REVIEW: Scottish comic does his people proud
Craig Ferguson did a remarkable show at the Winspear Centre on Thursday night – considering that he appears to have no appreciable career plans since his talk show ended in 2014, beyond doing stand-up dates. On what calls the “Hobo Fabulous” tour, Ferguson is a dyed-in-the-tartan Scot, for sure, and left absolutely nothing on table […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Alberta Grown, award winning
Loathe as we are to celebrate a granfalloon of musicians selected on the basis of where they live, you really can’t go wrong showcasing Alberta talent – can you? So while “Alberta” is technically not a musical genre, there’s certainly enough talent in this province to qualify for a star-studded variety line-up offered at the […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Steep Canyon Rangers ride on
Saturday night the Steep Canyon Rangers are in town at the Jubilee Auditorium – but its most famous member Steve Martin won’t be with them. This North Carolina bluegrass band recorded and released an album with the legendary comedian (who also turns out to be a pretty fair bluegrass musician) back in 2010 after backing […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Which side are you on?
We can’t ignore the connection – and friendship – between Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age and Jesse Hughes from Eagles of Death Metal. Hughes got into hot water recently because of some things that he said. Homme and Hughes co-founded Eagles of Death Metal in 1998. After QOTSA got big, Homme played […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Geoff Berner stays on message
Rachel Notley is on the record for being a “huge” fan of Geoff Berner. “I love his sense of humour, his angles on issues, he’s very cutting, he’s very witty,” the Premier of Alberta told GigCity in 2016. And Geoff Berner – the klezmer-loving accordion-squeezing political folksinger from B.C. – is on the record for […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: The Dears darlings of indie rock
The Dears have been around almost as long as “indie rock” has been a thing, forming in Montreal in 1995 and releasing their debut album End of a Hollywood Bedtime Story in 2000. Their particular brand of rock music, both dark and orchestral, has found them fans across the continent, and three of their albums […]
REVIEW: Bahamas pretty heavy for soft rock
There’s a keen musical mind lurking behind the dark wit of the man who calls himself Bahamas. Or maybe it’s the other way around. During his show at the Winspear Centre on Monday night, Bahamas picked out a couple in the front row who’d told him they just got engaged to his song Lost in […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Bahamas or Dwight Yoakam, tough choice
You concert promoters need to get it together. You give us weeks of nothing but sporadic metal and classic rock shows during a usually dead time of year – and then on the same otherwise unassuming first Monday night of March you book two must-see acts in two concert halls at opposite sides of town. […]
Portugal. The Man. Greater. Than. That One Hit.
It’s always a interesting experience seeing a concert from a modern rock band known in the mainstream for only one massive radio hit. Seems like they’re all that way these days. You never know what you’re going to get. They could be a box of chocolates – or as has been witnessed once or twice, […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Fearing loathing Trump
Stephen Fearing was born in Vancouver, raised in Ireland, lived in Minnesota and wound up back in Vancouver in 1984 – where only then he became the Canadian folk hero he is today. He could live anywhere – and America is bottom of the list. In the area for a trio show at Festival Place […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Jay-Z state of mind
News that Jay-Z has finally admitted he cheated on his wife Beyonce has us all thinking of how we can possibly separate artists from their art in this day and age. Musical artists might get more of a pass than actors or media personalities, because their art – their songs – sometimes becomes so disconnected […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Rural Alberta Advantage shows deep roots
The Rural Alberta Advantage is in town for a couple of sold out shows at Union Hall, including tonight. The band name was coined by frontman Nils Edenloff’s brother discussing heading back to the family farm in Donalda, where Nils also spent part of his childhood. A number of the band’s songs relate to Alberta […]
