COUSINS...
From their write up
on the CBC website,
Cousins is described as “devastating and joyful, full of
love and punk romance”. It’s an apt description. There’s
something very alluring about their sound. It’s sexy
without trying to be. It has an indefinable edginess, like
you don’t know whether the band is going to jump of
your speakers and bludgeon you with a dr umstick or
whip you with a broken guitar string. When I first heard
them—a gritty rocker of a tune called Speech from the
blistering 2012 album The Palm At the End of the Mind—I
stopped what I was doing and paid attention. “Who the
f--- is this?” was my thought. I wanted more. The whole
garage rock duo thing gives me a little tingle—not in my
pants, it’s deeper than that—and makes me really, really
happy when it’s done well. Cousins is a band tha t does it
well.
Aaron Mangle and Leigh Dotey aren’t actually
cousins (and I’m willing to bet they’re sick of people
asking) but they make music like they’re related, or at least
connected on some higher plane . With the most r ecent
release, the Halifax duo now has three full-length records
to their name. “This version of rock and roll music will
break through fences and set off roman candles. It will
fix your bike and leave paint under your fingernails. It is a
music that will shake off all that faux, dead, cool.” I caught
up with singer/guitar ist Aaron Mangle shor tly after he
and Dotey got bac k from touring Europe to c hat about
the latest record and find out a bit about what makes this
enigmatic band tick.
“We’re driven by fascination for life , love, and
music,” says Mangle. “I use writing and performing music
as a w ay to transfor m emotion, dreams, frustrations,
and elation.” Cousins have been making music
together since around 2006 and no w they’re
getting some recognition for all their hard w
ork.
Their most recent record, The Halls of Wickwire,
made it on the 2014 Polaris Prize longlist.
Taking the record across the pond to tour was
a nice change, says Mangle. “We just finished a
UK/EU tour suppor ting Chad VanGaalen,” he
explains. “Touring over there is in some w ays
much better than touring in Nor th America.
Particularly that the tec hnicians are better
trained and the v enues usually treat you with
better hospitality, including dinner and respect!
Audiences can be a tad stiff but no mor e so
than in Toronto, Montreal, or Vancouver. When
performing songs of a political nature, of which
we have a couple, we found that audience
members have a genuine inter est in wha t the
political nature of the song is. They want to
know about [the] nature of our evil government
and have points of their own to add. It’s quite
refreshing.”
Cousins’ 2012 r ecord—my first
introduction to the band’ s particular brand of
rock n roll—was rough around the edges, with
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