Supercrawl Presents JJ Wilde Nov 8 at Bridgeworks
JJ WILDE
GA Standing 19+ • $30-$95 (+SC/HST) Advance
Chart-topping tour de force JJ Wilde has been on an incredible journey since the release of her debut album Ruthless in 2020. With over 36 million global streams and prominent playlist placement on digital platforms, Wilde continues to captivate a diverse global audience, consistently establishing herself as a dominant voice in the rock music scene. Wilde etched her name in the history books as the first female artist to simultaneously hit #1 on all three Canadian rock charts with her debut SOCAN Award winning single “The Rush,” holding the slot for 10 weeks concurrently in addition to spending a whopping 21 weeks atop the Rock Big Picture chart. She quickly followed with two more back-to-back #1’s: “Best Boy,” an unapologetic anthem challenging societal norms for women, and her hit “Mercy,” a modern rock powerhouse weaving a tale of revenge. Her reign as Canada’s Queen of Rock n’ Roll didn’t end there; in 2021 Wilde took home the JUNO Award for Rock Album of the Year for her album Ruthless (2020), becoming the first woman to do so since Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill in 1996. Wilde has shared the stage with a veritable who’s-who of acclaimed acts including Incubus, Jimmy Eat World, Pearl Jam, The Glorious Sons, Scorpions, Kiss and more, and her magnetic stage presence at renowned festivals worldwide, including Bottle Rock, Firefly, Nova Rock, and Hyde Park with Pearl Jam, have solidified her reputation as a captivating live performer. Now, Wilde embarks on her next chapter, poised to release the first taste of her most powerful and personal collection of songs to date with the May 2024 EP Best Of Me (Part 1).
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The Vancouver folk-pop duo Fionn have spent most of the last year working on their new record I Might Start Smoking. This new record is a full-circle record for Fionn, revisiting the sound and spirit of their heralded first releases; however, their path to this point has been anything but predictable. After all, the duo only dropped their self-titled debut in 2018, though they’ve been quite prolific since, developing a song writing palette in a few years that even career artists would kill for. Their latest finds the sisters leaning on their Celtic roots and limiting their palette with organic instrumentation. It’s still catchy as hell, relying on musicianship, song writing acumen, and authenticity for hooks instead of high-tech tools. Fionn have been making their way back onstage after the pandemic’s forced hiatus and will surely return to pushing musical boundaries with subsequent recordings. For now though, this album revisits the pure, undiluted creative prowess that propelled them to fame in the first place.
Supercrawl Presents Andy Shauf Oct 4 at Bridgeworks
ANDY SHAUF
GA Standing 19+ • $35 (+SC/HST) Advance
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Hailed as “a gifted storyteller” (NPR Music) for 2016’s The Party and 2020’s The Neon Skyline, Andy Shauf writes albums that unfold like short fiction, full of colorful characters, fine details and a rich emotional depth. With his 2023 album Norm, however, Shauf has slyly deconstructed and reshaped the style for which he’s been celebrated, elevating his songwriting with intricate layers and perspectives, challenging himself to find a new direction. Under the guise of an intoxicating collection of jazz-inflected romantic ballads, his storytelling has become decidedly more oblique, hinting at ominous situations and dark motivations. Shauf had planned to be touring around The Neon Skyline but, like many of us in the early days of the pandemic, he spent a lot of time alone instead. He sequestered himself in his garage studio, self-producing and playing every instrument on Norm, a collection of more conventional songs written predominantly on guitar, piano and synths. The latter was essential to creating the more spacious and tactile sounds he sought. Shauf’s goals were uncomplicated: create something melody-driven rather than chord-driven, and make it modern. Shauf recruited Neal Pogue (Tyler, the Creator, Janelle Monae, Outkast), a prodigious shaper of genre-and-time-defying tracks, to mix the album, further building on the gently levitating, synth-laden atmospherics. After gaining indie notoriety with The Party and a Polaris Music Prize nomination, performances on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and CBS This Morning: Saturday, and praise from the likes of Pitchfork, ESQUIRE, NPR Music, Stereogum, The Atlantic and beyond for The Neon Skyline, Shauf has left the realm of things he’s known on his third album, pivoting away from the semi-autobiographical, and pushing himself to grow as a songwriter in an entirely different way. With Norm, he recreated his idea of a concept album, and also made it about faith and fatalism. But Shauf has realized he doesn’t need to moralize. He’s assigned that task to us, the listeners. At once narrators and investigators, we fill in the blanks.
Supercrawl Presents Boy and Bear Sept 9 at Bridgeworks
BOY AND BEAR
GA Standing 19+ • $27 (+SC/HST) advance
Boy & Bear have attained a level of staying power that most artists could only dream of; and all whilst maintaining their authentic vision and driving love for their craft. Achieving early career support from triple j Boy & Bear swiftly catapulted onto the world stage releasing their double-platinum debut album Moonfire in 2011, which went on to snag five coveted ARIA award wins. 2013’s Harlequin Dream and 2015’s Limit of Love strengthened Boy & Bear’s expansive presence, with both albums charting at #1, and Harlequin Dream marking the group’s second studio album to go Platinum. From 2019’s Suck on Light to 2023’s self-titled full length (both top 10 albums), Boy & Bear have continued to evolve and grow, gaining more and more fans from across the globe. In addition to their five consecutive top 10 albums and over 200 million streams, Boy & Bear’s live show is a uniquely compelling experience and has earned the band the glowing reputation as one of Australia’s most outstanding live acts.
Supercrawl Presents Too Many Zooz Sept 21 at Bridgeworks
Supercrawl Presents
GA Standing 19+ • $30 (+SC/HST) advance
Self-described “Brass House” trio Too Many Zooz make manically kinetic instrumental music that combines avant-garde jazz, EDM, punk rock, and sundryother traditions into their own distinctive brand of high-energy dance music. A viral sensation since theyfirst emerged as New York subway buskers in 2013, Too Many Zooz have evolved into a globally recognized phenomenon who tour often and produce YouTube videos that have garnered millions of views. Formed in 2013 in New York City, Too Many Zooz features thet alents of baritone saxophonist Leo “Leo P” Pellegrino, trumpeter Matt “Doe” Muirhead, and drummer David “King of Sludge” Parks. Pellegrino and Muirhead initially met while students at the Manhattan School of Music where they studied jazz. They eventually joined forces with percussionist Parks, whom Pellegrino had played with in a separate busking outfit. They began playing live at various New York subway stations and quickly attracted crowds with their aggressive instrumental sound and Pellegrino’s ability to dance and hype the audience like a DJ while playing. In 2014, a video of the band went viral and helped set the stage for the group’s meteoric rise. In 2016, the trio released their debut full-length album, Subway Gawdz, which featured guest spots from Kreayshawn, Armani White, members of Galactic, and Beats Antique. That same year they were featured on Beyonce’s Lemonade album, and performed with Beyonce and The Dixie Chicks at the 50th Annual CMA Awards. Over the course of the next several years, Too Many Zooz continued to release EPs and singles–including ZombiEP (2019), a concept album about a fictional band playing a music festival during a zombie outbreak, plus collaborations and remixes with The Floozies, Beats Antique, Spencer Ludwig, Moon Hooch, Dot Cromwell, Nitty Scott, Lester London, and RoRo. All of that set the stage for the band’s 2024 sophomore album Retail Therapy–a 13-song chronicle of auditory subway cinema that features appearances from Moon Hooch, Thumpasaurus, Lucky Chops, and Too Many T’s.
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Supercrawl Presents Boy Golden May 9 at Bridgeworks
BOY GOLDEN
with guest Fontine
GA Standing 19+ • $25 (+SC/HST) advance
Everything becomes fluid when you can pass through time and space like a ghost, a story, a melody. Boy Golden manifests all three on For Jimmy. When listening to his music, it feels easy to dissolve into the ether. Everything flows. From classic country to psych-folk, Alternative to roadhouse pop to Appalaichan bluegrass, Boy Golden’s music is easy, breezy, warm and gritty. And don’t it just feel good to listen to it. Since releasing his debut album, Church of Better Daze, in 2021, he’s played every summer festival on your list, produced X albums with friends, released a dozen videos, curated and directed an art show and music video for “KD & Lunchmeat”, the Seth-Rogenesque hit single that charted to #1 on Alternative Radio, and toured more than 60 venues across North America with The Sheepdogs. Introspective and vulnerable, traditional and queer, hard-headed and sensual, Boy Golden’s everyman-aesthetic can appeal to all of us. This ability lies in his songwriting: the songs your friends tell you about, the stories you hear from your neighbours, your community. He’s comfortable both in the spotlight and just outside it, sharing the moments with other artists, lifting others up along with him. He’s a genuine student of Townes Van Zandt and Willie Nelson as much as Dwight Yoakam and Stevie Ray Vaughan . Plus his C.O.B.D philosophy, “You can blaze and still get paid” might help us all to blur borders and old definitions of genres we thought we knew, like Steve Lacy or Justin Vernon do for Pop music. Boy Golden is able to maintain his own unique blend of Boy Golden using whatever frame of mind he’s in to fit us into this time. We’re here right now.
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A hush sweeps across Turtle Island. Birds flock to perch on towering maples and the waving prairie grasses still. There is a name upon the tongue of every creature from the elk to the shrew. Fontine. A gust of wind blows open the shutters of every home and young and old kneel in reverence to the dawn of a new era. Fontine. Queen of the road, King of the song, Fontine is here with a brand new EP. Co-produced with Kris Ulrich and mixed by Boy Golden, the Yarrow Lover EP is set to be released in 2023. Taking inspiration from her Nehiyaw Iskwew roots, the natural surroundings of her prairie home, and her musical surroundings in Winnipeg, the EP presents as a beautiful introduction to a powerhouse songwriter and vocalist.
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Supercrawl Unveils New Public Art
AUGUST 20, 2023
Supercrawl is pleased to announce the unveiling of two large-scale public works of art now on display in downtown Hamilton. On August 28, 2023, Reckoning, a digital collage work by artist stylo starr, was installed on the south facade of 118 James Street North. A short distance to the southwest, Nathan Eugene Carson‘s painting The Conversation was installed in a new location, on the south facade of 91 James Street North, on August 29, 2023. The artworks are presented as part of Supercrawl’s 2023 Visual & Public Art programming and will be on display for a year.
stylo starr, Reckoning, 2023, digital collage Image Credit: stylo starr. Image courtesy of the artist
stylo starr
Reckoning, 2023, digital collage
Artist Statement: I create intuitively, and believe there is a visual alchemy that happens in the process of cut and paste. I am energized by the tactility of old books, magazines, scrap paper or other found materials, and I appreciate collage for its accessibility. Working digitally unlocks a whole other way of approaching collage that further motivates me to stretch my imagination as I muse on possible futures. The focus of my work is the elevation of Black people and asserting our existence in fantasy and the future. I remove all spatial and temporal references. Challenges of limited representation are often encountered while sourcing material – not to mention the potential of engaging with historically harmful sources. These challenges are often met through experimentation with photography and digital collage as a solution. In either practice, the subject ultimately is recontextualized and appointed the power of
the gaze. The subject is Divine.
Artist Biography: stylo starr is a collage artist whose work centres nature, fantasy and the Afrofuture. Her work is driven by the observation and integration of fine layered detail in a collaboration with her deep amateur interests in astrology, crystals, herbalism, lepidopterology and the metaphysical – all of which are frequently explored in her collages. stylo’s art reflects beauty and power, and she believes prominent and positive representation of Blackness in the arts is critical and necessary. stylo has exhibited at the Art Gallery of Hamilton and the Art Gallery of Burlington among others and is an emerging curator and arts educator. She also facilitates creative mindfulness workshops open to a variety of age groups and experiences both in-person and online. stylo is based in her hometown of Hamilton, Ontario, situated upon the traditional territories of the Erie, Neutral, Huron-Wendat, Haudenosaunee and Mississaugas, where she works and lives with her feline companion, Samo.
Presented by Supercrawl in partnership with McMaster Museum of Art and McMaster University
Nathan Eugene Carson, The Conversation, 2023, painting. Photo Credit: Jonathan Groeneweg. Image courtesy of the artist
Nathan Eugene Carson
The Conversation, 2023, painting
Artist Statement: My artistic practice is focus on creating individual and bodies of work that inspire, inform, and invigorate both the viewer and myself to meditate on the beauty existing in the world. My process focuses on the reclamation of discarded materials such as paper, cardboard, and paint, and non-traditional materials such as gift cards, plastics, take-out food containers etc. Reclaiming, repurposing and repairing are important parts of my practice ensuring that the artwork created is truly “something out of nothing” giving materials a new sense of purpose and new life in the form of artworks. The subject matter within my art varies with thematic seasons of creation, however the focus on these reclaimed materials remains consistent throughout. Every finished work of art conveys that a life or soul has been breathed into it, magically reincarnated, and then the work is complete.
Artist Biography: Nathan Eugene Carson (b. 1980, lives and works in Hamilton, Ontario) received a BFA from the Ontario College of Art and Design in 2005. His drawings and paintings have since been shown at Verso Gallery, Lennox Contemporary, Gallery One, and the Drake Hotel in Toronto. Carson’s work was also featured during the AGO First Thursdays in partnership with the RBC Emerging Artists Projects and StreetARToronto. In 2016, he was part of an exhibition titled Ponto, the first of several held at Hamilton’s Oswald Gallery. Other group exhibitions include Free Fall (2016) and Worked Over (2017), both at Oswald Gallery, as well as 100 Paintings (2019) at The Carnegie Gallery, Dundas, Ontario, and Cut From The Same Cloth (2021) at the Power Plant Toronto, Ontario. His most recent solo exhibition Black Carnival (2022-23) and artist residency took place at the Art Gallery of Hamilton.
nathaneugenecarson.ca
Presented by Supercrawl in partnership with McMaster Museum of Art and McMaster University
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ABOUT SUPERCRAWL
A not-for-profit arts organization situated within the traditional territories of the Erie, Chonnonton (Neutral), Wendat, Mississauga, and Haudenosaunee nations, Supercrawl is committed to honouring, showcasing and celebrating all varieties of creative work. Positioning local and emerging artists alongside significant provincial, national and international peers, the festival fosters and promotes arts and culture as well as the myriad benefits they provide.
Presented by TD Bank Group (TD) as part of the TD Ready Commitment to amplify diverse voices, Supercrawl is Hamilton’s premier multi-arts festival, fusing new and independent music with art installations, fashion, performance, literature, theatre, and artisanal craft. Supercrawl’s diverse multi-disciplinary program of sound, performance, visual and media arts is staged along a pedestrian-only creative corridor in the heart of downtown.
Since 2010, Supercrawl’s Visual Arts programming has showcased upwards of 100 artists and featured visual art installations in a variety of media. Supercrawl provides opportunities to local, regional and national artists and performers at both early and established stages of their practices. An annual call for submissions is issued to invite proposals from artists working in a variety of media, and art-lovers will also find roughly two dozen gallery spaces and artists’ studios in and around Supercrawl’s neighbourhood.
Supercrawl was shortlisted for a 2019 Ontario Tourism Award of Excellence for Tourism Event of the Year and 2017 Canadian Tourism Award for Event of the Year. The festival received the 2015 Ontario Tourism Award of Excellence for Tourism Event of the Year, and has been recognized as one of Festival and Events Ontario’s Top 100 Festivals/Events for six consecutive years (2015-2020). Supercrawl is a member organization of the Major International Festivals and Events Network of Ontario, the Canadian Music Live Association, and Festivals and Events Ontario.
