With all the discussion of solo acts at this year's Ottawa Folk Festival presented by TELUS, it was a pleasure to find a group formed exclusively around the concept of a couple. Whitehorse – the Hamilton-based project of husband-and-wife duo Luke Doucet and Melissa McClelland – took to the Tartan Homes stage with a variety of instruments too broad for just a set of four hands, but their smouldering on-stage chemistry and wide-ranging musical abilities more than made up for this horse's physical deficiency.
Despite the unseasonably cool evening
temperature, McClelland sported a floaty red dress that barely reached her knees. At least once mid-set, she
– and her husband adamantly agreed – expressed her hope that “my dress and the
wind co-operate.” She needn't have worried. With the amount of samplers,
keyboards, drums, bass, and different microphone filters, the amount of work
the couple needed to put in racing between sections of the stage would have
kept body temperatures balmy. From the opening chords of the first song -
“Killing Time Is Murder” from their 2011 debut – the couple definitely brought
the heat, mixing head-knocking percussion with progressively more blistering
guitar work. “When all is said and done/ time will waste everyone” went the
opening refrain. Not if things keep up like this, the undulating audience
appeared to answer in unison.
“We put our new record a week ago, so here
are some new ones,” said Doucet, before dropping into a number dedicated to the
band's hometown. Title “No Glamour In The Hammer” may reveal an unintentional
truth about Hamilton, but the big, fat, menacing square basslines brought a
funk appeal to the tune that augers well for Whitehorse's future. If the band
can continue to transcend genre barriers this easily than the hugely popular
duo of Jack and Meg White – of The White Stripes – had better watch their back.
Two more selections rang out from the new
album, “The Fate Of The World Depends On This Kiss,” the building rhythm only periodically broken
by some equipment issues on stage, once humourously following the lyric
“there's no getting out of this one.” But Whitehorse did find a way out,
playing through the ensuing complications with an ease their fans clearly
appreciated. A failing drumbeat was taken up en masse by audience clapping.
“I'm as sober as a judge/ but the jury's certainly drinking tonight,” sang the
grinning couple, stage techs ferreting nervously around the mess of wires at
their feet.
Everything was quickly back in order for a
few popular cuts from the group, with the Bruce Springsteen cover “I'm On Fire”
expertly delivered, and “Broken” developing quite the mid-set groove. Voice
distortion appears to be an element the band is working with greatly, as is
vocal and percussion sampling to extend both atmospherics, and the phenomenal
harmonizing qualities of Doucet and McClelland. This was perhaps most apparent
on the very promising opening track from their new disc, “Achilles Desire,”
where spaghetti western guitar tones swim expertly around snippets of keys, a
Pink Floyd-esque chorus, and a thoughtfully fuzzed out high-range. “I don't
have much/ but I am a rich man,” sang Doucet, in a final truth spoken straight
from the horse's mouth...
- Cormac Rea
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