Ontario - Rock, Classic Rock, Indie
Zeus
In conversation, Zeus might sound like a bunch of keener teenagers eager to break out of the garage. But Say Us shows that they’re far from amateurs. Lots of young bands can conjure memories of the four B’s - the Beatles, the Band, the Beach Boys and Big Star - with the help of vintage gear and an ear for melody, but very few can write songs that have a fighting chance of going big time the way Zeus does. This is an act that's making a big impression and recently got signed to the star-making record label, Arts and Crafts.
www.myspace.com/themusicofzeus
Zeus is appearing in
Concert Friday at 9:00pm
Folk Horizons Saturday at 4:30pm
It helps that Zeus not only know their songcraft, but they’re a seasoned touring band that arranges their songs in the studio. Which means they sound entirely relaxed as they shift tempos, surround themselves with sugary harmonies, write countermelodies for dual guitar leads, and run honky-tonk pianos through sub-aquatic sonic effects.
Founding members Mike O’Brien and Carlin Nicholson met in high school in Barrie, Ontario,. They bonded over ’90s punk like Nirvana, Lagwagon and NOFX, before discovering Canada’s Halifax Pop Explosion and bands like Sloan, Superfriendz and Thrush Hermit. Those bands led them back to ’60s and ’70s rock and a love of analog aesthetics. They formed separate bands but remained close; O’Brien’s band, Paso Mino, found work as Jason Collett’s backing band.
Paso Mino dissolved when the band’s guitarist, Afie Jurvanen, was plucked for Feist’s touring band. O’Brien, not sure what exactly his next move was, called Nicholson to help him out with some home recordings, including a song called “How Does It Feel” (now the lead-off track on Say Us). Some friends from fellow power-pop enthusiasts the Golden Dogs were called in to flesh out that song and others that followed, including some of Nicholson’s. Golden Dogs guitarist Neil Quin stuck around and also contributed songs; Paso Mino drummer Rob Drake was summoned, and Zeus was born in September
2008.
Like their early influence Sloan—or even The Band, for that matter—the songwriters all exchange instruments depending on who’s taking the lead. And one of the many things they learned from working with Jason Collett was that no song should be set in stone: every possibility should always be on the table, every tempo tested, every genre mined—eventually you’ll strike gold. That said, being the self-assured pros they are, the final arrangements of many Zeus songs are obvious from the beginning.
A demo got them signed to Arts and Crafts in February 2009, and it’s not hard to see what parts of Zeus’s story appealed to the label best known for Broken Social Scene: young Toronto musicians regroup after their other projects dissemble; they craft a basement recording with no expectations about the end product; friends in other bands drop by to lend a hand.... Local boys make good...music that is.