In this installment of "10 things" we talk with Chase, one of the guitar players for Vancouver's Living with Lions about Canada, water sports and the ethical treatment of animals:

1. Although they've just released their first full length album, Make You Mark, the band is currently on their fourth cross-country tour: "We've been pretty lucky in the last year or so - had a lot of awesome people help us out."
   
   


2. The band first got together as housemates who liked to jam. The house soon came to be dubbed "Dude Manor": "There was a jam space in the basement and we'd alway go down there and play around, write fun songs and stuff like that, and before you know it that just kind of developed into a band."
   
   


3. The Sharpie tattoo victim on the cover of Make You Mark is actually named Mark: "That was one of our roommates at the house. He's notorious for passing out at parties and getting stuff drawn all over him."
   
   


4. Chase and company apparently enjoy swimming in open water. When I told him that an August gig in Cambridge, ON could be on the banks of the mighty Grand River (rather shallow and disgusting), his first question was: "Can you swim in that river?"
   
   


5. It turns out the whole band enjoy a cool dip, but as of the time of our interview last week they hadn't yet had the opportunity on this tour: "I'm sure once we get to Northern Ontario we'll be pulling over a lot."
   
   


6. The subject eventually turned to the bane of most musicians, the tedium of rehearsing. I ask Chase how he keeps the repetition from getting to him: "Six pack."
   
   


7. With the release of the new album, the band is also experimenting in a remix contest: "It's weird to hear one of our songs as a dance, techno kind of something like that. It's crazy; it's cool though, we like it."
   
   


8. The band is definitely looking forward to playing Toronto this time around, especially with the final show by Mississauga's The Fullblast: "It's definitely one of the more enjoyable stops on any of our tours. We look forward to it a lot, and lately the shows have been really good there."
   
   


9. The band spent some time in town when they recorded their album this winter: "We went [to the Opera House] to hang out at a show one night, and it looked like one of the coolest venues."
   
   


10. The first chord of the record scared the bejesus out of my cat when I first played the new album at home: "We'll have to put some kind of warning on our CDs now, I guess. We don't want to be getting any hate mail."
    
    

Living with Lions perform at The Opera House (735 Queen E) on Wednesday night (July 30) with The Fullblast, A Wilhelm Scream and The Artist Life.

Regular installments of "10 things" usually run every Thursday morning around 10-ish or so. If you'd like to have people know ten things about you, send Steve an email and he'll set you up proper.

Photo by Brooks Reynolds