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| Manic Sheep |
March 19 2013 – Canadian Music Week 2013 is almost here and we can’t wait for hundreds of bands to invade the bars and clubs of our fair city as part of the festival’s Canadian Music Fest program. Admittedly the names are slightly confusing but Canadian Music Week is the master name of the festival that is composed of a film program (Canadian Music Week Film Fest), a comedy program (Canadian International Comedy Fest), a conference, awards shows, a trade show and a kick ass music festival called Canadian Music Fest that runs between March 19-24 2013.
In 2012, T-Mak World initiated extensive coverage of Canadian Music Fest and we saw a total of 34 bands/artists and interviewed the following 10 bands as part of our Emerging Artist Spotlight series:
Beta from Puebla, Mexico (Alternative,Grunge,Rock)
Breaching Vista from Kitchener, Ontario (Alternative,Pop,Rock)
Floor Thirteen from Winnipeg, Manitoba (Alternative,Rock)
Grain from Edmonton, Alberta (Blues,Classic Rock,Rock)
In My Coma from Toronto, Ontario (Alternative,Progressive,Rock )
Last Bullet from Toronto, Ontario (Classic Rock,Rock)
Matt Groopie and The Bandits from Thornhill, Ontario (Blues, Classic Rock, Psychedelic Rock )
One Bad Son from Vancouver, B.C. (Rock)
Louder Than Love from Vancouver, B.C. (Rock)
TimeGiant from Toronto, Ontario (Rock)
Our wrap up article from 2012 is here and we are excited to be back in 2013 and to add even more bands to our Emerging Artist Spotlight Series. Today we focus on a band from Taipei, Taiwan and their CMF profile reads:
Manic Sheep is a band which formed in 2009 in Taipei, Taiwan. The band most lineup consists of Chris Lo(vocals, bass, synths), Scott Hsieh (guitar) and Jocelyn Kang (Drum).The original member was five, their earlier musical output was often labelled electro-pop, after some members left ,they have since moved into shoegaze and noise rock.
The band released their first debut album in December 2013 , which took half an year to finish and had a great influenced by The Kills, Sonic Youth, My Bloody Valentine, Blur and Yo La Tengo.
Unexpectedly, many overseas audiences have been becoming more and more interested in their music and they have been receiving a lot of attention globally.They have been opening for KYTE(UK) in 2012, and would be attending MPF, SXSW, CMF , NXNE in 2013.
Please note the band told us that English is not their native tongue so they do apologize for that, we decided to keep the answers as is in the spirit of authenticity. Here is what they had to say to us:
1. Hey Manic Sheep, thanks for taking the time out to talk to us. Let’s start off with the obligatory introductions. Who’s in the band and what instrument does everyone rock?
Manic Sheep: Chris Lo (bassist, vocalist) , Hung-yu Hsieh (guitarist), Yi-ta Tsai (live drummer), Jocelyn Kang (recording drummer).
2. How about the history of the band, when did you get started and how did it happen?
Manic Sheep: We formed in 2010, Chris and our first drummer Scarlett were high school classmates, we used to practice together, then one day Chris put her demo on a popular music forum, Hung-yu thought it was interesting, so we have a guitarist and got start.
3. Who are some of your musical influences?
Manic Sheep: Yo La Tengo, The Kills, Sonic Youth, DIIV.
4. Congratulations on being selected to play at Canadian Music Festival, what does the opportunity mean to you?
Manic Sheep: Actually we don’t know, it came so fast, one day we checked our mailbox and saw the invitation from CMF. Still can’t believe it, even though we are already in Toronto now, because we are from Taiwan and before this we have no international awareness, how does it possible to happen? But it must be meaningful to us, we never play in Canada before.
5. When and where is your CMF gig? And more importantly, why should a music fan come and see your show instead of all the other choices available to them at that time?
Manic Sheep: March 23, 10pm at Painted Lady. The second question is so hard, we are the only Taiwanese band play at CMF this year, and Taiwan is quite far from Canada, so it might be not easy to see our performance here. So…uhm…’-‘ just come to see us, we need you!
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| Manic Sheep |
6. What’s it like being on stage? Do you get nervous or are you thriving on the adrenaline (or somewhere in between)?
Manic Sheep: Ha, always feel good to be on stage, we love to performance, maybe would be a little nervous when we stand by on the stage, but after the show begin everything turns on.
7. What does 2013 hold for you?
Manic Sheep: We already attend SXSW and CMW this month, after the North America tour we will back to Taiwan to prepare our second album, actually I’m not quite understand this question….sorry our English is not that good ‘-‘
8. Ha, yes the question simply meant what else will you do in 2013, your English is fine! Imagine that you were asked to be the opener for any band’s world tour (both current and historical). Which band and tour would be your dream opening gig.
Manic Sheep: Yo La Tengo!!!!
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| Manic Sheep |
9. How important is the performer/audience connection? Can you rock a show as hard for 10 people as if you could playing an 80,000 person festival?
Manic Sheep: No matter how many audience in front of us, we always performance as hard as we can. We have a lots of show experience which was lack of audience, after we played more show, our performance become more stable.
10. Where can people get your music/CD, is it being sold anywhere?
Manic Sheep: You can buy digital album on itunes Store, Spotify and Bandcamp, but the physical album only available in Taiwan.
11. At the end of 2012 we published our picks for top 10 albums of 2012. Lists like those are always a reflection of personal tastes so if you were making the list what are some albums you would you have had on it?
Manic Sheep: DIIV- Oshin, Mac Demarco – 2, The Soft Moon – Zeros (We love Captured Tracks Tame Impala – Lonerism, Beach House – Bloom, Touming Magazine – Forever (Actually this one is EP, and this band is from Taiwan).
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| Manic Sheep |
12. 
Any closing remarks for our readers?
Any closing remarks for our readers? Manic Sheep: Please follow us on Twitter, Facebook, or even on the street, we need your support~~~~!!!
Thanks so much to Manic Sheep. We hope that you can see them live. They are playing Painted Lady, March 23, 10p.m.
The band’s website is on Twitter and Facebook. In the meantime check out their video below from YouTube.
www.tmakworld.com
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