Date: May 13, 2008
Venue:The Sony Centre

What a doofus I am. Seriously, I had access to tickets for Feist and Great Lake Swimmers at the Sony Centre on Tuesday night, but completely forgot. I know, I’m an idiot. To be fair, my boss had been given the tickets months ago and told me I could have them, but he’s been on vacation all week, so it slipped our minds—a weak defense, but it’s the best I’ve got.

That said, Sean, one of my best friends, was lucky enough to be born with the mental capacity to remember such engagements, and he as his lady friend actually went to the show. Being the stand-up guy that he is, Sean was good enough to email me his take on the event (in fact, it was this email that made me realize the error I’d made). Here’s what he had to say:

“I forgot how strong Feist’s voice can be. She performed a few songs solo with just her guitar, a few with the band, and a couple that were very Broken Social Scene-esque (particularly “Sea lion”) where it was her entire outfit as well as Great Lake Swimmers on stage performing, totalling about 11 or so peeps on stage. She can slow it down, she can rock, she can do it solo, or backed by a crowd—this kind of diversity really helped vary the pace of the show and showcased her musical talents and tastes.

There was also an art projectionist on stage creating great imagery throughout her songs. The artist created such splendid displays as simple as birds and trees, to more complex fair such as changing seasons, setting suns and even moving waves.

Feist was also great at talking to the audience and often received many professions of love from men, women and even a group of small girls closer to the front. She even used the crowd to create a harmonising chorus by dividing us up by area codes (416, 905, 647) which garnered a lot of laughs. This aspect of the show only served to grow my love for her all the more, but clearly I’m not the only one that felt this way.

A highlight for me was the beautiful cover of Kevin Drew’s “Fucked Up Kid” that she performed alone on stage acoustically. She was also kind enough to warn the parents that the song had some content less than appropriate for kids (all ages show).

GLS were good too. I had been exposed to them from you and knew a bit about them, but had never seen them live. They had a couple really good songs but the first 3 all sounded exactly the same to me, particularly the percussion. Also, GLS never said anything other than the band member’s names. I kinda like it when the band has good stage presence and interacts more with the crowd (so long as it’s natural and they’re not just trying to be funny). Feist was actually really good at this and it only served to make me fall more madly in love with her.”

There you have it. Sounds like it would have been a good show to see (said as I smack myself in the head). Thankfully I’ve seen Feist a few times in the past, but I’ve still yet to experience the incorporation of art projection during her shows, which is something that intrigues me. Sean also mentioned that she used a loop pedal to create some interesting live layers this time around, which is right up my alley (having just bought one).

As for GLS, I’ve got to admit that I share my friend’s slight lack of enthusiasm for the seeming repetitiveness of their perpetually reverb-soaked, mid-tempo sound. Though it’s still obvious that Tony Dekker (the main man behind the Toronto band) is a great song writer with some excellent tunes under his belt.

All told, I’m sure Tuesday’s show would have been a good one to attend first hand—something I’ll have to do next time.

—

Feist - Brandy Alexander

Great Lake Swimmers - I Am Part of a Large Family

Check out their respective Myspace pages (Feist, GLS) to hear more and you can buy digital copies of their respective albums from Zunior.com.