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we're THE PHOENIX LIGHTS BAND now

About Me

Le batteur de "Pinko Cronkite" a choisi le nom en Janvier 2006. C'était une plaisanterie, mais les journaux l'ont énuméré comme une vraie bande. Doc Pickles est arrivé exécuter au spectacle (CD release de "Secret Handsnakes") et a utilisé le nom accidentel plutôt. Steve et Michelle de "sadoceanspacebear" ils sont dans beaucoup de bandes fantastiques ils l'ont joint. Doc Pickles il fondé le feuilleton de musique Wavelength, (see www.wavelengthtoronto.com) en February 2000. Wavelength a aidé introduit des bandes de Toronto comme Broken Social Scene, The Constantines, Peaches, From Fiction, controller.controller, Final Fantasy, Jon-Rae and the River, Wavelength a présenté des artistes établis aussi comme Jens Lekman, The Blow, Michael Snow, John Oswald, Nash the Slash, et Julie Doiron. Doc Pickles est notoire dans Toronto a l'hôte sardonique mais optimiste qui proteste un monde injuste et demande aux clients pour rappeler se renverser le barman. Il était le premier booker de l'hôtel Drake (www.drakehoteltoronto) 2003-05.__________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________The drummer from Pinko Cronkite named the band in January 2006 in a joke that became a listings error. A bewildered Doc Pickles arrived to play the Secret Handsnakes CD release party and played under the new name. Steve and Michelle from sadoceanspacebear and lots of other great bands have joined him. Doc Pickles is notorious for being one of the folks who launched Wavelength, a music series and zine (see www.wavelengthtoronto.com), in February 2000. Wavelength has had a hand in spawning such notable Toronto area bands as Broken Social Scene, The Constantines, Peaches, From Fiction, controller.controller, Final Fantasy, Jon-Rae and the River, and has also hosted performances by established artists and performers such as Jens Leckman, The Blow, Michael Snow, John Oswald, Nash the Slash, and Julie Doiron. Doc is well known in Toronto as Wavelengths sardonic but upbeat host, railing against a world out of order while reminding patrons to tip their barkeep. Doc was also the original live talent programmer at the Drake Hotel in Toronto, through its startup and its thrilling first year or so of operations. Many bands who came to play the Drake will remember Doc by his fake pink name of "Duncan".__________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________ So ... Michelle, Steve, and Doc Pickles. That's us, aka Your Band Sucks. We have different roles depending on whether we are playing a live show or recording studio tracks. Studio Michelle is our producer and also sings beautiful backup vox and plays woodwinds like the clarinet and bass clarinet. Studio Steve does occasional remixing and reengineering. Studio Doc Pickles plays keys, pianos, and drum samples, also plays the occasional recorder or bagpipe chanter, writes the tunes and sings. We bring in friends sometimes too like Robyn Carrigan from Vancouver who played accordion. Live Steve plays electric drums and samples, plus keys and wires. Live Michelle plays the drum kit, sometimes plays the keyboard, and often sings. live Doc Pickles sings and plays a chunky reed organ. Sometimes Dave from KQUATTRO joins us on the drum kit, especially when we play the occasional Midweek Mayhem at Smiling Buddha. Michelle is an amazing solo artist and plays in sadoceanspacebear, she's also played in It's Patrick and the legendary Fifth Column. Steve is sometimes known as Moe Kellogg and was the drummer for Squirrel. Those were Steve's drums sampled on Peaches' first fantastic post Merrill breakout recording. Also drummer for Rusty and sadoceanspacebear. Doc Pickles has fronted Toronto band Mason Hornet in the 90s as well as performing in Folk Festival Massacre, Tigerbomb, and Conio. __________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________YOUR BAND SUCKS (concept for this press release lovingly ripped off from brock gel's inadvertantly brilliant website):A few exceptional bands one day cease to be bands and become legends. Your Band Sucks is one of them. Born in 2006 with a burning ambition to embody the best of their era, Your Band Sucks continues to symbolize this same excellence in the art of entertainment. Your Band Sucks, with many extravagantly crafted songs to their credit, perform their stunning original songs all around the world. Your Band Sucks are performers at the very top, heirs to the spirit of the grand performers. Why is a night spent with Your Band Sucks like no other? Is it the demonstration of the extraordinary skill offered during each unforgettable performance? The exceptional quality of the songs enjoyed by the millions of Your Band Sucks fans? All this would mean nothing if it weren't for one essential element, invisible to the eye: the authentic spirit Your Band Sucks injects into each original Noronegasque inspired songs which makes the music of Your Band Sucks a living entity. A night with Your Band Sucks is an unforgettable experience, a few hours of the pure magic of your dreams, blended with absolute comfort, down to the smallest details, that inexplicable flavor of the extraordinary that makes Your Band Sucks an band like no other in the world. Since bursting onto the scene in January 2006, Your Band Sucks has sold over two hundred million records worldwide and have reached number one in every nation on earth except Togo, Laos, and Guam. More than faithful to the noble tradition of prestigious performers, the performances offered and the close attention paid to the smallest details of their presentation underlines the personalized welcome offered to each audience member while Your Band Sucks is on the stage. Your Band Sucks must satisfy the highest of requirements: that of being worthy of an authentic legend. Each turn of phrase has its own character - Michelle and her natural splendor, Doc Pickles and his dashing good looks, or Steve Keeping and his refined classicism - and all band members are geared to touching the deepest crevasse of the weary traveller. Your Band Sucks, one band, a thousand facets.__________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________Steve Keeping's bio of Doc from Aliengirl website:Here is Steve's take on Doc:What can you say about Doc Pickles that hasn't already been said? Well, plenty, I suppose, so where do we go from there? Doc Pickles as a man is, perhaps, the truest artist I know. In making such a grandiose statement, I suppose that I should first define the terms. To me, the truest of artists are those who create in a world of their own, carrying little or none of the common baggage that plagues the "popular" artist – fear of critics, fear of public ambivalence or downright rejection, a need to confirm to trends and fads. In all the time I have known Doc, I have never seen the slightest trace of any such interference in his art. Doc's insistence on writing his own rules should not be confused with indifference towards an audience. There is a notable chasm between those who create with the interests of a target audience guiding their work and those who simply create work that they find most deeply gratifying or even amusing with the belief that the world will welcome its arrival with the same delight as that of its creator. Doc Pickles clearly belongs to the second group. If the songs presented on No Fire Day fall upon deaf ears then I would have to state with the utmost disappointment that it is a world that has lost its sense of adventure, beauty and fun. Doc dwells in a world of thoughtful, melodic pop with levity and insight in perfect balance. The songs are sometimes simple personal tales and other times a call to arms against the ills of society and a life out of order but they are all delivered with a musical sensibility uniquely Pickled. As a performer, Doc never fails to entertain, but once again, this is borne out of the most innocent and heartfelt belief that an audience is not present to judge and keep score of minor missteps but rather to share the gifts that the performer is selflessly laying at their feet. Doc's performances are never dull and are always peppered with his life-affirming sense of humour and often political rants. At the heart of all shows is an invitation into a universe where pop turned backwards is still pop and it's OK to think while you laugh and laugh while you cry; a veritable candy shop of off-kilter sing-a-longs and heartbreaking melodies that are never afraid to colour outside of the lines. As for history, Doc has been involved in several fascinating and notorious projects over the years and has been quietly distributing his own songs amongst friends for at least a decade. He has been the lovable frontman of art-rock units Tiger Bomb and Mason Hornet and, for the past five years, has been known to Toronto audiences as the often enigmatic but personable Master of Ceremonies at the ground-breaking Wavelength new music series. No Fire Day is his first "official" release and features the production work of Dave Newfeld and Alien Girl's own Michelle Breslin. A remix project with Moe Kellogg is in the works._____________________________ _____________________________SUCE, Votre Bande (2006 - ): La bande des Doc Pickles (de Wavelength) et Michelle Breslin et Steve Keeping (de sadoceanspacebear), c'est un indigène de Toronto, où il a été formé en 2006. YBS a tout à fait par accident a appris le commerce de la musique, et a joué avec des notables tels que Faux Fox, Say Hi To Your Mom, Dengue Fever, et Conio, la vieille bande du Doc, s'est ouverte pour Wesley Willis. NO FIRE DAY, son 2005 CD de début, a inexplicablement atteint le numéro 2 a University of Toronto's CIUT, la plus grande station de radio d'université au Canada. Le batteur de "Pinko Cronkite" a choisi le nom en Janvier 2006. C'était une plaisanterie, mais les journaux l'ont énuméré comme une vraie bande. Doc Pickles est arrivé exécuter au spectacle (CD release de "Secret Handsnakes") et a utilisé le nom accidentel plutôt. Steve et Michelle de "sadoceanspacebear" ils sont dans beaucoup de bandes fantastiques ils l'ont joint. Doc Pickles il fondé le feuilleton de musique Wavelength, (see www.wavelengthtoronto.com) en February 2000. Wavelength a aidé introduit des bandes de Toronto comme Broken Social Scene, The Constantines, Peaches, From Fiction, controller.controller, Final Fantasy, Jon-Rae and the River, Wavelength a présenté des artistes établis aussi comme Jens Lekman, The Blow, Michael Snow, John Oswald, Nash the Slash, et Julie Doiron. Doc Pickles est notoire dans Toronto a l'hôte sardonique mais optimiste qui proteste un monde injuste et demande aux clients pour rappeler se renverser le barman. __________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________ __________________________________SUCKS, Your Band (2006 - ): Born in 2006 in Toronto, Canada; band of Wavelength co-founder/emcee emeritus Doc Pickles and sadoceanspacebear's Michelle Breslin & Steve Keeping. Doc's 2005 debut NO FIRE DAY, predecessor to YBS, reached #2 on CIUT, Canada's largest college radio station. No Fire Day was a truly indie handcrafted labour of love and thus was enthusiastically and roundly ignored by Toronto's mainstream tastemaking industry/adult escort directories (Now eye don't want to name names but thanks for nothing). Happily, thanks to Saint Billy Bragg, FOXnews has rewritten its myspace user contract, allowing artists like you and we to post tunes free for download and perusal without giving up rights to our work, and as a result YBS is now available for your indigestion outside the 416 area code. We hope you enjoy some little musical treats on this and our strange sister site, "Doc Pickles". Please download these tracks and share them, World!

My Interests

Music:

Member Since: 2/1/2006
Band Website: myspace.com/secretjapanesegirlfriend
Type of Label: None

My Blog

Video-interview & review of our CMW show (Torontoist.com)

Review of our Canadian Music Week gig in Torontoist"I left to make it to Neutral before Your Band Sucks took the stage. By1 AM the audience was dwindling, but you would never tell by the wayband perfo...
Posted by NO FIRE DAY (songs from the Phoenix Lights 1st CD) on Wed, 06 Dec 2006 10:28:00 PST

Anti-Hit List podcast with Doc Pickles, Echo & the Bunnymen, Sam Champion, more (Toronto Star)

41.Anti-Hit List podcast for Sept. 3, 2005 This week, we have a full download of the hilariously-titled Teach Your Pets to Smoke by Toronto band Doc Pickles, plus new music by Sam Champion's stars E...
Posted by NO FIRE DAY (songs from the Phoenix Lights 1st CD) on Wed, 15 Mar 2006 11:42:00 PST

NO FIRE DAY reaches number 2 on CIUT! (!earshot)

Thanks CIUT! Wow, it's good to know somebody cares. YBS is totally going to help with your next fundraising drive. CIUT 89.5 MHz - Toronto Top 30 For the Week Ending: Tues...
Posted by NO FIRE DAY (songs from the Phoenix Lights 1st CD) on Wed, 15 Mar 2006 11:25:00 PST

T.O. Music Notes: Doc Pickles (NOW)

T.O. Music Notes --> --> Who? Doc Pickles Photo By David Lee       WHERE? Sunday (August 5) at Ted's Wrecking Yard and part of Wavelength 75 ...
Posted by NO FIRE DAY (songs from the Phoenix Lights 1st CD) on Wed, 15 Mar 2006 11:38:00 PST