It seems that a lot of people thought we had moved to Toronto for good, but we’re back in Vancouver for the whole summer now! Our tour back across from Toronto was quick and dirty but we had some great shows along the way.

We played a benefit show in Sudbury on June 5th for the River and Sky Festival and it was a super fun party. The festival takes place this summer with bands like obijou and our friends Yukon Blonde, so if you’re in the Toronto area I recommend you check it out and go for the weekend. I met the organizer and hopefully we can come out next summer to play the festival. We played Winnipeg on the following Monday after the grueling 2 day drive across Northern Ontario.

We pulled an all-nighter from Sudbury and just as the sun rose in the morning and I finished my shift and traded off to fall asleep, our muffler fell off. We were in the middle of nowhere so Joseph had to drive the next 3 hours til Marathon, Ontario with our van sounding louder then a Harley motorcycle the whole time. To our dismay the local Canadian Tire’s service department was closed, but luckily an old rocker tow truck driver saw us in distress and helped fix the muffler at his own shop. We were on our way a few hours later and made it to Dryden before crashing for the night.

It was only an easy 4 hour drive to Winnipeg the next day before our Monday night show at the Pyramid, which was actually better then expected, playing with a Weakerthans/Waking Eyes side project band called Imaginary Cities, who were great. We met up the next night with fellow Vancouverites the Buffaloswans for a solid Tuesday night Saskatoon show at Amigos, and the next day we were very excited to head to our friend Marc Greibel’s farm in Alberta for a day off and some tasty food. Unfortunately, as we were leaving Saskatoon, the van started to back fire like crazy and we thought our muffler had gone again. We took the van into the shop and 6 hours and $500 later we were again on our way after some sparkplug/engine block repairs. After a short stint getting lost without maps and relying to much on iPhone 3G actually getting reception, we made it to Marc’s farm at 11 at night. We hung out all the next day with a variety of farm animals before heading to Calgary for a show opening for Australian duo An Horse. The crowd was amazing and we sold record amounts of merch, especially our new EP.

  

The following night topped Calgary, however, when we played an almost sold-out Starlite Room in Edmonton opening for Young Rival and Born Ruffians. Both bands were great guys and good times, but we had to leave early to drive through the night back to Vancouver. I needed to get to Kelowna early to make a friends afternoon wedding and we pulled into Kelowna around 11am. I had just enough time for a quick nap before heading to the wedding. I had planned to spend the next week with my parents up at our family cabin but the day after the wedding I came down with a brutal stomach flu and was stuck to the toilet for the next 5 days. We still made it up to the cabin for a few nights but I couldn’t really eat or do much of anything. Anyway a somewhat sad end, but I’ll get over it, and I just flew into Vancouver three days ago.

  

Now we are going to start writing our new album and we have two shows left this weekend in Victoria and Vancouver opening for Minus The Bear which we are pretty excited about. After that I’ll keep you posted on any more shows, but we are going to lay pretty low and try to make a bit of money to get back on the road in September. It does feel good to be home sweet home though, and know that I am going to be hitting the beaches hard!

dan

We just got back to Toronto last week in time to rehearse a few times before playing a party for the guys from Them Crooked Vultures. Our friend Dave started booking a new club in town called the Cherry Colas and we were initially invited to come play Saturday the 15th at the after party for the Vultures show. Turns out though that the band came to the club the night before and they closed it down for a private party which we were invited to play as well. I didn’t really get a chance to talk to the guys much but I met everyone from the band and was a little starstruck by JP Jones. Dana (the biggest Zeppelin fan in the band) was almost as giddy as a small child which made us all laugh. We also got free tickets to see their set at the ACC and it was a great time.

We will now be hanging in Toronto and touring around Ontario the next few weeks and then we are heading to New York to play a showcase on June 2nd. We were suppose to head to Montreal this Wednesday but unfortunately the Green Room had a fire and our show got canceled. Now we’ll be in TO until our show at the Dakota this Friday, May 21st and we will also be playing the Cherry Cola (Queen and Bathurst) again on the 22nd! Stay tuned for more updates, and expect to see us back in Vancouver mid to late June, just in time for some killer beach weather.

PS – Also before I left Vancouver I had a party/show at my apartment. I invited some friends to play sets on my piano and had myself, Dan Werb (Woodhands), Tariq (Brasstronaut), Jody Glenham, and my friend Jordan Daniels all play. It was an amazing night and after the more intimate show, it became a raging party with a fridge I packed full of 150 beers going way too quick but at least I made my money back.. Anyway here’s a photo or two, I will throw another show/party when we return in the summer, I want friends Headwater to play!

We arrived back in Vancouver on the 14th. We were initially coming back to play the Arts County Fair and Telus Ski and Snowboard Fest. Due to the powers that be, those shows fell through and now we are basically here for a few weeks to hang out with the ladies and friends. We’re also continuing to write new tunes and playing one show out in Maple Ridge next weekend. I will also be working on finding some artwork for a new EP that we should be releasing very shortly. It will include the three tracks we recorded with Howard in February as well as two live versions of songs that will be coming out on our next full length.

Anyway if I go back to where we left off, we were on our way to play Ottawa, Montreal, and London at the beginning of April. Opening for Dragonette shows turned out to be great crowds for us in London and Ottawa, but the highlight was spending time in Montreal. We only had one day, but we met up with a large posse of friends and decided to have a picnic up on Mount Royal in the old graveyard… We didn’t plan it but it turned out that hanging out in front of the Molson (beer) families mausoleum was the best spot, and believe me we all tipped a beer or two for the Canadian beer tycoon.

Our Montreal show was a last minute thing but it turned out great. We met an awesome band named Trevor James and the Perfect Gentlemen who helped us to bring out a crowd, only promoting the show two days beforehand. Check out Trevor playing solo here:

When we returned to Toronto after the weekend, we had time booked in the rehearsal space all week. As a four piece (since Henry was still in Europe) we kept writing and working on new songs. In the past I’ve often brought more finished arrangements of chords/lyrics to the band, but since we all had lots of time in Toronto I tried to get everyone as involved as possible in the writing process. We came up with some pretty sweet new songs which we are still working out the kinks on. Joseph brought some lyrics to the table as well.

We had one last weekend of shows lined up and so on Thursday, April 8th we headed to Windsor to play the Phog lounge with a band called Huron. It was great to see the owner Tom and chat after almost two years since our last show there and the turn out was great. Huron reminded me of a cross between ZZtop and Lynyrd Skynyrd and were really awesome as well. Be sure to check out their MySpace.

We stayed in Windsor that evening. The following day we had to try to sort out a dentist for Joel who was having massive problems with a much needed root canal (which he could not get until we returned to Vancouver). His face puffed up massively. So while he went to get some sort of medical attention, the rest of us went out in search of a used window (to replace the one that got smashed) in the car capital of Canada. With luck we found a cheap window and after picking up Joel and the window we headed back to Toronto where our Friday night show was at the Bovine.

In preparation for a going away/after party, we bought over 75 beers and some vodka to leave at Dave Hollander’s house (where Dana stayed), which was right across the street from the bar. After we played our set and watched Darlings of Chelsea, we spread word of the party and had one hell of a hurrah.

I woke up with a cold on Saturday and felt pretty bad, but before I knew it we had to grab our gear from the Bovine and head to Waterloo for one more show with Will Currie and the Country French. When we got to the show and started to soundcheck, I was so sick I was worried I couldn’t sing. Joel was still in immense pain from his tooth. To kick it up a notch, Dana dropped a drum stool on his foot which immediately swelled up to a giant blood swell of a few inches. We debated what to do and ended up heading to the emergency room to fix him up. I was there with him for two hours and after the ‘Ice and Advil’ remedy, the doctor suggested we headed back to the show just in time to walk in and play our set. We were a bit of a rough group of guys that night, but Will’s amazing set made up for it. We all sat back and enjoyed his tunes a lot.

Check out this live version of their song ‘Flowers’:

So after this show we had our plane tickets booked for the 14th to head back to Vancouver. We figured since we’d be back touring around Ontario in May, it was better to fly back than drive across and back again. We met up with Henry at the airport hotel the evening before our 7am flight. However, the one big change was that after we played around eight or so shows as a four piece and started to write and work that way, all of a sudden the dynamic of this seemed to be working better for the band. I approached Henry about this via email while he was away.

While Henry has been a great member of Bend Sinister, it seemed his heart was also more in his own project Henry and the Nightcrawlers. The other four of us were also feeling like we were liking the vibe as a four piece live. Thus with equal sadness and excitement for both our futures, I have to inform everyone that Henry has left Bend Sinister to pursue his own endeavours and I wish him the best! There is a chance we will try to find a singer/multi instrumentalist to take over for him, but that is up in the air. So I will keep everyone posted soon about more news but until then, take care.

Dan

As I promised, I am going to give a bit of a recap of our time in Vancouver for the Olympics. I got laid-off from my job as an audiovisual tech about a week before the Olympics started in order for our building to be turned into Germany house. It’s mildly amusing to think that the Olympics promised to bring lots of work for locals but instead many people were in a similar position to myself, getting laid-off while the companies that took over their spaces and so on outsourced to their own workforce.

Nevertheless, while I was hurting for cash, especially weeks before leaving for tour and quitting my job forever, it did give me more of a chance to focus on our new recordings working with Howard Redekopp. In the past I’ve worked almost exclusively with Shawn Cole of Fader Master studios. I have always considered him a genius and would recommend any band to work with him, however this time around our label and team thought we should try someone new which I think is also a good idea. You never know what your going to get when you work with another artist or producer and I think learning and working with new people is very important to expand your artistic horizons. Anyway, we went to work the Monday after the opening ceremonies which I watched up in Whistler where my girlfriend has been working for NBC for the Olympics. You could definitely feel the excitement all around Vancouver and Whistler, but we went to work at the Armory Studios where I was most thrilled to see a YES song progress chart up on the wall in the tape room.

We recorded everything to tape and worked there for two days straight, focusing on three new tracks. We had a bit of time too to record some live versions of three more new songs, however we have yet to mix them. Howard definitely payed close attention to performance as we worked takes of some songs 20-30 times… However, after every five takes we would listen to them while we transferred from tape to pro tools. We’d also head upstairs to watch the Olympics on the big screen television until we were needed again.

The following day we had off from recording to rehearse and head to Surrey to play a show at the Olympic site they had out there. It was a huge tent with around 3000 people watching and we fought hard to win them over as many were unfamiliar with our music. Halfway through the set we busted into our version of Journey’s ‘Don’t Stop Believing’, which I dedicated to Canadian athletes competing in the games, and the place went crazy… I think I saw about 500 cellphones turn on to start filming in the audience. You can check it out here:

We were set to leave town in a week and a half. Before that, we got back to working on new songs. First Joseph and Henry laid down any guitar overdubs we though were necessary, though Howard wanted to keep as much of the live band from the initial session as possible so they didn’t put too much more on. Afterwords I laid down the lead vocals over two days and we had three days left to finish backup vocals and any other ‘colour’ parts. I spent one last weekend seeing my lady in whistler and then got back to Vancouver just in time to watch the USA vs Canada hockey game at a friend’s house. I’m not a sports person but I sure got into it, and every time Canada scored you could hear the roar of cheers across the city. After the game I rode my bike to pick up the van at Henry’s place and every person or car I passed was honking or waving or cheering.

Overall, I didn’t really party too much downtown for the Olympics cause we were focused on recording and I didn’t want to screw with my voice, but I walked around a few times downtown and the surge of crowds were ridiculous. I wanted to check out some stuff but you had to wait in line for an hour or two just to get in to any of the pavilions or see any shows so it was a bit of a write off. Only show I saw was Usher up in Whistler because Abigail had complimentary passes. Usher rules.

So now I’m writing this on day seven of our journey out to Toronto but I will fill you in with that in a few days! Here’s a pic from my time with the Olympics!

Dan

Thanks everyone for voting and supporting us along the way! We are now officially in the top three of the Peak Performance Contest, which means we have at least $50,000 waiting for us. We will be playing a show on January 22nd here in Vancouver at the Commodore and on that night they will announce the order of the top three, which includes us, The Left, and We Are The City.

First prize is $150,000 and second is $75,000. We are really excited we’ve come this far!! Thanks again, and come to the show if you’re in Vancouver on January 22nd!

So the results of this Peak Performance Project contest we’ve been a part of are going to be announced (on radio 100.5 fm in Vancouver and online at www.thepeak.fm) at 3:30 pm this coming Monday, December 14th. They aren’t announcing the winner but rather which of the 20 bands made it to the top three spots for a chance at $150,000, $75,000, and $50,000.

If we place in the top three then the final results are announced January 22nd and we’d play a special Commodore show where all of the top three bands would perform. We spent a lot of time over the course of the contest working on all the challenges and we really have our fingers crossed for the results. Thanks to all of you who helped spread the word and who voted for us in the contest because if we do win a spot in the top three, its all because of your help!

So last night we performed our showcase for the Peak Performance Project. The Cellar is a club on Granville street where I’ve never seen a live show, but I recall showing up there several times in my university years to dance to 80′s nights. For some reason, perhaps the beard that I doted even back then, the bouncers always singled me out as the drunk guy and kicked me out, even with my protests that I wasn’t doing anything offensive or confrontational, just dancing like a guy who doesn’t know how to dance. It’s funny that it happened to me both times I went there and never anywhere else.

Anyway, last night was a quite different, though under the surface there was still the same err of nonacceptance when the guy who handed out towels in the washroom yelled at me to courtesy flush only seconds after I entered a toilet stall. Overall though, the night was a whirlwind of hellos, catching up with all the fellow Peak mates and camp folk, and having the extra stress of organizing a light show and projector to set up within the changeover time. That aside, Bodhi Jones was a great set to start the night and Adrian Glynn (one of my all time favourites in the competition) really pulled it together even with the difficulty of a rowdy and increasingly drunk crowd partying in the back half of the room.

The difficulty was that the stage was hard to see except in one third of the bar and, especially for the solo performers, music was barely audible for the people in the back of the room over the roar of ‘hellos’ and ‘how are yous’. You can’t get that mad at people for having a good time, but they should have maybe cranked the sound system up to make your ears bleed, even when Adrien was doing nothing more then singing without accompaniment. The noise got a little less audible when The Left took the stage, and I absolutely loved their first track with the saxophone player kicking it up a notch. They had a great set and brought out all the stops with their own light show and the additional musicians. I look forward the seeing them play again.

When we hit the stage I definitely was a little stressed trying to rig up the projection and get everything together, but as soon as we started our set I just eased into the rock and didn’t look back. My highlight of the night was when I bought 60 or so lighters with some of the grant money and handed them out to the crowd for our song The Same Things. You always want to do that classic rock ‘wave around lighter’ thing these days, but it’s getting harder and harder with less smokers. To look out at the crowd during an epic harmony guitar solo and see 60 lighters held up is a great sight. It was also amazing to have Pat MacGibbon and Dan Herzog play sax and trumpet with us and I loved hearing them on the cover of the Guess Who’s These Eyes.

All in all it was an honor to close the last night of the Peak showcases and now with things wrapping up we are just putting the finishing touches on our all Peak challenges. That being said, I am going take it easy tonight, take a day off, and go check out 2012!!!!!!!!! I love big budget disaster movies soooooo much. Much love to all the Peak contestants and organizers and everyone who helped out!

Dan

So we’ve been back from our tour with Young Galaxy now since October 31st. We decided to drive straight from Edmonton after the show on the 30th because it was a 14 hour drive and Joseph wanted to get back for work on Halloween night. The fun thing about these night drives is that if you’re not taking the first few shifts, you are still kinda partied from the show. You sit back for the first hour or so and get some debaucherous junk food which helps take you mind off a night of mediocre sleep on mountain roads and 14 hours in a van.

This time round we stopped at one of those giant Flying J truck stops at around 3 am in the morning. They are always my favourite because they have weird stores, 24-hour restaurants, showers, and nature shirts for sale. This one even had an indoor mall that was deserted. It had an arcade and rooms you could rent by the hour… Anyway I decided to try my hand at one of those disgusting McCain microwave pizzas which I haven’t eaten since I was a kid.. To spruce it up, I ripped up a pepperoni stick and threw it on top before I microwaved it. Though it sounds horrifying, it was actually quite delicious.

After that, I slept most of the night and felt pretty good arriving in Kamloops at around 11 am. After a quick bite, I took the wheel and brought us the last four hours home. We got to town surprisingly early at around 3 pm. After a quick nap until 7 pm or so, I still had time to go out for Halloween. I threw together a quick cowboy outfit as a DIY makeshift costume and hit the town with my lady and some friends. We made it to a rooftop rave but then got stuck in the elevator for almost 20 minutes. People started to get claustrophobic and Henry freaked out and called 911, but then it started working again. He felt stupid. You can see some of the footage of me line dancing in our ‘Pre-Show Warm-Up’ video that Henry posted from tour footage and that night.

So now a week or so later I am back to the routine of work and blah blah blah, but we are also meeting regularly to put all of our focus now on the Peak Performance Project, where as before we were in tour mode. We’ve got lots of tricks up our sleeves and are gearing up for our showcase at The Cellar this Thursday. Dana, who’s passion for audio I’ve spoken of before, seems to be equally drawn to the world of pyrotechnics/light shows. With a bit of the grant money we have left, we are going to make our show a little extra special.. I don’t want to give away too much… but I am looking forward to seeing what he rigs up.

Lasers? … Check … Fog machines? … Check … Projected visuals? … Check … Strobe lights? … Check … Lookout Peak Performance Showcase!

So we are almost finished our tour with Young Galaxy. It was quite the quick run but it was definitely great to get back on the road, even though the money was tight and our van needed $850 of repairs before we headed out, eating up pretty much any extra merchandise cash we made. We had three shows on our way out to Winnipeg to meet up with Young Galaxy. First we hit Revelstoke which was Dana’s birthday… It was one of those funny shows where they want you to play multiple sets or be on stage for at least a couple hours. Even though there were maybe 20-40 people in the bar, we rocked two of the longest sets we have ever done as Dana proceeded to get more and more blitzed. The funniest part was as the set went on each song’s tempo creeped up and up and up… lol.

Our second show was in Olds, Alberta which was awesome. The guys at Tracks Pub treated us like royalty and after a nice dinner and some internet leisure time at the hotel, we came back to the venue where the basement of the bar was turned into a band room with fully stocked liquor. They recorded our whole set on pro-tools as well and I am excited to mix it down and post a song or two when the tour is over.

The next night we rolled into Amigos in Saskatoon, which happened to be my birthday!! The highlight of the day was a stop at A&W where, after being on a cleanse for 14 days, a burger and onion rings seemed like bliss… Though spending seven hours in a van on your birthday isn’t as much fun. I made Henry stop at 4 pm and pick me up a case of beer, which seemed fair for the birthday celebration, but I was the only one who wanted to celebrate as all the guys were hung over and burnt out from staying in the basement at Olds with the promoters until four in the morning…

Nevertheless, I casually mentioned to friends and fans all night that it was my birthday and continually got fed margaritas and shots of tequila. I then ate left over nachos and stayed up watching a brutal Schwarzenegger movie called Collateral Damage until four in the morning….

I won’t lie, the next day I was hurting and we had one of our longest drives to Winnipeg, almost nine hours straight… We arrived at the venue just before show time and they fed us a really nice home cooked meal. I avoided any alcohol and sipped lemon tea, my voice feeling pretty haggard. I tried a new trick of breathing in steam from a kettle for about ten minutes straight to sooth my vocal chords. The opening band in Winnipeg was amazing, a new project from the Waking Eyes camp called Royal Canoe. You should check them out.

The show would have been way better but Amy Millan was playing at the exact same time on a Sunday to a sold out crowd across town, so we only had around 50-75 folks show up. That always looks like no one in a big club (but it was still fun!). We didn’t meet Young Galaxy until after the show, but they dazzled us with fog, lasers, makeup, and hoods. It was impressive. Afterward, Steve from Young Galaxy and Dana realized they both grew up in Nanaimo and went to high school together, but had no idea until we met up.

No sooner did we hit Winnipeg did we then turn around and head back West. Our Regina show at the Exchange was fun and we got to know the Young Galaxy people better, but Regina is definitely hard on a Monday. Medicine Hat proved to be a wicked show, even though the bands had to work the door and do our own sound… When Young Galaxy brought out the fog machine, the entire bar become engulfed and it was rather amusing. Two days later we hit Calgary playing Broken City, which I think is my favourite spot there. As usual in Calgary it was a great packed show, and I made sure to wear my Calgary, Alberta shirt to represent.

Before heading back to island for the weekend shows in Nanaimo and Victoria, we played a middle school in Calgary on Friday where an old high school friend of mine, Jeremy Lang, teaches. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but a gym packed with 700+ screaming teens turned out to be quite a fun time. We gave everyone a download card for free to direct them to our website and hopefully vote for us in the Peak Performance Project contest. Part of me just wants do a tour exclusively hitting Monday to Friday daytime schools now… You might not make much money or sell much merchandise, but we probably made about 300 Facebook fans overnight and I don’t think I’ve ever signed more autographs, lol.

Anyway, after some solid shows in Victoria and Nanimo, we had to come back on the 6 am Monday morning ferry so Dana could get to work on time at 8 am… We stayed at the club until 2 am and with no other option, we just slept in the van outside the club and in the ferry lineup for a few hours until we got on. I slept in the front seat upright, which is never the best time.

We played a great show in Vancouver at the Biltmore last night after I went back to work this week as well… And now I’m here at work until two when we’ll hop in the van and head to play the last few shows in Kelowna and Edmonton. The saddest part is we’ll have a 13 hour drive back home from Edmonton on Saturday on Halloween… Maybe we’ll steal some sheets from the hotel, cut some eye holes in them and get into the spirit in the van. Yep. To end, here is some funny video of Royal Canoe… A great Winnipeg band!

So I returned on Friday from my week-long trip to Toronto to write new songs. It was my first time trying to write with songwriters and I was worried a bit at first, but ultimately it turned out alright. I thought that I might lose the direction that I wanted our tunes to go in. I was able though to bring the ideas/lyrics to the table and then have the two songwriters I worked with offer suggestions or recommendations on changing structure, certain chords, arrangement, lyrics, etc. This meant that it still felt like my kinda tune, but I got some direct feedback in the development process.

I also met Mike McCarty, the president of EMI Publishing Canada. We bro’d down while I laid scratch vocals to a new track we recorded sipping Heinekens. The new track seemed to go over well and they want me to return to Toronto again in a week to do another writing session. I am a bit concerned about finances as I am dead broke and we are going to be gone in July for a couple weeks in the states and up to Dawson City, but it’s a pretty good opportunity so I’ll have to sort it out. Too bad you can’t get something like student loans while being a musician. Something where you don’t have to pay interest until your career becomes a bit more ‘pay the bills’ style.

In Toronto, I also had loads of time to hang out and visit old friends. We even played a poker game until 5 am with Edwin from I Mother Earth and some other rad dudes in the rehearsal space that I was working out of. I kinda wish I lived in Toronto, as it would be very good for business, but i think it is undeniable that Vancouver is the nicer city for summertime. I have been to the beach over ten times already, even if just to watch the sunset and sip a tall can. Nevertheless there is something to be said about a place where you can ride your bike and hit a beach within 10-20 minutes or go the other way and climb a mountain… Or drive up and then ski down.

On my trip, Noel, who works at our management company as an internet guru, showed me a new band (to me anyway) which I am keen on now called Midlake. I liked how they seemed like a modern Fleetwood Mac. Here is a song from them:

And for something old… check out this rad video for Thin Lizzy’s Dancing in the Moonlight. It’s a classic, but I love it:

See you soon Toronto,

Dan