Wavelength

[wavelengthintl]

Silence The Swamps Readies Debut Full-Length Release

After a three year process of songwriting and technical tweaks culminated in a final “Hail Mary” play during the post-production process, Silence The Swamps are ready to unveil their debut full-length album Will-O’-the-Wisp this Thursday.

The Calgary based trio, comprised of longtime friends Cam Jonze, Dylan Sutton, and Brendan Toft, formed in the summer of 2016 following an impromptu jam session. They began writing songs almost immediately, and spent that winter honing their unique fusion of classic horror punk, grunge, and surf rock.

According to Sutton and Toft, the writing for their full-length was already underway when the group released their debut self-titled EP in March 2017.

“We probably had like three songs really organized in the bag,” says Sutton.

“Yeah, because we played three songs at that EP release show that weren’t on the EP, so yeah, it’s been from March 2017 up until January 10th [2020],” says Toft.

Production on Will-O’-the-Wisp was halted after drummer and vocalist Jonze briefly moved and the group went on hiatus.

“We had everything written, and I think it was recorded too and pretty well mixed, and then Cam moved out to B.C. for we weren’t sure how long,” says Sutton.

“It turned out to be not too bad, but there was a lull where we were inactive and not sure what was going to happen.”

When Jonze returned and the writing was completed, the group then shifted their focus to the post-production process. Whereas the debut EP was mixed and mastered by Jonze, who has a background in audio engineering, this time around they wanted to bring new expertise to the mastering process.

“It’s nice to get a few different ears listening to it too, to take your biases out,” says Sutton.

After Jonze did a preliminary master the album was sent to Kirill Telichev, a local producer who’s worked with groups like The Dudes, Free the Cynics, and The Torchettes.

“He kind of took the album from where we could get it to, and then put it through his compressors and so forth and put his touch to it, and then we got it back around January 2019,” says Toft.

From there the group began looking for an engineer to complete the final phase of the mastering process. It was during this time that Toft sends what he describes as a “Hail Mary message” to Canadian producer Jesse Frederick Keller, better known under the alias JFK as the bassist of Death From Above 1979 and one half of MSTRKRFT.

After hearing the album JFK agrees to take on the project.

“He’s done mastering on rock albums before as well so that was really, really cool because he’s an idol for all of us in this band,” says Toft.

“He was great about it too, like such a good guy to work with,” says Sutton.

The end result of this year-long post-production process is an album that sounds substantially better acoustically from their 2017 EP.

“There’s a big big step up from the initial EP to this one, you can just tell,” says Toft.

Fans can also expect to hear stylistic changes on the album. The core focus on horror imagery and fast, punk-inspired riffs is still there, however the group decided to branch out and experiment with elements like synths, natural hand claps, and samples from horror movies.

“It was cool that we could experiment and go above and beyond just the standard guitar, bass, drums, vocals, and a tinge of effects,” says Toft.

The members have also matured and become more experienced as songwriters, something that Sutton says adds a new layer of depth to the songs on Will-O’-the-Wisp.

“I think the writing’s gotten just better, we kind of figured out what we were doing a little bit more,” he says.

This new experimentation will continue to expand on the group’s forthcoming material, which they’ve already started writing and plan to release on two track EPs in the future.

“I think as time goes on you’ll see us branch out, and not just be pigeon-holed with the dark horror imagery,” says Toft.

“Yeah we’re not just a strict punk band, or a strict alt band,” says Sutton.

“I think we take influences from lots of things, and you have your framework of what you are, but you can definitely play on that by adding synths, or slower parts and acoustic songs on this album, which is super new for us.”

Two singles have already been released off Will-O’-the-Wisp, “Virgin Mary,” and “Once Human.”

The album officially launches on all platforms on January 9th, with an accompanying release party the following day at Broken City featuring Winnipeg band Ex Ømerta, The Ringwalds, and Saskatoon band League of Wolves.

Follow Silence The Swamps at facebook.com/silencetheswamps

Words by Jonathan Crane

[wavelengthintl]

Meet The Organizations Behind Anthroposcene

Taking place this Friday at Lukes Central Library, “Anthroposcene: Dry Disco” is bringing a 100% sober, all-ages, pay what you can, disco-fuelled extravaganza to AEMCON’s nightlife offering this year.

The event, which features the musical selections of Jonathan Crane (me), Ra/Sol, Mr. Beltline, and Anput, is the product of a collaborative effort between Anput and two local organizations: Boring Little Girls Club and Pink Flamingo.

Here’s an in-depth look at each of them.

Boring Little Girls Club

The Boring Little Girls Club was launched by Kira Dunlop last November with the aim of offering women, transgender, and non-binary individuals sober alternatives to social activities that would normally involve drugs and alcohol.

Alberta Health Services officially recognizes the club as a “coalition,” or a group of community members who come together to pursue a common goal. As Dunlop explains, this differs from recovery programs intended for those who identify as addicts or alcoholics in that the focus is on social engagement, as opposed to achieving the end goal of sobriety.

“For 12-Steps fellowship programs, for inpatient, outpatient treatment programs, for smart recovery, they are all taught by either professionals, or human beings that have taken it upon themselves to help everyone get sober and stay sober,” she says.

“We are more about the social aspect, and empowering people to go out and have fun.”

Although the club doesn’t have the structure or intent of a traditional support group, Dunlop notes that members find support through building relationships with people enduring similar struggles.

“We believe that community is the key to pretty much everything, but definitely in terms of being sober and staying clean, we believe that community is essential because we need to support each other,” she says.

Since its launch BLGC has grown to include 30 members from across the sobriety spectrum, including those who still drink or use substances but are considering sobriety.

“I like to say we are not the sobriety police, I do not pretend to ascribe to any particular recovery methods,” says Dunlop.

“I don’t want to tell anyone how to do it because there’s a possibility that I’m wrong, and I recognize that what works for me may not work for the next person.”

While the members-only meetings are only open to women, transgender, or non-binary individuals, BLGC has also hosted events like an arcade night and a sober Stampede breakfast that are open to all sober allies and supporters.

“At the bottom of it, it’s friendship, and it’s community, and it’s connection, and the ability for those of us who have taken ourselves out of substance use, and out of alcohol, to be able to connect with one another and love each other,” says Dunlop.

For AEMCON Dunlop will also be appearing as a panelist alongside Bass Coast founder Andrea Graham on “Addiction and Recovery in the Music Industry,” taking place Sunday, November 17th.

Pink Flamingo

Born out of a conceptual pinball league, Pink Flamingo is a duo that’s bringing new entertainment options to Calgary’s LGBTQ2SA+ community.

Helmed by Avenue Magazine writer Colin Gallant and former Calgary Pride board member Allison Dunne, the concept for Pink Flamingo began when the pair were approached last year by the then-nascent PinBar about starting an LGBTQ+ pinball league. As Dunne explains, her and Gallant had already been contemplating ways to bring different entertainment options to the queer community.

“We just kind of weren’t super into the queer scene in Calgary, not saying there’s anything wrong with it, just we didn’t want to have to go to a dance party and we didn’t want to have to go to a club,” says Dunne.

Not wanting to be constrained by these settings, the pair initially envisioned hosting pop-up events in spaces that aren’t typically regarded as queer venues, thereby boosting accessibility.

Seeing an opportunity to achieve this with PinBar, they decided that instead of a league they would throw parties every second Wednesday. The first Pink Flamingo Pinball Party was launched in May of last year, and by July they were garnering upwards of 500 “interested” RSVP’s on Facebook.

Dunne credits their success with creating a casual and fun atmosphere that was so safe and inclusive people could confidently go there alone.

“It was always really awkward going to queer parties alone because either you’re dancing alone, or you’re sitting alone and it felt like a junior high dance,” she says.

The success of the pinball parties also brought the attention of other venues that were looking to add LGBTQ+ nights to their programming, and Pink Flamingo soon found themselves collaborating on larger-scale events at The Palomino, Last Best, and The Hifi Club.

“We realized at that time that our purpose maybe is more than just a bi-weekly, maybe we can kind of help create a sense of community and a sense of fluidity between these known queer spaces and assumed straight spaces, and we can utilize our connections and our ethics in that way,” says Dunne.

Although the pinball parties are currently on hiatus, Pink Flamingo has plans to launch a regularly scheduled event series in the future. Their next collaborative project after Anthroposcene is “Being Extra 4,” an evening of live comedy storytelling at Lukes Central Library.

[wavelengthintl]

Original Bass: Moonchild Champions The Return Of Conscious Bass Music

Taking place at Habitat Living Sound this Thursday, “Original Bass” marks both the Calgary tour stop of international artists Subtle Mind and Ill Chill’s “Sun & Stars Tour” and Chelsea Moonchild’s return as a solo promoter.

From 2014 to 2015 producer and DJ Moonchild organized and promoted events like “NXTLVL” and “Indigo Pulse” that celebrated low-end bass music culture and the local community surrounding it. For the past three years she’s turned her focus to organizing events as part of a team, beginning with the then-fledgeling Costa Rican Bamboo Bass Festival in 2016 and, more recently, Bass Turtle Productions’ “Massive” series at Habitat.

The feeling of single handedly creating a bass music experience left Moonchild wanting to return as a promoter for a one-off event, specifically one that captured the zeitgeist of the early 2010’s bass community.

“I think personally I’m just missing that 2012, when I first got into music, and that feeling that it gave me when I got into it, that connectedness and inspiration,” she says.

According to Moonchild, recent years have seen a decline in the number of platforms afforded to bass music that doesn’t fall under the “face melting” category.

“I just feel like a hole can be filled with some conscious bass music in Calgary, and I thought of the original bass, the O.G. back to the roots,” she says.

“I just came up with it, I’ve been working on it for the last six months and the name just came to me this summer.”

Coincidentally, during the planning phase for the event Moonchild was contacted by San Francisco-based dubstep producer Subtle Mind looking to book tour stops following the release of the Sun & Stars EP, a collaborative project with Los Angeles-based MC Ill Chill.

“I was like yeah let’s get that to Calgary, it seemed so perfect and aligned,” says Moonchild.

The EP’s laidback yet artistically complex lyricism and jazzy bass-infused beats not only fit the vision for Original Bass, but Moonchild also met both artists during the period she’s hoping to channel.

“I’ve been really good friends with Ill Chill and Subtle Mind for six years now, right from when I started digging for music and meeting people from around the world,” she says.

Thursday’s lineup is further bolstered by Edmonton DJ Night Mother, “Massive” alumnus Josh Ray, and local fan favourite Illfitted going back-to-back with Moonchild herself. The event also features a raffle for visual art created by local artist Janelle Bird, with half the proceeds going to the Calgary Sexual Health Centre.

Moonchild has plans for more projects next year, but for now she’s satisfied that Original Bass and Bass Turtle Productions are filling a void in the local community.

“I think a lot of people are scared to do a night of slower, more mindful music. I’m not really scared of anything,” she says.

Visit the event page here https://www.facebook.com/events/350815912523609/

Words by Jonathan Crane

[wavelengthintl]

The Mixed Bag Fundraiser For MS Returns With New Focus

On June 16th Sled Island, CJSW, and proHAB Helmet Society are teaming up to present the Mixed Bag Fundraiser for MS at the Ship and Anchor.

The free mid-day event, which runs from 2 p.m. to 8 p.m., features live performances by Mark Mills, Dark Time, Paradise, and Mademoiselle, making it the first instalment in the fundraiser’s three year run to feature live music.

According to the event’s founders Jesse Lee Mason, Shane Rempel, and Jared Andres, the event has progressed substantially in scope and organization since its launch.

“I think it’s just part of evolving, I think we learn something new every year we do it, says Rempel.  

“The music format previously was just DJing rap music, and I think as we get older we try to cater to a more diverse crowd.”

The fundraiser initially took place at the now-closed Local 510, an intimately-sized venue. The increase in space afforded by the move to The Ship and Anchor opened the possibility to explore new musical options.

“We wanted to do something a little bit different, and having the bands at a place like The Ship and Anchor, I think it’s something that a lot of people can get onside with,” says Rempel.

“The Ship has been majorly helping us out with the bands, they’re donating a soundguy, donating a stage,” says Andres.

The idea for The Mixed Bag initially emerged in response to Rempel himself being diagnosed with MS.

“Well Shane got diagnosed with MS, and then I remember we were at a show or something, and I was talking to you [Shane] and I was like I want to do something,” says Mason.

Rempel has spent the last ten years running proHAB, a non-profit that aims to make bike helmets accessible, and already had intimate knowledge of how to launch a fundraiser. Andres, meanwhile, had extensive experience on running music events through his role as a DJ and drummer for local electronica group BLVD NOIR.

“We like to throw parties too right, get everybody together, get all our pals together, we’re all going to the bar anyways might as well do it for a good cause,” says Rempel.

“Between the three of us we have so many friends in the music industry, and in the restaurant industry so it just kind of made sense,” says Mason.

Even with their combined experience as event promoters the group wasn’t expecting the higher than anticipated response they received, and vowed to continue it as an annual event.

“I think the first year I was personally a bit surprised by how many people were so down to donate,” says Andres.  

“It was a really good response, that made us realize we could do it.”

From the onset the fundraiser has always been envisioned as a grassroots, community-driven event. It’s in keeping with these values that the team decided to make local non-profit Branch Out Neurological Foundation the benefactor of the donations generation.

Rempel met Branch Out’s founder Crystal Phillips at a bike swap last year and saw parallels between her story and his own.

“She’s got MS as well, and so what she did was try to make a good thing out of a bad thing by starting Branch Out Foundation,” says Rempel.

“So yeah it seemed like a good fit for us because she was very much entrepreneurial, but also very much rooted in the community and also had that lived experience with MS, and that really resonated with me.”

“In terms of our values and what we like to support Branch Out was more aligned with that,” says Andres.

The community-based aspect is also represented in the fundraiser’s musically and socially diverse lineup. Many of the performers are also friends of the organizers who share their taste and passion for local live music.

“We wanted to have it mixed up a little bit and have mixed representation,” says Andres.

“We try to think about what party would we want to go to, let’s make that party happen,” says Rempel.

In addition to collecting donations at the door The Mixed Bag also boasts a hefty silent auction that includes items like a Discovery Pass for Sled Island, two passes for FrogFest, a brewing lesson at Last Best, and numerous prize packages from other local businesses.

Children are also allowed to attend the event until 6 p.m.

For more information visit https://www.facebook.com/events/607846933069415/

Donations are also being accepted online at https://tinyurl.com/y4yspecl

[wavelengthintl]

Ritual Occurrence Debuts With Kybalion

This Thursday at Habitat Living Sound “Kybalion” will herald the debut of Ritual Occurrence, a new collective that aims to explore the possibilities at the intersection of art and music.

The night-long event will feature DJ sets from Smol, Fourlore, Thomas K, and Jonathan Crane as well as a dance performance from Liquid Wiccan.

According to Ritual Occurrence founder Janelle Kathleen, a longtime member of the local electronic music community and an accomplished canvas painter in her own right, this event is the first step towards incorporating more visual and performance art into the build of traditional DJ nights.

“I want to see a mesh of those two things, and done in a different way than it’s being done right now,” says Kathleen.

“I’ve had this idea, I’ve thought about it for a bit, and then just out of nowhere one day I was like okay I’m going to do this, I’m going to make a collective out of this.”

While Kathleen has past experience organizing DJ nights with other groups, she sees the idea of a collective as a way to move beyond the current scope of the party format.

“I find I go out a lot and the music is great, the people are great, but it’s really focused around nightlife, and I kind of want to see something different other than that,” she says.

In the future she envisions possibilities like daytime events, art gallery functions, various workshops, and more events that continue down the performance-art infused trajectory of Kybalion.

The idea for a group of this nature has been fermenting for a while, she says, however it took the right combination of personal development, community, and refining her own ideas for it to begin materializing.

“I kind of just sat on that idea and planted the seed and let it grow for a little bit there, just really focused on networking, figuring out my own personal brand, figuring out what my passions were, starting up my own art and all of that,” says Kathleen.

“And so doing all of my things, meeting all of these amazing people, just kind of pushed me in this direction that I was in this place where I was able to start something like this.”

Kathleen was also motivated by Liquid Wiccan, the dance group she joined this past fall. After performing alongside the group for the first time at Fozzy Fest she was inspired by their innovative and expressive take on traditional go-go dancing.

“That really inspired me to have more of that in the scene I guess, as well as I have been making music and I have my visual art that I do too, and having all these things and wanting to have a platform for me to present it, not just for me but for everyone else who wants to be involved,” she says.

Although Kybalion will primarily focus on electronic music it was nonetheless an important step in cementing Ritual Occurrence’s identity as a creativity-based collective. Its musically cosmopolitan lineup, which consists of DJs and producers that range from left-field bass to house and techno, transcends the often splintered, genre-stratified nature of local electronic music scenes.

It’s a quality that Kathleen vows to maintain moving forward.

“Right now what I’m hoping to see is actually a melting of minds, everyone who’s involved and everyone who wants to be involved putting forth what they want out of it, and then it kind of evolving in that sense,” she says.

“I don’t want to say we’re strictly doing dance shows, or strictly doing art things, I really want to be very multifaceted and very all-encompassing and inclusive as well.”

To create a sense of inclusivity Ritual Occurrence not only has a mandate of harm reduction that’s inspired by Vancouver’s Good Night Out organization, but also a commitment to creating an environment that’s inviting for non-drinkers.

“It’s hard for me to go out sometimes and not want to party, or also hard for me to go out and be around all of that,” says Kathleen.  

“And so I really want to have spaces for people who are sober, or who don’t want to go crazy, to feel safe and to have fun, because I know it can be a little intimidating especially if you’ve just gone sober.

“I have a few friends who have and I don’t see them out much anymore, I want to have spaces for them to feel really safe.”

For Kybalion this initiative will primarily consist of offering mocktails and alternatives to alcohol, however the possibility of hosting events at venues that don’t serve alcohol is one that Ritual Occurrence hopes to explore in the future.

Kathleen acknowledges that launching an organization with such a substantial inclination for changing the way art and music are presented can be daunting at times, however it’s a challenge she knows Ritual Occurrence is ready to handle.

“Yeah I would say it’s, maybe not harder than I thought it would be, but there’s definitely moments where I’m like oh my god what am I doing,” says Kathleen.

“But then I’m reminded that I know what I’m doing, and everyone I’m involved with is a friend of mine and it’s not scary.”

Find more information on Kybalion at https://www.facebook.com/events/376616126220638/

Words by Jonathan Crane

[wavelengthintl]

Top Tracks Of 2017

10. Rico Nasty - Glo Bottles

The story of DMV (D.C., Maryland, Virginia) rapper Rico Nasty is pretty remarkable. She released her first mixtape when she was 16 and still in high school. At some point during her senior year she became pregnant, however the baby’s father, who she describes as her best friend, died before he even knew he was going to have a child. She sunk into a depression, barely graduated, and was a single mom at the age of 18. After her child was 10 months old she started rapping again, and grinded from obscurity to the soundtrack of the Fate Of The Furious, the soundtrack of HBO’s Insecure, and this year’s top 40 rap albums list on Rolling Stone Magazine. This was all done without the support of a major label. When she talks about things like now having a “new whip every day” you genuinely feel happy for her as a person.

9. Pabllo Vittar - K.O.

Pabllo Vittar is an openly gay Brazilian drag queen who is now officially the most followed drag queen on Instagram, surpassing even RuPaul. She was bullied in school as a teen for her feminine voice and demeanour, then began doing drag at the age of 18. In 2014 she was discovered via YouTube and made her first television appearance. Her fame began to skyrocket the following year after releasing “Open Bar,” a Portuguese version of Major Lazer’s “Lean-On.” This year Major Lazer compounded her notoriety even further by featuring her in their original production “Sua Cara.” She was also featured on Charlie XCX's Pop 2 album, had the most-in-demand song of Brazil’s carnival, signed an official deal with Coca Cola Brazil, and cracked 100 million plays on both of her single releases. Her heavy usage of LBGTQ-affirming imagery and her vocal criticism of some of the countries conservative figures have made her a rallying point for Brazil's LBGTQ population, as well as those disillusioned with the encroaching conservative political establishment.

8. Lil Pump - Flex Like Ouu

Seventeen-year-old Florida Rapper Lil Pump is a lot like a Marvel movie. If you go into a Marvel movie looking for something that’s a dead-ringer to the comics you’re going to be disappointed. You have to just interpret each movie as its own thing, independent from the comics. Similarly, when you approach the music of Lil Pump you have to forget about rap music. Forget about Kendrick, forget about Big L and all those other old-head icons, and just interpret this music as existing inside a vacuum. When you do that it becomes more apparent why the sound of artists like Pump and Smokepurpp have become so infectious. A lot of times when artists try to add energy to a track they do so by being obnoxious, with brostep being perhaps the most egregious example of this. These artists, on the other hand, figured out how to create incredibly hype tracks by taking the stripped-down nature of trap music and adding this highly repetitive lyrical delivery. It’s a formula that’s really simple and efficient, and also easy for other Soundcloud rappers to replicate. I see a lot of similarities between the music of Lil Pump and genres like grime and kuduro. Even though it’s built off of hip-hop it’s essentially its own thing. The reason why old-heads are angry is because this isn’t happening in East London or Angola, it’s happening on American soil. Old-heads are shook at the prospect of someone in their own backyard gaining notoriety by yelling the same three words over and over while being associated with rap. Meanwhile the rest of the world is like hey welcome to the club we had this like 15 years ago.

7. Ski Mask The Slump God - Catch Me Outside

According to Pigeons & Planes, 21-year-old Ski Mask The Slump God is one of the most “inventive and compelling” figures to emerge from the rising school of Florida rappers, and for good reason. If anyone can reconcile the growing gap between old heads and fans of new-school rap it’s him. According to Ski Mask himself he’s lyrical, but not lyrical. In other words he has the intricately crafted wordplay that old heads value, but he delivers it with the based “I don’t really care what I’m saying” aspect of the new school. The music video itself is a testament to his ability to unite both worlds. His decision to rap over the 1999 Missy Elliott and Timbaland beat for “She’s A Bitch” earned praise from Missy Elliott herself. Ski Mask was also praised by Isaiah Rashad, who said he was upset at “how tight this nigga Slump God is.” On the other hand, the video appears on the channel of video producer Cole Bennett, one of the central hubs for the emerging new wave of rap. Two of Ski Mask’s recent tracks, “My Mind” and “Achoo!” have veered off into more experimental territory, signalling that this artists definitely harbours surprises that remain to be seen in the new year.

6. Shy Luv - Lungs

One time on a 20+ minute drive home I listened to this song on repeat the entire way, then when I pulled up to my house I sat in the car and listened to it like four times, then I went inside and listened to it again. Anytime a song provokes that reaction it's a good indication that it should probably be on some year end list.

5. Lorde - Perfect Places

Pretty much everyone who listens to music in this solar system was in unanimous agreement that Lorde’s sophomore release "Melodrama" is a masterpiece. This is evidenced by the grammy nomination for Album of the Year, numerous top 10 finishes in “best albums of 2017” lists, and Rolling Stone Magazine comparing her to Kate Bush. For a major pop release it has a tremendous level of depth and intellectualism that far surpasses Lorde’s age of 21.  A problem that some major pop artists face is switching to some trendy micro-genre then sounding unnatural, like the time Justin Bieber threatened to release a dubstep track, the first time Katy Perry did trap, or Lady Gaga going Americana to tap into the normie market. On Melodrama every track sounds like Lorde, and being able to firmly establish such a dynamic musical identity at that young of an age is also a testament to her power level. This could legitimately be the rise of the next Kate Bush.

4. Tei Shi - Keep Running

In 2015 I listed Argentinian-Canadian singer Tei-Shi’s song “Bassically” as my top song of the year. That track was one of the main reasons why pop music is still one of my most listened-to genres. It represented this whole movement that year of pop music’s indie side coming into the foreground, or of pop music with a high degree of artistic value suddenly becoming visible. At the time, I described it as pop music coming into its own. The same could be said of Tei Shi now, except this time she has an entire debut album “Crawl Space” to back it up. Her music continues to showcase the depth that pop music on the whole can have, and why it’s no longer the anathema of the underground, but an extension of it.

3. Charlotte Day Wilson - Work

Nylon Magazine called 24-year-old Canadian singer Charlotte Day Wilson “the next best thing out of Toronto.” The Star described her essence as “subdued soul, rich vocal texture and instrumental acuity.” According to Now Toronto she’s become a queer icon in the city, and she hopes to create space for women in music to flourish. I think one of my favourite memories from last year was wandering the streets of Budapest listening to this song on repeat.

2. Austra - I Love You More Than You Love Yourself

This was definitely a Facebook newsfeed discovery. Austra is a four-piece band from Toronto fronted by Katie Stelmanis. This song is from the group’s album “Future Politics,” and according to the album’s page on Domino Records it’s a “collection of urgent, but disciplined anthems for dancefloor and headphones, [and] asks each of us to remember that apocalypse is not an inevitability, but the product of human decision-making.” Although the write-up goes on to describe the album in ways that make it seem like a manifesto, I definitely heard “Utopia,” the album’s other main single, playing in Earl’s once. It will probably end up on some Netflix show at some point. This is the power of pop music, it can make critical statements but still be accessible at the same time.

1. Lil Uzi Vert - XO Tour Llif3

Last year, for the first time in history, hip-hop dethroned rock as the most consumed genre in the U.S., and I think it’s largely because of artists like Uzi Vert.

I held off on writing this one for a while because I wanted to actually do research to find out why emo rap in particular seems to have become the soundtrack of the contemporary urban youth. Thankfully I didn’t have to search too far, because this Pitchfork article (link below) perfectly summarizes it.

Unlike gangster rappers and some earlier trap rappers, emo rap has an aesthetic that doesn’t only speak to one demographic, but rather to the struggles that youth often face on the whole. Whereas rap music previously presented black communities as bastions of lawlessness governed by hyper masculinity and street bravado, lines like “Please Xanny make it go away” transcend racial boundaries and redefine the notion of how black men should present themselves in the performance of hip-hop.

In terms of the actual construction of the music itself, I think it’s worth noting that the spacey, atmospheric nature of Uzi Vert’s beats basically came from a subculture on Soundcloud that couldn’t find anything to relate to in their immediate environment, so they turned to the internet. This is evidenced by Uzi Vert citing Marilyn Manson as one of his biggest influences.

These beats, combined with the subject matter, combined with the anime-inspired outfits, mean that emo hip-hop right now is speaking to the largest population segment out of any genre. In 2018 old heads are going to keep being angry at music like this, but while they’re 45-years-old complaining in a basement somewhere, listening to Naughty By Nature, drinking AGD and playing Goldeneye 64, the rest of the world is experiencing rappers like Uzi Vert taking hip-hop to completely new heights.

https://pitchfork.com/…/1481-to-be-young-angsty-and-black-…/

[wavelengthintl]

Street Level: Days Of Future Past

Lazy Pluto (left) with Sonny Chiba (right)

This Saturday marks the launch of “Street Level,” a new night at Habitat Living Sound dedicated to electronic music’s grassroots genres.

The first instalment features local DJs Sonny Chiba, Lazy Pluto, DJ Dine & Dash, and Dr. Space. Together, these four artists cover a large spectrum of obscure, nostalgia-driven genres within electronic music that are rapidly trending.

The night was initially envisioned by DJ Sonny Chiba (Cody Freele), a figure who’s played throughout the city for close to a decade, and who’s played a role in many recent highly acclaimed startup nights.

“It was coming out of a love of a genre that a lot of people pay homage to without knowing, and a lot of people don't realize influenced where they're at,” says Freele.

“What I wanted to do is strip it down back to its rooted form and kind of build it from there.

“And obviously I'm speaking about acid and acid house.”

In addition to acid, Freele also lists the genres “lo-fi house” and electro as characterizing the night. What these genres have in common is that they were some of electronic music’s first genres, and their modern counterparts are created in an environment that’s an online equivalent of a street-level gathering.

They take place on outlets like Bandcamp, Soundcloud radio stations, and blogs. They’re all environments driven mostly by common people with no ties to major labels or distributors.

The genres are also linked by their simplicity. Acid house and electro, for example, were heavily based around Roland drum machines that were released in the 1980’s. This primitivism, says Freele, is something modern artists are trying to replicate to achieve a rawness that stands out in today’s climate of high production values.

“I just really like the fact that [acid house] it's a retro piece of music dating back to like 1987 that's just as relevant now,” says Freele.

“The same sounds and instruments are being utilized now more than they were when they were conceived back in the 80’s, so I think it's a nice resurgence.

“I think it's just time to kind of pay homage, and at the same time build something new and fresh within it.”

In addition to their composition, these genres are also “street” in their general attitude.

“I think I think if you look at the history of the musical landscape of acid music, electro, vogue house, all these things, it's always been rooted in nightlife and obscure cultures of its day,” says Freele.

“Vogue had the gays of New York, and acid house had the Chicago ravers and obviously the hedonistic lifestyle personified with that.

“The music screams attitude to me, and I think it's a soundtrack to the city and the streets.”

After Freele came up with the idea he approached longtime friend and fellow DJ Lazy Pluto (Jade Krogh) about being part of the lineup.

Under his former alias “Ancient Kroun,” Krogh was a resident of Northern Lights, a Wednesday night showcase at the Hifi Club that ran from 2010 to 2015 and was known for its relentless innovation and experimentation.

“When I was originally playing, I was with the most avant-garde guys in the city, they're master producers, and I was lucky to be in that crew at all,” says Krogh.

“And it was probably because of my obscure unique taste, which continues to carry on.”

As Krogh notes, however, the obscure nature of the music meant that it was sometimes difficult to attract people during the week.

“It was a struggle to fill that room even when you had world class artists that would fill a huge room in Europe, in Calgary you would fight to get 70 people, 80 people, and it was probably because it was a Wednesday night,” says Krogh.

“So the fact that we can bring an avant-garde sound to a club, a small club on a Saturday night, it’s going to blow up.”

After Northern Lights ended, its roster of DJs temporarily scattered throughout Canada. Although Krogh remained in Calgary he took a hiatus from performing.

It was the prospect of being able to play music that he’d observed from the other side of the world that drew him back in.

“I can confidently say that the sound that we're going to have in our night is probably not being played too many other places in North America,” says Krogh.

“I honestly believe that this is seriously a sound that's pulled straight from Europe, I haven't heard much of this kind of sound at all.”

Freele agrees, noting that Europe has been the main pressure cooker for these genres in recent years.

“It's funny because it all originated in Chicago, but the Europeans embraced it because they got it,” says Freele.

“And what we're hoping to bring to the landscape of Calgary, and you know more North America for that matter, is just kind of embracing that, and realizing that it is rooted in our culture as well without us even knowing it.”

It’s this new update that Europe, and pockets of innovation through North America, have given the genres that the roster of Street Level hopes to showcase.

“The night's going to be more focused on how the new school has adopted the old sound,” says Freele.

“We will have our classic acid [Roland] TB-303 [synthesizer] jams that we're going to play, and anthems that we all recognize and like to pay homage to, but it's a future focused night.

“The beautiful thing about it is what's old is new again, so even though it's a future focused night on artists and genres and whatnot, it's got an old school retro sound that's never sounded better,”

This is precisely why Freele and Krogh sought out DJ Dine & Dash (Liam Mackenzie), to join the roster. Mackenzie specializes in lo-fi house, a genre that’s achieved notoriety in recent years after a handful of tracks went viral on YouTube. His productions also pull elements from classic sounds like disco and 1990’s R&B.

Krogh first met Mackenzie at Northern Lights, and believes he’s maintained a steady focus on electronic music’s cutting edge ever since.

“The people who were there on a regular basis are pretty much very predominant players of the scene,” says Krogh.

“They're the guys that are still actually bushwhacking, and they're blazing trails still, not just in production, production very much so, but also in their nights.

“It's really nice to see that the people who have that craving for a unique sound are running the ship.”

The Street Level crew hopes to turn the night into a regular occurrence, and eventually branch out into hosting parties outside of the club circuit. Their immediate goal for Saturday, however, is to use this music to hopefully draw new audiences to the floor of Habitat.

“I want to have people who don't necessarily think about a night like this being something they're into, finding out that it's exactly what they've been looking for,” says Freele.

While the names and histories of the genres may be esoteric, they were ultimately created with ordinary people in mind, and this is what’s given them longevity and appeal across the globe for three decades.

Information on the event and links to the artists’ pages can be found at https://www.facebook.com/events/413336129122136/

Follow Wavelength on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WavelengthINTL/ Words by Jonathan Crane

[wavelengthintl]

Curtis Waters: Leanin In Tha Lobby

This past year has been a breakout year for Curtis Waters, a formerly Calgary-based hip-hop artist who moved to North Carolina a year ago.

His tracks “My Ex Girlfriend Turned Into The Moon,” and “Hot Boy Anthem” featuring Calgary rapper Harm Franklin, were featured in notable media outlets like Earmilk, Complex, and Good Juice Box. Both of these tracks were also accompanied by music videos that are currently sitting in the thousands of plays.

He also launched the Hot Boy Tape, a six-track EP, in October. Each track currently has over a thousand plays on Soundcloud, with the title track ending the year at over 15 thousand plays in the seven months it’s been out.

All of these accolades were accomplished before Waters turned 18 at the start of this month. Even with the promising start to his career Waters still has the work ethic of someone who makes art for art’s sake.

“I don’t even check my numbers and shit,” says Waters.

“What I do, it sounds narcissistic, but I make music solely for the purpose of me to listen to it, so I make songs that I want to hear.

“I listen to it for a few days, I get sick of it and I want to vomit, then I make a new song.

“Then I’ll share it with a few friends and if they’re like, ‘this is really cool you should drop it,’ I’ll drop it and I’ll move on to the next thing.

“I don’t like to dwell on the numbers and I don’t like to be like oh I had 30,000 plays.

“I don’t like the elitism that comes with music because it’s just fun shit, I’m just a kid making music, and people are fucking with it, so it’s cool.”

Originally from Nepal, Waters arrived in Calgary at the age of 10, and began producing at the age of 13, inspired by artist like Kanye West and Tyler The Creator.

“I used to only listen to emo music, and I used to hate rap music until my friend showed me Kanye West and then I got really into it,” says Waters.

“When I listened to College Dropout, especially Last Call, it made me realize [hip-hop] it’s not just flexing or anything, because when you’re a kid you don’t really understand why things are the way they are.

“But College Dropout is my first introduction to everything I play.”

Similar to Kanye, Waters doesn’t see himself aligned with any faction or sound within hip-hop. Going through his Soundcloud is like going through a spectrum of music that ranges from the warm, jazzy feeling of 1990’s-styled hip-hop beats to the droning, introspective stylings of sad-trap.

“I don’t want to categorize it because I think when you start labelling and putting genres on things it gets weird,” says Waters.

“I don’t want to ever be like, oh yeah Curtis Waters the cloud rapper, oh yeah Curtis Waters the boom bap artist.

“I want to make sure Curtis Waters is Curtis Waters.”

This statement is reflected in his latest EP, the Hot Boy Tape. Waters sees its emotionally dualistic nature as an extension of himself.

“It’s three bangers, so just like ignorant, just like ‘fuck yeah I’m so fucking awesome,’ like braggadocio shit,” says Waters.

“And three more like R&B, like ‘awe man I actually kind of hate myself’ kinda shit, and I love it because I think that’s perfect for who I am.”

The latter emotion stems from Waters’ own battle with depression, a struggle that continually drove him into isolation.

“I hated everyone in Calgary at one point because I was so depressed and I was so secluded,” says Waters.

Then in 2016 Waters met local artist Harm Franklin and slowly began to see a kindred spirit in the rising Calgary rapper.

“After I met him for the first time, because the internet it’s so fake, it’s so delusional, you kind of judge people based on their internet presence, but when I met him for real I was like okay this is a really nice guy he has good plans and stuff,” says Waters.

During their early studio sessions Franklin helped to establish the rambunctious, in your face “ignorant” nature seen on the track “Captain Underpants,” and Hot Boy later on.

“I kinda just grew into being friends with him, and one day when we were just producing music I just took my shirt off and started rapping, and that’s it,” says Waters.

He describes this as a turning point moment in his musical development.

“Then after that I was like yo this is actually sick, let’s do an entire tape of ignorant shit,” says Waters.

“Then I got more serious about it, and I dropped My Ex Girlfriend Turned Into The Moon, and then that got on Complex, I was like oh shit, okay shit’s working out I gotta keep going.”

The incitement of this snowball effect happened just in time. Captain Underpants came out on December 18th 2016, and two weeks later Waters found himself moving to North Carolina with his family.

“I went to this girl’s house and I thought she was super cute, I walk in, massive poster of Donald Trump,” says Waters.

“I just watched the movie Get Out so I was like dawg, this is insane.

“It’s also just a really small town, imagine a nursing home just multiplied into a whole town.

“It’s very unlike Curtis Waters but it’s a good place to go and figure your shit out.”

Despite his local, it’s allowed him to have the year he’s had because it’s made him more focused on his music.

“Honestly in America I haven’t left my room, I’ve been making music for eight months in my room, just musty-ass, no friends, no showering, just going crazy,” says Waters.

The move has also added new depth to Waters’ lyrics by opening him to new experiences.

“The states is whack, I get called sand nigger all day at school, it’s weird,” says Waters.

“I like it though because when I was here [in Calgary] it’s like an echo chamber here, where everyone’s like a liberal and everyone has the same opinions almost, and you kind of multiply.

“It’s cool being [in the U.S.] because it can challenge your world view, and be like why are people thinking a certain way, and also I can write songs about racist people and it’s awesome, because I had nothing to write about here except girls and getting drunk.”

Thus far, Waters has a project slated for release in February, and it’s already apparent that his sound is still evolving. He himself described it on social media as “full of love songs about awkward teenage romance and summer.” The past two songs he’s appeared on, meanwhile, have moved away from trap and into the territory of retro sounds and indie dance.

Waters also envisions releasing a full-length album, a feat he was hoping to have ready for his 18th birthday but decided to postpone. He knows there is still work to be done and new avenues to explore, yet his words are those of someone who has the confidence of knowing how to navigate towards his goals.

Furthermore, he knows he can get there using a formula that’s entirely his own.

“I used to lurk so much on the internet, I used to pretty much live on the internet and the thing is, that shit’s not healthy,” says Waters.  

“Now I’ve been trying to be healthy. I think in Calgary I think a lot of people romanticized being depressed and being all sad and shit, that’s not cool anymore, that’s over.

“I just make my own shit, I don’t do anything but shit that can improve whatever I’m going to do in five years. “

Follow Curtis Waters on Soundcloud at https://soundcloud.com/imcurtiswaters

Follow Wavelength on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WavelengthINTL/ Words by Jonathan Crane

[wavelengthintl]

DJ Dine & Dash: Lofi On The Brain

The SAFE EP from Calgary-based artist DJ Dine & Dash, the moniker of Liam Mackenzie, is a window into an emerging ethos in dance music.

Mackenzie firmly aligns himself with lofi house, a genre that’s been rapidly emerging thanks to the help of YouTube’s suggested videos algorithms.

Contrary to the incredibly polished and meticulously mastered nature of contemporary dance music, lofi house purposely tries to sound as if it was hobbled together on rudimentary equipment.

The upper frequencies are often slightly muted, giving the tracks a flat feeling. The melodies and the drums, meanwhile, sound like they were recorded with a tape recorder.

While this may sound undesirable in today’s climate, the genre prides itself on its contrarian nature.

DJ Seinfeld, one of the genre’s central figures, compared it to punk and metal, calling it the equivalent of “people rocking out in someone’s garage somewhere.”

Ross From Friends, another key figure, shared this sentiment, calling it a reaction to the “hi-fi soundscape we’re living in where every producer is striving for perfection.”

Mackenzie lists both of these figures as the main influences behind the SAFE EP, echoing their sentiments towards the music.

“The characteristics of the EP have mainly been influenced by the acts of DJ Seinfeld, he’s one of the biggest ones, and Ross From Friends, just because they really include a lot of natural characteristics,” says Mackenzie.

“Not everything is super polished, which is nice to hear, especially nowadays because, don’t get me wrong, it’s nice to have nice polished music but there’s a lot of that at clubs.”

Lofi house also alludes to the house music of the early 90’s, a time when house was driven by pieces of hardware like drum machines and samplers.

This isn’t the first time Mackenzie has been drawn to “netstalgia.” His first major musical endeavour was “Advances,” a live band that played Sled Island in 2016.

The group called themselves “Disco Dreamcore,” and their songs harnessed the feeling of raw, unadulterated synthesizers and retro effects.

When Mackenzie began producing his first influences where artists like Shlohmo, an electronica producer known for capturing the hazy atmosphere of 90’s RnB, and DJ Paypal, a footwork producer known for putting washed-out samples in his tracks and calling it “Mall Music.”

Mackenzie describes this as a kind of spiritual predecessor to lofi house.

“There was definitely that first wave of Soundcloud sub genre which was like Soulection, and they’re really good, but I feel like lofi house music is going to be more the second wave of the sub genre on Soundcloud,” he says.

After this, Mackenzie’s next main influence wasn’t a genre, but a medium.

“As time went on I got into more collecting records and figuring out, discovering samplers and different types of samplers,” he says.

This meant spending hours a day online digging for records, often of the “disco house” genre, that were only released online.

“Those are my big influences, definitely the underground culture collecting vinyl,” says Mackenzie.

From the onset of his time as a producer Mackenzie has been dialled into the fresh culture being generated by the back lanes of Soundcloud. All of these diverse influences have led to the SAFE EP, released on Calgary-based label VRNT, being a veritable compilation album of the internet’s most cutting edge sounds.

There’s the future-funk inspired “Dance,” the footwork offering “Footsie,” the haunting minimal techno title track “SAFE,” and the lofi house-styled “Skrappy’s Crush.”

Although these each represent different genres, each one harnesses the same feeling of nostalgia driven rawness.

He points to the last track as one that stands out genre-wise, but follows the album thematically.

“And then the last one [Footsie] is kind of the tail end, out of all of them it almost doesn’t fit in there, but I think it does just because of the simplicity,” he says.

One of the central elements in the EP is also the use of melodies, a trait shared by the lofi house movement on the whole.

Whereas house and techno are often designed with the club in mind, part of the appeal of lofi house is that it’s also seemingly designed for the drive home after the club closes.

Mackenzie cites this as one of the main reasons for the genre’s popularity among young people.

“I think the characteristics of the music is very moody, the chord progression is really well done, lofi house music has very emotional chord progressions, almost like rock, some of them,” says Mackenzie.

“And that’s true because some of them actually do sample rock songs, but yeah the teens they just [have] teen angst and they like to feel emotion, and I feel like a lot of lofi house can help them relate to that.”

Because of this he also believes there’s an entire untapped market out there of young people who listen to house music, and experience it through the blogosphere, but have never been to a club.

“Especially in high schools, Tumblr’s so big in high schools,” says Mackenzie.

Despite the genre’s success it’s still not without its detractors. Last year a journalist from The Quietus accused lofi producers of having “no original ideas.” An article on Fact posited that the current wave of lofi artists seemingly lean on “humour and irony.”

The SAFE EP contradicts both of these. It serves as an example of how the lofi philosophy can easily be ported to other genres to breathe new life into them. While the imagery and artists names associated with lofi may be ironic, Mackenzie believes the genre mirrors the direction that electronica on the whole is headed.

“There’s good lofi and there’s bad lofi house music, but with that said, a lot of music is sampled nowadays - mainstream, other house music, deep house,” says Mackenzie.

“It’s like regular deep house music with more of an edge.”

Mackenzie is currently working on starting a new night next year that will bring this Soundcloud, blogosphere culture to a club environment. There’s a high likelihood that by that time there’ll be new emerging trends in electronica, but if Mackenzie’s history guarantees one thing, it’s that he’ll be on top of it and ready to warp it into something new.

Follow DJ Dine & Dash on Soundcloud at https://soundcloud.com/ddad

Also catch him opening for lofi heavyweight DJ Boring in February, details at https://www.facebook.com/events/798271930354761/

Follow Wavelength on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WavelengthINTL/ Words by Jonathan Crane

[wavelengthintl]

Mental Health: Instigating Cloud Rap In Calgary

Mental Health is a Calgary duo that’s using the phenomenon of viral rap to their advantage.

When Chase Hadden and Kenny Bettcher released “Runescape Raps” in December, it received a combined 100,000 plays across all social media platforms within the first day.

While the lyrical content of the song actually centres around the game Runescape, Mental Health is far from being a satire, gimmick, or “nerdcore” project.

The recent success of artists like XXXTENTACION, Lil Peep, and Ugly God have laid a solid foundation for cloud rap that’s punctuated with anime and generation-z pop culture imagery.

Combine this with the critical acclaim that Hadden has already achieved as a producer in his own right, and Mental Health is at an intersection of space and time that could see their sound soon begin to rake in international acclaim.

“Unstable,” the song featured in their latest video, was the song that ignited the project. It was recorded during what was supposed to be a casual jam session, with no intention of starting an actual group.

As Hadden explains, that view began to change 10 minutes in.

“The first song we heard, we were like we could do this and make it, easy,” says Hadden.

“That one song, I made the beat, we recorded on it, it was three hours.

“We played it the next time we hung out and listened to it again, and we were like yo this is really fucking good. And this is no effort, this is just jiving in a room.”

They describe their approach as being nonchalant since the beginning, coming together with no expectations.

“[Bettcher] wrote the raps in 10 minutes, I wrote the raps as he was recording his raps,” says Hadden.

This nonchalance has made their music congruent with the “based” characteristic of cloud rap, or the seeming lack of care of what other people think.

However, this characteristic has caused Mental Health, and numerous other cloud rappers, to come under fire from hip-hop purists who value verbose wordplay, or lyrics pertaining to social and political issues.

“Just the amount of comments on Runescape raps, there’s the motherfuckers that are like ‘this is garbage, this is whack,’” says Bettcher.

“But that’s in between like 17 people tagged, I saw it all, I was watching it unfold.”

At a local level the group says they haven’t experienced any animosity from other artists, just indifference. Mental Health is part of the “Trading Card Club” collective of producers co-founded by Hadden.

Since the collective’s inception they’ve booked and performed at their own showcases. This decision to create their own “scene,” they say, has given them the sentiment of being viewed as outsiders by the central nucleus of Calgary’s rap scene.

“Everybody in Calgary just doesn’t like me,” says Hadden.

“I’ve never shown up to a show, I’ve never talked to anyone, I’ve never added anyone on Facebook.

“They all just unanimously found me on their own time and they’re all like ‘this guy doesn’t even play in the city, and he’s getting played and he doesn’t even get shows,’ they just hate that man.”

“That’s what it looks like to us looking at it, we don’t have any of the ins,” says Bettcher.

Still, the pair remain unfazed. From its inception cloud rap has been a primarily online movement, and as such Mental Health aspires to something that transcends geography.

“I never want to make a big deal about the local scene, we’re already so much bigger than that. People always limit themselves to that.” says Hadden.

“It would be nice,” says Bettcher.

“It would be dope, you’ve got to appreciate were you come from and for people to put me on, but they never put me on, so we just found our own niche elsewhere.”

“That’s what’s the internet’s for.”

“We’re on the way to having more people on the internet see our video than every single person that lives in Calgary. So when you think about that, who else got that? That’s the dope part.”

Attendance levels at their recent Broken City showcase, and the fact that there even was a showcase at Broken City to begin with, proves that there is substantial interest at the local level. The focus of Mental Health, and cloud rap in general, on the internet isn’t a cold-shoulder to the local scene.

Rather, it’s galvanizing and bringing together all those who watched the sound progress through the internet, and filling a void in the process.

“I’m just in it because I want to make rap music that I haven’t heard,” says Bettcher.

“I make the music I want to listen to, and Chase makes the beats I want to listen to, so it works out.”

Check out Mental Health’s “Unstable” video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEp8EiAiGb0

Follow Wavelength on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WavelengthINTL/ Words by Jonathan Crane

[wavelengthintl]

Catching Up With Karmik: Harm Reduction Amidst The Fentanyl Crisis

Last spring I talked to Munroe Craig, the co-founder of Vancouver-based harm reduction group Karmik, about the basics of harm reduction philosophy.

The discussion centred around the idea that harm reduction is more than the sum of individual acts like pill checking, or creating a safe tent at festivals. At its core, it’s about affecting change at both the cultural and individual levels to empower safe choices.

This also means that harm reduction initiatives have to be dynamic, as substance use and the attitudes surrounding them are constantly changing.

Before Craig and her team head to Costa Rica to work harm reduction at the second Bamboo Bass Festival, I decided to connect with her again to find out what’s changed over the previous year, both with drug discourses and their approach to harm reduction.

This time around Craig is joined on the phone by Alex Betsos, one of Karmik’s co-founders and their volunteer coordinator. Betsos also currently sits on the national board for Canadian Students for Sensible Drug Policy (CSSDP).

“When we last chatted it was a really great chance for us to be at the beginning of what was seeming to be a changing time,” says Craig.

During the previous interview Craig described the then-current drug discourse as a “paradigm shift” that saw substance use becoming part of popular culture and even gaining acceptability in the media.

Now, she says, this is provoking a change within governing bodies and a new wave of activism.  

“I think that some of the things that have changed is actually the talk about drug policy. Some of the progressive pieces that we’ve seen are focused around political officials and health officials; we have more people standing up and taking notice, even if that stepping up is starting with asserting ourselves and identifying that proactive, progressive drug policies are needed,” she says.

Nowhere is the dynamic nature of harm reduction more apparent than the fentanyl crisis, an issue that’s risen to the forefront of public discussion over the past year and left some officials scrambling to develop a response.

“A couple major things have happened since March,” says Betsos.

“One, Health Canada sought consultation to make naloxone more easily accessible, and that was responded to with an overwhelming, ‘Yes, please do that.’ ”

Naloxone is a medication used to treat opiate overdoses, currently sold under the brand name “Narcan.”

“I think that was a very good first step because it means that people have easier access to Narcan kits, which they didn’t necessarily have before,” says Betsos.

“One of the issues that’s coming up is so many people want Narcan kits because they’ve either known someone who’s had an overdose, or they’ve heard about fentanyl being cut into other substances and they want to make sure they’re safe.

“It’s created this new level of awareness which has been pretty fantastic.”

This new demand led Karmik to recently begin training sessions for the administering and usage of the kits.

Another major event occurred in June, when Betsos and Craig were invited to participate in a panel on overdose prevention held by the B.C. Centre for Disease Control.

“There’s definitely this change in awareness; both with the individual substance use level, but also we see public health is really trying to deal with this and catch up to the problem,” says Betsos.

Both Betsos and Craig agree that public health being put in the position of having to “catch up” signals one of the biggest flaws in how policies deal with substance use.

“We need proactive policies and support, not primarily reactive,” says Craig.

“When somebody has an overdose, responding with naloxone can be considered proactive; we educate individuals prior to situations occurring with an overdose, providing them with the tools to support. However it is also considered primarily reactive.

“Naloxone is what we respond with to an overdose situation, but it is not addressing the root cause which is why someone is overdosing to begin with.

“So I think that naloxone is really great, and it’s a step in the right direction, but we need to have more broader harm reduction policies as a whole.

“People have naloxone support and training, but we still have friends, loved ones and family passing away, often with naloxone in their hands.”

Some proactive initiatives that harm reduction activists have long been campaigning for include lobbying for substance decriminalization, launching public awareness initiatives, and working to reduce the stigma that users often face when dealing with public health officials.

These initiatives are favoured over prohibition because, as Betsos points out, prohibition can maintain the same situation currently being seen with fentanyl.

“It’s not like fentanyl came out of nowhere and hit the scene because Oxys [Oxycodone] became Neo [controlled release] Oxys,” says Betsos.

“It already happened before. It’s part of this constant process of drug-prohibition where, because we have all of these drugs prohibited, the cheapest substances that are the easiest to cut into other substances are always going to try to make their way onto the market.”

Similarly, Craig believes that without fundamental shifts in drug discourse, substance-related epidemics will continue happening.

“This substance could be anything,” says Craig.

“Fentanyl is absolutely a cause for concern. The amount of fentanyl that we need to take in order to overdose is much smaller and the substance increasingly potent, especially with synthetic analogues of fentanyl being created at an alarming rate.

At the same time let’s remember that illicit substances being adulterated is not a new thing, this happens all the time.”

The current climate has created a sentiment of fear, with some media outlets either declaring this as the most dangerous time to do drugs, or urging people to avoid drugs entirely. Betsos refers to this as fear mongering, and it creates the illusion that drugs will be safe again once fentanyl leaves.

“It’s actually recreational users that we’ve been seeing the most overdoses with, and we’ve seen an increase in that, so if that’s your metric for the most dangerous time to try substances then maybe it is there,” says Betsos.

“But, I think that’s kind of a sticky way of thinking about it, because it implies that there was a time when there weren’t overdoses, which is not true, and it also implies that there aren’t risks associated with taking substances.”

Rather than join this rhetoric of drug avoidance, Karmik is dealing with the issue by using their training sessions to engage the community.

“I know that what we’re talking about with naloxone, it can seem like a big, deep dark thought,” says Craig.

“You can kind of wormhole all the way down there to where you might feel really scared, afraid, anxious and concerned.

But really, let’s also understand that what we’re doing is actually proactive as well.

We’re empowering and engaging people and their communities to accurately respond and take care of one another.

“We’re increasing the capacities for communities to become more self sufficient as individuals, and lets face it, individuals who are healthy create healthy communities, and that’s also what we’re trying to do.”

The people who attend these workshops then return to their own networks and relay what they’ve learned.

“They’re so happy to put a picture on Facebook and say guess what everybody, I have that kit and I’m here for you. If you need something let me know, and when I go out to an event you’re going to know that I have this kit,” says Craig.

Our interview last March ended with an optimism that harm reduction policies were gaining more traction in both the public and political spheres.

This optimism is still there, but Craig points out the irony of requiring a grave catalyst like fentanyl to initiate discussions, something she hopes will change in the future.

“Why do people need to die or be severely threatened for us to want to change harm reduction policies, support, funding, and possibly start to look at stigmas around substance use,” says Craig.

“Why do we need to have such a very aggressive result happen, or such a very final result happen for us to even look at changing any of these policies, or for them to even garner any attention?

“Karmik has been doing harm reduction work not because people are dying all the time, but because we know it’s an important and significant piece of public health.”

Learn more about Karmik and donate to them at http://www.karmik.ca/

Words by Jonathan Crane Follow Wavelength on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WavelengthINTL/

[wavelengthintl]

The Top Ten Tracks Of 2016

10. Foxes - Cruel

Pretty much everything Foxes has put out since she did that track with Zedd has only gotten like 3% of the traction that Clarity got, which is really unfortunate because Foxes is one of the top pop stars of our time. She's one of the few pop artists who can give radio pop the sincerity of indie pop.

9. Famous Dex - Hit Em Wit It

Famous Dex is the latest artist to contribute to music's rich history of making music that emulates the feeling of being on drugs - in this case promethazine cough syrup. Although he wasn't included in XXL's freshman class he was pretty much an unofficial member, as his unique style differentiated him from the rest of Chiraq's drill rappers.

8. Kero Kero Bonito - Lipslap

When it comes to house music I definitely thought this was going to be the song of the summer, or at least hit over one million views by the end of the summer. Over the past handful of years the UK has produced a lot of solid house / pop fusion acts, and this track shows that KKB has the potential to be on the same pedestal as acts like Disclosure, Gorgon City, and Disciples. It looks like this style was a one-off for KKB however, as most of their music sits somewhere between J-pop, indie dance, and the soundtrack to most scenes ever made where Michael Cera is trying to talk to girls.

7. Rich Chigga - Dat $tick

In 2014 there was CoCo, in 2015 there was Slim Jesus, and Dat $tick was 2016's viral internet rap sensation. What all of these tracks have in common is that they use the phenomenon of "post-irony" to very rapidly gain traction. Some aspect of the production is unorthodox in a major way, and this then creates a wave of people who come to the video to make fun of it. Then, 20 replays later, people are actually hyped up on this shit and playing it full volume in the drive-thru at McDonald's in some kind of janky-ass trap-fuelled defiance of social order. Once people start to actually like it, that's when fights start happening in comment sections, people start encouraging popular YouTubers to film reaction videos, and media outlets start reporting on it. In the case of Dat $tick, this whole process can be summarized with the comment "I've been laughing for like thirty minutes and then I try to figure out if this is a real thing or not and now I'm laughing even harder, dammit." This song was a perfect storm of actual talent, a creative decision to go with an unorthodox look in the video, the fact that Rich Chigga is from Indonesia and taught himself English online, the fact that he was 16 at the time of the track's creation, and the reality that post-irony is constantly gaining more ground at the centre of hip-hop.

6. Charli XCX - Vroom Vroom

This year Charli XCX went back to her indie-pop roots with the launch of her new indie label "Vroom Vroom Recordings," and the release of its eponymous EP co-produced by PC music's Sophie. Post-irony seems to be on the rise in music in general right now, and if this keeps up into 2017 then PC music could easily become the dominant sound in pop music.

5. Danny L Harle - Super Natural feat. Carly Rae Jepsen

Charli XCX wasn't the only major pop artist to align herself with the PC Music camp over the past year, a surefire indication of that sound's gradual rise into the centre of pop. Whereas a lot of Sophie and A.G. Cook's productions sound like being transported to a post-internet caricature of the late 90's, Danny L Harle's productions sound like being trapped in the after-party of an anime convention with the type of people who wear fake tails, which is something I'm totally okay with it. Ironically this collaboration sounded like a natural progression for CRJ, who's been gradually drifting into pop music's more experimental side while simultaneously releasing two of the best pop albums of the year in back to back years. You can tell by how happy she is in the video that she's gradually honing in on her own sound, and this is it.

4. Rosie Lowe - Woman

This past year was a good year for noir r&b, with new material from artists like Banks, Sohn, and a new James Blake / Bon Iver collaboration. However, only noir r&b artist got Elton John so hyped up that he gave them props on the radio then invited them to perform a live duet, and that artist was Rosie Lowe hailing from Devon, England. She closed off 2015 with a Machinedrum collaboration, then came back this with her full length album "Control" that fully placed her on the same pedestal as artists like James Blake and Jessie Ware.

3. Clams Casino - All Nite ft. Vince Staples

A lot of amazing rap music happened over the past year, but it was also one of the most divisive years in hip-hop history. Old schoolers were angry at seeing their genre get overrun by MCs who look like those troll dolls from the 90's with purple hair. New schoolers were mad at old schoolers for being unwilling to let go of the past. Then there were acts like $uicideboy$ who drew fans that probably disliked both factions equally. Amidst all the turmoil only one figure was able to unite this divided landscape - legendary beatmaker Clams Casino. His album 32 Levels assembled artists from each of hip-hop's factions, and his witch house-leaning beats created something that rose above the partisan warfare raging in the streets.

2. Beyoncé - Formation

Mike WiLL, the same producer who forever changed the way the world saw Miley Cyrus, was behind the beat that forever changed the way we look at Beyoncé. When this track dropped the internet exploded with think pieces. It was apparent from reading some of the more conservative ones, particularly after her super bowl appearance, that before this track a lot of people expected Beyoncé to be a minstrel and use her blackness for benign entertainment. As one writer put it, however, this video was defiant blackness at its most unapologetic. On the other hand, there were a lot of criticisms, even from people on the socially liberal side, as to whether this was actually a powerful statement, or just trying to profit from social justice imagery. I remember shortly after this dropped I had an argument in some comment section against someone who had that opinion, and I was trying to argue that this video was essentially akin to Public Enemy. The other person obviously thought that Formation was nowhere near the level of a group that blatantly called Elvis racist on a track, but my position was that a track doesn't have to sound like a manifesto to be bold. The fact that Formation actually got Tomi Lahren to say the line "Guess what Beyoncé, white people like your music too," is a sign that a definitive impact was made.

1. 21 Savage & Metro Boomin - No Heart

I legitimately have no explanation as to how 21 Savage got this popular. I listened to gangster rap in the 90's, I've listened to artists like Jedi Mind Tricks and Jadakiss, and 21 Savage is by far the most violent shit I've ever heard. It's even more chilling because when he's describing all this crazy stuff he sounds like he's casually reading a shopping list to his mom on the phone. Here's why I think this track is so amazing: it's virtually impossible to hit these numbers in rap music without a substantial amount of white people being stoked. Fifteen years ago, however, music that's this charged probably would have alienated a lot of people in the suburban white market. I think in the early 2000's a lot of people from this demographic were drawn to gangster rap because it offered an emotional outlet that a lot of other genres didn't have. If 21 Savage would have been around back then, his music probably wouldn't have been viewed as offering that same vicarious outlet because the things he talks about would have been too alien to people, like glorifying the sale of a drug that ravaged inner city communities in the 90's. Now, however, 95% of white people on the internet are hyped up on this and putting 21 Savage on their playlist for spin class. I don't even really know what a spin class is, I just know it's where predominantly white civilians convene to listen to music when the club is closed. It's ultimately not the fault of any one market for spiking the popularity of 21 Savage though. We all know that this is bad. We all know that generally it's probably not a good thing to roll up to someone's mom's house and blind-fire live ammunition into it until someone is dead, but as soon as we heard five bars from this track we bought his entire discography. This is why Fidel Castro called mainland North America a land of sociopaths.

[wavelengthintl]

Topology: Year One

Topology’s Evil Ecstasy was an album that emerged out of complete obscurity with a deafening roar.

The sleek, brooding industrial soundscapes and bold warehouse beats were seemingly on par with the productions of a techno virtuoso - or at least someone who would be highly regarded in their local scene.

At the time of its release at the start of 2016, however, Topology, whose real name is April Terry, was almost completely unknown in Calgary.

She’d begun producing a year and a half earlier, signing up for production courses hoping to emulate artists like Actress, and the left-field leaning electronica she’d listened to since the start of the decade.

“I guess I just kind of discovered it online, it was stuff that nobody really knew about to be honest, and people thought it was weird if I showed them,” says Terry.

After completing the production course, Evil Ecstasy began emerging from a series of production sessions. As Terry states, it just kind of came together with no concrete goals or expectations.

“I just kind of, made it, to be perfectly honest with you,” says Terry.

“It wasn’t like it was going to be signed or anything, I just made some tracks that I thought kind of fit in.”

Shortly after self-releasing the album onto Bandcamp, Terry began submitting tracks to Habitat’s Studio Social. This would prove to be her entryway not only into the local scene, but also new stylistic directions.

“Once I heard Rob [A City Of Bridges] and Mark [Adam]’s music I was blown away, I was like this is the shit I want to make,” says Terry.

The influence of their bass-infused sounds can be seen in the shifting tone of Terry’s productions throughout the past year. Her new EP Tokyo Sunrise, for example, alludes to genres like lo-fi house, and the spaciousness of bass music.

Released under local label and collective Techno.Black, which counts both Terry and Mark Adam among its members, the new EP is a conceptual album based on Terry’s imagining of various Japanese soundscapes.

“[Evil Ecstasy] was my favourite kind of techno, I thought it was really original when I made it, but a couple months after I made it I didn’t think it was original anymore,” says Terry.

“I thought that everybody was kind of making the same music, so especially with Tokyo Sunrise, I wanted to make original music, a different kind of techno, no 909 hats.”

Just like the first album, the new EP seemingly came together out of a series of disparate production sessions.

“I had several projects that I was working on, but ultimately I ended up with Tokyo Sunrise,” says Terry.

The shift of going from warehouse techno to conceptual, more experimental electronica showcases the growth that Terry has made in the intervening year.

“I’ve learned that with my own ideas I can be more creative with music, and branch out and do different things,” she says.

In other words, she’s spent the last year exploring her own imagination, translating what she sees there into music. As the interview draws to a close she talks about new genres and sounds she wants to experiment with, an indication that the exploration has only just started to find its bearings.

Attend the release party for Tokyo Sunrise on December 28th

Words by Jonathan Crane Follow Wavelength on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/wavelength_intl/

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Phi-Pho: The Revenge Of Freestyle

“Off-the-dome” improvisational freestyle is the essence of Phi-Pho, a Calgary MC who’s been gradually gaining notoriety with a series of live appearances across the city.

Phi-Pho, whose real name is Deng Kuot, currently has a resume that includes MCing for promoters like Sub Chakra and Noctilux, being the creativity champion of Calgary’s 2014 Freestyle Olympics, and appearances on CJSW shows like Late Night Laboratory and Freshly Squeezed.

“There was even a night where I freestyled for more than two hours, and I didn’t get out of that trance,” says Kuot.

“I was literally in a trance, just channeling this outer body energy, just pushing subconscious bars, super conscious bars, intellectual and questioning bars.”

Kuot’s freestyles aren’t simply an unrehearsed stringing of rhymes together either. At the spur of the moment he can create a chorus and a bridge to interweave with his vocals.

“I make a song right on the spot,” he says.

“Especially with live music I find that to be easier, because with live music that’s what they’re already trained to do.

“They give me the pockets, then I go in and I just define them.”

Although Kuot is a fervent musician, his freestyle prowess is largely the product of where life has brought him, and how he’s used music to adapt to his environments.

“Hip-hop is actually how I speak English so well, English is my third language,” he says.

Kuot was born in 1990 in Cairo, Egypt, to South Sudanese parents. He spent close to the first decade of his life speaking Arabic and Dinka, a language from South Sudan.

He moved to Calgary shortly after turning nine, and began gravitating towards hip-hop artists like The Fugees and KRS-One.

High school is when Kuot begins “cyphering,” exchanging freestyled rhymes with friends.

“There was a lot of house parties going around at that time, and people would get together and cypher,” says Kuot.

At this point, Kuot has three primary goals.

The first was proving himself as an MC and establishing an identity on the mic.

“It was kind of proving to people that I was a good MC because, it was weird, when I was younger there wasn’t anyone that wasn’t American that was MCing really well, and I’m African,” he says.

“So it was a moment of my time where I was kind of trying to give people a different relationship to MCing. For the longest time, I never used the N-word, I never used anything like that.

“It was almost inspirational music, I’d say almost gospel music, gospel bars, but just very witty gospel bars.

“Just funny stuff mostly, actually, like life ironies.”

The second goal was changing how others related to him.

“The only school that I spent more than two years at was my high school,” says Kuot.

“Other than that I moved a lot, so a lot of my relationships were instant, I had to be on the ball, make people relate to me, and not relate to what they think of me, or what they think I represent.”

Herein lies his third goal, changing how others related to him as a black person.

“People have ignorant relationships to black people period,” he says.

“There’s things in hip-hop that ignorantly represent me, and doesn’t represent my culture at all.

“A lot of the [cyphering] was me taking something that they kind of already related to me, something I was passionate about, and breaking the stigma.”

According to Kuot, some of hip-hop’s more divisive content is often the most visible, and the most readily associated with blacks.

“Guns, disrespecting females, trap life, anti-school mentality, very ghetto wealth, very, ‘it’s only the hard knocks is where you succeed,’” he says.

“It’s just very not representative of a lot of black people that I know and love.”

Rather than disassociating himself completely from this area of hip-hop, Kuot uses his performative flair to transform it directly in front of people during the cyphers.

“I would take 50 Cent G-Unit songs and out-bar them, that was like my thing,” he says.

“I’d take an extreme that doesn’t represent me, and I’d re-wrap it in a clean, nasty bar, or nasty 16 or whatever.”

After high school Kuot continues freestyling and cyphering. Then, in 2012 he travels to London for two months during the Olympics to watch the games and visit family.

One again he uses music as a tool to interact with his new environment, turning the trip into an experience with lasting impressions.

“I met a lot of very strong people without even really meaning to,” says Kuot.

“The word coincidence doesn’t do it justice, and the word fate doesn’t do it justice.

“What I was asking for was finding me in London.

“London was definitely life changing.”

For starters, London is Kuot’s first time on stage. He begins frequenting weekly open jams at a venue called Troy Bar, freestyling alongside live musicians.

He also starts landing time on the mic in nightclubs by approaching club owners and freestyling in front of them.

It’s here, in the clubs, that Kuot learns the skill set that distinguishes an MC from a rapper.

“The accents are different but people only care about your bar delivery, your cadence, your energy, and your ability to make someone hyped, your ability to make someone excited,” he says.

“That’s how you kept the mic.

“There was times where someone would take the mic from me, try to hype up the room, and the DJ would rewind and just give me the mic back.”

When Kuot returns from his trip he finally begins songwriting, writing verses down on paper for the first time in his seven years as an MC.

Although now he still describes this as a recent development, he’s confident in his identity as a songwriter. It’s an identity that mirrors the way he’s approached music his whole life - a tool for affecting the environment around him.

“Because I sing as well I’m a big believer that hip-hop is a genre that is all genres,” he says.

“It’s a social platform, it’s like a social movement, it’s not just like a musical movement, it’s a social movement expressed in music.

“A lot of other things started from a different background, more music theory probably, but hip-hop started from people that didn’t have programs, didn’t have any of that, making new songs out of preexisting vinyls, giving the mic to somebody and it was on a sidewalk.

“That’s as social as you can get, no colours, if you’re white, you’re black, you’re purple, it doesn’t matter, you have a social view and you can express it on hip-hop.”

Locally, Kuot credits Calgary artist Yolanda Sargeant as an inspiration for creating a musical framework that aligns with these ideals.

“Back in the day there was a time where I was actually going to quit music, I wasn’t even going to try to pursue it anymore,” says Kuot.

“It was a 10 at 10 event that actually made me stick to my guns.

“It was Yolanda Sargeant performing and, I didn’t know her at that time, I got to know her, so I’m friends with her now, and that’s definitely one of the artists that pushed me.

“I wouldn’t even put her generically in hip-hop. She’s a multi-platform, multi-faceted musician, and that’s where I’d like to put myself too.”

Kuot’s recent appearances at two high-profile electronica events are proof that he’s turned his words into actions.

“Hip-hop is definitely an expression of mine, but it’s not my main focus, it’s music,” says Kuot.

As Phi-Pho continues to adapt in real time to whatever musical ebb and flow his path crosses, the one element that remains constant is showcasing the power of words, and harnessing the raw spontaneous energy of the cypher.

Follow Phi-Pho at https://www.facebook.com/PHi-PHo-341118769352166/

Words by Jonathan Crane Follow Wavelength on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WavelengthINTL/

[wavelengthintl]

Cousin of Death: Forthcoming Launch Signals New Level

This Thursday the new fall / winter line of Calgary-based streetwear brand Cousin of Death will be unveiled in an evening-long launch party at Local 510.

Evan Shaw, the brand’s founder, calls the launch party his biggest artistic endeavor to date. It’s more than simply a product showcase, it’s an attempt to immerse people in the identity of Cousin of Death.

“One of the things I like about pop up shops and launch parties, as opposed to being carried in a retail store, is with a pop up shop you can define how you want your customers to think and feel while they’re shopping, or at least while they’re being exposed to the brand,” says Shaw.

“In a retail store, sometimes you’re not even given the chance to define where your clothes are set up in that store, or you’re not allowed to choose what music is playing when people are looking at your clothes.

“With pop-up shops, or this launch party in general, I’m really defining the whole experience, with what people are coming, what venue it’s at, what music is being played, what they’re looking at.”

When guests arrive they’ll receive the new lookbook in the form of a DIY-style zine, and local producer Cole The God will be playing a set of 2000’s hip-hop. This intersection of street-style, punk, and hip-hop is something that Shaw says has fueled the brand since its beginning in 2013.

“I was in university at the time, for a marketing degree at Mount Royal, and I knew that I really wanted to start a brand,” says Shaw.

“I’d been interested in streetwear and how I dress, and how rappers dress, or how celebrities dress since probably grade nine or so.

“I think skateboarding played a big part in that too, because I was always interested in skate companies and how skateboarders were dressing in their videos.”

The first few pieces were created in the style of band merch. Shaw would send a logo to a company in Edmonton who would then screen it onto generic Fruit Of The Loom shirts. Now, however, Shaw works with manufacturers to design the cut of each individual garment.

“I have a manufacturer in Vancouver who I defined a t-shirt fit with, so how the clothing fits and the material used,” says Shaw.

“I’ve defined a t-shirt, a long sleeve, a hoody, and a couple different jackets, and all those are completely custom.”

Designing is a process that Shaw has become well versed in. He follows urban fashion closely enough that he can confidently create new pieces. This forthcoming collection, for example, contains a bomber jacket, a new design that he knows will sell out on Thursday.

According to Shaw, what’s challenging with a streetwear brand isn’t the look, but who’s looking.

“I think with streetwear, or clothes in general, it’s basically who’s wearing it,” says Shaw.

“The main challenge that I face is where we’re located.

“For example, you and I have both grown up in the hardcore scene, or the hip-hop scene, and in Calgary we know people in bands, we know rappers, we know battle rappers, we know artists, things like that, but that’s only in Calgary.

“Imagine if we lived in a place like Toronto, or L.A, or New York, and we grew up the exact same way. We would know people in the same sectors and groups of individuals, but they may be more influential.

“For example, if we grew up in the hardcore scene in L.A., and someone wore Cousin of Death on a full U.S. tour, or even like last week Xibalba and Nomads had an A$AP Ferg music video shoot, what if Cousin of Death was worn there? It would be a lot easier to gain traction.”

While Shaw’s quest to line up influential figures has resulted in a few cold-calls gone unanswered, he’s also seen some progress internationally. In 2015 Josh Kelting, the vocalist of hardcore band Expire, wore Cousin of Death during the band’s appearance at Rainfest. Recently, Seattle rapper Ghoulaveli has also become associated with the brand.

Shaw credits hardcore punk with helping him break these international barriers.

“I grew up in the hardcore punk scene, and 100% of my original customers were in the hardcore scene, they were just my friends,” says Shaw.

“So without that I think it would have been hard to start a brand, just because the hardcore scene spans across borders, whether it be in Canada or the USA, and people in the hardcore scene are just very compassionate as well.”

Despite the strong influence, Shaw stresses that Cousin of Death isn’t a hardcore brand, or a skate brand. It’s simply a brand that reflects underground culture, committed to growing organically from the underground upwards.

“I just kind of pull influence from multiple aspects of life, it’s just how I grew up,” says Shaw.

Following Thursday’s launch, all remaining pieces will be available on the website http://www.cousinofdeath.com/

Find out more about the launch party at https://www.facebook.com/events/825967707538625/

Follow Wavelength on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WavelengthINTL/ Words by Jonathan Crane

[wavelengthintl]

Flukeman: Beyond The Cloud

Calgary-based Steven Olsen has a master’s degree in biochemistry, and possesses the ability to genetically modify plants and bacteria.

He has a lab in his apartment, except this one’s filled with music production hardware from the 1980’s to the present. He’s gradually amassed them since he first began teaching himself music production five years ago.

“I got my first synthesizer when I was 23 for my birthday, it was just one of those little Korg Kaosscilators,” he says.

The Kaosscilator is about the size of a pocket calculator and has a touch screen, three buttons, and a dial. Despite its minimal construction, it was enough to get Olsen ensnared in the world of production.

“I would just make cheesy techno, like 120 bpm type stuff, but it’s not like real techno, it’s just whatever I could make out of my Kaosscilator,” he says.

That was point A, and last month Olsen revealed point B with Submerged Transmissions, six tracks of atmospheric beats released under his moniker “Flukeman.”

I ask Olsen what transpired between point A and point B to lead him down this particular stylistic avenue.

“I probably listen to 70% hip-hop, and that’s what I’m most interested in,” says Olsen.

The first tracks that Olsen uploaded to Soundcloud, three years ago under the moniker “True Bossalini,” were what Olsen describes as pure hip-hop. It’s a style that carried over to Olsen’s first release as Flukeman, 2015’s Loopholes.

“My earlier stuff was a lot sample based,” he says.

“Loopholes, every song has a sample in there, but more recently I’ve kind of broken away from that where I’m using my own synths, or sampling something and making an instrument out of it.”

“Say like an 808 cowbell, it hits a C [note], then you can play the whole gamut of octave on it.

“The first track on my latest one, the melody is an 808 cowbell, just add a lot of reverb to it and you get yourself an instrument.”

Although Calgary is home to a few notable avant-garde beatmakers, Olsen has never been aware of them.

“I have a lot of friends that make music, but they’re all in bands, they’re not making electronic stuff, they’re in sludge metal bands, or garage rock bands,” says Olsen.

This isolation is ultimately what caused Olsen’s music to shift into a more avant-garde direction, as it made one stylistic influence in particular all the more identifiable: that of cloud rap, the fusion of dreamlike beats with chopped-and-screwed aesthetics that began appearing online at the start of the decade.

“The person who got me into it, influenced me most, was actually Lil Ugly Mane, which sounds funny because he makes raw rap and stuff, but I heard what he was doing and I was like, ‘you know this is a guy who’s producing all his own beats and rapping over them,’ and I thought that was pretty honourable,” says Olsen.

“It kind of democratizes music in that anyone can do it now, you just gotta have the know-how.”

Olsen explains that it wasn’t necessarily the music itself that was influential, but how it was being made. One of the Lil Ugly Mane albums that Olsen drew influence from is called Mista Thug Isolation, a title that summarizes the album’s fabrication.

“He made it on his own, funded by himself, he was isolated just making his own thing.”

Although the atmosphere and ethos of Olsen’s tracks seem to closely resemble the internet-borne genre “vaporwave,” he doesn’t count it as a key foundation of his music.

“I am aware of vaporwave, but I feel like vaporwave is very dependent on slowed down vocals, or just slowed down samples of anything, usually 80’s stuff,” he says.

“I feel like there is a bit of an influence, but it wasn’t directly influenced.

“I like to claim that it’s influenced by video game music, especially underwater ones.”

When it comes to finding a musical template, Olsen doesn’t have one. Each song begins with a sample or a simple drum beat, then Olsen works around it, adding in both digital and analog sounds until it seems complete.

The tracks on Submerged Transmissions, for example, began as a continuation of his last album’s theme.

“I kind of started it as a joke because my last one was Distant Transmissions, the theme of it was transmissions from space,” he says.

“Then I toyed with the idea, because I wanted to make an album that sounded very under-watery, so I was like I might as well make Submerged Transmissions.

“So, it was based off a joke on my own work, but it worked.”

This isn’t the first time Olsen has used his own work as a main influence. Some of the first tracks that he uploaded to Bandcamp were reworkings of material that was already two years old by that point.

It’s another example of the isolated yet inclusive nature of his music, and his ability to draw from numerous influences without overtly sounding like any one of them. As a testament to this, I ask him if he still considers his music to be part of the hip-hop sphere.

“I’ve thought about that,” he says.

“I mean at it’s base, tempo wise, beat wise, you could say it’s hip-hop, but I think it’s something else.

“Maybe it goes into the genre of electronica, where you can’t really put your thumb on what genre it is, which I like. I’m all for that.”

Get Flukeman’s music on Bandcamp at http://flukeman.bandcamp.com/

Follow Wavelength on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WavelengthINTL Words by Jonathan Crane

[wavelengthintl]

Techno Black Enters Beast Mode

According to Calgary artist HollywoodGirl (Michael DeBolt), Techno Black is two years ahead of where it should be.

In the span of just three months the collective, which DeBolt co-envisioned alongside Chordlust (Kris Boekestyn), has gone from being an idea, to a reality with a cemented roster and website, to a record label with international digital distribution.

“When we started the collective it was always the goal to start a label,” says DeBolt.

“We thought it would be two years from now, but I pushed hard to include Diego into the collective, and that turned out to be a huge blessing due to his experience running a label, Angry Rabbit Records.”

The developments are continuing to roll. This week marked the official launch of Techno Black’s online radio, and Sunday will see the collective’s first ever live showcase.

HollywoodGirl and Chordlust

For many of the collective’s members, each one of these initiatives represents a move into uncharted territory. There are some members with substantial bodies of original material who have never played a DJ set. There are some prolific DJs who have never produced a track.

DeBolt, for example, had never seen the business side of the music industry before last month.

“For us it’s been a whole learning experience, just now we’re learning in the dark,” he says.

Although the scope and undertakings of Techno Black have been assembled in a relatively freestyle manner, each initiative ties back to the original goal that DeBolt and Boekestyn first envisioned.

“We just want to help create a sense of cooperation, and strengthen the voice of techno in the city,” says DeBolt.

This collaborative sentiment is what attracted six-year veteran DJ Leiya to join the project.

“I love the feeling of community,” says Leiya.

“I started DJing in Moncton, New Brunswick, and I played in Halifax, I’ve played basically all over the east coast, and I had that sense of community and family on the east coast.”

“That’s something that I was lacking here, and when HollywoodGirl approached me about it and explained what it was, and what they were doing, I was actually really excited to feel included in something like that, with the family and community vibes.”

Leiya recently returned from a small tour where she played a date in Toronto followed by an appearance at Moncton’s Evolve festival. Although she’s seen an immense cross section of Canada’s dance music culture, what ultimately draws her to techno is its versatility.

“I just like the feeling that it gives me, I guess because you can go any which way with techno,” she says.

“You can go melodic, you can go emotional, or you can go industrial, and you can base what you’re listening to on what mood you’re in.

“With me it’s more the melodic or the emotional techno that I like better, because I find that it brings back so many emotions and memories from different things that I’ve gone through.”

This is a diversity that DeBolt says will also be reflected in Techno Black’s catalogue through forthcoming releases.

“[Chordlust] he’s got more of a Detroit sound, [Intellekt]’s got his own sound, Marco has his own sound, so we have a lot of different stuff in there,” says DeBolt.

“It’s really given us a chance to get the DJs that want to learn to produce, and the producers that want to learn to DJ, sharing that knowledge and working hard to strengthen ourselves and the little techno scene here.”

This Sunday’s forthcoming showcase will mark the first ever DJ sets for DeBolt and Techno Black artist Topology, as well as Chordlust’s first DJ set in 15 years.

Leiya will also be appearing on CJSW 90.9 FM at 2200 tomorrow during What Will The Neighbours Think with both new and unreleased material from the group’s members.

Follow Techno Black on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/http.techno.black/

Follow Wavelength on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WavelengthINTL/ Words by Jonathan Crane