A GAL WITH HEART

- Local singer-songwriter Ana Miura release long-awaited EP Friday

(Cover of The Scene)

A musical buffet

The Ottawa Sun ; Wednesday June 22, 2005

By Allan Wigney

   "Press is great," Kris Ward muses, "but the grassroots approach is still to get in your car, drive somewhere and play." Ward's observations on the relative merits of launching a marketing blitz come in response to his acceptance of the fact that scheduling a CD-release party for Why is Everybody, Anybody?  - his slick collection of impossibly catchy pop songs that at times sounds uncannily like the album Coldplay fans should have received earlier this month - on the same evening as beloved, talented and photogenic singer-songwriter Ana Miura's CD- release party has inevitably created a few challenges, marketing blitz-wise. 

    "I have to admit I was freaking out when I learned about Ana's show," Ward says, "because I know she's going to be everywhere.  But I've already sold a few tickets, so I think there's plenty of room for both shows on the night."

    It helps that Ward  the rocker and Miura the folkie offer two sides of an evening, likely ensuring an audience for both shows.

THERE'S MORE

    But wait.  There's more.  Another local CD release Friday.  Plus a fourth Saturday.  And to Ottawa's credit, each is well worth our support. The moody, magnificent Red Fey, a quartet poised and determined to achieve greatness will be at Irene's Friday (over to Stephen Flood for more).  Saturday, it's over to The Banditas, one of the most dynamic live rock and roll bands this town has ever produced, at the same venue. 

    It's a lot to take in.  And any of the above artists could be forgiven for freaking out as a result.  But if we all pull together, we can surely make each feel appreciated. 

    Which brings us back to Miura, a tireless young performer we know well, thanks to her frequent appearances in clubs and coffee houses around town and to her opening sets at high-profile gigs by the likes of Fred Eaglesmith and Sarah Harmer. 

    Named the city's best singer-songwriter in a recent Ottawa X Press readers' poll, Miura is nonetheless only now releasing her first CD, the Dean Watson-produced six-song EP Tenacious Heart.  Sometimes over the past year it has indeed seemed, as her friend Ward suggested, that Miura was everywhere.

    " I've been really fortunate," Miura admits.  "I've been lucky enough to be able to choose the bills I'm on.  But it's been a natural progession.  I've worked really hard for this.

    "Recently I've heard some negative comments.  People have accused me of lauching a 'marketing blitz' and questioned why I should be on the Main Stage of the Tulipfest after just playing coffee houses.

    "When I first go the Tulipfest gig, opening for Sarah Harmer, it made sense to me.  Later, it did kind of sink in that not everyone could get a gig like that.  But if I"m going ot be criticized, I'd rather it was for my music.  I mean, if you don't like my music that's your thing.  I'm just going to ignore anything beyond that."

    Unfortunately for naysayers, Miura's is less susceptible to jabs, comprising as it does sweetly sung tales of personal experience and observation. 

    Marketing blitz or no, we will be hearing much more from Miura in days and years to come. 

    We will no doubt hear more from Ward too, if th well-crafted songs of the former Wellwisher's Why is Everybody, Anybody? are any indication.

    Confidently leading his band through rockers like Break me and epic ballads like Silver LInings, Ward is in control throughout the album's 10 tracks, even callingn the band off to tackle the haunting Sleepwalker along with his piano.  The evening is billed as featuring The Kris Ward Band, but htis is the singer-songwriter's baby all the way. 

    "I was tired of working with a band and having it collapse and rebuilding it and having it collapse again," Ward says.  "It is a band, but it's ultimately down to me."

    The same could be arguably said for Liz McDermott's role in The Banditas, a loud and brash combo that has gone from four-piece to duo to trio over the course of its existence, with McDermott's aggressive songs, shouted vocals and shouting guitar front and centre from Day One.  But as the band's long-overdue self-titled debut CD confirms she, guitarist Scott Terry (also by McDermott's side from the beginning, originally on drums) and drummer Colin Vincent are very much a unit, teaming together to assault the senses with songs far more melodic than the band's relentless hardcore-punk approach might at first suggest.  Even to the composer. 

    "It took me a couple of weeks listening to it pretty constantly, but I'm good with it," the notoriously reluctant-to-record McDermott confesses.  "There's nothing on there that I had the chance to do it over again I would change.  Well....not much."