Moondoggy has been a blog fave since I first heard them. Their first album, Mad and Noisy, is a roadtrip favourite, and it’s the sound of a band trying everything to see what feels right. This year, every one of their singles has been added to the Friday playlist. On the new record Changing Seasons, Getting Even, the band confidently defines their sound: throwback, chilled out, good-time classic-ish rock and roll.

Just listen to this:

It’s music for slow day drinking on the patio, for late nights at the local bar and even later nights when everyone comes to your place after said bar. It’s the retroactive soundtrack to my 20s. Doesn’t matter that those days are long past, these songs take me back there in an instant. I mean that literally; I have some hazy, vague memories of late nights at the Done Right Inn long before it was a hipster neighborhood:

Moondoggy has always seemed a bit like a band from another decade. Their sound is loose, with a sense of relaxed fun that’s contagious, and it has classic rock influences woven throughout. The songs sound like they’re recorded live from the floor. The vocal has a bluesy, overdriven sound to it, full of character and charisma. The themes are timeless too: lost love, regrets, growing up and living well.

It’s easy to envision this as a group of seasoned musicians who have played together forever, not some dudes just out of university. Forget sounding live, this music sounds like life. Their hometown paper (still available in newsprint!) tells us that Moondoggy plans to crowdfund a vinyl print of this record, and my name will be at the top of that list.

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