Discussing the work of Hannah Lew can lead to sheer exhaustion, or possibly envy — besides making haunting, catchy, jarring music, Lew is also a filmmaker, and has directed videos for several of her contemporaries. She is probably best-known for her work in Grass Widow; her new band, Cold Beat, occupies a similar position, blending decades’ worth of pop know-how with a deeply punk urgency. They recently released their debut single, and it was with this that our conversation began before […]

Ell V Gore is a Toronto goth-rock band who’ve been churning out rockabilly and no wave-inflected tunes for about three years now. Starting off as Brides, a sprawling multi-instrumental project combining brass instruments with more conventional rock instrumentation, the group, led by Elliot Jones, has since become a more stripped down affair, and has started to gain recognition since the release of the EP Sex Static over the summer. When I was living in Toronto, I saw different versions of Brides play […]

Last week, the highly-anticipated Grand Theft Auto V was released, making almost $1 billion on its first day. Coupled with the fact that gross revenue from video game sales eclipsed that of the film industry in 2005, it seems logical that video game culture would have begun making inroads into other realms of pop culture. Digital music has always made reference to the midi tracks of early video games; as technology changes the tools we use to make music, the impulse to revel […]

I saw Grooms play their album release party for their new full-length Infinity Caller at Death By Audio on August 31st. It was maybe the first time I’d been to the venue since the summer began where it didn’t feel like a sauna. The gig was full without being packed in a way that would encourage belligerence. Like a lot of their 90’s throwback peers, Grooms and their fan base nurture a kind of slacker-oriented, music nerd atmosphere at their shows, […]