I just can’t get enough, I just can’t get enough doo doo…

No, Depeche Mode has nothing at all to do with the weekend I just had. I think they came up once in reference to some sort of ‘what kind of music do you listen to?’ question that was posed to me. But I mean I just can’t get enough of fricking Wintersleep. Everybody, and I mean everybody on the entire planet, should make sure he/she has some conception of this band. They have a heap of crossover potential, from the snobbiest of indie-art nerds, to the shallowest of hipsters, to the kids who just want to rock and the kids who just want to cry. A band for all seasons, they chose summer to take their first trip to the west coast of Canada. After what I hear from everyone was a surprisingly rambunctious and enthusiastically-attended show in Victoria, Wintersleep and their accompanying bands, Sylvie and Uncut, arrived at the Media Club to find out if Vancouver could stand up to the province’s capital.

Here’s the moment I get a tad bit sheepish for jumping the gun. The three bands seem to be on a rotating-headliner kick for the duration of their time together, and tonight, Wintersleep was opening. This was unfortunate for a couple reasons. One is that it meant they had the shortest set time, and of course I’ve been pretty well doing nothing but lying on my couch staring at the ceiling and waiting for them to show up ever since their latest album landed in my hands, so I would have been quite content sipping wine and watching them play for oh, I don’t know, five hours? Anyways, additionally, the early set got me so revved up on Wintersleepdom that I started pre-reviewing (um… I guess that’d be previewing) the rest of the show really unfairly. I actually have a scribbled note here that I appear to have written in a euphoric, shaky-handed shorthand, probably when Wintersleep struck up their first chord, that says something to the effect of “Wintersleep is onstage. But you know what matters? NOTHING ELSE.” This seems to imply that the rest of the show sucked immensely, but as I was to soon see, that was really not the case. So my apologies to Sylvie and Uncut - it’s not you, it’s me. Really.

So on went Wintersleep. Recently sporting a fifth member on keys in Mike Bigelow, I get the feeling I was seeing something very whole and pure up there. Wintersleep is part of Dependent Records, which is sort of like the Saddle Creek of Canada - smaller market at the root (Halifax-ish), with a few branch-out artists in different towns, and one big DIY free-for-all pool of musicians that lend a hand in each others’ projects all over the place. Isn’t that cozy? So Bigelow is part of Contrived, which is a band that also is another home to Wintersleep’s drummer, Loel Campbell. Then there’s family and stuff… oh it’s too much to get into here, but just know that there’s a bunch of insanely talented people who all are friends and all share in these wildly-varying projects that sometimes don’t seem like they should correlate at all.

The songs Wintersleep played were all over the place too. Old stuff, new stuff, never-before-heard (…by me anyhow) stuff. So the hearty crowd that had shuffled up to an imaginary horseshoe-shaped barricade spent half the time singing jovially along, and half the time swaying contently to these new gifts we were presented with. The songs that I knew from the album were few and far between (apparently they like to shake things up and play different stuff to alleviate/prevent boredom - how one can ever bore of such brilliance, I don‘t understand, but perhaps this sort of genius is something I simply haven‘t gotten figured out yet), and quite differently-flavored from how they appear recorded. Particularly, “Nerves Normal, Breathe Normal” included an extended outro that mainly consisted of Campbell kicking the shit right out the window on his kit. I don’t even know what kind of stupefied face I must have been wearing at the time, but that’s okay because so was everyone else in the room. I think every drummer could take a lesson or two from this guy. The audience still seemed to fear electrocution if they were to step over that little boundary separating them from the band on stage, but the energy they pulsed forth could have easily filled any empty space.

And they didn’t have much to fill though - the room was packed, and the audience really had Wintersleep’s back in a big way. Even before going on stage, they were selling billions of their unique t-shirts and copies of their CDs. Speaking of which…

I finally finally finally have Wintersleep’s first album in my possession now as well. It’s beautiful. As if it could be any other way - they didn’t just ‘come into their own’ with the newer disc. They actually extended something that was already fantastic. “Orca” tears my poor little heart into tiny shreds. The way the words roll so smoothly into each other… Oh god, that warble… verge of tears, verge of tears. I hate it when bands do this to me. I’m so helpless. It might be a little unnerving how much I have fallen in love with this band. Sombre, quivering… So you know what I want to do? I want to take both albums, plop them in my stereo, press the repeat button, sprawl across and/or curl up on (depends on the song, whether it’s a writher or a contemplater) my living room floor under the coffee table and just lie there for days soaking and soaking and soaking. Through sleep and wakefulness, just let it rock me sweetly back and forth for a lifetime, and maybe even then for a little longer than that. Amazing. But hey, this isn’t an album review… I just wanted to let you know it’s all worth it to grab these albums. Back to the program!

Crowd singalongs were up for par as well. During quieter moments, the ocean of voices would softly overtake the gentle words being sung by Paul Murphy. He has such a sweet, charming, somehow innocent voice, coming across so passionate and genuine live. There’s so much rich colour flowing through his words, from his whispery bits to his foot-stomping caterwauls. It’s a solid, heavy block of emotion that he spits out and whacks everyone in the face with versus an all-encompassing silken blanket he lays out and tucks everyone in with. It’s difficult to really know what to feel from time to time, but I always feel like I just want to scream with pent-up emotion. And then there’s the super-tambourine assaults. I think everyone took a turn, but guitarist Tim D’Eon was especially zealous with the jingly instrument - he and Bigelow also swapped keys/guitars at one point in the set. So the long and the short of it - shockingly large and knowledgeable crowd, intense performance from the band, amazing songs, and a live ambience that takes the recordings to an entirely different level. It’s done some serious damage to my insides to see this band live now and have the full scope from that to the recordings. Seconds, please.

Following their set, people flocked merchboothward and to the band itself with accolade after accolade. As we prepared for the remainder of the night, I felt relaxed and satisfied, like I’d had an incredible meal that couldn’t possibly be improved by the addition of anything. Well, I was sort of correct there. I think I subconsciously separated the Wintersleep set from the rest of the show - the three bands are quite diverse anyhow, but I just didn’t really know what I was going to be expecting after this. Sylvie was up next. I’d been familiar with one of the members, Joel Passmore, from his Despistado days. Those of you who have been with us here at Cord for a while have probably read up on them and listened to them sing the theme to the Gummi Bears cartoon. So now here’s a rekindled older project of Passmore’s, which includes his wife Riva Farrell Racette on bass and sweet sweet vocals, Chris Notenboom on guitar, and Jeff Romanyk on drums. No no, not just drums. Clear blue drums. Oooh, selling point, and I believe Passmore even pointed that out at some stage in the set. The crowd remained packed up to the front during this set, with a large contingent of leftover and curious fans from Despistado’s various jaunts and fan-buildup in the city. Nice to see that dedication. Alongside the Wintersleep set, this seemed quite noisy and chaotic, and just a really interesting musical juxtaposition. The vocals from Passmore are sort of barky and shrieky, and are tempered out by Racette’s feminine lilt. Following suit, the energy from all members is super-high, radiating back onto the audience and creating a dancy atmosphere. Finally we got the weird dancing drunkards of the night - they took a bit longer to make an appearance than some nights. So, Sylvie. Very indie, very hyper. Nice to see such good things continuing for this group.

I love Uncut.

I was so surprised, knowing nothing of this band at all, to be so taken with them. I was a little bit unsure for a moment - after the first song they played, things tapered off just a touch, but they were right back into it after that. They had a backlit lighting setup that created a dark, edgy, tense atmosphere for their music. It was a bit of an odd arrangement. Vocals were shared between guitarists Ian Worang and Sam Goldberg, but those vocals were strangely subdued and monotone. They almost took on the role of a subtle baseline rather than a vocal line a lot of the time. Worang was bent over double, flinging his hair this way and that for a lot of the time. Goldberg was a bit more easygoing, and bassist Derek Tokar was slower-moving than Worang, but covered more ground, frequently showing up in the middle of the stage, hanging over the crowd. The drums were also set up interestingly, with all the cymbals placed barely higher than the drums themselves. Jon Drew played at a 90-degree angle just about, whacking the shit out of everything he had. The low arc I guess spawns more power. The songs were dark, somewhere between electro clash, emo, and Billy Idol. Strange combination, and the result was an engaging, unique and danceable sound that I was eager to check out a second time and form my solid opinion of just how much I enjoyed them.

Fuelled now on pastries and fruit, and after the oohing and ahhing over picturesque Vancouver was through, the ride up was pretty uneventful, save for a few demented traffic delays, and after making pretty good time, the van pulled in to the parking lot of the venue in Whistler, the pub/bar/hostel of Gaitors/The Boot/The Shoestring. The day was getting a bit overcast, and no other band vehicles appeared to be there. Passing time was done with telephones, frisbees, video cameras, and rapping, and then we discovered the reason Sylvie was so late in arriving. The Sea-To-Sky highway is treacherous undoubtedly, and they were nearly involved in a massive accident with a tire that had flung itself off a vehicle two in front of them. They escaped fine, though the car ahead of them apparently was pretty well annihilated. Shaken nerves and a story to tell. And Uncut just got lost trying to get out of the city. Heaps of hungry bands trudged upstairs then for dinner, and as the hours crept by and the venue promoter still hadn’t made an appearance, it started to become clear just what kind of show this would be.

It was Punk Night. Oh, and Despistado was playing, according to the posters. Passmore was very excited, as I’m sure that’s his favourite band. Hah. A few punk-night-looking people were already milling around the bar playing pool, and the bar cat, TC (or Tara the Cat) was perched on a stool, disinterestedly observing what was going on. The merch booth was set up, no sound check was had, and the line-up was determined by the posters, with Uncut opening the night this time.

This had a pretty different vibe from the night before, not only because of the weird they-maybe-don’t-know-why-they’re-here audience, but because the Boot Pub has an off-white stucco ceiling above the stage. The bright white halogen spotlights that Uncut used to create such a dim and eerie vibe at the black-deadly Media Club, were here bounced and scattered around so much that it almost looked like they just had the house lights on. Regardless, I was able to get a much better glimpse of them playing, and a feel for their tunes. And I confirmed, it was spectacular. Moody and evil-sounding, thick and churning.

Wintersleep was sandwiched in the bill today. The audience pepped up a bit for them, with again another surprisingly knowledgeable audience. I really didn’t expect much from the Whistler crowd in that regard, especially on Punk Night, but there they were, singalongers and dancers. Aside from a couple really drunk dudes who I think were just trying to cause a ruckus, everyone was really into it. The set was very similar except for one thing. Painful technical difficulties. What luck! Only rivaled recently by Elizabeth’s set at the Morrissey, where none of the mics worked and their singer broke about 40 strings on his guitars throughout the set before culminating in one of the guys from Hot Hot Heat doing a Sex Pistols cover and just about strangling everyone in the crowd to death with the mic cord as he ran around the room, Wintersleep was the victim of dead batteries and sudden cutouts in parts of the stage sound. So there were a few delays and bassless intermittent songs while everything got straightened out. Maybe it’s character-building or something. Nonetheless, once everything was back in functioning order, they performed with that same soulful and passionate intensity that they had the night before. Murphy looked like he was struggling at times, he was so twisted around in his body movements. D’Eon managed to balance himself precariously on a stool to initiate some clapalongs, and the tambourines were there again. And another stellar drumming effort was put in by Campbell.

Sylvie (oh, I mean, Despistado) headlined here, and the crowd was definitely into the groove they had going on. That’s not surprising, seeing as they’re the most ‘punk’ of the bunch, just with that walloping drive they have. The Sunday night was nearing its end though, and they played a snappy, encore less set, again similar to the night before. Everyone on stage got really really sweaty this time. I adore Racette’s voice, a point driven home tonight. Sylvie’s got it. Their on the way.

After that, everything’s a bit of a blur. I had a ride heading immediately back to Vancouver, so I don’t even know what happened. The quickest round of goodbyes ever and back we were on the highway at 1:30 in the morning, tearing through a light rain and observing late-night highway upgrades. It was all over so fast, but what a marvelous cross-section of these bands’ existences to take in for a couple days. Huge props to everyone involved for their excellent talents and personalities, and may they all see huge success in the coming months. Plug in.

Elsewhere

By Andy Scheffler
Photos : Andy Scheffler
Published : July, 2005.