Best of Vancouver 2013: Vancouver's music scene burns bright

Our favourite local musicians tell us which LPs they would save from a blaze, and who lights their fire.

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      Whether you’re a gloomy goth, a hirsute folkie, or some paint-splattered, rap-obsessed art punk with delightfully insane hair, Steve Albini is apparently the man. This is just one of the many highly fascinating facts to emerge from the Georgia Straight’s annual Best of Bands feature, in which we approach acts which released gold-star records over the past 12 months, and then get those who sing for them to hold forth on topics including best local releases and who among their Vancouver musical peers they’d like to see in the buff.

      As often happens, our favourite homegrown acts for 2013 do a fine job of name-checking many of our other favourite homegrown acts. Besides flattering the Straight’s unwavering good taste, it proves yet again that our talent pool is deep and wide enough to embrace itself in some kind of mutual citywide reach-around. Truth is, you could make a point of never leaving Vancouver—or never seeing an out-of-town band at the Commodore or Biltmore—and you’d still have roughly 365 great nights of your year covered.

      Whether it’s distaff garage rock, “cold punk” (whatever that is!), or some of the most vital and flavourful heavy rock on the planet (as if some small portion of the city’s shared brain has triangulated its inspiration out of San Francisco, Detroit, and Birmingham, England, in the early ’70s), Vancouver is obviously the place to be. And we clearly respect our forefathers. New Order, Minutemen, Television, and Portland proto-grungers the Wipers? You are all revered by people half your age, at least as much as Kanye, Foxygen, and whatever else kids are supposed to like these days.

      Meanwhile, we’ve learned that Tojo’s gold-plated and paparazzi-infested sushi joint on West Broadway retains its magical hold on musicians who can only dream of producing the down payment it takes just to walk through the door of the place. And in other news, billionaire Chip Wilson is not nearly as well known as he probably thinks, Jimi Hendrix is just as influential as ever, and, perhaps best of all—amid everything from blue-collar rock to fake kiwi-pop, mutant Americana, and time-warping power psych—Vancouver is still mercifully short on emo-roots doofuses trying too hard to sound like Mumford & Sons. Bravo, people. Oh, and Louise Burns? You are clearly everybody’s darling.

      Comments

      6 Comments

      Usual

      Sep 18, 2013 at 1:26pm

      As always, your "Best of Vancouver" music series is clueless and out of touch.

      Un-Usual

      Sep 19, 2013 at 10:29am

      Dear Usual, u suck. Regards, hard working musician.

      musicpro

      Sep 19, 2013 at 11:46am

      Pure vacuous fantasy.

      Usual

      Sep 19, 2013 at 3:05pm

      The Straight is like an anti-King Midas: everything it touches turns to shit (and was probably shit before they even touched it).

      Un-Usual

      Sep 21, 2013 at 8:39am

      how old are you? or were you given a bad review? for someone who hates the straight music section so much you are spending a lot of time here and commenting. Go shave.