#ThrowbackThursday: Model New Raged Inside Calgary

WORDS: Brett Fillmore
PHOTOGRAPHY: Courtesy of Jacob Zinn for Vies Journal

Certainly one of alt rock’s most mysterious bands simply acquired considerably extra mysterious. Within the years since 2009’s Daisy, Model New’s future has been blanketed in unknowns and unease. Whispers of writing and recording periods had been simply as widespread as ones about an inevitable breakup. Performances had been uncommon and sporadic, new materials much more so. The announcement of a brand new tour and studio album (to be launched someday this 12 months) ostensibly put all unease to relaxation. Nonetheless, as followers left Calgary’s MacEwan Corridor after a scorching set this week, there was extra questions than ever.

To start, all indicators pointed to the band being tighter than ever. The set primarily consisted of re-worked tracks from 2003’s Deja Entendu and 2006’s The Satan and God Are Raging Inside Me, prolonged to incorporate guitar interludes and brick-by-brick crescendos. A number of lengthy builds included further guitarists and drummers that appeared on stage merely to supply an added weight to the swelling wall of reverb and distortion. All through the night time the stage was a hazy shadowbox, smoke machines perpetually billowing and the band members at all times backlit—shadowy, faceless silhouettes. As an encore, band luminary Jesse Lacey appeared alone for a hushed model of the haunting “Play Crack The Sky.” As he strode off stage left, that’s when it occurred: because the guitar suggestions light, a graphic appeared stating solely “Model New 2000-2018”. Raucous applause shortly turned to murmurs.

If it’s a breakup announcement, it’s a peculiar method. Why a full two years upfront? And what of the brand new album? Titled I Am A Nightmare, the album is accessible on pre-sale—however there’s no launch date and the band didn’t play a single tune from the album on the Calgary present. Does this imply they’ll end this tour, after which tour once more with new materials? Stranger nonetheless, will we see this tour, an album launch tour, and a farewell tour? Unlikely, since this is able to imply {that a} group that hasn’t toured in six years would achieve this thrice in two.

There’s a lot confusion amongst followers, even essentially the most devoted of that are scratching their heads. Most confounding is the truth that, with most indicators pointing to the tip, the one public assertion by Lacey is that the band is not breaking apart. On the outset of tour dates than run via the tip of July (with the massive media centres and music scene hotspots nonetheless to return) the questions will solely develop extra heated. Is that this the tip for Model New? Or, possibly, the start of the tip?