Power-pop trio The Hundreds and Thousands might be new to you, but the Ottawa band formerly known as Starling have been around for more than a hot minute.

This fact becomes quite clear in their well-honed, high-energy concerts. So here's a live performance video for their fantastic single "Rat Race."

And If you dig it, then download this free MP3 of "Rat Race"

Shove it. That was the message emblazoned on Nickelback singer Chad Kroeger's t-shirt and one can't help but assume it was directed at his band's critics.

After all, the hometown mook-rockers did kick off the show with their dumbest-ever anthem "Something In Your Mouth"-even the edgy host Russell Peters joked "Ay oh, my mom's watching!"-and upon picking up their best album award, a grinning Kroeger quipped "The press are going to have a field day with this one."

Having abandoned the idea of seeing British dance-rockers The Ting Tings--another buzz band made famous by an iPod ad--I instead returned to what has become my Canadian Music Week/Fest ground zero The Horseshoe where the Ottawa band formerly known as Starling has reinvented itself as The Hundreds and Thousands.

The power-pop chops are as honed as ever and though the criminally early 8:30pm set is only sparsely attended, the people that are here are almost entirely young women, which means the men will be sure to follow in short order. Their music is beefy and guitar heroic enough for an indie crowd and head-catchy enough to soundtrack Gossip Girl, which I expect the single "Rat Race" to do any day now.

City-wide music festivals like Canadian Music Fest are structured like an endless bar crawl, which can make one feel the urge to bolt to a new joint after every 40 minute showcase. But often a few bars wind up with line-ups so solid that one is forced to lay down roots and rock out in one place.

And so it went with Friday night at the Horseshoe Tavern, a ChartAttack.com-curated bill that was arguably the most anticipated of the weekend, thanks almost entirely to the midnight slot when the Handsome Furs would debut their new songs from just-released album of the year contender (yes, already) <i>Face Control</i>.

Electro-pop is always looking for a new princess and next in line of succession is the little lady known as Little Boots.

Born Victoria Hesketh and formerly the lead singer/keyboardist for British band Dead Disco, Little Boots has been working with Hot Chip's Joe Goddard, who produced the MP3 below. She's currently in the US working on the final tracks for her debut album, due later this year.

Artist: Little Boots
Songs: 'Meddle'
Album: 'Arecibo'
Sounds Like: Goldfrapp, CSS

Download: 'Meddle' (MP3)


After the jump, watch Little Boot's bedroom cover of Hot Chip's "Ready for the Floor."

Being funny can go a long way towards making an otherwise unbearably lame singer less unbearably lame.

John Mayer, f'rinstance, might be a pretty good guitarist but insists on recording middling adult-contemporary slop. However, he is freaking hilarious-from his Chappelle Show skit "White People CAN Dance" and his cover of internet hit "Chocolate Rain" to snarkily answering in Japanese during a Ryan Seacrest red carpet interview and his wickedly self-deprecating behind-the-music video on FunnyorDie.com ("having not been inspired since 2004...").

Similarly, Michael Bublé regularly enjoys mocking himself and making dirty jokes. At this year's Junos, he dedicated his Doritos Fan Choice Award to "all those people who said I couldn't vote for myself enough times to win" and, backstage, told reporters "I just learned when you're eating them, you should never watch dirty movies or anything like that. It's true, I thought there was something really wrong with me, but it was just the Doritos."

Now the oh-so-serious Josh Groban has boarded the funny train. Our first hint the popera crooner had a sense-of-humour came from his hilariously random cameo in Jimmy Kimmel's "I'm F-cking Ben Affleck" video

Then on Sunday's Emmys, he offered a rare highlight, singing 30 classic TV themes, with tongue often deep in cheek, including the Muppet Show, the Cops theme, Brady Brunch and an eerily spot-on cover of the South Park theme. Dude even rapped "Fresh Prince of Bel-Air."

Now, if only Groban would stop recording music all would be forgiven.

Watch the Emmy mash-up after the jump...

Hey, remember when we spoke on April Fool's day about that whole bizarro RickRoll phenomenon where folks send you seemingly innocuous web links that trick you into watching the video for "Never Gonna Give You Up"?

Well, Rick Astley must feel like John McCain right now since he's just been outshone on his own turf by the Barack Star.

This, quite simply, rules...

I dunno who the heck decided to book indie-pop stars Metric as headliners for the debauched "extreme sports" Wakestock fest on Toronto Island, but thank goodness the wasted mookish masses had mostly departed by the time Emily Haines and the boys took the stage, leaving behind mud pits, empty beer gardens and shoulder-perched girls punching the air rather than doffing their tops.

Even the whipping wind and rain, which began falling almost to the second that Jimmy Shaw kicked into "Dead Disco's" indelible guitar line, merely added an epic booster shot to their typically epic sound. How these cats aren't a massive stadium band is beyond me, but hopefully their long-awaited (and reportedly finished) upcoming album will do the trick.

The set was mostly filled with supersized versions of old hits like "Combat Baby," "Monster Hospital" "Calculation Theme," "Rock Me Now," "Poster of a Girl" and, in my opinion the best song yet produced by Canada's post-millennial indie surge, "Hustle Rose."

A few more new tunes would have been appreciated, but rocky new track "Satellite Mind," with its "I'm not suicidal/I just can't get out of bed" refrain, was a nice addition to the fan-fave setlist. Then Emily and Jimmy emerged by themselves to encore with a powerfully intimate, slow-clap-inducing version of "Live It Out."

Then with a promise to "put out our record soon," Metric left the stage and the small-but-enthusiastic crowd headed over to the ferry terminal to put another wonderful, albeit wet, weekend to bed.

Ladytron has been known as the other Liverpudlian quartet (even though frontwomen Helen Marnie and Mira Aroyo hail from Scotland and Bulgaria, respectively) since dropping their still-brilliant debut 604 way back in 2001 on the late, lamented Emperor Norton label.

First the group (which also includes Daniel Hunt and Reuban Wu) were roped in with the 80s revival due to their vintage synth-based sound. Then when electroclash blew up they became unwitting poster-children for that movement, too.

But these cats were always too cool for school, eschewing "scenes" in favour of following their own muse. To wit, they've continued pumping out dark, icy and uber-stylish electro-pop that nonetheless pulses with life, even nailing one of the decade's best tracks with their blissful epic "Destroy Everything You Touch."

They recently played a free show in Toronto as part of Harbourfront's Beats, Breaks and Culture festival in support of their brand-new album Velocifero. Though still relatively static onstage, their live show has improved by leaps and bounds since their last tour for 2005's Witching Hour. The brilliant light show helped, to be sure, but they've also become better live musicians. The set was dark-hued and very intense, with analog synths blaring like guitars at a rock show as the singers cooed in English and Bulgarian and the beats pummeled the crowd. Not surprisingly, within a few songs the older folks that showed up for the free show were hightailing it the hell out of there. Their loss--by the time Ladytron had revved up into full-on rave mode to blast out inevitable closer "Destroy," the electro-pop outfit could lay claim to one of the summer's most impressive performances.

AOL blogger Chromewaves agrees...read his review here.

Though we didn't record the T.O. gig, we do have some fantastic live songs from Ladytron's concert at 12 Galaxies in San Francisco . Plus, their music video for ace new single "Ghosts."

After the jump, of course...

After months of online bickering--er, debates--and two rounds of voting, 178 music critics, broadcasters and bloggers (including myself) have compiled a shortlist of the "best" Canadian albums of the past year which will now compete to win the third annual Polaris Prize's bragging rights and $20,000.

Modeled after Britain's Mercury Music Prize (and, to a lesser degree, America's Shortlist prize), the goal is to spotlight Canadian albums which, despite the still-surging indie scene, were being ignored in major Juno categories because of the industry awards' sales requirements.

Arguably, Polaris has overshot in the opposite direction--last year Feist lost to little-known Montreal band Patrick Watson, but later won the Shortlist Prize and an armload of Junos--however this year's list is a respectable cross-section of the Canadian indie scene, ranging from Vancouver retro-rockers Black Mountain, Winnipeg folk-punks The Weakerthans, Ottawa alt-country crooner Kathleen Edwards, Montreal indie-pop vets Stars, London rapper Shad, Toronto electro-rockers Holy F**K and Charlottetown power-pop newcomers Two Hours Traffic.

Interviews and more after the jump...

It was a dark and stormy night. No, seriously, it was dark and stormy. Throughout the day the clouds repeatedly unleashed their loads and the hordes of kids who set up shop along Queen Street west to see their the musicians and celebs were repeatedly and mercilessly doused.

MuchMusic's award show itself fared little better. The usual stars were in short supply-instead of Paris Hilton, we got Perez; instead of Spencer and Heidi, we got Whitney and Brody; instead of Billy Talent's tank, we got illScarlet's ice cream truck and Kardinal Offishall's TTC bus; and instead of actual kid Avril we got the aged New Kids on the Block.

But let's take it from the top...

It's North-by-Northeast music festival week and like recyclables during a municipal strike, Toronto streets (parking lots, rooftops, public squares and even Pearson airport and Union Station) are once again piled high with musicians off all stripes, shapes and colours. And while there is admittedly some stinkery amongst the 500-odd bands playing 50 venues about town, these sorts of music fests are always, first and foremost, about new discoveries.

So after enjoying what these fests are about secondmost (free beer and BBQ) at the annual EMI Publishing rooftop kickoff party, I headed to the Horseshoe Tavern to check out The Wet Secrets, a band I chose based entirely on the scientific principle that, well, their name sounds kinda dirty.

More after the jump...

Festivals like Canadian Music Week tend towards rock and/or roll, so it seemed high time to take in some hip-hop, which led me to Hilltop Heads, a chart-topping rap trio straight outta Adelaide, Australia. Early sets can be plagued by lackadaisical crowds but tag-team MCs Suffa, Pressure and DJ Debris had hands raised and heads nodding....

After an interminable two hours of red carpet coverage--during which we learned that a) Billy Ray lets Miley Cyrus wear way too much eye makeup; b) Nelly Furtado looks creepy with dyed blond eyebrows and c) the Plain White Ts guy wrote "Hey There Delilah" for an actual Delilah who still won't date him--it's finally time for the 50th Grammy awards, and our adventures in live-blogging, to begin.

And we're off...wheee!

Street cred and award shows have never been bed buddies. But the cultural relevance of the Juno Awards--which just announced 2008's nominees list, has been fading for several years because Canada's internationally acclaimed indie scene has been relegated to the "alternative" categories.

It's a disconnect best embodied by Kevin Drew's 2006 tongue-lashing of the Canadian Idol kids after his band, Broken Social Scene, took home best alternative album but was shut out of the major categories because of sales requirements.

It hardly mattered back when lame acts like, say, Sky, won best new artist because their competition was pretty lame, too. But once Canadian music started ruling, it pained when the same-old corporate rockers and cookie-cutter pop tarts got the props....