KEXP has been partnering with the Consulate General of Canada to bring you some Canadian bands as part of our recent Uptown Concert series in the Gathering Space. Last month, we had Metric; last week, we had Sloan; and on Tuesday, April 9th, Dilly Dally will perform live on the airwaves and at KEXP, for free and all ages.
Sound & Vision spoke with Alex Grigg of the Music BC Industry Association, a member-based organization that advocates for funding of artists. Here’s what he had to say about the differences between Canada and the US’s music industry. Check out excerpts from our chat below, and listen to the full interview.
Many are very envious of Canada's funding stream which is very, very generous for the promotion and development of artists and music professionals. It's quite unique around the globe. There are a few countries that are similar but don't have as much money. Australia is quite active. Even the Brits are pretty good at activating around the world. I think our system has been in place for so long that we've been able to really sort of elevate grassroots development of artists.
Canada is an enormous, enormous country to travel and to tour and to carve a living out of. The next major center for Vancouver — which is geographically challenged — and the rest of the country is probably Calgary and that's a ten-hour drive through the mountains. We're really encouraging our artists to take advantage of the close proximity to the Pacific Northwest and the hotbed all those centers are. While having a career in Canada is great, obviously, we have a very weird, weird, weird star system and a lot of artists actually have to leave, get popular elsewhere — whether that be the US — to actually become popular at home. Seems very strange but that's been an ongoing thing for decades. So one of the prime missions that we have here is really focusing on Seattle, Portland, and Boise, Idaho.
For instance, if a Canadian artist wants to play Bumbershoot and they don't have their paperwork in order, it can cost upwards of fifteen hundred dollars to get it expedited. Sometimes for an emerging band to have to spend that kind of money to do a gig for 200 dollars in Bellingham seems very, very backward.
One of our studies pointed out that Vancouver musicians have the least amount of income anywhere across the country, which is a disturbing trend that we would like to see reversed. So yeah, I don't envy the artists' position. It has to be super tough. And we do all we can to support them financially or with advice on things to do. You can't blame them if they need to go establish themselves in other markets just purely based on affordability. I get it.
KEXP, in partnership with the Consulate General of Canada in Seattle, present a special acoustic performance with Toronto-based punk outfit Dilly Dally on Tuesday, April 9th in the KEXP Gathering Space. You can stream live video from the session at KEXP.ORG, and listen along worldwide at 90.3 FM in Seattle and KEXP.ORG everywhere.
Sound & Vision airs Saturday mornings at 7 AM PST. Hosted by Emily Fox and John Richards, the show "uses interviews, artistry, commentary, insight, and conversation to that tell broader stories through music, and illustrate why music and art matter."
