Ladyhawk, Vancouver's answer to slow-core grunge rock, came through Toronto last night to play The Rivoli. Opening bands were Guelph's The D'Urbervilles and Toronto's best solo guitar-rock orchestra Now Yr. Taken -- all of this presented by Over The Top Festival.

The D'Urbervilles started the night off with their trademark West Side Story intro which involved 2 members snapping their fingers shouting "SHARKS! JETS!" back 'n forth to each other. There's something about Indie-Rock with shouting that makes everything so much better. Maybe it's the fact that some of it had to do with West Side Story. Anyways, the band played roughly 8 songs to an attentive crowd of early show-goers. Besides the opener, the band's best song is clearly 'Shout It Out.' It starts out with lead-singer John O'Regan pushing out an organ sound followed by the hard-hitting on the drums to bring up a killer beat. 'Shout It Out' is a major pump-up song. Go listen to it!

The D'Urbervilles will be back in Toronto with The Easy Targets and The D'Israelis on August 5th @ The Silver Dollar.

Photos
here

Now Yr. Taken is, and always will be, Toronto's best guitar-rock orchestra. Aside from the fact that Now Yr. Taken (we'll refer to him as "Mikey") is one of the coolest people around, his music as a solo rocker has only gotten better. Although Now Yr. Taken has evolved from a solo loop-peddle project into a 4-to-5-piece band, Mikey had to go it alone last night under the hot lights of The Rivoli stage and bring out the old for the new (and for the ones who've been there since the beginning). Mikey uses an electric guitar, an array of pedals for affect, a beat maker (machine) and vocals. Buried under his black cap, Mikey rejects the light that comes in but manages to give out so much from within. His tunes span over 10 minutes long at times, but they're definitely memorable.

A fairly-packed room gathered to the front of the stage to check out Ladyhawk once everyone heard the heavy strums and beat-downs of the side-project band who are also involved with Black Mountain. The band also used to be Jon-Rae's Fletcher's backing band. Ladyhawk kicked off their set without introduction and pounced on the ears and beer-drinkers easily. Some audience members were seen doing windmills (with their arms - not on their heads), while others couldn't seem to keep their eyes off the hair-swinging bassist. If you could see his face, it was only for a second or two.