Monday, December 7, 2009

City And Colour


There is something I don’t always understand in the music industry. Solo Projects. Beyonce, Chris Cornell and many others have left their bands/groups to do their own solo projects. To me it just seems like a move to get more attention and fame and not share the credit and acknowledgement with others. Especially when the solo projects don’t really differ that much from the group. Not that the solo projects aren’t good, I still enjoy them. This is a bit of a pet peeve of mine but there are a few exceptions. Justin Timberlake’s solo efforts were definitely better than his boy band days and I grew to appreciate his musical talents. Of course Eric Clapton and Sting cannot really be criticized for their solo efforts either. For the most part though you really have to show me that you can do something really different in your solo project in order to impress me. Well, City And Colour has done that leaps and bounds.


City And Colour is comprised of Dallas Green who didn’t just go solo he did a 180 and went for a completely different genre. Dallas was the lead singer of a hardcore alternative band out of Canada called Alexisonfire and if you are streaming his music right now hardcore is not really what comes to mind when describing City And Colour. Dallas went folk acoustic, which is currently my favorite genre! He also didn’t want his solo project to go by his own name (already winning points with me) and decided to release his music with an alias. (I’ll give you ten points if you can figure out why he chose that name).


Dallas started writing and recording his music in between Alexisonfire gigs and started making it available to the band’s fans and started a huge buzz about the new directions he was taking. With the fans supporting him Dallas released his first solo album titled Sometimes, in 2005 which was soon followed by a live album in 2006 and a sophomore album in 2008 titled Bring Me You Love. I can only imagine the reaction of Alexisonfire fans hearing City And Colour for the first time. Its not what you expect out of a tattoo covered alternative rock singer but it makes me appreciate his work so much more.



I hope you are enjoying this new shift for Dallas Green as much as I am. I love comments so feel free to let me know what you think.

1 comment:

Mary (Mary's Musicology) said...

My apologies anon. I misunderstood your intentions and what you were trying to tell me. Vacation brain. Please forgive me.