Montreal under cover band Clues visit Guelph

Montreal's Clues will play the eBar along with Etaoin Shrdlu tonight at 10pm. Photo by Yannick Grandmont.

Clues, the five piece multi-instrumental indie pop band that hail from the vibrant city of Montreal, will bring their unique brand of jittery pop to the Royal city tonight at the eBar. Opening for Clues will be Etaoin Shrdlu.

Clues has been laying low in the Montreal music scene, carefully crafting a sound that they are the originators of since 2007. Started by Alden Penner formerly of Unicorns, and Brendan Reed formerly of Arcade Fire, the group gained three more members and started playing small venues and house shows around Montreal.

With a highly theatrical and frantic set, their stage show is as intriguing as their name. Throughout the set, band members switch instruments like a game of musical chairs, only without the chairs, and the weird array of electronics on stage (including an old Commodore 64) give the group a unique backdrop to set their vocals on.

Clues first full length, self-titled album was released earlier this year on Constellation Records and received critical acclaim and much attention from outside of Montreal.

In 2008, Clues put a lot of their energy into creating and launching VillaVillaNola.com, an online music store where users can digitally download albums for a fraction of the price you would pay elsewhere. The site gives local underground Montreal artists an outlet to sell their albums, where one may not have been available before.

Openers for the evening, Etaoin Shrdlu are a band from Toronto with a funny name that has no real pronunciation. Etaoin Shrdlu is the approximate order of frequency of the twelve most commonly used letters in the English language, and is a non sense phrase sometimes accidentally printed on Linotype machines.

Etaoin Shrdlu was originally a side project put together by a number of talented musicians from different bands around Southern Ontario. The group explores a style of instrumentation that has been lost in recent years and could be described as classical hardcore. Etaoin Shrdlu will be playing the eBar tonight in support of their debut album, Mating Calls.