Last night we had the honour of playing Toronto’s North by Northeast music festival as part of the Random Science showcase. We had the opportunity to share the stage with some of Toronto, Montreal and New York’s best artists including: The Clear, Hexes and Ohs, NLX, Airheart and Purrr.

We met a heap of great people, sold some Hold Back Light Show albums and got some great press (more on that still to come).  Thanks to everyone who came out, lent us your energy and made the night a huge success!

Available now is the newly finished track, Five Alarm!

As with all the songs in the Beta Collection, we are giving it away for free!  All you have do to is go to www.winhara.com and click on the link under the ‘Free Downloads’ heading.  You can also stream it right away in the music section.

Make sure you sign up for our newsletter so you get all the updates on free music and free shows right away!

From 8:00pm to 11:00pm we will be setting up camp at Yonge and Dundas Square to promote our upcoming NXNE showcase (Saturday June 19 at the Bread and Circus.  Info here).

On stage at that time will be Sloan, K-Os and Said the Whale.  So drop by say hi and grab a t-shirt and cd (only $10 each).

We continue work on our second album, Beta Collection, and have just received the latest mix of our newest addition – an upbeat track called Five Alarm.  While ‘road testing’ this song it has received extremely positive feedback, more from the movement of the audience than anything else.

If all goes according to plan, we will be releasing this track for free download via our website sometime next week before our showcase at North by Northeast on Saturday night.

In the meantime we have posted a live version of ‘God Save the Queen,’ recorded at our recent show at C’est What.  Listen to it now!

This year we will be part of a showcase at Toronto’s annual NXNE music festival.  We will be taking the stage Saturday June 19th at the Bread and Circus with other electro/rock/pop acts including The Clear, Hexes and Ohs, NLX, Airheart and Purrr.

This promises to be an amazing evening (we are equally excited to watch the other acts as we are to play) so don’t miss out.  More details to follow…

We sat down with Graeme of OntheGOinTo, an excellent Toronto entertainment blog, to talk about everything from writing to releasing new songs to the state of the music biz.

Click this link to see Winhara’s chat with excellent entertainment blog, OntheGOinTO.

Free Download:

Come On Over – Download

Or visit: winhara.com

Behind the Scenes Video:

Lyrics:

I was inspired today by the deep and thoughtful preachings of Ke$ha’s song “Dinosaur”

“Dinosaur”

[Chorus:]
D-I-N-O-S-A-U-R
You are a dinosaur
D-I-N-O-S-A-U-R
You are a dinosaur
O-L-D M-A-N
Your just an old man
Hitting on me what?
You need a cat scan

[Verse 1:]
Old man, why are you starrin’ at me, mack on me and my friends?
It’s kinda a creepy
You should be prowling around the Old folk’s home
Come on dude!
Leave us alone

At first we thought that it was kind of ill when
We saw that you were like a billion
And still out tryin’ to make a killin’
Get back to the museum

[Chorus:]
D-I-N-O-S-A-U-R
You are a dinosaur
D-I-N-O-S-A-U-R
You are a dinosaur
O-L-D M-A-N
Your just an old man
Hitting on me what?
You need a cat scan

Hey dinosaur, baby you’re pre-historic
Hey dinosaur, that’s what you are HA
Hey carnivore, you want my meat I know it
Hey dinosaur, that’s what you are HA
Yea, you’re pretty old

[Verse 2:]
Not long til’ your a senior citizen
And you can strut around with that sexy tank of oxygen
Honey your toupee is fallin’ to your left side
Get up and go bro!
Oh wait your fossilized HA!

Then you offered me a martini
Walk away with your hips with in sinking
Then you say, Honey wanna come with me
I’m about to barf seriously

[Chorus:]
D-I-N-O-S-A-U-R
You are a dinosaur
D-I-N-O-S-A-U-R
You are a dinosaur
O-L-D M-A-N
Your just an old man
Hitting on me what?
You need a cat scan

Hey dinosaur
baby, you’re prehistoric
Hey dinosaur
That’s what you are HA!
Hey carnivore
you want my meat, I know it
Hey dinosaur
That’s what you are HA!

Hey dinosaur baby,
you’re prehistoric
Hey dinosaur
That’s what you are HA!
Hey carnivore
you want my meat, I know it
Hey dinosaur
That’s what you are HA!

D-I-N-O-S-A
You are a dinosaur
D-I-N-O-S-A
That’s what you are HA!
D-I-N-O-S-A
You are a dinosaur
D-I-N-O-S-A
That’s what you are HA!

Her album Animal is hilarious…I just hope that’s what she was going for cause…well…wow!

Along with writing and recording “the beta collection” we’re also drawing up blueprints for a new live show – literally. Dan has already produced at least six different stage plots for us to discuss / try out. We’ve also been discussing lighting setups and other great visual ideas to add to our show. We’ve been away from the live stage for a while now and I can tell the three of us are overly eager to get back at it – but before we do we want to ensure that we are bring out 100% possible best to the stage. And we’re drawing on our long list of past concert experiences for guidance.
After attending the recent Muse concert (which was amazing) Dan and I started a discussion about our favourite concerts of all time – and what made them so. In the end we both were of the understanding that all the smoke and lights and visuals were nice, but it was the showmanship and songs that held our attention long after the concert was over. He spoke vividly of a Pearl Jam concert in a tiny hockey rink in small town Ontario where the band played past curfew and Eddie Vedder “threw his heart on the stage and stomped on it – like here you go, this is rock and roll.” And the Coldplay performance during their Rush of Blood to the Head tour when Chris Martin held so many thousands captive with his every word and movement.
I recalled Silverchair’s Diorama tour, still my favourite concert to date, in which everything, sounds, lights, performers, worked as one to create and amazing sonic and visual spectacle. And of a young upstart band called Say Anything I witnessed play a total of FOUR songs and fell in love. They weren’t even listed on the bill and had just released their debut “say anything…is a real boy”(which if you don’t own it run out and buy it NOW NOW NOW) but were the best band of the night. They had no flashy stage set up or props, but commanded attention, even when falling on patch chords, and had more than enough energy to light the city of Montreal for weeks after that night.
It was the interaction between the crowd and the band on those nights that made them what they were – not the pyrotechnic effects. Sure we’re working on lights and other on stage set ups, but mostly we’re working on our show to ensure that we can create that amazing connection between everyone, every time we hit the stage, with great energy and great music.

In 2008 we released an album entitled Hold Back Light Show.  We want to know which of these songs are your favourites so that we can make sure to keep them in the live set!  Thanks for taking the time give us some feedback!

These songs can be streamed on our MySpace page.

Hold Back Light Show is available on iTunes.