Young Empires

I didn't need to read in Toronto's Now Magazine, that Young Empires was the one band that 'blew up' this year at NXNE- I blew up with them. Essentially the music conference- which has little if any of the clout of it's similarly marcated Austin, TX based conference to the south by south west- took over my little honky tonk local (The Dakota Tavern). In what turned out to be an opening slot for a surprise show by last year's critical darlings Japandroids (who were immminently and immediately forgettable from the opening notes) the crew of Matthew Vlahovich (Hooks), Aaron Ellingson (Swagger), Jake Palahnuk (Rhythm) had the audience torn asunder within moments of their opening notes. For this devoted listener and dancer- having been a part of Toronto's burgeoning Jungle scene as far back as '94 (when one could see global talents like Kenny Ken, Darryn J, Nicky Blackmarket, MC GQ and oh my golly golly gosh wicked Mickey Finn) it was like too many worlds colliding. I am incredibly proud to be Canadian, incredibly proud to be from Toronto but the music renaissance as of late that has been most engaging has been the re-emergence of so-called Roots artists like Zeus (Jason Collett formerly of the Broken Social Scene's backing band often compared to a modern day The Band) at specifically The Dakota Tavern. Each night I bathe myself in the honky filth and analogue shuffles at The Dakota Tavern, and each morning I wake up and wash that honky filth right off with as much Prince and Black Milk as I possibly can. The morning of Friday June 18th there was not a speck of honky filth upon me. Their altruistically pyromaniacal set that night included their anthem Rain of Gold and the instantly recognizable from the first note (re-cognizable, from before, a priori) was the hook and innnate melodic sweep of White Doves. Just missed them in Toronto (July 21) prior to a brief UK tour, then NYC, Chicago and motherfucking Bogota, Columbia back to to Toronto which even Arianna Huffington and the Huffington Post agree is the 'hot new destination for all things crazy, sexy, cool.”
07.21.10 /// Toronto
07.27.10 /// London
07.29.10 /// Bristol
07.30.10 /// London
07.31.10 /// Brighton
08.01.10 /// Glasgow
08.03.10 /// London
08.13.10 /// New York City
08.28.10 /// Chicago
09.03.10 /// Bogota