CONCERT ANNOUNCEMENTS: Cave, Giant, Butt
Summer with Nick Cave in Edmonton – what could be better? His cold, dark love songs will go well with the heat on Saturday, June 28, when the Australian troubadour plays the Jubilee Auditorium, which happens to be the day after the last day of school. Cave and the Bad Seeds are touring select North […]
LITERATURE: 40 Below an Edmonton winter experience
Edmonton has to be the only city in the English-speaking world where residents complain about the weather ALL YEAR LONG. In most social circles in other places, weather talk is small talk. Here, it’s a passion up there with politics. Oh, sure, it’s nice here in the fall, according to Ian Tyson, but the only […]
BIG ANNOUNCE DAY: Arcade Fire, Nick Cave coming in 2014
First Sabbath and now this: Arcade Fire is coming to town. Nick Cave, too. It’s a big day for big announces in Edmonton. Arcade Fire, the Montreal orchspectacular band that music critics first fell all over themselves to love and then later seemed to have second thoughts about will perform at Rexall Place on Monday, […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Paper Lions bring East Coast to town
Darlings of the East Coast music scene, PEI’s Paper Lions headline a show on Friday at The Artery that’s sure to be the center of this weekend’s gigs. Actually from the small village of Belfast on the island’s South shores – where Lord Selkirk first landed in 1803 – the plucky band of castaways typifies […]
Can a novel just be a novel?
For the star of Come Barbarians: The Hollywood Blockbuster, author Todd Babiak doesn’t hesitate to cast Ryan Gosling – playing the suave but troubled security agent Christopher Kruse, who falls into a pit of political skullduggery at the hands of the Corsican mafia. “He can own this thing,” Babiak says of Gosling. “He could bring […]
LADIES MEN: City and Colour, Il Divo come to town
That little side project of Dallas Green seemed to work out well. His band City and Colour is back to play Edmonton’s biggest indoor concert venue – that would be Rexall Place – on Tuesday May 20, even though he was just here as the keynote act of Sonic Boom. With Half Moon Run opening, […]
INSIDE THE JOKE: Playing the race card to win
One of the jokes that gives Alonzo Bodden a reputation as a smart political comic goes something like this: “I support Barack Obama because he’s black. There are a hundred other reasons: taxes, housing, education, health care … but he had me at black.” Alonzo Bodden is black, too. Would the joke work otherwise? Appearing […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Stars align in Edmonton
The city plays host to a milieu of exceptionally talented touring music acts this weekend and beyond. Friday night is punctuated by alt-country Lindi Ortega’s sold out show at the Royal Alberta Museum, which is getting a reputation as one of Edmonton’s best acoustic venues, and the buzzworthy Hollerado gig at the Starlite Room. Saturday […]
Kemo Treats: Sane Clown Posse
The theory that parodying something long enough causes one to turn into the very thing being made fun is put to the test with Kemo Treats. Six years after starting the most ridiculous gangsta rap duo in Edmonton – if not the entire world – its co-founder Greg Goa remains clear on the targets of […]
Flower fracas: White poppies refuse to die
The red poppy is symbolic of the freedom that gives people the right to wear the white poppy – no matter how much it may annoy war veterans. There’s more irony to this emotionally-charged story that won’t go away: Just try to buy a white “peace” poppy in Edmonton. You can’t. Short of ordering one […]
Hollerado: When pop punk gets smart
Next to American country music stars, there is no one in show business that gets accused of rampant stupidity more than “pop punk” musicians. These thinly disguised boy bands play songs just as fast and loud as punk, but with candy coated hooks and lovey dovey lyrics in place of snarling political satire. You can […]
