On Feb. 5, the Grammy Awards ceremony emerged from its burrow and saw its shadow, which means five more weeks of music until the Juno Awards on March 13. With the help of the following concerts and albums, we might just make it.
Raye’s My 21st Century Blues
British singer-songwriter Raye's new album, My 21st Century Blues.Supplied
“Please, get nice and comfortable and lock your phones, because the story is about to begin.” So sings the British singer-songwriter Raye on a silky 15-track expression of pain, drama and vulnerability that ends in Fin. Songs on her debut album include Environmental Anxiety and Body Dysmorphia. Elsewhere, B.B. King is invoked and Amy Winehouse is channelled. The music industry is called out on Ice Cream Man. “Oscar-winning tears” are cried; codeine, red wine and “Mary Jane” are tried. Thankfully the story is not finished: Raye plays Toronto’s Velvet Underground next month on her lone Canadian date.
Pink’s Trustfall
Trustfall by Pink.The Associated Press
Are we running out of time? Are we hiding from the light? Are we just too scared to fight? On the pulsating title-track single to her just-out album, Pink asks questions and encourages the nearly defeated to leave one’s fears behind, put faith in the unknown and hit the dance floor. Pro tip for those feeling down: Pay attention to the party-starting pop star who believes in empowerment and Cirque du soleil-style aerial manoeuvres on stage.
Chiiild’s Better Luck in the Next Life
Chiiild.Eddie Mandell/Supplied
The forthcoming album from the Montrealer Chiiild is a free-falling daydream of fatalism and cloud-based alt-soul sounds. The single Good For Now, he has explained, is a reminder that “whatever happens, we should be present in the moment because we don’t know what tomorrow brings.” Other tracks include Bon Voyage, a psychedelic send-off about luxury hotel rooms and Lucy-in-the-sky highs. Trippy stuff. Chiiild’s spring tour hits Montreal’s Corona Theatre, Toronto’s Axis Club and Vancouver’s Hollywood Theatre.
Iggy Pop’s Every Loser
Punk-rocker Iggy Pop.Vincent Guignet/Supplied
Iggy Pop never claimed to speak for everyone, but sometimes it just works out that way: “I‘m sick of the squeeze, I’m sick of the tease/ I’m sick of the freeze, I’m sick of disease.” Frenzy, the lead track from his latest album, is a blunt, muscled response to any and all frustrations. The 75-year-old punk-rock icon, born James Newell Osterberg Jr., seems to be revisiting the sounds of his West Berlin-based collaborations with David Bowie from the late 1970s. Bowie is dead, Germany is reunited and Iggy Pop has unexpectedly survived intact.
Bill Frisell
Jazz guitarist Bill Frisell.
Here is a chance to see a legend in intimate settings. The inventive Americana-jazz guitarist Bill Frisell joins drummer Kenny Wollesen and bassist Tony Scherr for a brief Ontario tour that stops at Ottawa’s Bronson Centre (March 10), Toronto’s Great Hall (March 11) and Maryville’s Hotel Wolfe Island (March 12, two shows). His latest album is 2022′s Four, a gentle collection of clarinet-graced requiems and piano-based remembrances including Claude Utley, Waltz for Hal Willner, Dear Old Friend (For Alan Woodard) and the impish Blues from Before.
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