Victoria and Vancouver Island have a lot of musical talent, and Victoria Buzz wants to highlight some of the best and brightest local artists and bands.
Every Monday, there will be a fresh ‘New Music Monday’ article to help people find and support local artists and bands that are up-and-coming, well established or hidden gems!
For this endeavour, Victoria Buzz has partnered with our good friends at CFUV 101.9 FM, UVic’s campus radio station, to find and select the musicians and bands for this regular column.
This week, Trackmeet is the New Music Monday highlight!
Trackmeet is a four-piece indie/alt-rock outfit from right here in Victoria who have just released their first single into the world.
The band is comprised of Cade McBeth on guitar, Connell Neill on bass, Sacha Watson-Deegan on keys and Teague Arseneau on drums, with all members taking turns handling vocals.
Trackmeet’s origins began with Arseneau and McBeth, who had grown up playing music together in high school.
A couple years ago, they were in another Victoria band called Head with Feet, but when that project dissolved, the duo were keen to form a new band—one in which they could be more involved in the songwriting process.
McBeth recruited his roommate, Neill, who had a solo project of their own but was excited to be involved in the new band.
Then Watson-Deegan came in last, but really helped fill out their sound, McBeth says.
Trackmeet was fully formed by summer of last year, and the band wasted no time in writing and getting out and playing shows with their first gig being just a couple weeks later.
“It was quick. We formed in June but Connell, Teague and I started all jamming together in late April, so we had a few songs already,” McBeth told Victoria Buzz.
“We played our first show after Sacha joined, like two weeks after and that was an hour-long set so we wrote and got a lot of material down pretty quick.”
Stylistically, McBeth says they all have different tastes, but it comes together well. He noted that a touchstone band for all members would be Geese.
“There’s a lot of trust and open communication when we’re writing songs, even though right now, in our current setlist, there’s quite a range of styles in a song Teague would sing or a song Sacha would sing,” McBeth stated.
“We are into everything that we do, even if it’s a bit different.”
Highlight track – “Johanna”
The band’s first single “Johanna” was just released this past weekend on Friday, January 9th.
This is one of the first songs McBeth brought to the band and it was also one of the first songs the group started jamming when they came together.
“To go into what it’s about, the lyrics just kind of came over quite a stretch of time,” said McBeth.
“There were a few shows at the start where I was just kind of mumbling or saying the same thing over.”
He noted that he typically writes a song’s melody first and approaches the lyrics once he has that down.
“It is sort of a love song—a song about yearning, some sort of unachievable love.”
Though some people think his lyrics are alluding to Greek mythology, McBeth says that “Johanna” was the result of him just wanting to write a catchy love song.
Trackmeet’s first single was recorded by the band themselves, who worked out a way to record the song with some old equipment found in Arseneau’s garage.
Once it was recorded they tinkered with the sound and mixing for a while before setting its release date and putting it out into the world.
Check out “Johanna” by Trackmeet below:
Trackmeet’s “Johanna” is available on Bandcamp, Tidal, Apple Music and Spotify.
Coming up soon, Trackmeet will be playing at the Lucky Bar on Tuesday February 3rd, alongside Niloo and Jo Passed.
Other than that show, the band has been working hard recording a three or four-song EP live off the floor with a friend they know through CFUV.
McBeth says they hope to release this EP sometime in late winter or early spring.
Follow Trackmeet on Instagram to stay up to date with shows and future releases.
Related:
- New Music Monday: Prince Shima analyzes true crime obsession on latest album
- New Music Monday: CHARMED releases first single ‘Veronica’ on the power of love and loss
- New Music Monday: Trevor Lang quietly releases cosmic country-inspired album from Germany
CFUV is a non-profit campus and community radio station that plays a ton of local music of all kinds across Vancouver Island. If you like to support local music they are an amazing resource with a plethora of new local tunes in their arsenal.
“It’s really cool to have a local radio station that amplifies local voices, because few other people really do that,” McBeth says.
“We’ve had a lot of help from them.”
Tune into CFUV 101.9 FM on air or online!
Let us know what you think of Trackmeet in the comments below!
