Happiness held is the
seed; happiness shared is the flower.
On a mission to create a
euphoric communal experience, Rich Aucoin writes music with emphasis on the
feelings and happiness that it creates. With his second recording effort,
Public Publication, Aucoin has created an anthemic pop record where the
barriers between audience and performers are dropped and the group as a whole
performs this lush, orchestral, electro pop music. The end result is sweat
drenched party full of group singing, playing and dancing. Crowd karaoke meets
an 8 year old’s ideal birthday party, the bars and venues where the shows take
place are transformed into a magical event with Aucoin’s ever evolving sound
and light show with balloons, streamers and more confetti than the bars hoped
he’d bring to help celebrate the occasion.
The group huddles around
a massive projection that Aucoin broadcasts of the films that Aucoin writes his
music to. A over stimuli of collage is seen as a myriad of film clips from the
public domain are shown, woven together into a new narrative about following
dreams and overcoming addiction to find happiness in community. The film syncs
with the music the group performs together in the same way that Pink Floyd’s
Dark Side of The Moon syncs with The Wizard of Oz. Aucoin is familiar with this
type of syncing as he wrote and recorded his first record on his own,
performing more than 25 instruments on it and writing it …
Happiness held is the
seed; happiness shared is the flower.
On a mission to create a
euphoric communal experience, Rich Aucoin writes music with emphasis on the
feelings and happiness that it creates. With his second recording effort,
Public Publication, Aucoin has created an anthemic pop record where the
barriers between audience and performers are dropped and the group as a whole
performs this lush, orchestral, electro pop music. The end result is sweat
drenched party full of group singing, playing and dancing. Crowd karaoke meets
an 8 year old’s ideal birthday party, the bars and venues where the shows take
place are transformed into a magical event with Aucoin’s ever evolving sound
and light show with balloons, streamers and more confetti than the bars hoped
he’d bring to help celebrate the occasion.
The group huddles around
a massive projection that Aucoin broadcasts of the films that Aucoin writes his
music to. A over stimuli of collage is seen as a myriad of film clips from the
public domain are shown, woven together into a new narrative about following
dreams and overcoming addiction to find happiness in community. The film syncs
with the music the group performs together in the same way that Pink Floyd’s
Dark Side of The Moon syncs with The Wizard of Oz. Aucoin is familiar with this
type of syncing as he wrote and recorded his first record on his own,
performing more than 25 instruments on it and writing it to sync to the 1966
classic, Dr. Seuss’ How The Grinch Stole Christmas. Like the spirit of the
film, the record, Personal Publication EP, is about discovering love and
giving.
With this spirit, Aucoin
traveled across Canada on a bicycle and performed his show while raising money
for kids with cancer; cutting off a chunk of his hair during each performance.
After the tour and coverage from MTV and USA Today, Aucoin returned home to
find two letters: congrats from Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters and a not as warm
letter from the estate of Dr. Seuss receiving a letter of cease & desist.
Ironically, Aucoin got
hit on his bicycle by a mysterious black car with black tinted windows and got
paid off a grand in cash by another equally mysterious black car with black
tinted windows to not report the accident. Taking this money, Aucoin started to
record his next album that would involve recording from coast to coast and
recording more than 500 musicians before its completion. Along the way, Aucoin
would keep up the charity aspect of his music, running a series of
half-marathons for stroke research while touring on the road and recording this
album with some amazing producers and studios across the country: Andrew Watt
(Common Ground), Howard Bilerman (Hotel 2 Tango), Paul Aucoin (Halla), Jace
Lasek (Break Glass), Dave Ewenson (Echo Chamber) and with his mixing partner,
Joel Waddell in back in their home base of Halifax, Nova Scotia where Aucoin
has grown up and graduated from university as an honours philosophy and
experimental music student.
Now, with the party
fine-tuned after two years of touring experience, Aucoin is set to bring those
good vibrations to the road again. Aucoin has played more than 200 shows across
the country and has played at a number of the country’s more prominent
festivals including: NXNE, Pop Montreal, CMW, TIFF, Sled Island, Halifax Pop
Explosion, Over The Top!, AFF, Evolve, Atlantic International Jazz Festival,
Antenne-A Festival, and The
Victoria International Jazz Festival as well as sharing the stage with: Dan
Deacon, Girl Talk, Deerhoof, The Weakerthans, The Golden Dogs, Holy Fuck, The
Constantines, Dirty Projector’s talented Nat Baldwin and Spiral Stairs.
Here's a trailer for the
new record:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIj_ik7VGJY
The live show is a high
energy, crowd karaoke dance party with coordinated visuals and lights. Here's a
couple one-minute videos of what a show is like:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06ukPik1pvE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=doVwPgI1ZZM
