THE KLONDIKE SUN
WEDNESDAY MAY 4, 2011
P11
Over the coming months, the Klondike Sun will be featuring a number of artists appearing at the 2011 Dawson City Music Festival. To see this year’s complete line-up and buy your tickets, visit the festival’s new website: www.dcmf.com
Artist Profile: Minotaurs Artist Profile: Mr. Something Something A fantastic dance band with a powerful and political live show, Mr. Something Something joins fellow cohorts on the 2011 lineup, MINOTAURS, by taking the revolutionary musical form of Afrobeat to brand new places. Their music gives something for the body and something for the mind. Like inspiration, Fela Kuti, Mr. Something Something uses the irresistible rhythms and interactive performance style of Afrobeat as a vehicle for social justice and environmental activism. Whether tracking the global reach of the military-industrial complex or encouraging the audience to try out the SoundCycle, Canada’s first bicycle-powered soundsystem, Mr. Something Something is all about delivering power to the people, by the people. Western instruments and concepts of improvisation are explored and layered over what used to be called Afrobeat; but the term strains to contain the innovations happening in the rhythm section at every show. It also fails to express in fiery-enough terms the imaginative solo work of respected jazz guitarist Paul MacDougall. Liam Smith dependably delivers basslines designed to induce and sustain a state of ecstatic dancing. The horn section strikes with power and uplifts with melody. And above it all, acting as a lightning rod, is the lyric statement of the case for change and consciousness, passionately delivered by electrifying frontman Johan Hultqvist.
Over the last five years the band has toured relentlessly in Canada, playing more than 500 shows, including appearances at many folk festivals and most major jazz festivals from coast to coast. They’ve received a JUNO Award nomination for World Music Album of the Year and collaborated with a Nigerian Afrobeat griot, Iwukunga the Afrobeat Poet. They’ve played Japan, Europe, and across North America. Now, with support from the Canada Council for the Arts, Mr. Something Something will be making their first appearance in Canada’s North.
“Its bumpy afrobeat rhythms are built to make us move. Minotaurs is a big shaggy dance band that often diverges from a charted route into a delta of melodic possibilities.” - The Globe and Mail Minotaurs is the new project of long-time Ontario sideman and cult-fave songwriter, Nathan Lawr. As an accompanist for some of the truly great acts of the last decade (Royal City, Fembots, and King Cobb Steelie – the latter of which he appeared with at DCMF 2003), Lawr’s sensitive and creative approach to timekeeping placed him at the forefront of Canadian percussion.
Never content to rest on his laurels, the relentlessly energetic Lawr concurrently carved out a career as a singer-songwriter, releasing three solo records that became campus radio and favourites His debut, The Heart Beats a Waltz, appeared on numerous critical best-of-the-decade lists last year. He’ll be playing songs from these solo records in concerts and workshops in addition to the band gigs, and will show off his velveteen voice and evocative electric guitar style. Now, as a bandleader, Lawr is applying his uncommonly sharp songwriting and melodic sensibility to the Afrobeat rhythmic tradition. Backed by some of the leading lights of Ontario’s music scene, including Kevin Lynn (King Cobb Steelie), Don Kerr (Rheostatics & Ron Sexsmith), Paul Aucoin (Hylozoists, Cuff the Duke, Sadies) and sax go-to-guy Jeremy Strachan (Feuermusik, Canaille, Constantines), this eightto-ten-piece band is a dancefloor powerhouse, with the ability and chops to diverge into improvisational climaxes of incredible might and labyrinthine complexity. MINOTAURS are a dance band, but not a superficial one. Like the band’s main inspiration, Fela Kuti, the urge to dance is political, human potential energy that can be channeled into a revolutionary weapon. Nathan’s a deeply political man, and for the first time, his lyrics reflect it, discussing hegemony, surveillance and regime change in the context of sexual identity, urban riots, and police states. Sonically and lyrically, Lawr and the band are doing important, innovative work; by getting down on the dancefloor, you’re doing your part!
Conference to Highlight Northern Flying Feats Edmonton, AB -- The Canadian Aviation Historical Society (CAHS) will hold its 2011 conference June 22-26 at the Chateau Nova Hotel (159 Airport Rd.) to explore the theme of “Edmonton: Gateway to the North.” Extraordinary characters and events will be featured – from Wop May, to crashes in the Yukon, to the RCAF in the Arctic – through seminars, a day trip to the Reynolds-Alberta Museum, and a Stage & Screen evening featuring tv, film, and theatre productions (and their creators). The conference will coincide with the Alberta Aviation Museum’s last AirFest, and together the AAM and CAHS will honour the following anniversaries with exciting special events: - 70th of the Northwest Staging Route - 90th of the first sub-arctic flight
- 100th of the first public demonstration of powered flight in Edmonton
This event will bring together top-notch speakers as well as heritage, arts, and aviation partners and sponsors from across the country. The CAHS is the world’s premier organization dedicated to the preservation and celebration of Canada’s aviation heritage. To meet these ends it publishes a quarterly Journal, monthly e-newsletter, and manages several awards. To learn more or register for this event, please go to www.cahs.ca or contact convention chair Danielle Metcalfe-Chenail at info@cahs.ca. (Note: Danielle Metcalfe-Chenail was a Berton House writer-in-residence in the fall of 2010.)