Motorbike James, Tunic, and PONY
Motorbike James
VIISIONS // Slow Weather
A dream of being adrift in the universe, unencumbered by consciousness or time but rooted in humanity. A dream so real that you begin to doubt if it’s a dream at all. The type of dream that makes you hurriedly shut your eyes again in hopes that you will be able to fall back asleep and escape consciousness for just a little bit longer. But your alarm is ringing, you’ve already hit snooze twice. You can’t be late again. No time for existential crises.
This is what it feels like to get pulled into the world of Motorbike James. VIISIONS is a concept so much more well developed and executed than you would expect from a debut - a cosmic journey wherein a spaceman has an encounter with a divine entity, Motorbike James envelopes you in warm, welcoming tones and carries you alongside him as he explores higher consciousness both figuratively and literally, writing strictly through stream of consciousness and allowing emotion and energy to dictate the story.
It’s meditative, unique, familiar, and dripping in vibes. A lot of mid 2000’s indie shines through (think MGMT) alongside flashes of psych, R&B, pop, and vaporwave. But to pin it down to a genre would do it a disservice; VIISIONS is a concept realized by an artist who has proven their deep understanding and connection to a rich array of influences that don’t need to be defined.
Motorbike James refuses to let the heady concept overshadow the vibe of the party, and in his connection to the divine, he meets humans where they need it most and pulls us outside our existence for just a moment. “I don’t need to see the road with sufficient vibing” he chants as we are guided confidently through the unknowable space ahead with blaring horn-like electronics, “when I think a thought I don’t think about it”. Perhaps that line is too on the nose, describing the stream of consciousness process in the clearest possible terms just in case we still hadn’t figured out. But at its core, “me Roll” serves thematic and sonic anchor of the album, and its energy cannot be denied as it forcefully asserts its indie synth-pop magnetism.
Whether it be through groovy guitars, warm electronics, or dreamy synth vibes, Motorbike James crafts a sonic world that surrounds you in a blissful haze as you experience the celestial energy that connects all things. He brings his experience from beyond time and space back to earth so we can feel the warmth and bliss of divine unity for just a moment. To be pulled into his cosmic journey is to be unconcerned with existence or time or where you are headed, because you “don’t need to see the road with sufficient vibing”.
- Clay Geddert
Tunic
Exhaling // Artoffact Records
Tunic has never been a band to put out full lengths. They manage to seemingly stay prolific, but they’re efficiently prolific sporadically releasing singles and EPs. Honestly it works. Releasing singles as they please has kept me on my toes as a fan. Between their intermittent releases, the band tours relentlessly. While the world shutting down has singed the Winnipeg three piece’s hopes of touring, the band has made great use of their time lining up Toronto’s Artoffact Records to release Exhaling, a collection of most of their past catalogue neatly packaged and released with three spicy new ones to kick the record off.
Guitarist/Vocalist David Schellenburg opens the record as guitar incessantly bounces between two equally dissonant notes. The song quickly drops into its driving beat and speedy rhythm. As the band work between soft verse loud-chorus dynamics Schellenburg’s vocals follow, subbing an almost dopey low shout for gutteral screams. Amongst the chaos “Exhaling” holds a lot of melody for what one would expect from Tunic. The band slips that notion with an absolutely thrashing spastic outro.
Quicker than a drop of a dime “Invalid” catches the pace. Similar to “Exhaling” the track rips between heavy moments and a pungent bass line leading the verses. “Invalid” captures each member of Tunic’s invaluability. Each member playing a key role to the band’s sound. The interplay between the bass and drums hits hard while Schellenburg’s noisey guitar screeching gives the noise and aggression so indessespensible to Tunic
“Fade Out,” the final new track off the record, captures the band at their most vulnerable. The desperation in Schellenburg’s voice as they repeatedly scream “Fade Out” over the outro conveys the cathartic aspect Tunic’s music provides its listeners (and I imagine the members of Tunic). The personal vulnerability within the lyrics as the song hits its most grinding moment almost provides a release as the listener contextualizes the pain within the music to that of their own. Their ability to convey these languishing emotions is for me what makes Tunic. The album is full of these moments. The bridge of “Boss” as Schellenburg repeatedly chokes out “So you want to be the boss? So you want to be in Control'' or most aptly the end of “Eye Contact” screaming “I AM. A CONSTANT. A CONSTANT DISAPPOINTMENT.” The album continues full of previously released Tunic favourites (much of which has been covered by us in the past).
Exhaling is an exciting statement from Tunic that despite everything going on in the world, they are very much still here. Their collaboration with Artoffact Records feels fitting for the three-piece who have busted their asses reaching this point and if anything, Exhaling’s three new tracks provide an outlook of what is hopefully to come from one of Canada’s most pummelling acts.
- Kennedy Pawluk
PONY
TV Baby // Take This to Heart Records
Think about your room when you were a teenager. Was it a sanctuary from all that you perceived as bullshit? A refuge where you could stew in your angst, binge a DVD box set, or sleep your frustrations away? Was it the best place to ditch your responsibilities and do something worthwhile, like learn the power chords on Dookie? If any of this is landing, PONY’s TV Baby might be the record you should snap into your HitClip this summer. Partly a love letter to bedroom hermiting, and a nod to the merits of indulging in nostalgic comfort media, TV Baby serves up infectious bubblegum grunge via introspective power pop anthems, and just might slot comfortably into your CD collection somewhere between Dilly Dally and the soundtrack to 2001 cult classic Josie and the Pussycats.
TV Baby starts with a high-energy punch and rarely steps back, with an opening track (“Chokecherry”) that delivers the type of hook you’ll hear once or twice and then have rattle around in your head for the next month. With a thick wall-of-guitars attack, fast drums, and tube-screaming solos, TV Baby hits swiftly like a Pixy Stix sugar-rush. The sonic focus throughout is on Sam Bielanski’s cool and cutting vocals, coasting above the noise with the sweetest hard candy melodies, and then doubled in harmony to recall the ever-satisfying choral mirror between Veruca Salt’s Nina Gordon and Louise Post. An odd bit of synth adds a romantic touch here and there, but the basic formula is a tried-and-true mix of low-slung guitars, lively BPMs, and earworm choruses — this is pure power pop punk, polished to a Lip Smackers sheen.
You might be over it at this point of 2021, but staying home alone can still feel pretty darn good. The brighter side of introversion and the party-for-one vibe at the heart of TV Baby is very much reflected on “My Room”, where Bielanski sings, “Being alone, it’s my kind of fun / Cause in my room I am everything that I want to be / There’s no one here to please.” And if you’re avoiding something (or someone), there are plenty of welcome distractions, from a television left on just for the background noise, to rearranging the furniture, to sleep as a primetime event. It’s liberating to have nobody around to answer to, as expressed on “Sometime Later”: “I could spend my whole life with a fake smile on my face. / But I don’t want to. / Actually I am fine here with my distance and my space. / Don’t miss me, I don’t miss you.” But the exuberance and bounce of TV Baby’s power pop sound might belie the guilt, doubt, and isolation that can also come with an extended stay-at-home lifestyle.
Whether it’s self-care or selfishness, there might be a real power wielded in cultivating independence and conscious isolation — but it’s also inescapably a double-edged sword. Is withdrawal the ultimate passive-aggressive ‘Fuck You’, or is it running from your problems? Is hiding in your bedroom self-care, or self-sabotage? Are these sleep patterns part of healthy rest, or a depressive episode? Bielanski captures some similarly anxious self-diagnosing thoughts on “WebMD”, while committing to the safety of solitude: “It’s way too late for you to try. / Don’t want you to. / I don’t want to need anyone. / ‘Cause anyone can pull me down. / But I don’t want to drown inside of you.”
The drum-machine driven “Cry” is the most down-tempo and bedroom-y (as in the genre, not the subject matter) that TV Baby gets, and as Bielanski sings the limits of her detachment start to become more clear: “You would die to see me happy. / When you smile you look so pretty. / I still miss you even though it's been a while.” When the familiar heavy drums kick back in and the track swells to its climax, a hopeful sliver of sun sneaks in between the drawn curtains. Closer “Swore” is still lyrically a bummer, but hints at some hard-won progress: “Had a bag of your old t-shirts. / They smelled like you and made me feel worse. / So I put them on the curb and tried to forget you.” Staying still isn’t always stagnation, and sometimes rumination can give way to revelation. Until then, you can always put on a movie.
- Julie Maier
