The Belly of the Beast

You may or may not know this about me, but I have an issue with the Hipster community. I find it incredibly phony. The idea of spending countless hours and dollars to appear unique. Flannel shirts, unkempt hair, five day beard, skinny jeans, Chuck Taylors etc. You know, trying to look like Bret from Flight of the Conchords. Vinyl records of bands that no one has ever heard of, purchased only for the sake of being able to say they own vinyl from a band that no one has ever heard of. Like these two winners below. I mean, how much money do you think these D-Bags spent to look like they are borderline homeless?

I will admit that I do enjoy the ridiculous plastic sunglasses they wear though. So on Monday I decided to pick up a cheap pair, and despite my better judgement I decided Kensington Market would be a nice place to check out and buy some super cheap shades. The belly of the beast if you will. Nestled right behind Chinatown, Kensington Market is ground zero of the Hipster problem, even more so than Queen West. Stores selling ironic T-Shirts, second hand books and decrepit furniture from the 70s line the streets. Independent coffee shops selling free trade coffee on every corner. A bicycle to car ratio of at least 100 to 1. In fact, I believe this was the only car I saw on a road when i was there.

Shawn and I stopped at an Indian restaurant called Waterfalls. It was pretty cool. You could tell it was once trendy and expensive, clearly out of place in Kensington Market. But now it was kinda falling apart. The menus' lamination was peeling off, the fence around the patio was falling down and such. It was like one of those luxurious yachts found moored in San Tropez or Monte Carlo.... but 5 months after being hijacked by pirates. Still tasty though.

The Couch

OK, here's a little back story for you. When I first moved out of my mother's place the first purchase I made was an Ikea sofa. I figured it was cheap, functional, and not completely hideously ugly. So $1,000 later I had a couch that got me through for about a year and a half. Last month the unthinkable happened.

While it looks only like the leg was wonky, in fact the entire side wall of the couch had collapsed. So after a few weeks of propping the fucker up with the yellow pages, a French-English dictionary, and 5 coasters, I decided to get a new one. Not wanting to deal with Ikea again, I went to EQ3 and picked up this beauty.

So with the broken couch issue resolved a new dilemma presented itself. What the hell do I do with the busted couch? I would feel weird tossing it out (as it cost a mint just 18 months ago), and I couldn't sell (as no one would be dumb enough to buy it). So I talked to a friend who would take it off my hands and in return I would get a cased of beer. Fair deal.

So Friday I drove down to Parkdale to drop this thing off at his place. The day before I had told him I'd be there between 2:00pm and 2:30 pm. Now here's the thing about Toronto mid day traffic; driving from Uptown to Parkdale is, for all intents and purposes, like driving to the moon. After about 90 minutes on the road I arrived and lo and behold, the dude isn't there. I call his phone. No answer. I bang on his door. No answer. I text him. No answer. Now, I didn't drive half way across the known universe to still be stuck with this goddamn thing in my car. So I did the only reasonable thing. I left it in his yard. Sure hope he found it before the rain started.

The National

OK, I've decided that I don't like work. It keeps getting in the way of all the fun I should be having. Maybe I should quit my job and just be a professional haver of fun? But then how would I pay for the fun? Shit. Maybe lottery tickets is the answer? Its up to $50 million.

The past week has been a grind. About 60 hours in my dead end job. But on Tuesday I stole away an evening and went to another concert. The National played Massey Hall and my roommate Shawn, our pal Carla, and her pal Tyler got tickets.

The show itself was totally unlike the LCD Soundsystem show we checked out two weeks ago. GA vs. assigned seating meant the crowd was much more subdued. Of course the musical style of The National is much more mellow than LCD Soundsystem, but that didn't stop the lead singer dude from encouraging all those jive honkies to leave their seats and rush the stage... to an acoustic song. So the one burly bouncer seated in front of the stage, who most likely assumed he had the easiest gig this side of a James Taylor concert, suddenly had 400 of the whitest, rhythmless, douchiest hipsters dancing like retards around him.

The concert itself was... errrrr... so-so. The sound quality was pretty shitty which is weird considering that Massey Hall is world renowned for its acoustics and such. I think the sound engineer maybe was fresh out of technical school or something. With LCD Soundsystem, James Murphy himself would be tinkering with the amps and computers and sound hookups after every song to get the best sound out, and it paid off. The National, on the other hand, was difficult to listen to and the lyrics were near impossible to understand for some songs.

The lead singer though did put on quite a display. Stumbling across stage, dancing like and epileptic, hurling the microphone stand to the ground. Quite the stage persona we thought...til we noticed the bottles of wine lined up by the drum kit. He was shit faced. It became more and more apparent while he drunkenly swayed while he held on desperately to the microphone stand. At a certain point he jumped/fell of the stage and "interacted" with the audience in the orchestra section. And by "interact" I mean he ran up the aisles and clotheslined a few dozen audience members with the microphone cord.

The whole show was fun to watch, but not so much for the music. I guess LCD Soundsystem spoiled us.

Alexander Muir Park

For those who haven't been paying attention, we Torontonians have been enjoying quite a stretch of lovely weather recently. Mid 20's, cloudless skies, clean air etc. It has been really beautiful out there for the past week or so... and I can't take it anymore.

Now, I have no issue with great weather. In fact, I usually adore days like we have been having. However, after a long period of great weather, one begins to feel burdened by the obligation to get out there and do something in the great outdoors. Sigh. So when the mercury passes that 25 degrees mark and the sun peeks out from behind the clouds, like clockwork, every jackass in this city flocks to the beach, the parks, the roof top patios (a personal favorite), and every other location that involves any amount of fresh air.

And of course I was no different. To Alexander Muir Park I went with Shawn, a six pack of beer and the football. I took photos of the park and us enjoying it etc., but I've misplaced the cord that connects the camera to the computer. So here is a photo I "borrowed" from the interweb of the park.

The place is huge and impecibly well maintained. You have to wonder how much money the city pumps into this park while so many others, well frankly, look like shit. But I'm cool with, seeing as this park is like 50 feet from my front door. So we spent a few hours tossing the football around. having beer, sun tanning, getting sun burns, complaining about our sun burns, then drinking more. It was a good day. But I'm kinda happy that its cooling down a bit and the sun is going away for a few days. At least now I don't have to feel guilty sitting on my fat ass in front of the computer. Also, we don't have AC, and only the one fan.

This has nothing to do with the above post, but I found this pic on my iPhone that I took about a month ago. I was downtown having some patio beers and I noticed a plume of black smoke rising by the lake. Shawn can be seen in the foreground and in the far distance you can see the building on fire.

LCD Soundsystem

Lets get the ball rolling.

On Tuesday, the 25th of May, one of my all time favorite musical acts came to town. LCD Soundsystem, and their Dance/Punk/Disco/Funk/Soul/Electro/Pop/Rock sound came to the Kool Haus, in the Portlands and Shawn (my roomie) and myself got tickets. I haven't been to a concert proper in a long time. Since i was in Grade 8, to be specific, so this was definatly foreign to me. I have to say, I can't remember the last time I had such an awesome time. The venue itself was general admission and capacity of about 2500, so we got there early to get to the front of the line so we'd be right up front. It totally paid off. We ended up being front row, like eight feet from the stage.

They opened with "Us vs. Them" which was awesome and played pretty much all of their best tunes as well as a few that I didn't really care for but they did such an awesome performance I loved them regardless.

For the encore they played "New York I Love You" and mixed in "Empire State of Mind". Fucking brilliant! I know its not saying much, but without a doubt the best concert I've ever been to. I'm considering quitting my job and following them on tour (which sadly may be their last).

The original plan was to head over to Liberty Village to hear James Murphy spin at Wrongbar. But the show itself didn't let out until nearly midnight, it would have taken us ages to get all the fuck across town, and we figured that every hipster douchebag at the concert would be rushing to get there themselves so the odds of us getting in were slim to none. (I have since heard that we did miss a pretty awesome party though) So we decided to head home, but not after grabbing some food and beer at the Jack Astor's at Yonge and Dundas. While I tend to loathe that area because it is tacky, touristy, and for all intents and purposes a poor man's Times Square, it was actually pretty cool that night. It was quiet and we were on a patio about 7 stories over the square itself. So we sipped beer and enjoyed the cool breeze while watching Daisy of Love in closed captions on a 70 foot screen across the square. Pretty bad ass.

The Introduction

Hello! My name is Adam. I'm 25 years old and recently graduated university and moved out from my parent's house in Markham to an apartment in Midtown Toronto. Well, by "recently" I mean 18 months ago. In my year and a half on my own in Toronto I thought I was living the life, experiencing all that my fair city had to offer. But after meeting some people who had also recently moved to Toronto from small towns and hearing their stories I realized something. I hadn't experienced shit.

I have no idea what Toronto is all about. I have never explored the numerous enclaves and neighbourhoods. I don't know where to find the best Thai food, or the best live music, or what bars have the best drink specials on what nights. It's been a year and a half damnit! I need to get my shit together. I don't want to be an awful ambassador to my city. More importantly, I don't want to be missing out.

So recently I have resolved to get out there and discover my city, to get the true Toronto experience. This blog will be a journal of my explorations.