The Neighbourhood Mixtape: Quiet Hours

The Neighbourhood Mixtape is a collection of newly-released songs by Toronto musicians. The mixtape is meant to celebrate Toronto's music culture and provide a forum to listen to and discover new local music.

Every Sunday, I post a five-track mixtape - giving each song my own impressions - that you can download or stream as a soundtrack for the week.

Track #1: Grey Kingdom, "Born 1941" & "She Came from Spencer"

We begin our collection this week with two songs by Grey Kingdom - both a couple minutes in length. In "Born 1941", Spencer Burton summons the image of a desolate town and a desert sun that scorches through your shirt just before he serenades you with "She Came from Spencer".

Track #2: Northernists, "For Mama and the Lourie"

Cole and Hannah live apart, separated only by the easternmost of the Great Lakes. They make their music when one comes to visit the other. "For Mama and the Lourie" is like a sung letter between them, a song that drowns the room. The bird songs can come from anywhere.

Track #3: Lou Canon, "Heart Of"

"Heart Of" sounds like the middle of a love story, full of love conceits and displays of affection. The instrumental arrangement moves like a chase, as Lou Canon calls out to her lover, "Come on hear my call" - like Venus to her Adonis.

Track #4: Abigail Lapell, "Paper"

It's easy to picture "Paper" being just as beautiful without Abigail Lapell's vocals. Instead, Lapell's voice washes up against her thick picks of guitar, whispering the haunting lyric, "I want to be your island breeze / ashes, ashes to the seas" into an imaginary shell.

Track #5: Philip James, "Nostalgia"

When I was young, I could dream and imagine things the way I wanted them to be. My notebooks were filled with sketches of houses built on top of another like squatters, and people could see what everyone was doing like in "Rear Window". "Nostalgia" sounds like the construction of those worlds. I built serpentine bridges, where stick figures would climb up to and jump down.

If you wish to be a part of The Neighbourhood Mixtape, you can contact Aldrin at aldrin [at] blogto [dotcom]