5 Questions with Rags #71 - Frase

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Like a lot of people, I fell in love with Frase the moment I heard him start singing. His voice is illegally-smooth and soulful – captivating. And he writes groovy, chill songs full of heart, full of feeling. I always smile seeing his name on a festival lineup, knowing no matter what is going on, I'm going to get an hour of Frase calming my soul. This past summer, I caught his incredible set at Bass Coast and realized that as he's played more and become a favourite of these big west coast bass crowds, that same bass has found its way into his live sets. But where a lot of artists who experiment in heavy bass can have their identities swallowed up, Frase has found a way to blend the pensive grooves of his music with the higher energy that heavy bass injects into everything.

“I think it was osmosis. The bass kind of just worked its way in. I recognized that when you're putting on a show at nighttime in a club, people wanna dance. They want to feel the bass. I find a lot of really heavy bass music doesn't have a lot of soul in it – I'm not saying everything, but there is a compromise right? The more bass, the less soul there is usually. It's been kind of a challenge to me to make something that will work in that club environment but is still something that I'd want to listen to, something that people could put on a chill,” says Frase, talking to me on a break from touring, at home in Ymir, BC. “As a solo artist, I needed the tracks to make the show hyper. There wasn't much myself or Emily could do to make our performance more exaggerated, it was the music that had to step up and be more hype. Her being my partner and a dancer has also had a big influence on me wanting to make more dance music. I'll be working on a beat for hours and it's pretty chill, I'll play it for her and she'll be like, 'Meh.' But if I make a house song or something that's more danceable and only spent 20 minutes on, she'll say, 'Yeah, that's amazing.'”

As his profile and his sound have both expanded, Frase's audiences have become increasingly diverse, playing a variety of venues and festivals around the west coast and Canada. This past summer included a life-changing stop at Koksilah, here on Vancouver Island in the Cowichan Valley. “Koksilah was one of my highlights, just in terms of my ethics and my values. I definitely want to give them a shout out. It's a mix of music and a lot of workshops about reconciliation and Indigenous rights. It's a more workshop-based festival than a party festival. There's so many conflicts in the world right now and it's really nice to have a festival like that that's really about progression, bringing these issues to the forefront and talking about them and working them out instead of blaming other people for what's happening. 'Koksilah' means 'thank you' in Cowichan language. The location of the festival was a former residential school and a few of the elders mentioned they can't go inside. There's a lot of trauma but that's what this whole festival is about – reconciliation and reclaiming these spaces and helping people work through this trauma and create allies to focus on the problems we're facing now – deforestation and pipeline drilling. The Indigenous are really on the pulse of that. Snotty Nose Rez Kids, Mob Bounce played, the lineup was definitely leaning towards Indigenous artists and artists of colour and as a white man I was really honoured to be invited and ask to perform in those kind of spaces. It was really powerful. I got the logo they used for the festival tattooed on my arms.”

The world is a groovier place with Frase creating music in it – in more ways than one. After a few years of grooving to his music and catching his shows, we're honoured to finally welcome this righteous bean as a guest on the 5 Questions.

If you're in Victoria this Friday (Nov. 9), make sure to go catch Frase at Capital Ballroom with the homies Illvis Freshly, Bousada and Sidewaysounds. Seriously. Do it.

1.Do you remember the first album you bought with your own money?

It was Fine Young Cannibals. I was 6. I remember I got a walkman – it was on tape – and I remember walking around to it non stop. I listen to that album now and it's still pretty sweet! The production and the vocals and the dance-y soulfulness it has...it's super cheesy, don't get me wrong, but I understand why my influences have gone the way they have. When I was a little kid all I listened to was dance music. Dance Mix '94 and '95, all of those, pretty mainstream poppy kind of dance music.

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#festivalseason - Bass Coast celebrates 10 years of immense taste and endless style.

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2018 marked the 10th birthday of Bass Coast and also Rags Music's first in-person experience with the legendary BC festival. After years of whispers of the wonders inside and pleas to attend from musical and non-musical-friends alike, Bass Coast had reached near-mythic status and much to my delight, did not disappoint. In fact, even with my expectations at an all-time high, Bass Coast blew away my ideas of what a festival of its kind can be, do and inspire. After three full days of music, art and colour on a river just outside of Merritt, BC, it is evident that Bass Coast is the result of an incredible group of people – artists, organizers, light/sound people, builders, etc – at the top of their fields, working together to create an experience unlike anything else in the adjacent space around it. There's something immeasurably beautiful about so many talented people working in conjunction to expand, tantalize and delight the senses of not just their friends, but of complete strangers.

Interactive art installations abound throughout the festival grounds, encouraging attendees to interact with not just the art but with their fellow festival goers. Most entertaining among these were the telephone booths. The sparkly phones on opposite sides of the “downtown” area of the festival were hooked up to each other, ringing when the other was picking up and throwing both caller and answerer into the fires of impromptu conversation. Rags Music contributor Shawn McNicoll spent an inordinate amount of time taking pizza orders and pushing car insurance on people, to his own delight and, presumably, the confused delight of the folks on the other end.

The majority of festivals I've been to feature hoards of unwashed/disheveled masses zombie-ing about until the sun starts it descent back under the sky line. But not at Bass Coast. The lovely people of Bass Coast, if not stripped down and cooling in the river, were dressed in their finest and most colourful ridiculously early in the day. From around lunchtime on, wherever you looked, Bass Coast was all-out fashion show and I was more than impressed. Some peoples' dedication to their costumes, to the weirdness, was flat-out awe-inspiring as the heat generally led me to basketball shorts and a t-shirt. If you were one of the people who managed to stay costumed-up in the sweltering heat and swirling winds, I commend you! SALUT!

While incredible lights and art installations, beautiful humanity wherever the eyes laid and breathtaking landscape views all abounded, it was the music that truly brought me there and the music that really made this one of the best full weekends of dancing I've personally had in a long time. The women behind the organization of Bass Coast, particularly the booking of music, have done a fucking incredible job of putting together a diverse lineup that thankfully all shares the same important thread... QUALITY. I admittedly didn't know a large portion of the lineup and I was either pleasantly surprised or straight-up astonished as I made my between stages taking in act after act I'd never heard of. Bass Coast might genuinely be the most musically well-curated festival I've ever attended. These are some serious music nerds putting together this line up and everywhere a brother turned, there was world-class groove to be had.

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#festivalseason - Atmosphere Gathering 2017 might have been the most joyful festival of the year.

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The people behind the Atmosphere Gathering have built something truly special and unique in the increasingly large and saturated festival world. In the heart of Vancouver Island, nestled in the midst of the Comox Valley, they've built a festival that is part folk festival, part rave ala Bass Coast or Shambhala, part yoga/health/body festival ala Blessed Coast, an interactive arts festival – the breadth of art contained in the relatively small park is astonishing. And on top of everything, Atmosphere Gathering is all-ages to boot. Maybe more than ever in my life, I thoroughly enjoyed the presence of children, running around oblivious to everything but the immediate need for more fun, more dancing. Their energy was absolutely infectious and helped to power me through an incredible weekend in the soft, grassy embrace of Cumberland's Village Park.

The creative spirit of that youthful energy was on display everywhere you turned in the small, but never crowded (!!!) area. Paintings were on-going works of art, changing each time you passed by. The Elixir Temple was dispensing all variety of remarkably healthy beverages, created with a seemingly-endless array of fruits, veggies and spices. People of all-ages, suited up in a harness to help them climb safely, piled milk crates impossibly high throughout the day. There was a misting station that looked like an octopus! A strong selection of local vendors brought their most colourful and creative wares. And the musical performers all brought their best stuff, delivering some of the finest sets I've seen this summer in by far the most intimate festival environment I've experienced. Each provided highlights that hold up to anything else I've seen this year. These are some of those highlights.

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#festivalseason - Once again, Tall Tree is coming at your ears hard.

Over the past 7 years, Tall Tree has risen to the top of BC's endlessly growing list of bloody awesome music festivals. Over here on Vancouver Island, up on Brown's Mountain in Port Renfrew, in the clouds, overlooking the world below like the gods themselves, Tall Tree has split the difference between laid back alt-rock festival and balls-to-the-wall rave, creating one of the most unique festival experiences around. Vancouver Island runs at a different pace than anywhere else in the province, nay, the country, and Tall Tree exemplifies all the facets of what makes being a music fan here on the Island so fucking great. Be as normal, as weird, as chill, as wild as you want...ON A MOUTAIN.

On a lineup as deep as ever with local favourites (And past 5 Questions guests) like Mat the Alien, SkiiTour, and Pigeon Hole, Tall Tree has expanded their reach further than usual to pack their roster more full than ever. Here are the first six acts that jumped out to my eyes on my first look through the lineup. Get after it, good people.

Shapeshifter NZ

As I struggle to find myself a solid foothold on the vast mountain that is drum 'n' bass, Shapeshifter has found their way into my life like some kind of blessing from the headphone gods. The New Zealand 5-piece play relentlessly pretty liquid drum 'n' bass, throwing in heavy dollops of soul and dub reggae. Their live shows have garnered them sell-out, large-scale tours around their home country and spots at legendary festivals like Glastonbury. Highlighted by the ethereal but earthy vocals of P. Digsss, Shapeshifter's engaging live DnB opens up the genre to a whole new level of accessibility. It's important work, helping new aural seekers uncover the intense mysteries of this powerful form of music.

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