Breaking Down the Barricades with Courage My Love

(Courage My Love weekend continues here at the Bus Stop with coverage of the band's Ottawa show, interviews with fans and more pics! Tomorrow we return you to your regularly scheduled Mewes news...Mewes news...)

I had just turned 34 years old and had never nearly been rendered unconscious by an electric guitar. That was all about to change courtesy of a teen guitar powerhouse named Mercedes.

An hour before my near guitar-neck braining I was standing inside the entrance of the Ritual night club on Besserer street in Ottawa just a few blocks and a kick ass poutine joint away from the city’s bustling Friday night Market scene. With me was a group of young hardcore fans of a Kitchener band named Courage My Love. T-shirt with band logo? Check! Singing off lyrics? Check! Professing love for band members? Check, check, check! The doors had just opened when one of the other bands hitting the stage that evening, gear in tow, had to knock a few times to get in.

“I feel, like, two girls in a band is pretty good for girl musicians,” said Stacy Abellonsa, 17. “I feel like if people in other places were to hear them it’s kind of empowerment for women.”

Twin sisters Mercedes (vocals/guitar) and Phoenix (drums/vocals) only formed the band three years ago snagging the group’s name from a line in the 1936 film adaptation of H.G. Wells’ Things To Come. David Blake-Dickson (bass/vocals) joined the girls a few months later.

The early comers in the doorway would have their punctuality rewarded when the band appeared to say hello, pose for some photos and just hang out. Having attended over sixty concerts this summer, including one where it was not a guitar coming down on my head but the stage itself, it was a refreshing site to see a band devote so much attention to their fans.

“I think they are different from other bands because of many things,” says  Sarah Vockeroth, whose love for the band can be seen in her Twitter name:  CMLsuperfanclub. “One of the reasons is that they don’t just write songs about going to party at nightclubs or all the typical songs many bands their age would write. Their lyrics are real and from the heart, from real life experiences. “

I stood there watching wondering how to introduce myself. I had been placed on the evening’s guest list after collaborating with the band’s manager Nicole Hughes on some business cards earlier in the week. Hughes discovered the trio at a small Battle of the Bands in Stratford and along with her partner Chris Perry (a judge in the event) instantly wanted to meet them.

“I'm a sucker for guitar squeals, double kick, great voices and great songs,” says Hughes. “That's what I loved about CML the first time I saw them, and that's what I still love about them.”

Nicole knew my name but was the band privy to the identity of the dude Tweeting them under the moniker JMewesBusDriver? I opted for a little of both, stepped by the bubbling fans and said: “Hi, I’m Andre. I’m the bus driver!”  

The dimly light under belly of Ritual resembled something out of a medieval dungeon scene. You know, if a medieval dungeon contained neon, mirrors and a disco ball. Needless to say, it was pretty dismal down there before the party lights flicker, the crowd hits the floor and the first drinks are poured.  With very little lighting available I descended the steps with the band to discuss what has become a very interesting summer of exposure for the trio.

It all began with a podcast from New Jersey. Tell ‘Em Steve Dave (TESD) airs on director, now online broadcaster, Kevin Smith’s (yes, THAT Kevin Smith of Clerks fame) Smodcast Internet Radio Network. The award winning pod airs every Friday and is hosted by Smith’s buddies Bryan Johnsan, Brian Quinn and Walt Flanagan with the occasional quips by web designer Ming Chen. Flanagan also helms Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash, a comic book shop in Red Bank, New Jersey recently the subject of a reality show pilot.

An email from Johnson to Smith, relayed by Kevin on the July 19^th broadcast of Jay and Silent Bob Get Jobs explains the genesis of Courage My Love’s involvement with the show and soon to be near daily exposure by Smith online:

“Back in March (Johnson) started something with the listeners where any unsigned band …at the end of each show Bryan was offering listeners, any unsigned band, to send in a song and they would play it at the end of the show,” Smith said.  “So Dave, the dude in Courage My Love sent in a song and Bry put it on at the end of an episode and it got a really decent response, he said.”

David further explains how a friend of his tipped him off that Flanagan and crew were playing these songs by unsigned artists.  “I said: ‘Okay we’ll send it in and if something happens it happens’.  I didn’t really think anything would.”

Something did happen, however. The band would get frequent mentions on the TESD show. Johnson wrote Smith that “recently Walt wrote the lyrics to the I Sell Comics song and we challenged people to come up with the music. When Courage My Love didn’t respond within a week we called their manager on the show and chastised them for being complacent and not coming through with a tune. They answered by going huge with a song and a video.”

Huge is an understatement. Whereas many might toss together a one off recorded in their living room, Courage My Love hit the studio and recorded not only the music Flanagan requested but also vocals. The song received not only the attention of the show’s fan base but also was mentioned by some music websites and played on college radio stations in the U.S. Soon Smith was playing it on his shows praising the tune and stating that he listens to it as it makes him smile. “I just think it’s fucking badass,” Smith said.

With multiple shout outs and plays as well as an interview with the band on air, the video for I Sell Comics on Youtube shot up to over 30,000 hits in a matter of weeks. The band’s song had now gone global. Smith’s network broadcasts online to anybody with an internet connection and thousands of listeners tune in daily.

“The exposure from Tell 'Em Steve-Dave and Kevin Smith has been amazing! It's been an exciting and BUSY time for us all,” says Hughes. “It's so great to see the band being exposed to a larger audience--and an audience that really seems to 'get' what they're all about. ”

“It is awesome! It’s great,” Mercedes adds. “ Our Twitter is our central hub where most of our fans come and that’s where we can see that they are from Argentina or Norway or different parts of the world and I have noticed that different people now who are becoming fans, commenting on our videos and Tweeting at us, people who I think normally we wouldn’t have reached on our own.”

When one listens to Mercedes nail the guitar solo in I Sell Comics, something she did in only one take, or how much energy is behind her sister pounding out on the drums in Bridges, the band’s first video currently in the video flow circulation on Much Music, it’s hard to believe they have only been playing together for three years.

“She just started taking lessons,” says Mercedes as her sister laughs an agreement.

Their skilled sound comes from much practicing. The band holds regular practices and, according to Hughes, are extreme perfectionists when it comes to their work. The hard work is paying off. Not only has the band had the recent plugs from Smith but they were added to the Vans Warped Tour playing Mississauga’s Arrow Hall in mid-July.

Somebody calls down from somewhere in the darkness of Ritual: “I love you Mercedes and Phoenix!” Smiles break out on the girl’s faces as they echo their love in return for the unseen fan. If they are nervous that they are about to be taking to stage for the first time in the Nation's Capital they don't show it. All that resides in the look on their faces is genuine appreciation to that unknown fan out there in the dark, shouting admiration from the shadows as they await the group to hit the stage.

At this all ages show I was feeling my age while I lingered, camera in hand, between two sets of girls my daughter’s age. Alcohol was served in a roped off area for those parents carted along by their kids. I made my way to the merchandise table where I met one such. The difference here is that her children WERE the show. Judy, Mercedes and Phoenix’s mother, could not have beamed more as she sat there selling t-shirts and buttons for her daughter’s band. Amongst the collection of merch sat a pile of the posters I had made up for the band along with a thank you note. Very unexpected and sweet of the group.

Judy along with David’s parents haul the kids and gear from gig to gig and chat with the fans when they come up to the tables. Like their kids, this summer had taken them by surprise.  David’s dad says his son isn’t letting it go to his head, though, and is still putting in the work every week to improve.

“We’re still the same band,” says Mercedes. “ We still have the same goals and we do the same stuff it’s just that it’s a larger fan base that we’ve gotten. We’re reaching more people and whether or not all of them have become fans or if they just decide that it’s not for them that doesn’t matter because more people have heard of us now which is great.”

Despite my protests Judy handed me a t-shirt thanking me for supporting the band. My pleasure, Judy! I navigated the darkness once again in the maze of Ritual basement to find the washroom, pulled on the shirt and return to the front of the stage somehow now, despite the grays, managing to fit in a little bit better than before.

The band hit the stage to instantly own the room. The first chords kicked in and the energy blasted out over the crowd. A statement was made: Courage My Love came to rock.

Watching the group on stage is a work out. Trying to track their trajectory to get a photograph is tough. If they were any faster they’d have cartoon smoke puffs emanating from behind them.  The first blast is akin to that now stock footage of nuclear tests on make-shift homes and mannequins (or Harrison Ford in a fridge if you want to go that route).  David hits a pose with his bass silhouetted by the blue lights above the stage while Mercedes hammers out licks that you think shouldn’t come from a guitar held by somebody who has only been playing for a few years. Behind them Phoenix pounds the skins, her hair flying.

When I first heard the band played by Smith last month I, like so many others, was blown away. However, I wondered how they would fair in a live setting. Many bands can fall apart without the safety net of thousands of dollars of studio equipment and a good mixer. I urge you now 4,679 Twitter followers do not pass up the chance to see them live. They’ll knock you out.

Literally, in my case. As I fumbled with the settings on my camera to get something usable with the dark lighting and frantic motion of the band I felt something whoosh by my nose. I glanced up to see the culprit was the neck of Mercedes’ guitar as she had just jumped up on the speaker box in front of me, hands in the air trying the pump up the crowd.

“I love the fact that they are just as good live than on their recorded versions,” says Vockroth who, at this point, is clapping along to the beat behind me.  “Also, they have great energy and connection with the crowd, something not many bands have,” she adds.

Though the audio was hard to hear in the small space of the night club it was still evident that this group shouldn’t be playing small clubs much longer. The short set ended with Bridges after which the band mingled with their fans in and outside the club.

So, what’s next for Courage My Love? Well, the band says they are hitting the studio within the next couple of days to record a cover of Warren Zevon’s Hit Somebody! (The Hockey Song), a request from Smith.

“We’ve been working on a cover and we’re probably going to record it this week sometime and send it to him to see what he thinks,” said Mercedes.

Just so happens that’s also the title of Smith’s next film. Could there be a spot on a soundtrack in the not too distant future?

The band is also raising money now and hustling to get some Visas ready so they can head over to Jersey to play for Tell ‘Em Steve Dave and Smith’s live shows at the Count Basie theatre in Red Bank in October. You can chip in to the cause by purchasing I Sell Comics for a none-bank breaking .99 cents over at Band Camp (http://couragemylove.bandcamp.com/track/i-sell-comics).

Finally, the band hopes to fulfill a wish in the coming weeks when Smith hits Toronto on the Red Provinces tour to promote his latest film Red State.

“Kevin, when you come to Toronto on August 15^th we should go get Slushies,” says Mercedes. “On me! My treat!”

END NOTE: Thanks CML for rocking in my 34th. Hope to do more stuff with you all in the future. Thanks, too, Nicole for helping with the editing and pointing out my typos. That's what you get for writing things up at 4am after a day of zip-lining across a canyon waterfall. The shirt the band gave me was apropos. Courage My Love, indeed!