Friend Army
Some Party is a newsletter sharing the latest in independent Canadian rock'n'roll, curated more-or-less weekly by Adam White. Each edition explores punk, garage, psych, and otherwise uncategorizable indie rock, drawing lines from proto to post and taking some weird diversions along the way.
The Burning Hell are back with another new album. Revival Beach is the follow up to 2016's Public Library and will be the prolific band's eighth full-length. With their personnel always shifting, the indie rock act currently finds itself as a trio, with Mathias Kom's vocals and guitar backed by Ariel Sharratt on drums and bass clarinet, with Darren Browne playing bass and bouzouki. The first single from the new record is titled "Friend Army" and finds the group in full rock'n'roll mode backing some of Kom's signature wordplay.
Revival Beach was recorded and mixed by Al Harle at Big Jelly Studios in Ramsgate, UK this past June. Look for a September 29th release on BB*ISLAND. You can check out the cover art, track listing, and more over at the label's website.
Speaking of The Burning Hell, a frequent member in recent years has been Peterborough's Nick Ferrio. While Nick's taking a paternity leave from the group for this LP, he does have a collection of his own music that's also set for a September 29th release. Ferrio's new 10 song record is titled Soothsayer and was recorded with James McKenty in Peterborough with Sean Conway on bass and Brandon Munro on drums. There's no audio to share from this one yet, but expect it soon.
Of Note
Remember all the speculation last week with regards to the tenth anniversary of Attack In Black's Marriage? Dine Alone Records will be celebrating with a vinyl reissue (180 gram, tweaked artwork, and if you're in for the bundle, packaged with a new poster and t-shirt). That's perhaps less fantastical news than some were holding out for, but it's pretty cool for what it is (in particular if you missed the boat on the Record Store Day reissue of this album from a few years back).
Drew Thomson of Single Mothers dropped a surprise solo full length last week, billed as The Drew Thomson Foundation Vol 1: Huh, it's generally pretty empty in here. The seven song set was produced, mixed, and engineered by Ian Romano (of the aforementioned Attack In Black), who also drums on the recordings. Ross Miller of Single Mothers and the Dirty Nil plays bass and additional guitar on the songs. Given how much Thomson draws on anxiety and sarcasm on Single Mothers records, it's nice to hear his approach when the stylistic confines of punk rock are lifted a little.
Ottawa pop-punk group The Riptides are gearing up for a September 12th release of their new 18 song full-length Canadian Graffiti. Portland's Something To Do Records will be handling the LP, which is limited to 500. The band recorded at Sonic Iguana studios with Mass Giorgini (Squirtgun, Screeching Weasel, Common Rider) and the album features art by Archie Comics' legend Dan Parent. The sunny lead single, complete with doo-wop harmonies, is titled "Goodbye Hawaii" and it's streaming now via Dying Scene.
Toronto's Weaves, with their Polaris shortlist slot and prominent festival appearances this summer, are having a bit of a limelight moment. The band's taken the opportunity to announce their sophomore LP, Wide Open. The record's due on October 6th via Buzz Records in Canada, Kanine in the States, and Memphis Industries overseas. The 11 song album opens with "#53," which has a bit of a soaring new wave thing going on. Check it out below. The album art, full track listing, and international tour dates running through the end of November can be found at Pitchfork.
From atop Weaves' mountain of good will you can probably wave at Partner over on their own peak. The Windsor-via-Sackville rock band seems to be doing just about everything right in the lead up to In Search of Lost Time this fall. Everything the group's released so far has been enormously fun and the new single "Play The Field" continues that trend. The song's featured in a new music video directed by Lesley Marshall and filmed at the University of Windsor. Josée Caron described the new track:
This song is based on a true story of when I was in grade eight. My friends were really good at sports but I definitely was not; I was eager to belong. I gathered all my courage and tried out for my school basketball team. Somehow I made it past tryouts and onto the single ‘A’ team. I was so happy to just be on a team, it didn’t matter that I would only score one basket all season, or that I would score on my own team.
Lucy (Niles) and I try to channel that blissful state in this song, which could be described as an effort to reclaim some of our dignity by surrendering to our true talents. It’s about admiring, romanticizing, and desiring the dignified excellence that seems to come along with being good at sports, knowing it’s something you will never truly experience but not really minding because you’re stoked that you get to hang out with your crush at practice.
Caron and Niles provided some further background on their writing process in an interview at Stereogum. The new album's out on September 8th via You've Changed Records.
Red Deer, Alberta skate-punk act Trashed Ambulance announced a new EP for release at the end of August on Montreal's Thousand Islands Records. Instant will be the band's second EP of the year, following A Dime For Every Time in May. It features two new tracks ("Kooby" and "12 Inches of Christmas") along with three re-recorded songs that originally appeared on the band's 2016 release Blurry Thoughts.
Montreal melodic pop-punk act Lost Love have announced a set of August tour dates in Quebec and Ontario. Punknews has the dates listed. The band will be taking Parisian punk act Maladroit along for the trip. Lost Love last released Comfortable Scars on Stomp in 2016.
FME
I'm excited to announce that Some Party is sponsored this month by the Festival de musique émergente en Abitibi-Témiscamingue, or FME for short. The festival, now in its 15th year, will take place in Rouyn-Noranda, Quebec from August 31st through September 3rd. The 70 acts performing in this small mining town represent a pretty huge variety of genres, everything from folk to hip hop to metal and electronic music at equal measure in both French and English. I'll highlight a few of the Canadian acts performing each week this month.
Montreal's Duchess Says are FME veterans, having played the event on at least three prior occasions. Founded in 2003, the four-piece plays what I've seen kicked around as kraut-punk, synth-punk, or moog-rock. Any and all of those labels could be attached to the band's sprawling third full-length, Sciences Nouvelles, which was released in late 2016 on Slovenly and Bonsound. At this year's festival, Duchess Says cap off the opening night with a show at the Petit Théâtre du Vieux Noranda featuring Parisian dance-punk act Slosh and Montreal prog quintet Atsuko Chiba also on the bill.
Also hailing from Montreal, Chocolat is currently supporting their third full-length, Rencontrer Looloo. The band's latest effort fully embraces the weird extremes of the psych-rock spectrum, which of course means there's a narrative that follows interdimensional space gurus and the like. Musically Chocolat shift often from charging hard rock to danceable grooves, taking as many genre twists over the course of the record as their trippy lyrical concept allows. The album was released this past November by Dare to Care, Beyond Beyond is Beyond, and Teenage Menopause. At FME the band will play Cabaret de la dernière on Friday, September 1st.
