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We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.
Nous remercions le Conseil des arts du Canada de son soutien.
Folk-roots-vocal ensemble The Fugitives release No Help Coming!
The band has earned a reputation for unforgettable live shows, brimming with complex harmonies, infectious storytelling, and top-notch musicianship.
The Fugitives are an acoustic folk-roots group headed by songwriters Adrian Glynn and Brendan McLeod. They’re joined by banjo player Chris Suen (Viper Central) and violinist Carly Frey (The Coal Porters). Over their first five albums, they’ve amassed a JUNO nomination, 6 CFMA nominations, and toured extensively through Canada, Europe, and the UK.
Performance highlights include major Canadian folk festivals, a Glastonbury performance, and a tour supporting Buffy Sainte-Marie. In 2020, the band created RIDGE, a WW1-centered theatre show. Ridge has been performed at theatres across Canada and was named a Globe & Mail Top Arts Pick of the Year.
New Album: No Help Coming
No Help Coming is about the climate emergency. This might seem like a strange leap after The Fugitives’ last album, which centered on WW1 soldier songs—but the band actually sees a lot of similarities between the projects. On their last album, they were drawn to soldier lyrics because they were as humorous as they were harrowing. “It was the voice of people in the thick of things,” says Brendan McLeod, one-half of the Fugitives’ songwriting duo. “All the reading we did around the climate lacked this kind of playfulness. Part of that is the seriousness of the topic, but another part seemed like a lack of immediacy. That society still doesn’t feel, or talk, or act, like we’re in it.”
No Help Coming constantly reminds us that we’re in it. The normal human stuff takes place—fraught friendships (“Dead Money”), career changes (“Wing and a Prayer”), coping mechanisms (“Not Burning Out”), romance (“It Might Just Rain Like This For Days”)—but all under the spectre of environmental disaster. “There’s still a tendency to create in a vacuum,” says Adrian Glynn, The Fugitives other songwriter. “To write a love song as if our province wasn’t engulfed in smoke. Or, to write just about that smoke, and not about being in love at the same time as you’re breathing it in.”
By combining climate concerns with everyday concerns, No Help Coming grapples with a global phenomenon through the personal lenses of its four members—and they tracked the record accordingly. The band, minus percussion and an organ, plays every instrument. Everyone sings lead at some point, background at others. Thanks to Vancouver producer Tom Dobrzanski, the overall sound is highly polished, but there are also live off-the-floor takes, song snippets from jam sessions, and voice memo recordings.
The result is an upbeat album that’s both cautionary and uplifting. “Leading up to the recording, we asked environmental experts what was missing from the conversation,” says McLeod. “And they all said the same thing: no more sad songs. We know the world’s messed up. What’s missing are more invitations to get real about making changes. And to do that, we have to get less precious about the subject.”
No Help Coming is more playful than precious. This makes sense, seeing it’s not about the survival of the planet, which will be just fine without us (“After You’re Gone”, “Ash”), but humanity. “It’s an album about resolve,” says Glynn. “It’s upbeat because there’s a lot of resolve to be found in joy. And while humans have a lot of bad things going for us, we can be pretty great at the joy part. So, let’s use it.”
“Riveting…The way history was meant to be told.”
“Poignant and sobering”
Awards & Accolades
2022 – Traditional Roots Album of the Year (nominee), JUNO Awards
2021 – Ensemble of the Year (nominee), Canadian Folk Music Awards,
2021 – Vocal Group of the Year (nominee), Canadian Folk Music Awards
2019 – Best Folk Album (Winner), German Critics’ Music Association
2018 – Vocal Group of the Year (nominee), Canadian Folk Music Awards
2018 – Songwriter of the Year (nominee), Western Canadian Music Awards
2014 – Best Vocal Group (nominee), Canadian Folk Music Awards
2014 – Best Roots album (duo or group), Western Canadian Music Awards
2007 – ‘Pushing the Boundaries’ (nominee), Canadian Folk Music Awards
Specialty Show: RIDGE ft. The Fugitives
Often called “the battle that made Canada”, Vimy Ridge resulted in over 10,000 Canadian casualties.
Brendan McLeod and The Fugitives examine misconceptions and varying perspectives around the battle of Vimy Ridge, while drawing parallels to other formative events in our nation’s past. Featuring inventive musical interpretations of WWI soldier songs (often referred to as ‘Trench Songs’), RIDGE probes difficult yet necessary questions about how and why we grieve. Trench songs were written by frontline soldiers during WW1. Essentially protest songs, they were often parodies of well-known tunes.
The Fugitives perform their 5th and JUNO-nominated album Trench Songs to accompany the WWI storytelling and thought-provoking narrative McLeod provides. Based on the writing by WWI soldiers, the band wrote new melodies and music for these words. The result is a poignant and stripped-back collection of work that emphasizes the emotional content of the lyrics and continues the long tradition of folk music reshaping songs over time — the same way soldiers reshaped these songs in the trenches.
A vivid, kinetic ride through history, as well as an intimate, personal examination of our connection to the past, RIDGE is a visceral work that passionately argues against the exploitation of young lives.
Running Time: 1 x 75 mins (no intermission)
School Show available: Gr 6 -12 (study guide available) | 1 x 50 mins + 10 mins Q&A
Click HERE to watch ‘RIDGE’ Promo Video (full length show video available upon request)