beekeeper

While Beekeeper’s new CD “ Be Kept” doesn’t capture the intensity of their live show, it does capture the band’s beautiful vocal harmonies and stylistic musical variety.
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The Vancouver based indie-rock band features the quirky songwriting of guitarist/ vocalist Devon Lougheed as well as drummer Luke Cyca plus some very cool violin playing from Tegan Ceschi-Smith to add a different string to the sound, plus an array of girls singing background and harmony vocals on all the different tracks, which gives the songs a more modernized “Pursuit of Happiness” sound.
The CD also doesn’t include new bassist Terri Upton, best known for being one of roots/bluegrass trio the Gruff.


But the songs still explore a variety of styles from progressive rock to reggae and a lot of indie rock.
But the music is innovative, unusual and entertaining. The violin is a really unique addition to the band’s upbeat rocking sound which makes them tough to pigeonhole. They are all over the place. “Spider Webs/ Insect Eyes” is a Foo Fighters style rocker, while “Pinwheel Revolution is more Weezer.


Overall, the band sounds like a cross between Nomeansno and Suicidal Tendencies with a touch of the Pursuit of Happiness, especially on “Hurt and Enemy.” There is also a little Pixies and some Said the Whale influence as well. There are lots of highlights, including “Everyhthing is Repaired.” Overall, it is an interesting and innovative listen with lots of different sounds combined into an entertaining listen. - LA Beat

Luke Cyca and Devon Lougheed are two of the core members of Beekeeper, a wonderfully unconventional Vancouver-based indie band with an ever-changing line-up.

I asked, “So, out of you guys, who’s ‘the talent’?” and the pair instantly pointed at one another.

“Luke and I have a really wonderfully complementary relationship,” explained Lougheed. “We’re both creative in just the way the other person needs to actually get things done.”

Though primarily based around Cyca, Lougheed and violinist Tegan Ceschi-Smith, the band itself is a “strange community, augmented with extremely talented friends,” as musicians and artists from all corners of the country are enlisted to contribute parts. “It’s kind of a revolving door of people,” added Cyca. Both Lougheed and Ceschi-Smith are graduate students at UBC.


Their debut album, Be Kept, was made on a shoestring budget on their own terms. From the vocals being recorded in a room with nine others, to crowd noises in the rain outside a hotel in Toronto, they used “exactly the wrong recording techniques,” said Lougheed. The album is the result of several months of haphazard and off-the-cuff recording, which manages to come together as a cohesive and tight pop record. Wall of sound pop and pitch perfect harmonies make comparisons to the New Pornographers inevitable.

“One of the main challenges has been adapting songs from the album to the stage,” said Lougheed. “Sometimes there’ll be two people on stage, sometimes thirteen, all you know is it’ll be fuckin’ good!”

The official album release ties in with “Faithful Neighbours,” a concert series with proceeds supporting various Downtown Eastside charities. “We didn’t want the fanfare for ourselves really, the album speaks for itself, everyone will love it!” joked Lougheed. “The idea of doing a show for the release where everyone comes out and should love us seemed a bit weird to us. People should come out and love the Downtown Eastside.” - The Ubyssey Magazine

You know that feeling you get halfway through a tall boy—that wave of warmth washing over your body, replacing the grimness of the workday with a blissful buzz? Well, local indie rockers Beekeeper have found a way to replicate that glorious sensation on Be Kept.

A rambunctious debut packed with clever math-rock rhythms, cutesy boy-girl vocals, and off-the-cuff flourishes, the album deserves a sack full of gold stars. Opener “Table and Bed” kicks off with talk of belching before turning to sugary-sweet harmonies and a walloping pop-punk chorus to make its joyful point. “Nice Lunch” loosely recalls Sloan’s “The Good in Everyone” before dropping down a sonic notch and exploring the moodier depths of indie rock. These tracks, and the 11 others featured on the disc, hit the spot, but when heard back to back they almost feel erratic and reckless in terms of the genres at play.

But ambition should never be faulted—especially when the crew in question is helmed by a duo as talented as multi-instrumentalists Devon Lougheed and Luke Cyca—so Beekeeper gets away relatively unscathed here, beyond, of course, the gentle suggestion to simplify its modus operandi. It’s hard to knock them for more when they’ve found a way to weave sturdy hooks around fancy rhymes hinged on words like autobiography. - The Georgia Straight

It was shortly past 9PM by the time Vancouver's beekeeper settled behind their particular instruments and tore into their lively set. Frontman Devon Lougheed essentially carried the show, parading the stage like some veteran rock star, and blistering the mic with punk-fused pop tales that had him invoking Isaac Brock from time to time.

Over screeching from a heavy bass and the peeling of the violin, Lougheed solicited an audience presence, feeding us uptempo songs that lasted as short as 40 seconds, yet no longer than a few minutes, while we chugged back complimentary cans of Big Rock. They warmed up the crowd, no doubt, testing our energy with their own. His own. - I <3 Edmonton

I’m getting pretty tired of people always telling me I missed a great show. I can’t be everywhere, so when I try to hit multiple
THE HEARTBROKEN’S DAMHNAIT DOYLE. PHOTO BY RICHARD AMERY

gigs in a single night, I am going to miss one or two great shows a week, unfortunately, short of cloning myself , there is no way to avoid it.
I usually try to take Sunday nights off, though the day is usually filled with writing about all the great shows I did catch the rest of the week.


I am glad I caught Beekeeper and The Heartbroken at the Slice, this Sunday, Feb. 13.
I arrived in the middle of a frenetic set of crazed, multi-stylistic mayhem from Vancouver’s Beekeeper.

I was especially pleasantly surprised to see Terri Upton, the former bassist of bluegrass/ country trio the Gruff, up on stage rocking out on electric bass, trying to keep pace with frenetic frontman, guitarist and vocalist Devon Lougheed.


They had a really innovative and unusual sound, combining indie pop, jazz, reggae and a lot of other things including a variety of creative guitar soundscapes, Sonic Youth style noise rock and vocal harmonies and vocals ranging from soulful to screamo.


Violinist Tegan Ceschi-Smith and Upton added ghostly vocal harmonies, and after Lougheed broke a string, they launched into an impromptu funky jam with drummer Luke Cyca.


Upton was impressive as she just joined the band three months ago and only recently took up electric bass as she is used to playing stand up bass. They played an extremely tight set of really complex and energetic music, which had a decent sized Sunday crowd cheering. - LA Beat

Beekeeper and their debut LP, Be Kept, are self-advertised as a post-pop band burgeoning into the world of math rock dissonance with massive hearts on their experimental Southern Ontarian sleeves. Not sure what that means? Well it’s not certain if the band knows either, but what is clear is that this record of life, small towns and slain dragons was derived from maximum fun and excitement.
The album is delivered with an earnest and raw etiquette. Lyrics are cheeky and clever (“Bruised and all /Tastes sweeter / Does it?”) but every bit as sincere as those made in seriousness and sombreness (“Digging the ground / Not looking for blue skies”). The vocal harmonies of boy/girl sounds and the instrumentation within voice—switching from harsh, staccato rapping to sweet melodic pop swoons—add another layer of character to the already extroverted sound of constant time signature changes and instrument interjections. Some of the best moments are early on in the album; “Table and Bed” features a snappy duet, violins appear within “Sudden Cuckoo” and the jazz odyssey-esque markings of “Novel” are distinctive and help add to the chaotic nature of the song.
The album is a fun and off-kilter glimpse into the Vancouver indie music scene, but it is not, unsurprisingly, a groundbreaking work of art. The experimental fits of rage on “Hurt An Enemy” are full of great, thick guitar lines and raw emotion just as the over-dramatic violin lines in “There’s a Reason” are painfully real in their simplistic composition; however, the sum of the parts are not as great as the original Beekeeper concept. Each song has its moment, but then they tend to lead to or from parts that are uninteresting or just amateur sounding. As a debut, Be Kept is good with its nods to experimentation with both instrumentation and musical blends, but it lacks the ability to enrapture an audience. - Discorder Magazine

Beekeeper is an indie pop band from Vancouver consisting of Devon Lougheed, Luke Cyca, Tegan Ceschi-Smith, and various musical guests.



Be Kept serves as furiously energetic string of enthusiastic rock tracks with pop hooks. The record is an interesting blend and mixture of diverse songs, but Beekeeper is at its best when they stick to their notable brand of high tempo beats stringed together with unconventional pacing. The high energy carries the lyrics and music through the album well.

Interestingly enough, when Beekeeper slows it down and plays it straight with more conventional themes of melancholy and relationship angst, things diverge.

Some of the nonsense and strangeness found in the album are often the most charming parts of the record. "Spider Webs / Insect Eyes" plays basic lyrics and conventions with a sometimes haunting, foreboding backing track that is very appealing.

The ultimate charm of Beekeeper is their high energy, fun factor. The more familiar songs with common motifs are interesting, but not different enough to particularly stand out. However, the raw aesthetic and intriguing carelessness of their more amped up songs are inventive and play well. Be Kept, if nothing else, is quite clever musical experiment at the best of times and worth checking out. - Rick Chung.com

I am struggling with where to start with this band. The fact that Beekeeper sound like they have consumed 20 cans of high energy drink and about fifty packets of Mentos goes someway in making it difficult to pin them down.

Every song on ‘Be Kept’ has something totally unexpected. Random time changes, off-kilter musicianship and crazy acapella vocals. This album possesses more ideas than most bands could hope to create in a lifetime, and that makes my job at trying to find reference points all the more difficult – a rare thing in music these days but something that should be praised within the highest echelons of songwriting regard.



‘Be Kept’ is the perfect name for this album. It is literally like kicking the lid from a beehive and standing back & watching nature explode with awe. Beekeeper take flight in all manor of directions and the tracks on this release buzz and drip with infectious honey covered globlets of sweetness – Damn I sound like Nigella Lawson here, but don’t worry, there are plenty of melancholic moments to give a more ominous edge to this release.

‘Table and Bed’ is a song that is reminiscent of Guided by Voices mixed with a dash of Seafood’s slick vocal dualities. Deft choppy guitar lines weave intricate patterns of punctual Indie Rock, whilst some of the best drumming I have heard for a long time pounds my head into orbit.

There are some slower more pensive moments on the album. A vibrant mix of musical ideas that have come to life in exactly the way the band wanted. Songs like ‘Spider Webs/Insect Eyes’ just don’t come from thin air; they take years of moulding and crafting before they can finally be happily released. ‘Be Kept’ is making more sense to me with each listen. The aforementioned track actually reminds me of Ligament at their most adventurous. Phenomenal drumming and mathematical time changes are the key elements to the perfect chemistry here.

‘Last Words’, trust me these will not be the last words written about this band. I dare you to listen to this song and not sit back and think that something more than special has been created by Beekeeper. A piano motif spirals into controlled chaotic drum rolls and the guitar punctuates the overall feeling of angry yet beautiful noise. As soon as I heard this album in its entirety for the first time, I just had to start it over again as I can’t see a mind that is human being able to take this all in during one listen. Beekeeper you have an infectious sting that I for one do not want an antidote for. - Crumbs in the Butter

Luke Cyca and Devon Lougheed are a strange and won­der­ful com­bi­na­tion. Indi­vid­u­ally, Cyca is a ther­a­peu­tic pro­tein mol­e­cule designer and elec­tron­ics recy­cler and Lougheed is a doc­toral can­di­date and come­dian. Together, they are Bee­keeper – an irrev­er­ent indie band breez­ing into Vancouver’s music scene.
Cyca, a prairie boy from Swift Cur­rent, Saskatchewan, began his musi­cal career at home, singing with his father and sis­ter. After a pro­to­typ­i­cal string of garage bands in high school, Cyca moved to Van­cou­ver and bought a drum set. “I was in a band called The Kitchen, I played in a cou­ple other projects, and I play with Piper Davis now. That brings us to Bee­keeper,” says Cyca.
Lougheed fol­lowed a sim­i­lar musi­cal vein, always instill­ing his trade­mark cheek­i­ness. While in his home province of Ontario, Lougheed was in Tomate Potate — a band known for their onstage mar­tini con­sump­tion. “Fans started send­ing us mar­ti­nis and it turned into this game of ‘How many mar­ti­nis can these guys drink in a twenty minute period?’ Then one day the bassist, Nich, came up to me and said, ‘Just so you know, I don’t really like mar­ti­nis,’” Lougheed smiles. “So that’s why I’ve got a band­mate now who likes martinis!”
Bee­keeper melds high-energy beats with uncon­ven­tional time sig­na­tures, appeal­ing to both light-hearted lis­ten­ers and music nerds. Lush earnest vocals are bal­anced with play­ful melodies. “It’s indie-rock made by reformed hard-core kids who are suck­ers for male/female har­monies and sin­ga­longs,” says Lougheed.
Cyca and Lougheed keep things inter­est­ing for them­selves with con­stant exper­i­men­ta­tion. “Devon writes two new songs every week, so there’s no short­age of chal­lenges,” Cyca explains. “An mp3 comes to my email box and it’s got the shit­ti­est synth instru­ments play­ing drums — they’re not sequenced, just played live. I lis­ten to it a few times, we jam on it and it changes a bit into a real song. And that’s how they’re made.”
The record­ing of Beekeeper’s first album, BE KEPT, was an adven­ture in itself. Recorded through­out Canada, from par­ties to bed­rooms to stu­dios, the result­ing posh­ness of the tracks sur­prised the band. “We did every­thing wrong in terms of how you’re sup­posed to record,” says Cyca. “And then we dumped every­thing on Colin Stew­art at Hive Stu­dios,” laughs Lougheed. “He’s the god­fa­ther of the Bee­keeper baby.”
Lougheed means this quite seri­ously. “Inter­view­ing us about the album is like inter­view­ing new par­ents about their first baby. I like every­thing about it! I even like when it poops!” Cyca nods in agree­ment, “Nor­mally, after mak­ing an album, I’m totally sick of it, but this one I can actu­ally lis­ten to and enjoy still.”
BE KEPT fol­lows the nar­ra­tive of a man search­ing for some­thing to keep. While Beekeeper’s core con­sists of Cyca and Lougheed, they often fea­ture musi­cal guests in their live per­for­mances and a vari­ety of female vocal­ists, a vio­lin­ist, and sax­o­phone player were recruited to fill their sound on the album.
“I’m the most proud of Bee­keeper,” says Lougheed. “My mom has been dri­ving around with a copy and singing along, every once in a while she’ll call me and say things like, ‘What is this song about? I just like it so much! This is such a sig­nif­i­cant improvement!’” - Sad Mag

We have been dreaming of a day when bands wearing skinny jeans, relaxed-fit jeans, and skeleton pants could put their differences aside. Cracks in the proverbial Berlin Wall seem to have formed Thursday as Beekeeper and Exit 200 opened for an impressive performance by the Light Machines. The bands hit the crowd with their contrasting styles of music for 30:Live at the Forum Sports Bar.

Vancouver’s Beekeeper opened with their fusion of postpop and math rock. Those in the crowd mainly kept to themselves and avoided the tiny dance floor, but that didn’t stop the duo, consisting of Devon Lougheed on guitar and vocals and Luke Cyca on drums, from kicking tracks off their album Be Kept up a notch. Lougheed oscillated between catchy rhythm and screaming falsetto and Tegan Ceschi-Smith joined on multiple songs, using her violin to add an Alfred Hitchcockian feel and climax the songs. It was nice to see a band that didn’t take itself too seriously, and Lougheed demonstrated this when he yelled to the crowd, “We were nominated for a Juno…we nominated ourselves. Hope you enjoy Metric winning.” - The Georgia Straight