Second album proves Jason Rutledge's worth as great Canadian musician
World AIDS Day concert tonight at UOIT/Durham College
Dec 1, 2006Distilled is a great word to use when talking about Blue Rodeo for its various connotations. But if you distill the Canadian country rockers, whose roots run deep into cracked concrete of T.O.'s Queen Street, one would end up with a very clear and clean drop of pristine alt-country and you could christen it Justin Rutledge. His album, The Devil On A Bench In Stanley Park, is a masterpiece. There is hardly a weak moment and if anyone was looking for a successor to the great singer/songwriters of this country then Rutledge is front and centre. And by great I mean Gordon Lightfoot.
It is as if Justin was born to it. In a quick chat I had with him by phone, he says he is unaware of how much his record conjures up other classics of its genre. I'd venture that he then just stumbled upon it all, tripped onto drawers, knocking over the archives stored in the Tower Of Song and in the whirlwind of notes, chords, lyrics, photographs and records that came tumbling around him, somehow all of it stuck to his soul.
Chinks of Daniel Lanois's Belladonna, Joni Mitchell's I am a radio, Leonard Cohen's I'm your man, smatterings of Neil Young's lonely boy lost out on the weekend, scatterings of Luke Doucet's Broken, a paperchain of Blue Rodeo's elegance wrapped around him, all carried on a prairie wind.
There are three records this year that a person cannot just curl up with but curl up inside, pull the cover over and fade away into... Neko Case's Fox Confessor Brings The Flood, Luke Doucet's Broken (and Other Roque States) and increasingly this second offering from Rutledge, its melancholic melodies are a fire when the cold rains come, a blanket and a soft shoulder when the twilight saddens a room.
What is the appeal of roots rock for a lad who grew up in The Junction in Hogtown's West End? Good honest music he says. He began six years ago and was befriended by Blue Rodeo's Basil Donovan at a gig in the Cameron House. From there to Stanley Park with Greg Keelor, Jim Cuddy, Oh Susanna and Tim Veseley lending a hand.
What is the appeal of the country for all of these city dwellers and why is alt-country ingrained in Toronto and not Montreal or Halifax or Vancouver. I'd venture again that it has to do with the real and obvious division of the street and the field. Vancouver, as Douglas Coupland points out quite often, is not even a backyard away from the forest, Montreal is a mountain, life wraps around Mont Royal like ribbons on a maypole, there is no separation as such. Halifax is knee deep in folkies so its hipsters have cranked it up to 11 as a response.
But Toronto is only a friend's parent's cottage away from the constellations and a strum-along along the dock. So the alt-country is literally an escape for Torontonians. It's a metro-Mariposa. Queen Street starting with Handsome Ned has been the breeding ground and the refuge. There's Blue Rodeo of course, but also Lowest Of The Low, The Sadies, Cowboy Junkies, the Rheostatics have an overall rootsier vibe and Barenaked Ladies started out all folkie before going acoustic hiphop before going to One Week at the top.
The greatest country rocker of them all, Neil Young, is from Toronto and it is perhaps the great divide between the Hog and the Peg that shocked him into being the Neil Young we now know.
And maybe the indigenous culture in this most urbanized centre is cottage culture. And maybe all those kids are screamo in the 905 because Ma and Pa can't afford one yet. So next time you want to get to that place where a sunset can make you feel so stoned, turn on Justin Rutledge. He is a blue radio.
Justin Rutledge will open for Jim Cuddy at Johnny B's in Whitby Dec. 2.
His album, The Devil On A Bench In Stanley Park, is a masterpiece. There is hardly a weak moment and if anyone was looking for a successor to the great singer/songwriters of this country then Rutledge is front and centre. And by great I mean Gordon Lightfoot.
It is as if Justin was born to it. In a quick chat I had with him by phone, he says he is unaware of how much his record conjures up other classics of its genre. I'd venture that he then just stumbled upon it all, tripped onto drawers, knocking over the archives stored in the Tower Of Song and in the whirlwind of notes, chords, lyrics, photographs and records that came tumbling around him, somehow all of it stuck to his soul.
Chinks of Daniel Lanois's Belladonna, Joni Mitchell's I am a radio, Leonard Cohen's I'm your man, smatterings of Neil Young's lonely boy lost out on the weekend, scatterings of Luke Doucet's Broken, a paperchain of Blue Rodeo's elegance wrapped around him, all carried on a prairie wind.
There are three records this year that a person cannot just curl up with but curl up inside, pull the cover over and fade away into... Neko Case's Fox Confessor Brings The Flood, Luke Doucet's Broken (and Other Roque States) and increasingly this second offering from Rutledge, its melancholic melodies are a fire when the cold rains come, a blanket and a soft shoulder when the twilight saddens a room.
What is the appeal of roots rock for a lad who grew up in The Junction in Hogtown's West End? Good honest music he says. He began six years ago and was befriended by Blue Rodeo's Basil Donovan at a gig in the Cameron House. From there to Stanley Park with Greg Keelor, Jim Cuddy, Oh Susanna and Tim Veseley lending a hand.
What is the appeal of the country for all of these city dwellers and why is alt-country ingrained in Toronto and not Montreal or Halifax or Vancouver. I'd venture again that it has to do with the real and obvious division of the street and the field. Vancouver, as Douglas Coupland points out quite often, is not even a backyard away from the forest, Montreal is a mountain, life wraps around Mont Royal like ribbons on a maypole, there is no separation as such. Halifax is knee deep in folkies so its hipsters have cranked it up to 11 as a response.
But Toronto is only a friend's parent's cottage away from the constellations and a strum-along along the dock. So the alt-country is literally an escape for Torontonians. It's a metro-Mariposa. Queen Street starting with Handsome Ned has been the breeding ground and the refuge. There's Blue Rodeo of course, but also Lowest Of The Low, The Sadies, Cowboy Junkies, the Rheostatics have an overall rootsier vibe and Barenaked Ladies started out all folkie before going acoustic hiphop before going to One Week at the top.
The greatest country rocker of them all, Neil Young, is from Toronto and it is perhaps the great divide between the Hog and the Peg that shocked him into being the Neil Young we now know.
And maybe the indigenous culture in this most urbanized centre is cottage culture. And maybe all those kids are screamo in the 905 because Ma and Pa can't afford one yet. So next time you want to get to that place where a sunset can make you feel so stoned, turn on Justin Rutledge. He is a blue radio.
Justin Rutledge will open for Jim Cuddy at Johnny B's in Whitby Dec. 2.