The Mohawk Lodge - Done Fighting (live at The Dakota Tavern)

It is almost impossible - even for a writer used to putting his heart in his mouth- to overstate how important the music of The Mohawk Lodge has become to me at least personally in such a short period of time.  It is partly by function of working as a music journalist that you listen to a great deal of music you respect but don't like, like but don't admire or admire for it's craftsmanship but it's just not your bag.   Then there is that one band that comes by about as often as a lunar (solar?) eclipse who manage to escape the trajectory of Canada's protectionist 'CanCon' regulations (which force our radio and TV outlets to play %50 Canadian music even if it's utter shite) and 'music industry'.  In an innately local way they thrust their offering out upon the world and though they may not be switftly judged it is with absolute certainty that I pass onto you dear reader the humble opinion that you should see The Mohawk Lodge now, as frequently as possible, acquire their music and continue to let them wear down the rough edge's of your hearts jagged ends.

In that vein Done Fighting moves beyond simply throwing one's arms up in disgust, refusing to play that game to something like a clarion call for a new way of being in the world. 



This again is the studio version of Done Fighting however the music is synced to intimate footage of the band playing their most confident set to date on a recent White Whale Wednesday at The Dakota Tavern (unfortunately now ended). 

That evening I made a single definitive declarative statement at the top of my lungs to an audience of two rounders at the bar Sean Dean (The Sadies) and Wild Blake Manning (a friend of The Lodge's):

Every once in awhile - just for shits and giggles - a band comes along like The Mohawk Lodge who has so absorbed and subsumed all of their influences to the point that everything they offer is wholly new.   - Luke C. Bowden