When one thinks of a Canadian super-group, bands like Toronto’s Broken Social Scene and Vancouver’s New Pornographers come to mind.
Based in large urban centres, the two acts have drawn members from talent pools that span far beyond their local surroundings.
Saskatchewan-based Library Voices went a different route with their humble beginnings, culminating in five members from the mining town of Estevan and five more from Regina.
Twice nominated for Western Canadian Music Awards in 2009 and 2010, the band is making some big, bright and poppy noise and people from all over the country are starting to take notice.
On a current western swing of a cross-country tour, Library Voices will take the stage at Communitea Café on Tuesday (June 17).
Mike Dawson, band organist, vocalist and multi-instrumentalist, said the songs on their newest EP For John are dedicated to a close friend of the band who passed away in 2013.
“We set out to make an EP, but we didn’t want it to be super hyped up or a massive album process,” Dawson said.
“The songs are all dedicated to a friend of ours named John who passed away a couple of years ago. Having that open context of knowing it was going to be six songs allowed us to open up and not worry about making a three-minute pop song.”
The formation of the current collective, which is mostly thanks to Dawson and lead singer Carl Johnson, happened after most of the members lost touch for a decade.
“It all sort of happened that after moving around the country, we all happened to be back in the same place at the same time (in Regina) and I think we’d all gone through different musical experiences, but we wanted to start something pop-driven and we didn’t want to be afraid to make it catchy,” Dawson noted.
Starting as a 10-piece, the numbers of instruments and voices have varied over the years and the current seven members seem to make up the solidified core.
“It’s been the exact same seven people for the last three years or so,” Dawson added.
“We started as a 10-piece, but it was never a set number of 10 – it just sort of came together that way and we stuck it out for a while. But over a couple of years of touring, different people moved on to different things. For the most part, the main seven is the way it is now.
Songs like “Drinking Games” showcase the band’s catchy, bright choruses that beg the listener to hum along and appreciate many layers of instrumentation.
Dawson always saw the need for many instruments within Library Voices from the word “go.”
“It was a project where we didn’t want to set limitations on our sound. In the past, and in playing in traditional rock bands with guitar and bass and drums, we all wanted to be able to use whatever was on hand and to explore that sound. It’s an evolution of sound, really.”
With many different writers and voices within the group, the original sound idea came from the catchy but musically intricate songs of the golden age of pop.
“When we first started, we had this interest in re-exploring 1960s pop music and how actually unique and interesting the instrumentation is – because everyone has this idea that pop songs are these dumbed-down simple songs, but there are so many unique and strange sounds woven into those songs.”
Keeping Regina as the home base, Library Voices is a collective that boasts its Prairie heritage with no desire to be a big-city band.
“Everyone has been there for years, now. A lot of us have bought houses there, and it’s as much home as you can make a home. Sometimes people think it’s weird that (Regina) is where we are from, but I think there’s this weird stigma that if you start a band and you start to tour and stuff, people assume you’ll move to Toronto or Vancouver and I get that – but this is what we do and we’re from here and it works for us.”
Starting up their own record label, Dawson and company are interested in curating some of the music of their talented neighbours.
“We are working towards this new label called Prairie Shag, and we wanted to do that to make sure that those good hidden records in our area get out there and get heard by people, because there really is so much going on. There is a lot of stuff happening around here that’s pretty exciting.”
No strangers to adversity, Dawson and his bandmates have been robbed and even flooded on a few different occasions.
“I think it’s a rite of passage for every touring band to get robbed, and that was many years ago, but we also had a giant flood in our rehearsal space in 2010 in this big warehouse basement. A water main broke and there was 10 feet of water in a 1,600 square foot area.”
Having friends in high places, Winnipeg rockers The Weakerthans played a benefit show in Toronto to raise money for Dawson and his crew who lost somewhere between $40,000 and $50,000 worth of equipment.
“That was a tough one, but the Weakerthans being who they are, and the quality people that they are, they helped us raise some money and get us back on the right track.”
Taking it all in stride, Dawson sees the adversity as only making the band’s music and message that much stronger.
“It goes back to the idea of using different instruments and trying different stuff on different songs – sometimes when things get stolen or destroyed, you’ve got no choice but to try something new. It’s all part of the evolution for us.”
