-
Artist Spotlight: Luna Li
There was never really another option for Toronto’s fiercely feminist rock n’ roll moon fairy Luna Li. “I always knew that I was going to go into music,” she says. Listening to Luna Li is the moment you hang suspended between dream and a haziness, or when you’re dancing through a slight tipsiness. You feel beautiful, confident, happy. This is Luna Li and she’s here to help you love. Luna Li is making changes to create an inclusive and safe music scene for all people. Her shows aim to create a supportive environment where everyone and anyone can feel welcome. This oracular skill of Luna Li has brightened Toronto’s uniform…
-
Artist Spotlight: Les Petites Nouveax
Les Petits Nouveaux is a jazz ensemble who’s music is inspired by the legendary guitarist, Django Reinhardt. While many artists have taken to interpreting the classics of this genre known as Jazz Manouche, Les Petits Nouveaux’s goal is to incorporate modern influences and to bring a fresh sound to a genre that is often approached with traditionalism. Les Petits Nouveaux’s humble beginnings can be traced to the halls of Humber College, where many students discovering their love of Django Reinhardt formed an ensemble to perform his music. Many years have since past, and the spirit of the ensemble now lives on beyond the confines of the institution. Now Les Petits…
-
Artist Spotlight: Eekwol and T-Rhyme
For Women By Women (FWBW) is the debut of veteran rappers Eekwol and T-Rhyme, who team up to relay powerful messages about hip hop, Indigenous experience and being women in a new project which is aptly titled. Thanks to a Canada Council for the Arts, they spare no expense in delivering high quality content. They have built up hype around this album and have been invited to perform at festivals and events, such as Show and Prove in Los Angeles, CA, Regina Folk Festival and Sask Music Awards. Being an Indigenous musician is a political act. There is no exception for being women in the hip hop industry. Eekwol has…
-
Artist Spotlight: MONOWHALES
Fueled by a passionate desire to create a sound as unapologetic and powerful as the personalities within the band, MONOWHALES have taken the experiences gained fighting their way up the ranks of Toronto’s music scene and barrelled headlong into the creation of their new EP Control Freak. Exploding onto the scene with a DIY ethos and an unforgettable live show, MONOWHALES first made waves with their breakout single Home in August 2016. The band would go on to share stages with Dear Rouge, K.Flay, Matt and Kim, Coleman Hell, and many more. The band’s new EP Control Freak, released in June 2018, was produced by AL-P (MSTRKRFT, Death From Above…
-
Artist Spotlight: Kimmortal
Kimmortal is a queer filipinx second generation settler based on the unceded territories of the Coast Salish peoples: the Tsleil-Waututh, Squamish, and Musqueam nations. Recognized as “a voice to be heard” by Exclaim magazine, Kimmortal has been making waves with their multifaceted approach to music. Incorporating song, visual art, rap, and frequently collaborating with poets and dancers, Kimmortal strives to make an impact with their live performances. Their new album “X marks the Swirl” was a two year long process of creation that was ranked 1 of 40 in the Polaris 2019 longlist. Kimmortal’s music and art have been featured on CBC’s show “Exhibitionists”, the Queer Women of Colour festival…
-
Artist Spotlight: PIQSIQ
With a style perpetually galvanized by darkness and haunting northern beauty, sisters, Tiffany Kuliktana Ayalik and Kayley Inuksuk Mackay, come together to create Inuit style throat singing duo, PIQSIQ. Performing ancient traditional songs and eerie new compositions, they leave their listeners enthralled with the infinity of possible answers to the question “what is the meaning of life.” With roots in Nunavut’s Kitikmeot and Kivalliq Regions, the sisters grew up in Yellowknife, NWT, where endless sunlight shines for two short summer months and deep, wintery darkness consumes the rest of the year. These environmental extremes had a huge impact on Tiffany and Kayley’s overall aesthetic and the pair have always engrossed…
-
Artist Spotlight: Laila Biali
Multi award-winning Canadian singer-songwriter and pianist Laila Biali has toured with Chris Botti, Paula Cole, Suzanne Vega and Sting. She has headlined festivals and venues spanning five continents including Carnegie Hall. Her accolades include a 2019 JUNO Award for “Vocal Jazz Album of the Year”, “SOCAN Composer of the Year” and “Keyboardist of the Year” at Canada’s National Jazz Awards, a JUNO nomination for her studio recording Tracing Light, and a spot on DownBeat Magazine’s “Best Albums of the Year” list for her follow-up Live in Concert. In 2015, Laila released her first album of entirely original music, House of Many Rooms – an indie-pop project featuring a star-studded lineup…
-
The Big Count 2018 – Canadian Festival Report Card
We need your help with The Big Count 2018 -for the Canadian Festival Report Card! La traduction française suit ci-dessous (nos excuses pour le mauvais français!) As we’ve done for the past few years (2016, 2017), we’re collecting data on festivals and music series to find out how many women-identifying, transgendered, and non-gender-binary people are being presented at festivals and concert series across Canada. What we need from you is to choose a festival that doesn’t appear on the list below and give us a link to their lineup online and a count of the number of women-fronted, men-fronted, transgendered-fronted and non-gender-binary-fronted people are included. It can be a festival that…
-
A short list of women and gender non-conforming Canadian artists
ETA: Because this is awesome, we’re creating an accessible database for Trans folks, Non-Gender-Binary folks, and Women to add themselves and/or their bands so that bookers can find them. We launched it in Winter 2020; you can check it out here (and also add yourself or your band!). All of the artists in this short list are also in the database! ETA 2: When this post was originally published in Spring 2018 on our old website, it generated 138 replies from members of the community, listing more than 600 artists and bands. We’ve collected this information in the database above, and are looking for volunteer to help flesh out the…
-
2017 Canadian Festival Report Card
The 2017 Festival Report Card is here! For the past twenty years, the music industry has seen its stages dominated by men in most genres and scenes. With the exceptions of the occasional women-focused festivals, like Lilith Fair, women have tended to see very little representation on stages, and nowhere is that more noticeable than at a festival, where sometimes hours can pass before a woman, a racialized person, or an LGBTQ, Two-Spirited, or Gender Non-Binary person walks on stage as a member of a band. With that in mind, we’ve been tallying up the numbers, and are presenting them below. We’d like to give a huge thank you to…
