Big Rock Finish… reviews of independent music

August 2, 2008.

LONG WEEKEND!!!!!!!!!!! Nothing better than spending your long weekend away from your significant other. What? You mean normal people don’t spend 3 day weekends away from their boyfriend/girlfriend and would rather go camping at a rock festival?? Insanity!

So, Awaking State was invited to the Cutting Edge music festival. Something I’d never heard of before until about a week prior to the event. Alright, so it’s in some place called Grand Bend. What?! It’s three to four hours away (depending on who’s driving) and it’s a 4 day long event?? Do you think you’re crazy? I’m a seasoned couch potato (now THAT’s funny) and am not into the whole idea of camping.

Alas, the idea of media passes and all-access was just too thrilling, and I ended up finding myself in a car full of computer and drum equipment (and beer, lets not forget the beer) Friday night heading towards this mythical “Grand Bend” location. All other posting aside, seeing as how I wrote an entry about the event in general, let’s get to the show.

Awaking State was the exact first band to be playing. Good and bad. Good because once the band (and their entourage) is done, they have the entire rest of the festival to enjoy the sights/sounds and overall relax and have a good time. Bad, because they’re the first band playing, there really isn’t a lot of “walk-through” traffic to enjoy the sights and sounds of Awaking State, rather just their hardcore fans, and other bands were likely the ones to take in the music. Which is still good in my opinion.

I liked the set. The stage was MASSIVE. Biggest I’d seen in a while, especially for an independent band. Beer company sponsorship. Go figure. A generally new lineup included previously known Kent on guitar & lead vocals, and Brandon kickin’ it behind… the kicks. Danny was a great comedic lead guitarist, Andrew was one of the most chill bassists I’d ever seen, and all bassists seem really chill, and for the first time, Adam on keys.

Daytime stages are always so different for me personally, seeing as how most of my photography is done in the dark of a dingy back end bar. So it took me a little bit to get used to the idea of sunlight and the great outdoors, including having something burning in my eye for half the set. But my favourites are always the large vein in Kent’s neck that looks like it will burst at any moment. And I think he’s been working out, at least Awaking State-wise, because that vein gets bigger every time I see it.

So the first band at a festival probably isn’t the best spot in the world, but I do know that with their performance this year, they’ve already nailed a slot in next year’s Cutting Edge music festival. So here’s hoping that next year my photos will be more like the photos I always take, shielded from the sun!

Oh The Kathedral. How I love you so. This particular Sunday night would be a treat because I was going to, for the first time, go out on an excursion with someone from work. Well, other than a going away dinner we had for someone who was able to leave the hell-hole I call work.

But yes, tickets were purchased during working hours, and we were all set to go. The bus station was confusing, and we were getting there much later than anticipated. No matter, Dissident Saint were the last band playing anyways to close off the night so we had time to show up.

I also invited my friend Dan along because he’s a musician and likes metal music and overall is someone who wants to hang out with lots of people so it’s nice safe place to hang out… for a recovering alcoholic who is now stuck in a bar. Heh.

Anyways, the show was pretty awesome. I promised Ilya (my co-worker, and one of the guitar players) that I would bring my camera to make him look like a rock star. He believed me, and loved the pictures. Actually everyone loved the pictures.

The music live reminded me very much of the music on their CD. Proof of one thing, they are the real deal. I’ve had bands send me CD’s before and then invite me to their show and they sound nothing alike. And Dissident Saint sounds as good on stage as they do in the studio. It was pretty awesome.

The crowd was amusing and hilarious and surprising for me. I’ve not really gone to a whole lot of metal shows or progressive rock shows. I’m much more into the punk rock and the punk pop and the pop rock… that’s about all the combinations that come out of that. I’m into that more and there’s a whole lot of girls screaming and jumping up and down. This show kept opening up mosh pits and people running in circles and into each other.

I feared for the safety of my camera.

Although these mosh-pitters were kind enough to try and keep it to themselves and not involve the non-interested as much as possible. There was also some stage-diving, which wasn’t completely encouraged, but not discouraged either. A week before I had been at the same venue for the Matadors show and security interrupted the set to announce stage-diving was not allowed. So I must admit I was surprised.

Other than good music and energetic crowds, I think the only thing I can really say is there was a LOT of hair on stage. And I haven’t really been able to think about Ilya, my co-worker, quite the same since then.

One awesome thing that came out of it is my friend Dan is a pretty big fan of Dissident Saint now. He’s gone to other shows they’ve had in Toronto and continues to go, and for one musician to be impressed by another musical group… it’s unheard of in my world.

Name: Dissident Saint Album: The Rise Released: September 27, 2007 Members: Sergey Perunov – vocals Ilya Maximenko – guitars Dimitry Chebanov – drums Andrei Zaretski – keyboard Alon Shenfield – bass Gera Kisselman – guitars Website: www.dissidentsaint.com Favourite Song: Into the Fold (Track 1)

I think the only harder thing than reviewing a band that you have a schoolgirl crush on, is reviewing a band where one of the members is someone you see at work every day (or… every other day during the school year.) At the same time, I asked for it, so I guess it’s my own fault. *Sigh* And because I can hear the millions of people wondering who on earth in the band I work with… I work with Ilya. There. Happy?

So Ilya’s told me about a thousand times that his band is Progressive Rock. Well, the band’s Myspace says Metal & Progressive. iTunes told me nothing, so I had to put in Progressive Rock all on my own. I had my friend Brandon describe Progressive Rock as really technical music that’s a cross between rock, and classical or opera depending on how the songs are written. I’m now throughly confused although I can’t disagree with any of it.

When my friend B told me that progressive meant that technical and really hard to play, he wasn’t joking. Randomly I’ll be listening to a song and be thinking “Goddamn, does this guy have 17 fingers on one hand or something?” Anyways, out of everything, I think the vocals stand out the most to me because it’s the only part of music that I can understand the best, and I swear the vocalist has had opera-singing training or something similar. And I think I don’t hear enough keyboards in songs anymore, I can’t figure out exactly what to make of them because they can sound so different every time. Hmm…

I think I have to see Dissident saint live on stage to really experience the music properly. Thankfully they’re playing soon because I’ve been bothering Ilya for a show date I think for the past six months at least by now, ever since I found out he was in a band. Besides that I’ve been enjoying hearing The Rise in my car, because… why not. My stereo system in my car has been complimented for being pretty good.

Dissident Saint has scheduled two shows in the coming few weeks.
October 20, 2007 – Reverb at the Supernova Battle of the Bands
November 4, 2007 – The Kathedral for the official release party for The Rise
Go and say hi. And see if any of them will give you an autograph. Bonus points if it’s on a body part!

P.S. The riffs? Epic.

Name: Tribe 11 Album: six degrees of desperation Released: 2005 Members: bass guitar – tom lewis drums & percussion – gary craig electric & acoustic guitar – mike hall keyboards – gary breit lead/background vocals – steven webster Website: www.tribe11.com Favourite Song: Sunny Boy (Track 6)

THE PACKAGING! OH MY GOD THE PACKAGING! Alright, I realize this is a music review site and I should be listening to the music and making my judgment on that. And I even have offered bands to send me mp3′s of their albums to save on postage costs. But there *is* something about receiving albums in the mail. And I just feel special receiving something in the mail. But this is AWESOME. Tribe 11 Sprung for a Digipack which is a card cover with a CD tray inside. These are more expensive to make which is impressive enough. I just finally pulled out the insert stuffed into the sleeve of the digipack. The lyrics are printed on this insert. Only.. it’s folded really funny. I went to school for printing so the folds intrigued me. The paper wouldn’t fold out flat. After unfolding a few times I realized I am unfolding a LOOP of paper, printed on both sides, in that infinite way paper can be looped to prove that paper really only has one side. I’m geeking out like crazy for some folded paper. I realize. I should start reviewing the music now, eh?

Rock, Metal, Alternative. I think this may very well be my first introduction into indie metal music. I never know what metal really is, because my friends who grew up with the 80′s hair bands say that was metal and I just don’t see it. I can’t classify music anyways so maybe it’s better this way. This stuff is definitely stuff I don’t normally listen to, because I didn’t know what it was before. I enjoy it definitely. So it’s not like I won’t listen to it again. I just offered my friend who is into remixing and being a sound artist to see what he can come up with. If something cool turns out I’m going to have to e-mail Tribe 11 back.

While I’m not great on appreciating lyrics, I love the lyrics the first time I listen to the songs on six degrees of desperation. I also have a horrible memory so I can’t remember the lyrics by the time I’m done listening to them, but what I do listen to, always sounds profound on this album. Everything sounds like a whole lot of truth, and a whole lot of expectations. And it makes sense. And for the 3 or so minutes that I can remember them, all I think about is how I want to remember these lyrics because I don’t want to forget… until I forget. Umm… I just realized now that my iTunes decided to not give me song titles but to give me “Ariadne for theseus’ sake provided the clue, a ball of line to unwind the maze which no one had entered and left.”… This is officially the weirdest band I’ve ever encountered.

I honestly waant to hear this in some club I walk into one night. Just a big dance floor with darkness and bright lights and glow sticks galore. Dark moody people and happy overgrown little kids.

Name: Bishop Album: Steel Gods Released: March 6, 2007 Band members: Tommy (Guitars, Lead Vox) Rocky (Drums, Vox) Vinny (Bass, Vox) Website: www.bishopmusic.com Favorite song: Outlaw Beaver

A problem with a lot of the hard rock floating around the radio waves is either the down-in-the-dumps attitude or the seriousness bordering on laughability. All of this is usually thrown together in a sort of mish mashed fashion, processed with cookie cutter bleak lyrics, and then passed around the local scene for a few years before getting noticed. All of this with the only real intent being to have brain dead teenagers bob their heads up and down like they really mean it. Like they’ve got a deep sense that something needs to get done, right now! Of course, one could argue that any reason for bobbing your head up and down in retaliation against that certain something has long since passed, what with the wars having been replaced by “peace keeping missions” and cultural problems that have been run through the water filter so many times it’s tough to distinguish where oppression ends and simple indifference ends.

So it’s refreshing to hear a band that seems to have dropped out of nowhere with only the bare essentials for a rock outfit and start playing good, hard rock, oblivious to the BS everyone’s ankle deep in right now. The kind of hard rock that has no pretensions about it, just an energy and drive to say “Listen to this” as they proceed to blow the skull out of your head. These guys don’t introduce anything new, let me say that first of all, but the earnestness in which they play their music is electrifying. Take ‘Burnout Bitch’, the first song on the album, thumping drums, pounding bass lines, thrashy guitar, and speakers turned past 10 all the way to 11 (Eleven. Exactly. One louder.) And this formula works so well just because that is essentially it. They don’t try and throw in any complex structure arrangements or theatrical excess, and they certainly aren’t prancing around in silly clothes (I hope).

The rest of the album is all killer, opting out on any teary eyed ballads or 10 minute prog breakdowns that usually end up with the listener comatose, drool dribbling down the chin. No, this album rocks, rocks again, and then commands you to play it all over again. I suppose there really isn’t a whole lot else to discuss about this band that hasn’t been discussed about countless other hard rock bands. Sure, they bear a strong resemblance to Guns n Roses or any other hair metal band you can think of, but these guys manage take it in stride. It’s like they have actually come to grips with their musical lineage and are content making music that is just like that, with all the force and energy that was brought to the scene several decades ago. And it is this acceptance of the past and hope for a future filled with thrashy guitar solos and fist pumping that makes them a definite threat to all the other cookie cutter bands currently residing in Rockville.

To sum things up, these guys stop about 10 miles away from being anything resembling originality, but who cares? This stuff rawks.

<3 ~Polly Plumps