Tortoise Out Now!

Show Recap: Broadview Espresso with Anna Atkinson & Our New Ukulele

Posted in Show Recap
Posted on January 25, 2012 by Paul
Dog Is Blue live at Broadview Espresso with Anna Atkinson

  • When: Jan. 7, 2012
  • Where: Broadview Espresso, Toronto ON
  • Who with: Anna Atkinson
    Set List:

  • Dusty Bones
  • She Said
  • People w/Anna Atkinson
  • Young Enough (Ukulele)*
  • Till the End of the Day (Kinks cover)
  • Southern Ontario (Ukulele)*
  • Alligator Song
  • Raise Your Dead (Ukulele)*
  • Laura’s Song (Ukulele)*
  • *First time

This recap has been a long time coming. I held off a bit to get our favourite albums of 2011 and gallery of pedals I built last year posted first before we were too deep into 2012!

When this poster went up around our neighbourhood people thought Laura was leaving the band*. I suppose we should have clarified that it was her farewell to Broadview Espresso (we live across the street though, so take “farewell” very loosely…). Suffice to say she sold her soul to Dog Is Blue a looooong time ago…

Speaking of posters, I always try to save the ones we tape to the counter at the coffee shop, as after a few weeks they look wonderfully grizzled and abused by all the drips and spills. Sadly, I’ve only actually been able to rescue one of them, but a vigilant friend took the photo above before it got tossed.

As for the show itself, what more can you say about Anna Atkinson than she’s awesome? This time around she had accompaniment in the form of stand-up bass and vocals, which only made the experience more ethereal and charming in the intimate setting.

We kept the atmosphere light by debuting 4 songs newly arranged for the concert ukulele (we’re working on recording these for fun, so stay tuned). Speaking of which, Laura completely one-upped me by running the uke through one of my fuzz pedals during “Laura’s Song” —I can jealously admit that the sonic destruction was magnificent!

Of course, it wouldn’t be a Dog Is Blue show if the audio/video equipment didn’t malfunction. We were set to record the whole shebang through multiple mics, but somehow only ended up with Anna’s set. The nerdy A/V gods are still mad at us apparently. We’ll sacrifice a VCR for them before the next show.

*They also thought someone drew that moustache on her, but that’s actually one of Laura’s self-portraits as is.
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Best of 2011: Our Favourite Albums By Other Bands

Posted in Update
Posted on January 18, 2012 by Paul
Sandro Perri - Impossible SpacesRich Aucoin - We're All Dying to LiveMy Morning Jacket - CircuitalMiracle Fortress - Was I The Wave?Shotgun Jimmie - Transistor SisterThe Burning Hell - Flux CapacitorHooded Fang - Tosta MistaBeirut - The Rip TideTimber Timbre - Creep On Creepin' OnIron & Wine - Kiss Each Other CleanDoug Hoyer - Walks with the Tender and Growing NightWilco - The Whole Love

I know it’s getting a bit late to do 2011 year end lists, but it was another great year for music, so I wanted to quickly make a note of the albums we enjoyed most.

Here they are in no particular order (except that Sandro Perri really was #1 …so good):

Sandro Perri – Impossible Spaces
Rich Aucoin – We’re All Dying to Live
My Morning Jacket – Circuital
Miracle Fortress – Was I The Wave?
Shotgun Jimmie – Transistor Sister
The Burning Hell – Flux Capacitor
Hooded Fang – Tosta Mista
Beirut – The Rip Tide
Timber Timbre – Creep On Creepin’ On
Iron & Wine – Kiss Each Other Clean
Doug Hoyer – Walks with the Tender and Growing Night
Wilco – The Whole Love

Check them all out if you get the chance and support the bands making such amazing music! We’ve got lots on the go for 2012, so expect some new tunes from us as the year chugs along.

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2011 DIY: Homemade Effect Pedals of the Year

Posted in Gear
Posted on January 14, 2012 by Paul

◄ Back
Picture 1 of 13

You can still do year-end posts in mid-January, right? Good. Here's a gallery of the pedals I built in 2011. Most of these have since either been recorded with or used live. There are a lot more to come too!

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DIY Effects: Homemade MKC1 Mini Klon Pedal

Posted in Gear
Posted on December 20, 2011 by Paul

Mini Klon MKC1 Guitar PedalWith all the hype the Klon Centaur pedal gets I couldn’t help but try my hand at a project based on its likeness. This isn’t really a clone, as guitarpcb.com (where I get a lot of circuit boards for these projects) has stripped their MKC1 down to the bare essentials, while also adding some really useful modifications, like a bass toggle and extra stomp for even more gain.
Mini Klon MKC1 Guitar Pedal
I can’t really say how close to the “real thing” this circuit is, but a) it’s a great sounding overdrive and b) this build reminds me how perfect Fossil watch tins are for building pedals.

I’ve started gigging with this bad boy and it works very well with my BYOC 250 (the first pedal I built) to create some great lead sounds.

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New Music: Holiday Stan Rogers & Flaming Lips Combo Song!

Posted in Songs
Posted on December 12, 2011 by Paul

The 2011 Zunior Holiday BlenderI don’t blame you for thinking that headline sounds a bit ridiculous, but it’s true: we’ve got a new tune on Zunior’s annual charity Christmas compilation that blends the melody of Stan Rogers’ classic “Barrett’s Privateers” with the lyrics of The Flaming Lips “Christmas At the Zoo.”

Not only that, but our song is in amazingly zany company, as our good friends The Burning Hell have combined “Summer of ’69″ with “Deck the Halls” and Nick Zubeck’s blend of “Sunglasses At Night” and “Silent Night” is amazing.

In case it’s not obvious, the mandate for this year’s charity collection (Zunior does a holiday compilation every year to benefit the Daily Bread Food Bank) was to take a revered Canadian song and overlay the lyrics of a Christmas classic. Our interpretation of those two things was a bit more loose than some, but I’ll be damned if it wasn’t the most fun we’ve had in the studio in a long time. On paper it’s definitely the weirdest thing we’ve ever recorded, but I’d like to think we added our own strange holiday flare to the whole thing.

Check out the compilation at Zunior.com for only $8.88 and get some crazy original music for the holidays along with the warm & fuzzies of supporting a great charity.

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Show Recap: Live as Batman & Robin at The Central

Posted in Show Recap
Posted on December 5, 2011 by Paul

Dog Is Blue live at The Central as Batman & Robin on 03-12-11

    Set List:

  • Tortoise
  • Dusty Bones
  • Batman Theme*
  • The Way It Goes
  • People
  • Song Written Upon Getting Cut By the Argos (CLF Sessions cover) w/Henry Adam Svec
  • Stan & Georgie
  • Jingle Bells, Batman Smells*
  • Till the End of the Day (Kinks cover)*
  • Young Enough
  • Laura’s Song
  • Southern Ontario
  • Raise Your Dead
  • She Said
  • *First time

Years from now it won’t matter what songs we played at the 100 Days of Batman show last weekend, or even how hampered we were by technical difficulties for the first half of the set (check your cables, kids), because the above photo* will still exist in the ether of the internet as proof that we actually performed in full Batman & Robin costumes.

In fact, there was apparently some higher power at work (the spirit of Batman, maybe?) making sure that there was no further evidence, as BOTH video cameras we brought mysteriously didn’t capture a single shot and our audio recorder was never even turned on.

All told it was a fun, if sloppy, change of pace and we figured out the technical difficulties just in time to crank up the distortion for a rendition of The Kinks’ “Till the End of the Day” (using the latest of my Saturn electric guitars live for the first time…and promptly breaking a guitar cable at the end). Pulling out some Batman related tunes was also a hoot (we’ll probably record the three new songs listed to the left for a fun EP).

Henry Adam Svec and WL Altman put on a great opening set, as expected. I can never get enough of the subtle humour and great songwriting in Henry’s projects.

*Taken by our stalwart supporter/friend Justin Heldsinger
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Live: 100 Days of Batman Show with Henry Adam Svec

Posted in Update
Posted on November 27, 2011 by Paul

Dog Is Blue Live at The Central, 100 Days of Batman Show
This is going to be awesome. Those of you in Toronto have no excuse, so come celebrate the end of 100 Days of Batman! Here’s the Facebook event…

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Art: Batman Drawings On Display

Posted in art
Posted on November 12, 2011 by Paul

Batman on the toilet - Paul WatsonRight before we left for our show in Manhattan/San Francisco honeymoon (updates from that trip to come soon) I was invited to hang a handful of the most popular Batman drawings from my previously mentioned 100 Days of Batman blog at Broadview Espresso. The show runs for the month of November and includes 8×10″ prints of 16 drawings, including Batman on the toilet to the left, which was actually a request by kid who hangs out at the shop.

The framed prints are going cheap and I’ve heard from folks back home that they are moving like hotcakes, so go grab a coffee at Broadview Espresso and check them out before they’re gone. In the meantime, the 100 drawing challenge is still going strong—I’m well into the 80s now!

Speaking of art, Laura’s much more impressive portraits are on display at Rouge Concept Gallery in Leslieville right now, so show her some love and stop by. Don’t you want a photorealistic drawing of my face?

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Live from New York: Playing at Pianos in Manhattan!

Posted in Update
Posted on November 3, 2011 by Paul

Dog Is Blue - Pianos Concert Listing

On Thursday (Nov. 3) we’re making our US debut at Pianos in Manhattan! We’re on at 9pm in the upstairs lounge, so if you’re in the New York area come on out and help make our American splash a big one.

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Happy Halloween!

Posted in Update
Posted on October 31, 2011 by Paul

Here’s an oldy, but a ghouly for your trick or treating playlist.

Happy Halloween everyone!

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