Results tagged “brokensocialscene”

Today's Events

Urban Planner is Torontoist's daily guide to what's on in Toronto, published every morning. If you have an event you'd like considered, email all of its details—as well as images, if you've got any—to events@torontoist.com.

In a change that just might be the culprit for all the Wayfarers, Toronto's film industry is shining brighter than it has in a while. As recently reported by the Star, Filmport, the almost one-year-old megastudio—still only in its first phase of development—is all but completely booked for production on various series, pilots, and feature films, most of them funded by major American studios. Despite in-fighting between the city and its various other studio owners over municipal funding for Filmport, this work is undoubtedly welcomed by the twenty-five thousand professional crew members and ten thousand unionized actors in Toronto.

                

It's been a tumultuous month so far in Canadian politics, with an unlikely centre-left coalition seeking to oust the newly re-elected Conservatives from power in Ottawa. But although Prime Minister Stephen Harper put the kibosh on the opposition's attempt to boot him from office before year's end, Saturday's duelling noontime pro- and anti-coalition rallies in Toronto went on as planned, showing just how much this unusual crisis has shaken residents across the political spectrum.

DISCUSSION: If anything is going to force you to stop triple-flushing (we know it's sometimes necessary) when you next use the washroom, it's tonight's talk inspired by Coach House Books' latest publication, HTO: Toronto's Water from Lake Iroquois to Lost Rivers to Low-flow Toilets. Join in the debate about Toronto's past, present, and future relationships with water, before we sell it all to evil corporations and then have to battle against pirate armies with strange half-dreaded hair and football shoulder pads who will roam our privatized lake system, pillaging private vessels as they please. Hart House Debates Room (Hart House Circle, University of Toronto), 7–9 p.m., $5.

Under the umbrella of Avaaz Canada’s wide-ranging efforts to “close the gap between the world we have and the world most people everywhere want,” the new, targeted campaign seeks to inform the public of what its supporters believe are Stephen Harper’s environmental shortfalls. According to Avaaz’s Executive Director Ricken Patel, “under the Conservative government our country is actively wrecking international progress on climate change. This song is an eloquent reminder that Canada doesn’t have to be this way—it’s our choice.” “You Have a Choice” was written and produced by K-OS and Ian Lefeuvre, and it includes a slew of Canadian artists such as Ed Robertson of the Barenaked Ladies, Ben Kowalewicz of Billy Talent, Adam Gontier of Three Days Grace, Jason Collett of Broken Social Scene, and the Arts Offstage Choir. In the words of Patel, “these bright lights of the Canadian music scene are sending a message to voters: you can make a difference, and we need to come together and strategically support candidates who will defeat Stephen Harper and fight climate change.”

On April 1, Radiohead asked their fans to remix "Nude," one of the tracks from 2007's In Rainbows. Fans could buy any or all of the five "stems" of the song (voice, guitar, bass, strings/FX, or drums), create a version of their own, and upload it to radioheadremix.com.

If you are saddened by your procrastination that cost you Richard Hawley and Jose Gonzalez tickets this week, you can direct your attention to the eclectic choice of shows as a mild substitute. It does, however, appear as if local label Arts and Crafts have successfully cornered the market on this week's moderately sized shows (read: tickets that cost no more than $35). Tuesday you can catch Jason Collett with a surprise guest at the...

An excuse to post Feist's "1234"? Yes, please.

A lot happens in and around Toronto, but we can only write about so much in a week. Here's the best of the rest, in a new weekly feature we're calling Superfluist. Superfluist will appear every Friday night.

Photo of Cadence Weapon by David Topping.

Photo by Sylvain Dumais from the Torontoist Flickr Pool.

For the time, it seems, side-projects are here to stay. If you take a look at any of the large indie bands from Canada (Broken Social Scene, Stars, New Pornographers, The Arcade Fire and Wolf Parade, off the top of our head), they've got at least one offshoot, whether active or not. The surprising thing is that, for the most part, these side-projects have done a decent job of living up to the hype brought upon them from their larger, more successful bands. With the Handsome Furs' debut Plague Park (Sub Pop), Wolf Parade's Dan Boeckner joins the long list of artists who have spawned another band while in the downtime from their main gig.

Most people are probably jealous of Feist. As a globe-trotting artist she's had the chance to play shows around the world, both as a solo-artist and with Broken Social Scene, not to mention the time she has spent living and recording in France. But as her third album highlights, now out on Arts & Crafts, all of this travel has come at a high price. The Reminder shows the lonely life of the internationally popular musician who tries, unsuccessfully, to juggle their love life and career.

Spring appears to have, er, sprung, at least temporarily, in most of the Ist-A-Verse, so naturally, we're all feeling pretty good. (Yes, we know that spring doesn't start till later this month. Just let us enjoy our weather!) And that makes us that much more eager to share all of the nifty things we're up to...

On the way to the sold-out Bunch Family Salon at The Arts and Letters Club last Saturday, my eight year old son looks into the window of our subway car and sees an alternate universe; it's just us, but backwards. After he asks me to call him by his inverse reality name, "ttenraG," he ponders how my name would sound. Turns out that even in other worlds, my name is "moM."

Bunch Family is at it again. The family oriented group, who also run the Family Dance Party and Bunch Rocks events, bring the Bunch Family Salon to The Arts and Letters Club (14 Elm St.) this Saturday, February 24th, from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. The event "is a symposium of art, music and ideas for kids and parents," keeping the Bunch tradition that family events should be designed with both the children and parents in mind.

It's no wonder why Broken Social Scene are taking a "significant break" right now, aside from appearing at various festivals. It seems that all of the 1233 band members are busy working on their own projects at the moment, including lead guitarist Andrew Whiteman. On February 6th, Whiteman and bandmates are set to release Apostle of Hustle's sophomore album National Anthem of Nowhere on the Arts & Crafts label. To celebrate, the band will be doing a residency, called "Ouija," at the Rivoli one night a week over the next month, bringing along some special guests.

We realize that we probably talk about Owen Pallett, aka Final Fantasy, way too much. So we're not going to talk about his free show on Saturday night at North York Central Library, also featuring The Creeping Nobodies, Hank, Ninja High School, and Bob Wiseman. Nope, not a word.

think. It just made us wonder: if it were up to the -ist-a-verse, what would we be voting for?

i (heart) music has just released their list of the 33 hottest bands in Canada for 2006, as selected by a more than forty Canadian music bloggers (including yours truly, current Torontoist contributor Carrie Musgrave, Said the Gramophone, former Torontoist contributor Frank Yang from Chromewaves, and lots of others). We don't mean to gloat, but it looks like we're still the best city for music in the country.

Yes we know it's awfully presumptous of us to assume that Ignatieff could not just win the Liberal leadership but lead the party back into 24 Sussex Drive.

On Sunday, the twelfth installment of the World Electronic Music Festival drew to a close. Even so, I expect most of the 5,000 or so sleep-deprived Torontonians who trekked out to Tweed, Ontario for the outdoor festival are still recovering. This was an odd year, with Destiny Productions opting to include a rock stage for the first time ever, partnering with Edge 102 to bring names like Broken Social Scene, Pilate and Mobile. This year, the promoters decided that teens in euroshag haircuts and studded belts would mix awkwardly with their binkie- and fun fur-clad counterparts.

More evidence that we're the centre of the universe (kidding), the nominees for the inaugural Polaris Prize is out and four five out of the ten nominees are bonafide Toronto artists. Broken Social Scene, The Deadly Snakes, Final Fantasy, Sarah Harmer and K'Naan make up the Toronto contingent. If we add Metric (which live in a whole bunch of places) and Sarah Harmer (who lives near Kingston) then over half the list calls Toronto home. Good job scene.

The Canadian Content of the Late Show with David Letterman will increase by several hundred percent as our own uber-group Broken Social Scene hits CBS tonight. We wonder whether Paul Shaffer will join Kevin Drew, Brendan Canning, et al.

It's old news now, but just in case you didn't hear, Boing Boing editor and former Torontonian Cory Doctorow is one of three judges for the 2006 Blooker prize. The Lulu Blooker prize is awarded to the best non-fiction, fiction and comic books inspired by a blog (or blog turned into books). The most impressive title on the short list, in Torontoist's humble opinion is Julie Powell's Julie and Julia, the New York secretary that cooked every recipe in Julia Child's epic Mastering the Art of French Cooking. But we also have a soft spot for Toronto artist Ryan North's Dinosaur Comics. (pictured above)

Sometime last year there was a rumour going around that a NYT writer was in town fishing for interviews for a piece on Toronto's indie scene. Well that piece is here and the ever resourceful kids at Stillepost have somehow got their hands on the piece before it was put up on the NYT's site (NYT subscribers get a sneak peek at Sunday's issue, the piece will most likely appear in this Sunday's NYT magazine).