JANUARY 2009 - BILLBOARD - FEATURE

Neil Haverty isn’t exactly sure where his band Bruce Peninsula fits in the context of Canadian music. The singer’s blues howl, coupled with the band’s grandiose choir-meets-Polyphonic-Spree tendencies make Bruce Peninsula decidedly unique in a market used to noisy guitars and sing-song vocals.

“We are a group of friends all coming from scattered suburbs,” Haverty says from his day job at
distributor Outside Music. “We came together in a completely organic way. It was important for us not to play to one specific thing.”

So there are elements of old-time blues, Tom Waits-style artiness and modern indie rock all incorporated in the band’s debut, “A Mountain Is a Mouth,” released Feb. 3 on the act’s own Bruce Trail Records.

Haverty says the group, which on occasion has included up to 15 individuals but has a core of five
members, wanted to boil down the essence of the blues records it was listening to. The group then asked friends to come and join it for joyous singalongs when the band played live, a trend that continued onto the record.

The album has already won over bloggers from around the world (“Every day I open my e-mail
and there’s something new going on,” Haverty says), and the next step is to take the group out on the road, with select Ontario and Quebec shows next week.