North of Here

EDMONTON – The name North of Here is half a joke. Stationed in Edmonton, Alberta, there really isn’t that much in the northerly direction besides Slave Lake, Wood Buffalo Park, Those oil sands things, and that big ice mass we call the Northwest Territories. Rather, North of Here is a way of passing something off you don’t know. “Where is it?” “North of Here, probably.” For the sea-folk three piece however, this does them something of a disservice, because they are not something to be easily dismissed.

The group formed from their high school band program around a shared love of music, in Sherwood Park, Alberta, a suburb of Edmonton. It’s a bit of a bedroom community, where middle class Edmontonians go to raise families. Although suburban, it’s a space that’s “not devoid of the arts… [it’s] just a different environment,” bassist Luke Jansen tells BeatRoute from the band’s rehearsal space, as they clean up leaking water from a recent rainstorm. “we had to home-grow a little bit,” Mandolin player Ian St Arnaud attests. The group were fortunate enough to start out musically in a relatively supportive environment. St Arnaud had a friend with a mandolin, so he borrowed it to take to a music class and the band wrote a song around it. After hearing it, their music teacher offered them encouragement and opportunities, “more than we asked for,” St Arnaud jokes.

This was around 2012 when folk music was surging back into the mainstream, and when the group picked up some folk instruments “things made sense” Jansen describes. But despite their acoustic music, the band never developed a traditionalist attitude. “Because we didn’t grow up in the kind of community where you are handed an instrument at a young age and taught to play the songs of your people, you don’t learn the structures that are ingrained in folk music,” drummer Will Holowaychuk argues, “we didn’t grow up with the standards.” Thus the band never developed the revivalist bent that encourages an investment in the moves and turns of traditionalist music. Instead the band takes thoughtful, geographically centred lyrics and puts them on top of rhythmic mandolin and guitar soundscapes.

BeatRoute is proud to premiere ‘Without Windows,’ a meditative new single from the band. Luke Jansen wrote the lyrics for the song after coming back from a trip. “When you come back from being away for a bit you are maybe a little more reflective, ”he attests, the songs is about “capturing a feeling at the time.” Having recently amicably lost a member, the band is becoming more comfortable with being a three piece, with drummer Will Holowaychuk contributing to the track melodically as well as rhythmically, which brought a new dimension to the song-writing process. The song is “a lot about growth” both in the sound and the song-writing, and the band is allowing themselves to write songs with an open-endedness to them, arguing that “if [the band] are still trying to figure out what it is… you are going to get so much more out of performing it for an audience.” The band recorded the single with Leeroy Stagger at his Lethbridge Rebeltone Ranch, a studio the band describes as “the coolest clubhouse in all of western Canada.”

Two of the three members of the band have now migrated into Edmonton, where there are a few more places to play and are preparing for a busy summer of festivals, including Edmonton, Canmore, and Winnipeg Folk Fest. The band is starting to demo some material for a full-length album, and they anticipate hitting the studio for a 2018 release.

BeatRoute is proud to premiere the new 7’’ single by North of Here, ‘Without Windows,’ available to stream on beatroute.ca. Catch them June 22 at Little Brick (Edmonton). - Beatroute

This week, young Alberta artists, on the rise. It's your chance to say, "I heard them, back when they were just starting out!"

Edmonton Folk Music Festival
Thousands of music lovers flock to the Edmonton Folk Music Festival every year. (Edmonton Folk Music Festival)
Plus, highlights from the School of Song stage at the 2017 Edmonton Folk Music Festival.

Rhea March mentors emerging talents from across Alberta, and each year, the Edmonton Folk Festival devotes a stage to the School of Song. This year's crop of young artists was outstanding, in a wide range of musical styles.

You'll hear three of the best: an acoustic folk trio called North of Here; singer-songwriter Maddie Storvold; and the worldly instrumental group Bardic Form.

Check out North of Here, on a new video performance of their song, Milk & Honey, below. - CBC - Key of A

Edmonton band North of Here brought their youthful exuberance to the Nancy Appleby Theatre stage Nov. 12, the farthest north the group has played so far.
The performance was put on by the Heartwood Folk Club, after organizer Peter Opryshko scouted them.

“I think he heard a song of ours on CBC Radio, showed up at a show of ours in a dinky little club in Edmonton and was confident enough in our 15-minute set to book us for an hour and a half,” said bass guitarist and vocalist Luke Jansen. “I don’t know what that logic is but, thanks again.”
The group, which features Jansen, Caleb Sinn, Ian St. Arnaud, and Will Holowaychuk, started the show off looking a little uneasy, but the more they played their confidence grew, and so did their sound. Watching this transformation on stage, it was clear to see that with some experience, the band has a great future ahead of them.
By the end of the show they were cracking jokes between tunes and belting out a beautiful blend of original works and cover songs.
One of their best pieces of the night was a harmony sung immediately after the intermission. At some point the band realized the mic was, in fact, off, however, the harmony melded beautifully and reverberated around the theatre.
“You can turn off your hearing aids now,” Jansen said, cracking wise with the older crowd, inciting a mixture of laughs and “ooooohhhhs.”
The quartet formed in high school, and recently started touring around the province, opening for the likes of Craig Cardiff, Aidan Knight and Michael Bernard Fitzgerald. They also receive regular airplay on the CBC.

The band has put out a couple of EPs, but is currently in the process of putting together their debut album.
“Big full length albums take years and years and we’re trying to give it the time it needs.,” Jansen said.
“We really want to do it right,” St. Arnaud added. “We want to do it, to really pose ourselves how we’ve learned from other stuff. We’re getting to play these shows, we’re getting to test new stuff.” - Athabasca Advocate

If you’re from Sherwood Park, then North of Here may sound familiar to you. The group has made its rounds through the community playing at coffee shops and during Festival Place’s Patio Series last summer. West of the community, however, the band remains relatively unknown.

“There’s nothing wrong with being from where you’re from, but [Edmonton’s] where the scene is. This is where the community is,” Ian St Arnaud says, sitting alongside his bandmates at a Whyte Avenue café.

“Sherwood Park is where you start your band, and then you go learn to be a band in Edmonton,” Luke Jansen adds with a laugh.

North of Here, rounded out by best friends Jansen (bass, vocals), St Arnaud (mandolin, vocals), Caleb Sinn (guitar, vocals) and Will Holowaychuk (drums, vocals), met in high school during band class. They soon began performing as a group at high school concerts and various venues around the Park, but their setlist was comprised of cover songs by the Head and the Heart, Dan Mangan and the Oh Hellos at that point. After graduating high school, the guys decided to pursue music on a professional level, writing original songs and recording an album.

In February 2014, North of Here released its first record, To The Wild, a four-track EP that was produced, recorded and mixed by Mel Gargus at Premier Recordings. To The Wild showcases the group’s talents with traditional band instruments like trombone, glockenspiel, trumpet and tambourine, giving the record an eclectic modern folk vibe. For its second EP, Make Hay While The Sun Shines, slated for a November release, North of Here will focus on a meatier folk sound that draws on influences like Fleet Foxes and Dan Mangan.

“I think it shows a natural progression in songwriting and understanding the recording process and production,” St Arnaud says.

For Make Hay While The Sun Shines, the band worked with Jared Salte (one-half of folk duo the Royal Foundry) at Salt Shaker Records in Sherwood Park.

“Working with Jared gave us an ear for the particular sound we were trying to get with this record,” Holowaychuk says.

“Finding a producer that was in the scene [and] actually creating the music that was in our realm was really important,” Jansen says. “The folk scene sees potential in young artists and is totally willing to wait for them to grow up. It’s not as competitive as you would think. … If they see a young band, and maybe [that band doesn’t] sound great the first time but has the ability to write good songs, they’re willing to stick around.”

Fri, Aug 14 (7 pm)
With Devin Cuddy Band, Eyes on Ivan
Mercury Room, $12 - Vue Weekly