Interviews

Growl? Scream? Fry? How does one navigate all the vocal techniques heard in punk, metal and adjacent genres? Writer and radio host Jolène Ruest has mapped the women who practice these techniques across the spectrum of underground music, and created the online platform that could well become the ultimate reference tool for fans, artists and show programming teams alike: Gueuleuses.

A seasoned observer of Quebec’s underground music scene, Jolène sat down with Pan M 360 to answer a few questions about the platform, which will be officially launched on Friday, March 8, 2024.

PAN M 360: Your gueuleuses repertoire will be released this Friday, March 8. Is this project a natural extension of your former radio show Jolène jase de gueuleuses on CISM? In what way?

Jolène Ruest: It was just a Jolène jase de gueuleuses season, it’s funny the impact… It’s really more personal. I feel that Gueuleuses fits in perfectly with my artistic and professional career, because it was born out of Spectacles Bonzaï, who produced the project. After the season of Jolène jase de gueuleuses, I kept archiving lots of scream and growl singers. When Colin saw my Excel file, he sent it to the webmaster of Spectacles Bonzaï, then said “I’d like to do a website with that.” And the webmaster, he was a big fan of Québec Punk Scene in his teens, so he was like “yeah, let’s make a directory!” At Spectacles Bonzaï, we’ve also listed all the independent venues in Quebec. We like listing things, obviously! It was the timing between working for Bonzaï and what I do artistically. You know, in all my books, there are mentions of punk, metal and mosh pits. It’s like there’s a meeting point between that kind of thinking, that kind of research, and the job.

PAN M 360: How did for an online directory format come about?

Jolène Ruest: It’s really because this is our third digital project at Spectacles Bonzaï. So from the outset, we wanted it to be digital. But it’s funny because Roxanafrom Your Last Wish, even though she can’t be at the launch, still wanted to talk about it, and that’s exactly what she said to me: “But now, is this going to be a book?” Oh no, that’s it! But it’s a good idea. But I’m already working on other writing projects. I already had a writing project linked to the Quebec scene.

PAN M 360: Are we talking about a directory that can be built up by the Internet community, a bit like the Encyclopedia Metallum (metal-archives.com)? Is the aim to be exhaustive?

Jolène Ruest: We can’t be metal-archives because of the way it’s computerized. It’s really complicated to make a Wikipedia or to make a site where there can be more than just one content manager. What I’ve done as a compromise… On the one hand, I go to people. I write to them when I have doubts, for various reasons. Having written to several vocalists, I’ve already bridged the gap to get the content from the source, even if I haven’t necessarily done so for everything… Then I’ll do it mostly afterwards because it’s easier to explain with the site and visuals. But to better answer your question, on each card, there’s a “suggest a modification” button. For me, it was really important, whether it was your favourite singer or yourself, to be able to make modifications. But it’s really more of a computer issue. You can’t get involved in such a complex project. But at the end of the day, it’s still very niche. Just the question: what is gueulage? It’s very subjective and will surely evolve over time.




PAN M 360: So you’re the main moderator when it comes to finding new data?

Jolène Ruest: Yeah. It’s clear that there’s going to be a shortage, in the end. When I was talking about questioning the notion of gueuler, the webmaster said to me: “Ah, the singer from Against Me?” and then I was like “she’s shouting, isn’t she?” She sure sings loud… and since then, I can’t stop thinking about it.

But you see, it’s all part of the internal conversation. Louise Girard helped me at the time. And since she’s going to be present at the launch, I sent her the list again. She referred me to a band from Estrie with only one album on YouTube. It has come to a point of very narrow discovery. I hope that people will turn up to take part in the project, because every time I’ve had responses from the vocalists, they’ve were very positive and very, very generous. But I’ve also tried to surround myself with people. There’s Christine Fortier too, who made suggestions.

So many other blog sites that have done it in the past, then stopped updating, others that are doing it now, others that are only doing it in punk, those that are doing it in metal, etc. It would be very ungracious of me not to be grateful for all the work done by so many other fans. For me, it’s about highlighting a collective web and human effort in the field too.

PAN M 360: What role do you hope this new platform will play in the extreme music scene?

Jolène Ruest: Discovery, quite simply. As we’ve just said, there’s no shortage of discoveries. It’s true that we touch on different musical genres that don’t necessarily meet, so I think that also allows us to reach out to a wider audience. It’s true that you can like punk, but you don’t necessarily like it when it screams either. There are a lot of interesting intersections in terms of music lovers and then convergence towards a somewhat unusual common point: female screaming.

But otherwise, having more representation of women and people from gender minorities can certainly become a tool for any programmer, radio station or festival. It’s a desire to have more women. There will be fewer and fewer excuses for saying we couldn’t find them. In fact, you’ll be able to find plenty of them in a very niche field, so that’s cool.

PAN M 360: What can you expect at Friday’s launch party at Quai des brumes?

Jolène Ruest: A lot of fun! I have the impression that they’re all going to be friends, so those who aren’t will become my friends. There are going to be punks, metalheads, and vocalists who don’t know each other at all. I’ve invited every gueuleuse in Quebec to be there! After that, it’s like sending a letter to a pigeon: sometimes it’s returned, sometimes it’s not! I think there’s going to be some unprecedented encounters. Maybe metal singers know each other, but you know, they don’t necessarily know punk singers. I think this is going to be a very unique moment.


Otherwise Kapitur, I have a feeling it’s going to be a good show. The meeting with Louise Girard will also be interesting. She’s getting ready, she’s gone back into her research and we’re trying to figure out who are the first loudmouths? Maybe we won’t get an answer, but that’s the fun of the evening. It’s a moment where we build the story from a female angle. You know, it’s not written! There’s a little bit of that going on in the evening, I think.

PAN M 360: Finally, where can we hear you, Jolène Ruest, screaming?

Jolène Ruest: On the song “Pardon!..” by Ultra Vedge, released in 2021. Simon Gauthier, he’s nice, he invited me, but I don’t shout very well, so I’m just very grateful. But I’m waiting for the invitations!

Gueuleuses will be launched this Friday, March 8, 2024 at Quai des Brumes starting at 7pm
with presentations by gueuleuses Corinne Cardinal, Louise Girard and the band Kapitur.

https://quaidesbrumes.ca/evenements/ligue-rock-lancement-de-gueuleuses/

Les Percussions de Strasbourg is a pioneering group in the world of contemporary music, percussion-wise as you’d expect. Founded in 1962 by Jean Batigne, the French ensemble has become a veritable institution on an international scale, simultaneously presenting several concerts across the planet, including Ghostland, for the first time in Montreal as part of the Semaine du Neuf organized by Groupe Le Vivier. This immersive work by composer Pierre Jodlowski is based on the idea of the ghost. It involves 4 percussionists performing on drums and virtual instruments, joined by a puppeteer, all accompanied by an interactive light, sound and video device. In this case, the ghost is evoked in multiple symbolic dimensions. The stage becomes not just a performance space, but also “an ambiguous place and an infinite space, essentially destined to see the birth of a kind of sound and visual ritual that itself becomes an object to be perceived”. To better understand the ins and outs of this project, the artistic director of Les Percussions de Strasbourg, Minh-Tâm Nguyen, talks to us on video about Ghostland and the institution he heads. The Percussions de Strasbourg is a unique and highly original institution.

PROGRAM

Pierre Jodlowski: Ghostland , 2017 – pour quatre percussionnistes, un marionnettiste, vidéo, scénographie, lumières et électronique

ARTISTES

LES PERCUSSIONS DE STRASBOURG

MINH-TÂM NGUYEN (percussion)

FRANÇOIS PAPIRER (percussion)

THÉO HIS-MAHIER (percussion)

OLIVIA MARTIN (percussion)

KATHARINA MUSCHIOL (performance)

LES 3 REPRÉSENTATIONS SONT PRÉVUES À L’ÉDIFICE WILDER, SOIT SAMEDI 9 MARS, 16:00 ET 20:30, ET DIMANCHE 10 MARS, 10:00 INFOS ET BILLETS ICI

French-Colombian artist Ëda Diaz dazzled us with her debut album, Suave Bruta, described as an “intoxicating elixir” by Radio-France. From Paris, she spoke to us about her multiple musical identities and the journey that led to the creation of Suave Bruta.

“It’s an album that reflects my multi-polar identity, which I wanted to explore musically, a blend of tradition and contemporary music,” says Ëda Diaz, with a luminous gaze. Ëda grew up in France, the daughter of a Breton mother and a Colombian father.

Music has always been part of her life: “My father was a great music lover, listening to France-Musique in the morning, then Ella Fitzgerald or Joe Arroyo (a well-known Colombian singer) in the evening.”

From the age of eight, she studied classical piano for over a decade. At the same time, she regularly visited her father’s family in Medellín, immersing herself in Colombian culture.

“My first real musical emotions came from spending afternoons singing with my grandmother and cousins, over hot chocolate or aguardiente”, says Ëda Diaz. It was Latin America, rather than the conservatory, that inspired her to become a musician.

She has also developed a passion for Latin American and Spanish literature. Musically, the double bass became her main instrument, and she discovered how electronic effects could transform its sound. In 2017, she produced her first EP, entitled Ëda. “That’s when I started exploring this mix of traditional rhythms with modernity.”

Suave Bruta was a long time coming, with production slowed by the pandemic. But it was worth the wait, as this record marvellously synthesizes electronics, natural sounds, and Colombia’s multiple musical styles: valletano, bullerengue, danzón, currulao or bolero.

“Cumbia was the Colombian genre that was all the rage in France, but I had so many others in mind that I wanted to share,” says Ëda. “Among others, all the extraordinary black music of the Pacific coast was neglected because of structural racism. The mixtures between native, white and black are very special.”

Ëda Diaz adds two styles that don’t originally come from Colombia, but which occupy a very important place there: Cuban bolero and Argentine tango. Did you know that Medellín is the second tango city in the world, behind Buenos Aires?

“Suave Bruta is a dialogue between different kinds of music, but also between myself and my producer Anthony Winzenrieth,” says Ëda. “We’re as influenced by Latin music as we are by Bjork, Jeff Buckley, James Blake, Miles Davis.” Anthony Winzenrieth is a jazz guitarist, keyboardist and member of the alternative band 3somesisters.

“That’s how we came up with our version of what you might call a Colombian French touch,” says Ëda with a smile.

Suave Bruta was released at a time when Latin and Spanish music was in full swing. “The international success of Rosalia opens a lot of doors for alternative music in Spanish,” says Ëda. “In Colombia, there’s Bomba Ésteréo, Las Anès, Lido Pimenta (who lives in Toronto), The Méridian Brothers.”

Ëda Diaz also notes that attitudes in France are changing: “In the past, Spanish-language music had to be traditional, so people were closed to more modern styles; now I see more openness towards pop and contemporary styles.”

Suave Bruta has received rave reviews from many French media, as well as from the UK and Canada.

Ëda Diaz hopes to come to our latitudes as soon as possible to present her music in concert. And so do we. I’d love to hear this innovative music live on stage.

Photo credit: Misael Belt

Producer and musician Radwan Ghazi Moumneh is one of the founding manitous of the Hotel2tango studio, but also a sought-after artist who founded Jerusalem in My Heart and actively participated in Land of Kush, among others. A true luminary. Moumneh has teamed up with Amélie Malissard, artist and cultural project manager and founder of act-art-mgt, which guides the destinies of several artists and groups on the Montreal scene, to create a new label: Asadun Alay.

Radwan and Amélie wanted to showcase artists who have little chance of obtaining such a passport from “conventional” labels. In other words, they’re going for the niché. At PAN M 360, we agree with this vision a thousand times over. So, when we heard that two albums would be released at the same time on March 29, the label’s first two (with the exception of a first attempt, released in 2022, but which was a vinyl edition of an album previously released on another label), we thought it would be the perfect opportunity to talk to them over video about the label, the artists chosen, their albums and a launch concert at the PHI Centre. We’re sure you’ll agree that PAN M 360 is a great label to work with.

Two albums will be released on March 29 under the Asadun Alay label:

  • Farah Kaddour – Bada
  • Nadah El Shazly – Les damnés ne pleurent pas will be launched at PHI Center, March 21

Singer-songwriter Erika Angell is one half of the Thus Owls duo, formed with her husband Simon Angell. Through this ultra-Montréal indie band, she has helped create a body of work of the highest calibre, culminating in the duo’s most recent opus, Who Would Hold You If The Sky Betrayed Us? recognized world-wide as a high achievement, even an authentic masterpiece. The only problem was that the artist felt the need to return to a part of herself that she had left behind in her native Sweden, before the Montreal adventure and Thus Owls. It’s this part that she rediscovers on her very first solo album, The Obsession With Her Voice, to be released on 8 March on the Constellation label. A more experimental universe, which I have described as Dark Cinematic Cyberpunk, with the agreement of the artist. See and hear everything she has to say on this next chapter of her career in the following interview.

The Obsession With Her Voice is released on March 8, 2024 and will benefit from a launch at Ausgang Plaza, on March 12.

Avec les versions en concert de 14 jeux vidéo à succès, Game ON! associe des arrangements symphoniques inédits et de classe mondiale à de superbes vidéos HD de jeux vidéos et des illustrations jamais vues auparavant.

The 100-piece FILMharmonic Orchestra and Chorus, conducted by prolific maestro and composer Andy Brick, a true pioneer of symphonic music for video games, will delight audiences with award-winning soundtracks in a breathtaking concert experience. Fans will be thrilled to hear their favorite music from the best role-playing, action-adventure, puzzle-strategy, e-sports and combat games, including World of Warcraft, Ori, League of Legends, The Elder Scrolls, Guild Wars 2, Assassin’s Creed, BioShock, and many more.

Originally from the Chicago area, Andy Brick studied composition under Leslie Bassett at the University of Michigan, followed by graduate studies in composition at Manhattan’s Mannes School of Music. In 1990, he arranged the music for Sesame Street and wrote scores for independent films. In 1996, he won a competition sponsored by the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers. Also Andy Brick has conducted the Czech National Symphony Orchestra at the Gewandhaus.
A pioneer in this symphonic subgenre, Andy Brick has composed and/or orchestrated music for games such ase Sim City: Rush Hour by Maxis, Stranglehold by Midway, The Sims 2 by Electronic Arts and Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning by Electronic Arts, Super Mario Bros. by Nintendo, Halo 3 by Bungie and the Final Fantasy series by Square Enix. His music has been used in games such as Arc the Lad by Working Designs, Shadoan by Interplay, The Far Reaches by 3DO, Tesselmania by MECC.He has also worked in film for productions such as The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea and The Music Man.

Andy Brick has conducted symphonic performances of over 70 games, including Final Fantasy, Super Mario Bros., Legend of Zelda, Halo and World of Warcraft, with orchestras around the world. Brick is Distinguished Associate Professor and Chair of the Music and Technology Department at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey.

Having just arrived in Quebec to conduct the FILMharmonic Orchestra twice, Andy Brick grants PAN M 360 a generous interview.

Details

In Montreal, Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier at PdA, Friday, February 23, 7:30 pm, INFO AND TICKETS HERE

In Quebec City, Grand Théâtre, Thursday, February 29, 7:30 p.m., INFO AND TICKETS HERE.

Passion, love tragedy and French melodies are on the program at the Maison symphonique with the opera Carmen. The Orchestre Philharmonique et Chœur des Mélomanes (OPCM) will perform a concert version of Bizet’s masterpiece with Wallis Giunta (Carmen) and Adrian Kramer (Don José). The soloists are accompanied by 60 musicians and 120 choristers from the OPCM and the Petits Chanteurs de Mont-Royal, directed by young maestro Francis Choinière, who, as many know, is passionate about the most unifying works in the repertoire. And that’s why the mezzo-soprano graciously offered this video interview to our contributor Alexandre Villemaire, shortly before she embodied Carmen on stage.

Carmen – Bizet

Orchestre Philharmonique et Choeur des Mélomanes

Conductor: Francis Choinière

Children’s choir: Petits Chanteurs du Mont-Royal

Choirmaster: Andrew Gray

Carmen – Wallis Giunta

Don José – Adam Luther

Escamillo – Hugo Laporte

Micaëla – Myriam LeBlanc

INFOS & TICKETS HERE

You might not know the name Hauschka, but you have probably heard his music, that is the music of Volker Bertelmann. His name came up quite a bit last year after he grabbed an Oscar for Best Original Score for the German perspective World War One film, All Quiet On The Western Front. But outside of his work with film scores, Bertelmann makes his music under the moniker, Hauschka, experimenting with neoclassical, contemporary piano music.

For his latest album, Philanthropy, Bertelmann used prepared piano techniques; putting objects inside the piano for a different sound. The result makes the piano sound a bit more electronic and different than your standard piano album. As Hauschka, Bertelmann will bring his Philanthropy album to Montreal during MONTRÉAL EN LUMIÈRE. We spoke with him briefly about playing the prepared piano and writing one of the most successful film scores in the last decade.

PAN M 360: Could you tell me about your musical beginnings, like Gods Favorite Dog, and then getting into film scoring, and then Hauschka?

Volker Bertelmann: I started learning the piano at the age of 9 after seeing a pianist playing Chopin. I wanted to learn to play that piece immediately. So I asked my mother if she could organize lessons for me with this pianist. I had piano lessons for over 10 years and formed my first band at the age of 12. I then played in a whole series of bands as a keyboard player. A few years later, I met my cousin by chance on the street in Dusseldorf and we decided to form the band God’s Favorite Dog. The music was inspired by bands like Cypress Hill or the Red Hot Chili Peppers and we got a record deal with Sony Music. But after a while, I realized that a contract with a big record company doesn’t mean that they are interested in you as a musician and we broke up our band. I continued as HAUSCHKA and through my concerts all over the world, internationally working directors came into contact with me. That’s how I started with film music and that was about 12 years ago.

PAN M 360: How do you separate your time? Are you working on Hauschka material, while composing film scores? 

Volker Bertelmann: At the moment I’m working 90% on film scores in the studio and cooking lunch for our family. I love being at home and making music, so it’s ideal to have a job as a composer and the freedom to release a record whenever I feel like there’s a new idea and I’m ready for a new album.

PAN M 360: What is your process of creating a soundtrack for a film like All Quiet on the Western Front? You must have to really get enveloped and consumed by the film?

Volker Bertelmann:  When I work on a movie, I want to immerse myself in the protagonists and understand their emotions and the story. I also want to understand the director’s intentions and ideas. All Quiet on the Western Front was a great experience for me because everything came together well and naturally without much effort. And I found the three notes (dun dun dun) the very first day after I saw the movie for the first time.

PAN M 360: So you know where you were when you came up with the “dun dun dun” for the soundtrack, which is almost dystopian and a musical motif throughout the film?

Volker Bertelmann: Yes, I was sitting in my studio at my great-grandmother’s harmonium working on recordings for the movie, trying to figure out how to make the harmonium sound like a rock instrument.

PAN M 360: The soundtrack for All Quiet on the Western Front, of course, won the original score Oscar, my question is did you know you had something special and Oscar-worthy before winning?

Volker Bertelmann: I received a lot of positive feedback for the music. At the Toronto Film Festival, after the first screening of the movie, people came up to me and complimented the music. Oscar-worthy is a very undefinable term for me because you can make music that is strong and potentially good for an Oscar, but the movie doesn’t even come close to a nomination.

PAN M 360: Did it take you a while to figure out what kind of musician you wanted to be? Was it a lot of parroting and copying others at first?

Volker Bertelmann: When I started making music, I wanted to be someone I couldn’t be. I tried to copy pop stars and write exactly the same kind of music as the bands I admired. It wasn’t until I was 36 that I saw myself as HAUSCHKA, and that helped me to develop my own artistic identity. But getting there, so all the copying and learning and dealing with different challenges, like teaching piano lessons, writing music for commercials, being a session musician or keyboard player in a band, traveling with a children’s theatre or producing folk musicians … all of which ultimately helped me learn and gain the skills to do and appreciate what I do today.

PAN M 360: Philanthropy isn’t a standard piano album, can you share a bit of your process to get all of those different sounds? Like putting materials in the piano? On the strings? 

Volker Bertelmann: Mostly all the sounds are made with the piano and the base is the prepared piano I started with. Sometimes I’ve added a synthesizer or a bass to get more dimension, but I always use materials on the strings of the piano to create bass drums, percussion, and all the rattling sounds. The materials I use are felt wedges, mutes from piano tuners, plastic light filters, erasers, magnets, bows from string instruments, etc …

PAN M 360: What are some of the weirder items you’ve used during this technique

Volker Bertelmann: I think table tennis balls, vibrators, and glass lenses.

PAN M 360: I find it kind of makes the album sound a bit electronic, and there might be only two pieces that are contemporary piano pieces.

Volker Bertelmann: Yes, that was my intention. On my last record, A Different Forest, I composed a lot of solo piano pieces. With Philanthropy, I deliberately wanted to go in the direction of an electronic, slightly clubby record but with two melancholy piano pieces that stand for a moment of reflection.

PAN M 360: On “Loved Ones” you are accompanied by strings, how did you decide that melancholic melody would be on, I think it’s a cello?

Volker Bertelmann: I recorded two cellos in addition to the piano recordings for “Loved Ones,” and I liked the melancholy because it sounded to me a bit like a melody from a French movie about a lost love. It’s great when a record can contain different emotional pieces and take the listener on a journey. For me, melancholy as an emotion is just as much a part of it as happiness.

PAN M 360: Can you tell me a bit about the live performance? Will you be using prepared piano techniques, will we hear some film scores?

Volker Bertelmann: At the concert you will hear pieces from the album Philanthropy, but not in the same way as on the album. It will mostly be improvisations based on motifs from the album. As I perform under my stage name HAUSCHKA, you won’t hear any film music. So you will hear the music of Hauschka, which is based on prepared piano and electronics. I’m really looking forward to it.

SARAH ROSSY (she/they) is a multidisciplinary artist based in Tio’tia:ke/Montréal whose work blends jazz, experimental electronics, and visual projections into ethereal soundscapes that are both autobiographical and socially conscious. In our conversation with Sarah we spoke about her latest release, Seemingly Insatiable Waves, and the obstacles facing the musicians and artists of 2024.

PAN M 360 : Hey Sarah, a big congratulations on Seemingly Insatiable Waves! It’s easy to hear that a lot went into this EP, and I imagine it must feel good to finally let it out. 

Sarah Rossy : Oh it feels good, and it was a long time coming! I haven’t released music in a longer form since 2018! And this is the first of many things to come, it’s kind of like my first foray into releasing music again.

PAN M 360 : Well what a time to be releasing music in 2024. I’m finding that with more and more of the artists I speak to, they seem to be more and more uncertain about what a release actually means these days.

Sarah Rossy : Yeah, I mean, it’s a good question. I think we’re all trying to answer it. I decided to release this EP one single at a time, but in a short time span. I think it was within over two and a half weeks that I just dropped a song every four or five days with different visuals, so people could see and hear a little taste of each song.
Things move so quickly these days; the algorithm pumps content down the pipe after like 12 hours sometimes. So by stretching it, I tried to get the most exposure online after all these months and so much money and time put into this. I don’t know if it worked, but it’s definitely scary to release music in the 2020’s. There’s no one way of doing it, there’s a lot of people telling you how to do it, and I just decided to start small with an EP.

PAN M 360 : Would you say then there’s a really noticeable difference in the release landscape between this year and just a couple years ago? All thanks to the algorithm-ification of social media. 

Sarah Rossy : Yeah, for sure. I looked at my Bandcamp stats from the last release. And even the number of purchases and streams directly on that app were so different than they are today. Nowadays, you drop releases onto a fast-moving treadmill of content and news and all these other important things that people are taking in. So how do you fit into that?

PAN M 360 : Especially with two ongoing wars these days, with tragedy unfolding every second, reconciling art with social injustice and social media. 

Sarah Rossy : It’s scary when the pool in which we’re dumping our art as “content” is a melting pot of algorithmic cacophony. All of the cat photos, all the propaganda, all of the very important global injustice… where do we fit into that? It almost feels inappropriate, but I also feel that mental wellness sourced from art is a radical tool for systemic resistance. I feel guilty for taking up space when major catastrophes and genocides are happening, but if we can’t take care of each other with art, we can’t fight, we can’t push back.

PAN M 360 : That’s a struggle everyone seems to be facing. But at least you seem to enjoy a strong presence in the local arts scene. That must be a good counterbalance to the digital side of things, having a community of artists and collaborators around you. 

Sarah Rossy : Oh, it’s essential to have in-person connection through it all. With this EP specifically, they began as songs that I produced with Ableton alone, and then I recorded some real drum/bass parts with real humans. But at the show, of course, we were playing all the parts live, and I adapted the songs to include everyone in the group. That was great, because at the end of the day, music is about connecting with others. We do all this creative, administrative, and marketing work, and it’s like, for what? For me it’s all about connecting with people from audiences to other musicians, and creating a shared experience. 

PAN M 360 : Generally themes of self-discovery, self-love, identity, and healing, seem to be a big part of your musicality. Have these themes always been aligned with your musical identity or is it something you’ve started to explore recently?

Sarah Rossy : Yeah, I think it’s been both recovered and uncovered in layers as I’ve grown. I think back to my relationship with music when I was a kid, which was probably universal in a way: I’d go to the piano or any other instrument with a sense of play and curiosity, and express whatever thought or mood was on my mind, and release. It’s always been like that for me, but pursuing formalised music education distorted that channel a little bit. My heart was somewhat swept to the side as I learned tools that stimulated my mind and intellectualised my main channel of expression. That environment sometimes prioritised the technique over the emotional impact or authentic alignment. I am grateful for that time, but it was also traumatic in ways. The process of making this EP was a much-needed return to a pure sense of play and catharsis.

I have also been doing a lot of therapy and a lot of self-work in recent years, which have opened up more channels for understanding myself. My art is a reflection of that. Themes of identity and self-love are very present, and have become very focal points in my lifelong quest to understand my little existence. I hope that doing this work and sharing it through music can offer healing perspectives to people who perhaps don’t have the resources or readiness to do it themselves.

PAN M 360 : Was the pandemic a big shake-up in terms of how it affected your songwriting? 

Sarah Rossy : Yes, I lived alone for most of the pandemic, in total isolation. It was me and my piano and my anxiety. And we had a big restructuring of our relationship, me and music. Because, you know, I was alone, couldn’t create with people, and needed to heal from a lot of misalignment from the aforementioned “creative institution” trauma. After many months of being too devastated to play any music at all, I returned to the songs and the songwriters that moved me the most in my lifetime: Joni Mitchell, St. Vincent, Bjork, Fairuz, Yebba… who brought me the deepest comfort and a renewed sense of creation. I also began a deep dive into Ableton and music production, and brought many songs that I had been writing for years into the production world of infinite possibility. I discovered the joy of layering vocals… Like 800 vocal layers are on my record. And they were all just done in my apartment, on the floor at 2AM with a cheap microphone. I also fell in love with sound colour, VST orchestration, and plugins that have now seeped into my live performance practise. The pandemic also forced a confrontation with the self; this space of hyper-solitude made me face a lot of major wounds and themes in my life, and I feel that my songs have reached a deeper level of honesty in the years since.

PAN M 360 : Yeah, well you always have such a lush and rich sonic palette in your recordings. It’s very layered, with a lot of moving parts, and it must help have such a strong community to help see your vision across!

Sarah Rossy : Yeah, I was thinking the other day that over the past six years or so, I’ve planted a lot of creative seeds in cities and communities around the world. And now, it feels like all those things are coming to fruition and there’s ripe fruit on the tree. The global network of creative connection and creation is alive and well! If I’m like “hey, I want an ethereal guitar loop!” I’ll call Kevin Lafleur. He’s also one of my best friends. Or, if I’m looking to produce some interdisciplinary films (not-so-subtle hint of what’s to come), I can ask Camille Huang to artistically direct some creative fusion between the dance and music worlds. Or if I want to book some shows in Europe (where I’ll be in May), I have so many kind friends made over years of residencies and workshops willing to help. Or my VIP collaborator, Jack Broza, who mixed and co-produced the record, whom I met at Banff Centre for the Arts in 2018. We just have fun when we work, playing like kids in his studio in Brooklyn. The EP is under my name on paper, but there’s such an important community of people that were involved in this who offered many shades of support.

PAN M 360 :  So as someone from Montreal, do you feel this is the best place to be for your art? 

Sarah Rossy : Culturally, it feels pretty aligned here. I really love Montreal, but then again, it’s like marrying your highschool sweetheart or something, because I’ve been here my whole life. But I love New York, and I go there often, but disturbingly, I could fly there once every two months and it’d still be cheaper than living there, and I feel that I even get a more concentrated visit with my time because I’m “off” work. So that’s kind of looking like what my strategy will continue to be. I like to travel a lot; I’m going to Europe two or three times this year, and I go to New York almost every month. So for me, the lovely community here in Montreal, the grants, the amazing creative opportunities, the healthcare… These things entice me to stay put and hop around often, but we’ll see where life takes me. 

PAN M 360 : So as an artist in 2024, what would you say your goals are with your art? Are you optimistic or pessimistic about where things might go?

Sarah Rossy : I mean, once I restructured that my goals were to really connect with people above all else, it completely changed the landscape. I’m not trying to get famous. Obviously, fame can be a vessel to more connection. It can also be a vessel to more loneliness, you know? Selling your music can sustain you financially in a capitalist vortex, but who are you selling it to? Are they people who really care about your heart? So this album launch, playing a sold out show to all my friends and community members and people who I care about and maybe their friends one layer out, was so warm and fulfilling. I left the venue (Ursa, an amazing artist-run space) feeling good, and at the end of the day, feeling good is what matters. So like, I’m optimistic in the sense that I’m clear on that, but pessimistic about the overall state of industry. Each musician made $100 that night, and I worked non-stop for three weeks to pump the hell out of the promotion. But I’m trying not to put that financial pressure on my art.

PAN M 360 : I hear you Sarah. We wish you all the best and thanks again for taking the time. Let us know where we can catch you next!

Sarah Rossy : My next show is March 27th at Ursa for the first edition of the Anti-Jazz Police Festival. It’ll be a double bill with Claire Dickson, an amazing artist from Brooklyn, which will be an amazing show. Don’t miss it!

This year, PAN M 360 brings you Igloofest from a new angle  that of behind-the-scenes at the event, shining the spotlight on behind-the-scenes workers. After Stéphanie Cléroux, Production Director at Multicolore, we continue this pair of interviews with TiND, responsible for Igloofest’s VJing programming this year.

PAN M 360 invites you to dive into the creative world of Montreal-based VJ TiND, short for ” thisisnotdesign “. 

Active for over twenty years, collective TiND has collaborated with the SAT and  Moment Factory among others,  the organization has known how to evolve with musical and visual trends, forging a solid reputation in the Montreal art scene. We spoke to Francis Théberge, one of the collective’s co-founders.

PAN M 360 : Introduce us to TiND in a few words.

TiND : We founded the collective in the early 2000s, there were 3 of us originally. We started out at raves, which is classic. Then big industrial parties, experimental music. Our specialty was really visuals that were very rough, sampled from pop culture. The classic VJ of the late 90s and early 2000s. Later, in 2005, we officially formed as a collective registered as a nonprofit organization. Then we all became moms and dads, which diminished the group’s activities. At the moment, I’m the main active member, with my wife in charge of archives and organization.

PAN M 360 : How did the collaboration with Igloofest  come about?

TiND : If I’m not mistaken, we did the VJ booking in the third year, so that was over ten years ago. Then it was other great VJs, including Marion Carassou-Maillan aka VJ MA –  she really worked hard to get us a great spot. Then there was Marc-Olivier Comeau aka VJ Binocle, a veteran of big stages and U.S. tours. Then there was Catherine Turp of Moment Factory, who has been booking for years. This year I’ve taken over the programming, with the aim of keeping the spirit of the Montreal VJ scene alive. We take care of the B stage, the smallest stage, and with the Montreal music program, it really feels like a local scene.

PAN M 360 : How have VJing practices evolved over time ?

TiND : Headliners are increasingly coming with their own visuals. We started to feel it several years ago, I’d say even before the pandemic in festivals like ÎleSoniq, Osheaga that I did a few years. I don’t think the place of VJs has quite been won. We’re obliged to play the content given by the artists without having much time to prepare. This is happening more and more with the big headliners. The artist choices were perhaps more balanced with a better representation of the underground. Obviously, the visual field has evolved a lot, technologies are more and more accessible. For example, someone who knows a lighting console very well will be able to operate visuals quite easily. 

PAN M 360 : Do you have carte blanche for Igloofest ? 

TiND : Yes ! Igloofest gives us a lot of freedom. The programmer supports the artists’ applications, and then the choice is made on the demos, whether it’s a series of images or ideally a demo clip. Of course, there’s production validation, but I’ve never seen an artist turned down unless the content was really inappropriate. There’s a diversity of visual styles represented,  from the more experimental (like me) to stuff much more motion closer to the graphics you see in animated advertising. They’ve got a good eye, they know what they want, but it’s a really nice carte blanche. This year, we’ve made room for people who are just starting out, and we’ve taken them under our wing. I like the idea of including several generations of VJs.

PAN M 360 : In terms of content creation, how  do you strike a budgetary balance between your visual universe, your signature, your style and the artist’s style? 

TiND : There are VJs who are very good at adapting, creating or remixing visuals to make it work very well. On the other hand, there are VJs who have huge banks of visuals, who are also very malleable in general; they have a style that will stick with just about anything. It’s all a question of selecting the right clips, setting up the right set in the right software, whatever it takes. After that, it’s a question of feeling the music on site, and of craft. Sometimes you realize that the artist plays very differently from the sets on SoundCloud or MixCloud that you’ve been listening to in preparation. There are surprises. The primary role of the VJ is to have enough content to adapt to different styles and rhythms of music, and that’s important. Then you have to be able to improvise on the spot. In some cases, there are more specific mandates, where we’ll be asked to create visuals tailored to the artist, which requires collaboration between the labels and the artists, but unfortunately it’s very rare for us to be in direct contact with the labels or the artists.

PAN M 360 : What are the challenges for VJs at Igloofest ? 

TIND : It may seem strange despite Igloofest being a big festival, we’re so well supported by the technical team on site, it’s incredible. Honestly, it’s very easy. As much as you can play a simple signal that takes up all the space and becomes really immersive, you can also cut out each tile, play different layers of visuals or a color more to the left, more to the right… It’s extremely flexible. 

PAN M 360 : You emphasize the importance of the technical teams in enabling you to carry out your work. What is the dynamic like with the lighting designers with whom you collaborate very closely ? 

TiND : I’ll be very transparent with you: in many cases, it’s a love-hate story! (laughs)  Sometimes hate, it’s more because there’s miscommunication between the two artists. I’d like to stress that the lighting people, as much as anyone else on the technical team, even if you call them technicians, I call them artists. There’s no doubt about that. For example, the lighting technician on stage B this year is fabulous. He’s a young man of 19/20 who has already played for MUTEK. He’s very patient with us, calm, and communication is excellent. Despite me being chaotic and colorful, we manage to find a balance, and then at some point give each other more space. As soon as there’s good communication, it works really well, even if it’s improvised. Because these people are extremely good at improvising. In an ideal world, with more budget for preparation, there could be synchronization, which produces an incredible show for the audience.

TiND – Igloofest x SAT

TiND – MUTEK 

We’re all trying to make sense of this world as it gets more and more twisted and confusing. Living is almost to a point of reaction instead of planning and artists have been writing songs about this since they could walk. While you could generally categorize that as ‘songwriting,’ for Tom McGreevy the lead lyricist and rhythm guitarist of Ducks Ltd., it’s kind of his M.O. A Ducks Ltd. song usually sounds bright and full of life, with a steady momentum, as if finishing or overcoming a race or an obstacle, but the lyrics are nine times out of ten about the frailties of human relationships or straight up societal collapse.

This is probably the most present on Ducks’ newest release, Harm’s Way which will have an album release show this Saturday, Feb. 10 during Taverne Tour. We quickly chatted with McGreevy before the show to learn more about his artistic process and Harm’s Way.

PAN M 360: There is always this momentum with a Ducks Ltd. song. Especially on Harm’s Way. I kind of always feel like running when I listen to it…

Tom McGreevy: Haha yeah thanks. I definitely feel like we always have the innate impulse to make the song slightly faster. It always ends up going that way. There’s a pretty long process with the editing of the lyrics too. I tend to write the lyrics a little bit slower, but when it gets to the point of playing it out with Evan, we will always push it an extra 5 bpm faster or something in the demo. Historically, I think there have been only like two or three instances when we’ve had to slow down a Ducks song.

PAN M 360: And even though this album kind of pushes that Ducks jangle pop sound further, I feel like you’re one of the only bands where I can take a song and put it anywhere in your repertoire and it fits, almost as if they were written around the same time or place.

Tom McGreevy: That’s interesting and I’ve heard that a bit before. But the truth is most of them start in my bedroom and then we take them to the studio. For this album, some of them were written while we were on tour. I think I find personally that when I’m doing my kind of side of it, which is more in a sort of solitary space, it’s often that I’ll be working on a thing for a really long time. It will be like eight or nine months of just sitting on it. And it’ll come in pieces, and then the pieces will eventually be locked together and coalesce the way I want it to. Sometimes you just have to walk away and wait for that epiphany down the line y’know? I rarely write a song in one sitting. Usually, I’ll let the second verse hang for a while.

PAN M 360: So going off of that, I feel the studio process must be quite methodical and not very spontaneous?

Tom McGreevy: Yeah we are quite meticulous and there is very little spontaneity. The way we approach to stuff is definitely with rigour, but every now and then I will get stuck, but I need to get something down in the studio. So it will be like 11th-hour shit and we have to go with what I got. That used to be worrisome, but now I think we have more confidence. Of course, there’s always that one line that I hate right, or it annoys me. It’s a deadly struggle that I think I only notice.

PAN M 360: The music is very upbeat and feel-good. But if you read into the lyrics, they’re pretty bleak. The world is drowning, kind of a cynical take. Would you consider yourself to have like a bleak outlook on the world?

Tom McGreevy: I try to stay optimistic, but I think reality resists that (laughs). It always comes from me trying to process these difficult realities. And so I think that tends to be part of maybe why it comes through in that way. At the same time, it’s like, I think if I’m being honest, is a pretty accurate reflection of my worldview most of the time.

PAN M 360: There is something to that with the jangle pop kind of genre; depressing lyrics and upbeat music…

Tom McGreevy: I think it’s just in pop music in the broader history of like, you know, commercial music as a medium. Think of somebody like Smokey Robinson’s “The Tracks of My Tears.” Like, that’s a pretty bright-sounding song. I think that juxtaposition is sort of core to the appeal of a lot of music. And I think it’s like, sometimes less present in our current moment, but I think it’s, it’s interesting to me. Many of our influences are fthe guitar music from the UK and New Zealand in like 1980s, and that was something I was aware of, but I think it’s just one sort of element in the medium.

PAN M 360: You guys were really able to tour these songs, kind of road-test them. How did that tie into the recording process for Harm’s Way?

Tom McGreevy: I think it taught us about how the songs work. Not just live, but on a basic level. Historically, we would write the song, write the parts, and then never play them until we had to learn them for the live show. When I think the thing that was kind of different with this one was that because we did play it so much, we talked about it all the shows. I think we kind of got a better sense of like, how a Ducks song works and what a Duck song does. So when we were kind of making this record, it was a lot, almost easier to do because it was sort of like sort of knew innately what was going on and we didn’t have to think about it as much. It was a lot less sort of hitting a crossroads in a compositional process. It was like ‘Well, obviously, it will go like this.’

PAN M 360: I wanted to ask you specifically about the song “Train Full of Gasoline.” That might be my favorite track. I like it reminds me a lot of The Cure, but also that metaphor of this huge train of gasoline being like a volatile relationship … such a great metaphor

Tom McGreevy: Thanks. That’s in part about the train disaster in Lac-Mégantic and the one thing that struck me after reading about it and learning about the clean up in the community was there wasn’t like one, central mistake that was made that caused this to happen. It was like this series of small, like failures that like just compounded on each other. And I thought that was like, kind of compelling as a metaphor. Like, the description of most human folly is these things where it’s small things that pile up and don’t get observed and don’t get addressed. That theme definitely comes up in Ducks music all the time.

Photo by: Colin Medley

Ducks Ltd. Plays Taverne Tour w/ The Wesleys, and Dresser at Quai Des Brumes on Feb. 10

Internationally renowned soprano and specialist in the modern operatic repertoire, Canadian Barbara Hannigan is also a maestra. Now a respected conductor, this exceptional singer has developed a singular style of orchestral conducting that does not exclude her original artistic practice, this time in the service of Francis Poulenc and Richard Strauss. More specifically, she will sing and conduct La voix humaine, by composer Francis Poulenc and librettist (and celebrated author) Jean Cocteau. Prior to this, she will conduct a 26-minute work by post-romantic composer Richard Strauss. Joining us in Paris by videoconference, Barbara Hannigan discusses the complex issues involved in her planned double task with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra and the works on the program for next Wednesday, February 21 and Thursday, February 22.

ARTISTS

Orchestre symphonique de Montréal

Barbara Hannigan, conductor & soprano 

Barbara Hannigan, Denis Gueguin, Clemens Malinowski, staging and vidéo

Clemens Malinowski, cameras in real time

WORKS

R. Strauss, Métamorphoses, TrV 290 (26 min)

Poulenc, La voix humaine, tragédie lyrique, FP 171 (40 min / Texte de Jean Cocteau)

With staging and projections

Concert without intermission

crédit photo: Marco Borggreve tirée de la page FB de Barbara Hannigan

For info, it’s HERE.

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