CITY AND COLOUR
INTERVIEW BY JUSTIN TYLER CLOSE
-
PHOTOGRAPHY BY MIKE LEWIS
ASSISTED BY STEPHEN DAGG & JENNIFER TAN
—
If you’re the type of person who feels like music these days has become too electronic or over produced, then ask yourself this…When was the last time you went into a record shop and bought a vinyl? Or better yet, when was the last time you actually listened to a full record from start to finish? And finally, have you heard of Canadian singer-songwriter Dallas Green, aka City and Colour? Well, I urge all of you to go buy his latest album “Bring Me Your Love” because you will find it impossible to turn off. A musician like Dallas Green, in the year 2010, revitalizes that timeless feeling of music, when musicians’ tools were only guitars, their own natural voices and their stories. His folk-acoustic sound mixed with lyrics inspired by real life, is so relatable it makes you truly believe in the artist he already is, and the artist he is naturally becoming. City and Colour, which started as a side project for Dallas, has now evolved into one of the most respected Canadian acts of the past decade. I was thrilled that I got the chance to chat with Dallas, because I was curious about how a kid from St. Catherine’s, Ontario became a Juno-award winning musician.
JUSTIN—Hey Dallas.
DALLAS—Hi, Justin, how are you?
J—Good, how are you?
D—Good, I’m just packing up because I’m flying out tonight.
J—Oh, nice. Where are you flying? Are you out on tour?
D—No, I’m at home in Toronto. I’m flying out to Chicago tonight. I came home for a day because I was touring all weekend and I had two days off.
J—How is your tour going?
D—It’s been great. It’s only been four shows so far, it’s a pretty short tour, nine dates in total in the States. The thing is with City And Colour, I don’t really ever have time to do big, big tours. You know what I mean.
J—Is that because of Alexisonfire?
D—Yeah. I do it in my downtime from Alexisonfire, so…
J—That’s a pretty solid side project.
D—Yeah, it turned into something that I never thought it would become, so yeah, the shows have been really good; people seem to be very interested in what I’m doing. It just feels really good.