What does it take to make it in the Calgary music scene?
Lacey Holowaty, Contributor
Over the past few decades, Calgary’s musicians have been taking up more and more space in the national and global music scene.
Notable household names include Tegan and Sara, Feist and Tate McRae. Now, many young artists are trying to navigate the unique landscape of the Calgary music scene, and it can be daunting to figure out where to start.
An emerging artist from Calgary is indie-rock band SHY FRiEND, who got their start playing at the city’s well-beloved Rockin’ 4 Dollar$ events. Lead singer and founder of the band, Julie Olive, says an integral part of the Calgary music scene is how live-show focused it is.
“It’s one of the most helpful things for aspiring or coming-up artists to sort of meet the community and figure out how to play live and get the opportunity to do so in a sort of judgment-free zone,” Olive says.
SHY FRiEND initially started as a solo project of Olive’s during the pandemic. Olive put herself out there through Twitch and Reddit livestreams, where she’d play her then-unreleased songs and covers for up to 100 viewers every day. The demand and financial support from her viewers eventually led to her releasing her solo EP, Frank.
“A lot of the stuff that actually went on that record was just stuff that people really wanted to hear over and over again, and not just live,” she says.
After releasing the record, Olive realised that managing her music career was becoming too much for one person to handle, so she asked a bunch of her college friends if they would help her perform the record live. From there, the group slowly formed.
According to Olive, the band’s sound is reminiscent of what Chappell Roan would sound like if she played rock ‘n roll.
“[The resemblance] is not just the music, it’s definitely the style,” Olive says. “It’s the culture that we’re wanting to create.”
Olive says the Calgary music scene has been incredibly supportive and welcoming of not only SHY FRiEND, but of other up-and-coming artists as well.
“[The music scene] is really focused on uplifting people who have something important to say,” she says. “I really love what people are doing to support folks who are femme, or queer, or fringe, or not white, just be able to say what they have to say and have the platform to do it.”
The current music scene in Calgary can be described as a “mixing pot,” according to the founder and producer of Calgary’s Peach Jam Records, Kenton Dobrowolski. Despite Calgary’s closeness to country culture, there are many well-established subcultures within the city’s music scene, including punk, indie and R&B, among others.
“I think Calgary’s a really untapped market,” says Dobrowolski. “We’re not nearly as developed as the Vancouver or Toronto music scenes.”
But Dobrowolski says there’s value in that. Calgary’s hidden-gem status when it comes to harbouring a plethora of talented musicians makes it easier for artists to connect to their hometown and build an audience. He mentions Toronto’s pride towards Drake’s success as an example.
“I think that people want to see the hometown hero win,” he says.
A common misconception with budding musicians is that success in the industry is determined by how big a record deal you sign. However, Dobrowolski says that with the rise of social media and self-promotion, record labels just aren’t what they used to be.
“I would honestly encourage artists to stay independent,” he says. “I think in today’s world, there’s actually not a lot of labels that do what artists can’t do themselves.”
According to Dobrowolski, Peach Jam Records ensures the artists they work with own 100 per cent of their masters and royalties. The purpose of the company is to empower artists and assist them in various phases of their project launches, including production, recording, development and marketing.
That same sentiment is echoed through SHY FRiEND’s status as an independent artist. Olive says that after thorough research and conversations with people in the industry, the most a label could do for the band is distribution, which they already have covered.
The band rocks out at the Palomino Smokehouse, a popular music venue in Calgary.
Photo by Joel Johnson
According to Olive, a common dream for any creative is to be able to make a living from their art. Unfortunately, funding is hard to come by, and many record labels don’t offer much money up front anymore. She explains that the band’s only options are to either self-fund or apply for grants, which has proven to be a lengthy process with a lot of red tape.
Olive says that, in order to ‘make it’ in the Calgary music industry, artists shouldn’t be afraid to put themselves out there authentically.
“The worst that someone can say is, ‘Oh, they’re working hard. Cringe,’” she says. “But if you kind of accept that and live with cringe being a bad thing, you know, it’ll work out good.”
