Sound Seekers by Fateema Sayani is published weekly at OttawaMagazine.com. Read Fateema Sayani’s culture column in Ottawa Magazine and follow her on Twitter @fateemasayani
AMOS THE TRANSPARENT REUNITE WITH THE DARCYS, TREVOR JAMES
Six Ottawa musicians come together under the banner Amos the Transparent. It’s a band named after a fictitious dude who displays a number of contrasting qualities. He’s sometimes sweet, sometimes fierce.
The band makes a clear distinction between those dualities with a set of four-song EPs. The first one, being released at the end of the month, is called Goodnight, My Dear and is full of singer-songwriter tales. The second EP, being released at the end of the year, is turned right up. It’s called I’m Falling Apart.
Next year, the band will bring it all together with the release a full-length album. It will include all eight songs from the two EPs, plus an additional six new tracks. That album is called, fittingly, Goodnight, My Dear….I’m Falling Apart, and is scheduled for Valentine’s Day 2012. It follows Amos the Transparent’s 2007 debut, Everything I’ve Forgotten to Forget and the 2009 sophomore release My What Big Teeth You Have.
The debut had expansive, lush Patrick Watson-style pop, while the second record morphed into a big rock sound. The constant is songwriter Jonathan Chandler’s lyrics that are sometimes vulnerable and candid and at other times head-scratching and ambiguous. It’s a push-pull tension that works on a lyrical level and on a musical level — making for seriously affecting rock tunes.
The show this weekend is a reunion of sorts. The Darcys, who just released a new record on the Arts & Crafts label, are Amos tour mates, while opener Trevor James is an old band mate of Chandler’s. The two created enduring sing-along tunes in the early ‘00s as The Architects.
Amos the Transparent, The Darcys, and Trevor James & The Perfect Gentlemen. Saturday, Nov. 26. 9 p.m. $5. Live Lounge, 128 York St.
BEST BET: LOVIATAR
Mike Bond, Justin Gobeil, J-P Sadek, and Shane Whitbread are Loviatar. The band melds disparate genres into a mash of thrash, metal, and brain-searing rock replete with wild imagery. There are some requisite refs to shit like wizards and castles too, as the sound-seeking may recall. Worth seeing because they are technically astute and dutifully indulgent in all the right places (guitar solos!).
Red Fang, Collider, and Loviatar. Thursday, Nov. 24. 8 p.m. $12. Maverick’s, 221 Rideau St.
MORE
Surf-spy noodlers The Reverb Syndicate play Irene’s Pub (885 Bank St.). Friday, Nov. 25. 9:30 p.m. $6.
Slim Moore & the Mar-Kays (O-town soul) play the Mercury Lounge (56 Byward Market). Thursday, Nov. 24. 9 p.m. $10.
Electro-veering folk rockers Sunparlour Players are at the NAC Fourth Stage (53 Elgin St.). Friday, Nov. 25. 7:30 p.m. $25.