Festival Summer!!!

After a quiet winter spent finishing our new album, we've got a series of festival shows booked over the next while, before starting some more extensive touring in the fall.  First up is Saskatoon's MoSoFest, before we head to Calgary for Sled Island, then in late July we'll be playing Bengough's Gateway Festival.

Lots more exciting stuff in the works that will be annouced soon, but in the meantime, here are a couple videos of new songs from JunoFest in Regina in April.

 

It's the end of a great year, so we're playing a home town show to finish things off in style.  It'll be us, Moonbahn (Ben Dobni of Feral Children/Zombifyus and our touring band on our May UK tour) and DJ SOSO, alongside a host of things our drummer Ryan has planned. 

We sincerely hope this show doesn't co-incide with the end of the world as we've been hard at work on a new album and are incredibly excited with what we have so far.  We are working with some wonderful people and we are confident it is some of the best work we've done.  We can't wait to share it with everything sometime in 2013. 

Thanks to Reeperbahn Festival and Incubate Festival everyone who came out to our shows in Belgium, The Netherlands, and Germany.  It was so great to play to such appreciative crowds.  We really hope we can make it back next year.

For the next few months we will keep a pretty low profile, while we finish work on a new album.  In the mean time you can preview a couple live versions of songs that will be featured on the new album.

And as a bonus, check this great video of Tyson performing an improvised set alongside a couple members of Mogwai and a host of European bands as part of legendary Can vocalist, Damo Suzuki's band at Incubate festival in Tilburg, the Netherlands

Europe-bound

Yes! Yes! Yes! We are headed to mainland Europe for the first time very soon.  We'll be playing shows at Hamburg, Germany's Reeperbahn Festival as well as Tilburg, Netherlands Incubate Festival.  Both festivals look to have incredible lineups and we are incredibly honored to get to be a part of them.  While we are in Europe we'll be playing a series of shows around the festivals.  We will be in Europe from Sept. 13-27 and still have some open dates, that we'd love to fill, so please do get in touch if you have space on a bill or an open venue....

Our current tour routing is as follows:

Sept. 13 - Brussels, Belgium - Le Botanique - support for Gemma Ray
Sept. 14 - Tilburg, Netherlands - Cul-de-Sac - Incubate Festvial w/ Busdriver, The Horse Company and Virals
Sept. 14 - Tilburg, Netherlands - De NWE Worst - Incubate Festival - Tyson performs an improvised set as part of Damo Suzuki's backing band.
Sept. 15 - Tilburg, Netherlands - secret afternoon set.
Sept. 16 - Antwerp, Belgium - Bar Nadar w/ T-Bone & Brickstone
Sept. 17 - Groningen, Netherlands - Wishful Music House Show w/ October Gold
Sept. 19 - Berlin, Germany - Schokoladen w/ Sickerman & Susanna Berivan
Sept. 22 - Hamburg, Germany - Hoorsal - Canada House at Reeperbahn Festival
Sept. 23 - Dortmund, Germany - FZW w/ Admiral Fallow
Sept. 24 - Cologne, Germany - Blue Shell w/ Admiral Fallow

We'll be bringing along some new music with us, including a flexi-disc put out by the great folks at Saved By Vinyl records of a new song called City Sublet, as well as a limited edition re-release of Walk Into The Sea that includes a bonus remix album.
 

Festival summer starts up again this May with two weeks in the U.K. anchored by shows at The Great Escape Festival and Liverpool SoundCity.  See below for the full details including information on a special hometown tour kick off a the Bassment in Saskatoon with our good friends The Foggy Notions.

Hometown Tour Kick Off

May 3 – The Bassment – Saskatoon w/ The Foggy Notions

UK Tour

May 9 – The Windmill – London w/ Half Moon Run

May 10 – The Blind Tiger – Brighton - The Great Escape Festival

May 11 – Prince Albert – Brighton – The Great Escape Festival

May 13  The Wheatsheaf - Oxford w/ We Aeronauts, The Cooling Pearls, & My Crooked Teeth
May 14 The Moon Club - Cardiff

May 15 – The 13th Note Café – Glasgow

May 16 – Henry’s Cellar Bar – Edinburgh

May 17 – The Underbelly – London

May 18 – Mello Mello – Liverpool SoundCity

May 19 – Wolstenhulme Creative Space – Liverpool SoundCity

Watch for lots more exciting announcements soon!

Download a free (pay what you want) remix ep of songs from Walk Into The Sea, featuring remixes from Light Fires, Factor, Message to Bears, Mehta, Sebastian Reynolds, Form, Economics and Foam Lake

Massive thanks to the incredible Andrei Feheregyhazi for creating this video for our song Bodies. For more of Andrei's great videos, including one for our friends The Libary Voices, check out his youtube page here; http://www.youtube.com/user/andreipedia

Off to the U.K.

We had such a good time over in England and Wales in September, we decided we have to go back. See you in the spring!

UK Touring

This summer feels like it has gone by in no time at all.....suddenly we are mere days from September! For us it's been a bit of a factor of being so fortunate to be so busy. We've had a great time playing festivals across Canada including North by North East, Sled Island, Ness Creek and the wonderful and amazing Regina Folk Fest. Each festival has been a treat in it's own way and we are incredibly thankful for the chance to play alongside so many great bands at some truly wonderful festivals. Thanks to everyone who came out and all the festivals.

With such a great summer filled with wonderful shows, we are now all nervously, fidgeting waiting for the next string of shows and we couldn't be more excited about what we have coming up. Starting August 30th in Oxford we have a week's worth of shows booked in the UK, all centered around the amazing End of the Road Festival taking place Sept. 2-4 in Dorset. It's a really incredible thing for us to not only get over to the UK to play, but especially to get to play End of the Road. In a few short years the festival has gone from being an upstart little festival to a pseudo-mythical wonderland that seems to bring together all of my favorite bands in one fantastic location. To say the least we are incredibly excited.

Full details of our UK shows are as follows:
August 30th - Oxford - Port Mahon
August 31st - Northampton - The Labour Club w/ My First Tooth!
September 1st - Cardiff - Ten Feet Tall
September 2-4 - End of the Road Festival
September 5 - London - The Windmill w/ Future Primitif and Mat Gibson

Thanks for listening.
Tyson

NXNE

Hey! It feels like we just got back from tour last week, but a couple months have almost passed...so it's time to head back out. We will be heading out to Toronto this week for NXNE to play three. Hopefully you have a chance to check one out!

Here is the complete list of all the shows Slow Down, Molasses is playing during NXNE.

As a special treat for NXNE we will drawing from our expansive collective to feature a different line up at EACH SHOW!

We would really love to see you at one of these. times listed are our set times, make sure to check out the links of each to see all the great bands we are playing with.

Thursday June 16th - 11pm - Official Showcase - Dakota Tavern
http://www.facebook.com/ev​ent.php?eid=16473595358944​6

Friday June 17th - 3pm -Kelp/Line Of Best Fit BBQ -GLOBAL VILLAGE BACKPACKERS (460 King Street West @ Spadina)
http://www.facebook.com/ev​ent.php?eid=21434622193968​0

Saturday June 18th - 2pm - Live in Bellwoods - Trinity-Bellwoods Park
http://www.facebook.com/ev​ent.php?eid=15893352417205​9

and also check out Jeans Boots!

Sunday June 19th - 1:30pm - Static Zine launch - Sky Blue Sky
http://www.facebook.com/ev​ent.php?eid=21546212849424​2

A massive thanks to the Arts Board of Saskatchewan who's help is definitely making it much easier to make it out to the festival!

follow along, follow along

Mid-tour and a quick update. We're hanging out in Charlottetown waiting for our show at Baba's and I've finally got a spare moment to update this page........with links to some other pages.

We've been sending out updates a few other places, so if you want to follow along with this tour, there are a few options:

Twitter:

Officially, follow http://www.twitter.com/slowdownmolasse

but if you want the full experience, follow a few of the touring band's personal twitter feed:

Ryan - http://www.twitter.com/ryandrabble

Jeanette - http://www.twitter.com/jeansboots

Chris - http://www.twitter.com/chrixmorix

Paterson - http://www.twitter.com/patersonmonday

Tumblr:

Officially, follow http://www.tumblr.com/slowdownband

and again, individually, you can find a couple people at:

Ryan, blogging on road food, diners, and all the best places to eat if you are a band touring canada - http://apocalypsenom.tumblr.com/

Jeanette providing Jeans Boots updates at - http://jeansboots.tumblr.com/

Also, check the link on the side for our facebook page for links to videos, music, etc.

And stream (and buy) the entire new album at http://slowdownmolasses.bandcamp.com

Or order a cd copy at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/slowdownmolasses2

We are very happy to announce a full Canadian tour to coincide with the release of our new album. There are still a few details to work out, so a couple dates might be added, but here is a list of the places you can find us this spring.

March 10 - Saskatoon - Caffe Sola Walk Into The Sea All Ages album release w/ Dreaming of Electric Sheep
March 11 - Saskatoon - Amigo's - Walk Into The Sea album release & tour kick off!
March 12 - Edmonton - Wunderbar w/ Jeans Boots and Jessica Jalbert
March 15 - Vancouver - The Biltmore w/ Jeans Boots and Aunts & Uncles
March 17 - Calgary - Broken City w/ Deadhorse and Scars & Scarves
March 18 - Regina - O'Hanlons w/ Jeans Boots
March 19 - Winnipeg - The Lo Pub w/ Jeans Boots, The Empty Standards and The Slow Dancers
March 20 - Thunder Bay - The Apollo w/ Jeans Boots
March 22 - Toronto - The Horseshoe w/ Jeans Boots
March 24 - Halifax - Gus' Pub w/ Jeans Boots, Dance Movie and Klarka Weinwurm
March 25 - Fredricton - The Capitol w/ Sleepless Nights and Writer's Strike
March 26 - Sackville - The Royal Canadian Legion - Shotgun Jimmie's cd release!!!
March 27 - Charlottetown - Baba's w/ Jeans Boots
March 29 - Montreal - Casa Del Popolo w/ The Sunnies and Asthma Camp
March 30 - Ottawa - The Raw Sugar w/ Jeans Boots and The Ethics
March 31 - Peterborough - The Cannery Arts Centre w/ Jeans Boots and Typewriter
April 1 - Toronto - The Garrison w/ Forest City Lovers and Kite Hill
April 2 - London - APK Live w/ Forest City Lovers and Olenka & the Autumn Lovers

See you soon!

Walk Into The Sea

Finally, here we go.....a new album.

Slow down, Molasses - Walk Into The Sea

1. Sometimes We All Fall Apart - 1:54
2. Bodies - 6:55
3. Late Night Radio - 3:39
4. As Meant To Be - 5:10
5. Feathers - 2:59
6. Wake Me Up At The Coast - 2:13
7. Light - 4:03
8. Fade Out - 5:35
9. Walk Into The Sea - 3:24

After 14 months of work with a cast 16 musicians, 3 engineers and whole pile of late nights and long weekends, we have a new album - Walk Into The Sea.

Walk Into The Sea will be released independently on our Little Pictures label on March 15, 2011 to coincide with a coast to coast Canadian tour.

The record runs 36 minutes 30 second and will be released on both vinyl and cd.

We had the amazing opportunity to work with incredible people on this album. Julie Doiron joins us on the first single Feathers (have a listen below), Olenka & The Autumn Lovers join us with string arrangements on 2 songs and layers of vocal harmonies on 3 more. Toby Bond (Carbon Dating Service, No Birds) added viola on a couple songs, local trumpeter extraordinaire Claire Anderson played on 3 songs, and Nikki Schmid (of local goth-rockers New Jacobin Club) added some cello to a couple songs. Finally the wonderful Mr. James Bunton of Ohbijou came out and mixed it with us and our amazing engineers Jordan Smith and Mark Klopoushak. To cap it all off Harris Newman of Grey Market Mastering mastered the album for us.

It was a pretty crazy year with some of us having big things happen (kids, marriages, big moves across the country, crazy day job happenings), but it all came together with some pretty key help along the way. We have to send some huge thanks to the Saskatchewan Arts Board from whom we were fortunate enough to receive a recording grant and to the CBC and Sask Music who were kind enough to ask us to play a CBC Canada Live recording last March which helped fund some of the record and was a great way to re-focus us after a busy winter.

So here you go, a first taste of the record. This is the first single (....if naming a single really makes any sense anymore). Julie Doiron sings backups on it and we are so incredibly happy to finally share it with people.

Feathers by Slow down, Molasses

Recording Update

Soooo, it's been a while, we've had a busy, big year. One new child, one wedding, a couple changes in our day jobs AND a whole lot of recording.

We are nearly finished recording our next album. We'll finish tracking this month, then in December we will mix it with Mr. James Bunton (of Ohbijou fame).

Expect the album to be 10 songs over 42 minutes and it will be released on vinyl. We are very excited to have some of our favorite musicians joining us on this recording, including Julie Doiron and Olenka & the Autumn Lovers. The plan is to release the album in late March or early April 2011 and we will be doing some pretty extensive touring around then, potentially including some dates in the U.S. along with a full Canadian tour.

As a teaser for the album here are some photos from the last 6 months of recording.

Julie Doiron Day 2010!!!

I'm sure it comes as no surprise to anyone reading this that we here at Sdm headquarters are huge fans of Julie Doiron and many wonderful indie venues across Canada....so last year, when our good friends at All Citizens declared June 7th to be Julie Doiron day in their small town of Bruno, Saskatchewan, we were excited to stop in and celebrate with them. Now one year later, we figured it would be great to commemorate that day with a Julie Doiron tribute show/fundraiser for All Citizens.....so without further ado, let me announce Julie Doiron Day 2010 in Bruno, Saskatchewan!!!

Join us for Julie Doiron Day, a celebration of Canadian independent music and one Canada's best songwriters, on June 7th 2010 in Bruno, Saskatchewan.... and maybe in your town too!

History: In 2009 All Citizens (art gallery/café/community hub and soon to be legendary music venue) declared June 7 to be Julie Doiron Day in Bruno. The occasion was aptly marked by a performance by the women herself, playing a remarkable set to a capacity crowd of 21 Bruno locals and a few Saskatoon residents. The town’s Mayor was on hand to unveil a plaque dedicating All Citizens' front bench, on the town's main street, to Julie in commemoration of the event. The Mayor's husband opened the show with a set of old-tyme accordion tunes.

The event was one of those quintessential only-in-Saskatchewan (or maybe only in Canada) moments affirming how an amazing music & cultural scene can build up around a few dedicated, talented individuals and a small, perfect little cultural space.

Despite it likely being the smallest show Ms. Doiron played that year, it was the ideal way to reaffirm her status as "Canada's Indie Queen". Where else would you find one of the most celebrated songwriters in the country going out of her way to play in a small town of 600 people, a few kilometers off the main highway in one of the least populated parts of the country? If anything it just helps explain why people are so drawn to the music of Julie Doiron and why she has become a symbol of everything that is great about Canada's independent music scene. She's toured the country from coast to coast countless times, co-founded her own music label (Sappy Records), co-founded one of the Canada's most charming festivals (Sappyfest, which brings world renowned musicians to her small town of Sackville, New Brunswick, pop. 5411), collaborated with everyone from Gord Downie and the Tragically Hip to Attack in Black to French anti-folksters Herman Dune and released albums on celebrated indie labels Jagjaguwar and Subpop... all this while raising three children and remaining one of the most approachable, kind people you'd hope to meet.

The inaugural Julie Doiron Day was celebrated in a tiny town, but it received an enthusiastic response across Canada and abroad. Our hope this year is for it to spread beyond Bruno's borders. On June 7, 2010, Julie Doiron Day will be honored at All Citizens, this time with a tribute to Julie Doiron featuring performances by members of Slow down, Molasses; The Seahags; Jeanette Stewart; Pearson; All Citizens' co-owner/operator Tyler Brett (a.k.a. The Department) and more. The event will be a benefit concert with all money going to All Citizens to help keep it alive and able to present some of Canada's finest bands while acting as a unique cultural outpost in the middle of the prairies. What better way to celebrate the work of one of Canada's favorite independent artists than by supporting and celebrating the independent cultural spaces that provide a place for their music to be heard?

In a perfect world every town and city would have a space like All Citizens. Maybe June 7 could be the day everyone gets together and plays some Julie Doiron songs to celebrate Canadian independent music and the spaces that nurture it. If your town has a great indie arts space or indie record store or tiny, perfect venue it would be amazing to see Julie Doiron Day shows happening all across Canada in support of such spaces.

Sincerely,

Tyson McShane

Slow down, Molasses
http://slowdownmolasses.blogspot.com
(306) 381-4772

For more information about All Citizens:

http://www.allcitizens.org

For more information on Julie Doiron:

http://www.juliedoiron.com

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKlvVNS79gI

For more information on the bands playing:

The Seahags - http://www.seahags.ca

Pearson – http://www.myspace.com/pearsontunes

Jeanette Stewart – http://www.myspace.com/jeanettestewart

Tyler Brett - http://www.myspace.com/dept

Slow down, Molasses – http://slowdownmolasses.blogspot.com

postcards

A quick post to give an update on what's new in the slow down camp....

Jeanette has recently completed her debut ep, watch for it later this summer. In the mean time, check out her new video:



Also watch for her at Caffe Sola in Saskatoon on May 20th, opening for the wonderful Megan Hamilton (http://www.myspace.com/meganhamilton)

Also at Caffe Sola, our good friends Olenka & the Autumn Lovers are making their first trek west and we are so happy to host them. The show is May 25th and I (Tyson) will be opening the show solo-ish (well see who's around to help out!).

Otherwise, we've been diligently working away in the studio and I have to say, we are getting very excited about the results. Hopefully we can provide a preview from the album in the next month or two....

Vivefest 2!!!

Big show this weekend in Saskatoon, our good friends at Vive Music are celebrating two years of bringing some of the best bands in Canada to Saskatoon and they are keeping up their good work by bringing some of my favorite bands to town. Women, Eamon McGrath and paper beat scissors just a host of locals for a great night of music at the German Concordia Club (next to Amigo's on Dufferin Avenue).

It should be great fun and Jeanette will be playing with myself (Tyson) and Chad Munson of Golden Smoke backing her. Barrett Ross (of Foam Lake) and I will also act as Eamon McGrath's backing band for the night. It should be a great night, so if you are in the neighbourhood stop in!!

I still rave about the show Women played in our old jamspace with Mt. Royal a couple years ago....they are definitely one of my favorite live bands, so it will be great to see them again.

Check out more info on the show here:
http://www.facebook.com/faitour#!/event.php?eid=348843402591&ref=ts

cheers,
Tyson

Wow! What a weekend! Thanks to everyone who came out to the On a Cold Road show. It was taped for CBC Radio 1, 2 & 3, so watch for it in a couple months. We'll post when it is scheduled to play. Thanks so much to the CBC and Sask Music for putting the show together. We really can't thank you enough. We had a blast and I hope you did too.

Now it's time for a couple Jeanette Stewart & the Brodeo shows, Jeantte, Drabble and myself (Tyson) will be opening for B.A. Johnson at Amigo's this Saturday (April 3) and then Jeanette, myself and Chad Munson (of Golden Smoke fame) will be playing Vivefest 2 on April 17 w/ Women, Eamon McGrath, Feral Children & lots more. It should be great fun!

Then it will be back to recording. Since November we've been working on 6 songs for our next album, with a few of them getting pretty close to being completed. Later this spring we'll record a few more as well as getting some super special, secret guests to add a bit to the record as well....but that has to stay secret for now.

That's all for now...but watch soon for some tour and recording stories. It's been a hectic, exciting few months, even if we've been a bit silent recently!

Home / Hibernation

We're home...well we've been home for a few weeks, but it was a busy few weeks of returning to jobs, getting re-acquainting our homes, friends, partners etc. and well, lots of sleeping. As for the tour, we had a pretty amazing time, playing some sweet venues, seeing some great bands and meeting some pretty wonderful people, as well as seeing a part of the country, I've not had the chance to spend much time in. All in all it was a pretty great tour, capped off with three show with our new friends Ohbijou. I don't think we could ask for a better way to finish the year...

Hopefully in the next few days I'll start posting some tour stories, photos, etc, in the meantime here is a video from Charlottetown town of us backing Jeanette Stewart, playing here song 'light'.

Bigger Beards, Better Plaid - Tour 2009

Coming to a town near you (hopefully...) our fall, 'Bigger Beards, Better Plaid' Tour 2009 will finally take us all the way out to the wonderful east coast of Canada and to the Halifax Pop Explosion. You can't imagine how excited we are! There are a couple dates we are waiting to confirm, but for now here is the tour. Stop by and say hi!

October 8th - Tour Kick off - Amigo's - Saskatoon, Sk w/ The Peacoats
October 17th - acoustic trio show - The Apollo - Thunder Bay, On w/ Jeanette Stewart
October 18th - acoustic trio show - Millard's Garage - Sudbury, On w/ Jeanette Stewart
October 20th - L'Hemisphere Gauche - Montreal, Qc w/ Rah Rah & The Darling Demaes
October 21 - Crumb's Cafe - Fredericton, NB w/ Jeanette Stewart
October 23 - Halifax Pop Explosion! -The Paragon Theatre w/ Lake of Stew, The Divorcees and Will Currie & the Country French
October 24 - Ampersand Cafe - Charlottetown, PEI w/ Jeanette Stewart & Andy Swan
October 25 - Plan B - Moncton, NB w/ Jeanette Stewart
October 26 - L'innocent - Riviere-Du-Loup, Qc w/ Jeanette Stewart
October 27 - Raw Sugar Cafe - Ottawa, On w/ Olenka & the Autumn Lovers
October 28 - The Mansion - Kingston, On w/ Rah Rah and Olenka & the Autumn Lovers
October 29 - The Garrison - Toronto, On w/ The Wilderness of Manitoba and Olenka & the Autumn Lovers
October 30 - Patty Flaherty's - Sarnia, On w/ Doug Hoyer & Michael Rault
October 31 - The Bull & Quench - North Bay, On w/ Jeanette Stewart
November 14 - Amigo's - Saskatoon w/ Ohbijou