Thus Owls, Fortunato Durutti Marinetti, and Apollo Ghosts
Thus Owls
Who Would Hold You If The Sky Betrayed Us? // Secret City Records
These days, defining genre feels more and more futile. I think I speak for most people when I say that the interminable urge to split genres into more and more micro sub-genres is nothing short of exhausting - so it’s all the more exciting when I get to hear a new album that shatters genre in such a way trying to define it would do it a disservice. Thus Owls latest offering Who Would Hold You If The Sky Betrayed Us? does just that. More than just merely blending genres, Thus Owls celebrates and revels in the unique styles, influences, and personality of each contributor, with a result that is expansive and spellbinding all while remaining grounded and approachable.
Due to their relative unfamiliarity with each other, the band approached this album with audacity and openness. Many of the contributors were merely acquaintances before working on WWHYITSBU, so in place of rapport, they had to be vulnerable and build new connections – and those connections are clear in the music. They move freely but intuitively, flowing as one like the current of a river during spring runoff. All of this mirrors Erika Angell’s own experience being cut off from her family in Sweden and learning to exist and build new connections elsewhere. The thematic consistency from Erika’s experiences to her writing to the formation of the band elevates this album from merely good to truly great – maybe even a masterpiece.
Saxophones spit and swirl with the tradition of the free jazz greats like Pharaoh Sanders all while pushing the sonic envelope in new and layered directions à la CARM. Wild woodwind free expression is pinned down with classic Canadian indie tendencies that act as perfect millennial adolescent nostalgia fodder. More still, guitars cut in and out of psychedelia as the drums push and pull the band – sometimes swirling with contemplation, at others, driving forward with purpose. Amidst it all are Erika Angell’s ruminations on distance, relationships, fragility, and connection. If that weren’t enough, Angell delivers her musings with a blend of melodic spoken word and spellbinding vocal explorations that are as haunting as they are enthralling.
WWHYITSBU is a mature and accomplished effort that could be misconstrued as too high-minded and experimental, but where the Angell’s show their mastery is their ability to ground an otherwise art-house and seemingly pretentious style. I know that if I picked up a twelve string, tuned it randomly, and tried to accompany spoken word poetry – it would be a disaster. But in Simon Angell’s hands, a randomly tuned 12 string is more than enough to accompany and elevate Erika’s haunting reveries. This is certainly amongst the best of the year and will no doubt be one of the most memorable albums of 2022. Thus Owls took a bold step forward and the result couldn’t be more impressive. Keep an eye on these folks, this is some of the finest that Canada has to offer.
- Clay Geddert
Fortunato Durutti Marinetti
Memory’s Fool // Bobo Integral
Memory’s Fool is the second album from Forunato Durutti Marinetti. Self-described as a “poetic jazz rock” musician, Marinetti finds a beautiful and delicate balance of an almost spoken word platform and a pleasant musical partnership. Choosing to write the lyrics first enables him to find the core of the song, the story, and the vocabulary even before adding the flourish of notes. Allowing the words to come before the confines of rhythm, melody, and chord progression set their boundaries.
The idea that “we are all memories fool” is ever prevalent throughout the entire aptly titled album. We are told story after story of relationships, the self and discovery of who that is, confusion and clarity – all things that we as humans know from the past, know in the present, and will continue to know in the future. There is no escaping the grasp of memory and Marinetti will not let us forget that.
I was surprised at how soft and conversation-like the lyrics were in these songs, as I was a first-time listener of Marinetti. It is not a common thing to come across, but it is a gem to find. Each song is meticulously crafted to let you in on an experience that is only enhanced by the strings or guitars that have been carefully selected to accompany the storyline. The conversation. The memories that we are lucky enough to be privy to. The ability to have a bright and cheery backbeat, while still keeping the lyrics direct and somber is something I truly admire in songwriting. The line between emotions is sometimes drawn too strong, whereas we do not always experience them as such. Humans are messy, we experience emotions messily, and frequently live and exist in this grey area. And is a memory not the best example of the grey area?
Listening to this is calming. It is compelling. It pulls and draws you in and speaks to you as if every word holds a heavy importance, to not just you but all of us. The connection this creates is quite wonderful and very special. Marinetti and his band have a simplistic beauty that I am so glad to have come across, especially in times where disconnect and isolation feel like such common problems. This album is a necessary reminder that we do all share similarities, we all experience the pleasure, the pain, the hope, the despair, and the hazy confusion that comes with remembering. And ironically, I think this is something we too often forget – so thank you for reminding us, Marinetti.
- Krystle McGrath
Apollo Ghosts
Pink Tiger // You’ve Changed Records
As something of indie royalty in the Vancouver scene, Apollo Ghosts have a reputation for the heartfelt and hard hitting, and over the years— from the gritty splendor of Hastings Sunrise and the Polaris-nominated Mount Benson to their unexpectedly ambient 2019 comeback album Living Memory— they have maintained their affinity for the all-powerful hook. For nearly fifteen years they have been a seemingly bottomless wellspring of effortless pop melodies that tumble one after another through instrumentals that jangle and strum, with lyrics that confess as much as they console.
Pink Tiger is split into two halves, conceptual twins: the first LP, Pink, is composed of eleven intimately performed home recordings, many of which were created during a period when vocalist and guitarist Adrian Teacher was beginning to suffer hearing loss in one ear. The first song seems to describe the genesis of the album, as Teacher sings about “firepit philosophies/hoping for answers”. On his Instagram, he wrote about standing around a firepit with a group of his best friends on a small Gulf island, burning a beer can and making jokes, reflecting then on the dying cedar trees, the worsening condition of his father who suffers from Alzheimer’s. Pink searches these ideas for meaning, laying bare the painful ordinariness of loss, such as on “To Set the King in Bloom” when he describes moving through a funeral home as “walking around this weird museum, trying to find the body.” The plainspoken delivery here becomes a comment on the often undramaticness of death— the sort of anti-drama of grief. It can be acute, but mostly it is long, and the dishes still need to be done.
The second LP, Tiger, cranks up the amps and cracks the beer. Lead single “Spilling Yr Guts” could be seen as a manifesto for the band’s affinity for the personal lyric, and the electric version of “But I’ll Be Around” is a reassurance of the love between friends. If Pink is an observation of the dying cedar trees, then Tiger is the planting of new ones.
I moved to Vancouver during the pandemic, and I haven’t been to any shows here, haven’t met many people. I have never been to an Apollo Ghosts show, but I get the feeling that the band must get approached by fans often— folks who want to share something they’ve been through lately, something that resonated with them in a particular lyric, the way that a song became a sort of soundtrack to an experience in their life. I say this because the songs here feel like an opening of arms, a feeling that touches on the isolation that many of us have been experiencing for over two years now. In this way, listening to Apollo Ghosts can feel a little like hanging out with your friends, whether that be jumping around with them at the basement house show, or sequestered out on the back porch with a cigarette, sharing the quiet grief of life among people who have been there too. Whichever you need, Pink Tiger has it, and whenever you need it, it’ll be around.
- Harman Burns
