The opening day of North by Northeast is a bit of a dry run. There are no free shows at Yonge–Dundas Square, most of the big-name acts aren't in town yet. You just get to figure out the quickest way from venue to venue and get your feet wet. Here's what we learned on the first day of the festival.
1. Follow the NXNE Twitter feed religiously
Our major plan for the evening had been to see huge-in-Europe, weirdly underappreciated-at-home house-pop crossover act Kiesza at the Mod Club. Unfortunately for us, the app hadn't been updated with the fact that the show had been cancelled that afternoon. (Apparently she's quite ill.) Let this be a lesson to you. Always check the NXNE Twitter feed before you go out.
2. A reminder to keep your schedule flexible
Last-minute changes like that are a valuable lesson. Many people we know have turned NXNE into a tightly timed surgical strike. We get that, you're going to see more bands this week than you will in the rest of the year, and you don't want to miss anything. That said, it's important not to get too locked in. Sometimes you can discover a great band just by wandering into a venue.
3. Foxtrott proving that synth-pop needs more French horn
Montreal's Foxtrott is actually a one-woman band, but for her live performance, she brings out a friend to play French horn. You know what? It really works. Our new demand is for more horns in genres that don't usually have horns.
4. My Gold Mask creating a sound bigger than the sum of its parts
Speaking of blending diverse influences, Chicago's My Gold Mask mix garage-rock energy into a brand of synth-y, Editors-style indie rock. What's more impressive is that they generate a massive, full, multi-layered sound from one guitar, one sequencer and two drums.
5. Greys reminding us why NXNE is awesome
For all the corporate sponsorships and the controversy around the new radius clause, there's nothing like the sheer joy of walking into a venue to see an up-and-coming band playing a high-energy, aggressive, loud set in a room that's basically a sweaty hallway. We're generally stoked to see indie rock and punk coming back together again after a long separation, and very few bands do that better than Greys. They combine boot-to-the-chest aggression with a willingness to be honest and weird. We love this band.
6. Lizzo, a hilarious rapper with serious skills
Minnesotan MC Lizzo is that rare hybrid, a singing rapper who sings as well as she raps. As a rapper, she has a stretchy, rapid-fire, polysyllabic flow filled with internal rhyme schemes. As a singer, she has a sort of retro-soul belt that would make most of today's modern, detached post-R&B singers blush with its rawness. She's also just hilarious. In her songs, she does things like rhyme "winter" with "Anna Wintour" and make fun of insufficiently stoked audience members by comparing them to Mr. Peanut.
by Chris Dart via Electronic RSS
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