Parlour Steps at Canteen and Zaphod’s
Two weeks ago, Kara, coordinator of Bands Undone followed me on Twitter after seeing a review I wrote for North by East West and extended an invitation to the upcoming Bands Undone event. I have been a little slow on the inter webs this past while so it took about a week for me to respond and then switch shifts at work so I could make it to Canteen, the little art gallery slash store that provides Bands Undone with an unlikely, but inspiring venue. Let me just say, I am really glad I ended up responding to that Twitter post. I made it to my first Bands Undone event on Thursday of last week for the private Parlour Steps show at Canteen Gallery. I got there a few minutes late so the band was already playing to a small audience, most of whom I recognized from seeing at shows around the city. I use the term ‘audience’ pretty loosely considering that there were exactly seven people in the tiny store/gallery – eight if you include the mandatory Canteen staff. Such a small audience is part of what made this such a great experience. Standing there listening to what has become one of my top five favourite bands at the moment, I couldn’t help but think, this is the reason I started a music blog.
Parlour Steps has been around for about 10 years, although there have been a few line up changes. Right now the band is lead singer Caleb Stull, keyboardist Alison Maira, drummer Rob Linton, bassist Julie Bavalis and guitarist Rees Haynes. At Canteen they played a fairly short set but I was happy it included Sleeping City my favourite song from their recent release, The Hidden Names. At one point the band introduces themselves to the small crowd which was funny because they had already been playing for about ten minutes and because everyone knew who they were. One of my favourite things about seeing them in this setting is that there is none of the showmanship that you see at a real concert, the band is facing each other as often as they are facing us. After their set, they encouraged us to ask them any questions wherein I learnt that playing in Los Angeles sucks if you’re a relatively unknown Canadian band but they love playing the Horseshow in Toronto. After a few more questions, Kara does a full interview asking how their recent album has been received and what their song writing process is like – Maira laughs at this question saying “Well we like each other – so that’s good” in a way that makes me smile.
The set at Canteen wrapped up by 7pm, but I liked them so much I decided to kill a few hours downtown til they hit the stage at Zaphod’s at 10pm. The plus side to being a Monday night is that it is showcase Mondays at Zaphod’s meaning the show was free. This time I managed to get to the venue before the band, but I was disappointed to see such a small audience out to see Parlour Steps. Just four or five people down in the stage area and maybe 20 or so in the entire bar. This was especially a shock after seeing how packed the place was for the Rural Alberta Advantage last week (I promise, that’s not a dig at them – I would just expect to see a lot of the same people at Parlour Steps). The band put on a very tight set – playing a ton of songs from their newest album as well as a few tracks that I didn’t recognize that I can only assume are from their older albums. After their set, I caught up with them to wish them good luck on the rest of their tour and of course, buy a copy of the album! Stull told me they hope to be back in the spring so I plan to keep my fingers crossed and my eye on the Zaphod’s calendar.
Here is an awesome video, thanks to Brian for posting this!
Parlour Steps are the band I did not know I was looking for until I came across them. Stull’s dreamscape vocals and heartfelt lyrics, “All my life I have wrestled with words/insufficient and remote and absurd/you say I won’t need those words/ where we’re going, I won’t fight to be heard” make me want to listen to this band all the time. Parlour Steps have been compared to the ethereal sound Arcade Fire and Stull lyric writing ability is comparable to Sufjan Stevens or the Decemberists. On a few tracks they remind me a little of Maybe Smith or alternatively, the New Pornographers. I would not expect to see these guys and gals on too many top ten lists this year (just because they are relatively unknown) – but they definitely deserve to be!
Want to listen to Parlour Steps? You can listen to them on Myspace or on their CBC Radio 3 artist profile page. I recommend listening to Sleeping City and Little Pieces.
Now for pictures! Thanks to my friend Daniel for playing photographer for me.
Parlour Steps at Canteen
Me posing with the band in front of Canteen
Parlour Steps at Zaphod’s
