Let's take the bus up to the Canadian Capital City, Ottawa, Ontario.
This is where Canadians go to lead.
We've got their favorite Post Hardcore band on the line and they're going to talk to us about their favorite albums.
Whilst you're checking it, get on their BANDCAMP.
1. My favorite kind of album is the concept album. The Wall is my absolute favorite. Beyond the amazing songs, it has spectacular nostalgia for me.
What's your favorite one and why?
Adam: The album The Hazards of Love by The Decemberists that came out in, I believe, 2009. It details the story of this woman, Margaret, who finds an injured deer in the woods which suddenly transforms into a man, William.
They instantly fall in love, and subsequently have sex. The rest of the story is how William’s mother, some forest god or something, tries to break them up and turn him back into a deer. I first listened to it when I was in University and it really influenced my writing style.
I loved how they used this kind of metal-influenced folk to set up musical themes for characters and spaces in the story. It was a masterclass in how to use music to tell a story. It also featured a whole song dedicated to a father murdering his children, and that was so delightfully grotesque that it hooked me instantly.
2. My very first album was Live Evil by Black Sabbath. Since then I've had a strong affinity for the live record, even if they're a bit fake. KISS set the bar with Alive!. Surely, it was fake, but it's got the best concert feel of any one.
Tell me about your favorite live record?
Jeremy: I’m going to have to go with the Tree City Sessions by Dance Gavin Dance. Listening to DGD has always been more than just listening to music for me, it’s more of an experience.
They’re very complex but very fun. There’s always more to what they’re playing than what you hear you know? So when they announced a live album, I was skeptical. I remember telling myself that there was no way it could sound as good as their official albums.
But man was I wrong. That live album gave me a whole new appreciation for that band! The singer was actually nailing his high notes, the screaming was flawless, the guitars were wild and so pristine, it was just incredible.
DGD was never a band I wanted to see live because I was so afraid I’d be disappointed, but listening to that album changed my mind. I ended up seeing them in Montreal a few months after and it was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen, still to this day.
3. There are a great number of records I've turned to for my moods. What do you listen to when you're angry? Sad?
Darien: Oh man, I always listen based on my mood almost to the point where I have albums for some pretty obscure feelings. However to start; when I'm feeling sad I am probably throwing on Youth by Citizen, Swimming by Mac Miller or maybe The Albatross by Foxing.
Those albums are great, they don't try to bring up or down, they are just great pillars to lean on when you're in the dirt. When I’m angry it's probably The Black Parade by MCR is a classic for almost Sad anger or almost any Eminem album Pre Marshall Mathers LP2 for that real “I am about to Smash S***!”
If I am feeling happy like I am driving home from work on Friday it's any or all Modern Baseball album(s) or All Killer No filler by Sum 41. If I am even more pumped than that it's Between you and Me by Belmont or the legendary Half Hour of Power again by Sum 41!
Especially that Belmont album, it just drives so hard and that drummer is killer, it's impossible not to be amped.
Quick round:
Existential dread: Anything Sorority Noise,
Feeling cool while walking: Tell Me I’m Pretty by Cage the Elephant
Dance party while cleaning the house: Distractions by Bear Hands
Just feeling like I need to get through today: Stovall by Microwave
4. One of my friends laughs at me, routinely, for loving the Misfit Toys of albums by major bands. Lulu by Metallica and Lou Reed, Carnival of Souls by Kiss, Diabolous En Musica by Slayer, etc.
What's the strange one that you love?
Aaron: It’s funny, here I am answering by playing in a post-hardcore band and yet very rarely do I actually listen to post-hardcore. My music taste routinely gets me laughed out of a room full of metalheads or punks.
I could sit here and tell you how much Madonna’s discography absolutely slaps but if we’re talking misfit toys from major bands it’d have to be my absolute adoration of 80’s era Rush, and if I had to pick a specific album it’d be Power Windows.
People give Rush s**t for going all synthy and poppy in the 80’s but man that was the times! People consider everything after Moving Pictures somehow sub-par until the 90’s when surprise surprise, they sounded like a band in the 90’s would!
They’ve always been a band that moved and grew with the times and I have always really admired and respected that part of them as a band and it’s something I strive to do. So when I sit here and say songs like “The Big Money” or “Middletown Dreams” are absolutely bops my prog rock friends all look at me like I just insulted their mother.
Screw that, Geddy Lee absolutely demolishes the keys and the music is absolutely incredible. Electric drums and all.
5. It's almost fashionable to release live versions of albums or re-record the old ones. King Diamond is releasing a concert with Abigail front to back. Roger Waters has done The Wall twice.
Which ones do you have in your collection?
Alex: I wish I owned it but I listen to it all the time: Beartooth’s The Blackbird Session is an amazing expression of 4 of their own songs from Disease, their 2018 album, with re-imagined instrumentation and amazing 3-part vocal harmony.
It’s even more mind-blowing to me because it’s performed live.
I enjoy any time a band decides to re-work their own music, but Beartooth’s live session is definitely my top pick for that category.
I do actually own the live version of My Chemical Romance’s concert version of The Black Parade, which is called The Black Parade is Dead!, performed in Mexico City, and was an amazing performance on their part.
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