Who fuckin’ loves New York?
I spent this past weekend in the city. Let me preface this: I hold a grudge against the city of Toronto. But it seems in one’s blooming twenties, it is a necessary evil. A place where music plays, and drinks are poured, and people are hitting feet to pavement, gliding down Queen West with their bicycles. But these two eyes have seen better. Longing for the Haight in SF, East Nashville, Northpark in SD, Silverlake, these places had character, you know? They have real history. They had crevices. Toronto, perhaps a place too close to home, had traffic jams, rude people, bored people at boring dance parties. It’s adolescent. It hasn’t seen the world. It’s stayed at home, within the confines of Queen and Bloor, Jarvis and Bathurst. The music was only passing through, getting ticketed on sidestreets, and driving off to better towns with louder crowds. And all the artists hibernated, it seemed. I never felt like I belonged in Toronto.
My heart beats for red, white and blue. I’ve given Toronto so many chances to redeem itself, and every night, it has fallen flat. My exploration has led me to believe that the city in my head, doesn’t exist at all. I’ve sat in the booths of the hip bars, leaned against the walls at the parties, paid to see all the good shows. I know it’s where the kids are supposed to feel like they’re in, but there’s nothing holding them ‘in’ there. Of course, it’s all relative. I could have fallen in love with pedestrian Sundays at Kensington, or the Annex, Sweaty Betty’s, the Horseshoe. I could’ve even settled with the consistently crowded ‘Dees.
, a band I’d been listening to since my San Diego days has most recently recorded a . I’m holding out for the proper time to articulate my great love for Daytrotter, complete with all the loveliest words and deserved praise it requires. Anyway, because of the laid-back, hallucinogenic track ‘Inside the Cinema’ I’d assumed this was a West coast beach band, but to my surprise- they are from Toronto. Their name is perfectly fitting- with a firm grip on truth and all it’s discomforts, frontman Michael O’Connell wears the title of reject in the best possible sense. He dissects the madness of culture, in our exhausted efforts to claim it, to dominate it, not to just experience it. He talks about moving away to busy cities instead of looking our demons straight in the eyes. The ones that live at home. Under our beds. The ones who’ve been there since our shorter days. He asks, ‘who fuckin’ loves New York’ not asking for an answer, but just leaving it as is, making all the I <3 NYs squirm in their socks. Maybe I’m not the only one searching for the good in the city.
Culture Reject: Inside the Cinema (Daytrotter Session)
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Culture Reject: Beach (Daytrotter Session)
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