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BEST MUSICAL ACT #2, HEAVIEST LOCAL ACT #4: Chix ’N Dix

Best Musical Act

1. Arcade Fire
2. Chix ’N Dix
3. Nomadic Massive
4. Homosexual Cops
5. Kalmunity Vibe Collective
6. Patrick Watson
7. Red October
8. Shane Murphy Band
9. Unsettlers
10. Chase Stacks
Honourable mentions: United Steel Workers of Montreal, the Brains, Everything After Zero, the Hypnophonics, Random Recipe, Plants and Animals, Priestess, Stars, Sweet Mother Logic, Think About Life, Leonard Cohen, the Stills, Underground Realroad, We Are Wolves, Handsome Furs, Sam Roberts Band, Trigger Effect

Well, the umpteenth top ranking for Arcade Fire comes as no surprise, as no doubt Montreal’s getting psyched to catch their favourite global export at Osheaga this summer. But after that, all bets are off in this category. All of last year’s runner-ups in the Top 10 have been demoted down into honourable mention territory, while conversely, acts in that also-ran file last year, like Nomadic Massive and Shane Murphy, rate admirably this time around, and hard-rockin’ Warped Tour vets Red October throw their hat in the ring. But it’s busy punk-scene newcomers Chix ’N Dix who really impress with their second-place showing..

Freakiest local act

1. Duchess Says
2. AIDS Wolf
3. Death Boat
4. The Brains
5. The Unsettlers
6. The Nailheads
7. Bloodshot Bill
8. Trigger Effect
9. Tony Ezzy
10. The Hypnophonics
Honourable mentions: Homosexual Cops, Mad Parish, Nista, Tonstartssbandht, Bad Uncle, Chix ’N Dix, Dynamo Coléoptera, Interracial Love Triangle, Pad Class, Red Mass, Cirque du Soleil

AIDS Wolf and Duchess Says switch places from last year’s showings, while Death Boat, despite determined cooperation by global naval authorities to combat piracy in international waters, hold on to third place with the same tenacity a hammerhead shark might apply to Long John Silver’s wooden leg. New in this category are punk rockers the Nailheads and psychobilly unit the Hypnophonics. Whatever the rating, though, they’re all freaks—dirty, slimy FREAKS!

Most Pretentious Local Act

1. Arcade Fire
2. Jonas
3. Simple Plan
4. The Stills
5. Rape Faction
6. AIDS Wolf
7. Coeur de Pirate
8. Rufus Wainwright
9. The Dears
10. Pierre Lapointe
Honourable mentions: Stars, Celine Dion,
Empire Isis, Amanda Mabro, Creature, Homosexual Cops, Velvet Trench Vibes

Largely the same names as always in the realm of roll-your-eyes, “are they serious?” pretension. Jonas is up by two from last year, the Dears down from number 2 to 9, Coeur de Pirate is up by three and AIDS Wolf by one—and Arcade Fire are still the biggest poseurs, according to you, our dear readers. New to this category is Rape Faction, whose choice of moniker suggests remarkable nuance and judgment.

Heaviest Local Act

1. Priestess
2. The Catalyst
3. Mad Parish
4. Chix ’N Dix
5. Trigger Effect
6. Endast
7. Everything After Zero
8. Derelict
9. Duchess Says
10. The Agonist
Honourable mentions: Death Boat, Despised Icon, Voivod, AIDS Wolf, Fattooth, Barn Burner, Cryptopsy, Slaves on Dope, Squalor

As they have the last two years, heavy-minded Montrealers continue to worship at the altar of Priestess, and afford accolades to a number of newbies in this category—Endast, Everything After Zero, Chix ’N Dix, the Agonist and surprise second-place winners the Catalyst (see article).

Best Hip Hop Act

1. Nomadic Massive
2. Radio Radio
3. Underground Realroad
4. David Hodges
5. Random Recipe
6. Velvet Trench Vibes
7. MurderFace
8. Kalmunity Vibe Colective
9. M.O.
10. Socalled
Honourable mentions: Malicious, Omnikrom, Magnum 357, CeasRock, Jus Frais, Annakin Slayd, Chase Stacks, Karma Atchykah

Despite their ambulatory name, Nomadic Massive don’t budge from the top slot in the hip hop category, which they’ve held the last two years.

Best Club DJ

1. Stevie V
2. Keith Dean
3. Truspin
4. Mini
5. Sammy M
6. Johnnybonnyrock
7. Nujax
8. Mary Hell
9. Blaster
10. Diamonds Cut
Honourable mentions: Jordan Dare, A-Rock, MC Mario, Noisy Nora, Tiga, Cherry Cola, Hatchmatik, Crowd, Don Smooth, Mutante, Pat Boogie, Team Canada

Stevie V takes top place again, and his colleague behind the decks at Laval’s Moomba, Sammy M, doesn’t do too shabby here either. In other words, the 450 contingent supports its own! Mini holds her fourth place, Mary Hell slides down two slots, her occasional co-biller Jonnybonnyrock steals #7 and Nujax, familiar to Blue Dog Sextape crowd, make a respectable first-time showing at #8.

Best Country/folk Act

1. Lake of Stew
2. United Steel Workers of Montreal
3. Bones Malones
4. Ladies of the Canyon
5. Katie Moore
6. Rae Spoon
7. Bloodshot Bill
8. Notre Dame de Grass
9. Joel Kaiser & the Devil’s Own
10. Charlotte Cornfield
Honourable mentions: Li’l Andy, Rob Lutes,
Unsettlers, Colin Moore, David Simard, Nadia & the Tchotchkes, Yesterday’s Ring, Yonder Hill

Best Jazz Act

1. Kalmunity Vibe Collective
2. Nikki Yanofsky
3. Indigone Trio
4. Franco Proietti Morph-tet
5. Oliver Jones
6. Oscar Peterson
7. Ranee Lee
8. Amanda Mabro
9. Susie Arioli
10. Chet Doxas Trio
Honourable mentions: Stina August, Christopher Cargnello, Dave Turner, Dawn Tyler Watson, Holly Gauthier Quintet, Wray Downes

Good work, Kalmunity—not only are they up from #6 last year, they’ve taken the top slot over precocious globetrotting teen sensation Yanofsky, if only by a nosehair. The Indigone Trio leap up from 10th place to third while Franco Proietti’s band doesn’t morph at all here, maintaining a steady fouth-place ranking.

Best Singer/songwriter

1. Leonard Cohen
2. Rufus Wainright
3. Patrick Watson
4. Joseph Gabereau
5. Shane Murphy
6. Athena Holmes
7. Coeur de Pirate
8. Ariane Moffatt
9. Paul Cargnello
10. Sam Roberts
Honourable mentions: Celin Dion, Amanda
Mabro, Pierre Lapointe, Bones Malones, Colin Moore, Rae Spoon, Rob Lutes, Charlotte Cornfield

Best Busker

1. Spoonman
2. Spider-Man
3. Valkyries
4. Hollywood
5. Accordion player Bin Jiang
6. Scott Dunbar
7. Blind singers at Lionel-Groulx metro
8. Hugger Busker
9. Slide guitar guy at Guy-Concordia metro
10. Hellbound Hepcats
Honourable mentions: Stilt Man, Bad News
Brown, one-man band at Guy-Concordia metro, bucket drummer Richard Baxter, Pirate Boat Guy at Jean-Talon metro, Violin player at Sherbrooke metro, “Guy who plays electro up and down St-Laurent”

Spoonman, Spider-Man and Hollywood, still up at the top here, but what’s with the Valkyries? True, there have been a lot of operatic antics going on in the metros lately—or maybe they’re there to collect the bodies of noble, fallen buskers and take them to a paradise where their hats are always full of gold doubloons and nobody ever crosses the hallway to avoid them? Stilt Man is relegated to a mere mention this year, though he hasn’t been very visible as of late at Lionel-Groulx metro (and at what, 25 feet tall or so, he’s hard to miss), as is the manically funky bucket drummer Richard Baxter.

Best Local Music Label

1. Dare to Care
2. Stomp
3. Constellation
4. Indica
5. Little Baby
6. Secret City
7. Turbo Recordings
8. Alien8
9. Bonsound
10. Justin Time
Honourable mentions: Arbutus, Mile End,
Audiogram, Grosse Boîte, Signed by Force,
Semprini

BEST HIP HOP ACT #3: Underground Realroad

Franco frequencies

Maritimers Radio Radio are
right at home in Montreal

CHIAC PACK: Radio Radio (Best Hip Hop Act #2)

By DARCY MACDONALD

Second-place winners in this year’s BOM hip hop category, Radio Radio are, as it happens, neither from Montreal (or Quebec, for that matter) nor by any standard strictly a hip hop group.

“We’re music, most of all,” says Jacques “Jacobus” Doucet, one-third of the electro-leaning Acadian party trio. “I mean, I love country and all, but I rap. In my head, I’m more country, being from smalltown Nova Scotia, than hip hop, but I rap, that’s what I do.”

Doucet and cohorts Alexandre Bilodeau and Gabriel Malenfant have been doing it well enough to earn big love in la belle province, relocating from New Brunswick to Montreal in 2008. The success of their first LP Cliché Hot found the group a guest spot in the Quebec star system, where their new album Belmundo Regal has been making big noise steadily since its March release. “If they hate you, you’ll know it,” Doucet says of the city’s music fans, “and if they like it, you’ll know it.”

Rapping in English, French and their native chiac dialect, Radio Radio has inadvertently breached the divide between the two solitudes of Montreal’s rap scene, and in so doing can boast the rare achievement of ranking so high in a category that has been traditionally anglo-centric. “Because we’re from the Maritimes and we’re bilingual, they get caught on that,” Doucet says, speaking of English audiences the group has encountered outside the province and in the States. “They can sing along or whatever. We slip in some French words and people react like if it was reggaeton. They don’t understand it always, but they like it.”

Doucet says he can speak for the band in terms of what they all love about Montreal. “There is something to do or see every night,” he says with emphasis. “We’re from a small town, you get Friday and Saturday. Otherwise, you gotta drive an hour to see a movie.”

Food, culture and women make his personal shortlist of things to love in Quebec, but he even finds something nice to say about what he views as our city’s “ego tripping” cops. “They don’t get it when it’s a joke,” he laughs (and I don’t ask what the joke was), “but I guess that means they’re doing their job.”

On their own grind with spot dates instead of a tour for the immediate future, Montreal tunes into Radio Radio next at Cabaret Juste pour rire for the Francofolies this June.

Teenage torch songs

Shedding light on young Montreal jazz
chanteuse Nikki Yanofsky

AGE APPROPRIATE: Nikki
Yanofsky (Best Jazz Act #2)

by LORRAINE CARPENTER

Coming in at second in the BOM’s Best Jazz Act category is 16-year-old Nikki Yanofsky, already half a decade into her career as a chanteuse. Her national and international renown grew significantly this year with her Olympics double whammy, singing Canada’s national anthem at the opening ceremonies and recording the hit Olympic anthem “I Believe.” But Montrealers have supported this Hampstead native since her first gig, at the 2006 Jazz Fest.

“It was so exciting and so much fun,” she says. “I went out barefoot, make-up-less—well, I was 12—and in a white dress, and I had a blast.”

Followers of the local cover band Past Their Prime Time Players may have caught wind of the child’s pipes even earlier, when she sang Aretha Franklin and Judy Garland songs with them at local charity events. She scored that gig through the band’s pianist Richard, her father, who now oversees his daughter’s career via the independent label A440. Her mother is her stylist and handler. Despite their degree of involvement, Yanofsky says her parents only eased her into this career, never pushed.

“Ever since I muttered the words, ‘I want to be a singer’ at age two, they’ve always believed in me. The mentality they have instilled in me—before you can be, you have to think that you are—is the reason I have been able to achieve my dreams.”

Lately, Yanofsky has been consumed with promoting her debut album Nikki, featuring her own compositions alongside contributions from songwriters such as Feist and Ron Sexsmith. But despite a busy showbiz schedule, Yanofsky still finds time to be a teenager, listening to Lady Gaga and Beyoncé and obsessing over Twilight—she invited Robert Pattinson to be her date at the Junos, an offer he apologetically declined.

Maybe she’ll have better luck in a couple of years, when she’s legal. That said, Yanofsky is hardly jailbait, always careful to appear “age appropriate,” and she says she’s likely to retain her modesty into adulthood. There is, however, one restriction that she is tiring of.

“I’m underage, and most jazz scenes [revolve around] clubs I can’t go to yet—two more years!”

Yanofsky has already performed at such venues as Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center, but her favourite gig to date happened here at home, a rained-out show at last year’s Jazz Fest. “It was pouring cats and dogs but no one moved, it just looked like a sea of umbrellas,” she says. “It was so dream-like! It made it really special.”

In the studio, Yanofsky has worked with the likes of K’naan and assorted Canadian pop stars on a version of “Wavin’ Flag” for Haiti earthquake relief, as well as Wyclef Jean, Herbie Hancock and Will.I.am. And she’d still love to collaborate with Paul McCartney, Stevie Wonder, Paul Simon, Bob Dylan, John Legend and John Mayer.

“This might sound a little silly, but they’re just hopes. I always say ‘dream big’.”

Hard at work

Montreal heavyweights the Catalyst bring their
A game to the local metal scene

FIVE FOR 500: The Catalyst (Heaviest Local Act #2)

by JOHNSON CUMMINS

If you step into the monolithic rehearsal facility Cite 2000 on Notre-Dame E. at any given moment of the day, you will be literally knocked to your knees by the maelstrom of metallic riffage bleeding out from the hundreds of rooms in the building. Kind of depressing, really, as many of the bands, although highly talented and disciplined, will never get their just desserts. The Catalyst’s brand of classic thrash with hints of modern death metal, however, has earned them a second-place nod as one of Montreal’s heaviest according to the Mirror’s adoring readership. With their debut record already in the can, with the production handled by J.F. Fortin (Neuraxis, Anonymus), 2010 should prove to be a watershed year for these already seasoned metal vets. The Mirror broke the good news to bass player (and nephew to Montreal rock legend Frank Marino) Mike Marino over the phone.

Mirror: How does it feel to be voted one of Montreal’s heaviest bands?

Mike Marino: Wow, it’s a real honour and it means a lot to us that we’re making an impact on people.

M: Montreal has always been a hotbed for metal, with international attention only increasing.

MM: Well, in Europe, metal is one of the largest genres of music there is and I guess because Montreal has so much influence from Europe, that could explain some of it. I also think the bands here really work on their craft, maybe a bit harder than other places. They really put in the time and discipline in the rehearsal space to woodshed and develop before they start playing out, especially with a lot of local metal venues recently closing.

M: Do you think it’s hard for a metal band to get their name out, compared to a pop band?

MM: It’s still underground music so you can’t really go the traditional pop route of getting out there, and it’s still important to really go about things DIY. It’s really competitive in Montreal because there are just so many great metal bands here. Talent is obviously important but you really have to use all of the tools that you have available, like MySpace and Facebook, to help get your name out. Touring is still really important and you really want to be the only band people are talking about when you are playing on a bill, so you have to bring your A game, no matter if there are five people or 500. At the end of the day, it’s important to try and get people to hear your music but it’s really the quality and conviction of your music that is going to help you.