Spending a night in the studio with Royal Canoe would be fun. Or absolutely terrifying, I haven’t yet decided which. I say fun because by all accounts, the Winnipeg based sextet’s sonic adventurousness knows no bounds. “Living a Lie” is a deeply funky digital experiment, mutating and morphing right before your ears. It’s terrifying for pretty much the same reason; only the most brilliantly demented masterminds to ever set foot in a studio could conjure a song this wickedly inventive.
Royal Canoe add wildly flatulent organ wails to a stuttering beat in a slow, controlled drip. Like mad scientists, they eye their concoction for the point when the combined chemicals react. The flashpoint comes three-quarters through “Living a Lie”, sending sparks flying, singeing eyebrows, and flinging sound samples through the air, busting down walls and blowing out windows.
They’re calling their new album Something Got Lost Between Here And The Orbit. On “Living a Lie”, the only thing that sounds lost is Royal Canoe’s musical inhibitions (if they ever had any in the first place). I’m genuinely in awe of, and utterly petrified at how daring and dazzling they sound right now.
