“Sun-drenched, reverb-heavy psych-pop” (NOISEY/VICE) The Backhomes are a two-piece DIY band formed in Montréal, 2009 by musician Kees Dekker and visual artist/animator Aimée van Drimmelen.In 2010 the duo pulled up roots to move west, settling first in a cabin on the prairies for a long cold winter of writing and recording. The next spring they moved to a small house in Victoria BC, completing debut release ONLY FRIEND (2013), EP TALK B/W BACKWARDS SUNSHINE (2014), and soon-to-be-released TIDALWAVE (May 5 2015) entirely in their living room. Their music ranges from hypnotic psychedelic pop pioneered by The Jesus and Mary Chain and Spiritualized to the minimal pulse and tonal bliss of 70s German Kosmische Musik. Live shows feature mesmerizing animated projections created by van Drimmelen. The Backhomes have toured North America and shared the stage with such bands as Dead Meadow, Suuns and Moon Duo. Upcoming tours include the west coast of North American with Sur Une Plage (members of Black Mountain & Lightening Dust), and western Canada with Dada Plan this May. Summer festival performances include Levitation Vancouver and Sled Island. Emotional ~ "Currently based in LA, long time Gnar Tapes friend Brian Wakefield offers an impressive and pretty debut solo album. If you are familiar with the drum machine driven guitar pop of the truly beautiful sound of his SF-based band Meted Toys you will have a faint idea of what to expect. While similar to the new wave digital-age lushness of his main band, Emotional is more tripped out and stripped down, recalling soft and melancholic pop sounds of 80s UK softies, as well as contemporaries like his friend, and fellow Gnar associate, Nick Ray of Speculator and Cool Angels. He also shares a kinship with Rose "Keel Her" Schafeller (another fellow Gnar artist and buzzing UK pop sweetheart who appears on the track "I Hate The Sun"). Completed in the now RIP Animal Town house in LA alongside other internet underground weirdos like Snow Wite, Teams, Labana Babalon, and Beer On The Rug, "Feeling" is a promising and surprising entrance from a true heartbreaker." - RIKKI GAGE (GNAR DADDY/FREE WEED/MEMORIES/WHITE FANG/BFF) | The Backhomes (Montreal) + Sur Une Plage (Vancouver) + Emotional~ $8 ~ 7:30 pm - 10:30 pm http://thebackhomes.com/ http://us1.campaign-archive2.com/?u=fe30c7a76e9ceedd6ebd22a3f&id=ffd5d2f597 http://soundcloud.com/theicesculptor http://www.gnartapesandshit.com/ http://gnartapes.bandcamp.com/album/feeling Vancouver-based Sur Une Plage combines the talents of Joshua Wells (of Black Mountain and Lightning Dust, among others) and Colin McKill (of Lord Beginner and Hard Drugs, among others). Discussed primarily as a concept for some time, Wells and McKill eventually began work on Sur Une Plage in December of 2013 at the Balloon Factory, Wells’ Vancouver studio. Eschewing the “traditional” band format of which they are both veterans, Sur Une Plage instead employs a clinical, precise approach to arrangement, utilizing an era-and-genre-pillaging pirates' collection of sequenced hardware and hand-massaged analogue textures. The live Sur Une Plage experience is a dance-able exploration of the tension created by the percussive instrumentation of Wells, combined with the adventurous, world-weary, cautious optimism found in McKill's vocals. Check out what Exclaim had to say about "Minimum", here. |