Movies of War

1 of 3 2 of 3 There is lots you can take as a given with a new SLIP~ons release. For instance, there will be tuneful, dexterous, passionate, Johnny Thunders-esque guitar solos from Rob “Shockk Mongoose” Matharu, the band’s glammiest member. (He spells Shockk with two Ks because it rocks harder that way). Whatever band he’s in—he's also in the Spitfires—his playing is a reliable highight. You can also count on the songs to have a straight-outta-Minneapolis, no-bullshit rock craftsmanship equally evocative of the Replacements, Hüsker Dü, and Soul Asylum. Add to this thoughtful, provocative lyrics, usually of an introspective and interpersonal nature, delivered with wounded passion by singer/ rhythm guitarist Brock Pytel.Pytel’s voice has grown richer in nuance and expressivity since his early days singing with Montreal’s Doughboys from behind the drumkit. If you missed it, Pytel and I talked about his time in the Doughboys and his transition to the SLIP~ons here, around when the band's previous album, Heavy Machinery, came out back in 2022. The liner notes on Bandcamp for that release describe it as occurring “sonically in-between Exile on Main St.-era Stones and the Afghan Whigs”, if you want a couple of additional reference points. I don’t want to spend too much time trying to think of cool things to say about the SLIP~ons’s ever-dapper bassist Brian Minato (who is on the opposite end of whatever fashion spectrum Shockk is on, dressing like he’s from a skinny-tie new wave band from Akron—but that’s a cool look too). Along with drummer Shane Wilson, he's a seamless part of the SLIP~ons' package of solid, honest, unpretentious rock craftmanship. The quartet makes rocking, intelligent records, has great live chemistry, and probably deserves a lot more love and attention than it will ever gonna get locally. That unfair latter reality is because the group's members are too busy just making great music to bother pimping themselves. All these things are as-you-might-expect, things SLIP~ons fans know implicitly. But what you might not expect of the SLIP~ons is a politically charged rock video, “Overtime” offered in solidarity with Minnesotans. It shows animations of ICE goons harassing immigrant families, spraying pepper spray, and beating citizens on the pavement while neighbours rally with placards that read “They Blame Immigrants So You Won’t Blame Billionaires”, “We Will Not Be Silenced”, and “Melt the ICE”. Later in the video, the language on the placards toughens to read “Fuck ICE”. Those words, writ large, also appear behind images of the band, alongside phrases of similar resonance: “No Kings”, “Fight Fascism”, “Fuck Fascism”, and that sort of thing. Video of SLIP~ons–Overtime [Official Video] “’Overtime’ is kind of a first for me”, Pytel tells the Straight. “I have been finding it increasingly more difficult to bite my tongue. I’ve valued tolerance my whole life, but from a more passive, striving-for-self-awareness kind of perspective. Suddenly I found myself noticing submarines in the Burrard Inlet and wondering what I would do if American tanks started rolling across the Peace Arch crossing.” Pytel is in no aspect anti-American, mind you. Besides an abiding love for the Minneapolis music scene, he has spent plenty of time in the US, touring with the Doughboys, playing on bills with bands like ALL, and even getting stranded in Oshkosh. “We stayed at the Crucifucks’ manager-guy’s house for several days until he eventually chased us out for eating too much of his welfare cheese,” he says with a laugh.Later, he lived in Boston when he was studying in the 1990s at the Berklee College of music, then Seattle from 1995-2000. But the SLIP~ons have never played in the US, nor has Pytel played there with other bands since he moved to Vancouver. “We probably did not help our chances of getting across the border with ‘Overtime’, eh? Time will tell, I guess!”The lyrics for the song are a bit less overt than the video, mind you, with the politics are slightly veiled.“I was trying to keep it honest and not preachy or judgemental," Pytel relates. "My intended point was essentially about picking a side. I’m sure there are people that legitimately believe that ICE agents are serving some useful purpose, for example, but for those that are ambivalent, well… I’m not sure we can afford that luxury now.”Initially, the video was conceived as being quite so overt. The early concept was going to be something more hockey-related, a motif featured throughout the lyrics. It’s not overtime on the job that they’re singing about, but an extended metaphor for political turmoil: “Things are escalating. Pressure is on. I’m also considering mortality a bit. People we know are dying!For lyrics like "Four on war", Pytel has to explain hockey language to me. Before the NHL's current three-on-three format for overtime following ties, teams used to play four-on-four."War doesn’t rhyme with three, so I took some liberty,” Pytel shares. Originally, the hockey angle was going to find its way into the video. “We had plans to include some footage of us on the ice, and shot a bunch of greenscreen stuff with us wearing winter clothes. Shane played the entire song on the drums wearing enormous mittens, for example.” "Overtime" was helmed by Scott Gordon and Sherise Seven of HaloLa.tv, who previously worked with the SLIP~ons on the video for "Greystone". Everyone decided that the cute hockey footage did not fit with the heavy themes around what was going on in Minneapolis. Video of SLIP~ons - Graystone [Official Video] "Also 'Overtime' is part eulogy,” Pytel says. The opening verse of “Overtime” indeed references the death of his friend Rob Goodall, who trained Pytel in rigging for movies and concerts, literally “showing him the ropes” of the trade. He is the “battleship" in the songs opening lines: “The battleship has left the harbour now/ Breathed his last one night/ In a Honda Full of silver/ Behind the London Drugs on Hastings Street/ Walking distance from my home”. “Robbie was one of a few people that showed me the ropes—quite literally—in rigging, and helped me to get established as rigger in concerts and film," Pytel says. "In his prime, he was quite a large human, and seemed indestructible. When he went out drinking or showed up for a load in, he sometimes would announce, ‘The Battleship is in the harbour!’ When I heard he’d passed, I immediately wrote down that first line.”The reference to the now-gone London Drugs on Hastings Street adds to the Vancouver locations namechecked by Pytel in his lyrics over the years. (Grandview Park featured in the title track on the Heavy Machinery EP).“There’s a big parking lot behind where that London Drugs used to be," he says. The building is under construction now—new rental homes or whatever, but I did shop at that location for the longest time, you know, buying padded envelopes, laundry baskets, CDrs/memory cards, or last minute stuff for my kid’s Christmas stockings. When the police found Robbie, he was in the car he’d been living in, parked in that parking lot.”The cover of Overtime also riffs on ships, Pytel explains.“That’s a photograph taken by Shockk at Lonsdale Quay at a time when a pair of JMSDF vessels from Japan were moored there," he says. "The one on the cover is either the JS Kashima or the JS Harusame. Technically, they’re destroyer class, not battleships, but close enough, you know?”The SLIP~ons are planning to play the new record in order, then do some older stuff with a show tonight at a venue tba. Pytel is hoping James Farwell of Bison, who is in a band with Pytel and Mike Payette called Award of Excellence, will greet the room with some poetry, as he did last year. “For those about to Brock, we salute you!” was one singularly memorable line in Farwell’s reading. Also on the bill will be Cascade, Liquidlight, and Vic Bondi. Pytel calls Bondi, interviewed here a "legitimate force". "There’s a lot going on in Van on the March 7th, but it would be cool for those guys to have good crowd to play to," he says of the whole lineup. As for hockey, one question remains: given that he’s a transplant, which team does Pytel root for—the one from his hometown or the one from the place where he now lives? “Being from Montréal, I’m pretty much a lifelong Habs fan, so I would cheer against the Vancouver team if they played each other, yes," he says. "Sports fandom is weird!”For more info on the SLIP~ons show on March 7 show go here. Join the discussion Facebook comments not loading? 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