Tag Archives: Ontario

Raphael Weinroth-Browne – Worlds Within Live (2021); Jason Blake feat. RWB – Candles Burn (2024)

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Good afternoon, y’all. Last time, we talked about the most recent release by Canadian neofolk trio Musk Ox and the news that their music was being featured in the CBS medical/mystery drama Watson. (In case you missed it, episode 2, which broadcast about two weeks ago, set their song “Weightless” against a montage wrapping up the various storylines near the end of the show.)

Anyway, at that time I had promised more music from Musk Ox members would be forthcoming, and so here we are. The group’s cellist (and co-writer/arranger) Raphael Weinroth-Browne put out his first solo record back in 2020, which at the time was met with plenty of acclaim on this website. But the following year, he released a brand new version of the whole thing re-recorded live, which we’ll take a look at here. And to cap things off, we’ll also check out an EP the cellist created in collaboration with Chicago-based Warr guitarist Jason Blake, just about eleven months ago.

 

Raphael Weinroth-Browne – Worlds Within Live (self-released, 02 July 2021)

 

Jason Blake featuring Raphael Weinroth-Browne – Candles Burn (7d Media, 05 April 2024)

 

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Musk Ox – Inheritance (2021); Nathanael Larochette – Old Growth (2023)

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Good afternoon! If you’ve been a longtime visitor around these parts, you’ll remember Musk Ox, from all the times we’ve previously discussed that Canadian folk trio as well as some of its members’ numerous other musical pursuits.

Well, yesterday I received an interesting bit of news from the group:

 

Hi Everyone!

We hope you are all well, safe, thriving and taking time to nurture whatever endeavours bring you fulfillment.

We just wanted to share some exciting news. After years of people telling us that our music would be great for tv/film we are thrilled to announce that several of our songs will appear in the new medical/mystery series Watson on CBS! The second episode airs tonight (Sun Feb 16th) at 9pm EST and features our song “Weightless.” We’re honoured to have been asked to provide songs for this series and are grateful for the opportunity to reach new audiences with our music. If you happen to catch the episode tonight, take a video while our song plays and tag us @muskoxofficial.

 

Musk Ox – Inheritance (self-released, 09 July 2021)

 

Nathanael Larochette – Old Growth (self-released, 21 July 2023)

 

For the uninitiated, Watson is a brand-new show (the pilot episode premiered on CBS and Paramount+ last month, with regular weekly episodes scheduled to begin as of last night) which stars Morris Chestnut as the titular doctor. In this modernized adaptation, Watson is moving on from the canonical death of his former partner in crime-solving, Sherlock Holmes, whereupon he has started a medical facility — a fictional foundation set right here in Pittsburgh, PA — that appears (based on the one episode that has aired thus far) to specialize in rare and unusual ailments, thus calling upon the doctor’s famed investigative skills.

While I don’t usually find myself drawn toward medical dramas, I’ve always been a connoisseur of all things Holmes-related, so I decided to investigate that pilot when it aired and have been looking forward to the continuation of the story for these past couple weeks. The series can be found streaming here, where I was already planning to check out the second episode tonight, but now I’ll also have my ears attuned to catch the inclusion of the Musk Ox material mentioned above.

As I’ll be stuck at work for another few hours still, in the meantime it seemed like a perfect time to revisit the 2021 album on which the song in question was originally released. And while we’re at it, it never hurts to pop in to see what else these musicians have been up to lately, so I’ll toss in one member’s solo album as a bonus in this article, and then spend some time with another member’s output shortly thereafter.

 

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Swarm of Spheres – Invest in Your Death (2013), Brother Take Five (2021); Cell Press – S/T (2020)

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It’s Friday, and we’re firing up the way-back machine. Got a lot of ground to cover, so there’s no time to waste… Here we go!

 

Swarm of Spheres – Invest in Your Death (self-released, 18 October 2013)

 

Swarm of Spheres – Brother, Take Five (No Why Records, 15 October 2021)

 

Cell Press – Cell Press (Ancient Temple Recordings / No Funeral, 27 November 2020)

 

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Natalie Zina Walschots – Hench: A Novel (2020/21)

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Hello out there! Time once again for a quick excursion outside the music world and into the realm of the written word.

That’s right, we’re doing another book report…

 

 

Natalie Zina Walschots – Hench: A Novel (William Morrow / Harper Collins; hardcover and digital 22 September 2020; paperback 09 November 2021)

 

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Mors Verum – The Living (2021)

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Hey gang — it’s Bandcamp Friday! Let’s talk about death metal! Again!

Mors Verum – The Living (Total Dissonance Worship, 05 November 2021)

 

 

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Sarin – You Can’t Go Back (2021)

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Sarin – You Can’t Go Back (Prosthetic Records, 05 February 2021)

 

Sort of like a response to this article from earlier in the week where we covered an album entitled A Way Back, today we’re featuring You Can’t Go Back — the latest from Canadian post-metal group Sarin, named for the chemical compound that has historically been used (and sometimes rumored to have been used) as a nerve gas weapon due to its extreme toxicity.

 

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Raphael Weinroth-Browne – Worlds Within (2020)

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Raphael Weinroth-Browne – Worlds Within (self-released, 24 January 2020)

 

Good afternoon! Hope everyone out there is doing their best to maintain a positive outlook on this gloomy mid-May Monday.

If not, perhaps it would help if you took a moment to listen to this album from earlier this year: you may remember Raphael Weinroth-Browne as the cello player who comprises one-third of Musk Ox and half of The Visit, both of whom we really enjoyed listening to when we had written about these groups’ previous output.

Well, Worlds Within is Mr. Weinroth-Browne‘s first solo full-length, and it nicely showcases the wide-ranging versatility his instrument (occasionally augmented by effects pedals) is capable of.

 

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Vile Creature – Cast of Static and Smoke (2018)

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Vile Creature – Cast of Static and Smoke (Halo of Flies (US) / Dry Cough (UK), 09 March 2018)

 

Today we’ve got another album review for you — and a worthy follow-up to yesterday’s, as this one also contains long, low-tempoed tracks filled with filthy noise and despair. Although it’s actually their second full-length, Cast of Static and Smoke is the first output I’ve heard from these self-described “two weird queer kids with lofty ambitions.” But from that very first listen, Vile Creature grabbed my attention and never let it go throughout four tracks spanning nearly three-quarters of an hour. Let’s dig right in, eh?

 

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The Visit – Through Darkness into Light (2015); The Night Watch – Boundaries, Nathanaël Larochette – Earth and Sky (2016)

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TheVisitFront

The Visit – Through Darkness into Light (self-released, 09 October 2015)

 

Cover (large)

The Night Watch – Boundaries (self-released, 15 July 2016)

 

NATHANAEL LAROCHETTE cover

Nathanaël Larochette – Earth and Sky (self-released, 29 July 2016)

 

Hey, folks — have you read this review of Canadian neofolk/baroque trio Musk Ox‘s 2014 album Woodfall? If you haven’t, I’d be kind of surprised — after all, in the two years since it was published, that review has become the most popular single item to ever appear on this website (as I alluded to when I named the album as an honorable mention for the Top 14 of 2014 list). In fact, it has had more visitors than the About or Contact pages, and far more than any other article I’ve ever written: twice as many as the second-most popular review ever, and almost three times as many as the most-visited article that I published in 2016.

As incredible as all that is, it’s absolutely true, and I figure it can be ascribed to one of two things: either I’m exceptionally good at writing about non-metal music performed with folk/classical instruments, or Musk Ox is just really, really popular. On the off chance that it would happen to be the first one, I’m going to take some time over the next few days to write about some more neo-folk/neo-classical groups whose orchestrations are decidedly non-metal. But in the event that the second thing also comes into play, I will be hedging my bets a bit today: what I’ll be sharing with you has been released by three different musical entities that each involve one or more of the three people who make up Musk Ox. And away we go …

 

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Auriga – VII Dimensions of Asymmetry; Astral Path – An Oath to the Void (2016)

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cover

Auriga – VII – Dimensions of Asymmetry (Avantgarde Music, 19 January 2016)

 

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Astral Path – An Oath to the Void (Avantgarde Music, 15 April 2016)

 

On the way down the street to the bus stop — this is around 5:00 this morning — I realized something. I was hearing birds chirping and singing, and sometimes as I walked past houses, window air conditioners whirring and humming, but otherwise very little background noise whatsoever. It took a few minutes, but finally I came to the conclusion, all of the cicadas must have been sleeping. All those millions of big, ugly, flying things that have gradually emerged from their seventeen-year arboreal naps over the past few weeks to create a deafening cacaphony all over the surrounding area. Over the weekend, when I was stuck spending much of my days outdoors, cutting grass and pulling weeds and various other activities that put me right in the middle of the flight path for hundreds of the clumsy, red-eyed bugs, this nuisance seemed to have reach a terrible crescendo. Sounding like a cross between a gas motor, an alarm bell, and a UFO, the swarm of insects could easily provide a soundtrack for any horror or suspense movie.

Anyway, completely unrelated to anything, today we’re going to spend some time talking about atmospheric black metal. The two different albums I’d like to share with you were both released earlier this year by Avantgarde Music. These bands — one Lebanese, the other Canadian — take slightly different approaches to the genre, but they both generally have a sort of outer space vibe going on. Enjoy!

 

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