ARTS & CRAFTS ANNOUNCES HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS COMPILATION, OUT TODAY

HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS FEATURING WINTER CLASSICS AND ORIGINAL COMPOSITIONS FROM DAN MANGAN, HANNAH GEORGAS, SLOAN, LOWELL, BUSTY AND THE BASS, CHARLES SPEARIN AND MORE

BUY / STREAM HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS HERE

HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS LIVE STREAM CONCERT DECEMBER 13 WITH PROCEEDS SUPPORTING THE DAILY BREAD FOOD BANK 

FEATURING PERFORMANCES BY KEVIN DREW, DAN MANGAN, CHRIS MURPHY OF SLOAN, REUBEN AND THE DARK, ZEUS AND MANY MORE

TICKETS AVAILABLE HERE VIA SIDE DOOR

Home For The Holidays Artwork // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

Home For The Holidays is Arts & Crafts’ new compilation of Holiday classics and original Winter / Holiday themed songs from some of the top Canadian artists across the country including: Dan Mangan, Hannah Georgas, Sloan, Said The Whale, and more. These songs have been curated by the team at A&C to give a new spin on what holiday music can be, whether it’s Dan Mangan’s soulful take on the classic “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas”, Hannah Georgas’ sorrowful re-work of “Let It Snow”, Busty and The Bass’ neo-soul-jazz rendition of “Auld Lang Syne”, or a fun stripped down original rock tune from Broken Social Scene/Do Make Say Think’s Charles Spearin; these songs aim to bring the warm feeling of the Holidays to you and your family during this most unusual Holiday Season. 

"Home For The Holidays began to take shape during the first few weeks of the pandemic,” says Kieran Roy, President of A&C. “With touring and recording plans put on hold, we approached our artists to contribute a holiday song for the album. In most cases, these songs were recorded in the artists’ own home studios, which now seems all the more appropriate. We hope these songs and the live stream concert will allow us all to feel a bit more festive while we’re home for the holidays.”

BUY / STREAM HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS HERE

The album opens with the “Christmas Box”, an original from Charles Spearin about “finding small sparks of love within the mundanity of the holidays,” he says. “It’s a song about getting old. It’s a song about recognizing the impermanence of all things despite the illusions of tradition.”

“Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” celebrates “the feeling of Christmas but isn’t about the Christmas story,” says Dan Mangan on his version of the holiday classic. “I love that it’s beautiful, but that it’s also kind of melancholy.”

For Hannah Georgas cover of “Let It Snow”, she wanted “to make you feel like you're walking down a quiet wintery street in the middle of the night,” she says. “The snow is falling and the only other thing you hear is the wind. I chose this song because I liked it a lot when I was a kid and it feels classic to me. I thought it would be nice to recreate an intimate version of it on the piano.”

And rounding out the compilation is Busty and the Bass’ neo-soul rendition of Robert Burns’ poem, “Auld Lang Syne”. “Alistair (Blu) threw the song out there as an idea and everyone immediately got on board with it,” the band says. “Then came the challenge of taking this poem from the 1700s and putting a Busty twist on it which is essentially what made the project exciting for the group. Due to Covid, we couldn’t all be together to craft this. Instead we passed around the audio, starting with simply a set of chords and some implied harmony, and one person at a time layered their instrument onto the others to build what you hear here.”

To complement the release of Home for the Holidays, Arts & Crafts is proud to present its first-ever holiday live-stream concert via Side Door. The concert will feature many of the artists from the album, and other Arts & Crafts favourites, performing from the comfort of their own homes to yours. The live-stream concert will take place Sunday, December 13 at 3:00pm EST (12:00pm PST). Tickets are $12.00 and can be purchased at sidedooraccess.com, with proceeds supporting the Daily Bread Food Bank in Toronto. 

 Including performances by: Kevin Drew, Dan Mangan, Chris Murphy of Sloan, Reuben and the Dark, Zeus, and many more.

HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS TRACKLIST
Charles Spearin - The Christmas Box
Zeus - Marching Through Your Head (Christmas Edition)
Hannah Georgas - Let It Snow
Ellevator - Urge for Going
Sloan - Kids Come Back Again at Christmas
Dan Mangan - Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
Jordan Klassen - Came Back On Christmas Day
Reuben and the Dark - Xmas in California
Lowell - To Mary
Said the Whale - Wanting Like Veruca
Sarah MacDougall - Out Of This Blue
Busty and the Bass - Auld Lang Syne

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SATELLITE AND THE HARPOONIST SHARE NEW VIDEO FOR “JUSTINE” FROM NEW EP

WATCH AND SHARE “JUSTINE” HERE

SATELLITE AND THE HARPOONIST - THE NEW SUPERGROUP FROM HARPOONIST AND THE AXE MURDERER’S SHAWN HALL, FEATURING MEMBERS OF THE DEEP DARK WOODS, THE BOOM BOOMS, AND KING MISSILE III

Today, Satellite and The Harpoonist are sharing the new video for “Justine” from filmmaker and animator Peter Ricq. “The inspiration for the video came from talking with Shawn,” says Ricq. “We talked about many things but the idea of turning this video into a journey mixed with pop art really stuck out. In the end, the idea of everyone around me maturing, starting or having a family, there's something that always stays, we are all dreamers and that's something we can always take with us no matter where we go.”

About the song, Shawn Hall says, “A couple summers back my buddy Jonas came over to my place and we just sat on my back deck and dropped some acid he had lying around and we began thinking about larger than life infatuations, obsessions. Shortly, after this huge guy started up a chain saw, and proceeded to drown out our thoughts, this small crew started cutting down the largest group of heritage cedar trees in my neighbourhood, directly behind my yard. So, I called down to City Hall and got an arborist over to try and stop this from happening with the neighbours yelling and crying. Well it didn’t work, the trees all fell and opened a hole in the sky that has never been filled and this song is the result, and it has nothing to do with trees.”

WATCH AND SHARE “JUSTINE” HERE

MORE ABOUT SATELLITE AND THE HARPOONIST

As the great poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow once stated, “The best thing one can do when it’s raining is to let it rain.” And so, in January 2020, as the city’s longest spell of precipitation in over five decades threatened to wash Vancouver into the Pacific, four musicians from disparate sonic territories did just that. Not that they had a say in the matter, they let it rain while gathering at Afterlife Studios to conduct an experiment as radical and historic as the weather outside. 

WATCH AND SHARE “LEE DORSEY” HERE

Shawn Hall of the acclaimed maverick blues duo The Harpoonist and The Axe Murderer was the progenitor, his notion being to assemble three talented friends with whom he had previously worked, yet that had never met each other. Then, during an intense three-day exploration of alchemic creative collaboration within a self-imposed pressure cooker environment, they would record a 6-song EP – all under the gaze of a film crew. So, as the rain smashed down on the City of Glass, Satellite and The Harpoonist was birthed, with every labour pain and its exhausting entry into the world captured on celluloid.

WATCH AND SHARE “SATELLITE MAN” (MUSIC VIDEO) HERE

LISTEN AND SHARE “ONLY LOVE CAN BREAK YOUR HEART” (NEIL YOUNG) HERE

Joining singer/harmonicist Hall in this extraordinary project – his “people that want to play in the sandbox” – are Geoff Hillhorst (Hammond organ/piano/synthesizers) of award-winning alt-country-folk dreamers, The Deep Dark Woods; Theo Vincent (percussion/congas/vocals) from Vancouver’s funk-soul powerhouse The Boom Booms, and on drums and Pencilina, Brooklyn’s Bradford Reed, of out-there art-rockers, King Missile III. The Pencilina, an incredible double-necked zither-like contraption, is Reed’s own one-off invention, making Satellite and The Harpoonist the world’s only band to feature it.

WATCH AND SHARE “BALLET IN A PHONE BOOTH” HERE

Photo Credit : Colin McTaggart // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

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MONTRÉAL OCTET BUSTY AND THE BASS RELEASE VIBRANT ANIMATED VIDEO FOR 2020 ALBUM TITLE TRACK “EDDIE”

WATCH AND SHARE “EDDIE” HERE

BAND TO PERFORM THREE AVANT EXPERIMENTAL IMPROVISED LIVESTREAM SHOWS DEC 1-3 - WATCH HERE

SOPHOMORE ALBUM EDDIE PRODUCED BY NEAL POGUE (TYLER THE CREATOR, OUTKAST, ANDERSON .PAAK) AND EXECUTIVE PRODUCED BY EARTH, WIND & FIRE’S VERDINE WHITE OUT NOW VIA ARTS & CRAFTS

STREAM / BUY EDDIE HERE

Photo credit: Maya Fuhr // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

Today, 8-piece soul-jazz collective Busty and the Bass, released their latest video for their sophomore album’s title track “Eddie”. The video, directed by June Barrie with 2nd animation by Vincent Hurtu, is a beautiful, trippy piece that flawlessly matches the band's romantic R&B and psychedelic funk soundscape.

WATCH AND SHARE “EDDIE” HERE

Today’s video launch is accompanied by the announcement of Busty and the Bass’ livestream series that will take place nightly from December 1st-3rd. Each livestream in the “Word Tour” series will be entirely improvisational, centring the ensemble’s roots in avant experimental jazz dating back to their conception in McGill University’s acclaimed jazz program.

BUY TICKETS FOR THE LIVE STREAMS HERE

Eddie was released in summer 2020 via Arts & Crafts. The 12 tracks set nostalgic and vulnerable lyrical ruminations against a soundscape of simmering soul, spirited rock, hypnotic hip-hop, perennial psychedelic funk and artful R&B. Produced by Neal Pogue (Tyler The Creator, Anderson Paak) and executive produced by Earth, Wind & Fire’s Verdine White, it features legendary collaborators George Clinton, Macy Gray, Illa J and Jon Connor. The octet of Nick Ferraro [vocals, alto sax], Evan Crofton a.k.a. Alistair Blu [vocals, keys, synths], Scott Bevins [trumpet], Chris Vincent [trombone], Louis Stein [guitar], Milo Johnson [bass], Eric Haynes [keys, piano], and Julian Trivers [drums] recorded Eddie over three uninterrupted weeks Montreal.

STREAM / BUY EDDIE HERE

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