Die Stadt Muzikanten was released in Canada earlier this month receiving high praise and glowing reviews from the publications such as the Toronto Star who said, “not unlike late-period Elliott Smith gone wild… This will be big,” and Exclaim! who stated, “Woodpigeon’s third album is a bold declaration of who the band are and what they hope to achieve in the future.” Die Stadt Muzikanten debuted last week on the CMJ Radio chart at #22, and Hamilton will be in New York the week of February 22nd to record new material. Hamilton is a relentless songwriter. Die Stadt Muzikanten, clocking in at 15 tracks and 78 minutes is packaged with the bonus lp, BALLADEER / to all the guys i’ve loved before, recorded this past Autumn in Banff, Alberta with Steve Albini, Howard Bilerman and Husky Huskulds. Treasury Library Canada will also be packaged with the bonus lp, Houndstooth Europa.

While this one-upmanship may suggest that Smith and Woodpigeon’s Mark Hamilton have a competitive relationship (which may well be the case) the pair of them actually get along quite well and are collaborating on not 1 but 2 EPs to be released in 2010. Christopher Smith + The Beckon Call will also open Woodpigeon’s Vancouver CD release show on January 16th at the Biltmore in support of Die Stadt Muzikanten out earlier that week.

Smith’s debut album, The Beckon Call, will be released in the Spring of 2010. The Keepsake EP is available here, or through iTunes and emusic. While “Christmas Day” isn’t on either, you can download it free below.

• Downloads

• “Christmas Day” for Christmas
• “Piece by Piece” from Keepsake

Video

A Jason C Myers production in collaboration with Jon Morris and Todd M Duym of elevater.tv.
Special thanks to Monitor Digital Solutions, William F Whites, Grip Brothers, Filmgroup, Hearing Protection Required, Jen Gordon, Alexis and Eric Hoffman.

There’s still time to pre-order Die Stadt Muzikanten here, and if you do you’ll not only get the album by January 12, but you’ll also get acoustic versions of each song.

Here are free downloads of the album-track “Empty-Hall Sing-Along”, and to celebrate the holiday season, “xoxmas”.

• Downloads

• “Empty-Hall Sing-Along” from Die Stadt Muzikanten
• “xoxmas” for Christmas

Upcoming shows

Jan 16: Vancouver, BC - The Biltmore Cabaret
Jan 22: Calgary, AB - Broken City
Feb 11: Toronto, ON - The Drake Underground
Feb 12: Guelph, ON - Jimmy Jazz
Feb 13: London, ON - TBA
Feb 15: Hamilton, ON - The Casbah
Feb 16: Sudbury, ON - The Townehouse
Feb 17: Kingston, ON - The Mansion
Feb 18: Montreal, PQ - La Sala Rossa
Feb 19: Quebec City, PQ  - Le Cercle
Feb 21: Ottawa, ON - The Blacksheep

Pre-order Die Stadt Muzikanten before the end of December and you will receive the album before release date, PLUS you will be emailed with a special access code to download exclusive songs leading up to the release. The exclusives include solo acoustic performances of songs from Die Stadt Muzikanten, and each comes with a new illustration by Mark.

The first 100 copies sold will include a Die Stadt Muzikanten poster featuring the art of Jeff Kulak.

Songwriter Mark Andrew of the Hamiltons, breathes a glorious new life into Die Stadt Muzikanten, an album both inspired by an extended stay in Germany and of the comparative lives of his ancestors. Hamilton found himself fascinated by the endless inspiration as he recollected thoughts of his childhood and took in the sounds and smells of a place once inhabited by his grandparents, to whom the album is dedicated. “I started thinking in terms of couples,” explains Hamilton of his time in Berlin, “of people coming and going, of walls and windows. Images of boating across the ocean to an unknown new life, and how so many of the movements I took run in the opposite direction from theirs.” Upon his return to his small Calgary apartment, the songs revealed themselves and Die Stadt Muzikanten was born.

Recently included in the CBC Radio 2 ‘Great Canadian Song Quest’ competition, Woodpigeon is one of 5 artists from the province of Alberta who may be chosen to compose a song inspired by locations as chosen by Canadians. You can hear the first sampling off Die Stadt Muzikanten, and vote for Woodpigeon now by going to http://www.cbc.ca/radio2/songquest/.

So it seems very fitting that we post this song off Die Stadt Muzikanten recorded for a CBC Radio 2 live taping, which is coincidentally about a place in Alberta.

• Downloads

• Morningside CBC Radio 2 live recording of a song from Die Stadt Muzikanten

“Seriously, if you’d ever told me that we’d someday find ourselves on a list of names alongside Leonard Cohen vying for the same prize title, I’d have laughed in your face. Really close and spitty-like. With deep, throaty guffaws. But, alas, it’s happened, and Woodpigeon’s Treasury Library Canada c/w Houndstooth Europa was named this morning as one of the records on the Polaris Prize’s long list, alongside such personal favourites as Chad Van Gaalen’s Soft Airplane and WOMEN’s self-titled record. And oh. Leonard Cohen.

“But where’s everyone else? It’s easy to feel complimented by this sort of thing, but once you realize who didn’t make the list, it’s kind of mind-boggling. Every blogger from here to Halifax has already written on who they think is missing, but here’s a couple of others we really think you should check out: The Blistering Sun, The Pale Moon, Hahahaha by Knots, In Flesh Tones by Azeda Booth, and where the heck is Julie Doiron? Still, despite the omissions, it’s great company to be in and we’re well pleased to be included. Thankyouthankyouthankyou, etc. It’s a real pleasure just to be nominated, and so forth.”

Canada!

Jun 20: NXNE at The Legendary Horseshoe - Toronto, ON
Jun 25: Sled Island at Central United Church - Calgary, AB
Jul 18: South Country Fair - Fort MacLeod, AB

Over Yonder!

Jul 25: Trowbridge Village Pump Festival - Wiltshire, UK
Jul 26: Gateshead Sage - Gateshead, UK
Jul 30: The Swan - Ipswich, UK
Aug 01: Field Day - London, UK
Aug 04: Brudnell Social Club - Leeds, UK
Aug 05: The Fishmarket Gallery - Northampton, UK
Aug 06: The End - Newcastle-upon-Tyne, UK
Aug 07: T on the Fringe Festival - Edinburgh, UK
Aug 08: The Bandroom - York, UK
Aug 14: Haldern Pop Festival - Rees-Haldern, DE
Aug 15: Way Out West - Göteborg, SWE
Aug 16: Summer Sundae - Leicester, UK

There will be a few Canadian dates in June and July, including NXNE and Calgary’s Sled Island, and then the band is back to Europe again to play a bunch of festivals we all wish we could go to. Busy! And somehow there’s still time for Mark to work on a split EP with Chris Smith that we will tell you more about as soon as we can.

Check out the tour dates here, and then go visit the new Woodpigeon site that Boompa’s own Erin Nicholson designed, developed, and recently launched.

Here’s a video of “Oberkampf” from Woodpigeon’s show at the Botanique in Brussels this past February:

Circlesquare: Songs About Dancing And Drugs

Today is the day that Circlesquare’s highly anticipated record Songs About Dancing and Drugs is finally available in Canada. This is the kind of album that comes around once in forever, and we are proud to partner up with electronic label K7! on its release. Visit the Boompa online shop and order it now now or visit your local record store and grab a copy. We also be releasing an amazing video for “Dancers” in the upcoming weeks featuring So You Think You Can Dance Canada top ten finalists Miles Faber and Vincent Noiseux, so keep your eyes peeled.

Boompa.ca: loved and mugged

The Boompa site got a face lift a few months ago, complete with pigeons and watercolours, mountains and rain (very Vancouver). A few days ago the site was included in Smashing Magazine’s Web Design Trends For 2009. The Boompa site was designed by our own Erin Nicholson who reads Smashing daily, and is very excited about all this. The site design has been so well received that it has even been stolen by a music blog. How flattering! The case has been brought to the court of public opinion that is the Beggars Group’s Soundalak Musak: Wordpress Theme Edition. Thanks Adam F, you are the favourite!

Woodpigeon: Treasury Library Canada

Woodpigeon’s double CD Boompa debut, Treasury Library Canada c/w Houndstooth Europa, will be released next week. We love Woodpigeon and think you will too. They make the loveliest orchestral indie folk around and will make you feel good about life. You can order it in advance through the Boompa shop now and you can get a free 7-song Woodpigeon EP called La Commission Scolaire, through emusic. If you happen to be in Vancouver next weekend you can see Woodpigeon perform on Friday night at Little Mountain with Chris Smith and Jody Glenham, and on Saturday at Performance Works as part of the PuSH Festival. If you aren’t in Vancouver, or any of the European cities they stop off in during their February old-continental tour, you can watch the video for “A Moment’s Peace For Mary Christa O’Keefe”. You should just watch it. It’s very, very Canadian.

Coming Up

April: Leeroy Stagger - Everything Is Real
June: Patrick Brealey - Title TK
August: The Scott Walker Band (aka The Salteens) - Title TK
September: Woodpigeon - Die Stadt Muzikanten

• Downloads

• Knock KnockWoodpigeon - Treasury Library Canada
• “Lay All Your Love On Me”Woodpigeon - ABBA cover

Video: Woodpigeon - “A Moment’s Peace for Mary Christa O’Keefe” from Treasury Library Canada

Woodpigeon’s otherworldly almost-orchestral pop was serendipitously born when heartbreak (cue the strings) sent Mark Hamilton home from Scotland, and back to Canada in 2005. The band has since been featured internationally in NME, Q, Mojo, and the Guardian, while being declared “Canada’s best kept secret” (Chromewaves) and “The next great Canadian break out band” (Now) at home.

Treasury Library Canada will be released as a deluxe double CD release out February 3. The album will also be released February 9 in Europe/UK by London’s End Of The Road. Look for Woodpigeon’s third album Die Stadt Muzikanten, due in Fall 2009.

• Downloads

• Knock Knock from Treasury Library Canada
• “Oberkampf” from Houndstooth Europa

Video: “A Moment’s Peace for Mary Christa O’Keefe” from Treasury Library Canada

Upcoming Shows

Jan/08: Calgary, AB - Big Secret Theatre
Feb/07: Vancouver, BC - Performance Works
Feb/15: Brussels, BE - Botanique-Rotunde
Feb/16: Paris, FR - Pont Ephemere
Feb/17: Amsterdam, ND - Paradiso
Feb/18: Hamburg, DE - Prinzinbar
Feb/19: Berlin, DE - Schokoladen
Feb/21: Middlesborough, UK - Westgarth SC
Feb/22: Glasgow, UK - The Captain’s Rest
Feb/23: Newcastle-upon-Tyne, UK - The End
Feb/24: Manchester, UK - The Deaf Institute
Feb/25: London, UK - ICA
Feb/26: Brighton, UK - The Audio