I recently had the great pleasure and opportunity to direct a mini-documentary about the Calgary Cassette Preservation Society and the importance of archiving music. For those of you who are unfamiliar, CCPS is a site run by Arif Ansari which holds a vast archive of Calgarian, Albertan and Canadian music dating back to the 1970s. The project started sometime in the 90s when Arif began to digitize some of his favourite cassettes as a passion project. From there, the project spiralled into a full-fledged, extensive archive of hundreds of musicians' and bands work over the last few decades. Each posting has a write-up about the artist, giving it some context and info on the members and style of the music, scans or photos of the physical media as well as a link to listen to it.
As an archivist myself, it's mind-blowing to think about the amount of work Arif and the others who have helped him have done. Any city would be lucky to have someone who cares as much as Arif and who puts so much of his time into a project like this. Not many cities have such a vast catalogue of music solely based on the local scene, and I think without Arif and CCPS, so much of this music would have been lost to time. As someone who was born and raised in Calgary, Alberta, it's a fascinating resource that I have learnt so much from and found so many cool bands through. Calgary has such an interesting and distinct scene due to its location and culture and I genuinely never knew that Calgary had such a vibrant punk/emo scene in the late 90s and early 2000s.
Getting the chance to speak to Arif himself, as well as Helen Young and Adam Kamis of CJSW has been a life-changing experience that I will never forget. All three of them are treasure troves of information, anecdotes and knowledge I one day hope to have! I think that the documentary I directed with the help of my production/post-production team is very valuable for a city like Calgary where this underground music as well as the importance of archiving goes unnoticed by most. It's a great feeling getting to speak with people who value this sort of archival work as much as I do because, without resources like CJSW's incredible library of physical media or Arif's work with CCPS, we would lose so much music, info and culture that has made Calgary the city it is today.
Real Friend is a band from Calgary, Alberta who formed in 2022 under the name Soylent Green before they lost a member and became Real Friend. The band members are Kyle Pierce, Noah Gall and Ayden Hamilton, the first couple of the three sharing tasks of vocals, guitar and bass while the former is on drums. As of today, they have digitally released one single titled "Serenity Now" and one EP titled "Standard Issue" which can be found on Bandcamp and Spotify.
Real Friend is one of the most genre-defying bands I've ever heard, refusing to comply with any one sound and instead experimenting tastefully with aspects of various styles and genres. I would say there is some heavy math-rock influence found within their work as well as a distinct influence from early 90s emo bands like Moss Icon (they even have a song named after the band) or even Indian Summer with a bit more distortion/noise. Their songs vary from mathy, complex and instrumental to noisy and chaotic with distorted vocals piercing through the explosion of sound.
To be completely honest I find myself very disillusioned with the scene in my hometown, bands that I genuinely enjoy and doing something truly unique are few and far between, but let me tell you Real Friend is one of them. I had heard they were good but when I first heard Real Friend play I was shocked. The members are not only incredibly musically talented but also have a completely different sound than any other local bands which is hard to do and can be scary. It's easy to copy your favourite bands or blend in with the scene playing mediocre music but Real Friend is braver, they are willing to risk it all to do something genuine and truly their own no matter what anyone thinks. That, above all is why they have my utmost respect. You can be the best musician ever and still play bland, boring music that sounds like 500 other bands, but Real Friend opts to show off their talent and creativity.
I had the pleasure of doing the cinematography for the entirety of Real Friend's first music video for their track "Portland, Oregon" alongside Nick Alford who directed the project, Benjamin San Martin who was 1st Assistant Camera and many more who made the project possible. I feel super lucky to have worked with great production/post-production teams as well as be able to work with Real Friend to make a video we are all happy with.
