Uptown Magazine Online - Winnipeg's Online Source for Arts, Entertainment & News

Uptown Magazine - Winnipeg's Online Source for Arts, Entertainment & News

May 8, 2008


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Better late than never

Wilco made good on cancelled show - and it was great

(Wilco, May 2, Burton Cummings Theatre w/ Retribution Gospel Choir)

From douchebags to diamonds, you could say last Friday's Wilco show at the Burt had it all.

The diamonds came in the form of musical gem after musical gem of familar and not-so-familiar Wilco material that ran the gamut of the Chicago outfit's career. If frontman Jeff Tweedy and his bandmates weren't turning songs such as Handshake Drugs, Shake it Off or Hate it Here into squirming, electric/roots potboilers, they were pulling out tender folk songs such as Summer Teeth (the title cut from the band's oft-overlooked third album) or I'm the Man Who Loves You, evoking Tweedy's wistful, vulnerable side.

The sextet played for 85 minutes on the night, offering up a solid 26 songs and a no-frills virtuosity that encompassed all aspects of the band's oeuvre - from folk to blues to rock. to face-ripping art-noise.

It was in this latter mode that guitarist Nels Cline particularly shone. Cline's a lanky, well-schooled axeman who's perfectly capable of tasteful, tonally correct solos - but he really impresses when his penchant for sonically caving in skulls comes out to play, as it did several times after he was first let loose, on Impossible Germany. After that first shock of a power solo, every single one of Cline's squealing, atonal barks was a reminder that Wilco ain't exactly your mama's folk/rock band.

And the douchebags? Well those were the guys in the stage-right, main-floor loge who high-fived and hooted through Tweedy's quieter material - so much so that the acerbic frontman actually called them to task.

The singer apologized (sort of) a few songs later, saying - with an impish grin on his face - that behaviour such as that simply made him "think of... well... of douchebags."

Such an exchange wasn't exactly pulled from the Official Book of Rock Patter - but it was certainly far more human than all the lame "Hello Winnipeg" shtick I've seen.
— John Kendle

Magic for music lovers

Hip hop rebels Buck 65 and Cadence Weapon lit it up at the West End

(Buck 65, April 29, West End Cultural Centre, w/ Cadence Weapon)

When I interviewed Cadence Weapon for Uptown a couple of weeks ago, he said that he and tourmate Buck 65 "make music for music lovers."

He's right. I'm a music lover, and even though hip hop doesn't usually turn my crank, this was one of the best shows I've seen so far this year.

Edmonton's premier wordsmith Cadence Weapon (aka Rollie Pemberton) got the party started at the West End - and from his Ian Cutis-like mannerisms to his Daft Punk T-shirt, it was obvious that Pemberton's influences aren't those of your average rapper. Easily handling his notoriously wordy raps - especially those off his latest, Afterparty Babies - Cadence Weapon proved a masterful performer.

Buck 65 (aka Richard Terfry) has long eschewed the conventions of mainstream hip hop, and having only known the record incarnation of Buck 65, I was interested to see how his genre-spanning brand of hip hop would play out onstage, particularly the more cerebral material from his latest, 2007's Situation - a concept album built around the Situationist movement of the late '50s.

Happily, his set lived up to the expectations I had for him.

With only Montreal DJ Skratch Bastid providing the backing tracks and art-house style film footage serving as the backdrop, Buck 65 treated the audience to a blistering, hour-and-a-half set that was virtually impossible not to dance to. Drawing extensively from Situation, the Nova Scotia MC hit up all the gems from that outing, including the catchy show-opener Dang!, the lyrically clever Shutterbuggin' and fun Spread 'Em. Buck 65 is certainly an artist, but he's also a personable performer, delivering an effortlessly entertaining show - one that was, indeed, for music lovers.
— Jen Zoratti

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