BLIND COMMENTARY

Blind Commentary’s major takeaway for upcoming musicians was to avoid Band Mix. 

“It’s like Craig’s List for people,” said Liam Jones, one of the band members.

Sam Thomson, another member, wouldn’t recommend it. Instead he suggested that people interested in the music scene should go to shows and network there.

That’s how Malcolm Stensrud made his way into Blind Commentary.

The bandmates joked that he was a fan, a groupie, to which he laughed.

“Malcolm is basically my sibling,” said Liam Swenson, the drummer. “I can bully.”

During their interview, all four people played off each other for a whole 45 minutes; joking, laughing and sharing the floor to talk. 

They get along in the band, said Stensrud, who confirmed that he actually knew Swenson for years before joining. 

The cliff notes version of Blind Commentary coming together, according to Thomson, is that the band, which formed in 2022, met through multiple avenues. Jones and Thomson had run cross country together in high school, Swenson connected through Facebook and of course, Stensrud was a consistent show goer. 

“We’re all very similar people from very different paths,” said Thomson. 

And together they all agree that Band Mix is a sketchy site. 

For people looking to break into the local music scene, Blind Commentary suggests following in Stensrud’s footsteps. 

Swenson said that actively networking at shows is how the community supports each other. Starting conversation, asking questions and offering to help are all recommendations for people looking to be involved. 

Building off Swenson, Jones said that there’s a handful of musicians in different projects.

“So the bands, they kind of start to intertwine with artists,” said Jones. “We’re just a bunch of friends… just helping each other out.”

Going to another band’s show and staying around for the whole night, Stensrud said, is the polite thing to do. People will come out and support each other, and the biggest thing is returning the favour. 

“I think here it’s more creatives uplifting creatives,” said Stensrud. 

The bandmates also took time to shout out organizations like Sask Music, Beefy Records and Tooth & Nail Promotions.

It’s a handful of individuals and creatives that make the scene happen, said Jones, there’s people who take the time to put on shows for different bands every weekend, which keeps the scene going.  The group is also friends with older bands, which helped Blind Commentary when starting out. 

Stensrud expressed his agreement, “...the local artists here are incredible. They don’t have a lot of listeners or scope outside the province, but the talent here is incredible.”

And outside organizations and other bands, Blind Commentary finds that they have a supportive and diverse crowd. 

They play a lot of all ages shows, attracting different people from everywhere, said Swenson. From older millennials to young, queer people.

“Most of us in the band are queer,” said Stensrud, who found that the venues Blind Commentary performs at happen to be queer community spots. “I think maybe the music speaks volumes to the experiences of those people.”

Jones and Thomson followed up by noting that the band went out of their way to play at Saskatoon Pride last summer. 

The band is unapologetically themselves, said Thomson, from their performances to social media, they actively choose to present themselves that way. 

“Pride for us was a big deal,” said Jones. “... We have queer bandmates, and some of us are queer, so it meant a lot personally.”

The band agreed that their younger selves would be proud for taking that opportunity.

And only a few days after performing at Pride, the band’s first EP, eyes open and staring, dropped. The first single from the EP, frail, currently has over 12 000 streams on Spotify. 

The group considers eyes open and staring a collage of soundscapes, a collection of their old and new sounds. At the current, they describe their signature sound as a dynamic fusion of shoegaze, emogaze and grungegaze, infused with hardcore elements. 

“It’s not necessarily a cohesive, single planned out project,” said Stensrud. “But it’s more of us growing and experimenting and trying stuff.”

Thomson teased the next project, saying that it’s coming around the corner. They plan to take their time with it and make it the best version it could possibly be. 

“I think it’s going to be a large, cohesive collection of songs that I think better represent our sound,” said Thomson.

Jones added that audiences can expect the music to be more mature, emotional and a bit darker.

In the process of creating their first EP, Thomson said they incorporated a variety of different sounds. The next project can be expected to choose one or two ideas and not stray far from those paths.

The band recalled their experience recording eyes open and staring as a grind. Every day, the first few hours in the studio were spent setting up equipment and prepping. The group would break for lunch at Dairy Queen then return to the studio for several hours. 

Jones' personal favourite memory was when Swenson was in the vocal booth recording red mist. 

“Me, Malcolm and Sam were sitting in the production booth,” said Jones “... And we’re just listening to them sing, we’re just like Jesus fucking Christ, like this human can fucking sing.”

Stensrud said it was the most insane vocals he’d ever heard.

Swenson, who had a smile of their face, told the group to stop stroking their ego. They said that their vocal technique comes from grunge, metal and emo influences. 

However, Thomson’s favourite memory was when Jones ran a marathon the morning before a recording session and still managed to be the first one at the studio.

Stensrud was supposed to give Jones a lift, but the marathon had shut down part of the city, so Jones ended up running to the studio and beating Stensrud there. 

The group laughed when recalling the memory, joking about his track and field background. 

“Generally, we’re close friends making music,” said Thomson. “...We’re just very close knit, and that’s kind of the strength of why we keep playing and why we do all these shows, cause we just enjoy it.”

Outside of their shows, the band juggles work, academics and personal life. The group is all in their early twenties; “We’re still kind of figuring out how to live,” said Swenson.

Blind Commentary has been very busy this past year, but spending time with each other and getting ready to make new sounds keeps them close and fully in the moment.

By: K.Levesque