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.
To date, there have been 80 New Music Monday features published through this collaboration.
This week, Sail Cassady is the New Music Monday highlight!
Sail Cassady is a Victoria-based band that was born out of the ashes of another group, Man Made Lake.
Lead singer and songwriter Colin Craveiro and keyboardist Nate Bailey formed Man Made Lake while overseas in China teaching English.
There they had unique opportunities to tour and play with several Anglophone artists and bands who were touring Asia, such as the Great Lake Swimmers and others.
However, when the duo returned to Victoria after a few years, they decided to pursue something different in their music.
That’s when Craveiro started Sail Cassady and brought several friends and esteemed musicians on board.
“Sail Cassady was sort of letting go of some of the things that we were focused on and just immersing ourselves in being musicians and not having so many goals,” Craveiro told Victoria Buzz.
“It felt like Man Made Lake was a job, where this actually feels like an existence.”
Though the band has seen several iterations since forming in 2014, the current lineup is comprised of Craveiro on vocals, Bailey on keys, Jonathan Blokmanis on lead guitar, Michael Wilford on drums, Aaron Blair on bass and John Flatman on small percussion.
“There’s been a lot of people change, and we’ve had a lot of amazing musicians come in and out,” recalled Craveiro.
Sail Cassady has now been around Victoria’s music scene since 2014. In that time, they have released a full-length album, Juniper; a handful of EPs and numerous singles.
Though Craveiro and the rest of the group have various musical influences and inspirations, one of Craveiro’s main influences comes from another source.
“I’m really inspired by the writers that I’ve been reading for the last 20 to 30 years of my life,” he explained.
He noted that many authors’ works associated with the beatnik movement continue to inspire him, despite some of their more problematic nature.
“Their problems aside, their way of really pushing against an envelope was something that I’ve always really admired, but in a more moral way than how they did it.”
That notion of pushing the envelope and trying to make something new is part of what drove Craveiro to write Sail Cassady’s latest single, “Corpse Paint,” which was released at the end of April.
Highlight Track – “Corpse Paint”
Craveiro says that the spark for the song “Corpse Paint” came from a time in his life when he found himself people-watching frequently.
“I found myself observing everyone around me, from friends and family to neighbours,” he explained.
“One of the things I noticed is that we’re always sort of wearing this ‘outer garb’ to represent either what we want to be, what we think we are or actually who we truly are.”
He said that he sees it everywhere, people wearing their heart on their sleeve to show the world who they are in the way they choose to express themselves.
“Whether you’re wrestling with life, death, love, whatever, we’re sort of wearing what’s within us outside and it can be really obvious.”
This notion, combined with his love for soul music and the gothic influences that stem from New Orleans, helped him to come up with “Corpse Paint.”
“I was really inspired by soul at the time [I wrote the song] but I was also really into Mardi Gras goth, you know, like vampires and the occult,” he explained.
“It’s really cool how in New Orleans they can combine so many dynamics, be it voodoo, vampirism or jazz music.”
He noted that he wanted to lean into the darkness of some of these themes on the track and he thinks it came out exactly as it was intended to.
“I just thought, I would love this idea of soul coming from the occult and the self-perspective that is about what we’re wearing and how we’re perceiving ourselves,” he said.
“So that song was just genre-smashing at its finest.”
Check out “Corpse Paint” by Sail Cassady below:
To listen to “Corpse Paint” and the rest of Sail Cassady’s catalogue on Bandcamp, Tidal, Spotify and Apple Music.
Craveiro says that the band’s latest single was meant to be a stand-alone track, as was Sail Cassady’s other more recent single “Hold Me Down.”
He added that the band has another single, “Hoping” that will be released soon.
Sail Cassady just played a show last week with Door d’Or, and will be playing again later this summer in Victoria, although they cannot quite confirm dates and lineups yet.
Additionally, the band plans on releasing a music video for “Corpse Paint” soon.
Keep an eye on Sail Cassady’s Instagram to stay up-to-date on future shows and releases.
Related:
- New Music Monday: Treewell rally Victoria’s screamo scene and release debut EP
- New Music Monday: grey divorce quietly releases new album while living in Scotland
- New Music Monday: Fuzzpeddler explore psychedelia and sci-fi on two heavy metal bangers
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.
“I think that CFUV is the independent backbone of Victoria and we would be lost without them, it would be such a shame,” said Craveiro.
“CFUV will always hold firm to what is truly the heart and the beat of this city and beyond.”
Tune into CFUV 101.9 FM on air or online!
Let us know what you think of Sail Cassady in the comments below!
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