Tag: Guelph

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Ep. #268: PUP

PUP is a young, hard rock band based in Toronto, Ontario. Known for touring hard and putting on riotous shows, PUP recently released their second album, The Dream is Over, via Side One Dummy and Royal Mountain Records and they will soon be touring the entire planet for months and months. Ahead of their return to Guelph’s Hillside Festival, I met with singer/guitarist Stefan Babcock and guitarist Steve Sladkowski on Steve’s porch in Toronto, mere hours after he and his girlfriend found out they were being evicted. A dog named Jane sat with Stefan, Steve, and I as we discussed the short but already tumultuous history of PUP, which science believes shouldn’t even be a band anymore, plus Roncesvalles Avenue, as a hood, Polish yelling, gentrification, High Park and poison cities, getting out of Dodge, a sudden eviction, when Steve lived in Guelph and first met Stefan at the Hillside Festival in Guelph, tour managing Zeus, hash brownies at Hillside, Zack the drummer, time passes slowly or quickly, pacing your not-as-young-as-it-was body, a Toronto heat wave, not curbing your enthusiasm, sustainable touring, van snacks, coffee and water and beer, tiny bladders and a presumably meddling landlord, bananas and spicy nuts, unsweetened iced tea, shotgunning McDoubles, ice cream, Waffle House, green juice, stocktaking and maturity and pacing a tour, Stefan getting told “The dream is over” by a medical specialist after experiencing discomfort from a cyst on his vocal cords, the visceral response to this issue, too many shows, vocal coaches and speech pathologists, the book Bad Singer and amusia, musical training, a rock band, the description of punk to come, the mythology surrounding punk and proficiency, resisting the terms of a medical diagnosis, the rarity of success in music making and creation, artistic freedom, playing the night of the diagnosis on the first day of a seven week tour, Stefan gets help from PUP patrol, the stress of bodily harm or alteration, the song “DVP” and the gestation of The Dream is Over, jokes and rage, Canadian enunciation and producer Dave Schiffman, The Bronx album III, Americans and “about,” pointed humour, imaginary and blunt arguments, apolitical lyrics and inclusive spaces, avoiding white mansplaining, the Hillside Festival, a long tour without writing new stuff, a conceptual proposal, the song “Familiar Patterns,” and then the dream was over.

Related links: puptheband.com sideonedummy.com royalmountainrecords.com vishkhanna.com

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News Podcast

Ep. #247: Cupcake Ductape

Cupcake Ductape is a very cool noise-infused pop band consisting of Steph Yates of the band Esther Grey and a folk-oriented singer and songwriter named Alanna Gurr. Based in Guelph, Cupcake Ductape have become local favourites on the strength of their live show and their 2015 EP, Get Over It. They’re playing a show at Kazoo! Fest in Guelph on Thursday April 7, and here, Steph, Alanna, and I discuss Steph’s chest cold, Alanna’s curiosity about being sick, how Alanna loves driving, stormchips, how we combine everything now, worlds colliding, the song “Champagne Birthday,” pronunciation, sparkle punk and playful music, the song “Whose Hair?,’ servers and customers, revenge, Steph meeting Alanna at the Homemade Jam Festival, getting Alanna a job, Scott went to the washroom while Cupcake Ductape wrote songs, bass and drums and Mike O’Neill and the Inbreds, melodic bass, being bratty, serious music, who cares, Alanna comes out of her shell, singing pretty versus singing roughly, being girly and tough, internalized perceptions of women, possible mutual interests, the Slits, working songs out, personal voids, getting an encouraging push from Brad McInerney, Lowlands, Nicolette and the Nobodies, growing up in Guelph, the Hillside Festival, piano tuning, Mona Lisa and Whip Cream Bikinis, two songs about hot dogs, Hamilton’s Art Crawl, Guelph needs a music infrastructure, a trip to Aruba, $1300.00, a happenstance band, fun, Too Bad So Sad Hire a Lawyer, Steph’s aunt, Little Room Labs, summer plans, the song “Unique New York,” lawyering up, and then we get over it.

Related links: facebook.com/cupcakeductape vishkhanna.com

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Ep. #245: Joe Casey of Protomartyr

Joe Casey is the lead singer and songwriter in an acclaimed American rock band called Protomartyr. Formed in Detroit in 2008, Protomartyr have released three full-length albums, including their well-received breakthrough, The Agent Intellect, which came out via Hardly Art Records in October, 2015. The band has been touring almost non-stop since then, including upcoming Canadian stops in Guelph, Ottawa, Montreal, and Calgary throughout May and June. Here, Joe and I discuss being back home after a long tour, Fargo and Fargo and Bob Dylan, playing inside and outside, the state of the state of Michigan, the water crisis in Flint, and Governor Rick Snyder, his dad who worked as a construction inspector for the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department, water plant schemes, former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and his appointment of Victor Mercado to head the water department, how Michigan is mostly run by Republicans at the state level, aggressively taking advantage of poor, vulnerable, predominantly black cities, why voters trust business people more than they do politicians, how touring is living in a bubble and not really travelling, Donald Drumpf and the meaningless concept of ‘President,’ Michigan’s political spectrum, Calvinists and forgettable Democrats, when Bernie Sanders won Michigan a little while ago, Ralph Nader’s 2000 election campaign and the Detroit Farmer’s Market, local politics, a Clinton/Sanders ticket, his dad’s political philosophies and humanistic beliefs, the state of Detroit, a focus on downtown instead of the suburbs, whether or not the city actually has jobs to offer the influx of younger people moving there for the cheap rent, false individualism within gentrification, saviours of Detroit, roadie-ing for Tyvek and hearing about Detroit from people who don’t live there, laze about artists, young people, and Detroit’s tax base, how he did and didn’t engage with Detroit’s musical history, Motown, the city’s relative isolation on the tour circuit, the State Theatre and the Shelter and 8 Mile, Zoot’s Coffee House, less shows and more movies, film school, bad news, don’t worry too much, comedy within the songs of Protomartyr, the Coen Brothers and Fellini, the year Protomartyr broke, media coverage and perceptions of success, working very hard, making music to sell clothing, t-shirt sales are the new charts, his stage presence and a collision between passion and indifference, learning how to be a lead singer, being a programs director at a summer camp, becoming an artist, going to see Paris but not seeing it, becoming a public person and interacting with strangers, stock answers, the way fans know artists, Dave Thomas of Pere Ubu, meeting heroes versus contemporaries, trying to record a new song under a tight deadline, perks and road managers, saxamaphone, the wisdom in playing smaller markets like Guelph, Constantines, writing again, his notebooks, the song “Clandestine Time,” and that was it.

Related links: protomartyrband.com vishkhanna.com

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