Last weekend we loaded up the van and hit the road for a little road trip. It was about a six hour round trip, so I filled up my new iPod Shuffle, plugged it into my FM transmitter and shuffled my way to Pinery and back. Never underestimate the positive
The Polaris Music Price is meant to recognize Canada's best album based on creative quality, regardless of musical genre or sales figures. It's essentially our Mercury Prize. Last year's winner caught me off guard, so this year I'm predicting Chan VanGaalen will win. I never heard of him/her/them,
ShowClix is a live music search engine that helps music fans find, track and share live music online. Here's a direct link to concert listings in Toronto: http://toronto.showclix.com. Lynsie wants you to know that they're celebrating their Canadian launch by giving away concert tickets. In Toronto, they're
Eddie Vedder's been busy with his solo stuff. He's finishing some new music for the upcoming Sean Penn-directed film "Into the Wild" and an album of his songs is due in September. Vedder likes to work on Penn films. He's all over the "Dead Man Walking" soundtrack and he recorded
It's been quite the journey. We kicked off our quest to assemble the greatest Canadian songs in the history of the world back on May 15 and here we are, a month and a half later. It's unlikely everyone will agree with all 100 choices, many great songs were left
Pete, I don't know if you're reading this, but your bro "borrowed" your copy of Neil Young's Live at Massey Hall 1971 and lent it to me. I've been spinning it all morning, and it's heaven. Young was 25 and on his game. It sounds brilliant, and his words and
I heard "Icky Thump" on the way to work this morning. I turned up the volume and funked out. It was so raw, so catchy, and those lyrics are super cool. It's a tremendous single. Then I started to think about other radio singles from The White Stripes. They're all
Did somebody mention Cypress Hill? How about some Beastie Boys and Cypress Hill performing "So What'cha Want", for Kic and anyone else out there with a soul. Awesome.
Checking my feeds this morning, I saw that FameWrites had linked to a new MP3 blog. Sure, there's are lots of MP3 blogs out there, but this one specializes in Canadian hip-hop and rap. living underwater starts strong by sharing a compilation of Canadian rap artists from 1991. In the
Here's Journey performing "Don't Stop Believin'". Those who know, know. Those who don't, don't. Don't stop.
When I wrote about "Icky Thump" a couple of weeks back, I embedded a fan-made video for the tune. Now I can share the real video. It's an awesome tune. It's organized chaos and it rocks. Truer words have never been spoken than "You can't be a pimp and a
How does Kelly Clarkson top "Since U Been Gone"? First, she gets royally pissed at a dude, then she swallows a jagged little pill and lets this poor dude have it with "Never Again". I wrote briefly about this new single from Kelly Clarkson when I wrote about the recent
I'm on a quest to come up with a definitive list of the 100 best Canadian tunes of all-time. Every couple of days I'm dumping ten great Canadian songs and inviting you to suggest Canadian classics in the comments. On July 1, I'll unveil the top 100. Here's the first
It all started with an email from Jim. Canada Day is coming up fast. I have never heard of a radio station collecting votes for the best Canadian songs of all time. And of course most of them would be restricted by their own formats (e.g. The Edge doesn't
We're living in a YouTube world, even when we're embedding ifilm vids. We're wired and starving for quick hits, two minute video clips and sneak peeks. Here's how you promote your new album in 2007. This is from Queens of the Stone Age, a band I already like, and they're
Yahoo! has launched a free lyrics service. They have the official lyrics for 400,000 songs and they're sharing them all legally. I've often wondered why there's been no decent lyrics database but I'm guessing the reason has to do with copyright. Yahoo! will share with copyright holders the revenue
There are some good songs with "James" in the title, and there are some good songs with "Michelle" in the title. What are my ten favourite songs with either "James" or "Michelle" in the title? Sweet Baby James - James TaylorMy Michelle - Guns N' RosesJimmy James - Beastie BoysMichelle
In the mid-80s, I loved WWF wrestling. Rowdy Roddy Piper was my favourite and I watched weekly. I even went to a couple of live events, including Hulkamania at Exhibition Stadium. As a fan, I loved The Wrestling Album, which I owned on cassette. That cassette tape bit the dust
There was a trend in the late 80s and early 90s where every hip-hop album contained a track that featured all the MCs taking turns. One by one they'd drop their rhymes in their style and they'd go down the line. One of my favourites was "Down the Line" which
Janis Joplin passed away on October 4, 1970, almost four years before I was born. I own Pearl and her Greatest Hits, but to truly appreciate Janis Joplin you had to be there. I remember taking a pop culture history course at U of T and the professor attempting to
Hot damn I love this. Kermit the Frog covers Nine Inch Nails' "Hurt" and it's all so sad. It's sad, but there's a comfort in feeling sad, and I haven't felt this comfort since Johnny Cash did the honours. The scene with Ralph is just wrong, but desperate times call
Watching "Blood Diamond" got me thinking about musical diamonds. Not Neil Diamond songs or Diamond Dave songs, but songs with Diamond in the title. And not "Black Diamond" by Kiss, "Diamonds on the Inside" by Ben Harper or "Diamonds Are Forever" by Shirley Bassey, but diamond songs that are in
I recently posted the video for The Tragically Hip's new single, "Yer Not the Ocean". There's a suspension bridge featured in the video that I'm trying to identify. A couple of commenters think it's the Capilano Suspension Bridge in North Vancouver but I disagree. Below is a picture of the
Arcade Fire's Funeral is one of my favourite albums of all time. That's right, I love it that much. Every tune hits home for me, and after thousands of listens I still love every note. When I first heard Neon Bible, I was ready for a let down. I'm happy
When you've got 1275 discs ripped to MP3, you're going to have some duplicate songs. iTunes makes it easy to isolate these dupes, so I can tell you that if I just played such songs I could could listen non-stop for eight days. As a random example, I have The
