The Besnard Lakes Founding Members Set To Release "The Soft Province"

On February 22, 2011, Three Ring Records will release a new album by The Soft Province. The album is self-titled and is a follow-up to their recent single "I See Two Eyes."

Somewhere in the two thousand-mile-journey between the capital of Saskatchewan and downtown Montreal exists a new body of music called The Soft Province. It's where the two musical minds of longtime friends (and Besnard Lakes co-founders) Jace Lasek and Michael Gardiner met to explore and draw the new borders that make up the 45 atmospheric minutes of their album, also called "The Soft Province."

The Soft Province's debut self-titled album was recorded at Lasek's own Breakglass Studio in Montreal during an August heat wave of 2008. It was mixed in November. The album's feel digs into the duo's love of layering sounds and instruments and using their studio as a way to achieve it.

Gardiner, who lives half a country away in Regina, Saskatchewan, came out to Montreal armed only with a Fender Coronado 12-string and a head full of ideas ready for Lasek's collaboration. Gardiner plays most of the instruments on The Soft Province. In addition to vocals, Lasek sits in on some drums, guitars and bass. Guests on the album include Lasek's wife and Besnard Lakes band mate, Olga Goreas (drums and bass) as well as drummer Max Henry (of SUUNS, Young Galaxy).

"Jace is my dearest friend and we grew up together and grew into musicians together," said Gardiner, who last played with Lasek in 2001 as a multi-instrumentalist with The Besnard Lakes. The two met in the mid 1980s while kids on a Saskatchewan baseball team. They began their songwriting relationship as teenagers, recording lots of "very weird music" on a 4-track tape machine.

Jace Lasek plays in the group The Besnard Lakes and runs Breakglass Studios where he records and produces many Canadian artists (Wolf Parade, Sunset Rubdown, Islands, among others). Michael Gardiner is a visual artist, musician and recording engineer living in Western Canada.

Track List

1. I See Two Eyes
2. Lazy Minds Die
3. Thin Ocean
4. The Broadway Coastline
5. For Untold Days
6. In a Some See No One Club
7. One Was a Lie
8. Late Night
9. Twist Twist
10. Anybody Hiding?

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