THERE’S something in the Canadian water at the moment: something that seems to promote one-man artisans, off crafting a chiming and exploratory pop, one in which they fuse elements as instinct tells them, searching, finding new colours and textures.
Toronto’s Sing Leaf is off fashioning this synthy-psych-folk odysseys such as “Sunshine” (and his September album, Not Earth, is a cracker – trust us, we get early dibs on these things, and watch for our review).
Meanwhile over in Montreal, Yves Jarvis – the nom-de-musique of 23-year-old Jean-Sébastien Audet, the artist previously known as Un Blonde – is shaping a very personal thesis of colour theory, soul, prog rock and folk into a quirky and wayward and rather lovely thang.
Last year’s set for Anti-, The Same But By Different Means, contained 22 tracks ranging from 14 seconds to eight minutes, a kind of Money Mark approach if you will; Jean-Sébastien has formalised things down to ten tracks for this September’s long-player, Sundry Rock Song Stock.
Have a gander at the lyric video below for the lead track “For Props”, a sideways salvo at those with wealth and privilege also coming looking for kudos as some means of self-justification, despite the fact they “can’t empathize or reciprocate,” alongside others in his social circles “pandering for props.”
On one level it’s the simplest of acoustic strumalongs, lazy and informal, but elevated by that politicization and the warm, warm layering of Jean-Sébastien in chorus with himself.
Expect Sundry Rock Song Stock to bring more of his personal vision: he played and recorded every instrument, mixed it down, even painted the cover. And cutting his teeth as a busker out there in the open-air auditorium inspired him to record most of the new album outside using a makeshift studio, letting the atmospherics of the world at large in.
Like the video, like the process, like the cover, the colour theme behind this one is green, which Jean-Sébastien espouses as “moving beyond an aesthetic attraction into feelings of wildness, boundless energy, and an anti-establishment streak”.
“People think I’m calm, but I’m very not calm, and I’m happy to elaborate on it now. This album came together exceptionally easy in reaction to that nighttime shit. This green is epitomized. This album is reduced,” he says.
Yves Jarvis’s Sundry Rock Song Stock will be released by Anti- on digital on September 25th, with the vinyl pressing following on November 13th. Order yours now here or from the Yves Jarvis website, here.
