Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Strange Breed: Toronto Mike'd #520

Episode Date: October 1, 2019

Mike chats with Nicolle Dupas, Megan Bell, Terra Chaplin and Ally Von Wallis from your fave queer, feminist, garage-rockers from Vancouver, Strange Breed.

Welcome to episode 520 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, StickerU.com, Brian Master from KW Realty, Capadia L, CPAs, and Pumpkins After Dark. I'm Mike from torontomike.com and my guests this week are your favorite queer feminist garage rockers from Vancouver, British Columbia. Strange Breed. Welcome. Hi, thanks for having us. Good breed. Welcome. Hi, thanks for having us. Good to be here.

And there are four of you here, and I have three mics. I'm just going to let the listeners know. Okay, this is my memory. Tara. So Tara, if you have something to say. Allie. Allie. Boot Allie off that mic and just swing it over.

The nice thing about this thing is you can share it. But welcome, welcome, welcome. Excited to have you all here. I almost introduced you as Strange Brew. I don't know if you've been told, but Strange Breed is a better name. See, Tara, you're the one who wants to talk and you've got no mic. We're definitely Bob and Doug McKenzie, so it'd work. We're also Strange Brew.

I love the original, the OG hosers. Are you kidding me? Oh, the OG. You know, they filmed Strange Brew in Toronto. Oh, yeah. But you could probably guess that. But yeah, lots of old,

if you want to see some early 80s Toronto, watch Strange Brew. You guys are from Vancouver. We are. Yep. And you're only passing through right you played what night did you play here sunday we played um sunday the 29th at the hideout and how did it go oh it was amazing it was a lot it was so fun okay i just realized the best way

to do is if you all introduce yourself so the listener can hear the voice and then tie it to the individual and for fun i going to guess names and stuff. I'm going to guess you're Nicole. Yep. Okay. I'm Nicole. I sing and play guitar. You are the lead vocalist.

I am. Does that make you the de facto leader of the group or is it a democracy? It's not. Well, yes, it is a democracy, but I also am very OCD. So I kind of have to do everything because it's just like how my brain works. Do the rest of the band find that an annoying trait or is that a good thing? I need the honesty here. I don't know if you've been told, but this is the home of real talk.

It's all good. We really want to help all the time, but like we do what we can and we do what Nicole allows us to do. Nicole rules with an iron fist. Iron fist. DuPont. That's what they call me. Okay, Nicole, that's fantastic. So you're the lead singer.

You play some guitar. And actually, I say I'm not good at names. I already know exactly who everybody is because next to you is Megan Bell. Hi. The drummer. I'm the drummer and yes megan yes the one without headphones is the one who will have the most difficulty being on mic because you got to bend in so uh let me actually oh my posture is struggling here you are you're yellow no not that's not an insult you're not your your cable is yellow i want to be clear why i'm clear why I'm calling you yellow here.

And you're the drummer. Drummers are the crazy members of the band. Is that true for Strange Breed? No, I am the most level-headed of them all. So you are... I was going to say, I don't know, would you be... You're also the tallest, I'll point out, because you're the only one who might have hit their head. Yes, yeah, I am the tallest by far.

And you're the drummer, and I always... I guess it's uh we've been misled we always think the the nut nut the crazy member of the band is the drummer that's how we that's what we've been led to believe well i am wearing a hat to cover my insane bed head so i think this is maybe as straight edge as i'm gonna be so far today who knows who knows what's gonna happen so megan i like that your name's bell uh bell the drummer i don't know i feel like uh i guess bell and drums have rhythm and there's something there you know what i'm saying you could play the bell the ride symbol or something like that maybe i could like create my own um like custom bell set of symbols or something who knows

any relation to uh george bell my favorite blue j Jay of all time? Like probably not. I'm going to guess not. I don't know. Any roots from the Dominican Republic? Nope. Nope. Absolutely not. All right.

Ali Vaughn Wallace. Hello, everyone. Bass. Oh, yeah. Bass. So you got to be tight with the drummer here. You guys got to be in sync. We have this look that we give each other when people say things and we want to start a song.

And I think we know what one another is thinking all the time based on our eyebrows. The knowing glances you exchange. Amazing. Amazing. Okay. And we have... Can we give an example for the podcast? Can we give an example for that?

I can. Oh, yeah. And we got to remind Megan that you got to screen that into the mic, though. Oh, I'm sorry. It's remind Megan that you got to screen that into the mic, though. Oh, I'm sorry. It's okay. You're going to learn. By the end of this 90 minutes, you're going to be well in control. Okay, Tara.

Yep. See, that's perfect. You swing it over. This is perfect. You are, of course, you are the lead guitarist for Strange Breed. Yeah, yeah, I am. And I always thought that's the coolest member of the band.

No offense to everybody else. Well, you've been proven wrong. She's definitely the stud of the band. Oh, geez. That was my next question. Who is the stud of this band? I need to know. Tara, for sure.

Oh, my God. By the way, Megan was lying. She's definitely the goofball of the band. I am to know. Tara for sure. Oh my God. By the way, Megan was lying. She's definitely the goofball of the band. I am very serious. Everything is very serious. So originally, I was under the impression only Megan and Nicole were coming.

So I wondered what happened between then and now because it wasn't that long ago. I feel like I got that email like this morning or something. They kicked us out of the Airbnb. Okay, a number of things probably, but like I got that email like this morning or something. They kicked us out of the Airbnb. Okay. A number of things probably,

but like, um, I've just been such a scatterbrain too on tour. Like I'm, you know, I'm the one that has been kind of going back and forth with everything and with, um,

Jessica from our, our PR team. So Jessica's the one who told me. Yeah. Yeah. She would have told you and she would have probably briefly consulted with me and I was probably like, yeah, okay. Me and megan will go but then i probably forgot and then today last night we stayed in the most horrendous place can you tell me where in the city it was like

approximately give me like a neighborhood or an intersection it was like saint george and dupont okay yeah so dupont and yeah okay that's so that's near i'm so that's near it was a beautiful neighborhood the buildings were wonderful I think that's Moe Berg's hood from Pursuit of Happiness it wasn't his place you were staying at no so what was wrong with this place

where do we begin it was definitely haunted we walked into and we think it was matured living. That's what it said. It said upscale mature living. Oh, that means old people lived there? Yeah.

But there was like a lot of weird ceremonial things happening in this house. We saw a pilgrim, I'm pretty sure. But it is October. I feel like pilgrims are coming out for Thanksgiving that's true but also this morning we like legit we were unpacking

or we were yeah we were loading up the van and I walked by this room and there was some sort of ceremony going on open door

and I looked in and there was like a bris going on oh like that's when they like circumcised like a young Jewish boy it was full happening it was fully happening yeah we were in

the basement we were number 13 which was terrifying next to the boiler room yeah it was oh yeah this is a haunted for sure even like the the room itself you're like okay there's no windows like maybe a window that's broken there was a broken window yeah covered with covered with a sheet in like the top corner there's like spray paint in a in a corner it was most likely to hide the black mold i would like but was it cheap oh wait but terry you were gonna say something oh sorry i would like to say they all left to go around town and i if anybody has any suggestions would like to see a ghost and i have never seen a ghost okay but i would like to believe they exist i stayed in this

place by myself i took a nap i shut all the lights off try to make myself all spooky there wasn't haunted yeah unfortunately you were tempting fate there i was tempting fate you know i was like hey you know no ghost either time you were begging the ghost to haunt you but i think the ghost knew that you wanted to see them so they were probably like not right now not right now these ghosts were fucking with you tara i think uh yeah they knew you wanted it too badly the trick is the trick is to not want it and then you're gonna you're gonna get it oh but was this a good deal like uh this airbnb like do you know what you're paying no i would have let you stay here because um you needed it for the last no which nights did

you need it for? Just for last night. Okay. Because my oldest who sleeps around the corner was at his mom's house last night. I would have let you, but I would have like put out an, I don't know how many of you can stay in a queen bed, but I got air mattresses from camping and stuff. I could have. Seriously.

Well. That's so sweet. Hindsight 2020. Now we know who to hit up. Well, here's the thing. There's lots of beer down here for you because you're getting a six pack. Now there's four of you,

so I feel like I got to, afterwards I'll find more beer, okay? Because it's not fair to give four people a six pack, right? I'm a baby drinker, so that's cool. Tara's a baby drinker, and I'm not a big beer drinker. So this is really for Allie and Megan. They're going to love it.

We will take care of it for you. Okay. And I don't have to check IDs here. We're all over. All legal drinking age. We're all over 50. Yes, we are. Actually, we'd love for you to check our IDs.

Well, I'm legally obligated because I have my smart serve certification. Yes, thank you. Which means in this province, can legally uh like serve beer at events and things like that because i wanted to work this uh beer tent and they said well you can't work it unless you've got this card it's like you got to be certified so i thought okay how hard can this be the most intense uh four hours of like my life was trying to pass yeah it's really tough. I thought I could breeze through it, but it was difficult.

I am SmartServe certified. I could have poured drinks at that brisk? Is that what it's called? At the brisk. It's brisk. It's not brisk. I don't think it's a brisk procedure either.

Brisk is a refreshing iced beverage. Poor baby. Do we think it's a brisk procedure either brisk is a refreshing ice beverage oh poor baby do we think that's a cruel and unusual punishment for a child do we have any any thoughts on the circumstance yeah 100 i think it's even for religious purposes you can't do that right because how is that even a religious thing well it definitely is yeah well, like I know, but like I just still don't understand why. It's a historical thing for, it's for safety for sex and stuff like that. It's like we're talking about circumcision. Yeah. It was like it significantly lowered STDs historically.

Okay. And I think, yeah. And yeah, probably infections of all kinds. Like forget STDs. And I should say, I don't know if there's too much information. I am circumcised with myself, so I can't speak on behalf of the uncut gentleman out there, but it probably would reduce infections.

Yeah. I wish I'd never had one, so maybe that's why. What do I know? I don't know. The TMI portion of the episode. I would always like to think people are good enough with their hygiene, but I guess back then back in the in the days that probably make makes sense yeah yeah yeah no judgment you know

whoever wants to do anything i just think it's it's sad when it's a little baby well people should have a choice it's it's see real talk here real talk you need to express how you feel about these things so you uh i think this is a strange question okay i was biking yesterday through a place called trillium park okay near ontario place you weren't there right you four weren't there at a trim park i thought okay so this is weird i'm biking along and i see like a band of four young women like posing on a rock for a photographer okay and there's like the sien tower There's a skyline in the background because that's the vantage point from this park or whatever

near Ontario Place. And I'm like, I think that's strange breed, but I couldn't tell. Like I was going to stop and ask and I thought that's kind of dumb. Like how can this be? But it wasn't you.

This wasn't you. No, it definitely wasn't us. No, you didn't do any photos at Trillium Park yesterday. We did not. And if we were, we definitely wouldn't look as cool as that band.

Because it sounds like they were doing a great job. Yeah. And this photographer kept backing up in the way of the path to get this shot. And I kept thinking, there's cyclists going in both directions. I'm like, I don't know.

This guy's going to get nailed by a cyclist. But he got his shot, I hope. Now, I'm going to play a lot of Strange Breed music. And we're're gonna talk about some of the songs on this new album is this the k permanence that's the name of the album is this the first album yes yeah is that exciting i've never made an album i feel like that's exciting

and permanence has a picture whose tattoo is it it's tara's we all have the tattoo though so you all got the same tattoo yeah it's okay but it's tara's arm or where is it actually i made assumptions here it's your leg okay okay and uh yeah so it's a cool tattoo on the cover uh who has the most tattoos amongst you four ali i think maybe nicole maybe me and Allie might be tied. I think I have 14. Yeah, I have around that. Yeah. Okay, so you guys are just going to keep going while you have space?

Until it's all filled up. Sorry mom. Is it a mandatory prerequisite to have? What if you didn't want a tattoo? Could you still be in strange breathing? Yeah, for sure. We have all just sort of we have tattoos and you know when you get like one or two you're like it doesn't matter anymore yeah it looks cool okay but you hear what i'm saying like you all have the same one that's

the cover of permanence like what if one of you didn't want that one is that a deal breaker well it's kind of cool because it's not like a specifically banned tattoo like it doesn't say strange breed and It does have SB, but that can be many things. It could be many things. It could be strange brew. It could be strange brew. That's exactly what it stands for.

It could be sandwich Bob. I love sandwich Bob. And Allie's is a bit different. Like she wanted hers a bit different. So hers is like black and white. It doesn't have the color on it. Yeah. Well, that's why she didn't get on the cover.

That's right. But ironically, the cover isn't black and white. She's ahead of the curve. Sharp one. Okay. But like no one was like forced to get the tattoo either. Like it wasn't like, you need to get the tattoo or you're out of the band.

Well, that's what I was looking for. Like is this a manager? No, definitely not. We approached a tattoo artist to draw something up awesome, to draw something awesome up. And I think everyone just kind of felt some sort of resonation within that image. And it was all just kind of, we all knew that we wanted a band tattoo.

At some point. The album was called Permanence. Tattoos are permanent. It was like we didn't set out for it to be this huge like concept but it ended up really working out everything just kind of fell into place and it just i don't know solidified the entire movement i think for us now congrats on the album like putting out permanence and it's pretty fresh right when did this thing drop september 13th yeah it's like, okay, so I noticed it was like

in all these digital places, right? Do you want to drop the places you can pick this up? Like in addition to like the iTunes or whatever. So where can you get it? Permanence? Looking at the lead singer now, I feel like it's her job. Yeah. I mean, it's like everywhere. Yeah. Spotify, Apple,

iTunes, YouTube, you know, all of those places. The best place is our Bandcamp store. So strangebreed.bandcamp.com. You can also order the physical album there because we have it on all of the possible, what's the word? Formats. Formats, yeah. We've got vinyl, CD, and we've got cassette.

I got to ask about the cassette. Like is that a popular, is that for more than just having a souvenir like people are listening yeah we were in winnipeg and we sold six and they're 10 bucks a pop right or yeah i saw that on the web on the band cam site so that's pretty good yeah so is that but they're probably i don't like maybe i'm just guessing they're buying it to have a memento from the concert is what i'm thinking i don't think they're gonna play the cassette are people really playing cassettes because somebody told me some people are yeah they're coming back man i feel like the 90s are really in right now so people want to look like the people did in the 90s and they were listening to cassettes then right well i was listening a lot except it's very inconvenient

very yeah and the sound quality is horrible yeah but uh but it looks cool and that's what matters yeah and it's like a very cheap format of of having something physical too so it's like especially i don't know how it's like received in the rest of the country it seems like pretty well but in vancouver everybody's trying to like put a cassette out because it's or just like run around with their cassettes because it's so cheap to make yeah people have like tape release parties and stuff like that so like where they won't really do any other formats but they do cassettes so i have an idea how you guys could double your money you ready for this yep oh boy charge 20 for the cassette all right that one's free that is brilliant

that one's free i'm gonna one-up that why don't we charge 120 dollars for the cassette so you don't need me you've got this gold nail polish to make it look like extra special yeah all right i shared some uh like youtube uh songs of strange breed and one of the comments came back that you had a sleeter kinney quality going on jills although i called him jills once before when he wrote in the comment and then he said i mispronounced his name so i'm wondering if it's gills it's g-i-l-l-e-s how would you guys say that no it's two l's though it's i know somebody with that name it's gill so yeah because it's french right yeah yeah and the last name is like le blanc or something which i feel like this okay

so jill definitely gill gill. Jill. So Jill likes you already. So, and again, we're going to play a bunch of strange breed. Okay. But since you're only in Toronto, like you're on your way to Kingston right now, right?

Like you're going to go straight from me to Kingston? No, we're going to stop in St. Catherine's. That's where I'm from. So they're going to meet my dog and my family. That's the other direction. Yeah,

I know, but we're spending a night there. Okay. Just for, hi mom, you know, that's good that you have there. Okay. Just for, hi mom, you know. No, you gotta, that's good that you have, you don't have to pay for that, right?

No. Yeah. And it's not haunted? No. No more murder basements. Are you sure it's not haunted now? I'm positive it's not haunted. All right.

Did you contact the Hits FM people about a strange breed coming into their backyard? Because they have that cool rock station you guys sound like you belong on that station yeah um I haven't done any of that work because we didn't know that we were going to St. Catharines unfortunately but like yeah we we're looking into that um I can contact Brock University as well it's my home city so I know you can contact anyone you want but Hits FM has a lot of like music listeners tuned in I don't know

like like for brock would they get a station is that the state oh okay okay uh but the nice thing about the hits signal is it's well listened to in toronto i don't think we get the brock i don't think we get the brock signal here that's a good suggestion yeah thank you no like the siobhan i know i mean i know i'm uh friendly with the program director there, Siobhan. You just got to reach out to Siobhan at Hits and let her know. You know what? Your sound is right up their alley.

I got to get to these tunes so people hear what I'm talking about. But it's just awesome rock. Thank you. So if you're going to St. Catharines, get on there. And in Kingston, they got the K-Rock there, right? Okay. I don't know anymore about how... I'm curious like new bands like yourselves like is it difficult like you're independent right yeah like is it difficult to even get on radio stations oh yeah yes like anyone

to speak to that like almost all of it is super spontaneous like when we hear it it's like i was on a i was driving to work one morning it was the first time I heard us on the radio. And it was like four in the morning. And I had this random radio station on. And it was like, we're going to play the Vancouver mixtape. And I was just like, oh, cool. It would be kind of cool if we were ever on this one day. And we were on it.

And it just like blew my mind. And then the other day I was on the bus getting home from work. And my dad called me and said, hey, you're on CBC radio. And we're going what the heck you know it's so fucking cool is that the two uh cbc music do you know which we were with gloria macarenko on the coast okay okay okay i think it's called the coast yeah yes and that's a radio one then but the uh like the bc version yeah yeah version yeah um yeah honestly it's really difficult um you can i mean with campus radio it's a little bit easier we we like um in bc we're pretty well played and

now we're starting to make our way across the country right um with cbc we were in the top 100 for searchlight this year. So that helped us. Congrats. Thank you. That helped us make it into their rotation, at least with Closer. So that's awesome. So we get played occasionally on CBC,

which is like obviously a big deal. Sure. But in terms of like more commercial radio, like it's... Can I use a specific... So you're in Toronto right now. Yeah. So kind to join me on Toronto Mic. That's amazing.

So hello. Thank you. Oh, kind for you to have us. Now there's two stations in this market that play music where you belong, I think, where you would fit in. Okay, there's two. One is owned by Chorus.

It's called Edge 102. 102.1 The Edge. I get those two. I don't know which one they're going with right now. And then there's this owned by a smaller smaller company so they call themselves indie 88 and they're in liberty village yes like do you reach out to uh those stations and uh like i know where they i don't i'm like i just want to know how that and if you don't know like if you have someone doing it or whatever let me know like no um i reached out to indie 88 a long

time ago but the thing is like i think with them it could be um something that could happen hopefully um but you're going to st catherine's now we gotta do it right now i know um hopefully next time we come i think we'll be more prepared and have more of a team to help us with that something like 102 one is it uh the edge yeah um i'm guessing commercial radio so well they're both commercial radio yeah that one's owned by chorus so it's a bigger bigger exactly conglomerate and i think that's like a learning curve too right like we didn't really know how to reach out to commercial radio you can't you can't at our level you absolutely can't like if you do it you're not going to get a response.

It's just so in my mind, it's not worth the time and energy that it takes because we know like for me, I'm like, I want something I know we're going to get results from. And right now that's campus radio. And that's a lot of our demographic is like young queer folks and things like that. So we want to target that first and kind of like get our name out there in that way. And of course we want to be on bigger stations and I know that we're going to get there, but we kind of have to take these smaller steps first.

Oh no, you're absolutely right. But I'm just thinking, cause I've listened and again, I got to play some of this stuff so people know, but if you sucked, I'd be like, okay, whatever. But you sound really good. It's like, you sound fantastic. Thank you. and you rock and you're canadian and you're indie and uh i always have to use a quote on this because it's like uh all over your like bio but

you're uh queer feminist garage rockers like to me like indie indie should be playing you and should have you in for a quick chat but uh it's tough to get a hold of these people, right? Like you almost have to like find the PD whose name escapes me right now. Like you have to almost like send them a Twitter DM or something or Facebook message him or something like that. And just say, hey, here's the deal. What can we do something or whatever? Yeah. All right.

So next time you're in town, we're going to get you on Indy and we'll get you on Edge 102. Okay. Maybe I'll represent you. Do you guys have an agent? You have an agent? No. Nicole's the agent. I am the agent.

Dream come true. Maybe it's time I diversify and try it out. I have some contacts. Okay. Let's do it. And how have you enjoyed this? Other than Miss St. Catherine's here,

you've probably been to Toronto many times. Yeah. My first concert was the White Stripes in Toronto. So I used to come up here all the time in high school for like shows and stuff. Oh, sure. Yeah. The White Stripes

never came to St. Catharines? No, unfortunately. They were too big for us. But the Hammer maybe. What's closer? Hamilton or Toronto? Hamilton. The Hammer? Oh yeah, no, the Hammer's a big... Yeah, the Hammer. Come on. Oh yeah. I forget. So, okay. So is anyone else, is anyone making their first trip to Toronto? Me. Okay. So what do you

think so far? It's been fun. I mean, like we only saw so much of it, but it's cool for sure. I'd definitely want to come back. Um, I mean, I, I, okay. So I have been here before, but it was really briefly, like, you know, it was maybe like one day in between trips somewhere else or whatever so yeah yeah but it's been great and the people are lovely and there's so much going on so you know former and i once i can get right to you there but uh former vancouver i biff naked who i think is to be the patron saint of like yeah yeah rock uh rock goddess i call her she lives i could throw a stone from here and hit her place. Oh, my gosh. Amazing.

So could we throw stones after this? Honestly, I... Let's invite her over. The thing is, I could have facilitated... I mean, it's all happening so quickly. We're all so busy. But quite like... She just made her third visit here last week or the week before.

Oh, my God. Maybe. And then do you guys know Mishy Mee? No. Okay, you're too young probably. But Mishy Mee is our hip-hop goddess. Come on, I need to educate you. But she came in and kind of crashed the Biff Naked Party because they were on tour together in the 90s.

And it was amazing. Mishy Mee, by the way, for listeners, is going to come kick out the jams on Thursday. So she's coming back. But, yeah, like Biff's biking on the trail all the time and enjoying life in this neck of the woods with her husband Snake and yeah so anyway I feel like it's fate like we're going to bump into Biff naked eventually yeah like it seems like everyone that we've talked to they're like oh yeah Biff naked's gonna be in Toronto and Biff naked's gonna be so I feel like Biff naked if you're listening like please come over to Mike right now let's just hang out let's get it out of the way Biff on periscope I'm talking to you make your way uh to the Toronto

Mike studios and come say hi to strange breed we have beer and traditional oh that won't work for Biff because Biff is straight edge fair enough yeah and she doesn't eat dairy. So the lasagna, I know that's the thing is all my gifts. Okay. We have nothing but our company for you. She does like the stickers. Okay. So stickers are free. Each of you get your Toronto Mike sticker from sticker you.com.

Thank you. Sticker you. Hopefully we're going to have an event at the sticker you Queen street location at some point, but that's not an official announcement. So just, just to whet your appetite there. So if you go to stickeru.com,

you can be making up like strange breed stickers and decals and temporary tattoos and buttons. And you don't have to order a million of them. You could order a hundred of them, for example. We're ordering a million of them. No, but you order a million of these. There's a volume discount if you order a million. And you sell these for $10 at the Strange Breed show. Okay, so you each got your

stickers from StickerU. Thank you, StickerU. I already mentioned the beer from Great Lakes. We're going to have a cool event next spring. If Strange Breed is in town, I would actually see if you want to play the event. But, you know, there's a geographical limitation. We'll talk. But there's going to be a big June thing,

hopefully with the Watchmen. More stay tuned. The Watchmen are a Winnipeg band, but that's close enough to Vancouver, right? It's all the same once you get west of Ontario. They're amazing. They are amazing. I love them too.

We all agree. There is many things we'll jump in our car and drive to for, so. That's a long drive. If it works out, maybe it works out. Did you drive here from vancouver oh yeah sure did but were there stops along the way like the hip would say many absolutely megan was like why did the hip constantly sing about the prairies

it's beautiful don't get me wrong it is beautiful. Canada is so beautiful, but they focused on like the most boring part of the entire country. Brandon. Ah, I just don't get it. It's the Paris of the prairies. I've been told I haven't been there. I just took words word for it. Guaranteed.

It's not words on the wall right behind you there. Oh, that's beautiful. So, all right. So thank you for the, and Palma pasta are going to host the next Toronto Mike listener experience. You ladies aren't around in December 7th. You'll be out West probably, So thank you for this. And Palma Pasta are going to host the next Toronto Mike Listener Experience.

You ladies aren't around on December 7th. You'll be out west probably. But December 7th at noon will be TMLX5 at Palma's Kitchen. More details soon. But thank you, Palma Pasta. Go to palmapasta.com to find out where they are in Mississauga and Oakville. And also they're on Skip the Dishes. So they're fantastic partners of the show. So thank you to them.

Will they deliver to Vancouver? Because it sounds delicious. I bet you they don't deliver to Vancouver. You know, even the Great Lakes beer, you can't get it in Vancouver. That's true. It's true. And it's so good.

You guys have like a Canuck pale ale. Like how is it we can't get it in Vancouver? I know. Because they don't want it to be anything but like ultra fresh like it's that's that's why they don't leave the province but you know what i'll see if they can't get some beer to vancouver it's about time we share this with the rest of the country vancouver is they don't hate toronto do they i guess sometimes i'm told like western canada hates us no not at all. I think we're jealous that you have a basketball team and we don't.

You guys blew it. They're cool, older brother that we want to be when we grow up, but we're never going to be there. But you had one. We had one. We took advantage of it and it went down to Memphis. We feel really sorry. Sorry, Grizzlies.

We let you down. I'm remembering now, Bryant-Reeves, big country. This was the first draft pick anyway. I know you guys are like way too young for Big Country, but I'm just having

some old Grizzlies flashbacks from 95. So pardon me, but yeah, they didn't change their name. I thought they would, they're still Grizzlies. Are there Grizzlies in Memphis?

Do we know? They're in Memphis, yeah. But are there actual bears, like Grizzly bears in Memphis? Like probably not. I don't know. Just the the gay men it's a facade all right um i was gonna say it's kind of like having a team in utah called the jazz i don't think there's a big jazz scene in utah come on okay permanence let's play. Let's play some, some of the C word here. Let's start with that here.

Is that a good place to start? Cause I'm going to hit a place. Okay. So let's listen to a bit of the C word. Do you wanna hold hands? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you wanna kiss me? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you wanna fuck each other? The C word. It's like a guide. We should be forcing our sons to listen to the C word. Yes, sir. It's curriculum now. Well, I have two sons. I'm going to make sure they listen to the C word. Yes, sir. Curriculum now.

Well, I have two sons. I'm going to make sure they listen to the C word here. Who amongst you is best to speak to exactly what the C word is about? Um, well, it can be more than one. There's no rules here.

You put it pretty well. It's a guide. I mean, like it maybe didn't set out exactly that way. Like I kind of I mean, like, it maybe didn't set out exactly that way. Like, I kind of got the hooks of it stuck in my head when I started writing it. It was just a little bit like the consent is cool and the kind of like the that sort of thing. And then we just I brought it into the studio and we were or into our jam space. And then was kind of, it was a little ways after the Me Too movement

and then we were all just kind of fired up and then we just started throwing out silly lines and stuff and we were like, we wanted to be on a heavy topic, but we wanted to be accessible and fun and something that's easy to listen to no matter who you are and just to kind of like, yeah, easy to relate to and I feel like we nailed it.

Did Nicole nail it? You guys agree yeah definitely i want the hoods here i see she's the spiritual leader well it's like really accessible which i think is great um i'm personally in education i work with kids um and consent is much more than just like uh it's much more than like sexual encounters. Like it's, can I touch you? Can I hug you? Especially with kids. Like, I don't want to be touched for this reason and that's okay. So like teaching about space is a really big thing as well.

Because they didn't do this in the 80s. No. This is not important. I think, yeah, I think the only thing we had in like the, well, probably was the 90s was Let's Talk About Sex by Salt-N-Pepa. I remember. That was a jam right there. It was a jam. I love that jam.

And the C word drops an F-bomb. You might have to clean that up for Indie. We definitely have easy access to radio edits. So a lot of our album needs them. The nice thing about this podcast is if you had sent me, if I had access to the radio edits, I'd be disappointed. Like I want the,

I want to hear the F bomb. Yeah. Packs a punch. Oh yeah. But what about musically? Like what are your influences musically? Like do you have any musicians you, you admire that you seek to emulate

oh yeah um i think we all have a lot of common uh bands that we all admire like veruca salt um whole heaney kill um a lot of like 90s riot girl um but it's interesting because we all do have our own like uh space that we occupy with like music so i i grew up my dad was always really into like oh this is the the new band and like oh i knew arcade fire before they were cool and like that kind of thing um but yeah we all have our very own specific types of um of songs that we admire yeah like i think we were all brainwashed by our parents. I listened to like a lot of Rush. Thanks, Dad. I listened to a lot of America.

Thanks, Mom. America's just trying to beat Neil Young, though. Oh, yeah, I know. So, I mean, yeah, I love them all. So I love really a huge variety. My biggest influences, though, I love Harder Rock. I love Joan Jad. I love the Distillers.

Okay, I listened to your stuff, and I thought of the Distillers right away. This is not you. This is not a strange breed, everybody. I'm sorry, that's awesome. But you guys are awesome too. But Tara, this is for you. I'm dedicating this one to you. I love the distillers.

I think they're just so awesome. And I saw them in Vancouver just before we came. And it's just so cool. And just everybody in that band is just everybody original. They're all friends and family. And Brody's just such a force. I love it. Yeah, she kicks ass for sure. For sure.

For sure. I'm going to play another strange breed jam here. I want to play Sharks. Is that okay? Yeah. All right. Anything. Anything.

There's no, there's no, how many, how many tracks on this album? There's eight on the album. And it's all killer, no filler. That's right. Just checking. I don't want any filler. And, uh, although I have a lot of my, a lot of my favorite albums, I go, I like Pearl Jam a lot.

And they're like, they'd stick, uh, like a stupid mop handle. I always get the name wrong, but they have these, the odd track they throw on a killer album. And it's like, it's not all killer, no filler. Like they stick that one song in there. You have to skip every time. There has to be one bathroom break track. Yeah. Right. album and it's like it's not all killer no filler like they stick that one song in there yeah right and if for your cassette listeners those six who bought the cassettes like it's hard for them to skip songs you have to remember the cassette listeners yeah which is i the whole cassette thing's amazing like i understand vinyl yep like although it's expensive and inconvenient

but it's not like the cassette thing where it's like, if you want to go to, you know, you got to fast forward. And anyway, I was raised on cassettes, but I still, you know, you can't go backwards. Okay, let's try Sharks. He won't get away He won't turn a blind eye At a girl like you, babe There's a shark in the water He smells your daughters And he'll get He's a shark in the water He smells your daughters And he'll get

Yeah, he'll get What he wants If you try to get away, he won't hesitate To bite your limbs off and leave you sinking I'll call the coast guard on you I swear to God I'll fucking do it We can do it If we all work together There's a shark in the water

He smells your daughter He'll get See, I'm going to play the C word for my sons, but I'm going to play sharks for my daughters. I have two daughters. They're getting sharks, okay? Hell yeah. Thank you. Is this inspired by Jaws?

Tell me. Yes. We're going to need a bigger boat. Oh, a much bigger boat. Much bigger boat. All right. Tell me about Sharks. Same kind of different side of the same coin.

You kind of nailed it there. This was our first one that we wrote pretty much right after or during the Me Too moment when it came out all over social media and we were just kinda like, wow, okay, this is a big deal. We're all impacted by this and I know that right away I just felt like I wanted to write something about that. But I didn't want it to be just like this doomsday kind of dark song. I wanted it to be about the fact that it's like,

hey, community comes together and does really amazing things. So that's what this is. It's kind of like the first half starts out as this warning, and it's like, be careful, they're out there. And then the second half is like, but we came together, and we're talking about this, and we're like talking about this and we're finding strength and vulnerability

and look what's happening. And now they have to watch out. So it's kind of a, yeah, it's just emulating exactly what the movement was. Play it for your sons too as a warning of consequence. You know, if they act inappropriately,

they will get caught. Yep. Yeah, that's a haunting line that these sharks are, if they act inappropriately, they will get caught. Yep. Yeah, that's a haunting line that these sharks are, they're coming for my daughters, but I'm here and here. Yeah,

come on. Okay. And musically, just rocks, right? It just sounds really cool. Thank you. Especially in the headphones. Yeah.

So, to bring us back a little, we'll go back in time a bit before we play more tracks from this new album, but this first album, this debut album. Hold on here.

Turn a blind eye at a girl like you, babe. How did you four meet? Okay, I told this story twice yesterday, so you guys do it. Should I start? It's long. yeah okay so nicole has always been a musician her um family had like jam nights um they always my dad works for roland so and he has for like 30 years so i've always been like like plunking away on different instruments and yeah yeah so nicole just has that in her brain

it's like a little seed that's growing um so she had been in a lot of bands and it was mostly dudes and she just didn't feel heard so she was like i'm sick of this i'm fed up i'm going to start my own project and it's going to be female oriented and i want people with like-minded politics to join me so she wrote a craigslist ad which is kind of funny because like a really specific craigslist ad like looking back I'm a bit embarrassed tell me what it how it read like what did it say well it was basically like listen it was like listen I am this kind of musician and this is what i my influences and then the next part was like so listen i don't want to work with dudes for the following reasons and not that i don't

love you dudes like i really do and i'm sure you're talented but here's been my experience like it was a long rambly thing and i was like so i'm looking for like badass bitches to work with. And, um, and I'm making my, uh, my, uh, girl, my young, my young childhood dreams of having an all female band,

a reality. That's my goal here. And it was this like long winded thing. And like how many people replied to this? Tara. Me. So Nicole always makes this story sound a lot creepier than what it actually was no she doesn't but anyway so i i had quit um my previous band and um then i was just like sitting on my couch

in langley wanting to do something so fucking bad and then i read this crazy ad and i was just like hey this like sounds like a lot of fun and she sounds like she actually gives two shits. So I messaged her on Craigslist first. No. Yeah, I totally did but you didn't reply. So then I creeped her on Facebook.

And so that's the creepy part. But she never tells it. I did try to message you on Craigslist before. I didn't get an email though maybe i went to my spam or something probably because i feel like it's hotmail's fault i think probably yeah and then i was just like nope this is gonna happen yeah and then it didn't happen for about a month but nicole you're in vancouver yeah like vancouver vancouver um well at the time i was yeah okay yeah and you're langley and remind us even though I was actually just I was there in uh August and I can no longer remember where's Langley to Vancouver uh it's

funny because it's actually not that far but when everybody thinks about it if y'all ever watch King of the Hill of course yeah it's a that's what everybody pictures but it's only about 45 minutes to like an hour out that boy ain't right yeah i know exactly so how long sorry i know i goofed an hour you said or yeah about a 45 to an hour yeah okay so i need to translate it for torontonians maybe that's like maybe that's like new market to our toronto and yes the saint catherine's uh girl is telling me i'm right okay approximately okay all right so you're in langley you're in vancouver so how do the rest of you get hooked up? What happens here?

Megan can tell her part. My part, okay. Well, so yeah, Tara and Nicole ended up getting together a couple times, playing some songs. They finished, I think, in the first jam or the second jam. They ended up finishing a song

that Nicole had been sitting on for a while. So they were just kind of ready to bring in a drummer and you know ready for those things and me being the supportive partner that I am I was like you know if you need me to you know just you know step in just for a little bit like I'm happy to be supportive well for clarification yeah too Megan and I had been together for a year and a half. Oh. So, yeah. So, and we were living together already. That's an important detail you almost skipped there. Sorry. But you're no longer together?

No, we are. We still are. We still are. The way you said it was like, we were together. We were together. We're almost coming up on four years. Congratulations. Thanks.

But you got to be careful of the inter-band romance. I know the romance precedes the band like was it well it worked no doubt it worked out right because I'm thinking no it didn't work

didn't it because they were together a long time I know don't speak is about that right yeah because they broke up no they broke up

but the band the band persevered yeah oh yeah that's what I meant we were planning on getting as big as ABBA and then we're gonna break up ABBA yeah

yeah stay tuned for strange breed rumors that's what people are tuned in for okay so that makes sense that gets us uh yeah that that story uh rings a bell that's good for you uh that's a terrible pun i'm gonna have to edit that out of the that was really good thank you i have to edit that i'm gonna wait in the car i I feel shame for that. Okay. All right. Now we need to hear from Allie. And by the way,

your name reminds me of like, what are the Austrian, the Alps? What's that? Or the sound of music or something. Von Trap? No, yeah. Yeah.

I was, I have this very, like I'm German and I have this very traditional German grandmother. And growing up, I think I had to watch that movie like once a week maybe. And they were like, look,

the Nazis, this is what happened. Like my mom, my grandma is very like, you know, need to know your German history. Today they make you watch inglorious bastards. Yeah.

I think I showed it to my grandma. I'm just like, this isn't true. This isn't what happened. This didn't happen. All right. Now. Okay. So tell us us uh ali how you end up in strange um so i was working at a coffee shop um and nicole came in with megan because i think there was like an ice cream shop like beside us and they wanted to like make ice cream espresso things but we were like just gonna close um anyways then we just like hit it off and

nicole came back the next day and she was like oh you know like i'm starting a band and i thought she was really cool and she apparently thought the same i wanted to make friends um and then she was like yeah so this is my project this is what i'm doing and like i grew up listening to a lot of like ruka salt and i love josie and the pussycats that was like my favorite movie of all time and my mom bought me a guitar when i was 10 and she was like okay we're gonna go to lessons and you're gonna learn because you want to be like josie so that's what i did for uh quite some time and then um i just kind of put it away and i don't really know why i just thought that i wasn't really going anywhere with it um and nicole was okay, so yeah, I'm starting this band. And we hit it off.

She's like, hey, like, do you play any instruments? And I was like, well, I used to play guitar. And she was like, oh, do you want to learn bass and be in my band? And I was like, yeah, okay. And how long ago was this? About two and a half years. So I picked it up. It was actually, I'm pretty happy because it wasn't incredibly challenging

because I did have that guitar experience but it is a totally different instrument like I had to focus on different parts of the music and I had to really like tune my ear and think about rhythm and that kind of stuff which I didn't really have to before um but I like I really love it and I think I picked up on it and I think I've been improving and um i want to learn more about bass and i want to like get a really nice bass and all that stuff well it sounds like the studio tracks that made the album sound really tight like it sounds really good thank you thanks and it's funny like every time we tell the story like even because we've been telling it on tour we've been talking to a lot of people and so naturally talking about the origin story and and i i just keep realizing i'm like this whole thing could have gone so wrong it's like you have craigslist person you have person that i'm dating and you

have person that didn't play their instrument right that was also a stranger and we somehow have stuck it out and made this awesome album and we're all like a little family. So it worked out really well for us. But it could have gone horribly wrong. Yeah, definitely. And who writes the songs? Like, do you guys,

who writes the songs? We hire Taylor Swift. Yes, yeah. And Ed Sheeran. She hires a Swedish guy. Ed Sheeran. We were really inspired with his uh his collaboration with uh brian adams no that's a horrible song um but uh see brian adams is the

vancouver drake no he's not we're just like burning bridges right now yeah um uh we were never gonna have a bridge with brian adams you never know i had a in with cory hart i know cory's not brian you know but does he actually wear his sunglasses at night i've been dying he does that's phenomenal there's a good bass there's a good bass line in that jam holy smokes oh my god um so to answer that question, I'm like, I guess the primary writer, a few of the songs on the album, the music and the lyrics, like always the two worlds, mostly the lyrics.

Like I, and the, like the, the base, the bones of the song, maybe like, because I do play guitar as well. Right.

So I have the melody there, but there's a couple of tracks on the album, like sharks. I wrote lyrically the entire song. I'm 25 sharks i wrote lyrically the entire song um 25 i wrote lyrically the entire song um but i think all the other ones we i would have maybe a verse or a chorus or like you know part of a song bring it in be like here's my idea here's kind of the melody and then we spitball things and you know comes together so it's cool because i i've been a writer for a long time, but I've,

I've always struggled writing with other people until now. Like it's starting to be more natural. You called it OCD, but really it's just, you're a control freak. Yeah. I don't know. I don't think there's any medication for that.

There is. And I'm on it. Okay. So I, my objective was like was I'd have a guest on. I'm doing five episodes this week, and I don't think I've ever done five in a week. Wow. Yesterday I had a guy on who was a member of Bruce Springsteen

and the E Street Band. Apparently they're a big deal. I don't know if you've heard of them. Yeah. So I was going to size up my guest and decide are they ministries every day is Halloween or are they Boris Pickett's

Monster Mash and I've decided without a doubt your ministries every day is Halloween may I argue with them because we all agree that we are individually graveyard smashing I am a graveyard smash I. I am a graveyard smash. I, in fact, am a graveyard smash.

Well, you know what triggered this sponsor mention? This is for Pumpkins After Dark. Somebody said bones. You said bones? Yes. Yes, and then I said skeleton, and then the music just started playing. That's so weird.

There's an algorithm at play if somebody drops a Halloween word or whatever. Incredibly spooky. All right, you a Halloween word or whatever, incredibly spooky. All right. You ladies are not going to benefit from this. They end because I have tickets. Like I actually from pumpkins after dark, I have a ticket for each of you.

It's a PDF that would get you into, uh, pumpkins after dark, which is, and I don't want to get this wrong. So I'm actually going to read this. It's very important. It is 5,000 hand-carved pumpkins that illuminate the skies of Country Heritage Park

in Milton, Ontario from now through November 3rd. And not only the 5,000 pumpkins, but you also get 100 sculptures and there's sound. It's amazing. But, like, if I gave you these tickets you have the St. Catharines family. Would anybody make the trip to Milton for this? That might be a fun walk. How far is Milton?

Milton is not a walk but St. Catharines, you want to help me out here? It's not far. It's not directly beside Toronto. So Brampton would be like connected to toronto and this is above brampton it's like langley 45 minutes maybe it's like maybe it's like langley yeah no it's definitely not far would vancouverites um go to

langley for a wonderful pumpkin oh all the time instagram is littered with people going to langley right now in the pumpkin patch like Like that's what's happening. It's true. So I guess I'm letting you know, I do have, if you have somebody who would use them, I have four tickets. I have family in Brampton too.

Thank you so much. Thank you. Brampton represent. Import at nine Oh five. Okay. But everyone else who wants to go to pumpkins after dark and you should, you get 10% off if you use the promo code Pumpkin Mike. So go to Pumpkins...

Let me get the right URL. It is... What is it? PumpkinsAfterDark.com. And then when you buy the ticket, you just pick the time and date you want to take go with you and your family or whatever. It's amazing.

I can't wait to go. And then when you sign out, there's a place to put a promo code. Put Pumpkin Mike. And you save money. Pumpkin Mike. All one word. when you sign out there's a place to put a promo code put pumpkin Mike and you save money pumpkin Mike all one word how come you don't have a DJ in your band

that would make us more like Slipknot and we're just not ready for that commitment yet I defend Slipknot all the time wait and bleed I'm ready for that commitment they're great congratulations thank you ubiquitous synergy seeker love them I'm ready for that commitment. They're great. Yeah, they're great. Congratulations to them. Also, I'm thinking of, yes, congratulations. Thank you.

Ubiquitous Synergy Seeker. Do you guys know them? Yeah. Love them. They're awesome. I was big into that in high school. That's a long time ago, right? No, that's like last year.

No. No, come on. Come on. I honestly will be checking her ID before I give it a go. That's fair. That's fair. So, Ubiquitous Synergy Seeker, ID before I give it a go. That's fair. That's fair.

Ubiquitous Synergy Seeker. They got the human kebab, kind of scratching it up, and it goes well with the... That's his name, the human kebab. I saw him the other day at the opera house at the Party for Marty. Anyway, get a DJ. We're on it.

Craigslist dad. Do you have an accountant? Nicole. Me. Nicole's your accountant. Yeah, I actually did work in accounting. So, yeah. Money.

If you ever need to bring in the big guns, okay? I know the rock star accountant. This is the guy. I want to say he's better called Saul. He's legitimate. He sees beyond the numbers. He's a CPA. This is Capadia LLP, and I'm talking about Rupesh Capadia.

Now, I did this thing, and it's still going on, where listeners would send me questions they want the accountant to answer. And Lou Skizes, who listeners will know as a two-time guest on Toronto Mic'd, he had a question for Rupesh, and Rupesh recorded an answer. So let's hear from Rupesh Kapadia. Hi, I'm Rupesh Kapadia, the rock star accountant who sees beyond numbers. Today's Toronto Mic'd listener question comes from Lou. Lou wants to know more about CPP survivor benefits.

So here you go, Lou. CPP benefits are paid to the retirees after the age of 65. However, one can apply as early age when they are 60 years old. The CPP pension, when a CPP pensioner passes away, the surviving spouse or the common law partner might be eligible for the survivor pension. The calculation is rather complex and it's best to contact Service Canada as they will have the accurate information. But you should note that it is the responsibility of the survivor to apply, and it can continue even if the survivor remarries,

and it can be combined with your own CPP benefits. Hope this answers your questions. Until next time, keep rocking, guys. Bye for now. Now, because, you know, nobody wants to deal with that, right? I'm listening to that. I'm like, I don't want to deal with that. I'm like, that's why you get Rupesh to deal with that.

There you go. You know what I mean? Perfect, yeah. And you ladies are probably not thinking about when you're 60, but it comes quick. I'm telling you right now. I was just about to ask Nicole about my CPP benefits, so I'm glad that he answered that for us.

I have a question about blimp ads. Is it worth our investment? Yes. Are you kidding me? Blimp ads. Is it worth our investment? Yes. Are you kidding me? Blimp ads are fantastic investments. So by the way, if anyone has a question for Rupesh, this is what we're going to do. He's going to record the answer and that'll be fun.

So thank you, Lou Skeezes, for going first. But there are several in the queue there. So this is cool. Rockstar Accountant. And if you want a free consultation with Rupesh, let me know. I'll hook you up for sure. Now, when you were posting the ad, Nicole, you wanted, it was chicks only. I'm

using that word. I don't know if that's the word you use. Yeah. I mean, it was basically like, I mean, it wasn't that I was like refusing anybody. I was like, however you identify, like I get that. But I was using a bit more of that sort of heteronormative um language because I was like well I've worked with like basically like cisgender dudes right like my whole life that are just kind of like maybe they're great musicians and we were friends but I just felt like they didn't really understand some of like the my lived experience that I wanted to sing about yeah you know and so sometimes my my perspective or my ideas just kind of got shut down and I feel like um there's been people that were a little bit

threatened by my um writing ability as well not to toot my own horn but there was times where it was just like they were like oh we're gonna do this song instead and I'm like this is I'm sorry it's bad like it's not why are we doing this right or they insisted they had to sing more and i'm just like okay bro you know no you need a little swagger okay this is this is not arrogance this is uh the thing is i know that i'm not good at a lot of things but that's one thing i know i'm good at but a lot of other things i'm really not so okay but what about the fact okay because again i keep using this line because you use it and i like it but uh you know strange breed is our favorite queer

feminist garage rockers from vancouver you know you should get t-shirts made up your favorite now uh the queer so is that a uh it's a coincidence we have you all identify as queer that actually kind of was that was definitely not something i was like i want specifically a queer well that's what i was trying to get at like is was that a like a prerequisite like yeah you gotta be tick all those boxes so you can make that claim yeah like mine was like a a blind email and so when she met me she was probably just like well gay because since you since you contacted me on Facebook, I obviously creeped your profile back. And I was like, okay, cool, cool, cool, cool.

And then obviously Meg and I knew because we were together. We still haven't had the conversation. And Allie, I had no idea. I had like that feeling. I was like, you know, like there might, there might be some queerness happening here. Um, I'm, you know, I, I, I hate to be that person that like assumes anything. Cause like bisexual, um, and femme visibility is a real thing, you know? Um, but, uh, it just, yeah. When we got talking, she was like telling me a little bit and I was like, okay, wow,

cool. So we all have this now really um uh sorry i can't even think of the words but we all understand that perspective on the world and that's the tie that binds i think and the cool thing too that we've talked about a little bit is that um like ali and i are both a little bit more like femme presenting so we have a bit of a different experience in the world than say like um megan and tara do so that that in a way even though we're all queer can you like um break that down just a little bit for like what that means exactly so like as simple as possible like after a show when people are like congratulating or approaching us whatever um tara tara and i will get handshakes

and nicole and ellie will get hugs. Yeah. Oh, interesting. Yeah. Just like simple things like that because like I feel like people approach us as like bros. Yeah, we're dude bros. And like Nicole and Allie are girls. Is that the hair? Yeah.

That's the only thing I can, like I'm just eyeballing you. I hope that's okay. But the hair is the difference I see. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Like at a show,

like Allie and I might wear a dress, you know, and Tara and Megan won't. And Allie and I will wear makeup and Tara, sometimes Tara has eyeliner, but that's pretty much it. Oh, hair and ears.

Because, yeah, right? Yeah, yeah. I was making, I was making a joke the other day because I like forgot my razor at home and I was like, oh man, like I have leg hair and armpit hair. Maybe people will think I'm queer now. Come on.

No, I get by a razor all the time. It's really frustrating. People think that I'm just the straight one in the band and it's like, dude, come on. You don't know me. This is fascinating. I'm so ignorant. Okay, because you don't present as queer? Is there a presentation of queer?'s oh sorry go ahead okay stereotypically well i feel like people just

assume that like if you're if you're a woman and you're queer then you have to be wearing you know leather or like you have to be wearing plaid or you know be this big like you can't wear a dress yeah like but that's not true at all right like? Like queer people look like people. Katie Lang wore dresses. She did. Yeah, she did. It's so funny. There's this Canadian comic. I actually think she's living in England now,

but her name is Mae Martin. And she actually writes her little skits. And one of them are about being bisexual and like getting into dating men. dating men she was like oh i dated women for a long time because like i look a certain way or whatever and she like is somebody you would say like not to be rude but like looks gay you know what i mean like some people like you look you know you look at megan and i and you you're probably gonna assume that whatever everybody assumes things no i'm with you and so it's just funny because she's just like she's like i i've been

on dates with men and they're just like this is so weird and she's like why and she's like well i've never been gay before and she's like what like this is like the definition of heterosexuality but anybody listen to may martin she's freaking hilarious oh for sure okay well let's listen to some strange breed again but before i we played sharks and i just want to point out that was the number one track uh cjsf yeah the vancouver mixtape gave us a lot of love and they named that their number one track of 2018 that's cool yeah it was very nice what will be well maybe this will be the number one of 2019. Let's listen to Closer. I think I'm closer to you More than I've ever been But even when you're at my door

I won't confess my sins I I I, I, I, I I think I'm closer to you I think I'm closer to you I think I't want to bring it down, man. It rocks hard. That's good.

Closer. Thank you. Thank you. It's not a cover of Nine Inch Nails like I thought it was going to be. That's an original composition right there. All right. Who wants to tell me about Closer? There's a video for this, right?

There is. Yes. We worked on a video with our friend Lindsay Hitchcock who directed it. Oh, Alfred's daughter. Yes, correct. Correct.

And at the Hipposonic Studios in Vancouver which is where we also recorded the album or partly recorded the album. Yeah.

It was really a lot of fun. It reminds me you guys know Holly McAnarland? Yes. fun. It reminds me, you guys know Holly McAnarland? Yes. Yeah. A little bit, right? Yeah.

I can feel that. Well, here, I'm going to see all my DJ skills that are here. Hold on here. I love this song. I love this song.

Just a little bit. Just a little bit. And your need for love makes you easy prey Safety on the rubber glove seems much too simple Climbing up and down, waiting for the day Waiting for a day You can't see if I'm not listening You can't hear with my eyes open Is it annoying when guys like me almost stick all the female rockers in like one bucket like you don't do that for dudes right no it's i mean it's it's it's one of those things where i

think like there is there are a lot of similarities like i think we have this conversation the other day too of like where i feel like you put it really well it was like oh that we only had so many influences kind of growing up so i feel like naturally there's gonna be a lot of um kind of crossover um in different genres even so whole for example uh like i mean yeah courtney love and whole that's a you're right there's it's different uh dudes there's a million bands to kind of emulate and kind of source from and then uh less so with uh woman bands yeah yeah no exactly and like and i think too like you're you're pulling some of the examples that are like late 90s early 2000s feel because that's like exactly our childhood so you know like like heart like holly like

exactly our childhood so yeah like you can almost make a direct like oh this is what these girls grew up to and like nicole was saying because there is having this resurgence of like grunge music yeah we're definitely i think we're definitely unintentionally but now maybe a little bit more intentionally emulating that feel because we literally had no idea what we were going to be at first yeah so you could have been like a the carter family or something oh totally yeah i think we were starting off with like a bikini kill feel yeah we had a little bit more punky um like we definitely in some of our songs like the c word for example is is one of our punkier tracks and we had more of that vibe kind of right at the start.

And then it's evolved to being a little bit more of an accessible, just like alternative rock sound overall, I would say. I think that's why I like it because I'm stuck in the 90s, like straight up stuck in the 90s. It's a good place to be. Listeners know that's where I'm stuck. So like I hear the distillers and i hear your hole and i hear uh yeah like veruca salt you're right and just yeah and i like it because that's what i like so do you like the gits i don't know the gits i'm only mildly cool treat yourself treat yourself all right i'll take a note on that one we were also lucky we have like we haven't talked about him at all yet but we worked with our our producer darren gron he actually um so he started his career in like the 80s working

with as an assistant to bob rock so in um vancouver so he got the chance to work with a lot of really big bands like um metallica and Jovi. Never heard of them. Yeah. And Katie Lang, right? Katie Lang and Veruca Salt. So actually, it's interesting. He really helped us bring out some of those textures in our music, like some of the harmonies that we do and the layers of guitars

really kind of bring back sort of that specific 90s sound. Is he expensive yep you might have to sell this beer yeah but the thing is that like i mean he helped us out in a lot of ways that a lot of other people couldn't have done and i think it was one of the best investments we've ever made because it made this perfect album and he helped us take our our kind of garagey sound polish it up make it more marketable bring out those sounds that we didn't even really realize we were looking for and that like you say there is a 90s resurgence but there's certain parts of it that haven't fully filtered out yet and i feel like we're kind of on the edge

of bringing certain sounds like like we're one of on the edge of bringing certain sounds like like we're one of the only bands doing it um in terms of that veruca sound or like things like that um so it feels good there is a couple local bands too in vancouver that are having like that 90s sound that they're awesome like the gins like they they have an awesome grunge sound yeah and like nicole said though we're the ones kind of right now representing a bit of the girl's side of things yeah um but yeah because vancouver has a pretty strong like you know surf surf punk and that west coast sound um but now there's definitely there's definitely some bands that are bringing that more grungy sound back the future is female

so i've been told my 15 year old daughter told me that the other day uh speaking of the future being female i just want to give a shout out to recent guest sky wallace because yeah do you know sky wallace you do yeah listen harder works with her too she's like i like her sound too and it's because it throws me back i get a like she just yeah i like that sound and my ears like it and i really liked what i heard it was lowest of the low uh and i was i don't want to cause any trouble with 90s can con bands because we all get along of course but uh i was advised by uh somebody from winnipeg who plays for a popular band from the 90s that lowest of the low were a toronto phenomenon when i was when i was growing up i thought lowest of the low was like nationwide big deal and then i found out like they couldn't

fill the commododore room. Like I had no idea. So this is my ignorance at play because I think, you know, I lived here. But they turned me on to Sky Wallace. Lois de Lalo turned me on to Sky Wallace and she rocks. She does. Yeah, she's great. So I was just giving some love to... We love you too

Sky Wallace. To Sky. I want to hear a collaboration. Sky Wallace and Strange Breed. We could call it Strange Sky. Yeah. Oh. The Sky. I want to hear a collaboration. Sky Wallace and Strange Breed. We could call it Strange Sky. Yeah. Oh. Very good. I like that.

Why aren't you the brains of this band? I secretly am. I'm just smart enough not to tell them. You guys are a power couple. I like that. All right. I'm going to play another track, but I'm going to ask some real talk question

about money. I know money ruins everything because art is beautiful and you're creating this amazing, powerful art with great messaging, et cetera,

and you're representing a potentially marginalized group in this country and then I was, in my brain's now thinking, like, can you afford all this? Like,

how does the money work? Because you got to, it sounds big. Like you got a producer who doesn't work for free and you go in a studio which doesn't donate the time. And I know you're selling the six cassettes and everything and that's good, but you got to put gas in there because you're driving across the country and you got to stay at Airbnbs.

Would you be honest with me about the finances of this? Like and how that works if you're comfortable doing so yeah i mean i won't go into like detail but i need to see t4 slips yeah yeah let me just whip those out for you um we're in a fuck ton of debt that's what um but it's okay i've like i've never really i've been privileged enough in my life i guess to like i but i mean i never really went to school like post enough in my life, I guess, to like, but I mean, I never really went to school like post-secondary, did a bit of like art schools and stuff. But I don't have like for me personally, I don't have like a student debt or anything

like for me, this is kind of that. It's also, but we look at it as an investment in a business because it is. We have a business bank account with a line of credit. And that's how we do this. But the other thing that I always say to other people is that Canada has a lot of resources factor. And we've got in every province or something. These are grants, right?

Grants, yeah. Funding. Government funding. So we received a lot of funding. And that's because we worked really hard to apply for them. The applications aren't easy. But I would recommend people to pay for a grant writer if they're not sure how to approach it.

Because, I mean, if you go to the States, they don't have anything like that. We're really lucky in Canada. So it's helped us a lot but it's much easier to tour down there because there's populations all over the place yeah tour is one thing but um there's no point in touring if you don't have an album how much does it cost to make a good album a shit ton even still we can we as canadians can apply for touring grants and then tour wherever the hell we want yeah and we did receive funding for this tour as well so and like from from place to place we've been making enough to put gas in the

tank yeah like people have been really cool like places that honestly i would say that almost going to the smaller uh cities has turned out to be even better people be really kind and responsive and like yeah then then even like maybe even our toronto shows like has been awesome but like i almost think that like the smaller towns people were just like yeah we made more money in colonna bc than toronto right so um but that's probably that makes sense i think because there's just so much going on in the city like how do you cut through the noise? Yeah. Yeah.

So it's, it's one of those things. Um, so yeah, it costs a lot of money to kind of try to do it big when you're in independent band, but I think it's worth the investment, like with seeing the product that we've got and like we wouldn't have, for example,

if we didn't receive funding, we wouldn't have maybe been able to do all the formats like vinyl and, and CD and cassette um we might have just picked one but um we we did get it so we were kind of like oh it's a no-brainer and it's helping us make our money back and um we're getting there so all right here's a dumb question so you're investing in your business basically like i have a small business too i know all about you know i know it's like you gotta buy the board that's a thousand bucks because it's you gotta spend money to make money I get it how in 2019 uh how does strange breed actually pay off all that debt and start

paying your all four of you like, we do all have day jobs. Um, hopefully not forever, you know, but like we do have them. And that's the main thing is we, we have a payment plan every month that we kind of just like put money into paying off our line of credit. And then, um, and I think that's the one thing I would say to bands is just like, don't slack on that. If you have to get a loan, like you have to get a loan, but just don't slack on that because you don't want to dig yourself into a deep hole. So go into it with a really firm plan in place with how you're going to pay it back. Yeah.

Be real with yourself. And the other thing is like, yeah, we didn't, when you're applying for grants, you don't know if you're going to get them, obviously. So you have to have a backup plan. If you're like, we're still spending this money regardless which is what the the like boards want to see right um you have to have a plan so we did um but then we got the money and that's really been does it help that you're a all-woman all-queer band absolutely absolutely i just clued in here yeah so they probably uh are probably putting money aside for uh uh non-white heterosexual white dude bands i think yeah i think we bring something else to

the board that maybe they haven't heard quite yet and i think two people are beginning to prioritize representation because like we we honestly we we're trying to be the band that we needed when we were growing up and they just didn't exist or they weren't as, they just weren't there. They weren't as accessible as we're trying to be. So I think it's beginning to come around to the importance, the importance of representation and how it does impact people's lives. And thank God that it's happening now because we're really we're really thankful to be yeah to be prioritized over like do we need another all white dude band do we need more another nickelback is that what you're saying exactly you know so like let's kind of make space for other you've had your turn you've had your turn now let's make space for

something else and we happen to be that something else and um like I know in BC, like Creative BC had some grants that were opening up that were more specific to people of color or the indigenous population making art and as well as like LGBTQ plus community, et cetera. So like more specific funding for just those groups, too. So it's really cool to see. Absolutely. No. And the other thing is you don't want to be like i heard rupesh talking about you know cpp and stuff like you don't want to be uh filing away for your cpp and think oh we didn't go for it like you

don't want to like think oh we didn't go for it yeah yeah i think that's part of it we were kind of like okay yeah we're gonna be in debt for a while but the thing is it's like it's the dream go big or go home. You guys made it, like, no matter what, when you're old, because you're going to get old, FYI,

I haven't been there, but you'll have that, you'll have those, you know, those MP3 files, or whatever the hell we're listening to, when you're old, it's a long way off,

but whatever we're listening to, you'll have this, like, professional sounding, well-produced album, that you guys made in like 2018 or whatever like you'll have that and you know they can't take that away from you totally it's like the reason why we all picked up instruments in the first place like everyone wants an album every

now i want to make an album and make an album it's great it's great and it's pretty funny like working with um like i work with a lot of like older men and like my my trade and stuff like that and a lot of people like work every single day of their life including my father which like I love very much but work so hard and it's just like they always have these things like oh I wish that I had. Regrets are called regrets. Yeah exactly it's just like you know what we don't have anything like what we have is that van outside and we don't even own it. I got to see the sand. Oh, you don't own it. And it's,

it's totally a hundred percent worth it. Yeah. Yeah. No, I'm on it. I mean, I'm in, I'm on team strange breed right now because you got to go for it now.

Yeah. While you guys are still teenagers, you got to go for it. Yep. That's us. Go for it. Honestly. I'm going to play. can I play another song?

Please do. All right. So here's another song from, and the album's called Permanence. And people who are listening to us right now should just go buy it so that you guys can pay off your line of credit. Thank you. Go buy it right now. Here we go. If you wanna kill for fun

let me be the first martyr If you wanna Hurt someone Take a stab at where my heart is If you wanna Take a stab at where my heart is. If you wanna win the crown, You're gonna have to try You're gonna have to try You're gonna have to try

You're gonna have to try harder There it is. Stuck me from my shoulders Take me for a better woman I am not Trade me from my ankles Overhead and underlined Twenty-five It took me twenty-five years to wanna stay alive Quiet now, it's not hard to bleed my mind of all the tries

okay you're not teenagers because uh this is 25 you have to be at least 25 years old i'm cluing in here all the answers are in the songs I should have paid more attention that's right okay amazing so next time you're in the GTA together yeah you got the station in Oshawa that should be playing this which is the rock okay

you got the Hits FM at St. Catharines they gotta be playing this you got Y108 in Hamilton should be playing this right you got the Indie in 102.1 in Toronto that got to be doing this. And then I get you, I'll get you back here

if I can still get you because you'll be so famous I won't be able to get you anymore. I mean, it seems like you have all the connections so feel free to forward our stuff. Give them a little poke. And I do know I can get you on a 820 in Hamilton. I can get you on their morning show just to give you some exposure.

Oh, amazing. For sure I can do that because they need to hear you too. Thank you so much. And they'd want you to play. And now I wish, would you play? Like, would you play here? Not today, obviously. Yeah, for sure.

Definitely. See, I should have asked you to play here. Okay. Okay, amazing. 25. What's 25 about? Just, I mean, it's kind of self-explanatory, I guess. It's about things you, like, you learned?

Tell me. You tell me. Yeah, well, this one was really about mental illness, which we all struggle with in this band. So this is kind of the opening track of the album because, A, I mean, I wrote it for a number of reasons. I mean, melodically, I loved the way that it would open an album

because it starts on a note no one's going to expect from anything else they've heard from us with our other digital singles. But you anticipate it. I noticed the first time I heard it, my heart was, I don't know how to explain it, but I guess I was groomed to expect it to get harder or whatever, as somebody was going to kick in and I started to anticipate it

and I enjoyed the anticipation. It felt good. I'm glad. Um, and yeah, and I wrote it just, um, just kind of like, it's a song I feel like that's been sitting with me for a long time. Like for me, I've, I've been dealing with depression and anxiety, um, pretty severely, um, for 10 or 12 years. And I, I, like I, you know, for a couple of years, I couldn't really work and stuff like that. And so it, um, just I'll like, I'm 27. Oh, there you go. There's my age. So I just, yeah So I just, yeah, just hit the 27 mark pretty recently. And so I called it 25 and there's a line that says, it took me 25 years to want to stay alive

because 25 was the year, was like the pivotal year for me where I think the last two years of my life have been very stable. The most stable that I'd been in a long time so this song was I think just a culmination of like all the years of like feeling so um hopeless and awful and just dealing with all that shit and it's it's kind of an exploration of that and then the rest of the album opens up to all the the lessons that we've kind of learned and all the things that are important to us so i feel like it's a cool way to start it because it's it's like a song that's like

it touches on hopelessness and it touches on like suicidal ideation and and like heavy things like that but then it's also kind of hopeful because it's like hey i did reach a point where i'm like i want to be here and thank god that i am yeah i'm glad you want to be alive like this is i'm happy to hear this i am too and and the thing is that it's it i wrote it but we all relate to it you know we all deal with that shit so um so it is a very strange breed song it's not just a me song that line that you mentioned i think that's the strongest line in almost the album like i resonate with that so much and I don't think I've had the words to say what I felt. And that line is just like right to the heart. Like it totally encompasses everything I've struggled with.

Yeah. Yeah. I think that's really important too. I remember when the, the, it gets better movement kind of came around. I felt like, like it was obviously really important to kind of bring up mental health struggles, et cetera. But I felt as someone who was struggling with mental health that it was kind of a ripoff saying,

yeah, this sucks for you right now, but like one day, one day. That's like it's darkest before the dawn. You hear that one? That's the thing. It was such a cliche and it was such a ripoff. And I feel like, like nicole saying it took me 25 years to want to stay alive it was like that was something that was really important um for yeah for for me for all of us i think

because it wasn't just like no it's it's better now so i'm fine so it doesn't matter it's like no like i actually do want to be here yeah it's It's like I had to, I worked really hard and it's still hard sometimes. It's not going to be easy forever. I think there's going to be probably be some points in life where I'm going to feel even worse, but like, at least for right now, it didn't just get better. Like I wanted to,

I wanted to participate in my life, you know, like, yeah, exactly. Yeah. Cool. Now,

uh, time-wise, like, can I do one more jam or do you oh please you need to blow out of here whatever okay i'll do do one more here my blood is clean my mind is not but i never get caught, do I? Heart of gold meets alone in this life And the next and the next one My blood flows so much deeper than you

Whatever I know now that you've become A heartache, such a shame A song trigger all the loaded guns My blood. What's my blood about? You know what? Honestly, this is one of the ones on the album that doesn't have a lot really behind it just invent a story no yeah invent a story uh i think it's maybe just like one of those songs

that's kind of like i'm a bad bitch fuck with me i dare you kind of songs i think this sounds interesting because it was one of the first songs that we jammed together before we had the concept of now and before we you know were writing songs it was this was the first songs that we jammed together before we had the concept of Now and before we were writing songs. This was the first song, I think, that Tara, Nicole, and I played together where we were like, hey, maybe we could be a band. Yeah, actually... And we love it because it's kind of...

It's stood the test of time. We still love playing it, and people still love hearing it, and we haven't outgrown it yet. And actually, I started writing this song. this was one of the old ones that i started and then tara helped me finish in that first like couple weeks that we knew each other and um i actually wrote it originally on a on the piano and it kind of had this different vibe it was like it was like a very different feel so almost like uh the breeders almost yeah a little bit of like but i was writing it like um with like major sevenths like and like different like kind of jazzier sounds and um because i was in a very different project before so then when i i

just thought hey that could be a rock song and then me and Tara jammed it she helped me finish it and now it's just like when we brought it to the studio it evolved even further and it's actually like such a like such a banger now I'm so proud of it and Kingston is when tomorrow night when no no no because you're going to St. Cath

tomorrow night okay so you're going to sleep in St. Catherine's tonight and then tomorrow you're going to get up and go to Kingston. And where in Kingston will you be playing tomorrow? The Mansion. It's The Mansion and we're working with Reel Out out there. They're a queer film festival, I believe, they put on. And so we're raising money for that.

And it's also Queerientation for Queen's University. So so we're raising money for that. And it's also querientation for Queen's University. So it's an all ages event. And we're playing with another band called The Meringues. And then there's some like drag performances. And yeah, it's going to be great. It is okay.

Like if the Nickelback crowd comes out for you guys. Totally fine. You don't turn us away. You don't turn us away at the door. No, never. We don't give you a hard time face to face

I'm just kidding of course anybody comes as long as your wallets are full well put me down for a cassette I feel like I should add that

to my to my shrine here to all the greats but thanks so much I was supposed to get half of you and I was like oh I hope I get

the good half. And now I realized, I realized it's all good. Like a four for four. I enjoyed that. It was a lot of fun. Yeah. Thanks for having us.

Thanks for being here. And that brings us to the end of our 520th show. Wow. Congrats. A hundred earlier, you could have been 420. You would have fell right at home I was in Vancouver recently

It's like a big cloud of cannabis Yeah, it really is Pollution But it's actually just Just weed smoke Absolutely Strangebreed Okay, I'm on Twitter

As at Toronto Mike If you want to tweet at me Strangebreed You're at Strangebreed underscore, right? Yeah On Twitter, yeah Yeah And do you want to shout out Any? Strange Breed. You're at Strange Breed underscore, right? Yeah. On Twitter, yeah. Yeah.

And do you want to shout out any other places to find you? Yep. Instagram and Facebook. We're at Strange Breed Band. And you can get all other information and links to us from our website at www.strangebreedband.com. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery are at Great Lakes Beer. Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. Sticker U is at Sticker U.

And Brian Master, tomorrow with Jim McKinney. So, I wonder what the Venn diagram overlap is of the Jim McKinney fans and the Strange Breed fans. It'll be arranged. I need the two circles side by side. But Jim McKinney is tomorrow, and I'm going to do a proper announcement about Brian Master and what he's doing with Toronto Mike. But you can reach him via email at letsgetyouhomeatkw.com. to do a proper announcement about Brian Master and what he's doing with Toronto Mike but you can reach him via email at let's get

you home at kw.com Cappadia LLP they're at Cappadia LLP and pumpkins after dark are at pumpkins after dark dot com don't forget to save 10% use the promo

code pumpkin Mike see you all tomorrow with Jim McKinney and Peter Gross. is coming up rosy and gray yeah the wind is cold but the smell of snow won't be today and your smile is fine and it's just like mine