Fans of guitar tone have a lot to learn about Bill Johnson. His fourth album, Cold Outside should be the one that has this Vancouver Island native flying high above the radar, finally. Ripe with an abundance of select tracks, Johnson proves...
Over a pitcher of Molson Canadian at the Princeton Pub, while a startlingly able roots-rock ensemble hosts the open stage night behind our table, we ask Bison’s vocalist-guitarist James Farwell how he feels about his band’s recent signi...
Launch Pad is pleased to introduce our 2017 - 2018 "A Kingdom for a Stage" Season
Focus by Brad NugentBrad Nugent
The Manglers and The Engimas at the Bourbon, January 8th
The Sick Sick Sicks, Gnash Rambler, Little Guitar Army at The Railway, January 10th
By Allan MacInnis
Nothing like a good cover tune to make a great live show even better. Case i...
Derek Miller
The Dirty Looks
Arbor
I try to balance the good and bad in my reviews, even if I'm not into the style. I don't like saying it, but the sophomore album from Ontario's Derek Miller thoroughly sucks. It sounds like a bar band...
Live-show extraordinaire act APEX BREAKS are quickly rising up through the ranks with their unique twist of Psychedelic Jungle Funk. The devoted 10-piece are carving out a lasting career for themselves, and kindly took part in an interview to delve a litt
Bill Johnson contributes eight originals to his Still Blue, each one a fine example of a contemporary blues song, not merely a retread of a familiar 12 bar theme, and each sung in his evocative voice. The variety of approaches, from the sne...
Danton Jay and Heather Lynn's album, Decades After Paris, was the poster project highlighted to invite other artists to send their music to the United Nations.
The Glim Project / Incura / Stand Down / Hezzakya
Stand Down C.D. Release Party
The Penthouse, Fri. May 9th
Edward Dinsley
I hate being the reviewer who turns up late to a show and all but misses the opening act. Unfortunately, I was...
IGNITE X
Toast Of The Town at The Wise Hall
May 20th 2009
Tonight The Wise Hall looks like something out of an Elvis Presley movie: the young crowd in fancy dress appropriate to 50’s dancehall goers, as the best youth talent Vancouve...
My great grandmother was a school teacher. She raised five children in small town Alberta. When she reached the point of near exhaustion, she would grab a book and a blanket. Then she’d tell her husband she needed a break and she’d disa...
BLACK MOUNTAIN
In The Future
Jagjaguwar
When I hear Stephen McBean’s slowly-picked A-minor guitar intro for “Stormy High,” I’m almost tricked into thinking it’s a cover of “Hell’s Bells,” but then the swing-time Black...