NEWS
2010 Billy Fong Award Winner Announced
And we gave it to the best band you’ve never heard and may never hear from again.read more…
INTERVIEW
Fiona O’Connor Knows Her Garden Tools
And we do mean spades, here folks. She’s also set the bar very high in terms of great music writing with her review of Amanda Blank.read more…
INTERVIEW
Metric’s Emily Haines and James Shaw from Matrix Issue 84
Every fighter goes back to their corner to take towel off, regroup, and spit out some teeth. Stepping back may have been a calculated decision for Metric, but the writing remains organic. read more…
HFS! Dead Matrix Journalist Surfaces in Psychiatric Hospital in Mexico City with Belinda Carlisle Cover
It started on August 25th, when an airline ticket appeared in the jacket of a Share CD, a refreshingly unpretentious collection of soulful east coast compositions including a heart-wrenching duet featuring Jenn Grant that teaches us that life doesn’t suck, it’s just okay, but only if we really try and agree to settle. But that’s beside the point. The CD was slipped to me at what may have been the last show of Montreal’s most underrated, and Canada’s most unfortunately unknown band, L’Embuscade, at Barfly. Long story short, our dead journalist was alive and packing songs from the boy genius himself.read more…
NXEW:Eat,Sleep,Drink:Music;Canada
BREAKING!
Harpoon Feared Dead: Emerges With Cryptic Dispatches
Last seen at a Torche show, Harpoon’s last correspondence came from a Wolves In The Throne Room show where he was also slipped clue which led Pistol to Billy Fong Foundation. He has yet to check in but his dispatches reveal something amiss. Take for example his last dispatch: “Imagine dudes marching down four-lane urban roads: strumming guitars, slamming basses, smashing cymbals and snares, but the resulting sound is blowing everything away. Parked vans and cars flip and fly out of the way. Trees uprooted, spinning and disappear into the sky. Moving tricks and moving trucks. It’s a war against aural waste.”…read more about TorcheOR “I expected more! I expected four songs and then an encore! Five songs! That’s all I wanted! I know the crowd wasn’t that big, but the crowd included me! It felt like you broke my heart, and I’ve only been able to talk about it now. It’s August.”…read more about Wolves In The Throne RoomWe detect something is amiss with our journalist. Andy Harpoon should be considered armed and dangerous. If you see him, please contact the Matrix offices immediately. Do not approach or corner Harpoon.
BILLY FONG Foundation Under Secret Construction
Matrix Journalists Sydney S. Pistol and Andy Harpoon have tracked down the top secret location of the Billy Fong Foundation on a remote piece of coastal property on the Pacific coast of Latin America. According to funding sources, the centre is to be used by musicians to unlock the sacred Fong key. …read our exclusive!
Essay: “Everything About Rock ‘n’ Roll is Bullshit!”
…after each critic has finally contradicted the other, the only thing a person can rely not to bullshit them are the hairs on the arms and neck that rise without warning when the music enters the blood stream..…read more
news
Pistol’s Pick: The Rural Alberta Advantage
We have no photos since our offices were ransacked. We the best we can do is a video for our pick for the best show at the Osheaga festival 2009. If there’s a band that could seduce Billy Fong out of hiding, this might be it.…read more
Rabbit vs. Harpoon at the Horseshoe
24 hours after the first real existential conversation about the relationship since there has been a relationship, and only two hours after the necessary physi-sexual re-acquaintance, I am standing waiting for the third streetcar to pass since the first time I tried to leave my apartment.…read more about Frightened Rabbit
Dispatch: Matrix Offices Ransacked…Again. Journalist Hospitalized…Again
Sydney S. Pistol is recovering from a serious groin injury after having been punched in the balls by assailants looking for renegade musical genius and holder of the sacred musical key to free energy, Billy Fong. Pistol’s balls are expected to heal in time for Land of Talk next week. Matrix Music offices have now relocated and we will only be sending dispatches from the road. Pistol describes his assailants as Persian and there is no doubt the escalating tension in Iran has something to do with the power Fong holds over the energy industry. …read more
Essay: It’s Not About the Photograph, by Ian Orti
The pixels will never capture the sound. They will never capture the stratospheric levels of serotonin that will always be better than drugs. They will not capture sweaty backs or the whiskey-tinged taste of a tongue deep inside your mouth in those precious moments when we wish time would just stop.…read more
Andy Harpoon Thwarts Assassination, Swears Bloody Revenge
Thankfully Andy Harpoon is now recovering well in the safety of his own home after defending the life of musical genius, Billy Fong, from an assassination plot. The apartment where he is squatting is under 24 hour protection…When asked why he believed the assailants to be Russian, Harpoon replied, “They were speaking Russian.” …read more
Victory Chimes Ring For Ghosts Of Montreal
If it weren’t for the pain killers I wouldn’t have gone out. An old lady at the community centre where I was chasing down a lead slipped me a muffin laced with nature’s own and the next thing I knew I was leaning on the bar at Divan Orange staring at my black reflection in the pint of stout. It was a typical night for November. Shitty and wet. But these are ripe conditions if you’re the kind of person I am who enjoys a solid band in a near empty venue..…read more
Mina May Put Local Bands on High Alert
In the course of one live show at one near empty venue – the city’s bar has just been raised very very high.…read more
Diplodocus Destroys City
There are likely many many painful pairings of knees and ankles from the amount of flat-out ‘jump-around-like-it’s-the-apocolypse’ dancing, and if all went well for the young hedonists that inhabit these sweaty Montreal dancefloors, then there are likely many many damp t-shirts strewn across the bedroom floors of friends, lovers, and strangers.…read more
Hollywood Holt Show Thwarted by Mattress Fire
Okay so here’s the deal. I was supposed to go to this show but I didn’t. During my pre-show nap, my mattress caught fire when a candle ignited it causing a minor house fire. So…here’s a video so you can decide for yourself.…click to view
Land of Talk Chart Course for 2009
Even with one bum leg in a brace and an ass parked on a stool Powell’s soft lyrics combined perfectly with the band’s cut-throat rock n roll grit to deliver clearly one of the best shows of the year, another in a string of amazing shows in the same venue this fall which have included the Silver Jews, Silver Apples, and The Walkmen. In other words, expect very very big things from Land of Talk in 2009.…read more
L’Embuscade Joins American Terror List
“What the fuck is an Embuscade?” I said to my colleague. “Maybe it’s a riddle,” she said. I toyed with the word. Scrambed the letters as I rattled the change together for a stout at the bar. Scum Da’bee. No. Mad Bees’ Cum…too many ‘m’s. Fucking band. They would probably suck. Not so…What I heard could easily double as the soundtrack to a volcano.…read more
Chilean Pitches Tent at Watson Twins Show
Funny how pessimism has a way of turning its back on a man. No longer able to stand, we found our Chilean a high school chemistry book to cover his boner for the Watsons so he could make it over to the merch table where he uttered what every sexy set of twins wants to hear: “You remind me of those girls from The Shining.”…read more