Live In Toronto

Hot damn, another great batch of tourdates:

Edge 102.1 FM will be having a pre-sale of tickets starting tomorrow at 4 pm EST, for the Sonic Youth show in Toronto on August 5, 2004 at Kool Haus. You need to be an Inside Edge member in order to gain access to link and password tomorrow.

According to the Guided By Voices site update on July 7/04, several new tour dates for September 2004(including Boston, Philadelphia, and Washington D.C.) have just been annouced and the rest of the dates will be posted July 16, 2004. I'm crossing my fingers for a Toronto date. The tour's been named THE ELECTRIFYING CONCLUSION TOUR, but as long as there's a Robert Pollard, GBV will live on. Po-tA-to, Po-tAW-to.

Jason Collett(of Broken Social Scene) will be bringing his alt-country tunes to the Rivoli on Wednesday July 21, 2004 as part of Umbrella Music Night. Cost is $8.00.

This isn't even posted on the band website, but according to the Toronto Bluesfest site, The Dears will be playing The Roots Stage @ 4:45 pm on July 24, 2004. There's a bunch of interesting artists that'll be playing over the course of the two weekend festival[The Black Keys, The Sadies, Cake, etc.], but I still gotta consider whether there's enough artists to deem it worthy to buy a weekend pass. Just looking at the schedule for July 24, 2004, there really aren't any other artists playing the festival that day that might even make it worthy to spend $20 or so for the day just to see The Dears play what'll likely be just over an hour set....Toronto Bluesfest is cancelled.

For some guitar-drums-bass instrumental goodness, check out Atomic 7 who play the El Mocambo in Toronto on Friday, July 30th, 2004. Read this great article on the band at Soul Shine Magazine.

controller.controller will be playing at Harbourfront on August 4, 2004 in the Brigantine Room as part of Masala! Mehndi! Masti! An Explosive South Asian Arts Festival, specifically the South Asian Alt-Rock Showcase. Cost is $5.00. There's also a batch of new controller.controller shows lined up for August in and around Ontario, the next closest show to me being the show in Hamilton on August 6, 2004 at The Underground. ...Hmmm, I may just go to both, which would then be the 4th and 5th times I've seen the band since I saw the band for the first time at last year's Pop Montreal festival. Can you say 'addictive'?

The Constantines finally provide an update on their site, reiterating tour dates that probably most of you already know, including the Olympic Island concert in Toronto on August 7, 2004 as well as a date on July 17, 2004 in New York City as part of the Siren Music Festival. I was hoping to make it down for this show with some friends, considering it was free, and it would have given me a chance to go sight-seeing in New York City, but the airfares now are f!*kin' more than what I paid to go to California in May. And since I would have only planned to be in New York City for 3-4 days, it doesn't seem justified to pay the horrendous airfares now. Maybe next year. Too bad because the Siren Music Festival lineup this year rules...ps. The Constantines recent update on July 11, 2004 also includes a link to the web site for Toronto band Ghost Story, who are quite interesting in their own right, playing a sort-of dreamy folky-country hybrid of instrumental music. They're on Toronto record label Blue Fog who are home also to The Unintended and Elevator. Song samples are included on the site...I'll forgive the fact that the guitar part at the beginning of "An Alley Through The Trees" sounds a bit like Radiohead's "Street Spirit". Otherwise, excellent music.