Songs of the Week: May 13 -19, 2024
“After A While” by Michael Bernard Fitzgerald
Calgary musician Michael Bernard Fitzgerald has announced that his latest full-length album, Horizon Lines, will be released on September 27th.
With the announcement comes the first single “After A While”, and of it MBF says:
"I think ‘After a While’ does a good job of encapsulating what things feel like these days. The pressure seems to be up post-pandemic and I think we’re also all a little drained. Long stretches of time seem to race by, I’m sure that’s maybe just the way things are with a big family and packed schedules, but I think it’s also a shared experience as we’re all working at finding our way again. This track mixes a few musical elements that I love: direct, calm, focused, effect-sparse vocals, a droning acoustic that feels welcoming and sustained, big, moving drums, eventide synth sounds and very present (sometimes edgy) organ bass."
There are some tour dates set for August, but nothing in Vancouver as of yet, but hopefully we’ll hear soon!
Christine
“For The Long Run” by Major Love
To celebrate the release of their new album, Major Love has dropped their latest single, “For The Long Run”.
The song is a slow-burner that builds to a big finish, and Colleen Brown explains: “During lockdowns, I think we were all experiencing some form of longing. A lot of us felt really isolated - maybe we were single and hadn’t touched another human in a year. Some of us were in bubbles or family units, but felt totally alienated from them. It wasn’t just physical isolation - but also the sense that humanity was splintering, along with a shared sense of reality and belonging. Many of us were losing people to conspiracy theories, seeing people we love suddenly spouting hateful rhetoric. And then some of those people would try to turn it around on us, accusing us of the same thing… it can break your brain, if you don’t have deep moral conviction behind your beliefs.
To me this feels more relevant than ever, right now, at this moment. I truly believe we are at the flashpoint that will determine whether humanity survives in the long term. We have a couple of years to avoid irreversible ecological collapse, which we have been rushing headlong towards, and we also have students and protesters around the world being shut down, attacked, and arrested for protesting war crimes. These things are 100% related. Propping up a colonial empire is the same principle as spraying your garden with Roundup: as long as we insist on control and domination of ourselves and our environment, we are doomed as a species. This moment, right now, is our opportunity to change that, to change our trajectory. That’s what this song is really about, and that’s the feeling we are trying to capture in the music.”
Live, Laugh, Major Love is out now, and you can catch the band live in Vancouver at The Lido on May 23rd!
Kirk
“Famous” by The Royal Foundry
The Royal Foundry have been putting out some really catchy tunes in the last little while!
“Famous” is the first single that is following up their last album, I Give Up, and it’s got everything you’d want in a song: chant-a-long chorus, driving guitars and fun lyrics.
The band says the song is about “living in your dreams wishing they were your reality” and waking up and having it all without doing the work.
Can’t wait for more!
Christine
“All This Living” by The Secret Beach
The Secret Beach is described as “an ever-shifting group of musicians and co-conspirators orbiting around the songs and voice of Prairie-based songwriter Micah Erenberg”
Last week, Erenberg (& friends) released “All This Living”, their newest single which Micah says is about “not giving up on your dreams. Even if you wish you could have gotten certain things done earlier, it’s never too late to get them done now. That goes for anything, be it in your career, personal life, health, spirituality or otherwise. Don’t let yourself be defined by the person you were. Embrace the person you can be.”
The breezy, catchy tune is of the upcoming album, our August 23, called We Were Born Here, What's Your Excuse? (and you know I’ll always appreciate a Simpsons reference in music — even if it is from season 16)
Kirk
