Wundi and the Track: It’s not the bar, it’s the booker
With the love Edmonton music people have for Wunderbar – officially known as Wunderbar Hofbrauhaus, or “Wundi” to regulars – it’s easy to compare it to the Sidetrack Café. If you’re old enough. Ah, good times. So sad. Old-timers rue the day the beloved ‘Track was bulldozed for condos. Others – Wundi regulars, for instance […]
Mike MacDonald and the Burden of Truth
There are two kinds of comedians, says Mike MacDonald, “diagnosed and undiagnosed.” That’s in the routine the Ottawa comedian will be doing at the Edmonton Comedy Festival this weekend – part of the act he put together six months after undergoing a liver transplant because when he woke up he couldn’t remember a damned thing […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Once a college band, always a college band
Sloan has to be one of the strangest yet most wonderful rock bands in Canada. From early campus success, “back in the day,” they’ve been compared to the Beatles for their sultry popcraft – epitomized by such masterpieces of heartbreak as The Other Man – and the fact there are four of them, each basically […]
INTERVIEW: The Unstoppable Shawn Bernard
Shawn Bernard survived losing both of his parents and his sister to drug overdoses. He survived poverty, living on streets, becoming a drug dealer, gang leader and drug addict himself. He survived jail. In an inspirational story he’s told to youngsters across Canada countless times since, he prevailed over all these trials to break the […]
Better Alf an Oo than no Oo At All
Area classic rock fans are rejoicing that The Who is coming to Edmonton as part of their 50th anniversary tour. Man, has it been that long? Sure has. So a year of anticipation won’t be much more compared to half a Century of rocking! Featuring originals Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend – the only originals […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Up + Downtown = Festival Time
After the highly acclaimed Ryan Adams (not Bryan Adams) plays the Winspear Centre on Thursday, the biggest gigs of the weekend are part of the city’s final music festival of the year, the Up + Downtown Festival which – you guessed it – includes a vast raft of venues in Edmonton’s downtown area. Arguably the […]
Pixies review: Where Nirvana really came from
The strangest yet one of the most influential bands of the 1980s gave a few really good reasons why their music continues to attract sizable crowds – like the one Pixies drew Monday night at the Shaw Conference Centre. This young, urban group of bespectacled, plaid-clad hipsters weren’t going to be flicking their Bics in […]
REVIEW: Boz a mixed bag
Full disclosure – we were all brought in by the promise of Silk Degrees. Okay, that might be making too much of an assumption on behalf of the audience who came out to see Boz Scaggs at the Jubilee Auditorium Monday night, but not by much. Silk Degrees, after all, was a monster hit, an […]
Tragically Hip to encore Fully Completely in Edmonton
In case you didn’t get your fill of Fully Completely the first time around, the Tragically Hip is bringing it back for an encore. The reissue of the band’s third album will coincide with the “Fully and Completely tour” across Canada in 2015. The Hip plays Rexall Place Thursday, Feb. 12. Tickets go ON SALE […]
