I confess:I had never heard of We Are The Take before finding out that they were on the roster for the Peace Dot Love Festival '09, which will take place on June 18th, at the Kool Haus. However, after keeping their MySpace page open just long enough to irritate my roommates, I have come to the conclusion that it would be difficult to recommend just one track.

After I had finally agreed to lay-off the same six songs, I was told my both roommates that they were familiar with the band. They had actually never heard them play, but they had seen the bands' trademark pavement stamp all over Toronto.

I sipped martinis with Erik Alcock (guitar/lead vocals) and Andrew Hobbs (guitar/vocals) at what has become my favourite interview hotspot - Nirvana. Here we discussed these mysterious pavement paintings and why one of their tracks, Montreal Love Song, has close to 100,000 hits on MySpace, while the rest have under 20,000.

Hobbs had an answer for me regarding the random pavement paintings. His answer, as he put it, is the "politically correct version".

"We know that people are doing it and we approve of it, but we don't condone it. And we definitely don't have any idea who's doing it," he explained. Alcock went on to reveal that although he believes it's "totally illegal," it's definitely the environmentally friendly approach to promoting their band.

"We did so much postering the other day, and it's such a pain in the ass. I've done postering for three hours on the street and some guy can be like four blocks behind you doing the same thing, covering up everything you've just done. That's a lot of trees," he says.

We Are The Take have been around for about two years, and up until just recently, have been hitting the Toronto circuit heavily. Just recently they went into studio and recorded a complete album, but for now they have only released five tracks as a self-titled EP. They are holding out on the other recorded five for the time being.

Alcock adds: "Right now we're looking to get some kind of record deal, or someone to help us with distribution. We didn't want to release all of the tracks, because their wouldn't be much to entice a label."

I inquired about the obvious spike in hits for their track Montreal Love Song, which you can find on their MySpace page, and Hobbs filled me in: "Oh yeah, it was up on Degrassi High, it was crazy. It was in one of the episodes and it was nuts. It was licensed so long in advance that it caught us off guard."

Alcock is currently signed to EMI as a songwriter, so anything that he writes, or that he writes with the band, is immediately licensed for future use. Also, I should note that the Degrassi they speak of is Next Generation (Joey Jeremiah is all grown up, unfortunately).

The band has also had one of their tracks re-mixed into a hip-hop song by a rapper on Dr. Dre's label in L.A. "That was really weird, especially for a Toronto indie band like us. We are so... not gangster. Well, he is." [Alcock gestures at Hobbs, and Hobbs nods his head in assent].

I don't think Hobbs is really that gangster. He told me that he's a big Tragically Hip fan.

This will be Peace Dot Love's first festival, but orgainzers are hoping for it to be an annual event. It'll be all-ages, and other bands include, Dragonette, Rebel Emergency, and USS, as well a slew of others.

Photo by Carl Heindl