Jenny Omnichord May shows!

Spring is finally looking likely to stick around for a bit!  Though it did snow today.  But…it’s sticking around in that productive “Get it done” kind of way, and it is leading to a lot of lovely and content looking people wandering the streets.  And I am feeling equally content and excited because my close-to-home album release parties are almost here!  I am playing three shows with Language Arts – a FANTASTIC dreamboat of a band from Toronto who are releasing a brand new music video at the shows.  The three shows are these:

Wednesday May 1st at the Casbah, Hamilton

Thursday May 2nd at the Piston, Toronto

Saturday May 4th at Ed Video, Guelph

And I am also hoping to line up an Ottawa show for May 24th so me and my dear friend Kris Demeanor can FINALLY share a bill.  Fingers crossed for that.  And I am playing the “One Man Band” festival in Montreal on May 25th!  Below, you can click on any or all of the event links, and in real life you can COME to these shows!  That’s my favourite part.  Here’s the little press release we put together:

“Days of Hard Drives: Excavating Ten Years of Jenny Omnichord”

This year marks the tenth year of Jenny Omnichord!  So to celebrate she learned to silk screen, dug through the ancient hard drives, and put together a twenty track collection of cover songs, rarities, and previously unreleased material.  There’s a duet about school bus driving featuring fellow school bus driver Richard Laviolette.  There are songs about “table scoring” and hot dogs restaurants.  There are covers by such celebrated artists as The Guess Who, the Pixies, and Construction and Destruction.  There is even an educational song about Ice Worms, so highly regarded it is featured in the Wikepedia article “Ice Worms in Culture”.  If ten years has taught Jenny anything it’s how to set up quickly, play first, and be pretty darn charming.

“Jenny is restless, endlessly inventing and reinventing herself, as a Brother, a bass player, a bus driver, you name it, and she never, ever sits still…She makes things happen, and likewise, things tend to happen when she’s around. There’s no one better to have on your team.”  - Mathias Kom, Cross-Canada tour companion,  & bandmate in “The Burning Hell”

“An old Canadian song When the Iceworms Nest Again, jokes about how cold it is in northern Canada. (Titles vary, using “iceworms,” “ice worms” and “ice worm.”) There is a different song of the same name by the Canadian group Jenny Omnichord, which is highly factually accurate.” - From the Wikepedia Entry “Ice Worms in Culture”

Event links:

Hamilton: https://www.facebook.com/events/548785588477789/

Toronto: https://www.facebook.com/events/179010022252040/

Guelph: https://www.facebook.com/events/607548569272918/

Montreal (One Man Band Festival) https://www.facebook.com/events/344909628954079/?fref=ts

If you can’t make it to a show, you can order the album here: http://jennyomnichord.bandcamp.com/album/days-of-hard-drives-excavating-ten-years-of-jenny-omnichord

This year Jenny Omnichord and Richard Laviolette became school bus drivers! But they have handed in their permission slips and are leaving for the east for a March Break tour. Neither have been out there in what seems like forever and are very excited to see all of you! So please come out if you’re around! You’ll get to see Jenny playing two omnichords at once, and you’ll get to see Richard’s new glittery rock fantasticness. It’ll also be a double release party. It’s so awesome. Here are the dates:

Fri. March 8th: Montreal, at “The Squalor”

Sat. March 9th: Fredericton at the Capitol Complex w/ David R. Elliott

Sun. March 10th Matinee at 1:

00pm: Sackville, at Struts Gallery w/ Construction and Destruction

Sun. March 10th evening: Halifax at Gus’ Pub w/ Construction and Destruction

Mon. March 11th: Rothesay at the Treehouse w/ Construction and Destruction

Thursday March 14th: St. John’s NL at the Ship

Friday March 15th: St. John’s NL at Prescott st (House show)

Here’s a link to the event on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/160154630804228/

This will be a double release tour: Richard is putting the final touches together for his full length record, and Jenny is putting together an album of new unreleased material mixed with old covers and rarities.  This year marks her tenth anniversary as a solo Omnichordist!  More details will be posted in the coming weeks.  Stay tuned!

There are some delightfully enjoyable things happening for our friends this summer.

As we speak, our dear Mathias and his band the Burning Hell are in the process of setting a world record.  They are trying to play 10 shows in 10 countries in 24 hours.  It’s really true.  I have no idea what point they’re at at this moment because I can’t do the time zone math in my head, but you can read about it here: https://www.facebook.com/theburninghell They are also making a documentary of the experience.

Our incredibly prolific and endlessly touring Wax Mannequin is putting out a new record!  And touring all over this summer.  There was a lovely write-up in Exclaim! that includes a track from his upcoming release.  Read the article here: http://exclaim.ca/News/wax_mannequin_announces_new_album_canadian_summer_tour

His tour dates are in the article, and are also featured alongside Jenny Omnichord’s on our Upcoming Shows page

Jenny Omnichord is headed west again!  The first time in two years, and her first tour with little baby Arrow.  Our favourite little boy Otis will be spending the better part of the month swimming in a swimming pool, getting a good and consistent school-compatible sleep schedule and learning to draw with a real pencil (instead of just with a finger on an ipad) courtesy of his grandma in Sudbury.  Little Arrow is earning her little wings, ambling across the country in an RV, then flying home.  A couple of festivals, lots of shows, and hopefully the Ground Hog museum.  Thanks to Joey and Spherical Productions for all your tour-booking incredibleness!  See the schedule on the Upcoming shows page, or on the Jenny Omnichord page.

Henry Svec is playing songs from Folk Songs of Canada Now at Home County Folk Festival this year!  You should probably go if you can make it to London.  More details here: http://www.homecounty.ca

Jenny is working on a Pauly and the Blowbots music video!  We’ll try to figure out how to post it when it’s done.  If you can make it to the Guelph Arts Platform’s “Invent #2″ you can witness its debut screening!  Regardless, you should check out the Guelph Arts Platform (http://guelphartsplatform.ca) they’re up to some wonderful things.

J.J. Ipsen is growing his fabulous reputation as the best guy you could have in your band.  Recent projects have seen him producing Jessy Bell Smith’s record, playing with Octoberman, and I even heard a rumour he’s going to be playing some stuff with Jim Guthrie.  Jim Guthrie!  All this, AND he bought a house!

We love these friends, and we hope you can cross paths with some this summer!  We’d love to see you!

We are VERY pleased to announce that we have released the NEW album from the recently reunited Barmitzvah Brothers!  Similar to Jenny Omnichord’s album of duets for Otis, Jenny wanted a special album to welcome her second baby into the world.  Over the course of a week, Jenny, Geordie, John, and Tristan reunited at Andy Magoffin’s House of Miracles in London Ontario to record “Growing Branches”, a series of songs celebrating the music of the Barmitzvah Brothers as well as babies, mothers, little sisters and older brothers.  The album celebrates ten years since their first record, and 11 years since the band formed.  It is also the 11th release on Label Fantastic!, officially coming out through us on 11/11/11.  We saved it for a perfect date (though in timely fashion, it was officially released through Zunior on baby Arrow’s birthday, September 16th 2011.  Welcome to the world little Arrow!

We are also releasing the new and incredible Pauly and the Blowbots album “Stone Boner” this month!  Paul Almond is amazing – on this record he is backed by the Blowbots, who are Richard Laviolette on drums, and Jenny Mitchell on bass.  The music is like a punk version of Daniel Johnson.  It’s a hi-fi recording of a low-fi basement band.  There are songs about nymphs, diarrhea, dragons and dinghies.

Look for both of them in “the shop”

We here at Label Fantastic! are super excited!

We put out records from time to time, but both of these two new  releases are super epic.  Both have been much anticipated for a long time, and now they have come out within days of eachother!

For “Folk Songs of Canada now”, Henry Svec- inspired by Canadian folklorists Staunton R. Livingston (The CFL Sessions) and Edith Fulton Fowke (Folk Songs of Canada) -  decided to become a folklorist himself.  He traveled the country collecting field recordings by a huge number of talented Canadian songwriters.  Included in this incredible collection are the Label Fantastic! team of Mathias Kom, Jenny Omnichord, and Wax Mannequin, as well as our favourite recording magician Andy Magoffin, Geoff Berner, Al Tuck, Laura Barrett, Ron Leary, and whole bunch of others.  It is incredible!  And Henry has made it available to you for FREE!

Visit http://www.folksongsofcanadanow.com/ to get the album

“Gravestone Rock” presents our favourite Guelph-living in Toronto-rockers “The Skeletones Four” in their finest light.  The follow up to 2009′s “Ahhhhhh” was recorded by front man Andrew Collins at his grandparents farm in the countryside of Caledon.  Somehow these boys have taken their unusual time signatures and ghostly vocal harmonies, and created a new style of music that manages to be the utmost of rock, while still pulling you in with hooks that remind me of Motown.  This is the best kind of rock around.  They will be your new favourite band.

Visit: http://theskeletonesfour1.bandcamp.com/ to pick up this incredible record.

For more information about both projects, click on their band pages here on our Label Fantastic! site.  They have links to the official sites for both.

Hey everybody!

So after some delay (which really just increased the anticipation and excitement) we have released TWO NEW ALBUMS!  Spring Breakup – the broken-heart child of Mathias Kom (the burning Hell) and Kim Barlow – are set to release “It’s not you, it’s me” at the beginning of February, followed shortly thereafter by J.J. Ipsen and The Paper Crown’s “Entertainment Ordinaire”  Spring Breakup has an indvidual artist page here on the site (you can find it above in the navigation bar)  and J.J.’s will be up soon, for now you can look for more information on our releases page.  You can also find information at:

http://www.springbreakupmusic.com/

http://www.jjipsen.com/

And of course, both albums will be available digitally through our favourite friends www.zunior.com.  If you can’t wait till these albums are released, go buy other awesome albums!  Spread the love, and support our favourite digital music store!

So much music to love!

Hey everybody!

I am making custom Jenny Omnichord shirts – for $25 I will turn one of your shirts into a one-of-a-kind Jenny Omnichord shirt.  No two are alike!  The price includes the shipping costs of returning your shirt to you.  Just bring a shirt to a show (or mail one to the address below) and I will turn it into a wearable piece of art!  Upcoming show dates are listed on the Jenny Omnichord page on this site.  Hope to hear from you!

Jenny Omnichord

103B Grove St

Guelph Ont.

N1E 2W8

http://www.thestar.com/living/article/830012–for-these-artists-charity-begins-online

You would have to be crazy to start a record label these days. Fortunately, Wax Mannequin, Jenny Omnichord, Mathias Kom, and Gillian Manford have never been shy around crazy ideas, and they intend to prove it with “Label Fantastic!”, their brand-new boutique record label and distribution company.

Like other Canadian indie labels, Label Fantastic! is mostly about supporting great music from great independent musicians, but it is also more: a creative approach to sales and marketing means that every Label Fantastic! release will be unique, with everything from handmade packaging to pieces of art included with each CD or vinyl record. In their in-house distribution, Label Fantastic! aims to break the mold of the traditional distribution model by forging personal, direct relationships with only the best independent music stores across Canada.

Look for new albums by Jenny Omnichord, JJ Ipsen and Spring Breakup on Label Fantastic! in your local independent record stores in May 2010.