Apologies; long time, no music advice, Dork Shelf-ers. But I have returned to these parts for the mighty occasion that is the North by Northeast festival! I’ve got a handful of acts – here, take a few – you should check out if you’re planning on perusing the festival market for the rest of the week. Here goes.
2010 was, by all accounts, a pretty rad year in music. The Canadian indie scene continued to thrive, all while established Canuck bands like Caribou and Arcade Fire wowed us with new albums. Didn't the music establishment declare electronica and rock n' roll dead nigh a decade ago? And yet here we are, still rocking out. Hip-hop, too, (or rap music as the kids call it) continued its rebirth of sorts; a vibrant new sound that is still hard to pin down, but one that is devoid of unironic autotuning and top 40 aspirations. Since summing up a year in music is proving quite difficult in less than 100 words, I'll leave that task to the musical experts of the Shelf: Jess and Zack.
It’s the end of 2010! Holy crap! Music has been really wicked this year, but you know what, we here at Dork Shelf are kind of glad we’re on to the next round. We're excited for a fresh wave of newly made-up genres and themes. While this year held Kanye, teenage dreams, The Suburbs and more in priority, next year could have much more west coast chillwave bands, danceable Brit Pop and hopefully a lot more interesting local Toronto bands (wink).
So, did anyone make it out to North by Northeast (NXNE)? If you did, what did you think? Suffering from concert and new band withdrawal? Well, Monthly Music is back to remedy just that with some exciting music to pump up your summer. So, without further adieu… Three Toronto bands you should know by now: […]
