Victoria and Vancouver Island have a lot of musical talent, and Victoria Buzz wants to highlight some of the best and brightest local artists and bands.
Every Monday, there will be a fresh ‘New Music Monday’ article to help people find and support local artists and bands that are up-and-coming, well established or hidden gems!
For this endeavour, Victoria Buzz has partnered with our good friends at CFUV 101.9 FM, UVic’s campus radio station, to find and select the musicians and bands for this regular column.
This week, Julian Marrs is the New Music Monday highlight!
Julian Marrs has been involved in the music scene in Victoria for a long while and also runs Marrs Audio, a recording studio, music store and lessons hub in Vic West.
Before living in Victoria, Marrs was raised in Haida Gwaii, and lived in Vancouver for a short time.
He is well-known as a producer and has worked with numerous local bands to bring their their visions to fruition. However, he admits it has been a while since he focussed on his own writing and career as a musician.
Now, Marrs feels the need to prioritize his own music after tragedy struck his life, leaving him feeling raw. He says he needed to do this as a way to convey what he was feeling and process his grief.
His self-titled album was written shortly after the loss of his mother, his dog and near death of his life partner.
For this endeavour he wrote the songs quickly and recorded using as few takes as possible to maintain the visceral feeling of the heart of the song.
“In terms of [what the album was about], self reflection, trying to deal with several emotions is part of the album, how to process things and being able to fully express the way you’re feeling because I had never dealt with stuff like this before,” Marrs told Victoria Buzz.
“It’s really different when you lose your mother and almost lose your life partner, there’s like a ‘what is life about?’ feeling that you have to navigate.”
He says in processing, writing and recording he was also left pondering where people go once they pass on, and that sentiment also inspired the themes of this album.
“Emotionally, you want to feel like they’re still around, kind of an afterlife, but I’m not a religious person so, in these situations you start to realize religion has a lot of value in these aspects—as a way to describe what happens next,” he continued.
“It’s a lot, and a heavy thing to process.”
To try to convey all these emotions as best as he could through writing, Marrs said he decided it was best to try to write all the lyrics and vocal melodies before crafting the music of the songs—something he had not tried before.
“I didn’t pick up my guitar, I would just kind of walk down the street, start humming a song and creating lyrics for a song before picking up another instrument,” Marrs explained.
Once he got to creating the music to support his lyrics, Marrs enlisted some people he had worked with or met through the music scene over the years.
Marrs had Thomas Di Ninno (Freak Heat Waves) and Keenan Mittag-Degala (Elan Noon, plays bass in Loving) on drums and percussion, Dougal Bain (plays in Peach Pit and with Layten Kramer) on violin, Celina Kurtz (Future Star) on vocal harmonies and flute and Nicholas Merz (Nicholas Merz, Sunset Rubdown, Darto) on vocal harmonies.
Marrs chose to highlight the opening track of the record, “Weathered” to help people understand what was going through his mind as he was writing this record.
“Weathered is about reincarnation,” Marrs told Victoria Buzz.
“I think when somebody passes, you remember them by their stories and by the lessons they tried to teach you and that’s the base of what that song is about.”
He added that it’s about moving yourself forward after a loss and remembering you carry that person along with you once they’re gone.
This album is genre-diverse but is rooted in pop influences and music that was made through the 50s, 60s and 70s.
Preview Julian Marrs’ self-titled album below:
To listen to Julian Marrs in its entirety, check it out on Spotify, Apple Music and Bandcamp.
Although Marrs says he doesn’t have the capacity to be booking shows at the moment, he has been re-prioritizing himself and his music and expects to release another album soon.
Once his next record is out, he will be looking to book some local shows.
Related:
- New Music Monday: liquidjane pulls songs from subconscious on ‘Light Matter’ EP
- New Music Monday: Prince Shima creates ‘Half Earth Socialism’ as soundtrack for video game
- New Music Monday: CORRODE injects debut EP with hardcore energy and meaning
CFUV is a non-profit campus and community radio station that plays a ton of local music of all kinds across Vancouver Island. If you like to support local music they are an amazing resource with a plethora of new local tunes in their arsenal.
“I think having spaces like community radio is paramount for music because the flipside can be the big radio stations people listen to, but that is often not the best music,” Marrs explained.
“I think that CFUV is a champion of the underground and supportive of the community in Victoria, and also across the country.”
Tune into CFUV 101.9 FM on air or online!
Let us know what you think of Julian Marrs in the comments below.
