“It's when all you want is honesty, but someone else is deciding that you can't handle it in full.” - Clothesline From Hell
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Slowcity.ca Open Mic: Cuff The Duke, Ontarians, Chris Gostling, Bob Sumner, Ada Lea, His His, Mia Kelly, and Charlotte Cornfield
Slowcity.ca Open Mic: Cuff The Duke, Ontarians, Chris Gostling, Bob Sumner, Ada Lea, His His, Mia Kelly, and Charlotte Cornfield
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Sampa The Great
Slowcity.ca Open Mic: Bonnie Raitt, Margo Price, Abigail Lapell, Ada Lea, Ken Yates, JAD, Henry Chadwick, and Sampa The Great
By Will McGuirk
"all dressed up" is a fever dream of isolation and claustrophobia, circumscribed by all these obsolete media machines -- but with a semi-hopeful note, too, about making the best of an absurd situation, or at least, 'this too shall pass'.” - Abigail Lapell
“The only thing to do is ride out your last few moments with the people you love.” - Ken Yates
"We’re not going to stay in one lane, we’re going to create multiple ones. . . My truest self encourages me to explore different lanes, and go beyond what I think I know of myself.” - Sampa The Great
Ada Lea @ the Axis Club, Toronto Tuesday May 10 2022
Ken Yates @ the Cameron House Toronto Wednesday, June 22, 2022
Fleece
Slowcity.ca Open Mic with Chastity, Ekelle, Charlotte Day Wilson, Ada Lea, Joy Crookes, Alex Cuba, Fleece, Graham Wright, Talleen, Mary Jennings, Jon Stancer, and Rise Carmine,
Ekelle
By Will McGuirk
“‘When You Were Mine’ is a song I wrote about an ex-partner that ended up being with a man after we broke up. It’s a song about accepting their love, but wishing the same for myself. I wrote it with the backdrop of Brixton because that is where their love unfolded and where I spent a lot of my childhood. We recorded a brass section (it was my first time recording brass and excited was an understatement); we wanted it to sound messy so Japanese whiskey was involved and listening to lots of Ebo Taylor.” - Joy Crookes
“My social media feeds are crammed with dire and insistent warnings from scientists, experts and activists, and newsreels showing floods, fires, hurricanes and other horrific, climate related catastrophes. All of this chatter and imagery were swirling around in my head at the time of writing this song.” - Jon Stancer
“We wanted to reflect how our society can sometimes be shrouded in mystery and symbolism, money being the driving force behind the illusion.” - Alex Crow, Talleen
Slowcity.ca Open Mic with Slow Leaves, Scott Hardware, Alex Izenberg, Ada Lea, Kadeema, Lukas Nelson & the Promise of the Real, and 100 Mile House
By Will McGuirk
Say you survive, most will, so say you’re a lucky one, say we get back to something resembling what we had, say you are talking to your grandchildren about this time, what will you say you did? You have time now, for all the projects, for all the records, for all the lessons, to learn a language, to birdwatch, to stargaze, to knit, too cook, to slow down and look at your neighbourhood and your neighbour, say you don’t die, then what? Did you help or hinder, grow or standstill like time.
“This song is a defence of my fears, conceits, and contradictions. Some of us were born with broken hearts and find comfort in slipping into sentimentality as though into an old pair of slippers. The video intends to be as transparent as the song.” - Grant Davidson
Little Scream, photo by Zach Hertzman
Slowcity.ca Open Mic with Jacques Greene, Luke Lalonde, Sandy Alex G, Lynne Hanson, Erin Costelo, LIA, Ada Lea, Little Scream, Badge Époque Ensemble, Lower Dens and Enterprise Earth
By Will McGuirk
I was watching an ad for No Frills, a video by Scott Cudmore and I started thinking about art, because that ad is art and how art is reinterpretation of life, art is a question of what is and who we are and who we are as art and there is a further story about how who we think we are can be reinterpreted as pixels for one or paint daubs for another. Who will you trust to reinterpret you? Who will you trust to re-constitute you? Would you even let go of your ego? But while I ponder here are tonight’s guests.
“This song is about the perils of falling for a poet, and just how rare it is to find true love.” - Lynee Hanson
“Directed by Amelia Curran and shot during the recording of my latest album, Sweet Marie, the video for "Hands on Fire" is a celebration of collaboration and the song itself embodies the struggles and joys of creating something.” - Erin Costelo
“This song is a celebration of me finding my way to womanhood and because of that, opening my arms to love.” - LIA
"During that period of 180 days, I often wondered what it would be like if I ever reached the other side; a seemingly unattainable goal. This song is an homage to that dream-like period." - Ada Lea
Badge Époque Ensemble, photo by Colin Medley
Ada Lea
Slowcity.ca Open Mic Catch-up edition w/ Kacy & Clayton, Jitensha, Ada Lea, Eden Warsaw, Alex Bent, Leslie Grace and The Drew Thomson Foundation
By Will McGuirk
Yah been away for a few weekends, been sitting in fields listening to live tunes under blistering heat, yah been offline and away but the inbox has still been open so tunes coming in - here’s a few that caught my ear when I came back burnt and energised. Always more to come so stay in touch, and yah Ada Lea has been featured a few times, happy to see her star on the rise.