Astral Swans, ACTORS, and BADBADNOTGOOD
Astral Swans
Astral Swans // Self Released
A collection of lush, orchestrated melodic pop featuring a plethora of guest musicians drawn from Canada’s indie rock royalty (Julie Doiron of Eric’s Trip, Brock Geiger of Reuben and the Dark, Scott Munro of Preoccupations et. al.), Astral Swans self-titled third LP seems like a CBC Radio 3 fever dream, the kind of eclectic, off-kilter yet accessible record that tends to get championed by the station.
The project of Calgary based singer/songwriter/auteur Matt Swann, Astral Swans is the third project by Matt to gain serious traction, following his work in all-ages darlings Hot Little Rocket and experimental psych-poppers Extra Happy Ghost!!! Astral Swans seems the culmination of his interests in crafting delectable pop melodies combined with flights of experimental/textural freakout (don’t let that last thing frighten you off, even the occasional bursts of avant-noise here still manage to appeal).
A note should be given here to the production quality of this record, a shared duty between Brock Geiger, Paul Chirka and Swann himself - it’s a genuine juggernaut of the kind of warm, well orchestrated and balanced production that allows for every single instrumental hook to be heard while never breaking away from the cohesive whole of the sound, which is always singularly mellow and rich, with whispered, wispy vocals that still manage to stand out and float above the tightly locked backing tracks. The playing here is oftentimes exquisite, particularly the positively delicious synth work.
Lyrically the album has a lot to offer, wry, observational and often humorous takes on the mundanities of daily life. “Tell me if you think it’s any better/knowing that we’re both in this together,” he sings on “March 28/20” a duet with SilverRing’s Shalom Toy, an apocalyptic pop confection that seems designed to evoke the claustrophobic feelings accompanying the early stages of quarantine. “Sometimes at the bottom of a spiral, it’s just more spiral” from “Spiral” expresses a similar sentiment, a sort of doomed but beautiful hopelessness-as-pathos that informs much of the themes expressed on the album.
The album centerpiece is Swann’s fantastic cover of Cat Power’s “Cross Bones Style,” a duet sung with Julie Doiron that’s sure to make it onto more than a few indie playlists, but the album is filled with subtly infectious experimental pop gems written with a master’s eye for composition and arrangement, and would make a perfect headphone soundtrack for a lonely walk through abandoned streets in Autumn while wrapped in a wooly cardigan.
- Shaun Lee
ACTORS
Acts of Worship // Artoffact Records
Vancouver’s post-punk darlings ACTORS brings the hits with their sophomore album Acts of Worship. Released Oct 1st via Artoffact Records, it slinked into my fall music rotation on repeat. It’s dark and daring and exhilarating. It’s a fist-pump in the rain and black mascara running unapologetically down your face. Does that make sense? It did in my head anyway. I’m feeling new-wave synth pop mixed with darkwave, which is a new word for a genre of music I’ve known and loved without knowing what it was called. Darkwave... the word crawls off the tongue and sums up the feel and texture of the sound nicely.
The band has built up its dedicated following after their 2018 debut It Will Follow. After touring that album across the world, they’ve expanded their sound while staying true to the music they love that makes people move. Lead singer Jason Corbett and Shannon Hemmett’s backing vocals float together with Shannon’s New Order inspired synthesizer style. New member Kendall Wooding brings the heavy bass lines reminiscent of Duran Duran’s John Taylor. Drummer Adam Fink rounds out the cast of ACTORS, balancing the yin and yang energies within the band and in their songs. The sound of the album was polished smooth in production in Corbett’s own Jackknife Studios in Vancouver.
Acts of Worship singles started teasing fans back in October of 2020 with the release of “Love You More”, paired nicely with its creepy cool video of a zombie looking for her love through the streets of Vancouver. More sneaky song and video drops with “Like Suicide” and “Only Lonely” throughout 2020 and 2021 kept the anticipation for the full album going, but it was the hand claps and verby acoustics of “Cold Eyes” that hooked me hard. It’s almost a crunchy Depeche Mode-esque tune, but in no way does ACTORS mimic the sound. They ARE the sound. It’s modern post-punk in all its dark undertone glory yet somehow bouncy. It’s music that has me dancing in my bedroom and yes, pumping my fists in the air with mascara running down my face.
- Mo Lawrance
BADBADNOTGOOD
Talk Memory // XL Recordings/People's Champ
BADBADNOTGOOD has become one of the most talked about bands in Canadian hip-hop in the last decade. Bound by their mutual love of hip-hop and classic jazz training, they arrived at just the right time with fresh, jazz-driven takes on mixtapes that aligned with some of the heaviest hitters of the day like Kendrick while also hearkening to the OGs like A Tribe Called Quest. Not unlike others in this vein, BADBADNOTGOOD made their name with freshly imagined takes on essential hip-hop classics. This formula has proven successful for others like Leon Michels to gain notoriety through the equity of hip-hop favourites, but it has also proven itself resilient as their charm and magnetism persists years later as lo-fi beats saturate the airwaves of students and coffee shops across the country.
Their approach gained them notoriety and the ear of high-profile collaborators in years past. This time around though, BADBADNOTGOOD are here to show you that their jazz prowess that laid the foundation for their hip-hop sound has the ability to shine on its own merit. These are trained jazz musicians after all, and they're not about to sit back and get comfy. BADBADNOTGOOD knows that it’s time to innovate in a new direction and they are doing so at just the right time as other insanely talented young leaders start to emerge on the jazz scene.
Talk Memory is a departure from their hip-hop drenched, weed haze acid jazz that ebbs, flows, and vibes. It’s a nod to the great cosmic jazztronauts of the 70s with Sun-Ra’s spiritual meandering, Pharaoh Sanders’ uninhibited exploration, and Miles Davis’ innovative instrumentation while also pushing things in new directions not unlike DOMi & JD Beck. It is the work of confident musicians with a deep rapport. Their understanding of each other is palpable as they explore and move freely but in unison.
Energies are balanced and matched effortlessly as they do some impressive ambient world building in between the infectious grooves and unhinged psychedelic quests that ties everything together. Collaborators are used to their fullest potential with rich additions to a number of tracks that often use graceful tones juxtaposed by the core of the band that marches forward fervently with a purposeful playfulness that is erratic and free but never out of control. Talk Memory is cohesive in its entirety with a number of tracks that do plenty of heavy lifting on their own - It will find its way into your playlists while also working as a striking piece of musical exploration when consumed in its entirety.
Talk Memory is not here to prove that these fellas know their way around jazz. Talk Memory is here to prove that jazz is cool. This isn’t a misguided intellectual endeavour of a band trying to prove they are worth their salt. They’re here to show us that they don’t need high-profile hip-hop collabs or bars spit over a jazz kit to be relevant. This is where jazz is headed and BADBADNOTGOOD is intent on being at the front of the curve. If you’re trying to keep your finger on the pulse, BADBADNOTGOOD is who you need to be paying attention to.
- Clay Geddert
