My Twitter and Facebook feeds have blown up this week in excitement over this new video from Calgary economic development in an attempt to showcase our city as a thriving, dynamic metropolis to tourists and potential residents alike.

For what it’s worth, it’s really well done and features local duo Jocelyn & Lisa with a catchy new song. In 2 minutes and 40 seconds it touches on a lot of awesome things about Calgary; our pathway system, the under-used Canada Olympic Park, sunshine, festivals, fun night spots like the Ship & Anchor all mixed in with Jocelyn & Lisa performing their tune outside of the historic Bay building downtown. However, after watching it a few times, there were a few things that don’t sit right with me. It’s cool and fun but it just doesn’t feel quite right to me for a few reasons. Reasons that I’m about to lay out in The List (in no particular order).

6) Holy Crap Calgary Is Sunny!

Is this Calgary or Southern California? Aside from a few beautiful snowflakes, Calgary looks like it has amazing weather! In all seriousness, did they shoot this on every sunny day last year? I have nothing against Calgary’s weather but we all know what you’re showing is the exception rather than the rule.

5) Calgary looks hip but where do I go to see some live music?

I think it’s awesome Calgary Economic Development used a local act throughout this video. Someone who sees this from outside our city could potentially travel to our city to see Jocelyn & Lisa. That’s rad. However I feel like aside from the song, there was next to no feeling of a musical climate in our city. A slight shot of Folk Fest, but no Sled Island/XFest or even something inside of one of the great venues. For all of the shots of people going out at night, they sure aren’t going out to see any music. Maybe it’s just me but on any given night you can hit up 5-6 venues to see something going down.

4) Lots of skateboarding for a city that isn’t skate friendly

As someone who is bad at skateboarding but is a skateboard supporter, I found it pretty shocking to see so much footage of skateboarding in a city that lags behind  metropolises like Airdrie and Cochrane when it comes in infrastructure and tolerance of skateboarding. This town is easily one of the most un-friendly places to skate. There’s no indoor park, a horrible ratio of facilities to users and BUILDING YOUR OWN RAMP ON YOUR OWN PROPERTY IS ILLEGAL. The dudes shooting on the downtown corner would likely be chased away by bylaw or CPS if they saw them.

3) Where’s the rest of the city?

I get it. The subburbs are boring. Everything sucks in Calgary aside from the downtown, Nosehill and COP. But no Fishcreek Park? One 2 second clip of Heritage Park?

2) Like it or not, the Stampede is a big deal…where is that?

So we had a shot of the Stampede fireworks, some line dancing, and a shot of the grandstand show. All awesome things. But like it or not the Stampede is a massive draw and part of our city and culture. It’s fine if you don’t want to show chuckwagon racing or steer wrestling but no Stampede parade or pancake breakfast footage? No midway? No little kids petting a baby calf in the barns? C’mon guys, that’s gold.

1) Lots of racial diversity, zero cultural diversity

One of my friend posted the video on their newfeed with the caption “I’m apparently not sporty, dynamic or successful enough to live in Calgary”. It was a joke, but it seems like this entire video was really aimed at a late 20′s/30′s, mainly white female demo. Sure, Calgary is a great place to be active and do active things, but I couldn’t help but notice the remarkable lack of cultural diversity. Sure, there’s plenty of people from other races featured, but none of the Afro-cuban festivities during Carifest, or the fun Expo Latino, and zero mention of the city’s long standing pan-Asian community. It just seemed like that whole video was an almost 3 minute tribute to Stuff White People Like.

As a citizen of Calgary, I love this town and for the record, I think the video was well done. I just think it missed the mark in a few areas and seemed to stretch it in a few others. I still congratulate Calgary Economic Development on a job well done in taking the right direction in promoting our city.

James

I had a great time at MBF’s Canadian Tuxedo birthday bash spectacular at Macewan Hall on Saturday night. There was a ton of denim, I drank a lot of Village beer and danced to Tribe Called Quest until they booted us out of the beer garden. Mark Mills did a great job of warming up the crowd but Michael Bernard Fitzgerald really blew the roof off and (as usual) pulled out all the stops on the show. There were so many highlights of his set, from Firecracker and Care For You to his covers of Dancing In The Dark and It Ain’t Me Babe. Personally, my favorite song of the evening was Movie Life.

The whole thing took me back to a time when I first heard of MBF via this video clip.

A huge thanks to everyone who came out on Saturday. We had a great time.

James

I’ve talked about my immense enjoyment of local gnarl rock outfit Chron Goblin before so I’m stoked to spread the news that they’ve managed to secure a spot on DesertFest, a pretty intense music festival for all things stoner/groove/doom in Camden, London, England April 26-28th. It’s pretty cool that a local act that’s just starting to see decent buzz locally is heading across the pond for such a rad gig. Best of luck to our pals and if you haven’t heard Chron Goblin before, check out their video for Bring Your Idols:

JC/NB

I listen to a lot of different music. To old school metal, dirty swag hip hop and classic bluegrass to jazz standards, post-punk and French house. There isn’t a lot of music I won’t at least give a chance to. One genre I’ve been giving the time of day to lately is alt-indie-dance-pop. Stuff like Joy Division, New Order and the like. So I was pretty stoked when I saw today’s video come across the internet at me last week. Mark Mills has been around the Calgary music scene for a while (Life Like Cobra, Needy Cat, Hot Sweet Noise) It’s almost 8-bit in it’s Casio simplicity, but Mills’ voice adds a strange, haunting quality to things. Some of your are going to hate this, but I’m digging this.

JC/NB

So today is a cool day in Calgary history. 25 years ago today the 1988 Olympics kicked off in our city. It was an exciting time for all Canadians and the event really helped to put Calgary on the map. There’s some cool things going on at the Olympic Oval tonight (retro skate, dig out the 80′s era Sun Ice!), Mayor Nenshi lit the Olympic cauldron at Olympic Plaza and tonight at the Flames/Dallas game, the Flames will be showing all kinds of videos from the 88 games and Howdy and Hidy will be in attendance!
It is my mission tonight to get my picture taken with Hidy & Howdy. In the meantime, all around rad artist and Calgarian Mandy Stobo aka Bad Portraits threw down this beauty today, best viewed while listening to this:

JC/NB

One of my favorite Calgary bands are set to drop a new record. I’m pretty pumped up because The Martyr Index has a really bad ass rock and roll sound with a political purpose. Think think along the lines of Joe Strummer writing songs for AC/DC and Thin Lizzy. Songs In The Key Of Strife is coming out on March 15th and I’m really looking forward to it.

The record was produced and recorded by Martyr Index drummer Casey Lewis at his Echo Base studio. If you ever get a chance to see them live, I highly suggest you do. For now, here’s the first track off Songs In The Key Of Strife, called Survival.

And I thought I was the only one who felt this way. Also: I like to walk up an escalator, not just stand there. Because then I get to the top REALLY fast. Why is it in Calgary people feel the need to just kick back, relax and ride it? It’s like standing on the moving sidewalk at the airport! Move it folks!

Higher res here:

So much thanks to Helen Tseng for this.

JC

I’ve been keeping my eye on this gnarly metal/hard rock/stoner/groove outfit from Calgary for a while now. Chron Goblin has just released a new video for Bring Your Idols and I’m really digging it. If you like your music loud, gnar and with a solid groove to it, then you should check this out. The video is sick and I  can’t wait to see more of these guys.

JC/NB

I found this on the Calgary subreddit. Thanks to Redditor catsfive for capturing this and sharing it. Here’s what it looked like back in the day:

Here’s a Calgary landmark getting turned into rubble:

JC/NB

I’m going to shoot straight from the hip today and hammer a specific group of people who really screw up Calgary’s roads. All week, we’ve talked about the terrified drivers, the jerk drivers and the invincible driver but one of the worst are the rubberneckers.

Rubberneckers don’t cause accidents. They feed on accidents. They are so wrapped up in human drama that they feel the need to slow down everyone behind them to gawk at what is happening on the side of the road when it clearly isn’t a hazard to them or directly impacting their driving what so ever. This point was really driven home this morning when I was driving north bound on Deerfoot trail from Mackenzie Towne Boulevard to downtown.

Earlier in the morning there was a horrific crash headed south bound just past Anderson/Bow Bottom trail. At least 5 cars involved, 16 people and 10 went to hospital. Brutal, sad and dangerous. It’s widely understood that for the rest of the morning, the southbound lanes would be very slow. However one would expect the northbound lanes to be relatively fine, just slower than usual due to the slippery conditions.

Not so. Not at all.

At 8:30 this morning, Northbound Deerfoot was backed up all the way to 130th avenue. It took me at least 20 minutes to get past the accident scene HEADED NORTHBOUND. As far as the eye could see up northbound Deerfoot, cars were CRAWLING. And while I sat in traffic, I had nothing but time to stew over such a unique problem.

The problem with rubberneckers is that they’re not causing real damage to a vehicle. They’re not doing anything illegal. They’re not even doing anything that’s usually considered rude, like cutting someone off or tailgating. They’re just slowing down and gawking for NO REAL REASON, other than to satisfy their tabloid-esque desire to stare at someone elses misfortune.

What rubberneckers don’t realize is that the moment when they slam on their breaks to take in human carnage, the guy behind him does the same. And the person behind him. And so on. Add in a few rubberneckers to the mix and it gets even worse. Make the accident REALLY bad and all of the rubberneckers come out to play, pausing extra long as if for every notch up the imaginary vehicular-accident scale, they must slow their pace accordingly. The next thing you know a major freeway is backed up for two miles, adding an extra 25 minutes to someone’s drive just due to the rubberneckers selfish, morbid, curiosity. There’s no reason for it. The accident isn’t going to jump the freeway like wildfire and somehow slam into you. Get a move on!

Who are the rubberneckers? Who are you? Come out so we can talk to you. I’m not going to hurt you, I promise, but I want you to know that what you are doing isn’t just rude, disgusting and annoying, your selfish actions screw up everyone’s morning behind you. Just so you good get a really good look to tell the girls at work. Come out and be counted so you can hang your head in shame and so we can stare at YOU? How do you think it feels? I doubt anyone will admit to being a rubbernecker, just like I doubt anyone will ever admit to paying to see an Adam Sandler movie or buying a Nickelback album, but all said it still happens all the time.

So here’s where the rest of us can improve the situation. Do you have a rubbernecker in your life? A spouse, sibling, parent, friend or co-worker who has to slow down and gawk? Slap them. Reprimand them. See a rubbernecker in traffic? Hit your horn. Hit it repeatedly. Get their gossipy asses moving down the freeway like a god damned professional.

I can only imagine how emergency services feels when they’re working with an audience like that. Is there any way police can hand out fines for obstructing traffic around an accident zone? Hit the rubberneckers where it hurts, in their wallet.

Lastly, if you’re a rubbernecker, think of the people who have just crashed. Ever been in a car wreck? How did you feel? Did you like having someone stare at you? Would you like to have a captive audience slowing down and making an even larger spectacle out of your misfortune? Of course not.

So next time you see an accident, check for hazards, then proceed as normal. Like a freaking human being.

JC/NB