Ron Hawkins and The Do Good Assassins play at Call The Office
Influential to the Canadian indie
music scene since the ‘90s, Ron
Hawkins started with The Lowest of
the Low, gaining a gold record with
Shakespeare my Butt, later forming
Ron Hawkins and the Rusty Nails.
Hawkins is now fronting The Do
Good Assassins, a bluesy rock and
country band currently on tour.
Hawkins wasn’t shy discussing the changing indie landscape.
“It’s sort of drying up of options on the large-scale with things like radio and change in format for [the] music industry in that there are fewer brick-and-mortar CD/vinyl stores around so distribution chain big labels have dwindled,” he said. “But the Internet flourished with YouTube [and] all kinds of ways of social media to get your stuff out … democracy of the Internet, it’s good, but there’s a glut of shit.”
He says that it’s due to the same tools at all levels of musicians’ hands that leads to too much out there and no way to discern between good and bad.
Playing at Call The Office on February 13, the act will focus on the recently released Garden Songs, a 10-song collection of new and backlogged country-infused hits, which will be paired with a more blues-rock album already recorded and waiting for release early next year.
Along with Garden Songs, the tour’s other piece is Luck’s Hard, the recently released documentary about the making of the band’s first album Rome, and the personalities of each member interacting to create a sprawling double album.
While newer songs hold a more country feel to them, the Do Good Assassins’ work on Rome retains Hawkins’ hardier indie edge, even with the slowdown in tempo – something he attributes to the constant influx of new sounds around him.
“When I was 15–16 I got pretty politicized, and it was The Clash and Stiff Little Fingers, Minor Threat – pretty influential to me for the DIY thing and personal politics, and ever since then I consider myself a sponge,” he said. “I hear Elvis Costello talk about this, where your minds never really off – you’re listening and going, ‘What can I pillage from this?’”
Earlier work from the band also feels more like a lament for love lost sometimes, of heartbreak, but Garden Songs is a change from those themes Ron stated.
“The new records songs are a lot more and birth and mortality,” Hawkins said. “A lot of the songs are about that – how do you grow old gracefully, productively?”
But also about beginnings with songs like “Saskia” written for a friend whose daughter was born prematurely three months, eventually surviving.
While most think a documentary about the making of the band’s first album might seem daunting, Hawkins brushed off the possible stresses involved in the feat.
“[Recording wasn’t] really stressful, [but] a classic move I would make, because I have a reputation as a shit disturber in the Canadian music industry – what would be ballsier and more ‘fuck you’ than starting a band and your first record being a double album and making a documentary about you band.”
Spinal Tap anyone?
Call the Office is located at 216 York St., with tickets for The Do Good Assassins selling for $20. Garden Songs released February 3 on Pheromone Records.
Hawkins wasn’t shy discussing the changing indie landscape.
“It’s sort of drying up of options on the large-scale with things like radio and change in format for [the] music industry in that there are fewer brick-and-mortar CD/vinyl stores around so distribution chain big labels have dwindled,” he said. “But the Internet flourished with YouTube [and] all kinds of ways of social media to get your stuff out … democracy of the Internet, it’s good, but there’s a glut of shit.”
He says that it’s due to the same tools at all levels of musicians’ hands that leads to too much out there and no way to discern between good and bad.
Playing at Call The Office on February 13, the act will focus on the recently released Garden Songs, a 10-song collection of new and backlogged country-infused hits, which will be paired with a more blues-rock album already recorded and waiting for release early next year.
Along with Garden Songs, the tour’s other piece is Luck’s Hard, the recently released documentary about the making of the band’s first album Rome, and the personalities of each member interacting to create a sprawling double album.
While newer songs hold a more country feel to them, the Do Good Assassins’ work on Rome retains Hawkins’ hardier indie edge, even with the slowdown in tempo – something he attributes to the constant influx of new sounds around him.
“When I was 15–16 I got pretty politicized, and it was The Clash and Stiff Little Fingers, Minor Threat – pretty influential to me for the DIY thing and personal politics, and ever since then I consider myself a sponge,” he said. “I hear Elvis Costello talk about this, where your minds never really off – you’re listening and going, ‘What can I pillage from this?’”
Earlier work from the band also feels more like a lament for love lost sometimes, of heartbreak, but Garden Songs is a change from those themes Ron stated.
“The new records songs are a lot more and birth and mortality,” Hawkins said. “A lot of the songs are about that – how do you grow old gracefully, productively?”
But also about beginnings with songs like “Saskia” written for a friend whose daughter was born prematurely three months, eventually surviving.
While most think a documentary about the making of the band’s first album might seem daunting, Hawkins brushed off the possible stresses involved in the feat.
“[Recording wasn’t] really stressful, [but] a classic move I would make, because I have a reputation as a shit disturber in the Canadian music industry – what would be ballsier and more ‘fuck you’ than starting a band and your first record being a double album and making a documentary about you band.”
Spinal Tap anyone?
Call the Office is located at 216 York St., with tickets for The Do Good Assassins selling for $20. Garden Songs released February 3 on Pheromone Records.
