Stories, songs, and cider
Downtown Guelph was bustling on Saturday, Feb. 8 with the many events occurring as part of the Hillside Inside Festival. Amongst all the action, many festival-goers sought out an intimate event: ‘Lit Music: The Broken Social Scene Story Project’ at Planet Bean. The café was packed to the front door with literature and music lovers getting up close to the talented contributors of the evening. The whole event was an extension of the Broken Social Scene Story Contest which occurred earlier in 2013. This writing contest challenged Canadian writers to compose a piece inspired by songs of the definitive Canadian-indie band, Broken Social Scene. The top three writers – Jane Ozkowski, Shari Kasman and Jesse McLean – shared their stories at the Lit-Music event and were paired with the Darcys, who covered Broken Social Scene’s tracks.
The Darcys are a Toronto-based band signed by Broken Social Scene’s label, Arts & Crafts. Two of the bandmates offered this free cover show to the crowd, which acted as a prelude to their later show with July Talk. Accompanied by a synth-maker, the Darcys created a dreamy environment for the crowd, accentuating the imaginative stories of the writers. The band played the songs “Looks Just Like the Sun,” “Pacific Theme,” and “Cause=Time” to supplement the stories of each writer.
McLean was the first writer to read his work, inspired by “Looks Just Like the Sun.” His story described a man’s strange plan to dig a six-by-twenty foot hole in his backyard. This story was deemed “the best use of the song title in the contest” by the jury.
The next story was read by Kasman, who took the song “Pacific Theme” as inspiration for a stay-cation. Her humorous story depicted a dreamt-up road trip across the states with her pal Maury. The story stayed true to the kitschy beats of the song, with Hawaiian shirts and silly banter. As a midpoint, Shari’s piece was a great relief from the contrasting themes of the other stories.
Last but not least, Ozkowski read her tale, titled “Cause=Time.” The story followed the protagonist’s desperate wish for a new life in an apocalyptic world. In Ozkowski’s wacky world, people are turning into fish at every moment and the sky rains spoons and light bulbs. This imaginative story kept the whole crowd attentive with a sense of eerie anticipation. Her story eluded to the Broken Social Scene song with the cryptic line “Cause = Time, Time = God?”
The night was a great opportunity to immerse oneself with the talent of local writers. If you want to check out some of the night’s literature, each of the story-tellers have their work featured in the collaborative book, Broken Social Scene Story Project.