Charge of the Light Brigade brings sound to International Pop Overthrow in England.
Charge of the Light Brigade (from left) Luke Sneyd, vocals and guitar; Marc Koecher, keyboard; Owen Tennyson, drums; and Jason Eagan, bass and vocals are set to perform at the Toronto edition of the International Pop Overtrow in November.
Photo/COURTESY
The poem The Charge of the Light Brigade by Alfred Lord Tennyson, praising the brigade while recognizing the futility of the charge, resonated so much with a Parkdale-based band that they took the poem's name as their own.
"When you are a musician you strongly believe in what you are doing and the cause of your music but we are journeyman musicians," said Luke Sneyd, guitarist/songwriter for the band. "We have been doing this for a while so there is just a hint of fatalism about what we are doing."
Charge of the Light Brigade, an alternative band that amalgamates a punk, prog and pop sound, is comprised of Luke Sneyd, vocals and guitar; Jason Eagan, bass and vocals; Marc Koecher, keyboard; and Owen Tennyson, drums. It evolved out of Sneyd's solo music project.
"Basically the guys that I had been playing with started to evolve into a more organic thing," Sneyd said. "We were becoming a band as opposed to it being my solo thing."
The men reinvented themselves in December of 2009 to acknowledge the collective and went on to play around Toronto as Charge of the Light Brigade.
Koecher, who plays keyboard in the band, also runs MK SoundWorks, a recording studio in High Park. The band recorded their first EP, We Haven't Been Properly Introduced, and debut full-length album, The Defiant Ones, there. The Defiant Ones was released in March.
In spite of that "hint of fatalism" that comes with working in the music industry, the band soliders on, picking up steam as they go. In fact, they just returned from a trip over seas where they participated in a power pop festival called the International Pop Overthrow in Liverpool.
"It is actually a festival that takes place (in) different cities all over the place at different times of the year," Sneyd said. "But the Liverpool one is the biggest."
The festival was eight days long and featured 140 bands, the best pop acts from around the world, and it is run out of The Cavern Pub, the famed venue that gave The Beatles their start.
"It was pretty cool," Sneyd said. "There is so much history associated with it and there are plaques and pictures up on the walls."
Beyond the Beatles, there are a host of associations with the club will all manner of artists drifting through there on their way up in the industry, he said.
"(Paul) McCartney still plays there once a year," Sneyd said. "It was pretty neat to be brushing up against all of that. It has a really good energy in terms of the people who are there to support the music."
The music scene is quite different in England, said Eagan, who, along with Sneyd, live in the downtown west end.
"Live music plays a different role in the culture in England, particularly in Northern England," Eagan said. "People aren't offended by live music. If they see that a band is setting up, they are more likely to go in and sit down."
Eagan said he has found audiences in England are a little less reserved and more willing to show when they are enjoying the music.
"They will dance and yell complementary things while you are playing," Eagan said. "And they will come up and talk to you after the show."
Charge of the Light Brigade is scheduled to play at the Hard Rock Cafe at Yonge and Dundas July 8 and plans are in the works to play the Toronto edition of the International Pop Overtrow in November.