Sled Island Edition: Motherhood, Ghostkeeper, and yoo doo right
Motherhood
Winded // Forward Music Group
Motherhood is not an easy band to categorize. Since the Fredericton trio’s 2013 debut Diamonds & Gold, they’ve maintained a reputation for the perplexing and exhilarating. From the wonky surf/country/sludge of Baby Teeth to 2019’s weirdo-rock multichromatic masterpiece Dear Bongo, they have always struck a balance between the crushingly heavy and the endearingly bizarre. Nowhere is this beautiful polarity more finely attuned than on their latest album, Winded.
Band members Penelope Stevens, Adam Sipkema and Brydon Crain conceptualize their music with purpose, and they can be heard joking in an interview on our very own Inside the Artist’s Studio about how long it takes them to write new music. Their skills as musical storytellers has always been evident, threading into their albums little breadcrumb trails of repeated lines and musical in-jokes, unspooling a narrative that, while often oblique, lends the often chaotic music its conceptual cohesion. Winded extends this technique, and it is maybe their most allegorical album, one where our protagonist must persevere against the winds that batter him from all sides, the rising waters below the cliff’s edge, the ever-present void never far from view.
Sound bleak? Good, ‘cause it is.
From Sipkema’s opening drum battery on “Crawly I”, we’re off to the races. Crain’s crooked guitar riffs dance their triangular dance, and his lyrics paint a nightmarish vision as we careen along a winding road before plunging off into a sea of distortion. Greg Saunier (something of a personal hero of the band) helped mix the album, and the hits have never hit harder.
While the album maintains the band’s penchant for rapid U-turns and Stevens’ knack for rich harmonies and arrangements, what is conspicuously absent is Crain’s signature vocal squawk, traded here for a lower register, a more somber delivery. While he still lets loose, such as on the fearsome “Crawly II”, there is a much greater degree of control, and his hoarse delivery feels much more directed.
While previous releases have certainly been serious, dark even, they were shot through with levity, playfulness. Winded is just as wild and inventive, maybe more than ever— but gone is the whimsical sense of humor that permeated Dear Bongo. On the apocalyptic “Flood” and the blistering “Ripped Sheet”, the protagonist veers on the brink of total existential annihilation, and Motherhood has never sounded more focused and unwavering. Even as the second half of the album begins to break open, veering into the beautiful sonic textures at the end of “Handbrake” and the meta, deconstructed coda of “Brakes Snap (demo)”, these experimental choices are not detours, but necessary components of a fatalistic story of uncertainty, confusion, and redemption.
Cowpunk-prog-sludge-post-circus-avant-rock genre shenanigans aside, Motherhood is first and foremost a true blue working band, and a band of friends at that. The reason their music is so singular is exactly because of this fusion of minds: the trio has created their own vocabulary, cannibalizing the culture and music that they revere and transmogrifying it into their very own post-modern blender, wholly original and always surprising. At the speed of a whip crack they pivot effortlessly between intricate Beach Boys harmonies and superfuzzed stoner riffs, literary references and obscure video homage (Captain Beefheart’s 1972 German television appearance, anyone?) while somehow managing to ensure that nothing feels out of place. Their crate-digger aesthetic is never merely referential, though. Every choice is in service of the song, the story’s emotional core— and more than that, making sure people want to scream along at the top of their lungs. This rare quality has been Motherhood’s trademark since the very beginning, and with this latest triumph, they have steered us right up to the edge, and peered over. In so doing, they have once again pulled off that one-of-a-kind magic trick, one that can only truly be described as Motherhood-esque.
- Harman Burns
Catch Motherhood at Sled Island on Thursday June 23rd at The Palace Theatre (9pm) and on Friday June 24th at Kaffeeklatsch (9pm).
Ghostkeeper
Multidimensional Culture // Victory Pool Records
I was driving on the Trans-Canada Highway, the Canadian road that connects us all in this beautiful country. Sometimes the TCH is riddled with potholes, and other times it can be the most enjoyable and smoothest ride of your life. I happened to be on the pothole riddled portion, when I thought this would be a great time to introduce myself to Ghostkeeper. I hit play on the Multidimensional Culture opening track, “Doo Wop”, and well, the only bumps I was feeling were the ones on my arms. Make no mistake, this is the truth, and I’ll tell you exactly at what instance it happened, the 43 second mark of the song! It’s the first one of many surprising, yet purposeful and organic transactions that occurs during the track and the album. I made it to around the 52 second mark when I had to hit rewind to decipher what my ears and conscious just heard.
I’ve read Ghostkeeper possesses a sound that is unique, but at the same time familiar, and their sound on Multidimensional Culture is exactly that. At times I felt as though I was traversing through past decades, perhaps starting somewhere in the 50’s. Actually, as I just typed the previous line, it sunk in that the first track is “Doo Wop”, GET OUT OF MY HEAD GHOSTKEEPER! Each individual track on the album has so many many different and unique elements from specific genres which work marvelously together!
Ghostkeeper’s ability to tell a story whilst being full of expression and phrasing, is at times avante-garde, arousing and inviting the emotions of the listener. To put it frankly, Ghostkeeper got soul and mojo baby! What’s that?, you want an example? - press play on “Ghost on a Rope” - say hello to swing, funk and pure grooviness! I must touch on the production, mixing and mastering for the album. It is both remarkable and inspiring!
In closing, I have to leave a question hanging in the grassy plains. I believe placing “Doo Wop” as the opening track for the album was brilliant! Do you agree?
“Headphones. That’s the only way to listen to music. It’s all kinds of different emotions because you get real quiet and comfortable and just listen to it.” ~ Gregg Allamn
- Branton Langley
Catch Ghostkeeper at Sled Island on Tuesday June 21st (9pm) at Commonwealth.
yoo doo right
A Murmur, Boundless To The East // Mothland
Returning a year after their 2021 torrent of tones, Don’t Think You Can Escape Your Purpose, Yoo Doo Right shakes the earth with another staggering maelstrom of sound, A Murmur, Boundless To The East. Adding some fresh touches without straying far from their method, AM,BTTE nods to British punk while filling every possible vacancy with sound.
Last year’s offering from Yoo Doo Right offered a psychedelic space flight of fuzz, while AM,BTTE feels more grounded and urgent. The album is bookended by vocal refrains of angsty, growling brit punk. In between the vocals is a cosmic soup of atmospheric post rock. True to form, this album is a short stack of massive songs that play like a movie. Yoo Doo Right has firmly established themselves as the new torchbearers of the Canadian post rock tradition, and this is a momentous addition to that catalogue.
This is the music of hi-fi lovers, and Yoo Doo Right knows their audience well. Outside of a live show, it’s difficult to replicate the sonic heft of Yoo Doo Right’s crushing power. I’ll have to leave my neighbour a note of apology after playing this album through. It left me in a chattering puddle in the centre of my living room while my house clung to the rattling foundation for dear life. Within their massive sonic textures are infinite layers that swell, break, crash, and recede like waves in a hurricane.
In a step towards replicating the live experience, the single “Feet Together, Face Up, On The Front Lawn” is accompanied by an experimental short film directed by Mackenzie Reid Rostad. Lights turned low, volume turned high, this will have you entranced and transported to another realm. The sound bears down on you like ever-increasing atmospheric pressure while the visuals carry you elsewhere until time itself feels blurred. Some tiny moments felt stretched into eternity, and other long stretches felt like they passed me by like a gust of wind.
Yoo Doo Right once again proves that they can marry grooves to massive sonic heft and blur the lines of space and time altogether. They know the power of sound more than most others and harness it to astounding effect. If you like Canadian post-rock, you can’t miss A Murmur, Boundless To The East. Listen loud.
- Clay Geddert
Catch yoo doo right at Sled Island on Tuesday June 21st (10pm) at Commonwealth and on Wednesday June 22nd at #1 Legion (10pm).
