Victoria International Ska Festival 2023

 It was an honour to return to Victoria's ska fest with Los Furios and share the stage with the Aggrolites and Chali 2na.

Space Elevator: Space Jamboree

A blurry photo of a very large band on a very special night. What an incredible musical project this was! Glad to be a part of it.

No Island returns to PJ

Of all the shows No Island has performed over the years, our appearances at various Scout Jamborees have always been some of the most memorable. This weekend we had the opportunity to once again rock out in the middle of the forest for the closing ceremonies of the 2019 Pacific Jamboree. What a great way to return to the stage with this band after a couple of years off, and a great first show to play with Rob on bass.

Vancouver Jazz Fest with Space Elevator

What a joy it was to perform with Space Elevator once again. Doing so on the big stage at the Vancouver International Jazz Festival was just an added bonus. The crowd was very receptive, and I had a blast hanging around for the rest of the day to catch all the other amazing artists performing after us including Too Many Zooz from New York.

The band's debut release is now available on Bandcamp for streaming and purchase, as well as Spotify.

New cover from No Island

A few months ago I went into the studio with my brothers from No Island to cover a classic Don Henley song. Probably the only session I've done as strictly a backup singer without an instrument. Enjoy the song, it's free to stream, download and share.

New Horizons

Over the course of the past few months I have transitioned into a new career as a music teacher in the public school system. So far it has been an exciting, challenging, and rewarding experience. During my return to school I had to put a lot of my private performance work on hold, but I am happy to say that I am becoming more active once again now that things are settling into place a bit.

This weekend I recorded my parts for the new Space Elevator album. I am beyond excited to hear the final result once it has all been put together!

June gigs

JUNE 15: SPACE ELEVATOR

The brainchild of musical mad scientist Mike W.T. Allen returns to the Fox Cabaret in Vancouver. This is a big band that, other than being loud, sounds like exactly the opposite of what a traditional big band should be. It's a big undertaking to get this many talented musicians all on the same stage at the same time. The debut show one year ago was a smash hit, and you definitely don't want to miss the new tricks this sonic juggernaut has up its sleeve.


Facebook event page

Tickets








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JUNE 17: LOS FURIOS @ The Victoria International Ska Festival

Los Furios are returning to the Victoria Ska Fest to share the stage at the Victoria Events Centre for the Canadian debut of La Banda Skalavera from Los Angeles.

Facebook event page

Tickets

Back To School

This week marked the start of a new chapter for me. I began classes at the University of British Columbia in the education program. In 12 months I will (hopefully) be the proud holder of a shiny new B.Ed degree, with my focus being music education for students in secondary school.

The transition has already been difficult; having to say goodbye to most of my private students was not easy. I'm also not looking forward to likely needing to turn down some gigs, although I will of course continue to perform as much as I can reasonably manage.

By all accounts this program is one that will keep be very busy, but I'm looking forward to learning lots as I embark on this new part of my music career.

2016 summer update

Lots of exciting gigs so far this summer and still more to come. Los Furios has some busy months ahead of us including the Legends Valley Music Festival on Vancouver Island, the Surrey Reggae Festival, and Non-Stop Ska Festival in Mexico City. More to be announced soon.

On another note, I will be going back to school this September for my B.Ed at UBC. I will continue to gig as much as possible during and after my program, but my private teaching practice will be reduced during the next year as I make time for my own educational commitments. 

No Island Feb 27

Saturday Feb 27 - Studio Records (919 Granville St)

7:30pm - $10 advance tickets, $12 at the door

Facebook event page

February Gigs

Feb 7

Los Furios with The Toasters

The Rickshaw Theatre

Facebook event page:
https://www.facebook.com/events/859298117520264/

Tickets:
http://www.ticketfly.com/event/1021917

_________________________________________________

Feb 11


Space Elevator

The Fox Cabaret Theatre

This is a brand new project I'm involved in. It is experimental Big Band music composed by my former Ivy League Brawlers bandmate Mike Allen. 5 saxophones, 4 trumpets, 4 trombones, 2 guitarists, 2 drummers, with keyboards and bass to round everything out. Things will be crazy, loud, and unforgettable. You might want to bring ear plugs.


Facebook event page:
https://www.facebook.com/events/966829470076238/

Tickets:
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/space-elevator-tickets-20965205494

_________________________________________________

Feb 27

No Island

Studio Records Granville

No Island is returning to the Vancouver stage after a recent announcement. Details to come soon.

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Horn Section

I had an opportunity recently to perform with Beatles tribute band The Fab Fourever for a special show featuring a 6-piece horn section. Fun music with fun costumes to boot!

Fan Footage of Los Furios

Some video from my most recent performance with Los Furios.

Wow.These guys really shook it up. Vancouver's Los Furios
Posted by Jimmi Jaq on Friday, November 27, 2015

Note: this Facebook video player might be hidden when using certain ad-blocking/privacy software

New Video from No Island

Check out No Island's take on an iconic song by The Guess Who, featuring yours truly on bass clarinet.

New Live Photos from No Island

Some new shots from a show I played recently at the Max Cameron Theatre in Powell River, BC.
Check out the rest of them here.

No Island summer 2015 tour dates

BETTER DAYS now available!

My band No Island's new album is finally available for sale worldwide!
Check it out at http://music.no-island.com

One Of These Nights

Woke up to some great news today, No Island won 2nd place in LG 104.3's VanCOVER competition with our rendition of The Eagles' "One Of These Nights". Check it out!

Uno Mas with Los Furios

From Los Furios' recent sold-out show at The Rickshaw.

Better Days ahead

This spring is shaping up to be a super exciting one with two big album releases!

Los Furios is dropping a new album on April 17, and No Island's long-awaited Better Days that we've been hard at work on for nearly a year will be released on April 21 with a Vancouver CD release show on April 25. 

For a sneak peek, check out http://music.noisland.com

2014 in Review

Continuing my annual tradition of waiting for a month before reviewing the previous year, here is my round-up 2014's personal and professional highlights:

• Performing with Field Study. When I was in University, my first introduction to Vancouver's local indie music scene was Parlour Steps. I attended a number of their shows as I fell in love with the world of live music. I wanted to start my own band, and I made it a goal of mine to one day open for Parlour Steps. By the time No Island had started to come into its own, Parlour Steps had sadly disbanded, but I reached out to their former frontman Caleb Stull and was able to arrange a show with his new project Field Study at the same venue I had gone to see him play at many times before.
• Opening for The Toasters and The Mad Caddies with Los Furios.
• The coldest winter tour EVER with No Island. Lessons about the Coquihalla were reenforced.
• Beginning my association with Lightbulb Vaporizer.
• Beginning work on a new Los Furios album.
• Another fantastic summer tour with No Island.
• And the one thing that dominated 2014: Successfully crowd-funding and recording No Island's first full-length studio album "Better Days". This has been such a massive undertaking, and it's exciting to know that the finish line is now so close.

Catch-Up Post

Had a very nice moment recently that made me feel warm and fuzzy inside. No Island got fan mail from a couple of young musicians who told us how much they like our songs and asked if we could send them some charts so that they could play them for themselves. We almost never use charts of any sort, but I was able to find something to send them. I heard back saying how excited they were and that they were going to get together with some friends to play through the songs. I hope they keep on going after that song.

To cover my recent hiatus from posting:

• No Island did a small summer tour, best summed up in the video playlist below.
• Los Furios opened for The Slackers at The Imperial, and then played a super fun Halloween show at the Howe Sound Brewing Co.
• Lightbulb Vaporizer has had me on board for some more of their shows, including a CD release show later this month at the good ol' Railway Club.
• This fall has seen many late nights at Habitat Studios overseeing the final stages of No Island's Better Days coming together, as well as continuing work on Los Furios' as-yet-untitled EP that was started earlier this year. Most of my focus will be on the No Island album leading up to its release in early 2015.
• 
  

June Update

I've been pretty negligent about updating lately, which is a shame because so much has been happening.

The biggest news is the success of No Island's crowdfunding campaign that will be concluding about 4 hours after this is posted. Thanks to all our incredible fans, friends, and family, we are able to move ahead with the production of our new album Better Days that we spent the month of May recording. Even unmixed, the songs are already sounding amazing. I'm so proud and excited to share this music with the world, hopefully sometime this fall if things go according to plan.

Behind the scenes, Los Furios also has a new release brewing (although the target release date is still unknown to me). We also have a free show coming up this Saturday at the Rio Tinto Alcan Dragon Boat Festival at the Olympic Village around 3:30.

I shall endeavour to be more regular with my future posts.

Next No Island show April 26! With horns!

No Island finally has another big Vancouver show coming up. Joining us on the bill will be my friends in missingNo, whom I assisted in recording their original demos. We'll be stealing their horn section for a few No Island songs. It feels like it's been a while since I last sat down to arrange horn parts rather than doing it on-the-fly. I also had the pleasure of designing the poster. Quite excited for this one! Details: https://www.facebook.com/events/1454741188095830/

Playing with Lightbulb Vaporizer

I've been called up to provide some saxophone next week for a band I'd never met before: Lightbulb Vaporizer. I jammed with them earlier this week, and it was quite different from any other projects I'm currently involved with. Simply put, they are an instrumental jam band. So if you want to hear me doing some uninhibited musical wanking, come on down to Pat's Pub Friday April 11. Also playing are The Jen Huangs for their last show ever.

More Furios

Had a great time in the studio with Los Furios on Monday working on the new EP. Going back again next week to lay down some more parts.

+ + + + +

No Island's winter tour earlier this month was cold, but also a lot of fun. Video below.

No Island has a free daytime performance coming up on March 12, then we're heading over to the island for a couple dates with our friends Spaceport Union. Details on No Island's upcoming shows page.

Los Furios is going into the studio this month to lay down a new EP. The newest stuff is a little different, and I like it.

2013 in Belated Review

We're a month into 2014 now, but I've just realized that after such an incredible year of music it might be worth recapping the whole thing as I did with this post at the start of 2013.

So, here are some items that made my 2013 highlight reel:

• Two new brothers joined No Island, Jay Esplana on bass and Max Ley on drums. Their influence has redefined the sound of the band in the most exciting ways possible.
• Los Furios released a new single "Bad Waters"
• In April, No Island recorded, filmed, and released a snazzy little two-song mini-EP featuring our new sound.
• I found the perfect alto sax for me, a Yamaha Custon-Z in silver. Such a joy to play.
• In May, I traveled to Mexico for the first time in my life to play a tour with Los Furios. I was immediately enamored by the experience, especially the culture and the people I encountered there.
• After recording (but not yet releasing) their swan song EP, The Ivy League Brawlers played their final show ever in June before amicably disbanding. I learned a lot from playing with that band, and I'm glad we got to go out with a band.
• July and August featured what is without a doubt my most ambitious undertaking to date: a 40-date (38 after cancellations), 7-week tour across Canada, all the way to Halifax and back again. Entirely booked by myself and band mate Andy Rice, the tour tested all five members in many ways. The endeavour was unarguably a success and a transformative process for the band.
• I finally acquired a bass clarinet. With any luck, it will start finding its way into more of my work soon.
• And last but very far from least, something of an entirely personal nature: 2013 is the year I met Maureen, the amazing lady in my life. I couldn't be happier.

So far, 2014 has been very good. Can't wait to see what the rest of it brings!

Gigs!

Catching up on some posts that should have been made sooner.

Los Furios has a couple of cool Vancouver shows coming up:

• Jan 29 at Vancouver FanClub with The Toasters
• Feb 12 at Venue with The Mad Caddies

No Island is competing in an acoustic battle-of-the-bands. It's a fun opportunity for us to re-imagine our songs in a new context, and it's also a chance for us to potentially win one of two prizes that would make our next album possible. If you want to hear a different side of No Island and support us in the competition (audience voting is factored into the decision), the semi-final round will be taking place sometime in the first or second week of February (date TBA soon) at The Sin Bin in Vancouver (two blocks east of the Olympic Village Skytrain station).

Also in No Island news, the band will be doing a winter mini-tour in February. We'll be hitting Kelowna, Banff, Stavely, and Golden. I took another crack at poster design for this one, with fellow band mate Andy Rice taking care of the text and logos for this one.

*UPDATE Jan 23* : Revelstoke show cancelled, replaced with new show in Banff.

Live Los Furios Video

Here's a clip from Los Furios' most recent gig at Vancouver FanClub for X-Mas in Skaville #11

No Island poster

I decided to wade into some new territory and try my hand at designing the gig poster for No Island's next show. Pretty proud of it for a first attempt. I've dabbled in GIMP a little bit in the past but have never really done much in the way of graphic design/digital art/photo manipulation/whatever you would call this, so I'm pretty happy with the result.

New No Island show announced

I am very excited to say that my main band No Island will soon be returning to the stage on January 4th after spending some time off writing. The new songs are sounding fantastic, and I'm very excited to debut them at what is certainly going to be an incredible show all around.

Facebook event page: https://www.facebook.com/events/181848982021576

Furios Gig Update

Next Los Furios show is now Friday November 1st, not the 2nd. Facebook event page here.

Furios Gigs

No Island isn't gigging much at the moment because we are busy working hard on a bunch of new songs for our future album (and they sound freaking awesome!). Perhaps some shows will sneak their way into our schedule soon.


Los Furios, on the other hand, does have a few dates on the calendar:

Nov. 2 *Nov. 1* at the B-Ex (1143 Kingsway) in Vancouver
Nov. 29 in Victoria (venue TBA)
Dec. 13 at Vancouver Fan Club
Jan. 28 with The Toasters at The Rickshaw Theatre in Vancouver

Back in Town

I've been back in Vancouver for a few weeks. Played a super fun homecoming show with No Island at the Media Club with Dubai and Criminal Caterpillar, and then jumped right back into the groove again with Los Furios a week later at Fortune Sound Club with the Hellbound Hepcats and Creepshow. 

I've been doing a few clinics recently while figuring out my teaching schedule for the season. Looking forward to the new year with my students, old and new.

No Island is in the process of writing new material for our future album. Very exited for all the new songs to come!

No Island's Big Tour

No Island's Cross-Canada Tour has been announced. Two months on the road playing our way from coast to coast and back again. I won't be updating my personal site while on tour, so be sure to check out http://blog.no-island.com/ and www.twitter.com/NoIslandBand for updates.

ILB's Last Show Ever

Relating to my previous post... here's a link to details for The Ivy League Brawlers' farewell show at Fortune Sound Club: https://www.facebook.com/events/600440806646844

ILB no more

Today, the Ivy League Brawlers announced that they will be folding up the band and calling it quits. It's an unfortunate development, but probably for the best. To be completely transparent, I had actually already stepped down from the band a couple of months ago. I had a blast with the Brawlers and learned a lot from them, but all good things must come to an end. The band's official release concerning the situation sums it up perfectly:

"Hello Brawlers and Brawlettes, your friendly neighbourhood ILB here with a big (but not necessarily good) announcement.

The Ivy League Brawlers have decided to call it quits as a band.
With time comes change, and for the 8 of us, that change has come in the form of new commitments, different priorities, and big life decisions.After 5 exciting years together as a band, we've experienced a lot together, played some amazing shows, and accomplished a lot, but now we've come to a point where our focus as individuals is elsewhere. Know that we're all still great friends, there's no animosity between members, no huge arguments, nothing like that. We've just decided that, since the 8 of us are all getting to a time and place in our lives where we can't commit as much time to this band as we'd like to, it's better to quit now and go out gracefully than to let it fizzle out and die.

That being said, we've still got some stokeworthy news! We're going to be playing a final farewell show JUNE 29TH AT FORTUNE SOUNDCLUB with our great friends Criminal Caterpillar and Fall Fair Car. This is gonna be a great show, and more importantly, it'll be the last time you can see us play live! So come on out and say goodbye to us in person, share some memories, or just cry in our arms.We'll be playing some old favourites, some new favourites, and even a couple songs that you may have never even heard. If you don't come to this show then you'll never be able to hear those songs again, so that's an incentive, right? Stay on the lookout for the event page for that show that will have all the details.

Equally if not even more exciting: We've been recording a FINAL EP for you guys to listen to after we're gone. This is a collection of some of our newer songs, stuff we've been working on after we got tired of playing Argyle Album songs all the time. We're doing it almost entirely DIY so it's slow going, but it's gonna be good! With any luck that will be available in time for the farewell show. So keep your eyes open for that.

This band has been a huge part of all of our lives, 5 years playing with one group is a huge undertaking and we've all learned a lot playing with ILB. It'll be sad to see it go, but we're not disappearing off the face of the earth. Here's a little insight into what the members of ILB will be doing after:Anuar, our sexy lead singer, will be continuing to sing with local choirs, groups, and is going to continue his acting career.Tom, our leading guitar man, will continue working on various music projects that “will hopefully see the light of day in the near future.”CJ, bassist extraordinaire, is going to finish school and then continue playing music in and around Vancouver.Nikko, the rumbling drum man, will continue playing with Dark Sun Profits (https://www.facebook.com/pages/Dark-Sun-Profits/129254880462467?fref=ts) and will definitely still be playing around town.Mat, the mohawked wonder, might be joining forces with a certain well known Vancouver band, but we don't want to spoil it, so just keep your eyes and ears peeled. Also, he's going to continue working with the musicians he's met through ILB.Jimmy, sax man with the ears, will continue playing and touring with his band No Island (www.facebook.com/noislandband) and Los Furios (https://www.facebook.com/pages/Los-Furios/189330161139990?fref=ts) as well as teaching lessons to little kids that want to grow up to be a rockstar just like him.Quinn “Quinn” Quinn, will be finishing school and then is hoping to travel across the world before coming back to Vancouver to continue playing music with the people he's met through ILB.Mike, that guy with the huge sax, will continue playing with his groups Big EviL (facebook.com/bigevilmusic), VaudeVille Vagabonds (http://www.mythmaker.ca/vvv.html) , Edarem (https://www.facebook.com/edaremband?fref=ts), and a bunch of other groups around Vancouver. 

Thank you all so much for supporting us for 5 years, you made this band what it was, we couldn't have done any of it without the support of our fans. You guys made it fun to play this music, and you drove us to keep going for long after any other band with 8 members would normally go for.

So thank you all so much, and we'll see you on the dance floor one last time on the 29th!- Ivy League Brawlers"That being said, we've still got some stokeworthy news! We're going to be playing a final farewell show JUNE 29TH AT FORTUNE SOUNDCLUB with our great friends Criminal Caterpillar and Fall Fair Car. This is gonna be a great show, and more importantly, it'll be the last time you can see us play live! So come on out and say goodbye to us in person, share some memories, or just cry in our arms.We'll be playing some old favourites, some new favourites, and even a couple songs that you may have never even heard. If you don't come to this show then you'll never be able to hear those songs again, so that's an incentive, right? Stay on the lookout for the event page for that show that will have all the details.Equally if not even more exciting: We've been recording a FINAL EP for you guys to listen to after we're gone. This is a collection of some of our newer songs, stuff we've been working on after we got tired of playing Argyle Album songs all the time. We're doing it almost entirely DIY so it's slow going, but it's gonna be good! With any luck that will be available in time for the farewell show. So keep your eyes open for that.This band has been a huge part of all of our lives, 5 years playing with one group is a huge undertaking and we've all learned a lot playing with ILB. It'll be sad to see it go, but we're not disappearing off the face of the earth. Here's a little insight into what the members of ILB will be doing after: Anuar, our sexy lead singer, will be continuing to sing with local choirs, groups, and is going to continue his acting career.Tom, our leading guitar man, will continue working on various music projects that “will hopefully see the light of day in the near future.”CJ, bassist extraordinaire, is going to finish school and then continue playing music in and around Vancouver.Nikko, the rumbling drum man, will continue playing with Dark Sun Profits (https://www.facebook.com/pages/Dark-Sun-Profits/129254880462467?fref=ts) and will definitely still be playing around town.Mat, the mohawked wonder, might be joining forces with a certain well known Vancouver band, but we don't want to spoil it, so just keep your eyes and ears peeled. Also, he's going to continue working with the musicians he's met through ILB.Jimmy, sax man with the ears, will continue playing and touring with his band No Island (www.facebook.com/noislandband) and Los Furios (https://www.facebook.com/pages/Los-Furios/189330161139990?fref=ts) as well as teaching lessons to little kids that want to grow up to be a rockstar just like him.Quinn “Quinn” Quinn, will be finishing school and then is hoping to travel across the world before coming back to Vancouver to continue playing music with the people he's met through ILB.Mike, that guy with the huge sax, will continue playing with his groups Big EviL (facebook.com/bigevilmusic), VaudeVille Vagabonds (http://www.mythmaker.ca/vvv.html) , Edarem (https://www.facebook.com/edaremband?fref=ts), and a bunch of other groups around Vancouver.Thank you all so much for supporting us for 5 years, you made this band what it was, we couldn't have done any of it without the support of our fans. You guys made it fun to play this music, and you drove us to keep going for long after any other band with 8 members would normally go for.
So thank you all so much, and we'll see you on the dance floor one last time on the 29th!- Ivy League Brawlers"

Post-Mexico Update

Wow, what a trip. The people in Mexico are amazing. The appreciation for music there is overwhelming. In comparison, it seems like people take live music for granted in Canada.

Check out http://www.youtube.com/user/jmjazzman for videos.

Mexico Tour with Los Furios

In three days I'll be departing for Mexico with Los Furios to play 5 shows (I think...) in and around the Mexico City area, including a couple of shows that by all account look like they will be the biggest shows in my life so far.

Needless to say, I'm quite excited.

New No Island songs/videos/recordings

No Island has released a new pair of songs recorded live in the studio.









Download the songs for free here:
http://music.no-island.com/album/off-the-floor-live

Los Furios Triple Set May 11

Los Furios. May 11. Vancouver Fanclub

https://www.facebook.com/events/566140350093123

New Alto!

After struggling with a student-level alto sax for the past year and a half, I finally have been fortunate enough to find myself able to acquire a new one. This isn't just a better horn, but pretty well my dream horn: a silver Yamaha Custom Z in near-mint condition. It's powerful, free-blowing, has a tone that I quite like, and is a nice match with my silver YTS62 tenor to boot. Needless to say, I'm pretty stoked. I've been needing a horn like this for a long time now.

No Island media

It's been a busy few weeks for No Island. We played a charity gala for GirlsCAN, a student party at The University of the Fraser Valley in Abbotsford, and a super fun show at The Savage Beagle in Whistler. Somewhere in there, we managed to squeeze in an early morning photo shoot too!

We have a video project in the works too, so stay tuned for that!