Sled Island, day 1: Fond of Tigers, Slim Twig, Final Fantasy

The Sled Island music festival kicked off in Calgary on Wednesday. First up for me was a three-band show at the Central United Church: Fond of Tigers, Slim Twig, and Final Fantasy. Fond of Tigers are an instrumental post-rock band from Toronto. Their sound is jazzy and occasionally a bit abstract for my taste, but they were very skilled musicians and their music was dotted with moments of hypnotic, haunting beauty.

Next up was Slim Twig, an electro-rockabilly artist about whom I can’t really say anything positive. While I’m sure there are people who appreciate his style, I couldn’t find any musicality to latch on to and had to just bide my time until Final Fantasy came on stage.

Final Fantasy (the stage name of Toronto violinist Owen Pallett) won the inaugural Polaris Music Prize for his 2006 album He Poos Clouds. I’d enjoyed the record even though I found it a little inaccessible, but the show cleared all that up for me: Pallett is an amazingly talented individual, and you owe it to yourself to check out his live performance if you get a chance. Crafting rich, beautiful melodies by layering violin tracks with a loop pedal, and complementing them with piano and vocals (on top of being a virtuoso violinist and a sound effects wizard, Pallett also has a fantastic singing voice).

Here’s some great footage of the concert on YouTube:

He played a two-song encore to an ecstatic crowd, after which I jetted across town to Dickens’ Pub for some dubstep and drum & bass courtesy of Excision and Dieselboy…

Smart Cities, by Way of Not-so-Smart Ones

FFWD Weekly recently ran a piece on Plan It, Calgary’s proposed urban development plan. The plan seeks to address Calgary’s present reliance on unbridled expansion into suburban sprawl, as the economic, environmental and societal costs of this “strategy” are quickly becoming unmanageable. Take a look at this summary of the plan.

I probably don’t need to say that I think these are all excellent ideas, and sorely needed in this city.

FFWD asked a number of city politicians to voice their opinions on the plan. While most of them sound like pretty normal political infighting (“it’s a great plan! we need to move forward!” / “it’s stupid! let the free market decide!”), one in particular caught my attention. Says Ray Jones of Ward 5:

I have a gut feeling to vote no because I’m kind of more on the development industry’s side on this one. They create a lot of jobs for a lot of people and, in particular, I’ve got two kids that are in the industry. I think jobs are a very important part of livelihoods.

That he seems blissfully unaware of everything that’s wrong with that statement is, to say the least, a little concerning. On the one hand, he’s saying that if it comes down to the industry lobby vs. his constituents, he’ll side with the industry. This in and of itself is alarming, but it’s unfortunately nothing new in politics (remember Hillary’s “lobbyists represent real Americans”?) But add to that his frank admission that he’s taking this position at least in part because family members of his work in the industry, and you have what should be cause for outrage.

The city council is set to vote on Plan It in June, although there have been attempts by opponents to delay the vote until the fall. Though we can hope the council takes the opportunity to bring the city into the 21st century, it seems likely that even if they decide to, they’ll have to drag it kicking and screaming: the Canadian Home Builders Association recently conducted a survey of Calgary residents, and the results are somewhat disheartening. From the Association’s website:

[...] it is clear that our citizens are ready to accept some degree of change in the pursuit of greater sustainability. The one thing that hasn’t changed however is Calgarians’ overwhelming preference for a single family home and a personal automobile to meet their daily needs.

Clearly there’s some level of cognitive dissonance going on here. What kind of “change” are you willing to accept in the pursuit of sustainability if the two core roadblocks to sustainability in your city are too sacred to even reconsider?

The outlook for Calgary may uncertain, but it seems other cities are doing interesting things in the interest of sustainability and livability: Montreal yesterday unveiled Bixi, its new public bike system. For 78$ a year, you get access to 300 bike rental stations littered throughout the downtown area and adjacent neighborhoods. Pick up your bike at any one of the stations, and you get a half-hour of free use, after which you start paying extra. When you’re done, you can return the bike to any of the stations (which, by the way, are solar powered). This seems like a great idea, especially for a city like Montreal with a lot of cyclists and densely populated communities packed in close to the downtown core.

Further afield, the New York Times ran an article yesterday about Vauban, a suburb of Freiburg, Germany, which was developed to be car-free. Though the idea of a car-free suburb sounds like a contradiction in terms, it appears that Vauban is making it work. The community is built lengthwise along a central street (the only one where cars are allowed, and also the street on which the community’s tram runs), so every house is a reasonable walking or biking distance from public transit.

Although people move to the community largely for environmental reasons, what they seem most happy with is how safe an environment it is for their kids, given the drastically reduced chance of traffic accidents. Combined with the reduced noise and the advantages of suburban life, it seems like it would be a great place to live and raise a family. I’d love to see this development model replicated elsewhere.

Well-designed cities are one of our most powerful weapons in the fight against climate change in addition to having a host of other economic and societal benefits, so it’s great to see some cities taking the lead in implementing courageous new ideas, even as others falter. If the smartest cities can present a convincing example of what lies to gain, the rest of the world will surely follow.

Documentary Roundup

I want to shine the spotlight on a few really terrific documentaries I’ve seen recently. I would recommend all three wholeheartedly. In the order I saw them:

Nerdcore Rising

Though this film has been out in the States for at least a year, it’s only just now running the festival circuit in Canada. Though it purports to be a documentary about the new subgenre of “nerdcore” hip-hop, it’s really a concert film following the style’s founder and namer, MC Frontalot, on his first nationwide tour. It’s supplemented with interviews with people like Prince Paul, Weird Al Yankovic, and Jello Biafra, but the stars of the show are without a doubt Frontalot and his band, a crew of geeks so quirky and lovable that the filmmakers don’t have to do much else but point the camera at them to make a thoroughly enjoyable movie.

But more they do, weaving together a lot of really touching human stories: both those of the social outcasts driving hundreds of miles to see Frontalot rhyme in front of a crowd of maybe twelve people, and those of Frontalot himself, who’s using the tour as a sort of acid-test for whether or not he wants to pursue his music career full-time. I saw it as part of Calgary’s Underground Film Festival, and the crowd in the theater was having a great time; this may have been the only time I’ve heard a movie theater audience emit a collective “awwww”. The film is just that cute. It’s a joy to watch, and I strongly recommend it. (You don’t have to be a hip-hop head, since nerdcore is really its own kind of animal, but being a nerd of some form probably helps.)

Radiant City

Now for a movie to wipe that goofy smirk off your face. Radiant City was recommended to me by someone when they heard me poke fun at Calgary’s euphemistic use of the word “Communities” to describe its suburbs. The movie aims to make exactly that argument: they are anything but.

A lot of attention gets paid to the environmental consequences of urban sprawl. But Radiant City instead focuses on the sociological impacts, and doesn’t find much by way of silver lining. The movie follows the ordeals of the Moss family, who have just moved to the suburbs of Calgary (the city is never named in the film, however). The kids are alienated, sometimes an hour’s drive from friends they see at school everyday. The father seems filled with a sort of resigned despair, and his only outlet is a neighbourhood production of Suburb: The Musical. Meanwhile, the mother’s frayed nerves are coated with a thinning veneer of everything’s-ok, but as the film progresses cracks begin to appear in that facade. Scenes of their family life are punctuated by interviews with urban planners, architects, and real estate agents. One guess as to which of the three has anything positive to say about the suburbs.

This is not a feel-good movie. Its portrayal of the Moss family can be downright terrifying at times. It is, however, extremely well produced, and it gets its point across powerfully. There’s a twist at the end that may reduce the film’s impact somewhat, even though I personally enjoyed it. I won’t give it away, but if you’ve seen the film give me a shout and let me know what you thought.

RiP: A Remix Manifesto

I was expecting not to like this one. I recently read Remix by Lawrence Lessig and was a little disappointed: I didn’t think the book brought anything new to the debate, and it felt more like a lecture than an impassioned call to arms. This movie, by Canadian director Brett Gaylor, could be that call to arms.

The debate in question is the questionable morality and social value of some facets of current copyright law. Lessig puts it best: while there’s no doubt that commercial, non-transformative use should be illegal (think bootlegged DVDs), the case against commercial transformative uses (selling an album with sampled music on it) and non-commercial non-transformative uses (P2P file-sharing) is perhaps less clear-cut. The film, however, rightly focuses on the other type of copyright infringement: non-commercial transformative uses (like Garfield Minus Garfield, for example). In these cases, it’s extremely hard to come up with a rationale for prohibition: it’s ludicrous to argue that sales of the original would be hurt, and the remixer isn’t profiting off of someone else’s work, so why not?

Focusing mainly on the mash-up artist Girl Talk, but branching out as far as Brazilian baile funk, AIDS drug patents, and Mickey Mouse, A Remix Manifesto abandons any pretense of impartiality and makes the case for liberal copyright reform with zealous fervor. And I think that’s what saves it. Trying to pass for a straight documentary offering balanced commentary would have made it seem dry at best and hypocritical at worst. But by finally making these ideas fun, and energizing, I think Gaylor manages to make his point far more effectively than those who’ve come before him.

Jérôme Bourreau-Guggenheim, Engaged Citizen of a Democratic Republic, also Unemployed

TorrentFreak today followed-up on the news that a French TV executive has been fired from his job for – get this – writing an email to his MP voicing his opposition to France’s new anti-piracy law. Apparently the MP forwarded the email to the guy’s boss, who then fired him, citing “strong differences with the strategy” of the network.

While I happen to agree with the position held by the executive, whose name is Jérôme Bourreau-Guggenheim, that’s not what I want to talk about here. I could rant about the evils of draconic anti-piracy laws all day, but it seems to me that there’s more at stake here than that. Obviously there are a lot of things wrong with the way this played out: Mr. Bourreau-Guggenheim’s letter to his MP should have remained private, and his company should be judging him on his on-the-job performance rather than his political leanings.

But my main beef with this situation is that it seems to exemplify the fait-accompli attitude that a lot of countries seem to have with regards to their democracies. Democracy is a fantastic form of government, in that it “crowdsources” policy decisions to an extent, and as such tends to more often arrive at reasonable compromises than one-sided ideological positions. But in order for that to happen, citizens need to be talking about politics, and to be involved in politics. It’s bad enough that police routinely round up and arrest peaceful protesters, but firing people from their jobs for expressing their political views to the representatives they elected is taking this to a whole new level.

Let me step back for a second: democracy in Athens was made possible, in part, by the fact that Athenians owned slaves, and therefore didn’t need to work particularly hard and could spend good parts of their days discussing philosophy and politics with each other. Nowadays only a small percentage of the population has the time and energy to be involved in politics, and it’s because of this that the small number who do chose to be active politically are extremely valuable. Since we can’t all be paying attention to every law the government tries to pass, it’s a damn good thing there are people who are, and who care enough to take action when they see something being done by their representatives that they disagree with. There’s real value in being an active citizen. No matter what the issue, it’s a selfless act for the betterment of the community. Being engaged in politics is as ethical, to me, as being engaged in charity. Companies should be encouraging this kind of behaviour in their employees, not suppressing it.

By instead attempting to crush this political spirit out of those who exhibit it, we can’t help but wind up with weak, ineffectual democracies. You get what you pay for.

Public Broadcasters vs. Public Media

The fantastic Search Engine radio/podcast program was recently canceled by the CBC, but thankfully TVO has decided to pick up the show. Hosted by Jesse Brown, the show focuses on the intersection of the internet with culture, society, and politics at large. This is not your news network’s three-minute segment on “the twitter craze”; it’s a really interesting conversation about the effects of this massively distributed and powerful system on a lot of entrenched structures.

Jesse Brown perfectly walks the line between the time-tested format of a news-magazine/editorial radio show and the community-driven online presence of a successful podcast. When the CBC cut back the show’s funding and canceled its on-air slot last year, it lived on in podcast-only form. Without a producer or crew, it’s survival is largely owed to Jesse’s desire to keep making it, to keep having that conversation with his audience.

Now it’s found a new home, with podcasts continuing to be released throughout the summer (albeit at a new address), and a return to air in the fall.

If you’ve never heard it, I strongly recommend checking out some of the past episodes.

The Torontoist blog has an excellent interview with Jesse Brown. One thing of particular interest he says is:

[...] I had done work before for a show called The Contrarians a while back on the CBC. The idea of the show was unpopular ideas that just might be right, and that was the first time I discussed copyright. Ironically, after the show was done, there was a lot of interest in listening to the back episodes. CBC podcasting was just getting started back then. I didn’t own copyright to the episodes, and there was no way for people [to listen to them]. Even to this day, you can’t get that show. Canadians paid for the show. So, I started thinking, everything a public broadcaster does should be accessible and open.

Which is an excellent point. Public broadcasters are in an amazing position to take advantage of the distribution power of the Internet. Their widespread embrace of podcasting is one of the ways in which they’ve already done so, but let’s take the idea even further: traditional media can be defined as media which is one-to-many and unidirectional. The radio station, book publisher, newspaper company, TV station all have this in common. One source, speaking to many, who don’t generally speak back. New media is many-to-many and bidirectional. Think MySpace for bands, Twitter, Wikipedia, craigslist. Many people broadcasting to many others, and frequently engaging with them in two-way conversation.

So while a “traditional media” public broadcaster is still a way to culture, entertain, and inform the citizens of the country, a “new media” public broadcaster can become a way for them to speak to the government, or to each other. The term “public broadcaster” would then be a bit of a misnomer: we should instead be talking about “public media”. Rather than cutting back funding these services in the face of their economic woes, governments should be pointing the agencies in these new directions, because an citizenry which is not only informed by its public media but also empowered by it will be far more able to enact a lasting recovery.

K-os Concert Review – Calgary, May 4 2009 (or, “I for one welcome our new robot overlords”)

K-os is calling his latest Canadian tour the “Karma” tour. There are no tickets or admission fee, but there are these little safeboxes littered throughout the venue labeled “Karma Boxes” where donations are accepted. It’s an interesting concept, though I’m not sure it will work as well for concerts as it has for digital music sales. More on this after the review.

There was a fair crowd milling at McEwan hall when I got there, and the opening act was just going through their sound check. As luck would have it, the band in question was Library Voices, whom I discovered less than a week ago while researching the bands that will be playing at this year’s Sled Island festival. They had stuck out as one of the better selections on the last.fm station for the event, and their live show was no disappointment.

A 10-strong collective from Regina, Saskatchewan, Library Voices play a sort of chamber indie pop-rock a little reminiscent of Spoon, The Hidden Cameras, and the short-lived but brilliant Spy Machine 16. They’re all very talented musicians, and virtually every song they played was a finely crafted pop gem.

More importantly, they look like they’re having a blast on stage, and that enthusiasm bled through to the crowd in short order. They had with them what I can only assume is their mascot, a fairly large white plastic robot with glowing eyes and a long antenna, which went on more than a few crowd-surfing voyages. Add that to the band’s goofy stage antics and infectious pop choruses, and I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face. Definitely check them out, and if they’re coming to a town near you, I promise it’s worth the trip.

After a too-long intermission (it had just reached the point where the cheers were punctuated by the occasional boo), K-os and his band came out onto the stage. They had their work cut out for them to recapture the enthusiasm of the tired and somewhat frustrated crowd, so the first few songs didn’t pack much punch (not even their most popular single, Crabbuckit). But after about 4 or 5 songs the crowd started to warm up, and that energy was reflected in the performers.

The band was highly rehearsed, professional and talented, and K-os’ songs are excellent, but in my mind none of that made up for his lack of charisma. Maybe it’s because I had been expecting more of a “hip-hop” concert, but the lack of banter and somewhat stoic “indie rock”-style delivery left me cold. There were a few exceptions, notably the few more acoustic songs, as well as the undeniable rocker Sunday Morning and his encore performance of Man I Used To Be. But when he seemed to forget the lyrics halfway into the first verse of Emcee Murdah and launched into a freestyle, it wasn’t pretty. K-os is a solid MC, but freestyling is clearly not his strong suit.

I can imagine that if I had been a huge fan of his work to begin with, or if I had never heard any of it and was being exposed to it for the first time, I might have been a lot more enthusiastic about the show. The performers were energetic, the musicianship was excellent, and the crowd was moving. But as is, coming in with the expectations I did, I can’t say they were entirely lived up to.

Which brings me back to the “Karma” concept: I dropped a 20 in one of the boxes, but in retrospect I should have used that money to buy the Library Voices EP. As is I had to settle for a gorgeous hand-painted bookmark made by their keyboardist.

Jay Smooth, FriendFeed, and album reviews (or, how I learned to stop worrying and love the blog)

This is my third attempt at starting a blog. If the conventional wisdom is to believed, that should mean that my odds of success are greater this time around.

But, platitudes aside, there are three real reasons I think this will be the time I manage to really get into blogging. Those reasons are Jay Smooth, FriendFeed, and record reviews.

Jay Smooth is a radio host, and also the man behind Ill Doctrine, a hip-hop video blog. He’s posted some amazingly insightful work in the past, but has a hard time getting into the kind of rhythm sustained by other vloggers, like the legendary ZeFrank, or the prolific Gary Vaynerchuck. Recently he started something called Morning Doctrine, where he would just turn the camera on every morning and talk at it. He published these posts as separate “mini-doctrines”, but it only took a day or two before those posts started covering issues as well as a lot of his previous, more “complete” posts.

I’ve always heard it told that the key to writing is just to write. A lot. All the time. I always loved how that sounded, but have never been able to do it myself. So for this blog, I will be adopting my own “Morning Doctrine”. I will post to this thing every day, come hell or high water, at least unitl I move to Taipei in July.

Second, FriendFeed. FriendFeed is a social networking site, sort of a hybrid between the simplicity of Twitter and the link-sharing and friend-of-a-friend features of Facebook. It’s a small community at present, and I’ve gotten fairly involved in it over the past few months. Prior to this point, the Internet had always been somewhat “read-only” for me. As much as I extolled the virtues of the democratization of the means of publication, I never really interacted with the Web on the level that I wanted to. I rarely commented on blogs, I wasn’t an old-school IRCer or forum junkie, and I only really interacted with my real-life friends on Facebook. FriendFeed changed that. And blogging to me feels like an extension of that interaction. Now that I feel comfortable interacting with strangers online, I feel I can carry that over to this place.

Finally, record reviews. The few posts I wrote for Live ‘N Loud Magazine before leaving Montreal (this, for example) proved to me that if I sit down with a record, I can write about it. And fairly well. And one of the problems I ran into in my previous attempts at blogging was running out of things to talk about. So, for this one, whenever I don’t have anything of my own to say, I will review a record.

There we have it. This is the beginning. More to come.