Rotosound strings on fire, rock reigns o'er them
MaximumRNR are hell bent on giving you some action
PREVIEW
MAXIMUMRNR
Friday, September 27
The Night Gallery
You don't have to read thousands of them to notice a trend: many band bio sheets are the most flamboyant displays of unnecessarily overblown language you'll read outside of poetry class. In case you're not hip to the industry jive, the usual angle is that the described band is the hottest thing the reader of the bio will ever see. Y'know, "If you don't see so-and-so, you will regret it until your dying day."
The bio for Toronto quintet MaximumRNR grabs attention, but for a different reason. While the members of the band have been around for years, the band itself is a mere two-years old. All the pertinent adjectives describing their power rock attack are all there (and by the staggering testimonials, I'd actually believe it this time), but what's really worth noting is the part declaring that their lead singer, Louie Durand, is a "woman-pleasing, bilingual spitfire." Well, if that isn't a reason to check out a new band, ladies, what is? According to the history books, every rock and roll band needs a scandalous lead singer.
Despite Durand's savvy talents, these days MaximumRNR is simply trying to dodge beer sprayed by hyper male fans who hug the front of the stage. Sad to say, estrogen isn't making a strong showing even with ol' Romeo on lead vox.
"We played in London last weekend and I realized what our fans are going to be like," explains guitarist Keith Maurik. "They're not gonna be the sweet, young, nubile 14 year-old girls."
Whoa there, tiger.
"It's gonna be the twentysomething angry, drunken, jobless rock and roll guy. It kinda scared me. We had a couple crazy fans right up front throwin' beer at us. Whatever, they're just very excited," Maurik says.
"I don't know if you followed Rush, but after their Moving Pictures album, they seemed to have really changed their sound – a lot more synthesizers and keyboards and stuff. Me and Mike Wall (of Calgary's Kybosh) used to talk about this all the time. My theory was that (Rush) were sick of all the meathead guy fans that they had and they wanted to attract more women to the audience. I came to the realization, holy man, we're into a bunch of drunken yahoos as fans."
Not that MaximumRNR will be adjusting their volume. They are making their recording debut during this tour with the first of a series of three 45 r.p.m. records (including a free CD inside). After the three 45s are out, they'll be compiling all of the songs for their debut LP.
"We've been doing this for a couple years now," continues Maurik, "but now is the time to break it out." |
