Archive for the ‘The Virgins’ Category
Anya Marina, Lissy Trullie & The Virgins @ El Mocambo
On Thursday night, I got to revisit The Virgins, headlining this time at the El Mocambo. If you remember, last time (here for refresher), I was among the 25-30 people there to see The Virgins. This time, they performed to a sold out crowd reciting their lyrics. What a difference 4 months makes!!! A huge difference in reception and crowd… more on that later.
Anya Marina
First up, Anya Marina. My friend had told me about this artist before we got to the venue. She researched the opening act on MySpace and liked her track “Move You” a lot. Anya came out to perform with her guitar to a track of beats, a 20 minute set. Her performance was solid. She wasn’t too eager to please, relaxed in her natural Southern Californian state. I enjoyed her performance enough to walk over and buy a CD “Slow & Steady Seduction: Phase II” during the break. She has this sweet sound that’s smooth enough to chill, reminds me of Shivaree. She also had great stage presence that makes you pay attention.
Anya Marina – Move You (SSSPII)
Lissy Trullie
Lissy Trulie seems to have a growing fan base in Toronto. I was hearing whispers of her ‘new” haircut, how pretty she is in real life, and this is “my favourite” song. Yes, she is very cool, bad a$$ and pretty on stage…. and I really hate to be saying this in the same sentence, boring. She’s definitely talented, but her performance didn’t get me going. I like her voice and the music is good. But her stage presence wasn’t there… maybe it was an off night? Tired from the road trips? Or maybe it’s part of her “who cares” attitude? Regardless, of this factor, I recognize her talent and can see her potential for the future. I actually look forward to what she’ll be releasing in the future. I also really liked this performance of “Just A Friend” from YouTube. However, at the El Mocambo, her 40 minute set didn’t really make my night.
The Virgins
And finally, The Virgins. This performance was much better than the one at the Mod Club 4 months back. Really, I enjoyed both, but there was a clear improvement. First, no drinking on stage… lol… which I had stated last time, bothered me because his voice started cracking as he was drinking. This set was full of energy and the crowd was fuelled with enthusiasm, which I suspect pumped up the band even more. The set lasted just under an hour, including the 10 minutes encore. They seem to be way more comfortable performing this time around, changing up their music a bit and not overreaching to sound exactly like the record.
The Virgins – Love Is Colder Than Death
Something really funny happened that I have to share. A small group of people (2 girls & 1 guy to be exact) decided to be real jerks, shoved their way into the front and wanted to mosh during the Virgin’s encore. After a failed attempt to push their way around, the dude decided he wanted to dive into the crowd. Since most of us were already pissed off, we parted the way when he jumped. Yes, he ate pavement… and it was effing hilarious!!!! He was a jerk and he totally deserved it.
Top 10 Heart Songs
I wanted to call this the “slow jam” list…but it’s hardly R&B inspired. This is about the “heartfelt” songs of the year. The songs convey a message to the heart. I can’t really explain each song (partly b/c I just don’t know how to), but also because it’s hard to go into detail about slow songs. It’s a subjective experience. This list goes all across the board, it doesn’t matter what genre. I liked these songs for several reasons: 1) The vocals. 2) The lyrics. 3)The melody. 4) The mood. As usual, in no particular order.
3. Blue Foundation – Eyes On Fire
6. The Virgins – Love Is Colder Than Death
Week In Review – August 25-31
Another week has passed and it’s the last day of August…shit where has my summer gone. Week 5 out Week 10 until I should be cleared to play sports again…
School starts on Wednesday and look for the website to go into some sort of limbo, I’m terrible at time managing. Without further ado here are the week’s posts and whatever else is going on around the blogosphere.
Welcome our 3 new writers, Matt, Coko and Lu.
Stereolab – Chemical Chords by Matt- put this on my list of albums to check out
The Virgins – Coko questions their band name, from band pictures it looks like more of truthful confession
Endeverater – Kiss or Kill by Lu
Reviews:
Broadfield Marchers – The Invitable Continuing
London Zoo by The Bug – I gave it a 5/5 (am I giving out too many?), it is really is worthy of its critical acclaim
The Faint – Fasciinatiion – What’s with the I’s?
Island’s Arm Way
Mothlite – The Flax of Reverie – hopefully we can get an interview going Jess 
The Sleeping Years – We’re Becoming Islands One by One
Other:
Cutting Edge Music Fest Pt. 2
Hamlet 2 Review and Mini-Playlist – save your $$
Tropic Thunder Playlist and Review – Hilarious but offensive movie. I’m shameless when it comes to these playlists.
Joe reviews The Final Riot tour with headliners, Paramore.
The Microsoft Zune is Gangsta – Screw The Ipod – srsly
Ghalib reviews the Woodhands and Lioness show he saw last weekend.
News around the internet:
F Yeah Fest guys got beat up by Radiohead security with the cops watching. They recorded security beating up a patron excessively and security ran and beat them up for it.
The man behind AntiQuiet (or one of the writers) had his house stormed by FBI and he was formerly charged for posting tracks of Chinese Democracy. Chinese Democracy is the long awaited Guns n’ Roses album that has cost a reported 10 million or so. He faces a LONG prison sentence, releasing copyrighted work before it’s formerly released is really the problem. He did have it coming, especially living in the states. Slash isn’t rooting for him.
Some good discussion at the Elbo.ws forum. Way to hold us bloggers to standards Under the Dog.
Pitchfork ended the hype of Bloc Party’s Intimacy with a predicted 5.0-something score.
The Virgins – Self Titled Review
My new favourite band, The Virgins, seriously. I’m saying, seriously, what’s with the name? I’ve got to ask them when I meet them. The first time I heard about this band…on the show Gossip Girl (please don’t ask & don’t judge either). So, here are 5 guys from New York…if you care about their names, you can wiki them, cause I really don’t. And, I really don’t care how they met either. What I do care about is how great they are, and I hope they can stay true to their style.
They released an EP in 2007, with 6 songs, which have been re-recorded for the full-length album that came out this year in June. The album starts “Room service muthaf*ckas” then switches to a danceable beat. I love all their songs. They don’t sound the same. You can dance to all of them. They all tell a story. This album reminds of the Maroon 5’s album “Songs About Jane” before Adam Levine became a “hot bachelor”, when he talked about the anonymous girlfriend that beat up his heart. The Virgins talk about the club nights where they meet expensive rich girls who infect them and offer “cocaine brunches”.
I guess I do have to pick a couple of favourites: “One Week of Danger”, “Hey Hey Girl”, “Radio Christiane” and “Love Is Colder Than Death”. It’s about the grooveable beats, the meaningful words and the strange anthems. The Virgins sound like guys who just said to themselves, “let’s just do it and see what happens”. You can hear their nonchalance in their album. This doesn’t mean they don’t care… but at the same time, it really seems like they don’t. In today’s market, everyone cares too much about having the freshest sound because we all sound the same. I actually bought their first album online, and it was sent in the mail with my address handwritten. That’s how real these guys are…and by the way, this was just a couple of months ago. I’ve read that there was a bidding war between record labels for the debut album release. That’s cool I guess, since it means their talents are being recognized by the industry. I just hope they can stay simple within their colourful complications. They are just guys grooving to their sound… and it’s hard to get tired of it because it’s not too out there, not too catchy and therefore not easy to get sick of.
