Dear friends, foes, and love interests,
This February I went from having absolutely no content to having too much content in a matter of days. My lack of material lasted so long that both my dad and my editor reached out asking me when they would be hearing about my next blog post.
Regardless, this post is massive. Filled with two interviews, behind-the-scenes stories, discussions of new bands, new books, and new playlists, this blog post has everything. Make sure to read all the way through to catch everything about Black Budget, Luella, F!TH, Guest Room Status, Nothing Special, Patti Smith, and a special announcement from me at the end.
Merch Madness
This month on Tuesday the 7th, I had a horrible day. I got locked out of a parking garage that my car was in, and then once I finally gained access to the parking garage, I was trapped with my car. Eventually, I was able to get out and return home after my day at work, only to find that a roommate had picked up a package for me and left it outside my door. Confused and honestly a little concerned because I had just done company security training that taught me to be suspicious of strange packages, I checked the return address and realized that my gift from Toronto band Black Budget had arrived.
I am ridiculously fond of Black Budget’s 2021 single Stuck in the Desert. The baseline, the soundscape, and the vocals building from just above a harsh whisper allow the ominous theme to mount throughout the song into an epic breakdown.
The week, prior to my epic breakdown in the parking garage, the desert punk band ran an Instagram giveaway for one of the most impressive merch bundles I have seen from a local band. As many of you know from reading previous articles, I love Instagram giveaways and am of the belief that you should enter every single one of them, just in case. And that is exactly what I did.
I was thrilled to receive the message that I had won the giveaway and expected the package to take over a week to arrive. The parcel came in just a day, brightening my mood immediately.
Women in Music
After two failed Zoom calls, Luella and I were finally able to hear each other after connecting on a Google Meet. The 18-year-old artist and I had used the awkward minutes of gesturing and key mashing in the chat to shake off our awkward first meeting jitters, but honestly, I think she is always that charismatic.
I first saw Luella when she was opening for fanclubwallet at Club SAW. My friend and I had been debating shows to go to, but when she listened to both artists she immediately decided that this was the bill we had to be there for.
The show started with Luella front and centre, sounding remarkably like her recordings. She immediately won the crowd over with her bashful admission that this was her third live performance ever and that her dad was joining her on stage from behind the bass. From that moment on the crowd was captivated. I say this as if they wouldn't have been captivated already with the young singer's clear voice and honest lyrics.
Outside of music, Luella goes by Liv – Luella being her middle name. We talked about her aspirations in terms of school and music, the plans she has made for the future and the ones she had made in the past. Much like her lyrics display, she is thoughtful and self-aware, but she is also very excited.
Based out of Kingston, Ontario, Luella has had music in her life forever. She took our call from her dad's recording studio in their backyard; where he has recorded artists like Glorious Sons. She shared how bands would often stay for a month in their home while recording, becoming part of their lives for a while.
Though she played the piano and was obviously encouraged in a musical direction, it wasn't until a pandemic hit that she and her dad were able to dedicate time for her to be in the studio as an artist, as opposed to an observer. Her debut album, Luna, was written and recorded during this time, when she was 16. This gave them the time to pursue a passion project, during which they were often heard saying, “we have all the time in the world.” This phrase was in reference to the state of uncertainty the pandemic put the world in and their attempt at putting a positive spin on it. They used this time to consider each and every song.
Once the album was finished, Luella made the decision to sit on it for a year before releasing it. She wanted to fully experience high school but moreover, she wanted to wait until restrictions had eased and they could give the album the proper sendoff it deserved. Few people in her graduating class even knew that she was making music which makes the well-received album all the more impressive in its initial success.
Luella is new to the Kingston music scene, only becoming part of the supportive scene in fall of 2022. She feels very welcomed into the Kingston music scene, but shared that her Ottawa show with fanclubwallet is an eye-opening experience for her. This was the first show where nobody in the crowd had a personal connection to her, meaning that the connection she made with the crowd was brand new and thrilling. She compared it to her sold-out album release show where people she had never met showed up to hear her music.
On stage, Luella has begun to experiment with performance, even though she is still in the early stages. My strongest memory of her show at Club SAW was when she answered a ringing rotary phone and preceded to sing and entire song into it, her voice echoing out of the speakers as if we were listening to a voicemail. She told me in our interview that the prop was actually made by her grandfather, the red handset having sat in his house when her father was growing up. The phone is a major takeaway for many people at her shows, and really harkens back, at least for me, to my interview with Noise Hotel where they talked about the importance of artists cultivating an experience, not just playing music.
When talking about her music career, Luella said that next month, next year, and next steps are ambiguous. She wants to maintain the momentum that she has in music but she also wants to have a backup plan and gain some knowledge about the music industry, whether that be through experience or postsecondary education. I found in our interview that not only did Luella speak charismatically, but she had a really strong understanding of the effort that she would need to put in to achieve her dreams. Part of this can be attributed to her lifelong exposure to the music industry, but I think it stems from to her genuine passion and drive.
Luella and I also spoke about women in music and the music industry, or lack thereof. Being someone that is more in front of the stage than back in a booth, she opened my eyes to the reality that not only are there less women on stage but there are even fewer women doing technical roles in sound. Through gender studies classes, passionate research, and first-hand experience, Luella has realized there is a severe lack of female sound engineers, meaning that throughout her time in the studio, she has been diligently absorbing everything in front of her so that she is able to run her own sessions. This is one of many reasons why it is not difficult to predict that Luella will be a force to reckon with in the music scene.
Speaking with Luella was genuinely inspiring. She is so passionate about music from all angles and is seemingly starting to find herself as a player within an industry that she only watched for the longest time. I am genuinely excited to be able to follow her career.
Kingston Behaviour
In honor of my conversation with Luella, February's Fan Behaviour playlist was dubbed Kingston Behavior. Honestly, I have never been to Kingston, but through blogging about and engaging with Canadian artists, I've gotten to know little bits and pieces about the Kingston scene and I'm just looking for a reason to spend a weekend there and see some shows. Maybe the summer will show me a festival and I can wind my way down the 417 to see it.
Growing Up
Okay guys it's time to give you some vulnerability: I only recently learned who Patti Smith was.
Long story short, someone referred to me performing poetry as part of a band's performance as “Patti Smith vibes” and in order to not look like an idiot in the conversation, I looked up who she was.
I was able to determine that Patti was someone of importance, that she had a really strong impact on the art scene and that she was someone that I should know about, but I wasn't getting a lot about what she actually did. Feeling pretty dissatisfied with the meagre Google results I was offered, I decided to dive head first and place myself on a waiting list for a library book by Patti Smith.
Finally, this month, I was able to get my hands, or more over my ears, on the audiobook. It was quite odd to listen to Patti tell the story of her and her soulmate Robert Mapplethorpe without having any understanding of either of their art, but I think that made the book more impactful for me.
Patti Smith's book Just Kids is the story of her life with Robert. The book is beautiful and honest, a piece of prose that really speaks to her life as an artis and the lifelong importance of her muse. Although more about her specific relationship with Robert, Patti explains through stories the importance of artist communities, and how art does not get made without the reliance on one another. I talk a lot about the importance of community building and Just Kids speaks to that so honestly.
What specifically spoke to me was Patti’s time at the Chelsea Hotel, where artists spent their days enjoying life and making art. In many ways, she was living my dream.
Although I was completely unfamiliar with Patti's life, I knew how her story of Robert would end. It was clear in the tone that she wrote in, as well as the time period that the story occurred in, how Roberts's life would be taken from him at 36. It didn't make it any less painful or the tribute to him any less beautiful.
Patti Smith is an internationally recognized rock icon, artist, and powerful woman in the art and music scene. I am simply joining a long list of people finding her story captivating. It is, however, interesting to discover an icon like this later in life as opposed to having them infused into parts of my life to the point that they become an accepted fact. It is always interesting to discover a new artist and realize that the work that speaks so powerfully to you have echoed through the ears of millions.
Backstage Pass
This past Friday, February 17th, I went to the debut show of Ottawa hottest new band, F!TH (pronounced “fifth”). Opening for them was well-known Ottawa band Guest Room Status and Nothing Special, a visiting band from Oshawa (who I have written about before). The event was held in The 27 Club, a bar in the Byward Market just next to The Dominion Tavern. It was my first time at this bar and it was alright, but I am starting to get really tired of having to pay cash at bars and dealing with the ATM transaction fees. However there were many stalls in the bathrooms and lots of places to sit if you weren't interested in being right up next to the stage, so I can't complain about the venue too much. Prices were great and the bartenders were very fast, they even served a good cider, which is important since I find that most bars who serve only one cider choose to offer one that is pretty rank.
First up to play was Guest Room Status, who opened the night with the same amount of energy that I would expect from a headlining band. The group always brings so much passion and fun to the stage that you can't help but get swept away in it. The band’s enjoyment is so apparent when they play together, and it seems that they don't need a lot of time to warm up to being on the stage. Guest Room Status moved like there was no tomorrow and made the crowd feel like the night had started hours before, even if it was just beginning.
After that headbanging performance, emo band Nothing Special were on. Coming from out of town, it was expected that many wouldn't know who they were, but I was one of a large group who actually had heard the band's music before and was singing along. Many puns were made that night about the band being “Something Special” and I assume that each member was struggling not to roll their eyes, even though they hid it very well. After their set I was able to catch up with James, their bassist who brings a lot of chaotic energy to the stage, much like Wolly from Guest Room Status.
Finally, it was time for F!TH, a band that had only been seen live at a secret show performed months prior after only three practices together. Unfortunately, I wasn't at that show, but I did hear great things making me even more excited for the night. The band had dropped their second single the same day that they were performing, giving fans a very short window in which to learn all the words. However, the crowd was rabid.
I had already been surprised that night by how excited the crowd was for the opening two bands but the shift that happened between the opening two bands and F!TH was monumental. There were suddenly so many more people in the crowd and all of them seemed to be moshing. One of the nice things about moshing at a show whose music actually warrants that behaviour is the fact that there will be people on the edge of the mosh pit moderating the crowd and making sure the people are behaving, even if they aren't there as security. This is a really roundabout way to say that the guy in front of me in the floral shirt saved me from many elbows to the nose, which was much appreciated.
By the time the band played their two originals which had both been out for less than a month, one less than 24 hours, the crowd lit up even more, which I had thought to be impossible. The crowd knew every single word to Dead and Rock & A Hard Place.
Not only was the crowd amazing, but the band’s energy was phenomenal. All of them seemed like heavily tattooed scene veterans, moving around on stage as if they had been doing this for years. F!TH ended the night by submitting to the crowd’s request for an encore, being forced to repeat their single DEAD because they legitimately did not have enough songs prepared for an encore, but the crowd was so thrilled to hear them play that they were happy to hear the repeat.
After watching the group perform, I had formulated a couple burning questions to ask the band and approached their drummer Zane. Zane has been a longtime supporter of the blog and has made me feel really at home within the Ottawa music scene, even inviting me to my first basement show, which he hosted.
But when I went up to Zane after the show, he was really excited to talk to me and asked me to wait for a bit so that he could get the whole band together so that we could talk in the basement green room. After the band had thrown basically every piece of stage equipment into the crowd, from picks to sticks, they brought me backstage into one of the dingiest basements I have ever seen, including two shower curtainless showers and a patio table identical to the one at my parent's house.
The band was so honest and excited about what they were producing and were definitely feeling an after-performance high. None of them had expected the turnout and the energy that they were given, but they were so happy to receive it.
“[The show] was beyond any expectations we had set for ourselves,” guitarist Max said. “We were really proud of the hype that we generated . . . there were more people than we expected to show up, they went harder than we expected [them] to go.”
“Everyone just wanted more,” added bassist Devon, whose studded Shania Twain jacket had been catching everyone’s eyes all night. “If that was the takeaway then I’m fuckin’ ready and everyone else seems to be too.”
The conversation turned to everyone’s stage experience and their level of comfortability, and while there were some real Ottawa music scene veterans in the room, I uncovered that some of the band members were a bit greener than their performance made them out to be.
Max has been performing since he was 13, formally being in the band Riot Police, who even graced the mainstage of Bluesfest. “For me, this is my home,” he said. “All of us have day jobs, but when we get on stage, the rockstar comes out. I've gone through so many fuckups that I know how to get on stage and just deliver at this point. It took a lot of work to get there.”
Zane, who was adamant that I rewrite his spiel in my own words, said “I've been playing shows for a long time, over a decade, and the one thing about [this band] is the dynamic between us is unlike any other band I've ever been in.” He talked about how the band really puts a lot of effort into making sure that they are cohesive and that the energy that they're putting out is all similar so that they can all be comfortable and ready to take on the night. He added, “[Vinny and Devon] bring a new excitement to the band because it’s new for them but old for us . . it makes [performing] feel new again.”
“We are living vicariously through their own first experience,” Max added.
Devon has had a lot of experience with playing music and being part of bands, but unfortunately, he had a habit of being in bands that did not perform. “It's been a great motivator to step up to the calibre of these guys and just be fuckin’ ready to roll,” he said. “It feels good to actually let loose.”
F!TH’s frontman and lead singer Vinny is seemingly the freshest member of the band, having dabbled in performing at a couple of Banezean shows. Yet the main extent of his performance experience was what he left on the stage that night. Quite honestly I was genuinely shocked that Vinny had little to no performance experience, because of how good he was on stage. Like the rest of the band, he cites their close bond as something that allows them to bring their performance to the next level. “We’re all friends and we butt heads sometimes because we are all passionate about this shit,” he said. “We love it so much and we love being on stage together. I’m stoked that this is the first of many shows.”
The band then began to give me the gossip on their upcoming EP release show, which was originally planned to be another secret show.
“I think [tonight] changes what we would even do for our EP release,” admitted Vinny. “People came the fuck out tonight . . . I think it will change the whole discussion.”
“For the future, we can maybe step it up . . . we are realizing more people care about this than we thought,” said Zane.
A first show like that is a total game-changer for a band, and F!TH knows it.
The band also has some unannounced shows planned for the Ottawa area in the coming months, so avid listeners will have to keep an eye out for that.
As a closing note Alex, the band’s guitarist said, “We built this band out of a mutual care for music and a foundation of friendship and love, and to anyone who shows us that in return, everyone who gives a shit about us, especially before we had music out, you’re the reason why we do this. We are just making music; it is other people that make us relevant. We just wanna say collectively thanks to everyone who has shown us support so far.”
“We are not gonna stop, the train is just starting,” added Zane.
Self Promo
This month was a lot. I've been working on a lot of behind-the-scenes stuff for Fan Behavior and looking to branch out into new spaces with the blog. Hopefully, I'll be able to incorporate some charity work this year, allowing me to give back to the city that has treated me so well.
On a completely different note, the week after this blog post is uploaded, I will be performing as the feature act for Live! on Elgin’s weekly open mic. Come by the bar on February 21st to see me play a 30-minute set of original music, as well as hear all the other amazing performers that will be there. If you have the time, bring a couple of songs of your own to perform.
Stay tuned for my second blog post of the month that will be coming out soon, it is for paid subscribers and will be an experimental essay delving into some of the issues within the art world.
With all the raddest vibes,
E