PREVIEW
What: Mother Mother with K. Flay
When: Friday, 8 p.m. (doors at 7)
Where: Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre
Tickets: $25-$45 available by phone at 250-220-7777, in person at the Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre box office (1925 Blanshard St.), or online at selectyourtickets.com
Given that its tour itinerary includes five consecutive shows at Vancouver’s Commodore Ballroom, one would assume the Commodore concerts would be top of mind for Vancouver group Mother Mother.
But frontman Ryan Guldemond admits to being more worried about Friday’s show at Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre, the lone arena stop on Mother Mother’s cross-Canada tour.
“Sometimes, in the face of space and size, you retreat into yourself and the channels close,” Guldemond said. “I’ve felt that before in big spaces. It’s a matter of overcoming that.”
Guldemond and his bandmates, drummer Ali Siadat, bassist Mike Young, and keyboardists/singers Jasmin Parkin and Molly Guldemond, should be well prepared for what lies ahead. The group, which got its start in 2005, has steadily increased its profile during the past decade, with a run of hit singles and videos that includes The Stand, Bit By Bit, Get Out the Way, Let’s Fall in Love and O My Heart. Mother Mother’s status as a headlining act is well earned, especially in Western Canada, where the five-piece is one of the biggest homegrown concert draws in the province.
All of that is cold comfort for Guldemond, who went through a rough patch during the writing of No Culture, the band’s recently released sixth album. He struggled with insecurity, hoping to put a lifestyle that was anything but healthy behind him. He could mask his habits when the band was on the road during one of its endless tours. But when the wheels on the bus stopped turning, and it was time to write songs for No Culture, Guldemond reached a crucial point.
“Even though I was back home, in the grips of familiarity, making music had never been so uncomfortable and painful,” he said. “That aspect was quite novel.”
Guldemond spent six weeks on Quadra Island — where he and his sister and bandmate, Molly, were born and raised — trying to write songs for the album. Being alone in a little room, housed in a studio on his dad’s property, wasn’t helping to ease the stress he was already experiencing.
But as time went on, he accepted the challenge and began to embrace the pain. “Creativity can be deceiving. I had self-proclaimed writers’ block during that time, simply because I wasn’t feeling the channels open. It was a lesson in not having to enjoy something to find success in something. Sometimes, doing the work isn’t about bliss — it’s about doing the work. That was a good lesson.”
What was supposed to be a back-to-nature experience wound up becoming an extended look in the mirror for Guldemond. Surrounding himself with the places and faces of his childhood became an artistic albatross.
“There was a nostalgia that didn’t comfort me. There was something almost embarrassing about being back and around the familiarity and safety, trying to unearth brand-new inventions of the soul. I thought: ‘Why didn’t I take a bigger chance, a bigger risk?’ Environmentally speaking, that had a lot to do with where I was at the time. I was in a discombobulated headspace, and my identity was taking a hit in myriad ways.”
Baby Boy, one of the key songs on No Culture, chronicles both his personal struggles and his relationship with his sister, which had become fractured. “Baby boy, baby brother,” his sister sings on the chorus, “We’re losing you to the gutter.”
Hearing her comments (which he based the lyric on) was a wake-up call, to say the least, Guldemond admitted. When he listens back to the album, the Bowie-like frontman said, he can chart his progress as a person over the course of the past year. These days, he likes what he sees.
“You’ll never repeat the same steps, because your life is always going to be drastically different, and that is what you mirror in your creative output. Maybe the next time around, [songwriting] will be easier and more grounded because my life will be easier and more grounded. That’s the lovely holistic nature of being creative — you don’t get to compartmentalize your craft from your life. It’s all wrapped up in one big snakefest.”
In some ways, the band expanded its scope on No Culture, presenting even the toughest lyrics — and the tone of the sonics that surround them — with a newly minted sense of positivity. The poison-pen performer who once delivered the lyrics: “Everyone’s f---ed and they don’t even know” with a sly grin? He’s openly enthusiastic these days, by comparison.
“I’ve definitely transitioned from being a cynical and sarcastic person to a more vulnerable person, and that transition was at its height during the course of writing this album,” Guldemond said. “I think you’ll be able to spot that as a listener, for better or worse. There’s a sneer to the old writing that I miss sometimes. But who knows? Maybe my shoulders will acquire a new chip.”
