Fight For Your Right

Saturday night, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association held a benefit to raise awareness about the erosion of civil rights in Canada. CBC radio host Vish Khanna was the affable host for the evening. Veteran agitator Judy Rebick spoke passionately about continuing to fight for our rights, especially in the face of all the state abuses from the G20 summit here in Toronto. She might have gotten a few people interested, but I feel her words fell on mostly apathetic ears.

Dwayne Morgan started the evening with some rapid-fire spoken word poetry, primarily dealing with broken homes, absentee fathers, poverty, and 'living while black'. Treading close to rap, they were edgy and uncomfortable to the mostly white privileged audience but his slick, practiced delivery undermined their rawness to some extent. To lighten the mood, 3 dancers (Mitzy C, Karen the Belly Dancer, and Tanya Cheex) from The Great Canadian Burlesque came on to dance and tease. The larger stage gave them a chance to wield their entire arsenal including veils, boas, and feathered fans. Inspired by their performance, Toronto's poet laureate George Elliott Clarke stuck to sex-drenched poems from his books Red and Black.

The musical portion of the evening started with Maloo, Maylee Todd's chill electronica alter ego. Accompanied by two dancers, she played multi-layered musings backed by bloops and beeps. MINOTAURS came on stage, 9-strong including a 3 horn section. They played exclusively protest and social issues songs such as the the G20-inspired Open The Doors from their upcoming album. With poly-rhythmic beats and funky horns and synth, they seemed a wonderful nod to the funk bands of the 70s: musical and socially aware. Nathan Lawr, who organized the evening, was joined on stage by Sarah Harmer, noted singer-activist, and Ohbijou's Casey Mecija for two numbers.

The head-liner was Ohbijou, an Arcade Fire-esque band that often build a sparse song into an anthemic number. Though they did sing love-lorn songs including the pitiful Barking At Your Door, they also had social issues tunes such as Balikbayan, an ode to all the Filipino caregivers who leave their children behind to care for other people's kids. Before a raging encore, in which Casey had bleeding fingers from ripping out the guitar chords, cellist Anissa Hart and pianist Ryan Carley played the Game of Thrones theme as a dare. To the amazing of both the other band members and the audience, a few tentative bars turned into a full song.