Magazine

Independent, provocative, now! The CJLO Magazine is the resource for features, reviews, and interviews. Established in 2004, and run by dedicated CJLO volunteers, the magazine covers the latest and best in local and international music, art, theatre, film, festivals, and more!


Raphael Saadiq

If I were to tell you that I was so excited to be given the opportunity to see Raphael Saadiq in concert that I took out my old "Tony! Toni! Toné!"  albums and starting dancing in my room like I was young again…that would be a bold faced lie.


Big Daddy Kane

Big Daddy Kane came to Montreal, twenty years after his last visit, on my birthday. I nearly didn’t go. I’ve had my share of rap artists landing in Montreal decades past their prime. I won’t name them now, but in the last few years a slew of rappers have performed here way too long after their hottest material. I’ve gone because the prices have been right, the chances of getting autographs were high and the sheer nostalgia still had enough to lure me.


Lady Sovereign

So I went to the Toronto Comic Art Festival this past weekend.  One of the guests was Kagan Mcleod.  Dude does a wicked comic called 'Infinite Kung Fu' as well as amazingly beautiful pieces for the National Post.  He's also getting well known in rap circles for his ‘History of Rap’ poster.  I purchased the first incarnation in 2003 which had about 80 heads.  The newest version has over 200, but on both sheets, the female rappers are few and far between.  As someone who pays attention to the girlie rappers, I found the whole thing a little disheartening.  There are scads of awes


K-OS + Lioness

Leave it to K-os to come up with the idea of a “pay what you want” concert.  I learned about it days ago and saw him playing video games with an E-Talk correspondent on the eve of the concert.  I was thrilled when I found out I was one of the lucky CJLO staff that would see him at L’Olympia.


The Rumble Strips

I am possibly the biggest Mark Ronson fan at CJLO, in Montreal and maybe in Quebec.  I admire his production, his albums and his own radio show has been influential on me this year.  His playlists are practically musical treasure maps.  One night while listening to his show, he mentioned a group and played one of their tracks.  Being a disciple, I paid attention to the group name and the track.  Months later, the "Girls & Weather" arrived at the station and it is fitting that I get to review The Rumble Strips' debut CD.


Thursday

Common Existence finds New Jersey’s Thursday at a crossroads: having been ditched by major label Island after their less-than-stellar studio album (2006’s A City By The Light Divided) and ending back up on their former home Victory Records, the band released a b-sides/rarities compilation in late 2007 entitled Kill The House Lights, and then last year dropped an EP with Japanese band Envy.


Psychroptic

With three previous studio albums already under their belts, Australian death metal giants Psycroptic released their fourth this year on Nuclear Blast Records to a fan base that had a pretty good idea of what to expect from them: extremely high caliber musicianship and a certain captivating energy that set the band apart from many of their less dynamic contemporaries.


The Knux

I learned about The Knux weeks before their debut CD Remind Me in 3 Days was to be released in October 2008.
 


2004 CJLO Staff Picks

“Hey, let’s do our Top Ten lists and post them on the website”. You figure that would be enough to send everyone scurrying to their keyboards and add to the avalanche of year-end lists that are fail-safe crowd favourites, if not the mark of lazy writing. So what happens when we’re too lazy to even do that? Well lure them with free alcohol.


2005 CJLO Staff Picks

The thing with lists, especially year-end ones, is that they undercut the obsessive passion of the music lovers. There's no true way around it, as any discussion will eventually boil down to inane nitpicking. That's why CJLO, as a whole, does not have a Top Ten list based on votes or anything remotely objective. Instead, we're throwing together individual staff picks from our motley crew of DJs, not to represent anything else but their true love for this year's music (mostly).


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