The Junction at The Horseshoe Tavern – 03/10/12

Written by Alex Metcalfe & Photo by Randall Vasquez (from 2010)

Saturday night at the Horseshoe Tavern is no laughing matter. The celebrated Queen West venue doesn’t let just anybody command its stage on that primo night of the weekend. That’s why The ‘Shoe was more than happy to host the CD launch party for The Junction’s third studio LP, Grievances, on Saturday night.

Joined by Trevor James & The Perfect Gentlemen and Goddamn Robots, two great Toronto bands made up of close to semi-close friends of the gents in The Junction, it was clear that The Horseshoe was in for a no-holds-barred kind of rock show. I also noticed an unusually high number of beanie/plaid combos in the audience, but I guess that’s a different story altogether.

It was up to The Junction’s long-time friends in Trevor James & The Perfect Gentlemen to kick off the night. With their fun brand of indie-rock that sounded, in my humble opinion, distinctly ‘out of town’ for a band based in Toronto, TJPG played a dynamic 45 minute set featuring some fantastic new songs and tracks from their previous release, the Community EP.

While TJPG has a strong library of recordings, I would encourage interested parties who are familiar with said recordings to see this band live. The combination of Trevor James’ voice and the simple instrumentation of their songs just comes off with much more grandeur on the stage. This was most evident in TJPG’s indie anthem “Best Friends,” a rare, non-emo song that keeps emotional intensity high while being underpinned with an addictive, upbeat tempo. I’ve got half the mind to suggest that Trevor James & The Perfect Gentlemen will be welcome guests at The Horseshoe in the future, and encourage them to make more tracks like “Best Friends!”

A short changeover later, it was time to switch gears with Goddamn Robots who moved the audience away from the melodic rock of TJPG and in to this fantastic, hard-hitting grunge rock that was straight out of 1995 in the best of ways. Much like TJPG, Goddamn Robots are a band that are in their element live.

Goddamn Robots have aced the sound, style and swagger of that straight-8s grunge rock that fell to the wayside sometime between The Spice Girls and Linkin Park. Listening to their opening tune, “Out There,” was actually like time-travelling for me. It’s the kind of song that demands one of those blurry, semi-stylized music videos. You know, the kind of video you’d see for an old Blur song! “Out There” was definitely my favourite song from Goddamn Robots’ set; I was upset that there weren’t more tunes at its level, but that didn’t necessarily take away from the fact that this well put-assembled Toronto rock group knows how to command to the stage.

This show helped me realize that listening to The Junction is basically like listening to the definitive sound of rock music in Toronto. What I mean by this is that The Junction have cultivated a sound in their decade-long career that takes cues from many of Toronto’s finest musical exports and builds on them, but doesn’t do much to assert itself from those same bands either.
This is not a slight against The Junction! The logic is simple: they’re experts in a genre they have helped define over the last ten years. Am I suggesting that that Toronto indie rock sound can be its own genre? Yeah, maybe.

The Junction kicked off their set with the first song from Grievances, called “Waves.” I don’t think I was the only person in the audience who felt like this channeled many familiar sounds from that one Broken Social Scene song. You know, “7/4 (Shoreline)!” It had the guitar texture, the same jumpy tempo and steady, fuzzy-sounding drums. I loved “Waves” and can’t blame The Junction for making such an homage.

Aside from proving that they know their sound, The Junction proved that they know how to work an audience. There were lots of high points throughout their live showcase of Grievances that proved this album sounds as good, if not better, live as it does on… well… computer speakers? Keep these names in mind when you give the album a listen: “Monuments,” “Awakenings” (my favourite!) and “Dispositions” – three tunes I would say mark the highest points on an exquisite record. And yes, all the splendid distortion on these tracks was only louder, harder and awesome-er live.

While the focus of their set was undoubtedly on their new songs, I was pleased to hear The Junction include some older material, too. I’m sure that there were others who enjoyed “Out Of Here” as much as I did. It really is that quintessential song in the repertoire that tells shows you everything that there is to like about The Junction. Its message also makes it a great penultimate track in any live set. Sadly, though, the old material on the set list did not include “Miles In Denial,” which is, and I’m sure many would agree, another example of their finer songs.

Saturday night proved two things: that The Junction continue to progress in their quest to bring us top-notch Toronto indie rock, and that this is a band that Torontonians can be, and should be, very proud to offer their continued support!