Animal Teeth

Mahogany Frog released their sixth album, Senna, last night at the Frame Arts Warehouse with some help from Animal Teeth and Ultra Mega.
First to play were Animal Teeth. The up and coming quartet has been together for less than a year and show signs being one the best new bands Winnipeg has to offer. They already have a deep musical symbiosis, perhaps because three of the members have also played together in Spirit Children. And guitarist Hudson Fedun is Winnipeg’s next musical genius (check him out in loudQUIETloud band Narwhal Strike and deejaying as FmSea). Anyhow, this evening Animal Teeth were in top form. Their 40 minute set careened effortlessly back and forth between Sunday morning laziness and dramatically urgent howls from Stefan Hodges, often within the same song. The crisp juxtaposition between soft melodies and crunching riffs allows for a maximum amount of space to be explored within the sonic palette. - Concerted Trash

This song features quirky indie-pop from Winnipeg’s Animal Teeth, who will be performing at one of Big Fun’s events on Jan. 26 at Gio’s. Check the rest of the sampler for more bands performing at the fest. - Winnipeg Free Press

Animal Teeth
The Indie Buzz Kids

Winnipeg indie quartet Animal Teeth has been a band for exactly one year, and even though not all the members in the group have reached the age of 20, they’ve been in more successful bands than you and your friends combined, including Spirit Children, FMSea, Boats and Narwhal Strike.

“We’ve all worked hard in our other bands and made lots of connections,” guitarist Hudson Fedun says over beers at the Toad. “We made a pact to play as many shows as possible for the first five months and our first show was two days before our second show, which was opening for Zeus and The Darcys.”

The big gigs kept on coming, playing the Big Fun and Rainbow Trout music festivals and opening for Royal Canoe.

So yeah, you’ve seen Animal Teeth on a lot of posters this year.

Forming the band around songs that singer/guitarist Stefan Hodges wrote as Spirit Children was coming to a close, the band eventually became a collaborative effort.

“I’m trying to lose control,” Hodges says. “I’m in a band with some of the best songwriters in the city, I want them to take control. Most of the songs I wrote were written in three months, it was a really specific mindset. I need to write a song that the band is gonna like.”

“You need to be in a good place to write Animal Teeth songs,” Fedun adds.

The songs, five or six of which will wind up on the band’s yet-to-be-recorded debut EP, are quite melancholy, yet hopeful and poppy.

“I think it’s kind of making fun of being sad,” drummer Ian Ellis says.

“It’s the only way to try to escape (the sadness),” Fedun adds with a laugh.

- Nick Friesen (Arts Editor) - The Uniter