Tracklisting:

1. Amerika – Wintersleep
2. Born Confused – Porridge Radio
3. Catchyalater – Frog
4. Water – Opals
5. Listerine – Foxall
6. Nightmare Song – Oscar Lush
7. October Mirage – Island Eyes
8. Past is Personal – West America
9. Roller – Quilt
10. Unattached – Two White Cranes
11. On the Nights You Stay Home – Donovan Woods
12. Call Out – Minor Moon
13. Consolation – The Chairman Dances (Lit Links)
14. First I’m Sorry – Haley Heynderickx
15. Waitress – Soft Lions
16. Vanitas – Hanging Hills
17. Waiting – Faint Peter
18. Farewell Navigator – Naomi Pop
19. Gifts – Real Swell
20. Future Wife – Jacob Faurholt
21. Wall – Slows Down
22. Olly Oxen Free – Creature Speak

The post January 2016 Roundup – A Mixtape appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Donovan Woods has a new album coming out next month called Hard Settle, Ain’t Troubled. The songs below both a) prove the above descriptions and, b) prove he is still very much on form.

You can pre-order Hard Settle, Ain’t Troubled on a variety of formats from the Donovan Woods website ahead of its release on the 26th February. We’ll try and get a proper review up closer to release. In the meantime, if you find yourself in Canada then Woods is about to embark on a lengthy tour with Matt Andersen:

Feb 16 – Duncan, BC – Cowichan Performing Arts Centre
Feb 17 – Victoria, BC – University of Victoria – Farquhar Auditorium
Feb 18 – Vancouver, BC – Vogue Theatre
Feb 19 – Kelowna, BC – Kelowna Community Theatre
Feb 20 – Banff, AB – The Banff Centre – Eric Harvie Theatre
Feb 21 – Edmonton, AB – Northern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium
Feb 22 – Calgary, AB – Southern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium
Feb 24 – Saskatoon, SK – Broadway Theatre
Feb 25 – Regina, SK – University of Regina – Darke Hall
Feb 26 – Winnipeg, MB – Burton Cummings Theatre
Feb 27 – Guelph, ON – River Run Centre
Feb 28 – London, ON – Centennial Hall
Mar 1 – Kitchener, ON – Centre In The Square
Mar 2 – St. Catharines, ON – FirstOntario Performing Arts Centre
Mar 3 – Owen Sound, ON – The Historic Roxy Theatre
Mar 4 – Burlington, ON – Burlington Performing Arts Centre
Mar 5 – Toronto, ON – Massey Hall
Mar 6 – Orillia, ON – Orillia Opera House
Mar 8 – Port Hope, ON – Cameco Capitol Arts Centre
Mar 9 – Markham, ON – Flato Markham Theatre
Mar 10 – Kingston, ON – Grand Theatre – Rosen Auditorium
Mar 24 – Ottawa, ON – National Arts Centre – Southam Hall
Mar 25 – Montreal, QC – L’Astral
Apr 12 – Fredericton, NB – The Playhouse
Apr 13 – Moncton, NB – Capitol Theatre
Apr 14 – Saint John, NB – Imperial Theatre
Apr 15 – Halifax, NS – Rebecca Cohn Auditorium

The post Hard Settle, Ain’t Troubled, a new album from Donovan Woods appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Illustrated by Joe Sumner, the book charts Wyld’s life, from hearing Aussie fishermen stories aged six to her grown adult self. From the moment her brother is brought the jaws of a bronze whaler by Father Christmas, Wyld becomes preoccupied with sharks. The captivation is not helped when she discovers a book on shark attacks and falls in love with Rodney Fox‘s “salty eyes” and look which said “the whole thing was just fine”.

Back in London Wyld finds obsession continuing, scouring the Sydenham library for shark books while plagued by a fear which makes baths difficult and forces her to sit with all appendages safely on-board the sofa. An ill-advised viewing of Jaws cements her mindset before the family return to Australia and encounter more sharks in a variety of situations (imaginary and otherwise).

What this simplification of the plot leaves out are the small details of familial life squeezed into both the writing and illustration, the astute observations and interactions from Wyld’s juvenile viewpoint which reveal what the book is really about. Wyld’s father, the pale Englishman, often cuts a lone figure, isolated in London by work and wine and in Australia by layers of clothing and high-factor sun-cream, while her mother floats with Wyld in the pool at night because “she is awake anyway”. When Wyld’s older brother begins “linger[ing] in doorways with a blank look on his face”, and returning home cut and bruised, the home is loaded with tension yet remains cryptic to Wyld, and by extension, us. Be they adolescent anxieties, genuine enduring depressions or just good old fashioned existential ennui, the emotions of the adults remain alien, unknowable and for the most part hidden, present only as dark, lingering shapes and ominous choppy wake.

Indeed, this sharks-as-emotions allegory can be extended further than sadness. From her father’s well-meaning day trip to ‘Vic Hislop’s Killer Shark Show’, to her encounter with an uncomfortably comic doctor, pretty much all of Wyld’s interactions are surrounded by the unseen forces of love and loss. Sumner’s artwork highlights this paradoxically by adding photo-realistic sharks and wounds to his otherwise simple drawings, beasts which often stalk Wyld when, consciously or otherwise, she is considering losing a loved one. Although she doesn’t quite understand it yet, she is thinking about love through its most illuminating prism – the loss of it. She is thinking about death.

While this morbid idea is true and central to the plot, it would be naive and unfair to dwell on it without noticing that, amongst it all, life not only goes on but flourishes. Wyld is never caught by the shark, nor is her brother or mother or father. She might have felt ill examining the colossal White Pointer at Vic Hislop’s museum but the next day she was braver in the sea. Our relationship with sharks is changing, with The Discovery Channel and National Geographic and the seemingly monthly event of ‘Shark Week’ beaming out pro-shark propaganda in which deep-tanned marine biologists preach education and understanding and love. Similarly, the message from Wyld seems not so much ‘LOOK OUT LIFE WANTS TO EAT YOU!’ but rather ‘life could eat you, sure, but such occurrences are exceedingly rare and even then you can poke it in the eye and escape to the hands of kind strangers who prod your guts back into your body’. In other words, learning to accept the atavistic, bone-level violence and pain as something natural, unaware and worthy of careful respect. Its strikes are few and far between, and even then, it’s nothing personal.

Everything Is Teeth is out now on Jonathan Cape/Random House.

As per usual, we’ve made you a playlist of songs that are related to the book. Nothing too subtle this time, I’m afraid, just plenty of teeth and blood sprinkled with Australians and capped off with the definitive garage-rock  anthem for sharks.

Tracklisting:

1. The Race – Oh Pep
2. Teeth – Bowerbirds
3. Drawn to the Blood – Sufjan Stevens
4. Swim – Surfer Blood
5. I Want Blood – Water Liars
6. Ocean’s Nerves – Songs:Ohia
7. Jaws of Life – Wintersleep
8. Find Me In The Ocean – Will Samson
9. Blood Song – Stupid Loser
10. Everywhere I Go Smells Like Fish – Donovan Woods
11. King Fish – Sun Kil Moon
12. Lurk Underneath – Trouble Books
13. Blood – The Middle East
14. Shark? – Shark?

The post Everything Is Teeth – Evie Wyld & Joe Sumner appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Woods also records new songs regularly and posts them on Soundcloud for us to enjoy. One of the newest, ‘I Saw On Facebook’, is a nice summation of his writing style – succinct songs that sad without being overly morose and a suggestion of a sense of humour. It’s a fine balance between sincerity and melodrama but, with his sprinkling of wry wit, I think you’ll find Woods has mastered it.

So please do check out his previous releases, although think twice before just playing them on Spotify. Woods shared his sales figures on Twitter back in 2012:

“My latest Spotify sales: 3942 plays earns $16.47395627. Big time. Enough to buy a Bruce Springsteen CD.”

The post Advent Calendar [23rd]: Donovan Woods appeared first on Various Small Flames.

We had originally planned for 15 songs each but found it was too difficult to fit in all the artists we felt needed to be included and decided to go with 20 each. Luckily, HI54LOFI included some of our favourites and I think we had some of his on ours, so we helped each other out a bit.

Granted, there are far more than 40 noteworthy Canadian artists out there and there were some hard decisions. Any disappointed acts crying into their maple syrup or taking out frustrations on their teamates on the ice, please don’t despair, there is always next year.

We hope you enjoy listening to it as much as we enjoyed making them. These songs certainly haven’t helped banish our romantic view of Canada.

Wake The Deaf side:

1.Docking Guard – Northern Primitive
2. Drop It – NEEDLES//PINS
3. Flyingshot Lake – The Flaming Moes
4. Ask Me Something – Wind & the Wild
5. Left and Leaving – The Weakerthans
6. Snow Ghosts – Paul Stewart
7. Voyageur – Doug MacNearney
8. The Future Of Tradition – Frederick Squire
9. Bruises – Dusted
10. Ben – Tyler Butler
11. Warning – Postdata
12. Margaret Downe – Aidan Knight
13. Coming Back Home – Zachary Lucky
14. Sask – Donovan Woods
15. Young Glass – Hey Rosetta!
16. Lightshow – Plants & Animals
17. And I Thank You – Pink Mountaintops
18. Cloud Of Evil – Blackout Beach
19. Sing! Captain – Handsome Furs
20. Continuous Thunder – Japandroids

HI54LOFI side:

1. Welcome To The Heart – Eamon McGrath
2. Broken Knees. – Different Skeletons
3. Sunset – Two Bicycles
4. Brook and Branch – The Weather Station (featuring Baby Eagle)
5. Skinny Ghost – HAPPY TRENDY
6. Deny, Deny, Deny – Joel Plaskett
7. You’re Cool – The Joe
8. Oh My God (It Still Means A Lot To Me) – The Wooden Sky
9. Necromancy – Jessica Jalbert
10. Scared – The Tragically Hip
11. Family Tree – Evening Hymns
12. Wind Driving Dogs – Chad VanGaalen
13. Were You In Love With Me – Andy Shauf
14. Big Bird In A Small Cage – Patrick Watson
15. I Need You Closer – LadyFace
16. Where are you? – nick everett
17. The Very Best – Mike Tod
18. Vapours – Islands
19. Sugar Mama – The Deep Dark Woods
20. Road Regrets – Dan Mangan

You can find both mixes here as a collection.

EH? – A Canadian Mixtape (Wake The Deaf Side) from Wake The Deaf on 8tracks Radio.

EH? – A Canadian Mix Tape (HI54LOFI Side) from HI54LOFI on 8tracks Radio.

If anyone can think of any more Canada-themed cliches or stereotypes then please don’t hesitate to let us know for next year’s mix. Going by this collection of songs, being insanely talented might just be one more.

The post EH? – A Canadian Mixtape Complied By Wake The Deaf & HI54LOFI appeared first on Various Small Flames.