By Will McGuirk
Juno nominees Dizzy, have had a head spinning ride since signing to Royal Mountain Records in 2015 and releasing their debut album ‘Baby Teeth’ last year. It has been a giddy giddy-up for Katie Munshaw and the Spencer brothers, Alex, Charlie and Mackenzie, taking them in a matter of months from their north Oshawa basement rehearsals to the international festival circuit and now two nominations in the 2019 Junos. It also means they have been busy touring Canada, the USA and Europe and away from playing any sort of homecoming gig for quite a while. But Munshaw has told me Dizzy will be home in the Spring, playing the Oshawa Music Hall Tuesday Apr 23 as part of their tour with fellow Juno nominees, Tokyo Police Club.
TPC are also named in the same Juno Alternative Album of the Year category as Dizzy but Munshaw isn’t thinking of awards or competitors as of yet. She is more just in awe of the opportunity to play with one of her fave bands she says.
“I've loved Tokyo Police Club before Dizzy existed,” she says. “To be nominated alongside them and to be going on tour with them through Ontario in April is a lot for me to wrap my head around. It gives you the sort of feeling of ‘How did we trick everyone into thinking we belong up there with people that we've looked up to for years?’”
Two nominations however indicates this is no trick; Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me, as the all-knowing They say. Munshaw’s modesty may be honest but it is misplaced. The band have been gaining critical acclaim since the Royal Mountain record deal. Britain’s NME gave the ‘Baby Teeth’ record 3/5 Stars and they have been building fans the old-fashioned way, playing their indie aired bed-sit blues tunes live. Performing at Britain’s Great Escape fest, billed as Europe’s festival for new music, helps.
As well as the Alternative Album nod they have been nominated in the Breakthrough Album of the Year category. The awards will be handed out March 16 and 17 in London, ON. with Canadian superstar and founder of the all-female line-up Lilith Fair Sarah McLachlan hosting. For a young woman such as Munshaw working in the music business, McLachlan’s trail blazing career has been an inspiration.
“I think Sarah McLachlan is a huge part of any Canadian music lovers family. Her songs were played at every wedding, graduation, funeral I’ve ever been to,” says Munshaw. “I remember seeing her at a show in Toronto in 2003. I would have been 8 or 9 at the time. Getting to see a woman on stage slamming on the piano and singing words that came straight from her own brain- and not a group full of male writers- it flips a light switch in your head. Seeing that kind of representation confirms to the writer and to the listener that girls can write and perform their own stories and people will listen.”
Folks are clearly listening to Katie Munshaw and her band of brothers and one can expect we will continue to hear more and more from Dizzy. And fingers crossed they will have some hardware to share with their hometown fans come April.
