Unfortunately, the Trade Offs have had to cancel their Swift Current show. Please contact us directly if you have purchased tickets. We are working on finding another fantastic artist to fit in our limited fall series. Please stay tuned for more announcements!
Previously performing at Blenders with The Jerry Cans, we are pleased to welcome back The Trade Offs! Arctic Soul, The Trade-Offs’s iconic sound, is distinguished by the soulful bass and backing vocals of Jeffrey Maurice, Michael Eckert’s pedal steel expertise, Galen Pelley’s creative drumming, and Joshua Qaumariaq’s deep brooding voice which was described in Exclaim! magazine as “big, bellowing, and bluesy, like Nick Cave with a little more rasp and Randy Newman with a little more edge”. On their sophomore album, Let Go Give In Fall Down, the band have refined their unique sound with a blend of deeply personal Inuktitut and English lyrics singing the Arctic blues about universal themes of darkness and light, closeness and isolation. The lead track on the album, Crowberry Hill, ends with the line “Now you know, baby where I come from”.
Released in the fall of 2022 on Iqaluit label Aakuluk Music, Let Go Give In Fall Down—in both its title and in the content of its nine tracks—is about how to bend, but not break; it’s about how to survive and find hope in the North amid loneliness, isolation, and deaths of close relations.
“It’s just the feeling of the album,” says lead singer and guitarist Josh Qaumariaq. “From losing people to being alone, you just gotta let go, give in, and fall down.” Qaumariaq says it’s the record he and Maurice have always wanted to create, finally pinning down the sound they’d been chasing for 10+ years as a band. “We finally feel so good because we sound like ourselves,” says Qaumariaq. “This album means a lot to me, and I finally feel like I have something that feels like me.”
After hearing “Let Go Give In Fall Down”, you will surely feel like you have explored the Arctic tundra with the band and will know a little more about where they come from. While the band is a staple of the Iqaluit music scene, they have played across Canada on big and small stages alike, including mainstage performances at major festivals and at the iconic Cameron House in Toronto. Press play and be prepared to fall in love with Nunavut's Arctic Soul.
Don’t miss these incredible musicians at Blenders on September 15th, 2023 at our new temporary location, Beatty Playhouse in the Great Plains College, 129 2nd Ave NE in Swift Current. Doors open at 7pm, music at 8pm. Tickets are available at Swift Current Pharmasave and eventbrite.com.
