Think About Life is an
indie rock
Indie rock is a Music subgenre, subgenre of rock music that originated in the United Kingdom, United States and New Zealand in the early to mid-1980s. Although the term was originally used to describe rock music released through independent reco ...
band from
Montreal
Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...
,
Quebec
Quebec is Canada's List of Canadian provinces and territories by area, largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, ...
, Canada, formed in 2005.
Biography
The group was founded by drummer Matt Shane and keyboardist Graham Van Pelt.
[Dunlevy, T'Cha. "Feckless abandon", '' The Gazette'', 2006-06-08, p. D3.] Think About Life's third member, vocalist Martin Cesar, also records and performs as Dishwasher. He has released a
CD-R
CD-R (Compact disc-recordable) is a digital media, digital optical disc data storage device, storage format. A CD-R disc is a compact disc that can only be Write once read many, written once and read arbitrarily many times.
CD-R discs (CD-Rs) ...
on
Pink Triforce Tapes. Cesar also previously sang in the rock band
Donkey Heart.
Graham Van Pelt is an active studio engineer in Montreal, and has engineered or produced for a number of local artists. He also has his own side project,
Miracle Fortress
Miracle Fortress is a Canadian indie rock band based in Montreal, Quebec. The band's studio work is primarily a solo, project of songwriter Graham Van Pelt, who is accompanied by the rest of the band during live shows.
Band history
Van Pelt, a m ...
.
Van Pelt and Shane moved into a loft space dubbed ''the Electric Tractor'' with other musician friends, and recorded the band's initial songs there.
Regarding the band's name, Shane said, "We were naming all the parts of our songs to remember them better. On
he album opener'Paul Cries', there's one part that sounded kind of deep. We joked that it made us think about life. Then someone said, 'Dude, I think that should be the name of the band.'"
2006 self-titled record
The band's self-titled debut recording, ''
Think About Life'', was released in 2006 by
Alien8 Recordings
Alien8 Recordings is an independent record label founded in 1996 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The label was founded by Sean O'Hara and Gary Worsley.
The label released material from prominent noise artists such as Merzbow, Think About Life, A ...
. They began touring in the United States in late 2005, with
Beaver Sheppard standing in for Martin for part of the tour, opening dates for
Wolf Parade
Wolf Parade is a Canadian indie rock band formed in 2003 in Montreal. The band released three full-length albums before taking a five-year hiatus in 2011. They announced their return in 2016, releasing a self-titled EP in May of that year, and ...
and later
Art Brut
Art Brut is an English indie rock band. Their debut album, '' Bang Bang Rock & Roll'', was released on 30 May 2005, with its follow up, ''It's a Bit Complicated'', released on 25 June 2007. Named after French painter Jean Dubuffet's definition ...
. John Wenzel of ''
The Denver Post
''The Denver Post'' is a daily newspaper and website published in the Denver metropolitan area. it has an average print circulation of 57,265. In 2016, its website received roughly six million monthly unique visitors generating more than 13 mil ...
'' called Think About Life "the new
Liars". During this period, the band toured Canada and Japan. Montreal artist
Brendan Reed recorded and toured with the band from 2007 to 2008. The band also issued a Japan exclusive ''Paul Cries 7"'' on Every Conversation Records.
''Family''
On May 26, 2009, Think About Life released ''
Family
Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...
'', their second full-length record, again on Alien8 Recordings. Shortly after the release of the album, a fourth member was added to the band. Caila Thompson-Hannant, of
Miracle Fortress
Miracle Fortress is a Canadian indie rock band based in Montreal, Quebec. The band's studio work is primarily a solo, project of songwriter Graham Van Pelt, who is accompanied by the rest of the band during live shows.
Band history
Van Pelt, a m ...
,
Shapes and Sizes and
Mozart's Sister, was recruited as a bass player and singer. Shortly thereafter, Matt Shane went on to pursue a fine arts career, and was replaced by Greg Napier, of Special Noise. On October 13, 2009 the album then saw its release in the USA. It was then released in Japan on October 27, 2009 on Escalator Records.
Since the release of ''Family'', the band have toured with
Franz Ferdinand,
Ratatat
Ratatat ( ) is a Brooklyn-based electronic rock duo consisting of Mike Stroud (guitar, melodica, synthesizers, percussion) and producer Evan Mast (bass, synthesizers, percussion).
History
Beginnings and first album, ''Ratatat'' (2001–2005 ...
,
Stars
A star is a luminous spheroid of plasma held together by self-gravity. The nearest star to Earth is the Sun. Many other stars are visible to the naked eye at night; their immense distances from Earth make them appear as fixed points of ...
,
You Say Party! We Say Die!
You Say Party (formerly You Say Party! We Say Die!) is a Canadian dance-punk new-wave band from Abbotsford, British Columbia.
Their first album '' Hit the Floor!'' was released in September 2005, and the band completed their second Canadian tou ...
,
Ponytail
A ponytail is a hairstyle in which some, most, or all of the hair on the head is pulled away from the face, gathered and secured at the back of the head with a hair tie, clip, or other similar accessory and allowed to hang freely from that po ...
, and
Land of Talk, amongst others.
Reunion
In the summer of 2017 it was announced that the band would be performing a reunion show at the 16th edition of
Pop Montreal
POP Montreal is an annual List of music festivals, music festival occurring in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, in the early fall, usually at the end of September or the beginning of October. More than 400 bands are scheduled to play in more than 50 ve ...
, their first show in nearly 5 years.
Discography
* 2006: ''
Think About Life''
* 2009: ''
Family
Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...
''
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Think About Life
Musical groups established in 2005
Musical groups from Montreal
Canadian indie rock groups
Alien8 Recordings artists
English-language musical groups from Quebec
2005 establishments in Quebec