Almost 10 years have passed since the release of Welcome to the Night Sky, Wintersleep’s third and arguably most well-known record. Since then, Wintersleep has achieved a healthy amount of credibility among Canadian audiences with a Juno win in 2008 for Best New Group of the Year and the release of two albums, 2010’s New Inheritors and 2012’s Hello Hum, both peaking within the top 20 of the Canadian charts.
A reminiscence of the old and much-loved album, Welcome to The Night Sky, and a trip into the new album, The Great Detachment, was the plan for Wintersleep’s sold-out show at Ritual Nightclub this past Thursday, March 3rd. The band played old favourites and brand new tracks from the new LP, which was released that night at midnight in digital format and the following day in physical format.
Halifax’s Walrus opened the night with their psychedelic garage rock, well-received by the crowd. Afterwards, Wintersleep calmly took the stage with humble hearts and a determined demeanour that was focused on creating an inviting and engaging musical experience—a feat that has been rigorously practised and achieved by the band.
Throughout early 2016, Wintersleep has come back onto the Canadian music scene with truly impressive vigour. Early singles off The Great Detachment, such as “Amerika” and “Santa Fe,” show Wintersleep are in fact very awake and lively. They also released “Territory,” which features Canadian musical icon Geddy Lee of Rush fame on bass.
When asked about the experience of working with Geddy Lee, lead guitarist Mike Bigelow said, “It was really cool—we just kind of sent him an email and asked him if he would play on the song and he checked it out and he really loved it.”
“Yeah, I mean, the worst he could do was say no,” said Paul Murphy, lead vocalist and guitarist for the band.
“We’ve played a lot of shows since putting out Welcome to the Night Sky,” Murphy said. “There’s two albums in between and we’ve done a lot of recording and played a lot of shows. I think it helped this record particularly because we had a live off the floor approach for all of the songs. We kind of utilized that atmosphere of playing live and getting good takes out of two or three tries.”
This “live off the floor” approach was effortlessly brought into the band’s live show, revealing the Halifax band as genuine artists looking to share an experience of true soulful expression with the few hundred attendees of the night.
The highlight of the show was found just before the encore, with the slow building tension of “Miasmal Smoke and the Yellow Bellied Freaks,” the final track off of Welcome to the Night Sky. Drummer Loel Campbell, drenched in sweat, played through the opening drum track with resolve and and eagerness.
Followed by an encore outro, Wintersleep left the stage for the night, though the energy and influence they emitted throughout the evening would be hard to dissipate.
