The Rare Birds

The Rare Birds in Vancouver:
After a year in the West Coast music scene, playing shows at Cafe Deux Soleils, the Backstage Lounge, the Purple Crab, Falconetti's, Lime, and weekly gigs at the Atlantic Trap and Gill, The Rare Birds (formally The Clementines) are ready to take flight with their first Vancouver album, set to be released downtown on November 5th at the Atlantic Trap and Gill.

A rare breed of musician, the birds trade off both instrumentally and vocally to create East Coast inspired folk sounds infused with rock, funk, ska, and bluegrass vibes. They sing an eclectic mix of sweet harmonies about places lost and people missed including tales of freight train hopping, bank heists, highways of the deep south west, clawing up the big city ladder and murdered Russian journalists.

A rich mesh of guitar, fiddle, mandolin, harmonica, and banjo acoustics add to The Rare Birds’ downhome feel. Boosts of an electric, driving beat give a loving rock kick to provide a layered union of sounds. Original bluegrass folk rock seems to be a befitting change for the group, comprised of two reformed punk rockers (Dave Mealiea on vocals, guitar, and harmonica, and Chris Arsenault on drums), a Salt Lake City funkster (Phil Stoker on bass, electric guitar, and banjo), Max Boyle on electric fiddle and mandolin, and the leading lady of Lower Montague from Prince Edward Island (vocalist/guitarist Mary Catherine Clements). Their sound has traveled as far as the group, picking up influence from coast to coast, but this gaggle of traveling hobos are happy to have found a home here nestled in the Coastal Mountains.