Synths of the flesh

>> Dragonette is a sexy, vexing new
position for Martina Sorbara

EXTREME STATEMENTS: Dragonette

by ERIK LEIJON

Although three of the group’s members hail from Toronto, sultry synth-pop quartet Dragonette’s flamboyant and provocative debut record Galore was cultivated in London. According to their lead singer, ex-pat Martina Sorbara, it wasn’t that Hogtown was a cock-heavy den of machismo rock and London represented a haven for hyper-sexualized dance music, it was rather the need to get away from her hometown that spurred her newfound love of spandex catsuits. Briefly back in Toronto after returning from a triumphant set at CMJ in New York, her time away has enhanced her appreciation for Canada’s largest city.

“Maybe I wasn’t looking in the right places before, but there’s a cool, young hipster scene here that used to be the place of indie rock,” she says. “There seems to be a new generation of good-looking people, almost rivalling Montreal.”

It may have been her shady past was preventing her from meeting the right, attractive people. If you’ve ever suffered a painful break-up before, Sorbara’s name might sound familiar—back in 2000, she was a perpetually heartbroken singer-songwriter and was featured on the Women & Songs 6 collection. Part of the reason she branched out into new styles of music was her inability to come up with depressing “tamponic” rock (her word) after getting the contrived melancholy out of her system.

“I didn’t have it in me. I didn’t know how to write those songs anymore. I couldn’t find some dull edge to gouge out my heart with. I wasn’t interested in being sad, or appearing sad.”

Perhaps it was also meeting Dragonette’s other principal composer Dan Kurtz, formerly the bassist for the New Deal, that wiped her Birkenstock blues away. What started as messing around with synths and recording software in his basement back in 2002 eventually led to a musical and life partnership—they married in 2003. Only six months after forming, they were armed with a U.K. record deal and a spot opening for New Order in New York. They were also the supporting act for Duran Duran’s 2005 North American tour.

Although largely successful in Sorbara’s eyes, there were some unkind Duranie bloggers who took exception to Dragonette’s lyrics, typically humorous takes on female empowerment, and Sorbara’s provocative stage outfits. “I’m up there singing a song called ‘Jesus Doesn’t Love Me’—that’s an extreme statement. Most people understand the irony of the song, but I think if you live in fucking Ohio, there might be some that can’t hack that.”

The group has two videos out, for the one-night-stand anthem “I Get Around” and the porn-star-themed “Take It Like a Man,” both featuring Sorbara in some racy poses. “What people are running up against is that it’s a kind of sexual empowerment that isn’t this kind of passive, female, ‘Oh yeah, baby, cum on my stomach, whatever you want’ kind of overt sexuality. I mean, have you seen the Beyoncé-Shakira video? Is there anything I do that’s more overtly sexual than that?”

Sorbara’s frankness when it comes to ribaldry has ruffled feathers back in her home province. Her father, Greg Sorbara, is the provincial finance minister under the McGuinty government, and was quoted saying he wished she didn’t use the word “tits” in interviews. “It illustrates more how I’m allowed to say it because I appear in a different section of the newspaper than he does,” she figures.

With Most Serene Republic and Mother Mother
at le Gymnase on Friday, Oct. 26, 8:30 p.m., $15