SPILL FEATURE: IT’S JUST PURE CONNECTION – A CONVERSATION WITH JAY MALINOWSKI OF BEDOUIN SOUNDCLASH

IT’S JUST PURE CONNECTION

A CONVERSATION WITH JAY MALINOWSKI OF BEDOUIN SOUNDCLASH

Few songs from the 2000s left as big of an imprint on Canadian people as Bedouin Soundclash’s “When The Night Feels My Song”. It practically raised an entire generation of Canadian kids as it was used for many years in CBC Kids. Chances are, if you hear it, it will transport you back to a time in your childhood. It was also a massive radio success, becoming a beloved part of Canadian music. Now, Bedouin Soundclash are celebrating 20 years of Sounding A Mosaic, the album their timeless hit is from. To celebrate the anniversary, Bedouin Soundclash released two new versions of “When The Night Feels My Song” and is touring Canada.

“We wrote this record when our band was not that successful, and we were really, really enthusiastic about the music that we were into,” Jay Malinowski says about Sounding A Mosaic. “I know talking to other bands that everyone has this moment where they feel like they’ve tapped into something that’s their own language. I feel like in that period writing Sounding A Mosaic, we were trying to synthesize all these records that we loved, whether they were drum and bass records, Massive Attack, Roni Size, LTJ Bukem, to like Finley Quaye, The Clash, The Specials, Desmond Dekker. It was this really magical time creatively for us where we just felt that ‘wonder’– This record was just like that pinnacle moment for us… That’s what it reflects to me: that magic moment when we were like 21 years old and just felt invincible.”

One of Malinowski’s favourite memories from Sounding A Mosaic was writing “When The Night Feels My Song”. “I was walking down the street, and I was like, ‘I need a song that has like a hymn part,’ he exclaims. “I love hymns and vocal harmonies. I wanted something to close out the song that would be like a ‘headphone song,’ so, to have this sort of beautiful, lush harmonies at the end, and I remember writing that. In those days, you just didn’t have all the luxuries of the laptop where you could hear everything layered up and do it really easily on GarageBand or whatever program you use for free. So, I remember we were in Montreal, and we recorded it. That was the last one we did. I’ll always remember we did the gang vocals and hearing it come back for the first time. I’ve had these moments a few times, but this was the first time I had this kind of like, ‘Woah’ astounded moment of like, ‘This thing has an energy that I’m not completely responsible for.’ It had this power that I felt even back then, and that song obviously had its own life and still does.”

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Another moment that stands out for Malinowski involves Darryl Jenifer from Bad Brains. “We had no money, and Darryl Jenifer from Bad Brains was like, ‘I’ll produce the record,’ and we were blown away by that,” he reflects. “I remember we were just kind of intimidated too because Bad Brains are like the pioneers of hardcore music, had a reputation for being some pretty tough guys from DC, and also being really good musicians, which set them apart from a lot of hardcore music. I remember when we first got to the studio, Darryl sat us down, and he’s like, ‘Y’all kids write parts you don’t know how to play. We used to do shit like this when we were young. We’d write parts we can’t play.’ We were so youthful that we were writing really technical. So, he made me sit in a corner and just play and like learn my rhythm. He did the same for Pat [Pengelly] and Eon [Sinclair], too. It was such a valuable lesson coming from him, just like a day sitting in the corner strumming a guitar and being like, ‘You’re not in time. You’re not in time. You’re not on time.’”

The biggest hit from Sounding A Mosaic was “When The Night Feels My Song”. It was part of many people’s childhoods, was an inescapable hit on the radio, and is one of the most well-known Canadian songs of the 2000s. Even to this day, the song still connects to people across Canada. “I don’t know how it happened; I really don’t,” laughs Malinowski. “It was on CBC Kids for like a long time. We did a tour for the record Mass, and there were kids that came to that who got introduced to us from hearing “Edge Of The Night” from that record, and they had no idea we were the band that played the CBC Kids song. I remember I talked to them after the show about it.” The song also appeared in a Zellers commercial. “That got to like all these soccer moms across Canada. I remember we came back from doing The Warped Tour, and we were going across Canada and all of a sudden, all these soccer moms were coming to our shows with their kids, and it was a totally different world for us. That said, it’s bigger than the band. Like if we play it, we know that if you may not know the band, you’ll probably know the song in Canada.”

Last year, Bedouin Soundclash put out two new versions of “When The Night Feels My Song”. One version features Frank Turner and the other features The Interrupters and Jesse Royal. “When we were thinking of doing a 20th anniversary of the song “When The Night Feels My Song” we thought like, ‘Let’s pay homage to sort of our roots as a band,’” comments Malinowski.  “I was writing this kind of more Billy Bragg version of “When The Night Feels My Song”, and I was like, ‘I’d love to have Frank on it,’ and he agreed to do it. That kind of paid respect to our deep love of English music, whether it be English folk or English punk… Jesse Royal he’d already done a version of “When The Night Feels My Song”. We love Jessie. So much of our music is reggae influenced so that is paying respect to Jamaica. We had The Interrupters who kind of represent punk rock, So-Cal, but also Two-Tone. We just thought, ‘Let’s do a version of all these things.’ Also, who doesn’t love hearing Aimee [Allen] sing? She’s awesome. That’s how it all came together. All these artists we handpicked and love.”

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“Rude Boy Don’t Cry” and “Living In Jungles” are two deep cuts from Sounding A Mosaic that Malinowski really enjoys. “We started playing those for the first time in the UK, and those ones you can really hear how young we are, and are like jungle, two-step, drum and bass inspired Bedouin Soundclash, which is like what we used to do early on in our career just to keep people dancing,” he states. “I love playing those now because I just feel the youthfulness, especially in the lyrics; I’m like, ‘I don’t know what I am talking about half the time.’”

To promote 20 years of Sounding A Mosaic Bedouin Soundclash is touring across Canada. “We’ve done so many tours, but this is a tour that I think to still be around and doing this 20 years later is a real honour for us and something we’re so grateful for and something that just doesn’t happen,” says Malinowski. “It is really special, though. We did it in the UK, and we go out after every show and try to talk to everyone as best as we can. You get to hear everyone’s moments that they’ve had with the music, and for us, it’s really profound.”

Malinowski is very excited for these upcoming shows. “It’s just pure connection,” he smiles. “That’s why I feel so grateful for doing what we do, especially given the climate of this sort of passé; I think it’s passé, but people just complain about everything all the time, and I would just say that’s a nice way to put it. People on every side and every issue just finding issues to disconnect and feel righteous as a result… I think when we go to a show, we get to have this amazing moment of like higher purpose, and I don’t know if that’s pretentious or something, but that’s what music is for me, so the fact that we get to go out and do that and “When The Night Feels My Song” is actually a moment in the set where that happens for me because it is such a sing-along, and so hearing 800 people sing back to you in harmony, like I don’t think there’s anything better in the world.”

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Photo Credit: Mike Neal