KULAS : TORONTO KATHEDRAL 6.2.02

Set list: Pavement, Sleep, The Only One, Glasgow Rain, Burning Down Hollywood, Starland, Hallellujah.

review by BRD

New haircut & colour (dark again rather than blond), new songs, and maybe a new career:  Michael Kulas returned to his adopted hometown of Toronto to play his first set of songs in the city in a number of years. Having spent the last five years recording and touring with James, and living in the UK, in the past year Michael has recorded and released his second solo album, "Another Small Machine" (ASM).  Over the next month or so, Michael will be doing a number of shows in his home province of Ontario to promote the "official" release in Canada of Another Small Machine. 

The first gig of this Kulas promotional tour was a rather low key, seven song, 40 minute long acoustic set which followed acoustic sets by two other local artists.  As I found out later, Michael's set was the last portion of the bimonthly "Lowdown Seminar", which he had done as a favour to a friend who puts on these events to give musicians the opportunity to meet industry people.   For me, the evening provided interesting contrasts to recent events: after having flown across the Atlantic to the UK in early December to see the last three shows of the (final?) James tour, tonight I drove a few kilometres to a local club to see Kulas; in the UK I had joined thousands of others to see James in seats about 30 to 100 metres from the stage and now I was sitting 10 metres away from Kulas with some tens of people.  Having become accustomed over the past five years to hearing Michael use his strong voice as a counterpoint and a complement to Tim Booth's, I had the opportunity this evening to hear his powerful, emotive voice all alone but for his acoustic guitar. 

To get the night rolling and work out the rough spots, Kulas broke in a new song, "Pavement", which he had demoed in Scotland November past.  Getting into a bit of a groove, Michael moved on to one of my favourite songs off ASM, "Sleep" which centres on the human condition.  Michael then played his trump card early, my favourite ASM track, "The Only One", substituting a new, striking humalong in the middle in place of the cd's electric guitar solo (I am hoping when he does a full band set later in February he will have some trademark Kulas backing vocals to further accent this one).  If there is a track on ASM with a "play me" label attached to it has to be "The Only One" - if there is any justice in the airwaves, local radio stations will be smart enough to respond as appropriate.  During the course of the evening Michael introduced us to two more new songs which he has demoed in Scotland: "Starland", a catchie Bowie-esque rocker (OK done solo acoustic); and "Glasgow Rain", a touching tune (as per Michael, after having spent a lot of time in Scotland you write a song like this.  If my brief experience in Glasgow is anything to go by, there should be some mention made of fog as well), where the opening vocals were a bit rough, but once he got going Michael blew the church doors out of the Kathedral.  Going back in time to his first cd, Kulas also had us all "Burning Down Hollywood". Having performed at a Toronto Jeff Buckley tribute a week and a half ago, Michael closed our night with a stirring take of Buckley's "Hallellujah". 

All in all, tonight's show was a blast despite being too short.  Limited by what one person can do with one powerful voice, one acoustic guitar and a full deck of strong songs, Michael came up aces [sorry but I couldn't resist the stale allegory].  I am looking forward to seeing his next acoustic set at Rancho Relaxo in Toronto February 16 as well as his full band set at his "record release party" at Toronto's the Rivoli on February 21.