Slowcity.ca Open Mic with Matthew Cardinal, Sameer Cash, Margo Price, Donovan Woods, Airliners, Yukon Blonde, Tucker Lane, and Rooks

By Will McGuirk

“Boy you’re gonna carry that weight a long time” sang four working class lads from Liverpool in hats from fifty years ago and they knew and fought forward, its tough to be tough. Its hard to be a hard man. We can’t crack, when we crack we break. We haven’t learnt to bend. . . yet, and yet . . .

“I would like it if people listened and interpreted the music anyway they want to. I don't think these songs need a narrative, and I think certain moods come through some of the tracks, while other moods might only be heard by individual listeners.” - Matthew Cardinal

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“‘Stay In Touch’ is about male friendship, and about how we as boys are not given the language to articulate pain or loss. . . Like when our friend lost his dad. Or when our form of a high school reunion was a funeral for one of our own. For those of us mourning the loss of innocence and the realization that the world was not made of us, for sensitive people who want the best for those around us. When we feel like we are not enough. When it gets too much, and when the money dries up, stay in touch with your mother, stay in touch with your high school band, stay in touch with me.” - Sameer Cash

Cash’s album ‘This City” will be released Friday, Sep. 11, 2020 on Postwar Records.

Order the vinyl here ->

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“To me the song is about, not only watching someone you love move on, but coming to terms with the realization that not only do you have to learn to let them go, but you have to be happy for them,” - Donovan Woods

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Airliners · Copenhagen

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Yukon Blonde have announced their fifth studio album, ‘Vindicator’ will be available on Nov. 13, 2020 on Dine Alone Records. Their new single “You Were Mine” is out now.

Preorder the vinyl here ->

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Slowcity.ca Open Mic with Arkells, Sameer Cash, summersets, Krief, Le Couleur, LAL, Sam Roberts Band, METZ, and the Happy Fits

By Will McGuirk

Its time I think for all of us to take a breath. Its been one hell of a year. Although we collectively hit the pause button back in Spring its still been go go go, an incessant propulsive hammering of dread, and with the country opening up, schools back and bubbles enlarged that sense of dread is amplified. I miss festivals. I go annually to rejuvenate my soul. I need it, I need trees and water and dirt and campfires at dusk and sky, so much sky. But there are trees in my yard and sky between the buildings in my city and water a drive away so I have been getting my festival vibes in fragments but still getting them. So do yourself a favour, grab some campfire vibes, go small, go slow, choose time, choose tunes, where ever you can, however you can, find a moment; outside, away from it all, remove the mask and breathe in deeply. As deeply as you can, feel it as deeply as you can, fill your boots. . . , pause. . . , and then strap on the mask and get back in the fight.

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“I kept trying to find ways of communicating this illusive feeling that seems to plague my generation. This access to everything, but the need for nothing – it manifests itself in all aspects of our lives, from relationships, to the internet.” - Sameer Cash

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summersets, photo by Brittany Lucas

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“As we took this journey without the noise, the people, and the parties in our warehouse apartment, along with the constant grind outside, I found beauty in the stillness of our block.” - LAL

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"Essentially, in my mind, it comes back to the need for some light. A way forward. To shine some kind of bright light on the future, the path that we’re walking and not giving in to despair," - Sam Roberts

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Slowcity.ca Open Mic with Sameer Cash, Katie Pruitt, Troy Junker, Juke Ross, Gold Star Gold Star, Leela Gilday, Soccer Mommy, Daysormay

By Will McGuirk

Watched a piece today on art galleries opening. Options included drive-thru and route markers. Most of these solutions seemed geared to getting numbers into the gallery and had little to do with the focus of a gallery which is, or at least should be, the artist and the art. In some of the galleries people were giving a certain amount of time and then had to move on. What a ridiculous and disrespectful notion! One needs time with art, the best art demands time, and rewards the time spent. One can read a novel several times over a lifetime and get something different each time. Art does that, art transcends time. Any gallery which puts a time limit on the experience of art is away in the before times and those times and infrastructures gave a platform for this Covid-19 virus. The same infrastructures will not offer us a way out. What will will be the creativity and invention and ingenuity of the artist. Rather than limiting exposure to art we should be maximizing it in all ways possibles. Art is the roadway we need to take to get out.

“With the rest of the world tucked under their covers endlessly scanning the news, we were present for the shift in real life, minute by minute. It all seemed so surreal, it was hard to relate to. Hard not to joke about. That night, we were all living in the active transition from one world to the next, we could feel it, it felt so close, yet so large and so out of reach.” - Sameer Cash

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“To me, Pride Month is all about celebrating self-love. This year, we might not have the parties or parades, but it’s never really been about that. ‘Pride’ is a feeling that we find within ourselves. It’s a sigh of relief that we don’t have to hide anymore or alter our personality or preferences in order to make a Cisgender society more comfortable. So, when straight people ask, ‘Why don’t we have straight pride?’ I always respond with, ‘because society never told you to be ashamed.’” - Katie Pruitt

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Leela Gilday · Giants

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