Ten years ago today, Built to Spill released their sixth album You In Reverse. It features some of my favourite Built to Spill tunes. I've seen the band only twice and got to photograph them at TURF last summer. Those pics are here.
Check out my favourite tunes from this album. They audibly illustrate the hypnotic and engaging music that makes this band a must-experience live band.
"Goin' Against Your Mind"
"Traces"
"Liar"
"Conventional Wisdom" The main guitar riff and hook for this song has to be one of my all-time favourites. It's awesomeness in audio form.
Day 1 of the 2015 of TURF, The Toronto Urban Roots Festival, was fantastic. The weather was great, the crowd, as always, was fantastic and, of course, the music was sublime.
Prior to the big festival at Fort York, the TURF team put on a Club Bonus Series the coincided with the main festival, as well as a Preview Series. I didn't make it out to all those extra shows, but for the ones that I did, my posts are linked below.
If you missed my individual posts, here's all of day one in one place, plus links to my Club Bonus Series and Preview Series posts.
Here's a band that I first saw in 2009. Ah, the days before concert photography. They're Built to Spill from Boise, Idaho and last time they were here in Toronto they played Lee's Palace. This time they were on the day 1 bill at The Toronto Urban Roots Festival.
They opened their set with one of my personal favourites, "Going Against Your Mind". This band doesn't look like they're having a lot of fun, but you can tell that they're right into it. And the music sounds amazing. Built to Spill rock, they jam, they make the most of the row of guitarists across the front of the stage. They are an incredible live band.
So many important things happening today. First, it's 420.
Second, today's the day that The Toronto Urban Roots Festival, TURF for short, has unveiled their line-up for 2015! The big names include Of Monsters and Men, Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, Wilco, The Avett Brothers, Neko Case, UB40, Cake and Lord Huron. Also on the bill are Desaparecidos featuring Connor Oberst, Deerhunter, Built to Spill, St. Paul and the Broken Bones, Shakey Graves and Will Butler. I'm personally excited about some more of the small-print acts like Fishbone, Skydiggers, The Elwins, NQ Aruckle, Ron Hawkins and the Do Good Assassins and Restorations. In total, there will be 46 acts across three stages, so more acts will be announced as we get closer to the show date.
Due to the Pan-Am Games, the festival is later than usual. It's scheduled for September 18-20 at Fort York Garrison Commons. This year's focus is on the Toronto scene with a local artist kicking things off on each of the three stages each day. The biggest challenge that I see for TURF is the other festivals, including Riot Fest, that are scheduled for the same weekend.
TURF ticket info:
Earlybird Tier One 3 Day Passes, 3 Day Front of Stage VIP Passes, and 3 Day VIP Plus Passes go on sale Thursday April 23 at noon through Ticketfly, and then at Rotate This, Soundscapes, and The Horseshoe Tavern Friday April 24 at noon
Earlybird Tier One ticket sales end on Wednesday June 10 at Midnight
Single day line-ups and tickets will be announced June 8 and on sale June 11
The Club Bonus Series, which features many of the festival performers, appearing in venues like Lee's Palace and The Horseshoe Tavern, is back and will be announced in early July
Here are some of the acts that I'm most looking forward to. Of course, one of the things that I like best about TURF is the acts that I discover by seeing them at the festival.
Of Monsters and Men
The Avett Brothers
Neko Case
Desaparecidos
Deerhunter
Built to Spill
St. Paul and the Broken Bones - quite the build-up from Mr. Letterman. I think these guys will put on a super-fun show.
Fishbone - I haven't seen these guys since the second Lollapalooza tour back in 1993
Skydiggers
Chuck Ragan
The Elwins
NQ Arbuckle
Ron Hawkins and DGA (Do Good Assassins)
Restorations - really like what I hear on first listen. Look for a more in-depth post on these guys.
Just in case you missed it, you can see all my TURF coverage from 2014 and 2013 by clicking right here. I've got pics of such artists as July Talk, Gogol Bordello, Gaslight Anthem, Hey Rosetta!, Drive-By Truckers, Shovels & Rope, Black Joe Lewis, Deer Tick, Gary Clark Jr., London Souls, The Hold Steady, Frank Turner, Lowest of the Low, Matt Mays, Dawes and more.
Back in late 2009, long before my ambitions of being a concert photographer, I saw Built to Spill live at Lee's Palace. However, I did write about it.
Now Built to Spill have a new album called Untethered Moon coming out April 21. They'll be releasing the album on vinyl for Record Store Day on April 18. Of course, the album release will be followed by a tour. These guys are incredible live so be sure to check them out when they hit your town or a festival near you.
Check out the two tunes from the new album that have been released so far:
See what I did there? There was a big crowd out to see Built to Spill at Lee’s Palace on October 7 hence they jammed Lee’s Palace and Built to Spill love to jam and they certainly did a lot of jamming at their show. Ha ha ha. Corny.
This was my first time seeing Built to Spill. I managed to completely miss them during the 90’s and only really knew You In Reverse going into the show. This is one of those bands that I guessed I would truly appreciate once I’d seen them live. This guess turned out to be true and I’m glad I dragged myself out on a Wednesday night to see these guys perform.
Here's the band's video for "Conventional Wisdom". It's from You In Reverse and has one wicked guitar hook. Love it.
Disco Doom opened the show. While my friends and I missed most of their set, their last two songs sounded good. I’ll be seeking out more of their stuff in future. Check out their myspace for some songs.
When Built to Spill took the stage, my friends and I thought that a final sound check was being performed. The singer/guitarist and drummer took to the stage first and over the next number of minutes, a magnificent jam ensued, with band members joining the beautiful noise.
The guys in Built to Spill take a different approach to stage presence than many bands. They take a few minutes between each song to tune and converse amongst themselves. At one point, a guitarist approached the mic and said, "Hey". Other than an occasional "thank you" that was about it for stage patter. Until the singer invited everyone to join him at a DJ gig at Sneaky Dee’s after the Built to Spill show. Being a work night, I didn’t take him up on his offer, but would be interested to hear what his DJ gig was like.
This week I have three, count 'em, three concert nights out that should give my earplugs a good workout.
The first comes tomorrow with one of my greatest influences musically - from his solo work, to Sugar and back to Husker Du - Bob Mould at The Mod Club.
Then, on Wednesday night, I'm off to see Built To Spill's second Toronto show at Lee's Palace.
As I posted previously, Built to Spill has a new album coming out and is coming through Toronto on their tour. The release date is October 6, which doesn't give me a whole lot of time to familiarize myself with it before their date at Lee's Palace that I'm attending on the 7th. Stereogum is featuring two tracks from the new album There is No Enemy. The songs are called "Things Fall Apart" and "Hindsight". I have a feeling that this is going to be one of those bands that absolutely shines in a live setting.
Ben Gibbard from Death Cab for Cutie and Zooey Deschanel (pictured) of movies and She and Him got married this past weekend. Good for them. And any excuse to look at Zooey Deschanel pictures is good with me.
Spiral Beach's new album The Only Really Thing is out. The album is streaming on their site. Listening to it now and it sounds goooooood. ExploreMusic has got some free songs, too. I've got to see these guys live.
Here's the video for "Made of Stone" from Ball.
And the video for "Domino" from The Only Real Thing.
As I posted previously, The Twilight Sad is on tour and has a new album called Forget the Night Ahead. It's due out today in North America and on October 5 everywhere else. You can listen to the album courtesy of Fat Cat Records. Another band that I suspect would have to be seen to be fully appreciated. I'm still toying with attending their October 10 show at the Elmo.
Here's a new track called "I Became A Prostitute" from the new album.
Spinner has the premiere of Imogen Heap's video for the track "First Train Home" from her new album Ellipse. I've really enjoyed Imogen's earlier albums and I'm looking forward to spending some quality time with Ellipse when it comes out August 25th.
There's a new song out from Do Make Say Think. It's 10 minutes long and sounds cool to me. I'll have to check out more from this band. They're playing tomorrow night at the Polish Combatants Hall. Other tour dates are in the article.
Built to Spill has a new album coming out. It's called There is no Enemy and it's coming out in October. I'm heading to the show on October 7th at Lee's Palace. It's not listed among the tour dates on Stereogum, but it is listed on the band's site.
Radiohead have a new song out, but the rumours are still unconfirmed as to whether there's a new EP called Wall of Ice on its way. The torrent is spinning.
The New Rockstar Philosophy has a funny article about the recent trend of the major labels and iTunes trying to get music fans interested in buying albums again. I still prefer to buy albums over singles, but maybe that has more to do with the fact that I don't buy a lot of Top 40 music.
I saw an article on Dead Sexy about a band called The Vicious Guns. I like the songs on their myspace and will be watching for a release. I couldn't find anything on emusic or iTunes.
The New Music, former television show and current blog, posts some new music in the form of First Spins. However, they don't seem to keep them up for long. A couple that I wanted to check back later to give a listen are for Sean Bones and The Junction. Both are available on emusic. I like 'em.
