SAM JR. (BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE) SHARES “SWEET FACE” FT. TESS PARKS FROM UPCOMING DEBUT LP

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SAM JR.’S SELF-TITLED DEBUT LP OUT MARCH 10, 2022 VIA ARTS & CRAFTS

Photo Credit : Britt Lucas ​​// DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

Last year, Sam Jr. (aka, Sam Goldberg Jr.) shared his self-titled debut album’s first single, the Dave Fridmann (Flaming Lips/MGMT/Tame Impala) mixed “You Lock The Door, I Broke The Window”, and at the top of this year revealed album track “Keep It Buried”. With less than a month to go before the album is released into the ether, today Sam Jr. is sharing yet another new track from the LP.

For the album’s third single, “Sweet Face”, Sam approached Tess Parks as he felt the album already had “too much me,” he says. “I knew her work but was reluctant to message her because I’m just a drip making my first solo album and she’s made records with all these cool people and I’m just me with my little song but I emailed her and she wrote back ‘Hey!! this song rules instantly - i am so down !’ So that made my day. Her voice is so unique. Low and raspy with so much character. She makes the song.”

On the track itself, Sam says he’s not sure he “needs to explain any further but my sonic mixing notes to Dave Fridmann we're ‘Keep it cool and sexy. Make it sound like you're driving a stolen car at night after you've robbed a bank and you pull over to a bar at the side of the road for a drink to contemplate your next move. While you've been sipping your drink you've been also locking eyes with someone across the room. On your way out the door you stop by their table and after a few words you both make a run for it!’”

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“Sweet Face” Single Art // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES


MORE ABOUT SAM JR.’S DEBUT LP
Fuzzed out guitars with psychedelic laced wah wahs and bongos?? And flutes? rock oozing buzzed out hippie rock ? Evil nihilist ooze-rock slacker fuzz? There’s a lot of play within that framework of Sam Jr.’s new self-titled debut so we’ll leave it to you to decide for yourself what Sam Jr. is all about when the appropriate moment comes. 

“My concept for awhile making this record was actually ‘What would the Dude’s band from The Big Lebowski sound like?’” laughs Goldberg, the titular architect behind this long-overdue solo stepping-out. “I’m not sure it landed there at all, but I think I was trying to harness the easygoing nature and spirit of that character. I’m a hardwired optimist and a mellow person overall, and I wanted that to come across in the songs.” 

Meantime, you’re probably wondering how such a confident ‘debut’ could pop out of nowhere. Well, that’s because it didn’t. This Samuel Goldberg, Jr., chap looks oddly familiar, right? And that name… it rolls off the tongue nicely, yes, but it also rings a bell. So where exactly have you seen this guy before? Because you know you’ve seen him before. 

You have indeed seen Sam Goldberg before. And you’ve seen him pretty much everywhere, that’s where. If you’ve kept even a casual eye on the Canadian pop landscape for the past 25 years or so, in fact, Sam Goldberg, Jr., has been hiding in plain sight the whole time as a vital member of an uncanny number of bands with whom you’re either already acquainted or – and no judgement here – should perhaps be ashamed of yourself in hindsight for previously failing to get acquainted with. 

WATCH / SHARE “KEEP IT BURIED” HERE
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There’s the globetrotting group hug known as Broken Social Scene, of course, which has counted Goldberg as a stable conscript since 2007 and whose ranks have over the years helped launch the likes of Metric, Stars and Leslie Feist to a modest form of indie-rock greatness. But there’s also Uncut, a truly formidable noise-rock “guitar band’s guitar band” that made evangelicals of its far-flung followers but never quite grasped as a whole how huge it could have been to properly follow through on its generous promise. There’s Bodega, whose subtly transfixing 1997 debut album Bring Yourself Up got gobbled up and murdered by an international major-label deal gone wrong and remains to this day one of the best Canadian records of all time (“That first Bodega record is fucking great,” concurs Goldberg) that pretty much no one has ever heard. There’s Bionic, a punk-rock pseudo-supergroup originally of combined Doughboys, Change of Heart and, yes, Bodega extraction that could reliably melt your face from the get-go but ultimately proved too volatile to survive for long in any consistent form. There’s Hawaii, a duo whose eponymous 2003 one-off LP will easily satisfy your next desire for a late-night (Slow)dive into (Mazzy)stardom if you bother to sleuth it out. And there’s Yardlets, another duo that was so sardonically ‘meta’ in its expert appropriation of au courant 21st-century ‘psychedelic goth shoegaze punk’ trends across two albums released in 2012 and 2015 that it actually managed to make you feel uncomfortable for enjoying its own music. 

Good company and a consistently high – indeed, often too-good-for-its-own-good – standard of quality all around, then. Goldberg even notched a high-profile Felix Prize nomination for “Producer of the Year” in Quebec in 2014 for his work on Kandle’s In Flames. But while one hates to invoke the “always a bride’s maid, never a bride” metaphor because Sam is a damn good catch and would look splendid in peach chiffon whether he was headed to the altar or not, there’s always been a sense amongst his friends, acquaintances and admirers that Sam Goldberg, Jr. hasn’t properly received his due. 

LISTEN / SHARE “YOU LOCK THE DOOR, I BROKE THE WINDOW” HERE
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So here you have Sam Jr., which is Goldberg taking a undiluted and unfettered deep dive into the black buzz-bin catacombs of the soul and having a bit of a laugh at his own expense while doing it, in much the same manner the Jesus and Mary Chain or Suicide were always kinda winking at you while they were wallowing. And it’s all Sam Jr., for the record, save some bongo-mad percussion work from Miles Dupire-Gagnon of Elephant Stone and Anemone, guest vocals from Toronto chanteuse Tess Parks and a sprinkle of cornet, sax and flute (yes, flute) here and there. Goldberg handled the rest of the instrumentation himself, observing a strict palette of sounds otherwise limited mainly to fuzz- and wah-wah-afflicted guitars, bass and a bit of synth. And he kept things strict for a reason. 

“I’ve played with bands my whole life and I’ve been working with other artists or producing other artists forever and, y’know, I’ve had people for years asking me ‘When are you gonna make your own record?’ I just kept getting that. So finally I just went ‘Why not? I should just start a record,” says Goldberg. “So I started a record in 2018 that I finished at the beginning of the COVID pandemic. And I hated it. It took me quite a while to finish and by the time it was done, I didn’t like it. I didn’t like the sound of the record, I was singing out of my register like Mariah Carey and there were just too many ideas - a zillion ideas - going on. And I didn’t like the songs. The songs just weren’t there for me, weren’t doing it for me.” 

Despite suffering “that deep, disgusting feeling” of investing a lot of time and money and effort into something he couldn’t even trick himself into standing behind, Goldberg sucked it up, shelved the record and “started from scratch again.” 

At least he’d deduced from that experience what he didn’t want to do the second time around. And so, after hearing from a friend with great interest about the amount of time Scottish electro-weirdos Boards of Canada would invest in deciding upon which highly specific set of sounds they would use for each recording, for Sam Jr.’s forthcoming “real” first album he decided he would take the same rigorously self-limiting approach. And that cracked the whole thing wide open. He had an entire record finished in months. 

“Once I found that palette of colours that worked it came together so quickly. I was shocked at how fast it came together,” Goldberg recalls. “For some reason, I was loving the sound of the wah-wah. And I loved the sound of ‘fuzz,’ a really fuzzed-out rhythm guitar. And that was kind of it. But I would also try to limit myself to, like, five tracks. It would always just be ‘I’m gonna record the rhythm guitar, there’s only gonna be one rhythm, there’s always gonna be a wah guitar happening.’ That sort of thing. I really made an effort to minimalize everything. There are barely any elements happening. There’s just the rhythm, the bass, the guitar, there’s drums and there’s lots of percussion. And you know what? I love the sound of bongos so there’s a lot of bongos going on. Which is kinda weird, but I was just really into bongos. 

“There are minimal elements, but when they happen they’re there for a reason. There’s no fluff there just to be buried in the mix. Everything’s there for a reason. I’m trying to keep people engaged, but I’ve also been listening to music and playing music my whole life so I just wanted to make something enjoyable for myself that, hopefully, other people might want to listen to, as well.” 

Read the full biography by Ben Rayner : www.killbeatmusic.com/samjr

UPCOMING PERFORMANCES
Mar 11 - Montréal, QC - Église St-Édouard
Mar 19 - Toronto, ON - Baby G


Album Artwork by : Walter Silver // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

SAM JR. TRACKLIST
01 You Lock The Door I Broke The Window 
02 Sweet Face (feat Tess Parks) 
03 Na Na Na Na Na
04 Keep It Buried 
05 Quarter To Apocalypse 
06 World Bangin On My Door 
07 Dippp 

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GHOSTKEEPER ANNOUNCES NEW LP VIA VICTORY POOL

MULTIDIMENSIONAL CULTURE OUT MAY 27, 2022 VIA VICTORY POOL

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Photo Credit : Heather Saitz // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

‘Let these bodies know / that they exist for one another,’ beckons Shane Ghostkeeper above an angularly shifting progression. ‘This is a reckoning of truth and perception / a smooth redemption. Each phrase is echoed by a response from a ghostly choir, which blurs the line between the spirit world and the world of flesh and bone. These are the opening lines from Calgary based art-rock band Ghostkeeper's latest offering, Multidimensional Culture, an album which contains no shortage of dimensions, both sonically, and spiritually.

Today, they share the new single from the album, “The Trees” a song which Ghostkeeper says is about “escaping this colonial, political climate with its greed that abuses the Earth and its many religions that vie to conquer and chain the soul. It’s about yearning to return to that powerful spot: that piece of land where I have played in wonderment with the Creator as it engaged as Mother Earth and Grandmother Sun; that place in time when spirituality was simple, concise and magical…and I felt safe, inspired, and grateful."

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MORE ABOUT GHOSTKEEPER
The duo (originally from the Paddle Prairie Metis Settlement in Alberta) met in their early twenties, and began artistically collaborating soon after. Sarah, already a visual artist and musician, was integral to determining the imagery for the project from early on. She utilized her talents to design their album artwork, t-shirts, and masks, while Shane, who had only recently embarked on his musical journey, began laying the ground work for what would become their shared musical voice. Once their vision for the project had presented itself, the duo's trajectory and purpose became clear.

Their early recordings were released through Calgary-based record labels Saved By Vinyl and Flemish Eye (home to acclaimed artists Chad Vangaalen, Yves Jarvis, and Preoccupations). The band have long collaborated with Calgary heavy-hitter musicians Ryan Bourne and Eric Hamelin, who are integral in forging the melodic complexity of the bands’ sonically expansive catalog. Multidimensional Culture is at once unpredictable, and easily digestible. 

The album blends the avant-garde instincts of Ghostkeeper's previous releases with a new found peacefulness that has presented itself since the couple became parents. Thematically, Multidimensional Culture tackles many of life’s big questions, from the fragility of human existence, to the innocence of love. Even the pain of their ancestral discrimination is approached with a tenderness and understanding that only a narrator with true empathy and wisdom could provide. The sonic range of this record traverses a wide spectrum of influences, including African psychedelia, traditional Metis music, 70’s freak-folk traditions, and proto-punk guitar based bands like Television. All of these influences blend seamlessly into a sound that is unique, yet familiar. 

WATCH AND SHARE “GRASSY PLAINS” HERE
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Each song holds its own weight as a pillar to which the greater sonic structure rests upon. Each story has been lived, and there is a penetrating honesty in both Shane and Sarah's delivery that is palpable. Ghostkeeper channels the spirit world in all of its pain, beauty and wonderment, and gifts it to anyone willing to accept.

MULTIDIMENSIONAL CULTURE TRACKLIST
01 Doo Wop
02 Finn
03 Grassy Plains
04 Rolly
05 Summer Child
06 This Is How I Know You
07 Ancestral
08 The Trees
09 Ghost On A Rope
10 Tropical Metis

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JERRY LEGER SHARES NEW TRACK FROM UPCOMING LP

“Underground Blues” Video Still

Just about a month from now, Jerry Leger will be releasing his new album, Nothing Pressing, courtesy of Latent Recordings. Today, the celebrated songwriter is sharing another new track from the album, “Underground Blues”, which Leger says is about ‘survival’. "When asked about what success meant to him, Leonard Cohen replied ‘survival’,” says Leger. “He was reflecting on when he wrote poetry books and novels that barely sold a few hundred copies each, then started making records that had sluggish sales before seeing his career become more financially successful. This was a guy who had one of his albums turned down which included the now much celebrated and covered song ‘Hallelujah’. They told him, ‘we know you're great but we don't know if you're any good’. On its eventual classic status, Cohen said a mild sense of revenge arose in his heart. Now, ‘Underground Blues’ isn't about Leonard Cohen but it's about survival. There's no smoke and mirrors in what I do and that can be rewarding for both the creator and the listener. Are we not all just trying to survive in some way?"

“Underground Blues” Single Artwork // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

MORE ABOUT NOTHING PRESSING

Written during the pandemic, Nothing Pressing isn’t the only thing has kept Leger busy while off the road. In 2020 Leger published his first book of poetry Just the Night Birds, made a film for his mailing list subscribers The Apartment Show He Never Gave, while releasing what he terms a “surprise” album, Songs from the Apartment. 

Songs from the Apartment was a stripped-down lo-fi affair recorded in his home using a cheap tape recorder with an internal microphone. Two songs from the current album, “Underground Blues” and “Sinking In”, were also recorded in Leger’s home, this time using two SM58 microphones fed into his vintage 1981 Tascam 4-track tape recorder. The remaining nine tracks included on Nothing Pressing present Leger’s work in two starkly contrasting soundscapes. “Nothing Pressing”, “Protector”, and “Still Patience”, are solo acoustic recordings cut live in the studio with little embellishment save Dan Mock’s overdubbed harmony vocals and, on the title track, producer Michael Timmins’ ukulele. The other six tracks are prime roots rock and roll featuring his long-time band The Situation (drummer Kyle Sullivan and bass player Dan Mock). Among the latter songs, “Kill It With Kindness” and “Have You Ever Been Happy?” have the kind of drive, energy and spirit that  are sure to make them highlights of his future live shows.

Leger often times finds himself at a loss as to explain the source of his songs. He feels his  songwriting, while clearly drawing on experiences filtered through a panoply of influences, often verges on being a supernatural experience. Over the course of the eleven songs on Nothing Pressing, the songwriter’s songwriter engages with questions of existence, mortality, hope, trust, and heartbreak while simultaneously conjuring feelings of isolation, reflection, longing, and gratitude.  

WATCH / SHARE “HAVE YOU EVER BEEN HAPPY?” HERE

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Paired with such evocative lyrics are wonderfully crafted melodies, soulful vocals, and the spirit and energy of a mature songwriter, comfortable in his skin and growing as an artist with every release. Nothing Pressing serves a wonderfully refreshing tonic in troubling times.

Born in the mid-80s, singer-songwriter Jerry Leger came of age in the Upper Beaches area of  Toronto. Surrounded by music from a young age, his grandfather first turned him onto Hank  Williams, constantly playing the youngster a plethora of the honky tonk master’s great  recordings. Although Williams’ voice came from another world in terms of time, geography,  and class, Leger was intrigued by the ways that Williams’ songs told a story and often conjured up mysterious images in his head. Other seminal influences were slowly added including John Lennon (and the Beatles), Bob Dylan, Lightnin' Hopkins, Leonard Cohen, Elvis Costello, Neil Young, the Everly Brothers, Tom Waits, and Gordon Lightfoot. 

In 2005 as Leger turned nineteen he cut his first independently released album. In the sixteen  years since then the multi-talented singer-songwriter has recorded nine additional studio  albums as well as one live compilation under his own name. In 2014 he was signed to the  Cowboy Junkies’ label, Latent Recordings, releasing the critically acclaimed Early Riser that  same year. His second Latent release, Nonsense and Heartache, followed in 2017. A year  later the two-album set was picked up by Proper Records for distribution in the U.K and  Europe, leading to extensive touring throughout the continent, in the process opening up a  whole new audience for Leger’s finely crafted songs. With his next Latent album, 2019’s Time Out for Tomorrow, Leger began to receive positive notices in such high-profile music  magazines as Uncut and Rolling Stone. 

A restless hungry spirit, when not performing and recording under his own name, Leger stays busy with a plethora of side projects including The Del Fi’s (loose improvisatory rock and  roll) and the Bop Fi’s (Leger reciting his poetry over jazz accompaniment). He has also been known to work under the pseudonym Hank Holly (bonus points go to those who can figure out where that name came from!). 

PRE-SAVE NOTHING PRESSING HERE

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NOTHING PRESSING TRACKLIST
Nothing Pressing
Kill It With Kindness
Recluse Revisions
Wait A Little Longer
Still Patience
Underground Blues
Have You Ever Been Happy?
With Only You
Sinking In
A Page You've Turned
Protector

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