discovered it in the last month. Anyways, check it, dig it, etc.

1. TVOTR – Repetition

2. Generationals – Greenleaf

3. Panda Bear – Surfer’s Hymn

4. Fucked Up – The Other Shoe

5. The Soft Province – Lazy Minds Die

6. Ruby Coast – Liza Liza

7. Loko – Cove City

8. Dona Nicha – The Gentleman From Paris (Water Babies)

9. Kildear – Finlandia

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Justice McLellan of Ruby Coast and I did a little phone interview a bit ago and talked about the band’s new album Whatever This Is (due out next year around ‘late Feb/early March’), writing more emotional songs, and persevering through emotional hardship when the show must go on.

M: So, I met you guys back in 2008 at the Halifax Pop Explosion. What’s been going on with Ruby Coast since then? How have you grown as a band and as people?

J: That was the first time we were on the road for a long period of time. We did a month tour with Tokyo Police Club and played SXSW and that was also our first time being in a confined space together – like a van, hotel rooms – for like, a while. We all got to know each other a lot better from that experience and we definitely grew as friends.

[More recently] we decided to take a break from playing shows to write. Playing live is great but the greatest part is coming up with something where you’ll be in a room playing and you’ll just look at everyone and share an energy that confirms that what you’re playing is awesome. We did that for a while, quite a long time. Then we went to Hotel2Tango and recorded with Howard Bilerman and Brian Paulson. It was kind of rough because our bass player Mark [Whiting], his mom was diagnosed with terminal cancer, so he was torn between wanting to keep writing and doing stuff with us, because he wanted to spend time with his mom, but she was really supportive of him continuing on [with the band] and going to record the album. She recently passed away – it’s been kind of a crazy time. But just playing music and stuff, I think it’s helped him.

M: Did you find that experience channeled into the music of the new record?

J: It wasn’t necessarily the subject itself but I think some of the intensity of the time leading up to it definitely channeled into our music. It was a pretty emotional time for everyone and the record feels a lot more emotional and that could’ve come from that situation.

M: Do you think that experience gave you guys a new perspective on things?

J: Yeah, especially Mark regarding whether to keep going [with the band] and having this sort of deadline of his mother’s life. He was obviously really torn between that. There were times when he would obviously be upset over the situation but his parents were also motivating him to come out. I think seeing that commitment was an eye-opener for all of us.

M: How did Ruby Coast begin?

J: I started playing guitar in grade 12 when I was 18 and I was in a co-op class with Nathan [Vanderweilan, guitar player in Ruby Coast]. My dad has this sort of makeshift studio and I had this teacher, Mrs. Nerling, and she was really awesome and somehow passed working in this crappy studio off as a co-op. Nathan and I started writing there and he was actually teaching me how to play guitar. And yeah, that was when we first started writing songs. That fell off for a few months after school finished, but then we got back to it and got everyone else in the band.

We were playing shows in Newmarket and they were going really well, so we decided to see if we could branch out a bit and go play Toronto. We played a No Shame show, and Lauren Shreiber [who runs No Shame] really enjoyed it and started putting us in her showcases. More people came and saw us, including our manager Bobby Kimberly. He saw us at the Drake and we talked, he was interested in getting us some shows, and then that just fell into place. Shortly after that Steven Himmelfarb, our booking agent, saw us play a few times and sort of signed up.

M: [Tokyo Police Club frontman] David Monks produced your first EP – how did you guys hook up with him?

J: He lives in Newmarket and Nathan was going out with his sister for a while. So he started coming to some of our shows and we became friends with him.

M: Was he like, “Alright guys, let’s go into the studio and make a record!”

J: Not really. We were playing some older material for a while before he was into doing anything. It was nice to have him come out to the shows and stuff, but we just kept writing, trying to progress as a band, and after a little bit he was like, “Oh, I like a bunch of these songs, we should go and record them.”

M: What was it like to go and record with Howard Bilerman and Brian Paulson in Hotel2Tango?

J: At first I thought it was going to be a lot more crafty and technical but it definitely wasn’t. We did all the tracks live off the floor without a click track, so it was just us in a rehearsal space, having fun, rocking out, but obviously being in a much better sounding room. There wasn’t too much that Howard and Brian changed when it came to songs. They were really great guys and we just worked.

M: What do you feel they added to the Ruby Coast or at least to the sound of the new album?

J: We did one mix at Hotel2Tango that was pretty pressed for time and we weren’t really happy with it. Also, I got sick so I couldn’t really sing one of the tracks. I went in a week later and did a vocal track to this one song that I didn’t finish and we sent it to Brian to get mixed and it just sounded way better than all the other mixes that were done at Hotel2Tango. So we asked him to remix a couple of songs that we weren’t really happy with, and once we received those back, you could see that’s where the record was supposed to be. He was really making them come to life with the live feel that we went for. So we sent them all to him and he remixed all the tracks. Brian found a way to make it sound like a band just playing in a room, whereas it was a bit mushy before – he just cleared everything out and made it sound great.

M: When I was listening to “Whatever This Is”, I felt like this was a much more emotional-sounding Ruby Coast then we’d heard before.

J: Well, I sort of ruined one really special relationship during the making of the record. It was just a mess and there was tons of emotion coming from that and…not being able to control situations, like Mark’s mom passing away. It was an intense time. With this album I was listening to a lot of music and discovering what songs really resonated with me, and what I really wanted to do with music. One thing that I came across was that it’s a great thing when you can put on somebody else’s song and they just say something the way it is. It can hit home and make you feel better rather than just hearing about some walking towel or something.

M: What songs in particular did you really connect with while writing this album?

J: I’ve been listening to Camera Obscura’s My Maudlin Career and I could relate to that album a lot, especially the song “Away With Murder”. “Sometimes” by My Bloody Valentine – that song really connected with me while we were making the record.

M: What was it about “Sometimes” you connected with?

J: It just sounds sad. There’s this epic-ness to it that’s so uplifting. I don’t know if it’s a keyboard or something, but it comes in halfway through and it goes from this washy guitar to this uplifting feeling. I feel like sadder songs can be easier for me to connect with than a song like “Walking On Sunshine”.

M: Did you know that album, Loveless, was made while [My Bloody Valentine frontman] Kevin Shields and [My Bloody Valentine guitarist] Belinda Butcher were going through a breakup?

J: Oh really?

M: Yeah, that’s why it’s called Loveless, because their relationship had become loveless.

J: That’s awesome.

M: So what does the future hold in store for Ruby Coast?

J: We’re constantly writing and we’re going to tour this record as much as we can. With this record I feel like we tapped into a different emotional level compared to our EP. I guess we just want to keep growing in that realm and making songs that are really personal and connect with us and hopefully other people. Do what we do and not try and make something that’s contrived and bullshit, but human.

My thoughts upon first hearing Toronto indie-rockers Ruby Coast were, “oh, it’s Tokyo Police Club Jr.” Though Ruby Coast have hardly undergone a sound makeover since their eponymous debut EP, they went up to Montreal for a bit this summer, worked with some killer producers, and the new stuff sounds phenomenal so far. Better than anything from Tokyo Police Club Sr.’s last album actually, and I wouldn’t make such a bullheaded statement if I didn’t back it 100%.

Check out the video below for their latest single, “Whatever This Is”, which manages to evoke the kind of emotion TPC themselves should’ve looked into a while ago.

Ruby Coast

Projectable Collections EP

[Independent; 2008]

7.2/10.0

Sometimes I get to meet the bands I review, and it’s always fun when I do. The boys of Ruby Coast were no exception. I met most of the band at Coconut Grove last week during the Halifax Pop Explosion, which they were here to play. I met Nathan first, kind of randomly. I was talking to Rich Aucoin, whom I’d met a long time ago during the Over The Top Festival in Toronto, which I’d played with The Fancy Claps in 2007, and when Rich had to go, Nathan was hanging by the bar. I saw him over at Spiral Beach’s show just before so we started talking and he told me he was part of Ruby Coast. I then got to meet most of the rest of the band and we chilled a bit, talked about the EP, Aurora and how many girls we’d slept with (you’d think the rock stars would have slept with more girls than the rock critic – not always so, apparently).

I’d heard the EP and liked it before meeting them but it’s taken me until now to strap down and review the damn thing. So yes, I do like the EP, as the score at the top already reveals. However, as the lack of a 10.0/10.0 score reveals, I have some problems with it. Namely, the band sounds way too much like Tokyo Police Club – something that is not helped by the fact that TPC member Dave Monks produced the EP. Lead singer Justice McLellan’s vocals sound almost exactly like Monks’ do, their lyrics could easily be written by the same person, and both bands’ pop sensibilities are pretty much identical. Honestly, in a more cynical world, Ruby Coast could simply be Monks’ attempt to clone his own band and profit off of it.

Luckily, Tokyo Police Club is a pretty good band that’s met with an enormous amount of success over the past couple years. But does the world really need Tokyo Police Club Jr.?  No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t even need Tokyo Police Club Sr.. The band knows how to write hooks like it knows how to breathe but their music isn’t pushing any boundaries lyrically or stylistically nor achieving anything truly that impressive. Elephant Shell was the same song rewritten like 12 times – but luckily it was a good song.

Ruby Coast’s Projectable Collectors EP is more varied than that album but not by all that much. The band tries some interesting things, like integrating shifting song-structures in songs like opener “More Than Television”, which starts as a two-chord charger but then gets a turn-around via cheerful melody. They also make use of a great bouncy-rhythm in “Laugh At Alice”.

Really every song is musically fantastic; catchy as fuck and stuffed to the brim with lovely little hooks. Their playing is amazingly tight and energetic, resulting in impressively performed songs from start to finish. Then of course there’s the pitch-perfect production by Dave Monks, which not only gets the job done but adds all kinds of fun little touches, like whirling noises that fill up the sides of the sonic landscape.

The lyrics however are often meaningless or contain some cute little cultural observation (“I remember watching television/at my first glance/what’s in what’s out, what our lives are about/you better dance the way we dance”). None of the songs seem to actually be about anything, and this is something TPC is guilty of also. Not only are they about nothing but they leave no meaningful impression upon the listener lyrically, emotionally or intellectually.

Though Pavement, The Pixies and The New Pornographers write most of their lyrics with meaningless wordplay, their songs often seem to be about something, even if they’re not. The song “Here” off Slanted and Enchanted might have been written with Steven Malkmus just tossing off whatever came to mind but how many better opening lines are there than, “I was dressed for success/but success it never came”? How many other alt-rock bands have written verses as affecting as “and I’m the only one who laughs/at your jokes when they are so bad/and your jokes are always bad”? That song might actually be about nothing but I have no doubt in my mind that that song has meaning, even if it wasn’t intended to. There’s a reason Malkmus and Pavement are as revered as they are. Ruby Coast has a long way to go to achieving such meaningless meaning with its lyrics and music.

I can’t actually give the EP a bad review as it’s too damn enjoyable. Each song is awesome and different enough to make listening to it a consistently exciting experience. However, if Bob Dylan is a Soy Protein Burger shot-up with essential nutrients and LSD, then Ruby Coast is a candy dipstick: sweet as fuck but disposable and unfortunately quite forgettable.

http://www.myspace.com/rubycoast  

In case you don’t know, the Halifax Pop Explosion was a music festival that took place last week in my current hometown of Halifax. Over 140 bands played at 12 different venues across the city between Monday the 21st and Saturday the 26th, including Jay Reatard, Laura Barrett, Holy Fuck, Islands and my hommies from T-dot, Spiral Beach!!!

Interestingly enough, I get a Facebook message about a week or so before the festival from this girl I met at V-fest a while ago and had since stayed in touch with (see my note on V-fest…you’d have to go waaaaay back though…) asking me if I can hook her friend up with a place to stay. I tell her I’ve got a lovely floor and her friend says, “I’ll take it!” In return, she hooks me up with a press pass to the festival…sweet…

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to see the first two days of the festival due to uNfOrtunate cIrcumstances beyonD my control at the time. So for me the festival started at around four on Wednesday when I got to see The Diableros play a short set at Taz Records.

It took them fucking FOREVER to get set up, though they have my sympathies, as they were setting up in the back room of a record store that was not set up with in-store performances in mind (I can’t imagine how people pull it off in Soundscapes back home, that place in tiny…but awesome). When they finally did get set up they played a great little set of melodically charged indie-rock to a whole like 7 people…very lame turnout for a very awesome band. I couldn’t even find anyone to go with! Sorry Diableros, hopefully your night set at Coconut Grove was better; the people of Halifax don’t deserve your awesomeness.

On Thursday, my guest, Sari, arrived. I showed her my room, we chilled for a bit and then we headed over to the Citadel Hotel and picked up our festival passes.

Fast forward a bit to that night and we went to St. Mathew’s Church to see Spiral Beach. We got there before the band started and I ran up to say hi to everybody. They were all like “oh, hey marc/grub,” but it was clear that the entire crew was running on empty. They’d driven something like 15 hours straight or something to get to Halifax just in time to play their half-hour set and then they had to drive another 10 or something hours right away to get to Ottawa to play some other show. I heard Maddy complaining about being really, really hungry so I went out to Venus Pizza and bought the band a pizza. Yes, I know, a little kiss-ass but my experience knowing Spiral Beach has been so rewarding in so many ways that it was really only an attempt at returning a favor to buy these guys a freakin’ pizza.

Anyway, even sleep deprived and starving they played an awesome show and managed to get the entire front row of the church onto their feet and dancing…no small feat. After their set, The Meligrove Band went on and they did their nice little indie-pop thing also. I was a little distracted because when they went on, Laura Barrett and Rich Aucoin both walked in and I just thought it was too cool that they were all there, chillin, and that they all remembered me (yay!).

After The Meligrove Band, Sari and I headed over to Coconut Grove to see Boxer the Horse. I can’t say I was that impressed by them or the band that came after, The Rural Alberta Advantage, but I guess they were both at least ok. For me, they were both just too interested in making weird noises than they were in writing good songs. While I was not-listening to those two bands I was talking to Hilary Beaumont (of the Dal Gazette) about the problem with music nowadays; talking to Rich Aucoin about what he’s up to now and meeting the members of Ruby Coast, who are all very nice, nice boys.

The very nice boys of Ruby Coast

Eventually Rich Aucoin gets onstage and sets up his projector and proceeds to rock out. Musically it’s just him and some keyboard-type instruments but Aucoin’s sound is bigger, better and so much more gorgeous than 90% of bands. He plays his beautiful songs synched up to clips of the original cartoon Grinch or some weird old movies projected onto a sheet in front of the stage. At times, Aucoin lets his gear run on autopilot and he marches around the stage, throwing confetti or balloons into the audience. His performance was probably the best of the entire festival; an absolute stunner in every respect.

The Ghost Bees are up next and they are like…really tiny…but really good. Playing guitar and mandolin, the twin sisters harmonize about vampires and old German ghost stories. They’re absolutely incredible and everything from their wardrobe attire to the way they set up the stage with creepy masks and such creates a fantastically creepy-woods vibe. After their set they poured “dream tea” for a couple of us to drink, telling us it would make us dream more. Did it? Not really…maybe a little.

Closing the night was the inimitable Laura Barrett. Armed with a bunch of kalimbas, Barrett coos lovely melodies over haunting kalimba rhythms that she plays with an obvious mastery of the instrument. At one point she tries to create some kind of “dance party” with some kind of old school drum machine type thing. It doesn’
t exactly work out perfectly but whenever anything doesn’t go right, Barrett and the audience just laugh it up, enjoying it regardless.

After Barrett’s performance I call it a night. I meet up with Sari (who was over at The Marquee Club for Holy Fuck) and we head back to my place.

The next night there weren’t really too many bands I wanted to see but I went to St. Mathews Church to check out I See Rowboats anyways, cuz I’d heard good things about them.

First up was The Prospectors Union. They were really great and there were a couple moments during their set that were really incredible though the whole thing really didn’t do it for me. Sometimes that’s just how it is.

I See Rowboats was pretty interesting and great too, though more the former than the latter. They use a lot of interesting instruments and focus a lot on the violins, which makes for a very beautiful sound, though again, they lacked that je ne ce qua that moves me.

Last was The Retribution Gospel Choir, which features two members of Low, which is a decent band. They played some new (and very loud) version of their slowcore rock from the 90’s. Again, didn’t do it for me. After a couple songs I decided to just head back.

The last day of the fest was pretty cool. Sari and I decided to head over to the Zine and Record Fair at St. David’s Church. Only problem was that it wasn’t at St. David’s Church. And that place is really far. So after we’d travelled all the way across the city to get to the place, we realized it wasn’t the right place. The right church was actually only ten minutes from King’s. My amazing sense of direction prevails once again! The good part of the whole getting lost bit though was that I found a new comic book store with better prices and selection than the resident one, Strange Adventures.

When we got to the Zine and Record Fair I bought a couple albums and checked out a lot of the cool stuff. A lot of zines, cool clothing, weird things, etc. It was great; I love that kind of homemade craft stuff.

We then headed over to The Pavillion to catch Islands, who played for like 20 minutes…but it was a really good 20 minutes…

That night we went and saw Picnicface’s HPE performance at the Citadel Hotel and of course it was hilarious. Then we went and had pizza and beer at Boston pizza. I decided I wasn’t going to go to any concerts that night and instead I would work on my essay. Sari however, convinced me to go with her to Coconut Grove for just a bit. We checked out The Bicycles and some rapper dude or something and then decided to head back to my room.

We got there and then we watched Me, You And Everyone we know which, like, BLEW MY FREAKIN MIND and scared the fucking shit out of me. I had been depressed that whole day and that movie only made it so much worse. I think the depression was caused by me drinking two Brava’s that day and for some reason I’ve become like caffeine intolerant. Weird. Anyways, yeah, good movie.

All in all it was a very awesome festival. I wish I could have seen Holy Fuck and Jay Reatard and Ruby Coast but whatevs, what I did see was awesome. I might even go so far as to say it was…explosive? Just maybe…

http://www.myspace.com/halifaxpopexplosion