The Sonic Collective

Send us Fan Mail Here we are at the end of our second round of Common Threads and what a month it was. We listened to Black Sabbath by Black Sabbath, The Stone Roses by The Stone Roses and Permission to Land by the Darkness. Three very different bands and albums and for the most part, everyone seemed to enjoy the musical journey. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail For the next four months we are changing up our format to try something fun. Each of us will pick three albums that share a common thread. We want you to listen to these albums and try to figure out what the common thread between them is. Member Darren Scott is up first and he chose The Modern Lovers self-titled album, R.E.M's Reckoning album and Sonic Youth's Goo album....

Send us Fan Mail This month brings the second instalment of our Common Threads round, where we choose three albums that ideally we like and/or are interesting and have one or more common threads that tie them together. I don’t want to say too much about these albums as I’ll likely then give away some of the common threads, but they have all been on my radar for some time and I finally dug in and h...

Send us Fan Mail While the entire team has a deep appreciation for Lady Gaga's talent as a musician and note her unique style, there's some differences of opinion on just how good the album is. Some of the highlights:- Lady Gaga pushed many boundaries with her lyrics on this album.- Her support for marginalized groups is clearly demonstrated on several tracks adopted as anthems by the LG...

Send us Fan Mail For the next four months we are changing up our format to try something fun. Each of us will pick three albums that share a common thread. We want you to listen to these albums and try to figure out what the common thread between them is. Member Darren Scott is up first and he chose The Modern Lovers self-titled album, R.E.M's Reckoning album and Sonic Youth's Goo album....

Send us Fan Mail Born This Way was released May 23, 2011 to critical fanfare. Lady Gaga's second studio album was said to push boundaries even further than her first, and tackled themes of sexuality, freedom, and feminism among others. Many of the tracks became anthems for marginalized communities, pushing important topics into public discourse. So if you're like me and know Lady Gaga mo...

Send us Fan Mail While all of us enjoy Alice in Chains in general, this was the first time any of us had taken a deep-dive into a full album. You'll have to listen to get all nuances of our perspectives, but here's some standout talking points we could all agree on:- The vocal harmonies and instrumentation are rock solid on this album, presenting a very unique take on the Seattle Grunge...

Send us Fan Mail Review of Unknown Pleasures by Joy DivisionThe boys overall were underwhelmed with Joy Division’s debut album Unknown Pleasures. All in all it was a bit too glum, the musicianship was that of a college band and there were no standout, catchy tracks that led any of us back to revisit them regularly. While we have some appreciation for the band’s stamp on that time period, we’re not...

Send us Fan Mail Alain here, with our pick for July 2022. This month, we explore Alice in Chains' celebrated and highly praised sophomore album, Dirt. What makes it so great? Does it stand the test of time? Apparently even Elton John likes this band, so we pretty much have to explore it, right? Support the show

Send us Fan Mail The Sonic Collective member Darren Scott picked this album from a recent vinyl collection he acquired. Little did he know, that this was one of the most interesting album picks we ever had. We discovered a legend in Harry Nilsson and our opinions and reviews were as crazy as his life was. How had we never known this artist? Listen and enjoy. For more reviews and music content visi...

Send us Fan Mail I’ve heard the strange legacy of Ian Curtis, who committed suicide in May 1980, mentioned on a number of episodes of The Ongoing History of New Music with Alan Cross and been intrigued. When I started out as a DJ at Lloyd’s Recreation in Calgary as a teenager, Blue Monday and Bizarre Love Triangle by New Order were huge and some of the original 12-inch singles I learned how to bea...

Send us Fan Mail For our music review pick for May, 2022, member Darren Scott reveals he recently acquired a large record collection that had been entombed for 40 years. He decided that he would pick one of the albums from this collection to review. Join Darren and listen to all the options he had and how he ended up landing on Harry Nilsson's Nilsson Schmilsson album. Be sure to listen in ea...

Send us Fan Mail Closing out the round of Soul selections, the Sonic Collective team shares their thoughts on Van Morrison's album Saint Dominic's Preview. We all had our favourite tracks and picked out the things that didn't land quite right. See who liked blue eyed soul and how we all found Van Morrison's sound hard to pin down. Listen along and let us know what you think! Su...

Send us Fan Mail As we enter our eighth year of our podcast blazing into 2022, we decided to have each of the four Sonic Collective members choose from the genre of 'Soul'.We’ve gone pretty far afield starting with a taste of neo soul, sliding into a lounge/chillhop and rounding out with a modern throwback to the roots of the genre. Scott is going to take us back as well and give us a ta...

Send us Fan Mail As we continue to explore the musical genre of Soul, Sonic Collective member Alain Dupuis has chosen for us to review Dap-Dippin' by Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings. This album was released in 2002, but you'd never know it by listening to it. As part of the Brooklyn soul revivalist movement that kicked off in the early 2000s, this album sounds like it belongs straight out...

Send us Fan Mail As we enter our eighth year of our podcast blazing into 2022, we decided to have each of the four Sonic Collective members choose from the genre of 'Soul'. It's Alain's turn to pick the album for us to listen to and review, and he's chosen Dap Dippin’ with Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings. Dap Dippin' was released in 2002 as part of a revivalist movemen...

Send us Fan Mail The gang was not united in their feelings about our pick for February, Thievery Corporation’s, The Mirror Conspiracy, which was originally released in 2000. Half of us loved it, while the other half were not so enthusiastic and for a variety of reasons. One of the things we enjoy about reviewing music is the different responses we all have to it and how each person interprets a mu...

Send us Fan Mail To kick off the new year, and our 8th year of The Sonic Collective, our four members have decided to select an influential album within the genre of soul. The first selection from member Darren Scott is the highly regarded Baduizm album from Neo Soul artist Erykah Badu. Listen along to hear what we thought of this album and if we felt it stood the test of time. We may have also ma...

Send us Fan Mail In this cycle of picks we’re focusing on ‘Soul’ as a genre and I’m kind of breaking that with this pick. But then again, maybe not so much? There were a number of albums I considered that are definitely soul and interesting, including the amazing Who Is Jill Scott?: Words and Sounds Vol. 1, by Jill Scott, Call Me by Al Green, Voodoo by D'Angelo, and Maxwell's Urban Hang...

Send us Fan Mail For the month of December, 2021, Scott G picked Garbage's debut album, Garbage. It started out as an exploration of Butch Vig's production and artistic vision, but branched out further into the music of the time and we have some DNA tests revealed. Spoiler: you are NOT the father. But there are still lots of unanswered questions, so tune in and see what the gang thought...

Send us Fan Mail As we enter our eighth year of our podcast blazing into 2022, we decided to have each of the four Sonic Collective members choose from the genre of 'Soul'. As the first to pick, I, Darren, decided to explore a genre of soul I always really liked, but never made much time for my choice - Neo Soul. I have some of Erykah Badu's songs on playlists of mine but I really w...

Send us Fan Mail For December 2021, Scott Gregory takes a dive into Butch Vig's musical mind by listening to Garbage by Garbage, the first album of the most successful band he formed and produced. To read the notes and for access to other album links and factoids please listen and read to this on our website at thesoniccollective.com. Enjoy! Support the show

Send us Fan Mail For the month of November 2021, Alain picked NERO's debut album, Welcome Reality to review. A concept album at heart, NERO tries to paint a picture of what life will be like in the year 2808. Why that year specifically? No idea. The Sonic Collective members are an open-minded bunch of music lovers, though none of us are all that keen on EDM, so this was a bit of a departure f...

Send us Fan Mail This month's pick is by Alain. We'll be exploring Welcome Reality, the concept album from electronic artists NERO. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail Here's our review of our pick for October 2021, Apollo: Atmospheres and Soundtracks by Brian Eno, Daniel Lanois and Roger Eno, which is the ninth solo studio by British Eno and was released in 1983. It was a collaboration with his brother and Canadian Daniel Lanois. Have a listen to hear what we thought of it. Support the show