CMF Day 1: Sloan, Will Currie & the Country French and Zeus

I started off my crazy five days of activity by heading just up the street to The Mod Club to see Sloan, the old reliables, doing what they do best. Opening the evening were a couple of local pop rock bands whose music treads a similar territory to the one that Sloan had crafted almost 20 years ago.
Opening the evening was Zeus, who are a musical amalgamation of bands that I've been somewhat acquainted with over the last couple of years: the 6ixty 8ights and Paso Mino. I was already an especially huge fan of the former band, so seeing Carlin Nicholson hop on stage with his newly acquired mustache immediately assured me that this was going to be a great show. With co-frontman Mike O'Brien, they played a wonderful 60's influenced set that was accessible and easy to enjoy. The songs were mainly uptempo rock 'n roll numbers, with just a hint of rootsy surfadelica thrown into the mix. When hearing their songs, it's easy to be shocked at how accomplished they sound for such a relatively new band. But the fact of the matter is that they have been playing in their own bands for several years, and also working as Jason Collett's band. Add to that the fact that Carlin and Mike have been making music together since childhood, and it's no wonder that they sounded so good. A debut album is hopefully going to be released in the near future.

Photos: My pictures of Zeus @ The Mod Club are on flickr
Myspace: Zeus

I've been meaning to see Will Currie and the Country French for quite some time now, and the fact that Jay Ferguson has been touting them as his favourite live band, only made me more intrigued. They play some of the happiest music I have ever heard, and it's easy to see what the boys in Sloan see in them. Their music is very piano driven, and I definitely hear shades of Ben Folds, McCartney and even a touch of Brian May in the guitar work. They're the type of band that I would love to have pumping out of my iPod while skipping down the street on a bright summer day (which hopefully we'll be seeing again someday soon in Toronto.) Although the songs were rather enjoyable, most of them do have a bit of a sameness about them, and ultimately it's the energetic nature of the band, performance-wise, that I would label as their strongest point. Their album A Great Stage is available now, on Murder Records.

Photos: My pictures of Will Currie and the Country French @ The Mod Club are on flickr.
Myspace: Will Currie and the Country French

What else can I say about Sloan? They put on a powerhouse performance, as usual, that once again proved them to be a real Canadian treasure. There is just something so satisfying about seeing a band that really has nothing left to prove, as they rip through a crowd pleasing set that featured many of the hits, and focused mainly on their more stadium rock type of material. They opened the evening with the one-two punch of Penpals and Losing California, before lunging into a set of material from Parallel Play. For obvious reasons, classics like Coax Me, The Good In Everyone and Everything You've Done Wrong seemed to get the greatest audience reaction, which culminated in a blistering rendition of Money City Maniacs. For me, the best performance of the night was their wicked fast version of HFXNSHC, which is quickly becoming one of my favourite songs in their entire catalog. Although most of my favourite songs by Sloan are some of the more experimental album cuts, there is no question that the straight ahead rock songs are the ones that encourage the greatest audience reaction, and it was great to see them simply doing what they do best.

Setlist: Penpals / Losing California / All I Am Is All You're Not / Witch's Wand / Burn For It / Living The Dream / Emergency 911 / HFXNSHC / Blackout / Cheap Champagne / The Good In Everyone / Coax Me / Ready For You / The Lines You Amend / Everything You've Done Wrong / The Dogs / People Of The Sky / I'm Not A Kid Anymore / Believe In Me / Who Taught You To Live Like That / The Other Man / Money City Maniacs / ENCORE: Push Pins (w/Will Currie & the Country French) / Iggy and Angus / She Says What She Means

[Note: I just took a glance at the Sloan Message Board to see how the Thursday show went, and now I wish that I hadn't. The Marquee and The Moon? Chester? Hate My Generation? Deeper Than Beauty? UNDERWHELMED? WHY? WHY?]

Photos: My pictures of Sloan @ The Mod Club are on flickr.
Myspace: Sloan