Hits, hells and holes

Things are slowing down a bit as Christmas approaches, but there's still a whack of Christmas shows to go to, and a few other events like Thursday's Freh Hell-Stuck In A Hole- Direct Hit shindig at the Luneta cafe. Fresh Hell made their first appearance on the blog just this Sunday after their appearance at the Centretown Recording Association Xmas show, Stuck In A Hole were playing their last show, and Direct Hit are just touring Canada (their home base is in Milwaukee).

First off, Fresh Hell - who also happened to be a subject of our last non-flashback post.



Cory sings!



A shouty bit!



Another shouty bit!



The whole lot!



Vance hits!



On to Stuck In A Hole and Direct Hit after the jump.

Smoke and roses

On to the Yips at Mugshots. That's a bit redundant: I don't think I've seen them play anywhere else. Each show has been a step up from the last, and the most recent one I caught, this November, was a real stunner. The crowd really went nuts for this gig back in March.

The whole smokey lot!



Jon hits!



More Yips!



Things got kind of smokey ...



Since then they've done some recording, and their new EP (on Bruised Tongue, natch) has received fulsome praise from the folks at Weird Canada.

Back in times

School's out for the year, so it's time to hop in the wayback machine and check out some shows from seasons past. In this case, we're picking up where we left off, in March. The Place: Mugshots; the band: Average Times, sharing a bill with The Yips and Teenanger.

This was pre-Seiji, with Tim on bass.



Stef hits!



The whole lot!



Tim sings!



Curtis sings!



Fisheye action!



More Stef!



The end!



They just played a show at 614 Gladstone .. who knows what the future holds?!?

Unsilent night

For the last few years the Centretown Recording Alliance - i.e., folks from The Centretown Cripplers, Allrights and sundry - offshoots and their friends have thrown a seasonal shindig with a heap of bands. This year they rolled into Gabba Hey. The weather was about as uncooperative as it could get, but a few dozen people showed up to catch the action. I got there a bit late to see Thunderuncle start things off.

Patrick Shanks was up, singing about sumo wrestlers and beating up giraffes.



And so on!



Next up were Neck, who I've seen a bunch of of late - third show in two months, or something like that. They like their matching duds!



Johhny rocks the low end.



The whole lot!



Kevin hits!



Singalong action!



Santa action!



More Centretown action after the jump!

Chill wave

There was plenty of competition for attendance Friday night, but in the end I headed for the locale most likely to have hot drinks - it was damn cold! An evening at pressed was also musically attractive, with varied guitar sounds from F Hood and Blake Hargreaves and some electronic experimentation courtesy of RAAS.

Josh Hawley lists his influences as Tangerine Dream and John Fahey, his guitar coruscation made me think a lot of Roy Montgomery.



Over-exposed action!



Many similar photos are available on my Flickr; you can check out and download his music at his Bandcamp. On to Blake Hargreaves. I saw one-half of Caymans last Saturday at Pressed, now here's the other half, doing a lot of guitar tapping.



Also singing a bit, backed by some canned beats.



RAAS rounded things off with a more electronic set; I saw Michael and Kerry at the House of Targ in June, they had some new stuff to show off.



The visiuals worked a bit better this time.



Blurry action!



Adjusting action!



Cubic action!



A fine night, though I kind of regret sitting near the door and getting blasted by cold everytime someone arrived or left ...

Black Ought

The entertainment calendar is beginning to thin out as we get closer to Christmas, but if you fancy post-punk or the hardcore side of Ottawa underground music scene in the mid-1990s then Pressed was the place to be last night. Mark from Black Bough Records brought Dark Plains, Lungbutter and Ought together to play a fairly intense show. (Taline Noelle Bedrossian also did some pre-set tape-manipulating, but I arrived too late to hear it.)

First up, Dark Plains. This is yet another Ottawa bass-and-drums duo, and it's interesting to hear how they differ from Big Dick (who come out of Ottawa's punk rock and punk-pop scene) and Thought Project (from the hard rock side of things). Andy Cant and Matt Deline have their roots in Okara and Shotmaker. Andy's also appeared on the blog with the New Autum Line and Les Allumettes. They had their first show this year at Ottawa Explosion. Here's Andy!



Plain action!



Dark action!



Matt sings!



Staring action!



The end!



More stuff after the jump.

Prodigal sons

Back in July I went to the House of Targ to check out C'mon frontman Ian Blurton's new band, Public Animal, and was duly blown away. When I heard they were returning to town for a show at the Dominion Tavern I naturally decided to go see them again, along with local lights Big Dick and Mass, a band with a bunch of local expats now stationed in Toronto.

Mass took the stage first. The band features local scene vets Mike Laderoute (Robot Kill City, Van Johnson) and Steve Lam (Black Actors). Here he is at right, with bassist Mark.



Ex-Black Actor Steve Lam and Andrew Butko (of Disgruntled, Van Johnson and others - though the only time he's appeared on the blog has been playing guitar in Nick Gaetano's country combo).



Andrew hits!



Mark sings!



Mike sings!



Extra Steve!



Rhythm section action!



More Mike!



The whole lot!



A fine exhibition .. then it was on to some former bandmates, Big Dick ...