Dual protests are set for tomorrow afternoon in Vancouver and Toronto in an effort to maintain media awareness of the misuse of force by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police that led to the death of Robert Dziekanski, captured on video by a witness. The video, since viewed (in its various incarnations) by millions of people, documents a confused and clearly agitated Dziekanski sweating and pacing until a fatal confrontation with four RCMP officers killed......

A massive fire at a townhouse complex on Jarvis Street near Mutual resulted in the death of an unidentified victim on Saturday night. Construction on the townhouses had been abandoned for ten months and the building was being inhabited by squatters, says a resident at the adjacent Radio City condo tower. Novelist Norman Mailer died this weekend. Kim Ruehl at Seattlest has a nice eulogy: "He was, as most great novelists are, a complete......

Ottawa denies entrance to Nelson Mandela's wife. Winnie Madikizela-Mandela was supposed to give a speech at a fundraiser gala last night, but was told that she was denied a visa because she had been previously convicted of kidnapping and fraud. The fact that she was allowed in the United States three weeks ago means nothing. Come on, the U.S. never lets anyone in! The Ontario government is handing over $4 million to keep kids busy......

When theatre "It Boy" Daniel MacIvor wrote Marion Bridge, a play which is finally getting its Toronto premiere after being performed out East, in New York City and being adapted into a film, he figured it would never be performed in the city. A big contrast to his edgy one-man shows, Marion Bridge is a family drama about three sisters reconnecting at their mother's deathbed that MacIvor supposedly wrote because he wanted to do......

We have good news for fans of Joel Plaskett Emergency. Tomorrow (Wednesday, May 2), Joel's going to be shooting a video for "Fashionable People," the first video from his latest album, Ashtray Rock, and everyone's invited to take part. All you've gotta do is show up from 5-8 p.m. at St. Joseph's Catholic School (at 50 Curzon Street, near Queen and Leslie; here's a Google Map). It's all-ages, and you have to wear black,......

One of two winning lotto tickets in Wednesday's $38.7 million Lotto 6/49 jackpot has been turned in by twenty carpenters. That means there is one more winning ticket worth $19.7 million out there, people! It is time for the wacky Dave Barry-esque hijinks and capers to commence! I call dibs on conning an old lady out of her wheelchair by wearing an obviously fake moustache and pretending to be Ringo Starr. (Also amusing: the article......

Guy Maddin is given an all-day retrospective at this year’s Rendezvous with Madness Film Festival, which opens tonight (at 7:30pm, with short Pretty Broken and Ole Christian Madsen’s Kira’s Reason: A Love Story). There is a full schedule, of course, with programmes carefully grouped to certain aspects of mental health, such as sexuality (Queer Madness) or addiction (Hell’s Half Acre); programme All in the Family includes a screening of Cottonland, which played at this year’s......

A brief aside; The London Film Festival is currently running and our sister site Londonist are covering it, and have already given a sterling review to one of our favourites from TIFF, Reprise. You might want to check it out. But back here on home turf (well, if not Toronto’s, at least making our way across the Atlantic as far as Nova Scotia) Trailer Park Boys has made it to the big screen, and the......

Who is Bryan Lee O’Malley? With the strength of character displayed by Scott Pilgrim, the protagonist of O’Malley’s breakthrough comics series, it’s easy to imagine that he is Scott Pilgrim - the unskilled bass player for a go nowhere band in Toronto, dating an American girl, sleeping in the same bed as a gay dude and getting into all kinds of crazy adventures. The kind of guy you could imagine punching a guy “so hard......

Who can promote a irresponsible multinational corporation? Sprinkle it in dew? Cover it in chocolate and a miracle or two? - Dalton's buddies lift energy alert. But that doesn't mean you can leave the microwave on all night. - Buy all the booze you can, right now. - Dear Summer, Jay Z is en route to Much Music. Rick the Temp is going to be grilling him, although VJ Hannah might have made a better......

Joel Plaskett, Musician...

Hailing from Nova Scotia, Matt Mays & El Torpedo play the kind of music that simply sounds "Canadian", for all the positive and negative connotations that may come with the tag. We're talking big, rootsy rock in the grand tradition of Neil Young & Crazy Horse - thundering guitars, raw vocals, a healthy dose of twang - nothing groundbreaking, but when it's done right it's a marvelous thing. And Matt Mays does it pretty damn......