BOOM – A FILM ABOUT THE SONICS SCRATCH VINYL FILMS IN THEATRES SEPTEMBER 13, 2024 After a number of successful festival screenings, the producers of “BOOM: A Film About The Sonics” are releasing the film to theatres in select cities. The [...]
OLD MAN FLANAGAN’S GHOST SIMPLE LITTLE BOAT INDEPENDENT An act that is well-known for tearing it up in pubs, and at festivals and public events, the Toronto indie Celtic stalwarts Old Man Flanagan’s Ghost (OMFG) have released their third [...]
MONIQUE BARRY HAAK INDEPENDENT HAAK is the fifth album from Toronto-based singer, songwriter and keyboardist, Monique Barry. It is her first full album release since 2013’s Wake, and while it took an unexpected seven years to complete, it has [...]
LORI CULLEN THE THUNDER AND THE BAY INDEPENDENT With the release of The Thunder And The Bay, Toronto singer-songwriter Lori Cullen definitely has something to celebrate. The album is Cullen’s first full-length release since 2022’s Blood Wonder, [...]
RICHARD THOMPSON SHIP TO SHORE NEW WEST RECORDS Singer-songwriter-guitarist Richard Thompson is celebrating the release of new music with his album Ship To Shore. Thompson first made a name for himself in the 1960s as a pioneer of British [...]
DON McLEAN AMERICAN BOYS BMG/THE ORCHARD Imagine that you’re a veteran singer-songwriter in your late 70s. You have had a storied career, and you wrote one of the most iconic pop songs of the 20th century. What kind of recording do you make in [...]
INDIGO GIRLS – IT’S ONLY LIFE AFTER ALL OSCILLOSCOPE LABORATORIES MAY 7, 2024 After an official Canadian release in April 2024, Oscilloscope Laboratories celebrates the digital release of the Indigo Girls documentary, It’s Only Life [...]
EXTC – TERRY CHAMBERS AND FRIENDS @ HEINEKEN STAGE, CLASSIC BOWL, MISSISSAUGA MAY 5, 2024 Fact: the English new wave pop band XTC famously stopped making live concert appearances in 1982, and became a studio-based entity. For fans, this [...]
VARIOUS ARTISTS LOVE, LA ORG MUSIC Compilation albums have often been hit-and-miss, over the course of recorded music history, but that is not the case with Love, LA. This multi-artist release is a rare gem among the ‘compilation’ genre. As a [...]
GILLIAN G. GAAR – SPRINGSTEEN @ 75 QUATRO PUBLISHING GROUP BOOK REVIEW BY BRYAN WILLISTON In honour of Bruce Springsteen’s 75th birthday, Gillian Gaar and Quarto Publishing have released the commemorative book, Springsteen @ 75. At first [...]
MATTHEW SWEET @ TD MUSIC HALL, TORONTO APRIL 13, 2024 “We haven’t been here in decades! I don’t know why it’s taken so long,” declared singer-songwriter Matthew Sweet from the stage of the TD Music Hall. Grizzled, and wearing a baggy shirt and a [...]
HURRAY FOR THE RIFF RAFF THE PAST IS STILL ALIVE NONESUCH RECORDS The Past Is Still Alive is the latest release from Roots/Americana artist Hurray for the Riff Raff (AKA Alynda Segarra). Following their 2022 album Life on Earth, Segarra began [...]
MUSIC THAT FIRED US UP A CONVERSATION WITH THE TAILSPINS’ OSKAR AND JULIA BUIE When we consider the expression ‘everything old is new again’, we are generally talking about addressing the issues of today, by mining the wisdom of the past. [...]
STEELEYE SPAN LIVE AT THE BOTTOM LINE, 1974 OMNIVORE RECORDINGS The English folk-rock group Steeleye Span was formed in 1969 and has been in existence, in various incarnations, ever since. The band enjoyed chart success a number of times in [...]
MARK D. DUNN – YOU GET BIGGER AS YOU GO – BRUCE COCKBURN’S INFLUENCE AND EVOLUTION FERMATA PRESS BOOK REVIEW BY BRYAN WILLISTON The writer, musician, and educator Mark D. Dunn has released a book which may be seen as the definitive [...]
VARIOUS ARTISTS HEARTS & MINDS & CROOKED BEATS: SONGS OF THE CLASH SHARED MEDIUM The Clash were a hugely influential band, whose music was the soundtrack of social justice in the late ‘70s and ‘80s. Fans look back fondly at the band’s [...]
DOTS OF HISTORY AND THE ARTFUL APPROACH A CONVERSATION WITH TOM ALLEN ON JS BACH’S LONG WALK IN THE SNOW The average modern listener probably gives little thought to music that was made 300 years ago. Even so, there is a long list of artists [...]
I’M STILL DOING MY THING A CONVERSATION WITH DON McLEAN “I’ve got a lot of albums, a lot of songs, a lot of appearances, because I only did one thing: exactly what it is that I’m doing. I never got diverted away into anything else. I only [...]
SKYDIGGERS @ THE DANFORTH MUSIC HALL, TORONTO DECEMBER 22, 2023 “It’s not really the holidays until Skydiggers play their Christmas show.” That statement was heard in various forms, as the veteran Toronto roots outfit prepared to hit the stage [...]
GIVE IT TO ME STRAIGHT, SANTA! I CAN TAKE IT! SPILL MAGAZINE EXPOSES SOME OF THE BEST/WORST 2023 CHRISTMAS RELEASES (PART TWO) As The Beatles once sang, “Christmastime is here again, it ain’t been around since you know when.” That means a whole [...]
BUILDING AN AUTHENTIC AND LEGIT MUSIC INDUSTRY A CONVERSATION WITH ANDREW CASH Andrew Cash is a man who has worn many hats over the years. From his early days in the 1980s Toronto post-punk band L’Étranger, to being a solo recording artist, to [...]
APAULL FOUGHT AND WON FURNACE ROOM RECORDS Dutch Canadian music producer apaull is back on our radar, this time with Fought and Won. This LP is an interesting turn for him, as the electronic music artist is best known for his series of EP [...]
FRÄNDER FRÄNDER II NORDIC NOTES Fränder is an acoustic family band from Sweden and Estonia, who play traditionally-inspired songs in a modern context. Formed in 2015, they released their first album (Fränder) in 2019. That album introduced the [...]
HELLO JUNE ARTIFACTS 31 TIGERS It is a rare thing when a newly released album is so strong as to defy genre categorization: a work which possesses the variety and quality of songs and sounds that has the potential to reach a truly wide audience. [...]
