The WildWorks Station

March is ending in a few days and this week’s radio show was filled with a lot materials from the first part to the live part of the show. DJ Digs returned to the show and Lauren is there as usual.
After the top 10 countdown from the first hour, we played the local acts that are performing at JunoFest and then played the favourite bands and musicians who are nominated for the Juno Awards.
The live part of the show had the interview with Minus the Tiger from the Netherlands and the yearly tribute to Leslie Cheung. April 1, 2003 was when it happened and it’s now nine years since his tragic death. He is still missed among Hong Kong fans and abroad.
This year’s tribute was a bit shorter than previous editions. It’s still nice to play his hits from Monica and others.

The fun part to this week’s show was The Charlatan coming in to shoot video (their second attempt) and giving them a glimpse on how we prepare and going live for the radio show. It was great to have someone from The Charlatan come in and check out my radio show as I try to make it fun in playing good music. Aside from that, the written article on myself and the radio show is posted at the Charlatan over at this link.
This week’s playlist has the live part of the show posted there. You can go over at this link. Don’t forget to listen to the interview with Minus the Tiger.
Have a good week!

Audio/Interview
The March 28th Radio Show – Press play to listen.

The Live/Second Hour of WildWorks on CKCU-FM – March 28, 2012

The Interview with Minus the Tiger

From Thursday’s Fundamentally Sound, the freestyle rap challenge. Aired on March 29, 2012.

Read the rest of this entry »

Last Saturday night (March 3rd), I had the opportunity to chat with some of the members of the Toronto band, Little City. They were preforming at the Avant Garde Bar.
I’ve been playing their songs on the podcast and live parts of the radio show. It’s nice to give a band some support. If you listen to the interview, there were mentions of a few prominent members (mostly part-time) in the band. There were some funny points to the interview as I mentioned a “rival” radio host. It’s all in good fun. Overall, give a lot of support for Little City.
You can listen to the interview in the audio section from below.
On the radio show, it was the return of Lauren on the airwaves as she has been away. She was there for the live part of the show. She got to listen to the interview. There were new tracks from the likes of Arcade Fire, Said The Whale (also played on the countdown) and a live track from The Naked & Famous for Daytrotter. It was a great show because of the interview and the tracks I played. I couldn’t be pleased with today’s live radio show and a relief that Lauren made it for the show.
I hope to do a review of Little Mountain by Said The Whale.
On another note, there will be delays to the Wild 10 Countdown blog as I got bogged down with various things. In case you wanted to know, Plants & Animals were on top for 4 weeks and right now, Said The Whale is number one this week as Little Mountain got released this week. I apologize for the delay for the current and past countdown entries.
Without further ado, the playlist for the March 7 show is over at this link.
Last thing, don’t ask me about the new iPad. I haven’t looked up much information.

Audio/Interview
The March 7th Radio Show (Full 2 hours) – Press play to listen.

The interview with Little City

It was a great privilege to chat with Will Currie from Will Currie and the Country French on the weekend. The band has been around for a couple of years and I did not get a chance to do an interview them when they stopped by in Ottawa. The interview was aired on Wednesday’s show at CKCU-FM. It’s been awhile that I have done a music interview because it was a slow time during the holidays and up until January of 2012.
The interview with Currie was light-hearted at best and really wished that my co-host was there to help out as well. Overall, it was nicely done. Oh yes! Even though I rarely mention it on my show, I had cupcakes to bring along for Will Currie and The Country French and almost forgot that it was the lead member’s birthday at the time of the recording. The photo of the cupcakes is posted below.
Don’t forget to listen to the radio show and the interview at your own time.
The playlist for Wednesday’s show is over at this link. The Wild 10 Countdown summary will be posted later.

Audio/Interviews
The full February 15th show – Press play to listen.

The live part of the show – Press play to listen.

The Will Currie and The Country French Interview

Photo
The cupcakes to Will Currie and The Country French from Saturday, Feb. 11th

The second radio show of January 2012 were interesting and fun as I had some new tracks to play and the return of Lauren as she returned from her holiday. To start off, there’s a going to be a bunch of new albums coming out for January and February. On the live part of the show, there were new tracks by Sleigh Bells, The Wooden Sky, The Darcys (again), and Joel Plaskett Emergency.
Halfway through the show, Lauren and myself talked about the Coachella lineup and then ending off with the 2nd anniversary of Haiti earthquake. With the Haiti earthquake, I had the opportunity to give my support to the wonderful organization, Kanpe Foundation through DAVIDsTEA. Kanpe is really dedicated to help rebuild Haiti and they’re still continuing with the achievements to keep Haiti strong.
Back to the Coachella lineup, one song I played was pretty nostalgic as it was Fade Into You by Mazzy Star. It’s quite a surprise that the band is still around after all these years. It was fitting to play it even though it’s a bit sombre to listen to the song.
In other CKCU related stuff, my entry for the favourite artist of 2011 is posted at this link. It’s about Emmy The Great.
The playlist for January 11th’s show is posted at this link.
The Wild 10 Countdown summary is at this link.

Audio/Radio Show
The full January 11, 2012 show – Press play to listen.

The live part of WildWorks for January 11, 2012 – Press play to listen.

Happy New Year! 2012 is now here and 2011 was an interesting year to say the least. From protesting to occupying and a lot of elections, there was so much craziness happening around the world. Aside from that, the music in 2011 was pretty good as indie music continued to be strong as Arcade Fire won every awards and seeing the rise of new bands and artists from the likes of Cults and Lana Del Rey.
The radio show to begin 2012 was a wrap-up to my best of 2011. The top 11 of 2011 time is the non-Canadian indie music. There were a good variety of indie music outside of Canada. My top 11 were my favourites throughout 2011. One song (and album) in the top 11 was technically released in 2010 but it was released in North America in March of 2011.
There was the return of the Wild 10 Countdown as it resumes from the holiday. Expect to hear new Canadian releases in the months to come.
You can check out the playlist at the link. The Wild 10 Countdown beginning 2012 is posted at this link.
What began 2012 was getting my MOO Minicards. You can see it from the photo on top.
Have a good start to 2012!

Audio/Radio Show Archive
The January 4th Radio Show – Press play to listen.

Updated on December 31, 2011

It’s the yearly festive time as I play a lot of Christmas songs on my radio show at CKCU-FM. Aside from the tunes, I decided to get these unique holiday flavoured sodas by Jones Soda. The flavours were Candy Cane, Gingerbread, Pear Tree and Sugar Plum.
One of the CKCU shows I hung out, we tried the Candy Cane Soda. The host’s verdict was that it tasted like something out of the dentist. It’s not in a bad way but he didn’t mind the taste of it.
This will be the 2011 edition holiday guide to the shows I hosted at CKCU-FM.
I was on the air for Christmas Eve and just played a bunch of Christmas songs and then a few past Christmas #1 UK songs. It was great to play the Christmas tunes everytime. There were a few requests through Twitter and hopefully some were pleased.

The full Top 50 of 2011 is over at this link or on the top right of the blog.
The playlist for the December 21st show is at this link.
I want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Finishing Up The Top 50 of 2011 for December 28, 2011
The third part of my Top 50 of 2011 is completed. Instead of playing the top 10, I’ve decided to play the top 11 as it’s fitting that 2011 is ending. This week’s show is slightly different as the first hour would usually be podcasted on this blog. It’s a bit of a flip-flop as the first hour was live and the second hour is for the blog. Both are splitter up for your listening convenience.
The playlist for December 28th’s show is at this link.

A New Year’s Eve Update
I had the opportunity to do a fill in for a Friday night radio show. I wasn’t expecting to have another final show of 2011. Thanks to the guys from Friday Night Derailment for the last minute fill in.
The playlist from the December 30th show is at this link.
Happy New Year!

Audio/Radio Show
The December 14th Radio Show – Press play to listen.

The December 21st Radio Show – Press play to listen.

From Both Kinds of Music’s Both Kind of Xmas Show – press play to listen.

The December 24th (Christmas Eve) Radio Show. The playlist is at this link. Press play to listen.

The December 28th radio show.
Hour 1  - press play to listen.

Hour 2 – press play to listen.

The December 30th radio show.  Press play to listen.

Photo
Here’s a photo of cupcakes I got at The Cupcake Lounge on Christmas Eve.

Update on Sunday, November 27, 2011 – Added Friday’s radio show.

Today’s entry is brought to you by the object, snow. That’s right! Snow walloped Ottawa causing slowdown on traffic for Wednesday morning. The radio show and podcast was almost fallen into place because of the weather. Candice So made a return to the show and we had an enjoyable and funny time on the show, despite the gloomy weather. For this edition, So was the host and I was the co-host/sidekick. The recording for the top 10 songs got reversed because of the snowy weather.
Also on the show was the interview with Neil Haverty of Bruce Peninsula. The band was in Ottawa last week for a show. It was a nice opportunity to conduct an interview with the band and to my own amazement, I did a good job on the interview itself.
The audio is posted below. Have a good week!

The playlist of the radio show is at this link.
The Wild 10 Countdown summary is at this link.

Audio/Podcast
The November 23rd radio show – Press play to listen.

The Bruce Peninsula Interview

The November 25th Radio Show – Filling in for Friday Night Derailment. The playlist is at this link.
Press play to listen.

Since I couldn’t get a photo to put up this entry. I decided to post a YouTube link to show that Fall is approaching. It’s from a Sally Yeh song called Fall Comes and Fall Goes (秋去秋來). I can’t believe the song is over 20 years now. It’s played towards the end of the September 21st radio show.
Due to circumstances, my radio show was live for 2 hours instead of the mix of pretaped and live for the one hour. Joining me for the first half of the show was Lauren and we got to count down the top 10 Canadian indie songs and talk about Arcade Fire winning the 2011 Polaris Music Prize. Also on the show was airing the interviews with Sara Lowes and Said The Whale. They were in Ottawa last Wednesday night. The one with Said The Whale was impromptu because I didn’t think of any questions but Ben Worchester was keen enough to do the interview. I stumbled on a friend’s blog as she wrote about Said The Whale and their documentary. If you listen to my interview, I mentioned about Winning America.
The entire documentary can viewed at this link [via CBC Radio3].
The interviews are posted on the audio/podcast section below.
I can’t wait to head down to Montreal for Pop Montreal from Thursday to Sunday. See you there

The playlist for the September 21st show is at this link. The Wild 10 Countdown entry is at this link.

Audio/Podcast
The September 21st Radio Show – Press Play to Play

The Sara Lowes Interview

Ben from Said The Whale Interview

What a way to begin a new season for the blog and radio show. It’s the second year to do a show playing moon songs and bringing in mooncakes in honour of Mid-Autumn Festival. This time, I decided to bring a unique kind of mooncakes to CKCU-FM. The ones I brought along were Taro and Sweet Potato cake and the other one with the purple, pink, yellow and white, they were the fruity flavoured mooncakes. Thankfully, I got them at T&T Supermarket and I wanted something different as I haven’t been accustomed to the lotus paste and egg yolk. I’m not a big fan of the egg yolk.
Enough on the food and on to the radio show. Now on the third season, it’s filled with great tunes and a returning co-host in some capacity. It’s great to have Lauren back, but I found out that she won’t be on the show for the live part. She will be there for the recorded part, which is the top 10 countdown. All in all, it’s great to get some help. In the first hour of the show, I played Go Outside (Menahan Street Band Remix) by Cults as I was listening to The Strombo Show on Sunday and George played the original version of Go Outside.

Wednesday night, we had an opportunity to interview Sara Lowes and an unexpected or impromptu but funny interview with Ben of Said The Whale. It’s great for my co-host to finally get a chance to interview a musician. Expect the interviews to be aired next week.
The playlist for September 14th’s show is at this link. The Wild 10 Countdown entry for September 14 is at this link.
Last thing, I decided to give some of the mooncakes to Dick Altavista of Both Kinds of Music and the hosts of A Juncture. Hoped you liked it. What a great way to begin the new season. Read the rest of this entry »

Decided to hold off posting on Wednesday because my radio show had no photo to post up but there was an event that I got to attend on Wednesday night. It was Adrian Wu’s Resort 2011 Launch Event and Film Screening at Lobby Nightclub. It’s one of those rare times that I go to nightclubs on the heart of Rideau St in Ottawa.
At the event, there were a 5 piece collection and then the film screening in collaboration with Cloud in the Sky Studios. From the film screening, it was short but amazing with the quality as it’s quite the high definition on the eyes. The clip is available at this link. It was also great to see the usual people in the Ottawa fashion scene. Photos will be posted below.

After the event, I decided to go to McDonald’s to try the McRib. The verdict, it was good but the BBQ sauce was quite messy on the fingers.

Wednesday’s Radio Show for June 22, 2011
It’s the second last show of season two and it was just playing through the 2o11 Polaris Music Prize Long List. I didn’t play all but I got through the ones that I haven’t had a chance to play. Dirty Beaches, Louise Burns and Little Scream were the one I haven’t had a chance to play.
For the Wild 10 Countdown, Lose It by Austra continues to be number one for the second week. No new entries but a re-entry for Miracle Fortress as the album, Was I The Wave? is on the long list of Polaris.
The playlist is available at this link.

Podcast/Audio – Updated on June 23, 2011
The June 22nd radio show – press play to listen.

There’s a Podomatic version at this link.

The short June 23, 2011 Radio show – Press play to listen and the playlist is at this link.

Interview segment from the June 23, 2011 edition of Fundamentally Sound (I made was referenced)

Photos
  

iPad and iPod touch Photos
  

  

The McRib