Back At It.

So we’re back at it, our first gig of 2020, and it should be a good one for us. Over the holidays we go to check out a band, Exo Trust, and we were very impressed. We hung out with them a bit and we mentioned we would like to do a gig with them at one point in the future. About a week later we got a text from their singer, Jim, who said “hey we liked your EP, and you guys seem cool to hang with, we have a show, you guys game?”

DUH, of course!

This is what it’s all about, going out, seeing bands, hearing cool tunes, and making some new friends. We’ve had tough years of slugging it out to get gigs, only to be dismissed for one reason or another. It’s sad as people constantly say, there’s no scene anymore. Well when people want their own clique, this is what happens. Regardless, we’ve seen things changing as some old guard people in the local scene are slowly dropping out or moving on. It’s a reminder to us, that we’re all in this together, and a rising tide raises all ships.

2019 get ready to meet 2020

Where we at (December 2019)

Ok we know it’s been awhile, and it seems like most of our posts start off this way, but the reasons usually fill in the blanks. Thankfully it’s been because we’ve been busy. Since our last “official” gig post, we’ve been in the pattern of

Gig

Week off to recharge, and do all the stuff that we put on hold to practice and prep for the gig, like laundry, see loved ones, clean, take extra shifts, stuff like that

Back to practice, working on new tunes mind you.

A call – “hey we had a band drop out/break up/can’t do the show – you guys interested” of course we say yes.

Practice for a week, try to figure out what new tunes are in shape for live shows to keep things interesting.

Play the gig. Meet new people, new bands, and have a great time

And the process repeats itself.

I apologize that we haven’t posted or really promoted these shows. In a sense, it kind of works. I’ve heard people complain of bands constantly posting and promoting shows to the point of over saturation, and costing them fans, and in some cases friends. Promoting a band sometimes feels a bit guilty, as in “please come see my band play”. So playing all these last minute gigs means the venues and other bands give us leeway on our draw, and we get better. When we meet new people at the show we get some good honest feedback from people. I’m hoping we’ll have a residency coming up in the spring of 2020, a weekly gig that we can promote properly.

The big downside is we haven’t been doing any flyers. In most cases we gave the other bands and venues our Le Toque stickers to put over the band logo or pics of the other bands on their flyers. Doing the flyers are as important creative outlet as the music, as we’re hoping some of these design elements will make it to... Wait for it...

OUR next EP.

We’re planning on sequestering ourselves for January, to finish off our writing sessions, pick the best 3 songs, and book some time to record. Mixing can take a bit, however we’re hoping for an April/May release.

So we have 1 more gig for 2019, and it’s a good one at La Casa. Saturday December 14th. The show starts earlier at 7:00, doors at 6:00. We did a gig with Tuna Chips this fall, and they were a blast! 

We’d also like to thank the bands that gave us all those last minute gigs this year: Jay Pruitt, Astrotek, Hug the Penguin, 10 drink minimum. Roboshark, Ann & Emory, Pogo of Death, Sushi Kat and old palms. It’s great to know we’re in good company.

So our resolution for 2020 (yes it’s that time to think about those) is to let you know about any last minute shows, and finish our EP. No promises though!

Thanx for making 2019 a great year for us!

We’re Getting Used To The Term “Finally!”

So it’s been awhile, but we’ve actually busy this time around. None of this “wait, wait, wait, something happens, wait, wait, wait, something happens, wait, wait, wait” thing. 

So we released our EP “Songs of Cigarettes and Poutine” and we were planning a CD release party, and then we get asked, last minute to open a show for our friends in the band Death Pickles. So we gladly take the opportunity as a low key chance to play live and warm up for our upcoming EP release party. The gig went well, we sold some CD’s and some USB drives.

Then we get back to planning our EP release, and get asked to open up for The Hype, as one of the bands on their bill for that night broke up. So we say “sure”, and step in to help out for another show. Again the gig went well, and we made friends with some new people, overall a great night.

OK, so back to our EP release..Nope. We get asked to play ANOTHER gig, This time opening for Tuna Chips. It’s a pop up show, and it’s being sponsored by Monster Energy Drinks. So of course we say yes. By now we have sold out of our physical CD’s and our USB drives, and our T shirt supply has dwindled. 

Needless to say, we’re happy for these kinds of delays and issues. It’s nice to be wanted, and as they’re last minute gigs we didn’t get the chance to properly promote them (i.e. Tell you all about it). But we’ve finally locked it all in!

We’ve re-stocked our CD’s and T-shirts (and have some new colors). It should be a great night with our friends in High Velocity Turtles starting things off at 9:00, Blue32 at 10:00 and our lil group at 11:00. 

We’ve gotten some great feedback on our EP, and while it may not be as new as we would have liked to present it, our “better late than whatever” policy always wins out.

Here are the links for those of you who want to check out our music, if you haven’t yet already!

Here’s where you can get our tunes!

As always, thanks for your support!!

Artwork & News

Hey all,

First off we'd like to thank all of you who've downloaded (and paid for) our new EP. We're looking into doing some limited edition vinyl, as well as some physical CD's.

In the meantime, we have finally made a DIY CD cover for you to download. You'll notice one of the "squares" is upside down. That's not an error. When you fold it, it's oriented correctly. If you print it on an 11x17 page it should be the proper size. For those of you that might want a larger version, we’ve included those as well.

Also, we are in the process of bringing all the elements together for a proper release party. We wanted to wait for the weather to be a bit more agreeable, and everything's ALMOST in place.

Someone said to us the other night "You're always late, but worth the wait". I know it's funny because it's true. We really love all the support we've gotten from all of you all through this, it goes beyond words.

2019

So 2018 was pretty interesting, we did some gigs, met some cool people, and released our EP. So as we enter 2019, we’re gonna do some house cleaning in a sense; We have our pre-release track “Acadie” available for download, but as it’s kind of a leftover of sorts, we’re going to pull it down after January 1, 2019. We’ve been using it in our sets, but as some have noticed, it’s not quite the same. So It’ll be coming down. Hopefully we will replace it with a newer version.

Speaking of recordings, we have been going through our song collection and hopefully we’ll have some selections available for our next EP all picked out, and will be working on it in the spring. As we had a lot of false starts on the last one, we learned alot during the last recording process, and will be able to skip to actually being productive!

We wish you all a happy & safe 2019!

Letoque

Interview

Just as we were getting ready to release our EP, we sat down with Fred Jordan for a bit for an interview for his blog/zine reSOUNDERground. An edited version is out in print, and he was kind enough to give us the full copy. It kind of outlines to any newbie, what brought us to where we are now, and the roads we took to get here!

It's Uploaded

So as promised, our EP, Songs of Cigarettes and Poutine is LIVE on the following sites:

Apple Music
 Spotify
 iTunes
 Google Play & YouTube Music
 Amazon
 Pandora
 Deezer
 Tidal

Thanks for listening!!

As Promised!!

So the big date is here!! As promised, our EP, Songs of Cigarettes and Poutine is available for FREE today and tomorrow on our bandcamp site:

https://letoque.bandcamp.com/

After that it’s gonna cost you, but not much

;-)

Soon has a date!!

So we’re done, yes you can put a fork in us so to speak.

Our EP has been:

Written (that was interesting)

Recorded (a plethora of challenges)

Mixed (We realized that listening is really important)

Mastered (It made it sound “better”, but we still can’t explain how or why, but It was worth it)

THEN we had to think about Artwork

AND THEN how/when/where to release it

HOW to tell everyone about it.

So here we are, our EP “Songs Of Cigarettes And Poutine” is completed, and we’re releasing it on Friday December 7, 2018. It will be up at our bandcamp site for FREE for Friday and Saturday, After that, it won’t be free. BUT It will be available on line at:

Apple Music
Spotify
iTunes
Google Play & YouTube Music
Amazon
Pandora
Deezer
Tidal

Yes we’re working on some options for those of you that like having a physical item, like CD’s and Vinyl. If there is interest enough to make it reasonably priced we’ll make it happen! In the meantime we’re living in the digital realm.

We’re really excited to share this all with you! An EP release party is planned for after the 1st of the year sometime. I know we haven’t really been super good at posting stuff, but with the EP done, expect alot of posts and news, now that we actually have our EP done!

Mark your Calendars!

Soon..

We’ll keep it short and sweet..But..

Soon… It’s coming…..

Closer

So while you haven’t heard our new EP yet, we have - Alot. It’s been an experience. We’re not sick of having to re-listen to everything over and over. Some people say if you don’t hate your record by the time you’re done with mixing, you better get back to mixing. I dunno, we’re really happy to see these tunes come to life.

We did a lil Pop up show last month, somehow we got some runoff from the POP Montreal Festival. The temporary venue that was once Candy/Jellybean store, sounded so sweet, when we had to turn people away, as the club for the night (aptly named Sugarville) reached capacity quickly.

As alot of our friends have known that the EP is close (or at least closer) to completion, we’ve been getting asked “when’s the release party/Are you pressing CD’s/cassettes”. At this point, we’re not booking or planning anything until it’s actually done. We may initially do it as a Digital only version, with a PDF booklet, perhaps even do USB drives, with some extras. We’ve thought of putting a code for free merch (yes we’re working on some merch) on the USB drives, randomly, so getting one may mean a free T shirt or poster. Speaking of merch, we still have a few green (of all colours) Le Toque “smoking duck” T shirts, so if you want one, drop us a line.

Recently, Fred Jordan interviewed us for his local Blog/zine “reSOUNDERground”. It was a pretty exhaustive session, and it should be out next month. We’ll be sure to share it with you all, as it’s been a long and unique voyage on this ship, and we feel we haven’t even left the harbour.

Summer is Still Here

I feel like our upcoming EP should be called, "Unfilled Promises". It's slow going, as the heat from our summers, coats our schedule in sweat, and slows things down. However we have made progress. Drums, Guitars, Basses, and Synths are done. However Vocal issues have plagued me in the beginning of summer. I've avoided cheese and alcohol for the recent month or so (not an easy task) and We're moving foreward to have everything done next month. We've been mixing as we go, and the final touches should go quickly. 

We do have a gig coming up to fill out our summer shows. It's a new Pop up Venue, this one named for our friend that passed away awhile back; Rene Thompson. He was a great friend of all of us, and one of the reasons we decided to make a change from acoustic to electric. This night will have some extra special guests. We haven't played with Sock Party, but we've heard them practicing down the hall from us, and we know you'll like them. Too Hot For Turtles are coming down from Morin Heights to join us. Come on out!

It's Been Such A Long Time.

I admit it, I used to scoff at big time bands that used to take years (and spend Millions) on making albums. Def Leppard, Boston, Fleetwood Mac. I get it now. Originally I wanted to do our EP using our beloved Ed Thorsen's hypersonic Mac Laptop. We did get 75% done. Turning his thousands of dollar set up into a simple 4 track. Then the flood came. Ever wonder what a water main break does do a basement studio? It's not pretty. I was half tempted to post the 2 tracks that we all agreed on, but I have to say it feels like a cop out. So add that up to trying to record an EP, move to a new apartment, a band member that sometimes has to travel to the USA for work, and our wonderful winters, it's been slow to say the least. We did find a new studio, only to realise our mixing engineer's side gig of making smoked meats took off, meant he wasn't going to be available. All kidding aside, he does a red wine soaked sausage that is amazing! Anyway. we're still here. We hope to have our own EP release party soon, but in the meantime we're supporting Ed Johnson at his EP release party at Moffatts' on Saturday June 2nd. It's one of Reinhold's "pop up" shows, so make sure to bet there early, when the beers are cold, and we can still talk the cops out of shutting us down!

New Year And New Stuff.

Yes It's been in the works, Our new EP that is. Long story there, and when it's done, you'll get the full story that will only be interesting to a few of you, but interesting none the less. In the meantime, we have a gig supporting THE SAD CATS for their CD release party at The Vieux, along with Deathboy. 

Coming Soon And Other Stuff

So Our Gig At New City Gas went really well. We hadn't played with the guys (and Gal) in the other bands before, so it was great to make new friends, and hopefully will be doing some more gigs in the future with them.  The Unknowns were really wild, and Station 1 blew us away.

Our set was really solid, other than a keyboard malfunction during soundcheck. It certainly made for a sweaty moment there. 

As far as our EP, yes it's coming soon. We may post a sample of it just for kicks this week. 

To those that came to see us play, THANKS. To those that didn't, you missed a great show with some great bands. You'll want to see us at the next one, which we may have info on this week as well!

Merci!

(The) Facebook

Hey All, I just wanted to share with you our facebook page, where you can like our..Facebook I guess:

https://www.facebook.com/Le-Toque

Le Toque on Bandcamp

Hello, we're still in the finishing touches of getting our EP "Songs of Cigarettes and Poutine" up and on line for your listening pleasure. 

The link should be here:

https://letoque.bandcamp.com/

Finally!

Yes we've had other versions of all our social media, but in light of our new EP, we killed most of them. Not out of malice, (it was a mercy killing), but due to the fact we really didn't have a proper handle on them name wise, as well as may have been beholden to members of the band that are no longer around. Now our intrepid bass player is covering all of our electronic needs. If you want
to reach out to us, please feel free to do so.