5 Questions with Rags #27 - Kevan McGovern (Filmmaker)

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Vancouver filmmaker Kevan McGovern is in the midst of a huge undertaking, attempting to document the importance and impact of electronic music and festival culture with his feature-length documentary I/O (Input/Output). What started as a love-affair with the legendary Shambhala Music Festival in Salmo, BC, has become an all-encompassing passion. Last year saw the release of the Shambhala Experience, a smaller documentary that dives into Shambhala specifically. I had the pleasure of catching it last summer right before the festival and highly recommend it for those who have gone to the festival and those that are even the least bit curious about the festival. Luckily it’s been made easily available as part of a new Kickstarter to help with the completion of the feature-length I/O. The documentary goes beyond Shambhala to capture the spirit that makes the EDM festival culture so vibrant, unique and ultimate important. (I know EDM is a shitty term, but it’s all-encompassing and easy to type, so lay off.)

It’s not every day you get a chance to nerd out hard about something you love with a genuine expert (And a bigger nerd about it than you) so I couldn’t just leave it with the 5 Questions this time. Take a moment to check out what I/O is all about, and then enjoy our nerdy Shambhala chat and another rousing round of the 5 Questions!

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

The first album I went out and picked was the the Crystal Method’s first album. That was probably my first exposure to electronic music.

I think that was a lot of people’s first exposure, right? Certainly the beginning of mine.

They were some of the first electronic music pioneers that made it into the mainstream before a lot of others.

Have you seen Crystal Method live?

I’ve seen one of the members play at Burning Man, but haven’t seen both of them?

2. Can you think of a movie that you saw that had an effect on the way you saw the world?

The first thing that comes to mind is the Matrix. I was very deep into that. My favourite movie is Almost Famous and that made me see things very differently. I saw myself in the protagonist. I just love that movie so much. I could watch it forever.

I could watch Philip Seymour Hoffman doing Lester Bangs for all times and be happy.

I know right. “Do not make friends with the rock stars.” There are so many amazing cameos in that movie. It’s mind-boggling how many people pop up.

It’s got my boy Marc Maron!

A lot of people don’t remember Jimmy Fallon is in there too.

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5 Questions with Rags #26 - OthaSoul

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If you take hip-hop from afar and don’t look too deeply you may be under the impression that the art form has given way to nothing but crass commercialization. But really, that’s an illusion. There are people making great hip-hop all over the world. In every city there are cats going about the art of hip-hop the right way, imbibing their music with respect for the form, the trail-blazers from the past.

I don’t think of London as a hotbed of hip-hop but somewhere in that concrete jungle OthaSoul are making the goods – Real, gritty, honest hip-hop without shtick or pretension. Their recently release album, The Remedy, is one of the finest, smoothest pieces of art you’re going to put in your ears this year and definitely not something you should be sleeping on. The album is city hip-hop in the most classic sense of the word. I’ve never been to London, but it sounds how I imagine the city feels – heavy breath holding up a pulsing heart, tense and relaxed at once, straddling light and dark. Listen to it, cop it, spread it around because it’s important stuff and music that every hip-hop fan should be introduced to.

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1. Do you remember the first album you bought with your own money? Do you still listen to it? Favourite track?

Louis VI: I think it was Nirvana... either that or Quality by Talib Kweli but I think it was Nirvana. 'Come As You Are' was a tuuuuune.

Dozer: Real talks… I got Tubular Bells by Mike Oldfield on CD when i was like 10. I don’t know why, I just saw that shit in Virgin Megastore, took it home and listened to it like the weird ass kid I was. It’s actually kinda tragic, cos I didn’t really get into hip hop til the MP3 age had kicked off. So I was getting everything from my boys and just downloading shit. Common was my favourite artist at the time, so me and my homie ran out to go get Universal Mind Control on CD when it came out. Got home, listened to it once, never listened to that piece of shit ever again. Mad disappointing!

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