Al Tuck & Gordie Roach - Merle Haggard's Swingin' Doors

Listen to perennial Canadian songbird Al Tuck pluck out a tune for his roommate, cohort and even one of his musical heroes Gordie Roach.

Al Tuck's All Time Favourites, Vol. 1 release forthcoming

The long admired and deeply revered Al Tuck  (acolyte Joel Plaskett for instance recently suggested he is an artist that should rightly get Polaris acclaim and support) is finally releasing a compilation of his earliest material.  Tuck is quoted as saying All Time Favourites, Vol. 1 will feature ``tracks from my first four albums, it is my first-ever release on vinyl.  I had forgotten that that had been my dream in the first place. Thanks to Youthclub Records for making it happen.``

The long wait for such a project may reflect more than just Tuck`s shambling and quasi inept spirit of self-promotion.  Tuck is far and away one of the most revered songwriters in Canada amongst other songwriters, and his love for the Maritimes and satisfaction with his life there makes him an increasingly rare phenom to see live elsewhere in Canada.  Recalling a sad period in his life when we both lived in Halifax I falsely presumed that the original master recordings were lost in a fire on Gottingen streeet in that cities north end.  Al was living with his partner in musical crime Gordie Roach, essentially a street or 'outside' musician, when the fire took place and while recordings were lost Tuck recently qualified by email the nature and extent of the loss:

"In that article about the house fire years ago (ed. in Halifax's Coast Magazine), if I mentioned lost tapes, I would have been referring not so much to masters of released albums, but more like unreleased personal tapes & that kind of thing. The last thing on my mind at that time was the music I had already managed to release. I was in the midst of making My Blues Away (2005) and thankfully had not yet managed to have the 2-inch reels transported from Toronto to Halifax. But yes, anything I hadn't lent to somebody went up in smoke, except my Guild parlour guitar, which I had with me at my girfriend's... well...she hadn't really been my girlfriend, but she was after that!
Master copies would have been difficult to locate anyways- we pretty much used the released items, except Arhoolie, which had been basically a cassette. Some kind of digital master of that surfaced (thanks to Dusty ed. Sorbet, I think) after the fire, so we worked from that. J LaPointe remastered things. I wasn't able to be there, but it seems like he did a good job."

Tuck's first two records (arhoolie and brave last days (1994)) were released on Sloan's murderecords at the height of Halifax-Is-The-New-Seattle hype- or properly the Halifax Pop Implosion.  In 2001 on his own label brobdingnagian he released what many believe to be his masterwork New High Road of Song (named after a musical hymnal of the same name).  Since he has only released Live at the Rebecca Cohn (2002) and My Blues Away (2005) since it's a fairly safe presumption that the new vinyl release will be composed of tracks pulled from arhoolie, brave last days, new high road of song and live at the rebecca cohn.  Each of his first three albums work so well as proper albums in their own right - particularly The New High Road of Song which may be one of the finest albums ever recorded by a Canadian songwriter- it will be interesting to see what songs Al chooses to cull for this release.

"All my girlfriends have crushes on Al Tuck" - Buck 65 freestyle circa 2001

Zeus headlines Mod Club with Matt Murphy, Danielle Duval

I don't know how much more needs to be said about Zeus at this juncture. They are an unparelleled group of young musicians whose seminal release Say Us has already earned them a place in the Canadian rock canon while their career is firmly in it's incubus. They're opportunity to headline their own show at a large venue like Mod Club (May 27th) will undoubtedly mark a considerable landmark for the band. Zeus are not simply consummate musicians but particularly co-founders Carlin Nicholson and Mike O'Brien are exceptional recording engineers and producers. This past year they produced 3 phenomenal albums from their jerry rigged studio on Toronto's East side - Ill Eagle Studios. Those albums were of course their own LP Say Us, their opener's Danielle Duval's new release (which has all the Zeus touches upon it) and The Golden Dogs impossible-to-overstate stupendous album Coat of Arms (coming out July 27 and likely at very least to shortlist them for the Polaris). In some cases - I guess if you've lived through certain chapters of Canadian music across this great nation of ours- well let's just say wikipedia or google are just not your best options to understand an artist or their significance. In the oral tradition of Canada's musical culture that I prefer- the bonding over the intricacies of performance, dynamics, influences, shared history- this writer does not mind admitting that Matt Murphy is as big of a personal hero to me as Rick Danko (who I was fortunate enough to meet as a youngster before his passing). I'm reminded because of a nostalgia for Halifax's twin bridges and brine filled air of the final words of Jack Kerouac's On The Road - from top of mind "what is the feeling of specks receding on the distance on the plain behind you - it's the too-huge world vaulting us and it's goodbye as we lean forward to the next crazy".  
Murphy who has split his time as of late between Toronto and Halifax is predominantly known to Canadians for his fictional protrayal in the film The Life And Hard Times of Guy Terrifico. While Murphy of course wrote the music for that film, is clearly an accomplished musician in the film (in fact the premise is that he is a passed over country legend himself) look for his being backed in the film by real life chums (and also Canadian legends like his straight man Dale Murray, known now for his involvement with Cuff The Duke but he was a seminal founding member of The Guthries one of the most influential roots or alt.country bands this country let alone that city ever new). Dale also bears a striking resemblance to a Springhill, NS native named Anne Murray for some reason. But if you're impression of Matt Murphy is that Guy Terrifico is his only schtick- that would be a dangerous presumption to make. If you have not lived in Halifax which safely you haven't appreciating Murphy's profound musical gift - synchronous as it is with his great humility, humour and affability- might be tricky. He is known for his work perhaps most famously with the definitive mid-90's power pop band Super Friendz (when mind you SubPop and a whole handful of people were freely handing out the accolade that Halifax was the New Seattle). The Super Friendz were (my academic fellows in that they all attended the fine University of King's College) Drew Yamada, a fantastic timekeeper and feel player and Charles Austin who became known moreso as a phenomenally influential producer. In his Ultramagnetic Studios, an odious stair climb up the multi-genre performance space the Khyber building, Austin produced and played on albums the likes of Matt Mays self-titled debut (2002)- (Mays is likewise a founding member of The Guthries also with siblings Gabe and Ruth Minnikin) Austin also produced Buck 65's last good album Talkin' Honky Blues (upon which Austin and Murray notably play). Charles also produced one of if not the finest albums by a Canadian singer songwriter written in the last fifteen years- Al Tuck's The New High Road of Song.

Tuck is a deeply revered and self-satisfied Halifax talent whom many the likes of Joel Plaskett and Pete Elkas idolize deeply. It may be, on a side note that, Al Tuck, is the single most under-rated talent and overtly influential commodity in Canadian music period. Later in Murphy's career, truly an unparalleled guitarist in every vein (rivalling for intance Afie Jurvanan aka Bahamas on a sheer chops level), had a brilliant psychedelic group The Flashing Lights with bassist Henri Sangalang, organist Gaven Dianda, and drummer Steve Pitkin. Opportunities to see them, particularly at the Khyber which was a mixed use bar/ gallery/ studio, were both rare, devastating and managed to psychically/psychedelically devastate the listener. While Murphy has experienced considerable success as a film actor his recent life has been tied up sadly with being the sole caregiver for his own by now enfeebled hero Orton Hoggett. Hoggett, an American expat draft dodger, a very private and not so much damaged but frail gentleman took a shine to the young Matt Murphy. As a result Murphy has played a handful of country rock gigs, with his mate (no relation) Chris Murphy on drums under the moniker Lil' Orton Hoggett but it is important to note that one is a human being and the other music group. If Ronnie Hawkins lived in Mortgage Mansion and Levon Helm and Garth Hudson have gone bankrupt four times over at last count you can imagine unfortunately that caring for Hoggett has dominated, at least in the last couple of years, Murphy's own creative outlets.