It’s that yearly time on the final month of the year. It’s the popular advent calendars in the form of DAVIDsTEA and Squish Candy. Squish Candy has opened a location in Rideau Centre for several months and it’s been a great convenience in getting the 24 Days of Candy. DAVIDsTEA offered their hot selling 24 Days of Tea in late October. It used to be released on November.
Here’s the list of the advents calendars. They will be updated for the 24 days.
The openings will be shown on Instagram. Continue reading →
On Thursday night, the National Gallery of Canada held their traditional Christmas tree lighting event as part of their holiday activities. Their Christmas tree is quite tall and just astounding to look at.
Aside from Parliament Hill’s Christmas lights which started on Wednesday, I never knew the National Gallery of Canada had their Christmas tree lighting event as well. There were hot chocolate and cookies served at the event. It was a good fun for the family and a nice way to stay indoors as Winter approaches.
The photos are posted below. Continue reading →
It’s back for another year and this time, I got two advent calendars to contend with. It’s been a yearly tradition getting DAVIDsTEA’s 24 Days of Tea. In the last minute, I decided to get Squish Candies’ 24 Days of Gummies.
This year’s DAVIDsTEA’s advent calendar is different it looks more like a drawer and sliding or pull the small boxes. Don’t worry, I’m not going to cheat.
For those that don’t know, Squish Candies makes gourmet gummies and candies and they’re based in Montreal. They’ve been established since 2014, so they’re basically a new and young company. The candies caught my interested when I was browsing around Hudson’s Bay at Queen St. W in Toronto.
As with past posts, I will be posting the list when opening the teas and candies for the 24 days. Keep on checking. I will also post the openings on Instagram. Note: I’ve come to realize that Squish’s advent calendar is random with their boxes. If you check their Twitter, it will be different than mine. Continue reading →
On Tuesday, it was a privilege to be a guest co-host for Friends With Benefits, which is hosted by Tonya Price. It was an impromptu appearance as I decided to give her a Christmas gift in the form of Hudson’s Bay’s Tres Canada Canvas Tote Bag.
On her radio show, she went through her Top 5 Non-Canadian music of 2014. There were some Christmas music as well.
You can check out the radio show by going to this link.
As an added bonus from below, here’s an audio from last year’s Christmas audio and joined with Lauren Bridle as we played the favourite Christmas songs. It was part of the year-end countdown from 2013 for extra time.
In 2014, there’s a new version of Do They Know It’s Christmas by Band Aid 30. In the audio from last year, it’s the original version.
It was an epic day as I was on the airwaves from 7-10am and then the regular show at 11am on CKCU-FM. First, it was the Monday Special Blend and I was joined by Canadian Spaces host, Chris White as we had Shannon Rose & The Thorns. Rose has a new song which is fitting for Christmas and it’s called North Star. She performed three songs live on the airwaves. First was North Star, the second was Phoenix and lastly, a Bing Crosby cover song, I’ll Be Home For Christmas. Luckily, Ottawa didn’t bear brunt of the ice storm which hit Toronto on the weekend. Overall, it was a great morning to have guests like Chris White and Shannon Rose. From the image above, it was shot on a Polaroid.
The next show to help out was The Filibuster and we basically played Christmas songs ranging from the popular one to Metal to Canadian indie music. It was a nice mix of tunes to play as I was joined host, Ben James for the Filibuster.
To my own show, I played the favourites from Jill Barber, Basia Bulat and Nat Jay. It’s become a yearly tradition to play those wonderful festive songs. There were a few new tracks from Mounties, The Mountain and the Trees and a new Said The Whale.
You can check the playlist over at the this link. You can listen to the audio below. It will be a lengthy listen. Happy Holidays! Continue reading →
It’s that time of festive season where I’ll be playing Christmas music. This year is a bit different in terms of music format as I decided to play J-POP Christmas songs on CKCU-FM. After a debacle from last year’s radio show where I played Christmas UK #1 songs, it’s a better way to play it safe by choosing Christmas tunes from the Far East.
Played were Cream, B’z, L’Arc~en~Ciel, BoA and KinKi Kids. For Cantopop, there was Lonely Christmas by Eason Chan as it’s become part of the yearly Christmas playlist.
As usual, I was joined by Lauren as we decided to play through the festive tunes and it’s her last live show for 2013. She will still be on the air for the year end countdown show.
We were joined by Erica who made a surprise appearance. We also had fun taking some instant film photos using The Impossible Project film to the Polaroid camera. It was two hours full of fun music and wearing Santa hats.
The playlist can be checked over at this link. You can also listen to the audio below. Continue reading →
I know it’s November and Christmas decorations are slowly being displayed at malls. I missed out last year as DAVIDsTEA released their 24 Days of Tea at their retail stores and online. This year is no exception as I decided to get a head start in purchasing this hot seller in time of the holiday season. I like the design and lovely colour to the 24 days of tea. There’s a magnetic to keep the box closed. I’m glad I got a chance to get it as I missed out on the 2012 edition advent calendar.
It’s definitely worth the $34.50 as it brings on the holiday spirit.
As for the days the teas are set and I’m not cheating or peeking (as the box says), here’s the list for the 2013 edition of 24 Days of Tea; Continue reading →
It’s that festive time of the year where Christmas music is being played on the radio and television. The 2012 edition is a bit different as I try avoiding to play the usual Christmas pop tunes on the airwaves.
I shifted the modern and mainstream Christmas tunes for the blog part for the show (stay tuned for the update). I have noticed that a couple of CKCU shows have been playing tracks from the likes of Christmas In Hollis by Run DMC and countless versions of Fairytale of New York.
On the live radio show, what was played were more on the Canadian indie Christmas music and luckily got to play some of the tunes from the newly released Ho! Ho! Ho! Canada 4. There was also an extended edition as I tried to not play a lot of Christmas tunes but used more on the Ho! Ho! Ho! Canada 4 compilation as they were new. The local band, The Acorn are on the new holiday compilation.
The photo shown has the Charlie Brown Christmas tree, a Santa hat and a present as a prop.
As usual on Christmas day, the only thing I anticipate is the Doctor Who Christmas special. This year was pretty good and all I can say about the new companion just makes me melt my heart.
To cap off another year with great Canadian indie music. Ending the interview segment for 2012 happened to be Diamond Rings. It was quite the last minute as I encountered a problem from last week’s radio show. It was the second time to interview John O. aka Diamond Rings as he’s currently touring to promote his second album, Free Dimensional. I forgot how laid back and easy-going when I chatted with Diamond Rings. He was in Ottawa on Friday, December 7th and heard the show at Ritual Nightclub was sold out. Aside from the funny photo shown on top, I got a lot of “likes” when I posted the photo.
The audio of the interview will be posted below.
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.
WildWorks 