Tuesday, December 01, 2009

Mackenzie MacBride - Believe in Love (Mysterious Ways) - Music Video - Official

Welcome to the music video for "Believe in Love (Mysterious Ways)"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZU_quyVY9s

A song of hope for all the world to sing!

People have mentioned that this song and video have helped them "scrape themselves off the driveway" of heartache so to speak, so that makes me feel like my dream encouraging hopefulness, despite the odds, is coming true.In some ways I feel I was naive when I made this video, in others ways, I know I am right to still believe... During the film shoot, there were many vivid moments for me. Moments that cut the air like diamonds when they fell. Moments that were too "meant to be" to be coincidence. So many moments that I had to put this video away for a long time. I make art mostly "to understand", and at a point, in the case of this video, I felt I no longer understood. Now, this time later, I better understand all of those events, or at least have accepted them. So here you go.

Synopsis:

(Ofcourse whatever you get out of it is great... who's the artist to say...)One possible interpretation is:

The film follows the journey of a woman as she climbs out of heartache and slowly floats up into the hope that she can still find true love.The womans emotional journey is symbolized by her travelling through the cold, bleak and empty streets of earth towards the top of a mountain.On the path the woman finds essentials that she thinks will help her overcome heartache: truth, as symbolized by the see through ya dynamic of the glass mannequin head, willingness to love again, as referenced by the 1980s heart shaped earrings, and music, as depicted by the tiny red accordion known as Cherry Supreme.To her surprise, slowly but surely, she also finds the most important treasure of all, a hopeful spirit, as symbolized by being given feathers for her bare, neglected wing.

She eventually finds enough feathers to fill her entire wing, makes it to the top of the mountain, dances with the angels of love, and flies free of her misery into a sky full of promise.The subtext of the film is the exploration of whether the relationships between shopkeepers and people who've struggled to make real friends are ones of commerce, sincere friendship, mutual self-preservation, or all of the above. (Not these particular shopkeepers, who are obviously cool.)If you like the video then you're invited to join the Mackenzie MacBride Facebook Page which is linked below.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Mackenzie-MacBride/10503822505

If you like ths song you can buy it for 99 cents on iTunes., also linked below.

http://itunes.apple.com/us/album/believe-in-love-mysterious-ways/id294579937?i=294580003&ign-mpt=uo%3D4

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Pride Toronto 2009 Part 2 Mackenzie MacBride Montage

Welcome to the video montage for the Pride Toronto 2009 Concert (Part 2)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5Z65IUbFtU

Part 2 of a Montage of songs from Mackenzie MacBride's Pride Toronto 2009 showcase. The songs performed are, "Learn To Crawl", "Born In The Flames" and, "Believe In Love." Includes behind the scenes footage of Mackenzie sharing her comments, which are by turns heartfelt, sharp and whimsical. In Part 2 she continues to talk about her journey as a person and a musician. A rare expose into the world of Canada's woman of "Heart Music". Check out Part 1 as well.

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Pride Toronto 2009 Part 1 Mackenzie MacBride Montage

Welcome to the video montage for the Pride Toronto 2009 Concert (Part 1)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfnmZpWLU_Q

Part 1 of a Montage of songs from Mackenzie MacBride's Pride Toronto 2009 showcase. The songs performed are, "Curtains Came Down", "I'm Not Marilyn Monroe" and, "Your Flowers Are Still Alive." Includes behind the scenes footage of Mackenzie sharing her comments, which are by turns heartfelt, sharp and whimsical. In Part 1 she talks about her journey as a person and a musician. Of Note: At 7 mins 30 secs, a Random bouquet is handed to Mackenzie at the moment she's about to sing, "Your Flowers Are Still Alive" in memory of Alexandrea Tucker. (Angels at work? We think so!) A rare expose into the world of Canada's woman of "Heart Music". Check out Part 2 as well.

Sunday, June 28, 2009

Mackenzie MacBride - Music Video - I'm Not Marilyn Monroe

Welcome to the music video for the song, "I'm Not Mariln Munroe"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEjtPNvylPU

Well, to start with, the tiny accordion, "Dusty Diamond" glitters mysteriously at 5:21. (Unscripted glimpses of the sublime...)

The plot of the music video, "I'm Not Marilyn Monroe" is a sort of "return home", and a first walk on the beach for the character who has been away for years. Essentially, she comes back to find her beach, after having found herself. While there, she reunited with a person of significance who she has not been in contact with in a long time. (In real life, this video is the live filming, not a recreation, of Mackenzie MacBride's return to her beach for the first time in almost 10 years.)

The music, lyrics and video have little to do with mainstream pop, rock, indie music, folk etc and everything to do with outsider music and the glamour, quirk, and audatiousness of counter culture art.Featured in this video is the first little stretch of Mackenzie MacBride's secret beach. While she is rumoured to have handed out over 5000! touist guide books in her time, not once did she give anyone the directions to the red sands of her heart."I'm Not Marilyn Monroe" is from the album, "An Outsider's Heart", which can be purchased real cheap from iTunes by following this link: http://www.apple.com/search/ipoditunes/?q=mackenzie%2Bmacbride

Monday, May 18, 2009

Pride Toronto - Saturday June 27 th @ 6:20 pm

I will perfrom at 6:20 pm on Saturday June 27 th at Pride Toronto. Please check the schedule in June to determine the exact location if you would like to attend, which I hope you will. I will be performing songs that have never been played in public as well as some favourites. My goal for the performance is to offer the message that we all need to dance in life, even if we are missing a shoe.

Friday, May 15, 2009

May 15 – Death’s Chariot

( A short story about an ambulance ride .)

He says the smell of vomit is the worst part of the job for him. Out of all of the grotesque sights he’s seen working as what he calls, “an ambulance guy” for 26 years: blood, tears, death, it is smell of kindergarten classes during flue season that turns his stomach the most.

At first he doesn’t like me much: just a lip glossed woman with a cell phone glued to he ear after a traffic accident. The people in the city bus had been hollering to the driver that he had turned the wrong way for the #14, and he had been hollering back in a thick accent that he’d been driving the #5 all morning, and the people were yelling back, “right bus, wrong way” when the screech of metal on metal at 70 kms an hour began tearing through the air like ravens with steel tipped wings. A shiny half tonne truck, that was distinguished by it’s odd plum colour paint job, more so than having been jacked up on monster truck shocks, skidded along the side of the bus like an amateur snow bunny down a picturesque peak in the Alps. Inside the sensation was like being in a sardine can and having the metal lid peeled off. It was only later that I pieced together that the accident had been caused by a garden-variety traffic fuck up: the bus driver not checking his blind spot.

The ambulance guy tells me he’s seen, “more than what the average person sees, that’s for sure.” He doesn’t elaborate, other than to say dealing with people’s emotions is another hard part of his job. He mentions having to go to tell old people that their spouse of 50 years is dead. “That’s not easy.” A voice calls out from a loud speaker, “Female patient. Vomiting blood. Her co-worker is with her.” “A lot of times it’s not as bad as it sounds,” he says dryly.

Overhead there’s a sign that says, “Think Hypo-something-or-other” and offers a “Top 5 Signs” of this medical predicament, which include “hematoma of the head”, “erratic breathing” and other indicators of the immanent separation of body and soul. I notice the discrepancy between the popular notion that if a person gets in an ambulance, that they will have made it into some well equipped medical haven, some safe house with bars on the windows to hold out the pain, a sanctuary where professionals pamper over them like a pedicure parlor. I could see death’s chariot offered no such appointments. With it’s metal framed cots and it’s walls lined with the same sort of metal cabinets found in an old man’s garage, it was clear that the Grim Reaper doesn’t “think you’re special.”

The ambulance guy himself is far from a tender passerby tending to a 5 year old’s freshly scraped knee. It’s not that he’s mean, it’s just that I can tell he’s, “on the job.” He’s like one of my singing teachers who said, “I don’t really care what your goals are”, in response to me sharing my fragile creative aspirations. There was a pay cheque at the end of these inconvenient human interactions, and these men were going to find it. The less the client confuses their needs as being the men’s primary motivator, the better for everyone involved.

The ambulance guy does take a bit more interest in me once he learns I volunteer at a campus radio station. I’m amazed to think anyone is actually listening. “I thought I was talking to the wall.” He says he thinks he’s heard my voice before as he passes me a single use plastic hot pack for my neck and then enough gauze to bandage two wounded soldiers to wrap the scalding little packet in. He ends up telling me his father plays the old time fiddle and his son has just started learning to chord on the guitar. “I never picked anything up,” he adds with a sort of twisting of his mouth and a distant look in his eye, that might suggest he’s hurt by this truth, but somehow it’s clear he doesn’t care. As we ride along in the rain I start telling him that I imagine that a lot of people die with a lot of resentment towards others, feuds between friends not fixed, lover’s quarrels unresolved, loved ones not on speaking terms, regret for what could have been, and bitterness burning in their soul. (I think about my own life.) The ambulance guy offers only, “Things happen fast.”

By the time the door opens at the “Emergency” entrance to the hospital, I’m still thinking of what song I’ll dedicate to the ambulance guy next time I volunteer at the radio station. After hours in the waiting room observing the misery of the human condition juxtaposed against subtitled soap operas playing on muted tv sets, I see the doctor. Secondary diagnosis: “whiplash”. Primary diagnosis, “ Keep on trying to find joy, to the point that you “become joy.” The night before hadn’t I just been visiting with some new-agers with wine glasses in their hand saying, “You don’t have time to educate people, or hold his hand or give him therapy about how he finds his feelings for you too inconvenient to deal with. Life’s too short!” Now these facts are made true all over again by the glint of the ambulance’s mustard yellow paint job that was still flickering in my eyes. Back outside the sun has come out. I ditch the single use hot pack and began to feel fairly refreshed after my reminder of the temporary nature of mortal life. . From what I saw, the Grim Reaper doesn’t have any time for “poor me” routines, so neither should I. It was time to get on with things. As I rode along on a bus destined for downtown I thought: “There’s no particular “key” in your head to turn to “get on with things” - that’s true - but all the same, try to “hot wire” it.

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Thank you - Top 10 on CHUO Radio In March 2009

My album, "An Outsider's Heart reached the Top 10 on the University of Ottawa's CHUO campus radio station during the last week of February / first week of March, 2009. thank-you to the djs who played the songs and to people who phoned in and requested the songs. My goal in music these days is to make music for whoever is meant to hear it, and get benefit from it. I hope you're hearing the songs if you are meant to, and they are making you happy.

Saturday, February 21, 2009

IN The SAW-NA

After four months of working on it my music video for the song "Believe In Love" will be screened on Thursday (February 26, 2009.)

The last part of the video editing had Pixie and I sitting in the editing suite for 9 hours. We ended up calling it "the SAW-NA." All it was missing was hot rocks, steam, and some starched towels.

At one point I burst out of the room and started confessing I thought that one of the resident video guys made me weak in the knees. It became an episode of "True SAW-NA" confessions. Everyone had a laugh, and a good sweat.

I really hope you will all enjoy the video and it will inspire you to "Believe In Love" in your own lives, despite whatever obstacles, and heartaches you have faced.

It's a message of hope, so please think of coming out to the SAW Gallery on Thursday. The screening of the film is at 10 pm. I've decided not to put the video on You Tube for an indefinite period, so this will be one of the only times to see the film, especially on the big screen, for the foreseeable future.

Friday, February 20, 2009

You're Invited!

Mackenzie's Music Video for "Believe In Love"

will be premiered on the big screen at SAW Video on Thursday Feb. 26, 2009.

PRESS RELEASE

SAW Gallery presents:

Band of Outsiders
(Music/Arts - Exhibit )

Thursday, February 26, 2009 at 8:00pm

Exhibition opening and Outsider Art Fair:

Curators: Stefan St-Laurent (Ottawa) and Ainsley Walton (Ottawa)

A refreshing look at the influences of outsider art on contemporary art practices, the smash exhibition Band of Outsiders brings together 13 emerging and established artists from the Ottawa and Gatineau regions, some of whom will be exhibiting their works for the first time! Expanding upon the definition of outsider art, the exhibition includes a wild array of contemporary, folk, intuitive and naïve art, displaying the personal and visionary work of Angie the Barbarian, Irene B., JeanGuy, JP Danys, Marika Jemma, Anne Johnson, Karen Jordan, Mike Hewko, Trevor Laalo, Ron Noganosh, Rene Price, Herman Ruhland and Tina Tolgyesy.

Band of Outsiders highlights include:

An Outsider Art Fair during the exhibition opening with the participation of Canteen,
H'Art of Ottawa, Nomad Gallery and La Petite Mort Gallery. Presented by Galerie SAW Gallery and La Petite Mort Gallery.

the Fair will also feature the special launch of Mackenzie MacBride's newly released album An Outsider's Heart and the world premiere of the video for her début single “Believe in Love”

Galerie SAW Gallery
67, rue Nicholas Street
Ottawa, ON
www.galeriesawgallery.com
Contact Info Phone: 613 698 9205
Email: sawprogramming@artengine.ca

"Those works created from solitude and from pure and authentic creative impulses—where the worries of competition, acclaim and social promotion do not interfere—are, because of these very facts, more precious than the productions of professions. After a certain familiarity with these flourishings of an exalted feverishness, lived so fully and so intensely by their authors, we cannot avoid the feeling that in relation to these works, cultural art in its entirety appears to be the game of a futile society, a fallacious parade."
—Jean Dubuffet, on outsider art

Sunday, January 11, 2009



Go Get Your Pants On - New Mackenzie MacBride Album EP - Now Available

The new EP An Outsider's Heart (A Short Alt Rock Opera – Opus 5) is now available in stores (see store locations below) and online at ITUNES as a Limited Edition, for a limited time.

Yes, An Outsider's Heart
...

  • the playlist for rebels, shut-ins and skeptics, the sarcastic, the wretched, and the just plain fed up…
  • the soundtrack to add 27 minutes of intrigue and angst to a dull Sunday afternoon…
  • the sing-a-long mix tape for morning showers and evening battles with dirty dishes…

which was voted "Honourable Mention - Best Country Album" in the Ottawa Xpress Magazine 2008 Reader's Poll is now up for grabs.

An Outsider's Heart is, as the button on my hat says, "Here Today, Gone to Maui." So don't miss out.

Inside The Box, Outside The Lines:

This is a 5 song record I completed on Halloween Day 2008 that features a selection of the songs that were crowd favourites when I performed them live.

So, I present this record as a present and a souvenir to fans of music I've made, and a primer to those of you who are just now discovering the fun question marks "outsider music" can paint on your faces.

Dramatic Thematics:

The themes of the songs on An Outsider's Heart cut zig zags acrosss the front lawn of the human condition including:

  • Questions of whether love can be as intense as it was in high school, even as it stares it the face of park bench infidelity.
  • The lost and found of friends we hung out with in small apartments.

  • Moments of Marilyn Munroe-esque glory snatched away at their crescendo.
  • The frozen peas we jam into our ears, and other vices we jam into our hearts.
  • The rollings around on beds, dance floors and yoga mats that we do to try to come to grips with our searches for people and feelings that we've already found, but thrown away.

    Big News on Subversive Soundz:

    For the first time on any of my records, real acoustic instruments are played throughout An Outsider's Heart. From pianos to percussion, this is live heart music. The musicians were a group of excellent players that I located in various obtuse locations, including the dim corners of folk cafes, the practice rooms of university music programs and the blissed out jam sessions of hippie hangouts.

    As well, for the first time, this CD was professionally manufactured, so it will be sure to both play, and play real loud on your home stereo.

    Fine Print Reading List:

    There's also a booklet with all of the song lyrics (without typos) and pictures of me standing in a snow drift in my bare feet, like an idiot, I mean "artist."

    Genres, Influences and Punches:

    An Outsider's Heart was influenced by, and occasionally breaks bread with these genres:

  • Outsider Music
  • Alternative Country
  • Heart Music
  • Eccentric Story Songs
  • Freak Folk
  • Avant Pop

(those last two descriptions are new ones on me, that I read about in, of all places, Manitoba, so let's throw them in as well).

What It Aint:

A lot of the "chick with piano" CDs that I've bought recently technically "work", but at the end of the day are really just records to "pass the time"; they don't go anywhere other than the usual cliché "Baby Be Good To Me" places.

An Outsider's Heart is not meant to be "safe" background music for doctor's offices or public broadcasters. It's meant to match the gritty moments of your life, when you need heartfelt music and subversive singing to stir you into action, not put you back to sleep.

I'd also like to think that this CD is not the female equivalent to "Sad Bastard" music, as, contrary to the pablum of that genre, this record does have at least a unique character and a spirit of hope that is meant to inspire you "onward", even if you're missing a literal or metaphoric shoe.

If You Like:

If you like any of these artists, you would probably like parts of, or all of An Outsider's Heart

  • Dolly Parton
  • Regina Spektor
  • Antony & the Johnsons
  • Tracy Chapman
  • Bonnie "Prince" Billy

    Holdin' Your Own:

    The price on the store shelves in Ottawa is $7.99. In Toronto it's about $8.99. My father always used to say, "You don't like it because it's cheap!", which I guess is a mentality that does exist.

    So, even though my father was yelling about hamburgers at a Friendly's Restaurant when he leveled this enduring quote against snobs of commerce far and wide, I would like point out that I would only put this record out if I knew it could have some soul-value for people who are open to receiving it.

    Okay, it is cheap, I agree. For the price of a coffee shop snack you can have:
  • a new coffee table conversation piece
  • epic sing-a-longs
  • an artifact of Outsider Canadiana
  • some sounds of New York City's underground

    When I say, Limited Edition, Limited Time, I mean these record store locations have about three copies each, and the deal is once they are gone, they are gone.

    So I hope you will treat yourself and own An Outsider's Heart, the very first chance you get to go shopping this weekend.

    CD/ Hard Copy Locations:

    Ottawa, ON –


    Sounds Unlikely:
    5 Arlington Avenue
    Ottawa, ON
    (613) 565-1661

    Compact Music:
    785 1/2 Bank Street
    Ottawa, ON
    (613) 233-8922
    (Glebe Location Only)

    Toronto, ON –


    Criminal Records:
    493 Queen Street W Toronto, ON
    (416) 364-5380

    As well as other independent record stores in Toronto (shop around, or contact me if you need another location.)

    If you are not in Ottawa, ON or Toronto, ON, then for a limited time / limited quantity you can catalog order, "An Outsider's Heart" directly from:

    HMV Music Store (across Canada)
    Amazon.ca (Across North America)


    Digital Downloads:

    If you prefer a digital download of "An Outsider's Heart", the price is approximately $3.99 and is available from many online music retailers including these, and many more:

    ITunes – Available Worldwide

    Here is the direct link to get "An Outsider's Heart" from ITunes

    http://www.apple.com/search/ipoditunes/?q=mackenzie+macbride

    More Digital Download Options
    :

    OD2 (Loudeye) - Europe
    Pure Tracks - US and Canada
    R2G - China
    Rhapsody- World
    Rogers Wireless- Canada
    Sprint - US
    Virgin Mobil - US
    Virginmega.fr - France, Monaco