Music releases

Released

Sunday, December 6, 2015

Producer

Ryan McVeigh

MOSMA | Mid-Ocean School of Media Arts

Champagne Years describe their sound as "the playlist for your sad, late-night dance parties." When pushed to elaborate, their response was to direct me back to the music. "Listen to it," says guitarist Josh Benoit. "Isn't it the sort of thing you'd listen to after a depressing night at the bar, at home by yourself, shuffling around your living room with a nightcap in your hand?" That's really specific, I tell him.

Born out of the ashes of a dozen Winnipeg bands, the members of Champagne Years claim that this is the project they feel they've been working towards their whole lives. While Benoit's self-deprecating sad-sack description of their sound holds some water -true the melodies are brooding and the songs deal with themes like racial injustice (Corner Boys), alienation (Ghosting) and a love so painful it chokes you (Somewhere, Montana)- the arrangements are so lush and the rhythms so propulsive that the overall takeaway from listening to this album is a  life-affirming euphoria, a deep joy at the realization that music like this is still being made.

Singer Gareth Williams attests to the power that music has had in his own life, "I was not in a great place when Josh and I started this band, but one year later...who knows, maybe songs are magic." Whatever feelings their music stirs up, good or bad, it's undeniable that the songs are ambitious and packed with meaning. Their forthcoming EP 'This Yen Closing My Throat' is as introspective as it is accessible. And you can, as Benoit says, sad-dance to it, but personally this record makes me feel anything but sad. 

'This Yen Closing My Throat' comes out December 6, 2015