A road trip to Philadelphia on Presidents Weekend mixed historical exploration, delectable vegan cuisine, and a thrilling concert experience. The journey included visits to the Mütter Museum, Edgar Allan Poe’s house, Eastern State Penitentiary, indulging in vegan delights and attending an exhilarating concert featuring YDI, Flag of Democracy, and The Dead Milkmen. The trip encapsulated a rich blend of history, culture, and entertainment.
Revisiting a hot December night in a boggy Hamilton sweatbox with MVLL CRIMES, Fight on Sight, Lowheaven, Monk, and Single Mothers that capped off the action for Wood-stein.ca in 2023. It’s time to crawl out of the mire and prepare for a productive 2024.
Yes, please, I’m trying to quit quitting.
The Matadors’ Halloween event with The Dead Souls and Chachi On Acid at Palasad Social Bowl in London left me wondering, should I bother?
And, if I bother, what is next?
On Sept. 8, the evening before the official release of MVLL CRIMES 12” EP “YOU EMBVRRVSS ME,” lead singer Jillian Clair took the opportunity to avoid helping her bandmates to load in for a show at Doors Taco Joint and Metal Bar in Hamilton, Ontario, instead having a conversation with Woodstein Media. The chat took some unexpected turns as connections through the music and zine community were discussed in a Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon way, which led to as much talk about the reporter’s accomplishments as the new MVLL CRIMES release. You have been warned.
Audiences are prepared for entertainment, and entertainers are more than willing to entertain. Two years of repressed social energy is helping live music explode back to life.
Concert halls, bars, basements and other dingy venues are beginning to shake and shimmy with the sounds of rebellion again. Canadian punk legends D.O.A, The Anti-Queens and Blackout! hit Maxwell’s in Waterloo on Sept. 22, and it was a hell of a good time.
D.O.A. are still delivering kickass performances of the seminal album Hardcore ’81 over 40 years after its release.
“Our goal each night is to go out and deliver the goods, and at this point, I think I’m going to be going a long time, but every town I get to these days, I go, ‘you know what? I will give it my all because this might be the last time I’m here.’ You never know. I consider myself a lucky guy in life, and I hope that continues and that good luck prevails with many other people,” says Joe “Shithead” Keithley.
It’s a two-election year, at least in Ontario, provincial and municipal, and it’s time for people to be considering if they are going to step up to get their name on the ballot. Will it be the usual names people will have the option to vote for, or will there be new faces at the all-candidates meetings?
Joe Keithley has persevered in music for over 40 years as the leader of legendary Canadian punk band D.O.A. He successfully stepped into municipal politics in 2018 as a city councillor in Burnaby, British Columbia, and has proven that the will to keep trying can succeed in elections, even if you might be an outsider.
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