Stereo Total Returning to Montréal!

After a year-and-a-half's absence, the Berlin-based, Franco-German duo Stereo Total, a.k.a. The Best Pop Group in the World, will be returning to Montreal. The details are as follows:

Zoo-Prod présente
STEREO TOTAL
with Leslie & The Ly’s + Donzelle
LE NATIONAL - 1220 Ste-Catherine Est
Vendredi le 20 mars 09,21h*Portes20h*
Infos 514.845.2014
Admission générale

From Françoise and Bretzel :

Put the Martini into the shaker and the burger on the grill! We're going back to USA & Canada.
[...]
We are coming on tour next spring (March-April) and are just recording a tour-single called "Anti Love Song", in which all numbers are sung in really bad English, but they are negatively lovely.

I've been a huge fan of this band since I first stumbled upon Musique Automatique in the new releases at Music Trader back in 2002, attracted as I was by all the French and German (my two favourite foreign languages!) sillyness on the front and back of the packaging. It's quite thrilling all these years later to be living in a city where I can actually see them in concert; with the closure of Le Parisien cinemas, and the impending reconversion of Ex-Centris, at least there are still some upsides to living in Montreal.

So we shall tanzen im 4-eck to the Moderne Musik, and a good time will be had by all...

Melody Day by Caribou

I've been so out of touch with the scene lately that I didn't even realise that the sublime intro music to Louise Bourgoin's weather report on Canal+ is actually a Canadian indie song. La preuve en images:

This impossibly lush song is in fact Melody Day by Vancouver's Caribou. Before this Dick threatened him with legal action, Caribou used to be called Manitoba, which is where I come from, and last night he played Montreal, which is where I live. Et voilà, la boucle est bouclée.

Long Blondes Promo Videos For 'Couples'

Couples, the new LP from The Long Blondes, is coming out over here on 8 April, as announced by these somewhat cryptic promo videos:

Video n° 1

Video n° 2


A perfect representation of what I like to call une certaine idée de l'Angleterre, that is to say, that appealing quality of Englishness.

And then there's this one, which just rocks my socks:


You can hear the first single from the aforementioned new record here:


The Long Blondes will be in Montreal on 20 May 2008 at the Cabaret du Musée, 2111 St-Laurent. Not to be missed!

Common People

If you're like me and grew up with Archie comics, and thought that the answer to Blur v Oasis was Pulp, then this is for you.

This synchronisation to music is based on the original work of comic strip détournement published by Chris at his Invincible Super-Blog.

The Best Indie Record Store in Canada

CBC Radio 3 has initiated a contest to indentify Canada's Best Indie Record Store. My submission to the nomination committee went as follows:

Located at River & Osborne, the hipster equivalent of Portage & Main, Music Trader has got to be the best record store in Winnipeg. They have EVERYTHING (new & used, tons of indie), they host live, in-store performances of local and touring bands all the time, and they're open until midnight!

They've got knowledgeable staff, a kooky mascot and, of course, the famous wall of customer polaroids. Plus, their long 'bar' of listening stations in front of windows facing out onto Osbrone Street is perhaps the best spot in the city for people watching.

For a kid from the suburbs, the plan was simple. Listen to RadioSonic (the predecessor of Radio3 for you kids out there) on CBC Radio 2, then go to Music Trader and buy the records. What could be easier? My taste in music is due in large part to the existence of this store.

I've been in Montreal for about year and a half now, I haven't really found anything that compares, so I'll be curious to check out the recommendations posted here.

Music Trader
97 Osborne Street
Winnipeg

On that note, I await your recommendations for a good indie record store in Montreal, preferably one with a fun atmosphere and all the week's new releases.

By the way, we also have an annual contest to designate the best independent English-language bookstore in this country. But no one cares.

Great Aunt Ida

One of my favourite websites is the CBC's New Music Canada, a showcase of the best English-Canadian independent music. Makes you proud to be a taxpayer, really. From time to time I'm going to post my old favourites and recent coups de coeur.

Today it's Vancouver's Ida Nilsen, a.k.a. Great Aunt Ida (also of Radiogram and The Gay). Tout simplement alt-folk at its best, and what a sweet voice! Have a listen to Macarena from her 2005 album Our Fall (mp3 stream @128kbps; requires Real Player):

More Great Aunt Ida can be found on New Music Canada...

My New Favourite Blog

I love French culture. I love French music. I especially love French sixties music. Vidéo Nostalgie serves up classic music videos from this era that I am too young to have seen at the time and too far away from France to be able to see today on Télé Mélody.

Take this clip, Poupée de cire, poupée de son, for example:

Written by Serge Gainsbourg, one of the greatest pop geniuses ever, and perfromed by France Gall, it won the 1965 Eurovision Song Competition. Isn't it wonderful? It must surely be one of the best pure pop songs of all time and has always been a favourite of mine. Vidéo Nostalgie is simply
chock-full of gems like this. Highly recommended!

Brisa Roché

On Wednesday's On a tout essayé (seen weekdays in France on France 2 and in Canada on TV5), we were introduced to The Chase, Brisa Roché's wonderful début record. She's originally from California, but now lives in Paris. The record is out on Blue Note, but only in France. In his review on the show, Jean-Bernard Hebey put forward that she can't sing, composes insipid melodies, and will therefore appeal to the pseudo-intellectuals who read Télérama (I must admit, I do recognise myself in that description).

They played the video (WMV or YouTube) for the song Mystery Man, and it was bloody brilliant! I don't know what he was on about... While we wait for a North American release, here are six tracks from the record for your listening pleasure:


Enjoy!