Slowcoaster

Slowcoaster is one of Nova Scotia's hardest working bands, playing virtually every week, while its current CD, the aptly titled Where Are They Going?, remains a fixture on the East Coast Countdown, with the good time anthem Patio staying in the top five for a number of weeks. The band's mix of rock, pop, reggae and funk guarantees an evening of fun, while also ensuring you won't hear anything else like it around. - Stephen Cooke

Slowcoaster, Volume II (House of Rock): Slowcoaster has emerged from the Cape Breton underground to win the Keith?s Rock of the Atlantic Band Showdown. The Slowcoaster sound combines hip-hop, jazz and rock elements, to produce a very intriguing feel worthy of addition to any music collection.
- Trevor Savory, Halifax, NS

The reason a simple, catchy musical description seems to elude the Sydney-based rock band may be the sheer number of musical influences, from jazz to hip hop to reggae, that they weave into their material.

Slowcoaster, featuring LeLievre, guitarist/vocalist Steven MacDougall and drummer Brian Talbot, prefers to let each audience and music fan listen and decide for themselves if they like what they hear.
- Laura Jean Grant - Cape Breton Post - September 2007

Slowcoaster is arguably one of the best rounded bands on the east coast today. THAT is a statement to back-up. Just listen to their third full length cd Future Radio. With hammered out high energy, guitar-based rock that incorporates touches of hip-hop, jazz, reggae and Afro-Cuban grooves you just have to be impressed. - dabew.blogspot.com - September 2007

Aquiring a distinctive, free floating, improvisational style, through songs which light up with possibility and haze - over peregrinations, Slowcoaster explore with a kind of gentle abandon, a verbose and mesmeric word -tumble, bass, drum, guitar which hops, skips and clashes, a musical feel not fearful of stumbling off or rolling out like exhaust. The crisp first track and "Prison Guard"'s quiet moodiness earn a mention as does "Desert Island"'s soft restless guitar chime and lift - off swirl, "420"'s dreamy film noir cinematics, the pick up of "Jon", and the blend of Violent Sister achieve a cool reverie not lessened by a dip in wine or a fuse of incense. - Michael MacDonald

Jody's Garden is a fine collection of tunes. It's all about hints - a lot of reggae, a hint of rock, a hint of latin -y guitar, a hint of funk, a hint of balladry. Above all it's very well played. - Lezlie Lowe

With a hint of hip-hop, their ska inspired rythyms go straight to your hips but your head will soon follow, pulled along by Steven MacDougall's melodic ramblings. One of the most irresistible voices to come out of the region in a long time. - Marla Cranston

By Sandy MacDonald

This band has a great melodic sense, dressing up the tunes in lush arrangements. Multi-layered guitar parts create plenty of texture for the tunes, while the solid rhythm section sets up the grooves. What makes this polished disc so appealing is the constant changes Slowcoaster throws in the mix. Middle-sections sound like post-Revolver Beatles pop, then spin back into one-drop reggae or a light funk. There's great energy here, as young musicians grab sounds and beats to construct music, like bold painters slosh colour on canvases in a fit of creative passion. Yet there's a cohesiveness to all the music, that comes from the urgent dance rhythms underpinning everything. Night Life shakes its asses with a kicking drums and rolling bass lines, under MacDougall's fluid guitar playing and surprisingly soulful singing. Can't Change Me is a moody reggae-inflected tune with a plunky banjo playing the lead lines over the staggering rhythms.

Slowcoaster just wrapped its first video, for the rockier tune Patio from the new disc. It's flash animated from Helix Digital studio in Sydney. The video should air on MuchMusic in the new year. The band is part of the fraternal assembly called House Of Rock, a Sydney-based management group that also works with Rock Ranger, the Squatters and a couple of other young artists. HOR will handle distribution throughout Eastern Canada. - HFX/The Daily News, Halifax, NS

Cross-pollination of musical styles is nothing new, but in a relatively isolated environment like Slowcoaster’s Cape Breton home, styles and influences flow between musical friends like cold beer on a warm summer night.
Slowcoaster produces catchy ska, pop and reggae influenced rock songs with a progressive edge. - Richard Dooley - HFX / The Daily News - August 2007

Slowcoaster

Future Radio

(Company House / EMI)

(*** 1/2)

Cape Breton's Slowcoaster blends pop, rock, funk and reggae, producing a fun, upbeat sound that has made the group a favourite for jam band lovers on the East Coast. While in concert their songs often feature extended jams, most of the songs on Future Radio clock in around three or four minutes. The longest, Holdin' Down The Fort, only runs a little over six minutes.

Some tunes here lean toward the rock side while some are a little funkier while still others have reggae leanings, but the key throughout the album is groove.

The band creates music you'll want to rock out or dance to all night.
- Times & Transcript - Eric Lewis October 2007