The DOMINIONATED Newsletter is a monthly(ish) round-up of music and creativity from across the country, bringing reviews and recommendations from our writers right to your inbox.
Apollo Ghosts, Pink Tiger (Vancouver BC)
My first exposure to Vancouver indie heroes Apollo Ghosts was their frenetic 2010 album, Mount Benson, a wild and adventurous collection that featured more than a dozen tracks averaging less than two minutes in length. Singer Adrian Teacher has kept busy since, and the group has released music sporadically but has returned in grand fashion with an ambitious double album, Pink Tiger. Apollo Ghosts continue to excel at creating short and catchy sketches of life in power pop form. As with previous releases, the group eschews predictable songwriting formats, avoiding verse-chorus-verse approaches in favour of letting songs come together organically, in a way that has found them so much success in the past. The album’s first disc is a more intimate, home-recorded acoustic set, while the tempo and energy increase on the electric second part. At twenty-two songs in just under an hour, the album is their broadest statement yet, but with terrific songwriting and reliably tight musicianship, Apollo Ghosts show they have plenty more songs up their sleeves. • Daniel Field
Arcade Fire, “The Lightning I, II” (Montreal QC)
I’ve been here before: Arcade Fire announces a new album and drops a new single, and I’m salivating like a bell-addicted dog, high on expectation and low on criticism. The last time this happened, in 2017, even though I fully embraced its title track lead single, I was burned by the underwhelming Everything Now. This time, I’m holding back on making any kind of prediction about the forthcoming album, WE, and choosing to revel in the power of its dual lead singles. [“The Lightning I, II”[(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJiALpiqpk8) are about as inseparable as Win and Regine, two halves of the same coin, each bringing a particular dynamic that informs the other. “The Lightning I” rumbles in like the Who’s “I Can See For Miles” before rolling into an instantly-classic Arcade Fire anthem. Like the gathering black skies referenced in its opening verse, “The Lightning I” signals the torrent of energy and hallowing winds coming when the barometer drops and “The Lightning II” strikes. Arcade Fire hasn’t sounded this visceral — this rock — since “Month of May.” There’s definitely a storm brewing and I’m anxious to see what it brings • Jim Di Gioia
Haley Blais, “Coolest Fucking Bitch in Town” (Vancouver BC)
Haley Blais is the frontrunner for Dominionated’s Best Song Title of the Year award (not actually a thing…but it should be) thanks to her hazy pop-rock single, “Coolest Fucking Bitch in Town.” Blais is not afraid to say the quiet parts out loud on this one (“I want my therapist to think I’m cool,” she sings) as she depicts an all too familiar struggle of wanting to present yourself to the world as cool and put together meanwhile you feel like a complete mess on the inside. It’s an incredible, and relatable, song. • Laura Stanley
Dr. Joy, Dr. Joy (Toronto ON)
Dr. Joy achieves fluency on their self-titled album, as an array of instruments come together in a fusion of jazzy, prog-rock ambience with an almost hymnal quality. The trancelike pulse of a disco beat and guitar fuzz are among the abundance of styles saturating Dr. Joy. Like the chaos of the album art, Dr. Joy is colourful and textural, but there is a method to their madness. Dr. Joy has the effect of catching your attention while simultaneously diverting it with riffs and licks that send your brain waves in all different directions, making a truly experimental listening experience. • Tia Julien
farewell, alaska, piano songs (Glovertown NL)
In early February, Fog Lake‘s Aaron Powell recorded a collection of lo-fi, droney piano pieces and last month he released them under a new project name, farewell, alaska. The short instrumental tracks of piano songs are restful and kind of eerie too, like when you buy a used book and find a picture of strangers tucked inside. But if you’re looking for thirty or so minutes of peace, here it is. • Laura Stanley
Humours, “Local Business” (Edmonton AB)
Edmonton project Humours continues exploring acoustic folk experimentation with another tune from what I can now say is their highly-anticipated sophomore release. “Local Business” is billed as a “tongue-in-cheek display of scenesters that blurs the line between mockery and self-reflection.” The song’s hipster narrator details how they plan to open a movie rental business where they will “judge [customers’] shitty taste when they leave my store / Because I went to college and watched foreign films.” Who among us hasn’t been that customer? Who hasn’t been the clerk? • Jim Di Gioia
Yves Jarvis, “Bootstrap Jubilee” (Montreal QC)
On his last album, Yves Jarvis wrote songs — three or so minutes long; choruses; mostly strummy acoustic guitar-based numbers; far and away the most accessible work of his career, but also the least distinct. It was a departure from his previous two albums that featured fragments, implied grooves, and long ambient segments. They were like punched mirrors, broken in seemingly random ways, but all those pieces formed a beautiful, distinct whole. “Bootstrap Jubilee,” the first single from his upcoming album, The Zug, feels like a return to that unique Yves Jarvis sound, with a twist: the lyrics feel more autobiographical, open and direct than ever, but the groove, the sonic obfuscation, the fakes outs — they are back. Add The Zug to your most-anticipated albums list folks, it’s at the top of mine. • Mackenzie Cameron
Lizzy & the Fanatics, Deux soleils (Montreal QC)
I (and depending on where you live, maybe you too) have reached that point in the year where I have forgotten what a warm, sunny day feels like. Thankfully, Lizzy & the Fanatics‘ EP Deux soleils really does have the power of two suns. These five songs by Montreal’s Lizzy (with her band the Fanatics) have everything you are looking for in a dream-pop release: catchy rhythms and enough reverb to make you feel like you are lying atop the lone fluffy cloud on a perfect summer day. • Laura Stanley
Sheriff Birch, Duck Mug (Winnipeg MB)
It’s not often an artist leaves me as flummoxed as Winnipeg-based Sheriff Birch. A Metis musician “who’s played in all sorts of configurations, but now is a solo boy,” Birch’s first ramshackle collection of tunes under his current moniker is called Duck Mug and it defies classification. Folky acoustic arrangements underpin what can sometimes feel like nonsensical children’s tunes until you realize that, yes the forty-six-second title song really is all about being excited to serve coffee in a mug with a duck on it. Likewise, “When I’m Drunk,” “Here, Have an Egg,” and “Shit Stained Letter” wear their intentions in their titles. I usually hate when I hear someone say, “it is what it is,” but Duck Mug pretty much fits that — ahem — bill to a tee. Drink up. • Jim Di Gioia
Young Guv, Guv III (Toronto ON)
Recently, I’ve been on an exploration through classic rock, listening to old albums that I read about in Rolling Stone ad nauseam as a kid, but never actually heard. Early Beatles (beyond the singles, c’mon), the Byrds, the Kinks — all weird blind spots for me. Ben Cooks’s latest Young Guv album, Guv III, scratches the same itch as all of the aforementioned stuff: jangly, supremely catchy and just a pleasure to listen to over and over. • Mackenzie Cameron
