Montag There Is a Voice

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About

The sixth phase of the Montag’s twelve-month project brings us ‘There Is A Voice’; a tribute to friend and mentor Trish Keenan of Broadcast who encouraged Montag to make music.  “The lyrics were inspired by emails that Trish sent me about two years ago now. One of them was describing a huge winter storm that happened in the UK. She was describing how the canal right by their home was all transformed, frozen, and that everything looked ‘quite alien’. But I also wanted to make the song about Trish’s voice, that voice that was present so often in my life. It had to be about her voice. “  In mood and texture ‘There Is A Voice’ is unmistakably reminiscent of Broadcast with vocals reverbed by the Roland Space Echo and 60s electronic samples, and really serves as a tribute to the music of Broadcast as much as it is to Trish’s voice.

The B-side, “Le Pavillon De La France”, came about as Montag had been working on an iPhone application that would serve as a guided tour of the site of Expo 67 in Montreal.  He was asked to write original music for the project and asked James Cargill to collaborate on a few tracks. The music intended to be a sound portrait of some of the pavilions still on the site today. Ninety pavilions were built representing countries from all over. The French Pavillion is now a casino which Montag feels is “a shame really because the building has a unique architecture. But the music was written so that we can really feel the language of the building’s architecture.” James’ “spaced-out arpeggios” are meant to represent the “spinning movement” that its metallic structure creates.

Artist Bio

Montreal’s Montag, otherwise known as DJ Antoine Bédard, launched his first record, Are You a Friend?, in 2002. The record was released on electronic music record label, Gooom Disques, which is also home to M83. Are You a Friend?’s dreamy and minimalistic sounds were soon noticed by France’s Les Inrocks. His extensive discography, which consists of two EPs and five records, demonstrates his composing abilities.  Bédard’s talent has sent him on major tours across the world.

The 2005 release of Alone, Not Alone (his first release on Carpark Records), received international praise, including a 7.8/10 rating from Pitchfork. His third release, Going Places (2007), was well-received in Japan where he toured with Au Revoir Simone and YACHT.

Through the years, Montag has performed live at a number of music festivals such as Mutek (Montréal), SXSW (Austin, TX), Sonorama (Guadalajara), Canadian Music Week (Toronto) and CMJ (New York).  He has shared the stage with Caribou, Broadcast, Feist, The Junior Boys, Lali Puna, Xiu Xiu and Stars among others. Montag regularly collaborates on visual art installations, theatre plays, art videos and other audio art projects.

In 2012, he conceived Audiosphere, an award-winning iPhone application that allows transit users to discover local artists with use of geolocalisation. In early 2013, he worked on the original score and sound design for Pascal Grandmaison’s Le jour des 8 soleils, presented as part of the event Luminothérapie in Montreal.

In parallel to his work in musical composition, Bédard has been producing various soundwalks that explore the relationship among sound, urban environment and history. He also co-hosts and spins at some of Montreal’s highly attended gay nights, Mec Plus Ultra and Audioporn Club.