Wu-Tang Clan’s Raekwon will be at the AGO on Saturday as part of Stylus’ It Starts With The DJ event. Alongside the Wu-Tang alumn will be producers, record label execs, local DJs and rappers such as JD Era, who will take part in panel discussions on how the DJ shaped hip-hop. Though the Spinfest Awards will take place next week, we’re crossing our fingers for a wayback playback from Raekwon. Tickets are $10.
Kalle Mattson wrote his first album when he was 18, and his second when he was 19. A veritable triple threat, the Ottawa musician also plays a role in recording and producing his own albums. Though he started as a solo act, he’s joined forces with a full-fledged folk-rock quintet for a new experimental indie rock sound, which ranges from danceable pop tunes to lyric-heavy music that’s both mellow and disturbing (in a good way).
This photograph is clear evidence that The Force has been prevalent in Toronto for some time now. How else are we supposed to explain this woman’s uncanny balancing act? Unfortunately, this kind of sheer talent was made obsolete by the invention of “plumbing.”
Currently on tour with Cold Specks, Great Lake Swimmers are going to be making a few visits to Toronto this summer, including shows at the Danforth Music Hall on June 2, plus an opening show for Blue Rodeo at the Molson Canadian Ampitheatre on Aug. 18. We had a chance to sit down with lead singer Tony Dekker to ask about the new record, New Wild Everywhere. Here are a few of the highlights:
Back in 1914, men in Toronto used to play the Rope Game. It went like this: one brave soul would have to enter the Alleyway of Knots. At the end of the Alleyway was a golden egg (not pictured, but trust us, it’s there). The other players would hold the ends of ropes with the intention of trying to trip the courageous contestant. If the man succeeded, he won the egg. If he lost, well, it didn’t really matter because the egg wasn’t golden anyway.
You could be the next Justin Bieber! Well, if you’re under 15 years old, and have some discernible talent. YTV’s The Next Star, the reality show which pits kids against each other for singer supremacy, is back for its fifth season. This weekend, Toronto will host the Ontario auditions at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. Prepare yourself for countless covers of “Call Me Maybe.”
So now that Battleship has finally opened, we can only imagine what real naval officers — like these dudes from 1945 — would think of the summer blockbuster: “You know when a movie starts playing songs from AC/DC it’s trying way too hard to be cool,” or, “Liam Neeson has definitely sold out.” On a side note, movies based on board games should just stop.
Marking its return to Toronto after more than three decades, the world-renowned Bolshoi Ballet opened a five-night run of Swan Lake at the Sony Centre for the Performing Arts Tuesday night. The story (which will be vaguely familiar to anyone who saw Black Swan) follows the romance of Prince Siegfried and a maiden named Odette who is turned into an aquatic bird by the Evil Genius, a meddling sorcerer determined to thwart Siegfried’s fidelity to his one true love.
With news that Apple’s latest iPhone will have a bigger screen, thereby rendering all current iPhones obsolete, we look back at some really antiquated technology. Look at these two chaps fondly gazing at their old thingamajig, bidding it farewell. Touching it once last time. “She was a beaut,” says one. “She sure was, Frank. She was a fighter. She had a ribbon that wouldn’t break.” “Yeah… now, let’s throw her off the roof.”
Don’t let his name fool you. Old Man Luedecke (née Chris Luedecke) is a banjo-pluckin’, foot-stompin’ one-man-show — and arguably the most original solo act out there. His style is reminiscent of old school bluegrass and folk musicians such as Dock Boggs and Pete Seeger. It’s hard to pin the Torontonian-turned-Nova-Scotian’s music into one genre — is it folk, blues, roots, bluegrass or, dare we say it, country?
Whatever your feelings are about Conrad Black — genius, criminal, fine historian — you cannot deny that he had a way with words. He added to many vocabularies a few years ago when he was being interviewed and mentioned how, upon first seeing his future wife Barbara Amiel, his mouth “fenestrated” (a Latin-inspired way of saying it fell open).
Casting a belly in plaster is the latest way to commemorate pregnancy
