Mr. Lonelyhearts — Woodpigeon’s Mark Hamilton, presumably contemplating long-lost loves.

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Wood Pigeon CD Release with Extra Happy Ghost and Foonyap & The Roar
Broken City
Friday, January 22 - Friday, January 22

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Mark Hamilton has succeeded in turning the typical “local-lad-makes-good” story on its ear. A noted music journalist and radio personality in his own right, Hamilton’s most precious talent has proven to be his ability to look to the future. Perceiving that he had reached a developmental plateau of sorts, he took time off in Scotland in the interest of advancing his personal evolution to the next level. That period, spanning 2004 and 2005, helped galvanize Hamilton’s resolve to stop critiquing art and start producing it. Shortly thereafter, he returned to Calgary with a freshly inked songbook and the burgeoning vocal and guitar-playing skills to bring his dreams to life.

“From the time I spent living in Scotland to playing my first gig in May of 2005, I never did anything with the intention to play [in front of an audience],” he says. “I guess in terms of decisions, I started to put less energy into writing about others and to start writing my own music. I had to totally reconsider how I consider things. In the past… I’ve been flippant and funny when reviewing people’s music. Now I’d rather be constructive and give them the benefit of the doubt. It’s hard to be on the other side of being looked at that way, but at some point you get to the stage where you realize that the most important thing is the work itself.”

Ultimately, it was the love of music and desire to express himself in new ways that led the admittedly jaded disc jockey to form the polyphonic spree known as Woodpigeon. Much like the migratory dove from which it takes its name, Hamilton’s gregarious flock travels about, roosting at will in a ruffle of feathery coos and shy sideways glances. Appearing as a solo effort as often as not, the lo-fi folk brigade has enveloped some of the city’s best and brightest at various points, including Kenna Burima (piano), Daren Powell (drums), Annalea Sordi (various instruments), Aimee-Jo Benoit (backing vocals), Peter Moersch (guitar), Mike Gratton (bass), Foon Yap (violin) and many others.

“It can exist as both a solo project and an ensemble,” says Hamilton of Woodpigeon’s elasticized membership. “As of the last tour, I’m up to having played with 62 different musicians. Everybody has lives and the songs have lives too; they only get interesting when you get to switch them around once in awhile. In terms of the band existing as just me, off somewhere with a pad of paper, that’s been requested more than once. I’ve opened as a soloist for Basia Bulat in Vancouver and for Andrew Bird in London at St. Giles on the Green. I think in people’s minds, Woodpigeon comes down to me. I like that a lot. I’m totally into the idea of a troubadour travelling from city to city by train. In fact, I’ve already booked a tour of Canada via train for later this year.”

Running along the same intellectual tracks that spawned 2006’s Songbook and 2008’s Treasury Library Canada (re-released by Boompa Records in 2009), Woodpigeon will be rolling out a double-dose of antiquated modernism in the form of its third album, due out this month. A tip of the hat to his German grandparents, Die Stadt Muzikanten will be accompanied by an exceptionally revelatory mini-disc EP recorded in Calgary and Dublin, titled Balladeer/To All the Guys I’ve Loved Before.

“I worked the non-Calgarian EP in Banff and recorded part of it in Ireland; it’s sort of a relationship journal about coming out as a person and then as an artist,” he explains. But just because Hamilton has been recording prolifically doesn’t mean the singer expects audiences to take the music lightly. “I’m so over that music blog mentality that you have to have heard everything. I consume music much more carefully these days, like when I was 16 — one or two good albums a month. Gone are the days when 15 or 16 new CDs would enter and leave my life in the span of a week-and-a-half cycle. How many bad albums have you heard already this year? I listen to the music that I love.”