To celebrate the 40th anniversary of David Bowie’s legendary 1972 album, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, Toronto’s Paper Bag Records (PBR) recently released a free cover compilation by multiple artists from the label. For Bowie fans, this may appear to be an exciting[Read More…]
Arts & Entertainment
Keep up to date on local art, new albums, and everything entertainment-related.
Golden Boy: Blue Swan Orchestra
Blue Swan Orchestra is the re-release of the Golden Boy’s 2003 debut album, and their latest since 2011’s Sleepwalker. The soft-rock/indie-pop band’s re-mastered album also features two bonus tracks, “Blind” and “Windows.” The album’s greatest strength is the blend of the familiar sounds of indie and pop with uniquely evoking[Read More…]
Jack Davey: LO-F! Side A
Jack Davey, frontwoman for the Californian electro-soul duo J*DaVeY, has gone solo. But for a singer who has opened for Prince, the Roots, and Janelle Monáe, the five-song EP falls distinctly flat. Davey’s voice, sultry, breathy, and deep, is wasted on what she calls “stripped-down grunge” and her attempt at[Read More…]
My beef with art
In my youth, I would occasionally visit the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow. For the uninitiated, the Tretyakov houses a vast collection of Russian fine art—picture the MoMA, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Frick collection all diced up and served as an exquisite borscht. I can’t remember much of[Read More…]
Kaguyahime: Waxing passion, waning love
Purity and human desire clash in Kaguyahime: The Moon Princess, the first show of the 2012-2013 season of Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal. Les Grands is the third ballet company in the world to stage the abstract piece, which fuses contemporary dance with traditional ballet, and succeeds in bringing[Read More…]
Could be Good
Film Free Movies at the Forum Saturday, Cineplex is hosting a community day of free films, with all proceeds going to the Starlight Children’s foundation. Selections include Transformers: Dark Side of the Moon 3D, Hugo 3D, and Mission: Impossible–Ghost Protocol. For complete listings, visit www.cineplex.com Theatre Bergman’s The Seventh Seal[Read More…]
War, worship, and wine: resurrecting ancient Greece
It’s been said that art finds its highest form in the Grecian tragedy. After watching The Bacchae, it’s easy to see why. Scapegoat Carnivale’s production of Euripides’ classic benefits from an original translation by director Andreas Apergis and assistant director Joseph Shragge. The resulting textual clarity aided the talented cast[Read More…]
Safe haven
Any excuse to meander around Old Montreal and not study for midterms is a good one, right? Currently showing at the Montreal History Centre, Nous Sommes Ici is an interactive photography exhibit that documents the lives of immigrants to Montreal, and their past struggles with violence in their countries of[Read More…]
Lolcats and revolutions: the faceless future of hacktivism
Brian Knappenberger, the writer and director of We Are Legion: The Story of the Hacktivists, claims to have compiled a documentary which explores the roots of hacktivism. What Knappenberger has created, in fact, is a fawning, if well-intentioned, tribute to Anonymous—the loose virtual collective which originated on the 4chan message[Read More…]
La Belle Époque, here and now
A unique opportunity to see works by Degas, Gauguin, Monet, Pissaro, as well as twenty-one canvases by Renoir, has opened at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA). More than a million people worldwide have already viewed the 75 Impressionist paintings on loan from the Sterling and Francine Clarke Art[Read More…]