O Canada

After years of musical atrocities committed against the United States, the nation of Canada is finally trying to make amends. Though it will certainly take decades for America to recover from the damage done by many years of enduring hit singles from Avril Livigne, Good Charlotte and Nickelback, there is hope for reconciliation. Celine Dion has been exiled to the deserts of Nevada, and, just this past weekend in Brooklyn, in observance of Canada Day, the Canadian Consulate put on a program of some of the best indie rock that Canada has to offer.

Unfortunately I had misjudged how long it would take to get to Prospect Park, so I had to kick myself for coming in at the end of Malajube's set (though I have no doubt that, had this not been an outdoor concert, they would certainly have blown the roof off that sucker). They're one of those bands that should really be much more popular in America than they are, but due to a combination of an almost unpronouncable name, an inability to speak English, and an inherent weirdness that seems to only exist north of the border (you'll notice in this picture that the lead singer is wearing the head-section of a monkey costume), they'll probably never achieve the popularity of their Anglophone peers. This is especially unfortunate, since they're easily one of the most energetic live bands I've ever seen. I guess I should just be happy I can see them without going through the bullshit I had to to get Arcade Fire tickets.















For those of you who don't know, Canada Day is like the Canadian version the 4th of July (which happens to fall on the 1st of July), except that, while we cowboy Americans celebrate the day we fought the British into submission and secured our full independence, the Canadians celebrates the day they asked the British Parliament really nicely and convinced them to grant Canada partial sovereignty. So, like most things Canadian, it's pretty much just a lamer, more wholesome version of it's American counterpart, which is about what I was expecting of the other two bands on this bill, but was happy to find was not the case.















I read an Esquire article a few months back claiming that Sam Roberts is possibly the "greatest rock'n'roll front-man working today." Like all good music criticism, this was a bit of an overstatement, though not entirely unfounded. The Sam Roberts band basically sounds like a more macho, less intelligent version of Wilco. I would have preferred to see them playing a smoke-filled bar in the deep south with a chicken wire-lined stage than at a Starbucks-sponsored outdoor concert in Brooklyn (the whole thing really just felt like I was watching a taping of Austin City Limits), though they definitely rocked.















Then finally, a square-looking old guy from the Canadian Consulate came out and gave a long spiel that nobody really paid attention to, and introduced the Stills. It seems as though the goal of whoever billed this show was to make each act seem progressively more familiar to the audience twentysomething hipsters and aging Park Slope parents that want to pretend that they're still twentysomething hipsters, going from full French-Canadian freak-out, to faux-Americana, to post-punk revivalism. And with their shaggy haircuts and jeans tight enough to ensure that no member of the band will be having children in the next decade, the band couldn't have been more at home. As soon as they went into "Still In Love Song" it was like instant nostalgia for hanging out at East Village dive bars circa two years ago. This was probably more like a homecoming than anything for the band who, to the best of my knowledge, were never popular in Canada until they came to New York and became the next Interpol (who, as far as I'm concerned, are still actually the next Strokes). Though, I must say, for a group of Canadians acting like New Yorkers that want to be British, they put on an excellent show.