Date of Show: September 17, 2010
Oh, The Golden Dogs, how entertaining you are. It’s hard not to enjoy yourself when at a Golden Dogs show. They bring a hell of a lot of energy to already energetic power-pop rock tunes. Even better than how they sound recorded is their live show. The vocal dynamic between Jessica Grassia (keys) and Dave Azzolini (guitar) is so apparent live and it makes for a large part of aura surrounding the talented Golden Dogs. The rest of The Golden Dogs are James Robertson (guitar), Jay McCarrol (bass) and Taylor Knox (drums) and they are no less impressive with their respective instruments. They work well together on stage and sometimes play a bit of musical chairs by switching instruments.
The Golden Dogs played mostly newer material off of their much anticipated Coat of Arms that was released in July, which features tunes that are a little more guitar-heavy than their previous work. What’s even more fun than just some great energetic tunes is being in a packed house of loyal Golden Dogs fans. Looking around the crowd, it was evident how much people were enjoying the set. It was a great way to end a night of solid music (but if you were there, then you’d also know that the night continued with late night DJ sets from Caribou and Jeremy Greenspan of Junior Boys). They also had Sandman Viper Command and The Darcys set the stage for them. (More from The Darcys can be found here and more from Sandman Viper Command can be found here.)
The Golden Dogs have been picking up steam post-release. They have been playing pretty frequently and continue to book shows, with a couple more dates in Toronto already confirmed. See The Golden Dogs live. You won’t regret it.
buying shots for bands 
Nice B&W photographs by Alex McCusker!