Polaris Music Prize

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Better Know a Jury Member #13: Mike Devlin August 04 2009

Mike Devlin (Victoria)
Arts reporter, Victoria Times Colonist/CanWest News Service
Jury Member Since: 2007

Please share the Top 5 Canadian records you put on your final ballot.

Handsome Furs Face Control
Pink Mountaintops Outside Love
Fucked Up The Chemistry of Common Life
Bison BC Quiet Earth
Great Lake Swimmers Lost Channels

Tell us about your top ranked choice. Why #1?

Face Control is an epic journey through a hedonistic night club. Oh, wait a minute...I’m thinking of Dan Boeckner and Alexei Perry’s inner sleeve photos. Images aside, Face Control oozes vibe. That can be a terrifically flaky word, especially out west, but in this particular case it applies. It’s a club record at its core, but I hear Billy Joel (on "Evangeline"), U2 ("Passport Kontrol"), and Feist ("Thy Will Be Done"), a surprising mix of influences given Boeckner’s roots in Wolf Parade. Perhaps that’s why I like Face Control to such a degree. It doesn’t purport to be anything other than what it is — a freaky, fun record, genres be damned. We could all use more of that in our record collections, no?

Reaction to the Short List: Your most pleasant surprise? Shocked by any omissions?

What, no Handsome Furs? I really, really like a lot of the records which made the Short List, but there’s nothing I truly LOVE on a personal level (the omission of Pink Mountaintops’ Outside Love is a criminal oversight, as Stephen McBean remains one of the great writer-performers in Canada.) And while I certainly dig Joel Plaskett and Patrick Watson, I feel the new recordings from both were short-listed largely because of past accomplishments. The biggest surprises, for me, were Hey Rosetta! and Metric; I figured neither had a chance, either by being too well-known (Metric) or not known enough (Hey Rosetta!). That said, looking at the quality assembled here, I am proud to call myself a hoser.

Describe the state of Canadian music in five words:

“Crushing the competition since 1968.” (assuming we’re using Music From Big Pink as a starting point.)

Imagine the tables are turned and you are the nominee: What would you do with the $20,000 prize money?

If I’m dedicated to playing music as a profession, and have been for some time, $20,000 probably doesn’t begin to cover what I owe to the bank, credit card companies, family members and long-suffering friends. But it’s definitely a good first step in the payment process. “Thank-you, Polaris,” I would say afterwards. “Now I can afford to eat.”

Related Link: Victoria Times Colonist

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