Sim Bansal, the bandleader of 4-piece Action Forever, grew up in Brantford, Ontario. His obsession with music began at age 5 and, for the next two decades, his natural talents were fostered by a musical family upbringing and constant exposure to a unique and eclectic mix of influences ranging from ‘80s pop, to progressive rock, to jazz, and indie.

The music of Action Forever, while lively, electric, melodic and danceable, explores darker themes such as loneliness in a digital age, abusive relationships, loss of identity, and mental health. New single, “Stay With You,” loosely tells the story of the troubled relationship of two lovers from the point of view of the abused.

“Immediately, I feel a sense of tragedy when I hear this song. It’s meant to broadly acknowledge any kind of abusive relationship one might have – could be with a person, a thing, or, as I’m seeing more clearly these days, a society,” Sim explains. “I aimed to capture the spectrum of emotions one feels in this situation and have the listener experience the full weight of it – the naive delusional love, the frustration, the isolation and the denial.” 

Sim had studied business as well as applied music, while gigging as a lead singer and guitarist in many bands including a Police cover band (Blue Turtle) and a progressive-rock tribute act (Bypass Off). Sim won Hamilton’s Brian Lee Griffith Guitar contest for an original composition and a live performance.

With guitar and voice as his primary instruments, he learned drums and bass as well and now plays most of the instruments on his own original work. 

Folk singer-songwriter Dan Pallotta has a delicate and hopeful new single to share entitled “Kendra’s Pictures.” The Kendra in question was a neighbour of Pallotta’s who “took the most beautiful landscape and nature photographs that were filled with light.”

The song features a gently rolling melody which seeks to transmit a feeling of light and of beauty that transcends mortality. Pallotta took many approaches to the song’s production, experimenting with synthesizers, piano, and upright bass.

“It was when we asked Marc Muller to try a lap steel that it all came together. It gave the song an other-worldly feeling that the story was calling for. It was big without suffocating the negative space we needed for the lyrics to come through.” – Dan Pallotta

American philanthropist and musician Dan Pallotta has been writing songs for forty years, but took about a thirty-year break in the middle to create the AIDSRides, the Breast Cancer 3-Day walks, and the Out of the Darkness Suicide Prevention walks. 182,000 people took part in one of these epic, heroic journeys, which raised nearly $600 million in nine years—more money raised more quickly for those causes than any events in history, and were the subject of a Harvard Business School case study.
In September 2022, the Stephen Gyllenhaal directed documentary film adaption of Pallotta’s book, Uncharitable, was released, which advocates for liberating the nonprofit sector to its true potential. It features Edward Norton, and the heads of TED, the Ford Foundation, the Nature Conservancy, Charity:Water and many other organizations. 

Pallotta’s TED talk on charity is the 16th most commented TED talk of all time. He has written five books, served on two school boards, sang the national anthem at a Los Angeles Rams game, and did not forget the words! 

Pallotta’s music and his commitment to making a difference in the world are inseparable. He tries to write songs about the human condition, as experienced by all kinds of human beings across all manners of circumstance, and songs about the possibility of a world that could work for everyone. 

Swaying between the punchiness of modern rock and the nostalgic tones of ’90s alternative, June Body‘s rawness and forthright lyrical delivery throws back to the likes of Death Cab for Cutie and The Weakerthans. “Agree to Stop” from their new album, Last Everythings, is about songwriter Connor James’ seven-year relationship coming to an end. Even though he and his partner were both still in love with each other, there was this pervasive feeling of understanding that the end was what was right for both of them. It was such a difficult experience to have to agree that they’d be better apart.

“I was constantly imagining the end of my relationship leading up to it actually happening,” says songwriter Connor James. “I had this idea of ‘fast-forwarding a tape’ as spoiling the events that would occur on the night of a breakup. It was almost as if I was numbed to the emotions of that night because I had been manifesting and visualizing it for so long.”

Gwyn Love (they/them) is the first-ever American artist signed to Vancouver-based 604 Records. Together, with multi-platinum producer and composer, La+ch (best known for the certified 4x Platinum hit “2 Heads” with Coleman Hell), they’ve crafted an upbeat, feel-good track for the summer, “happy 2 b here.”

“happy 2 b here represents moving from Oklahoma to LA perfectly to me,” Gwyn explains. “It combines the two vibes whilst having a little splash of country with a dance-y beach track. This is the first song I wrote after moving to LA and it means a lot to me because it shows how much I’ve grown over the years in music. So excited to finally share this one with the world!”

Born into a conservative family with eight siblings, and growing up in small-town Oklahoma, Gwyn Love was introduced to music at a young age; picking up the cello at age 5 and writing their first song at 11. Over the past decade, their sound has continued to evolve — blending what the artist describes as a punk mentality with an electronic-pop vibe. As a creative deeply invested in every aspect of their sound, drawing mainly from their own life experience, Gwyn maintains that they are hardly ever at a loss for words when it comes to songwriting — musical motivation and vision are always priority one.

La+ch has produced records for a wide variety of other artists in addition to his continued work with Coleman Hell. His discography includes production credits for electro-pop outfit Dragonette, Toronto hip-hop artist Shan Vincent de Paul, and rising indie-pop songstress Emily Rowed. La+ch also produces and mixes his solo work, including his critically acclaimed debut album, +, which has amassed over 35 million streams on Spotify.

Custie is an emerging artist from London, Ontario whose distinct sound explores pop music as it intersects between singer-songwriter, R&B and alternative. “E, pt. 2” is largely a continuation of his previous single, “ON E, AND EVERYTHING IN BETWEEN,” balancing the heaviness with softness.

“‘E, pt. 2’ was born from a period of slow-focus after I recorded ‘ON E, AND EVERYTHING IN BETWEEN.’ The follow-up both literally and figuratively achieved some distance from the themes that haunted me. I was in the mud of the friendship, doing snow angels in the glass shards. As a counterpart, ‘E, pt. 2’ is sadder, but a lot more dream-like. You don’t have to succumb to the sadness, or face it, because it’s constantly weaving different emotions and, intentionally, creating some formless tapestry of Experience.” —Custie

100% of profits from “ON E, AND EVERYTHING IN BETWEEN” are being donated to MINDS, an initiative local to him for youth struggling with mental health and addiction

Parade is an experimental pop-rock trio based out of Toronto, Ontario. “Do You Know Where Your Friends Are Right Now?” from their brand new album, Lullabies After Storms and Floods, was inspired by the social media fueled mental health crisis. 

It has been extremely distressing, in my work as a music educator, to see how badly young people are struggling with anxiety and depression and I feel that there is a responsibility as an artist to advocate for solutions.

The song title is a throwback to a time before social media when we weren’t hyper aware of our friends whereabouts and activities at all times. If you couldn’t reach your friends on the landline, you’d have to find them in the REAL WORLD! – Stefan Hegerat (drums, compositions)

Drawing on their diverse backgrounds in jazz, classical, and electronic music, Stefan Hegerat, Chris Pruden (synthesizers) and Laura Swankey (voice, electronics) and Patrick O’Reilly (guitar) of the experimental pop/rock trio, Parade, push the boundaries of genre and form by blurring the lines between improvisation and composition to create unique and immersive sonic landscapes.

Lullabies After Storms and Floods was largely inspired by band leader Hegerat’s work as a grassroots organizer during the COVID-19 pandemic, the compositional content of the album provides both a critique of the institutions and systems which threaten our very existence, and utopian imaginings of a healing world. The hope behind Parade is that the music dwells on all we have to celebrate, while acknowledging all we have to mourn.