If you're looking for some place to take your special someone dancing, nothing screams Valentine's Day like Andrew W.K. The man who is dedicated to partying hard will be performing his live show and a DJ set at the Sound Academy this Thursday. His set kicks off a weekend that is busier than usual due to the new Family Day long weekend. Every holiday has their own set of unique traditions and clubs are working......

The last time Torontoist made mention of local punks The Little Millionaires, it was a few days after a rousing night of rocking and rolling at Sneaky Dee's. This time out, however, it seemed like a good idea to give some advance warning of the band's next Toronto show. So get your black t-shirts ready! This Thursday, February 7, the band will be opening for recent Juno nominees The Saint Alvia Cartel (another Torontoist......

No, you are not mistaken; Michael Bublé, Ozzy Osbourne and Rob Zombie are all passing through the city this week. Imagine Michael Bublé (for some unknown reason) making a vocal cameo during Ozzy’s sure-to-be "Crazy Train" encore? Best mash-up, ever! Or not. Ozzy, Michael, and that ridiculous idea aside, there is a show worthy of your attendance for reasons beyond an ideal encore. On Saturday, January 26, The Tranzac will be hosting the CD......

When local promoter Dan Burke so unabashedly declared “less drugs, more shows” as what he looks forward to for this calendar year, no one believed the drugs portion of that resolution—but Friday is reason to start believing the show portion. Friday night will gather many to the Silver Dollar to celebrate the CD release of local experimental composer Katie Stelmanis. Widely recognized for her contributions to all-female baroque rockers Galaxy (R.I.P.) and alt-gospel howlers Bruce......

Oh, how this time of the year can be so unexciting. Holidays are done, the New Year has come, and there is not much to look forward to until, well, the new statutory holiday. Until then, Musicologist recommends indulging in the odd show that surfaces from the woodwork and makes trekking through 20-below weather worthwhile. This Friday, for example, is worth that trek: Metal Kites and Great Bloomers are playing the Rivoli for a mere......

The Hidden Cameras are back home, and we are all better off for it. As we mentioned in this week's music listings, the Cameras––they of the Mississauga-bred now world-famous exuberant gay pop fame––are playing an AIDS benefit concert this Thursday night at the Great Hall in Hart House (7 Hart House Circle), with proceeds going to Toronto People With AIDS Foundation and AVERT International. The show, with Montreal's Sister Suvi and Toronto's Allie Hughes, will......

Photo of Architecture in Helsinki by Zach Klein. There are lots of great shows in Toronto this week—including a bunch of free ones. On Tuesday, Musicologist recommends checking out Sarah Melody at the Mod Club (where Snow of "Informer" fame will be making an on-stage appearance—YES!) and then running to the Horseshoe to see Wintersleep and A Northern Chorus. Spiral Beach, who also put on a great live show, have a free concert on......

Musicologist is Torontoist's weekly concert listings. Check back in every Monday for more. This week, Musicologist recommends Girl Talk at the Phoenix—if you can find a ticket—but with a couple of caveats. First, do not go expecting your typical live show, or even your typical DJ. The magic of Girl Talk is in the atmosphere he creates with his sample-crazy mash-ups, not in any sort of live technical impressiveness. Think of the $15 ticket price......

Musicologist is Torontoist's weekly concert listings. Check back in every Monday for more. This week, we suggest Land Of Talk and Thunderheist. Land Of Talk has put out some of the most addictive songs of the past year on their EP, Applause Cheer Boo Hiss. The stripped-down, guitar-driven pop of "All My Friends" and "Speak To Me Bones" will stick in your head and not come out, even after you've purchased the album and listened......

Songs about zombies, drive-by shootings, Obi-Wan Kenobi, pirates, monsters, punching people in the face, pregnancy, "reeking and seeking," families, obesity, virginity—all of them catchy, all of them disconcertingly happy-sounding, and all of them sing-and-clap-along-able. That is what Austin's Oh No! Oh My! is made of, and their albums—their self-titled full-length; their new EP, Between The Devil and The Sea; and their Jolly Rogers demo that the songs from the new EP are culled from—are the......

Weekly indie institution Wavelength started in 1999, setting up shop at Ted's Wrecking Yard, then bouncing between venues until landing at its current home, Sneaky Dee's, in 2002. Past performers read like a who's-who of home grown indie music: Great Lake Swimmers, The Bicycles, Cadence Weapon, Julie Doiron, Peaches, Final Fantasy, Feist—and the list goes on. After a Canada Day hiatus, the Sunday night series is back with a stellar July lineup for its live......

For Toronto's Kids On TV, it's been a long road to get their debut album completed, one that has lasted the better part of three years. For those waiting to hear Mixing Business With Pleasure, released last week by the Blocks Recording Club, there has been the lingering question of how the music would translate from the live show onto tape. For a band that is so infamous for its high-energy, explicit performances, how would......

Part Pet Sounds-era Beach Boys, part Animal Collective, part something else completely, Grizzly Bear have a unique sound that's tricky to categorize. This is not music you will necessarily dance to, but you will be moved. The Brooklyn-based band hits Toronto on Tuesday at Lee's Palace with Dirty Projectors to promote their newest (and critically acclaimed) record Yellow House. Despite ranking their last show in Toronto in support of TV on the Radio their......

When the weather is this shit the best thing to do is either hang out with friends at someone's house and tie one on, or go see a flick or two. Last night was time for the latter and the film was Rock The Bells. The film takes a funny, behind the scenes look at the trials and tribulations faced by a promoter trying to book the entire Wu Tang Clan for a live......

What do Colonel Sanders, Charlie Chaplin and the Anti-Christ have in common? They're all backing members of Tenacious D, the self-professed "greatest band in the world," who brought us all down into the pits of hell on Monday night at the Ricoh Coliseum. Love him or hate him, Jack Black (JB) is comedy's "it" boy these days, and along with his sidekick Kyle Gass (Kage), "The D" have developed quite a following since the......

How unusual! Not a lot of festivals this week. Just the Indie Can Film Festival this weekend, and the Toronto Arab Film Festival starting on Wednesday. Of course, Cinematheque Ontario continues with their exhaustive Roberto Rossellini retrospective and the Toronto premiere of the acclaimed Au-Dela De La Haine (given glowing reviews in both Eye and Now) but our pick of the week has to be tomorrow afternoon’s matinee, Night of the Hunter. Robert Mitchum is......

Musicians must really love our city; so many of them have made multiple trips to Toronto this year that there could be no other explanation. Or maybe they just like our money. Either way, Panic! At The Disco (P!ATD) brought their elaborate set and crew to the Ricoh Coliseum last night for the second time this year, not even six months after their first visit at the Molson Amphitheatre. As a person out of......

We had the good fortune of catching J. Mann at the Free Times Cafe last night. It was his first Toronto gig since last year's NXNE showcase. Live appearances are rare -- the Canadian singer-songwriter now resides much of the year in Barcelona, Spain. Though he may not be local, J. Mann is still very supportive of the Canadian scene. In far-off Spain, he runs a small record label, Middle of the Road Records,......

Local chef Sam Higgs must like to multi-task. How else can you explain his semi-regular monthly food event "grub-a-dub" where Higgs would prepare a vegan meal while on-stage a dub band entertained the diners. It combined going out to a restaurant with a live show. After a hiatus Higgs has brought back "grub-a-dub." Rechristened the "stew and brew hootenanny," tonight at the Tranzac Higgs will prepare a stew (think of all those yummy fresh summer......

If you'd like to take thoroughly reading NOW Magazine's live show listings one step further, cautiously enter the Toronto section of Stillepost. The message board is frequented by musicians, promoters, and the like, so a head's up on upcoming shows can often be found. (Info on the Wolf Parade show on Aug. 5, for example, would've helped this person.) But the insider's scoop comes with its share of behind-the-scenes drama. The most recent is......

Austin's American Analog Set have been turning out gorgeously hushed and hypnotic drone pop for a decade now, but with their latest album Set Free, they've now got a local connection - it's been released in North America by Toronto's own Arts & Crafts label. AmAnSet found themselves homeless when Tiger Style went out of business following the release of their 2003 album Promise Of Love, but that timing was fortuitous as frontman Andrew Kenny......

The events leading up to Ear to the Ground, Toronto’s newest independent arts festival, are already starting. The festival itself takes place later this summer, but before it begins there will be a series of events across the city. Like tomorrow night for example. Thursday June 2nd, Ear to the Ground are taking over the Bloor Cinema for an evening of vampire like fun. It all starts at 9:30 with a live performance by Vampire......

Yes, The Arcade Fire are playing their last of three sold out shows at the Danforth Music Hall tonight. And it's true concert reviews from the past two nights have been favourable. Tonight will be just as good, if not better. Like the past two nights, tonight’s show is sold out. If you have the money for it, scalped tickets are anywhere from $40 to $120. But don’t buy a scalped ticket from that jerk......

You’ve heard it here before.  You’ve read it in the New York Times and Spin magazine and countless other publications.  Montreal is where it’s at and the Arcade Fire is THE Canadian band.  Why even bother to offer an adjective, there’s just too many too choose from.  The critically-and-David Bowie-acclaimed Arcade Fire is “Canada’s most intriguing rock band,” as declared by this week’s Time Magazine’s Canadian Edition, on newsstands now. Laura Blue and Hugh Porter......