I just finished assisting the 15th Annual Hear Here funfest for kids in Whitby, ON, raising funds to purchase hearing aids in families who might not be able to afford the high cost. I’m glad I found these two videos, as they remind me (as if I needed it, I wear hearing aids in both ears), what daily life is like for a deaf person. Rachel Soudakoff produced and edited this compelling video one, highlighting Ren who is deaf.
There was food left on the table. Dishes filled the kitchen sink.
It looked like 25-year-old Wellington resident Brittany Nunn, her husband Peter Barr, and her two young girls had gone out for ice cream, said Drew Weber, an investigator with the Larimer County Sheriff’s Office.
Instead, the woman — about to lose primary custody of her young daughters — fled to Mexico with Barr. That spurred a seven-month local, state and federal search for the abductors and 6-year-old Eden Marie Nunn and 4-year-old Gemalynne Nunn-Mcmorrine.
Early indications suggested the family may have been in Minnesota where Nunn had family. But those tips never panned out, leaving Weber and other investigators with a search unlike thousands of other custody disputes.
The case inched forward as days turned to weeks. Then, a break.
Drawing on new investigative tactics, Weber executed a search warrant and pulled records from Nunn’s Spotify account. He found it was being used from an IP address in Mexico. He later pulled search records from Netflix and Nunn’s other accounts and eventually tracked a package that Nunn had ordered to be shipped to Cabo San Lucas.
A private investigator soon joined Weber and helped monitor the family for months while agents with FBI, customs officials and the U.S. State Department worked with the consulate in Mexico on a plan to bring the children and alleged abductors home.
FBI agents met Barr and Nunn at the gate at DIA on Wednesday, and arrested them on suspicion of fleeing the country to avoid prosecution and felony custody violation counts.
Canadian Music Week is pleased to welcome Cameron Wright as Vice President of Operations and Live Programming. In this role Cameron will oversee all aspects of the festival and additionally assist with programming in the Live Touring Music Summit. This position marks Wright’s return to Canadian Music Week having previously held the role of Festival Director for five years before moving to Live Nation in 2014.
“We are thrilled Cameron is returning to Canadian Music Week in a new expanded leadership role. He is joining CMW at a crucial juncture where live music has emerged as the fastest growing sector of the music industry. Cameron¹s tenure at Live Nation adds to his already extensive experience with live music bookings. He will oversee both CMW¹s live music festival as well as touring & live music content for the CMW Conference”, says CMW President Neill Dixon.
As a promoter for Live Nation Cameron focused on club development and the theatre touring business. He has worked with artists such as Hozier, Faith No More, Stromae, Tove Lo, Milky Chance, Nick Jonas, Meghan Trainor, Catfish and the Bottlemen, as well as prominent local acts Alvvays, Dear Rouge, K.I.D., and Coleman Hell. In addition, Cameron brings a wealth of experience to the festival having worked as a production manager for companies such as AEG, Embrace, Union Events and more.
“I’m very excited to return back to my roots at CMW, this time in a larger role, and to be working alongside our great international partners as we continue to make the event a world-class destination for emerging talent”, states Wright.
“My life is a country song.” When Theo Fleury says that, it’s hard to argue. From his small-town upbringing to the heights of hockey glory, from the depths of sexual abuse and alcoholism to his current health and happiness, the Canadian icon’s 47 years come packed with enough triumph and tragedy to inspire not just a single song but an entire album.
And now, Theo is launching his country music career with his debut album, I Am Who I Am (out October 23) and lead single My Life’s Been A Country Song.
I Am Who I Am, out October 23 on Entertainment One, finds the NHL superstar, Olympic gold medal winner, best-selling author, motivational speaker and entrepreneur tackling a new game: Country singer-songwriter. And it’s a more natural fit than you might expect.
“I know that when people hear that Theo Fleury made a country album, they’ll go, ‘Well … OK,’ ” he laughs. “And I wouldn’t say I’m the greatest singer in the world, but I’m a real singer. But I have a decent voice. I grew up around music. I’m a Metis person and music is really part of our DNA. Some of my fondest memories as a kid were listening to my grandfather play the fiddle. My dad sang and played guitar, my uncle sang and played the guitar. Music was always a huge part of any gathering we had as a family. And it was all country stuff, you know — Charley Pride, Buck Owens, Hank Snow, all those old guys. So that became my favourite genre of music. And making music was always in the back of my mind.”
But it wasn’t until 2009 — the same year he published his unflinching memoir Playing With Fire — that Fleury moved music to the forefront. Wanting to cross an item off his bucket list, he teamed with Winnipeg musician Phil Deschambault to write a song about his life. Once they heard the results, they decided to keep going. Over the next few years, the duo — who discovered their fathers had made music together in Russell, Man., before either of them were born — penned more than a dozen songs, each stronger and more personal than the last. Fleury also began collaborating with fellow Calgarian Paddy McCallion, a longtime drinking buddy who turned out to be a talented musician and composer. He assembled Fleury’s backing band The Death Valley Rebels for his future live shows, and produced the autobiographical I Am Who I Am, which merges the hockey star’s Cash-deep vocals with the classic country twang he grew up hearing in his father’s car.
“We wanted this to be a real grassroots album — ‘Let’s get back to fiddles and steel guitars and accordions and honky-tonk pianos, but put our own stamp on it,’ ” he says. “We’re a bunch of guys who love that old-school country sound.”
It’s about more than just entertainment or nostalgia, however. For Fleury, it’s also about helping others by sharing his story.
“The album is definitely dark,” he admits. “The songs are all about my life, my experience, my struggle. But they’re also about coming through that struggle. At the end of every song, there’s hope. That’s what the lyrics and music reflect: Hope and healing. If people listen to this and there’s a line or a word or a phrase that helps them get out of the situation they’re in or how they’re feeling, that’s really why we’re doing this. The message is that no matter how far we may fall, we can make it back.”
National Geographic’s Jason Silva knows the mere existence of this baby is an unbelievable, ridiculous miracle. Watch him explain this one-in-a-billion happening to the newborn. Hell, if Jason told me that personally now, I might have the same expression.
Stephen Hawking, Arthur C. Clarke and Carl Sagan (via satellite) discuss the Big Bang theory, God, our existence as well as the possibility of extraterrestrial life.
Mild High Club is the home for the musical output of Alexander Brettin, a jazz-schooled musician transplanted from the Midwest to Los Angeles. This Friday, The Club’s debut album Timeline comes out on Circle Star Records, a new imprint of Stones Throw Records, and fans can now hear the album in full ahead of its release here.
With influences ranging from the pure-pop of Todd Rundgren to the sixties psych scene, Mild High Club’s music favors phased melodies and heartfelt lyrics. SPIN call it “head-swayingly hypnotic” whileImpose Magazine proclaim his track “Undeniable” to be “one of your new favorite songs . . . here is the most chill and mild sounds imaginable.” Brettin began recording Timeline in 2012 with everything from a Fostex 4-track cassette recorder to a MacBook, 12-string electric guitar, PortaSound keyboard, bass drum machine and software, resulting in what Stereogum refer to as “a lost ‘60s tune, each note sustained with a twirl of vibrato creating an elongated nonchalant West Coast vibe . . . it’s sweet, in all senses of the word.”
For live performances, Brettin draws other members of the loose Mild High Club collective from all over the United States, for what Brettin calls “a vessel for our musical and comical curiosities.” Collaborators and loose Club members Ariel Pink and Weyes Blood feature on Mild High Club’s “The Chat,” while he has toured with compatriots like Mac DeMarco, Mikal Cronin, Ariel Pink, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, post punk pioneers Wire and more. Currently on a massive North American tour, Mild High Club will head to Europe next month as well as New York’s CMJ, with all dates below.
Timeline arrives September 18th on Circle Star Records, with pre-orders available via iTunes.
Timeline Tracklisting
(September 18th, 2015 | Circle Star Records)
1. Club Intro
2. Windowpane
3. Note To Self
4. You and Me
5. Undeniable
6. Timeline
7. Rollercoaster Baby
8. Elegy
9. Weeping Willow
10. The Chat (feat. Ariel Pink and Weyes Blood)
“Mild High’s melodies are refreshing in their simplicity, harkening back to the days when the studio was an instrument and songs topped out at three minutes. MHC’s chill, cerebral, and spaced out: the stoner-philosopher of 2015.” SPIN
“Lucid, lovely and weird . . . ‘Undeniable’ is built and on a warped and withered groove that ascends like ‘Come On Eileen’ then descends like a bad trip, but all with the an airy and effected vox hovering over the revery akin to Fab Four stylings, making for a very enjoyable (and fitting) score to your next hallucination.” Okayplayer
“Dilapidated retro sound brought to mind the eccentric breeziness of Mac DeMarco cut with the researched baroque-pop of Jacco Gardner.” Exclaim
“Like Ariel Pink, Brettin exists within a realm of hazy analog hiss where the melodies are strong and catchy, but the performances and arrangements remain unpredictable and otherworldly . . . an infectious slice of home-recorded charm and strangeness.” FLOOD Magazine
Mild High Club Tour Dates
Sep 14 – Philadelphia, PA – PhilaMOCA *
Sep 15 – Brooklyn, NY – Silent Barn *
Sep 16 – Boston, MA – Out of the Blue *
Sep 17 – Portland, ME – Empire *
Sep 18 – Burlington, VT – Monkey House
Sep 19 – Montreal, QC – Pop Montreal
Sep 20 – Guelph, ON – Army Navy Verterans Hall 344
Sep 21 – Hamilton, ON – Fort Elgin
Sep 22 – Toronto, ON – Smiling Buddha
Sep 23 – Pittsburgh, PA – Spirit Lodge
Sep 24 – Cleveland, OH – 17th Street Warehouse
Sep 25 – Detroit, MI – Elijah’s
Sep 26 – Bloomington, IN – Blockhouse
Sep 27 – Cincinnati, OH – Midpoint Music Fest
Sep 28 – Chicago, IL – The Owl
Sep 29 – Des Moines, IA – Vaudeville Mews
Sep 30 – Sioux Falls, SD – Total Drag
Oct 1 – Omaha, NE – Lokoout Lounge
Oct 2 – Denver, CO – Rhinoceropolis
Oct 3 – Colorado Springs, CO – Flux Capacitor
Oct 9 – Los Angeles, CA – HM157
Oct 21 – Birmingham, UK – Hare and Hounds
Oct 22 – Glasgow, UK – The Hug and Pint
Oct 23 – Manchester, UK – Gullivers
Oct 24 – Bristol, UK – Simple Things Festival
Oct 26 – London, UK – Old Blue Last
Oct 27 – Pitchfork Paris Opening Night – Paris, FR
Oct 28 – Antwerp, BE – Trix
Oct 29 – Amsterdam, NL – OT301 (Subbacultcha Night)
Oct 30 – Berlin, DE – ACUD
Oct 31 – Bandittown, CA – Vertigofest
Giving deserving pups the best day of their lives, one incredible story at a time.
Meet Bretagne: the last known living search and rescue dog who worked at Ground Zero.
As members of Texas Task Force 1, Bretagne and her mom/handler Denise Corliss had an intense first deployment They joined nearly 100 other search and rescue dogs to find and save people trapped in the rubble of the World Trade Center after 9/11. They’ve had an unshakable bond ever since.
After hearing Bretagne’s story and learning that her 16th birthday was coming up, there was no question in our minds that she deserved a Dog’s Best Day for the ages.
To celebrate her birthday and thank her for her incredible service, we were honored to team up with the dog-lovers at 1 Hotels to bring this New York City hero and her mom back to the city for the ultimate Dog’s Best Day.
Ronnie Morris, best known in the Canadian music scene as the bass player for controller.controller and Lioness, is the focus of fundraising efforts from friends and family over the next two months. There are two benefits planned to help raise money for the Ronnie Morris Recovery Fund.
The Ronnie Morris Recovery Fund was set up by friends in May 2015 after Morris suffered a massive stroke from a double-arterial dissection. After complications during emergency neural surgery, Morris underwent a life saving surgery at the Trillium Health Centre in Etobicoke, Canada.
On Thursday, October 8 at Lee’s Palace, Ronnie’s friends in the music community are coming together for a benefit concert. “Do It For Ronnie” will feature performances from Ronnie’s former roommate Dave Monks of Tokyo Police Club who will play a solo set, Toronto noise-punks METZ and krautrock masters Fresh Snow collaborate as “FrETZ”, V ∆ N E S S ∆ of Lioness will treat us to her new dance/pop solo project, The Flowers of Hell will perform excerpts from their latest space symphony and members ofcontroller.controller, Uncut and the Two Koreas are planning an all-star jam.
“Ronnie’s much more than a bassist; he brings a creative force to things and gels musicians together socially,” said Greg Jarvis from The Flowers of Hell. “He’s the sort of precariously employed creative type that makes Toronto’s culture what it is – but sadly he and too many like him slip through the cracks of the system and need help from friends in such times of need.”
Nirmala Basnayake, controller.controller bandmate, adds, “Raising awareness about the risk of stroke to people in the underfunded 20-64 age bracket is important to all of us, and we are working to bring more attention to that issue, but the heart of this fundraiser is Ronnie. He’s our brother and our friend and a talented musician who is missed in the Toronto scene. We love him and want him to return to making music. This fundraiser will help him get there.”
In addition to the October 8 benefit, friends from the Scottish and Irish communities in Brampton have planned a fundraiser this Saturday, September 19, at the South Fletcher Sportplex in Brampton. The event gets underway at 7 p.m and features CHIN radio host and Irish singer/comedian Hugo Straney, various DJs and music by The Worts (featuring Colwyn Llewellyn-Thomas of controller.controller).
Ronnie returned to his family home in July and continues to improve daily, however, Ontario’s health care system (OHIP) limits post-stroke care for victims between the age of 20-64. At 37 years old, Ronnie is left to cover months and potentially years of rehabilitation costs, including equipment, physiotherapy and medication. To date, the Ronnie Morris Recovery Fund has raised over $45,000, which will help to cover rehabilitation costs, estimated at $200,000.
“We, Ronnie’s family, are so thankful for the support given to Ronnie by his friends, family and rehabilitation specialists and thank everyone from the bottom of our hearts,” says Ronnie’s mother, Rosemary. “We are most grateful that our son, our miracle, is here to witness for himself just how much he is loved and how many people’s lives he has touched.”
For more information on how to donate and for updates on Ronnie’s recovery, please visit: www.ronniemorrisrecovery.com.
“I would want to play Bob DeNiro’s character in Taxi Driver,” Kristen Stewart tells THR at the TIFF lounge. “A female version of Taxi Driver would be incredible because it’s always the guy who loses his mind, and I’m like, we’re way more complicated than that.”
