  Bedouin Soundclash |
TORONTO - To those not in the know, it might seem that reggae-pop-punk trio Bedouin Soundclash are somewhat of an overnight success. But despite having scored an across the board hit with the Bob Marley-sounding "When The Night Feels My Song," landing a spot on this past summer's Warped Tour, and nabbing a headlining gig at tomorrow's Edge Electric Christmas all in the same year, drummer Pat Pengelly says the band's seeming good fortune comes from old-fashioned hard work.
"We've been a band for over five years now," he says on the line from Quebec. "And I think the period of growth we've seen in both our music and our fan base, have given us a really good perspective on what it means to have commercial and mainstream success."
"The first four years of our band we worked really hard on developing a grassroots fan base. We sold records out of the back of our van at live shows."
In 2002, the group took the big leap and recorded its debut, "Root Fire." Blending bits of reggae and R&B with splashes of punk, Bedouin spent the next two years touring with bands like the Slackers and the Skatalites before settling in Montreal to record their sophomore disc, "Sounding A Mosaic."
Produced by Daryl Jenifer (Bad Brains), Pengelly says that the music on "Mosaic" shows a band coming into its own sound.
"We all come from different places musically, but reggae was the meeting point for the three of us."
The trio recalls the Police's punk-reggae cocktail on the "Driven To Tears"-like "Shelter" and the "Spirits In The Material World"-ish "Shadow Of A Man," while vocalist-guitarist, Jay Malinowski, reinterprets David Byrne's Latin strumming from the Talking Head's "(Nothing But) Flowers" on "Gyasi Went Home."
"There's a lot of different flavours of things that influenced us," he says. "From drum 'n' bass, to two-step, to a more stripped down country reggae sound, to songs with a heavy dub feel; there's a lot of diversity to the album."
"A lot of people hear bands like the Police, but our biggest influences are groups that incorporated punk and reggae with each other. Bands like the Specials, the Clash, Madness and other acts from the early '80s. That period in music, we take a lot of influence from."
And though Pengelly admits that radio's love for the Toronto-based band was helped in part by "When The Night Feels My Song's" appearance in a television-ad campaign last spring (remember those brick red Zellers commercials that featured singer Jay Malinowski's melodic vocals?), he says that the Bedouin's success owes more to their fierce work ethic.
"When that commercial came out, we had already gotten to the point where we were selling out pretty large venues in Toronto and other urban areas just based on the fact that we'd been around for so long and touring. That mixture allowed our radio play to take off."
And when you're a self-proclaimed "reggae fusion band," getting your music onto today's niche-market radio stations isn't easy.
"With a disc like 'Mosaic,' which dips into a lot of different influences and sounds, it is really hard to get played on the radio, but we were able to break through those barriers and eventually our stuff got played."
"Even though before our music was getting played on TV and radio we had really good followings in major cities, people are now hearing the single and are curious about the band, so they come to our live show."
"It's a different challenge now. It's about winning over someone who only knows a little bit about us. Live shows for Bedouin Soundclash are very integral to understanding what we're all about as a band."
But the delayed commercial success of "Sounding A Mosaic" (the album was released in 2004) means that the trio's third album, "Street Gospels," recorded with Jenifer early this year, and featuring Beastie Boys collaborator Money Mark on keyboards, won't be hitting stores until later next year.
"After this past summer, 'Mosaic' was granted a new lease on life as an album," he says. "By the end of last year, we had done three cross-Canada tours promoting 'Mosaic,' and we planned on releasing 'Gospels' right before the Warped Tour, but we've shelved it for now because the three of us feel strongly that 'Sounding A Mosaic' deserves a chance."
The group does manage to squeeze a few of the new songs into its live set, and Pengelly says that fans who attend tomorrow night's show at the Kool Haus in Toronto are in for a treat.
"We opened for AlexisOnFire at last year's Edge Electric Christmas," he recalls. "And to be headlining the same event twelve months later is something I'm really proud of."
Here are the remaining dates for Bedouin Soundclash's current Canadian tour:
12/17 Toronto, ON - Kool Haus
12/20 St. Catharines, ON - L3 Nightclub
12/27 Vancouver, BC - Commodore Ballroom
12/28 Vancouver, BC - Commodore Ballroom
