Del Barber

DEL Barber is a Prairie boy at heart.

The evidence is all his fourth full-length album, Prairieography — out today via True North Records — the Junonominated Winnipeg country/ roots troubadour paints vivid pictures of small towns and the hard-working people who populate them. His portraits aren’t rendered in misty, pastel-hued watercolours; they’re rougher, grittier. Barber lets the brush strokes show.

The 30-year-old was inspired by another document of life on the Prairies:

Cowboyography, the 1987 album by venerated Canadian singer/songwriter Ian Tyson. He rediscovered the album on a drive through southern Alberta.

"I was so impressed with how he was able to connect me with that place directly," he says. "I realized that what I was trying to do."

It’s something Barber did with success on Prairieography’s predecessor, 2012’s Headwaters. As its title suggests, that record was all about returning to the source, about going home again.

Prairieography is mostly about the people who never left — in particular, those whose lives exist somewhere between urban and rural.

"It’s a subject I want to continue to write about until I’ve exhausted it," he says. "There are so many great stories about characters who live in both worlds."

Barber is not an autobiographical songwriter. He prefers instead to tell the stories he’s picked up along his travels. Some are seemingly plucked from the headlines; lead track Living with a Long Way to Go details the day-to-day struggles of a farmer who decides to work on the oilpatch in order to save his family business: "Heading out to Fort Mac/Gonna make a comeback/make a million dollars pulling oil from the ground."

The song feels especially topical in light of Neil Young’s Honor the Treaties tour last month. Barber is a big fan of Young’s — he sings a cover of Harvest Moon — but he feels the issue is complex, especially for folks who need to make choices like the protagonist in his song.

"I think the way Neil Young spoke about this issue alienated people instead of bringing them together," he says. "The stories are all more complicated than we think they are. We’re all dirty."

Prairieography marks a departure for the singer/songwriter, skewing more country than the albums before it — a stylistic shift Barber attributes to his songwriting style.

"(The lyrics) seem more direct and precise," he says. "They’re not ultra-poetic, which is why it sounds more country. I’m not trying to be a part of high art or something oblique."

That’s part of the reason he loves playing for rural audiences, which major tour circuits often neglect.

"They keep me honest," he says. "They don’t have a lot of patience for obliqueness. The more direct the narratives are, the more sincere they come off. It’s easier to perform songs that are easier to understand. It’s a tradition of folk and country music that gets lost."

Barber’s plainspokenness is complemented by warm, textural soundscapes that were recorded live to analogue tape at Empire Recording. Field sounds of grain augers and combines made it on to the finished product, which was co-produced by Barber and his steel player Bill Western. A silo was painstakingly transformed into a reverb tank.

"We didn’t want it to sound too manufactured," Barber says. "We thought, ‘How do we make these songs sound like the landscape?’ Winnipeg, the Canadian Prairies and the western States — there’s a lot of grit to them."

The fact that Prairieography was made entirely by prairie people also gives it a homespun vibe.

"It felt like making a record with friends," he says. "It sounds like the Prairies."

-- Jen Zoratti - Winnipeg Free Press

A rootsy singer/songwriter from the West could sure do worse than turn to Ian Tyson's landmark record Cowboyography for inspiration. Highly-touted Winnipeg songsmith Barber did just that for his fourth album, and the results will surely bring a smile to Tyson's grizzled visage. Prairieography explores the places and people of the West with poetic skill, and Barber's easy-on-the-ear voice does them justice.

The opening song, "Living With A Long Way to Go," tells of a beat-down farmer eyeing oil sands dollars, while other tunes depict a drug-running trucker ("Yellowhead Road") and lovers working at a cheap motel ("Peter and Jenny Lee"). The album was co-produced with aptly-named pedal steel player Bill Western, and the use of analogue tape pays off in the warm sonics. An average of seven or more players and harmony vocalists appear on each track, resulting in a very full sound, though a more minimal setting for a song or two would have added variety.

Befitting the subject matter, the style is more down home country than Barber's earlier folk-inflected efforts, with the upbeat "Country Girl" bringing Corb Lund to mind. A real album highlight is "Big Smoke," which sports a gorgeous melody and a sombre feel, with a spoken word sample from a CBC news item on farming incorporated cleverly. It's a very solid effort.
(True North)

-- Kerry Doole - Exclaim!

TORONTO - For Boyd Barber, work was never about anything as fanciful or intangible as pursuing a dream.

In fact, it was the dreams that chased him. Vivid nightmares that have haunted him since 1969, when he was one of the Canadian Navy members onboard the HMCS Kootenay when a gearbox exploded,
killing nine crew members and injuring at least 53 others.

For 40 years afterward, Barber worked as a millwright. He spent most of those four decades toiling in the depths of Manitoba mines, but his was a jack-of-all-trades position that required him to nurture a
general aptitude for all sorts of body-burdening tasks: welding, electrical work, installation of industrial machinery.

It's the sort of stuff often referred to as good, honest work, but Barber hated it. So he was glad his son, Del, developed a talent for music and opted to follow a different path than his dad.

But he never expected to follow in his son's fresh footsteps. These things are supposed to work the other way around.

Boyd's son — Juno nominee Del Barber — recently released his third collection of hand-crafted indie-folk, "Headwaters." It features "Running on a Wire," a song co-written with his father, just one of a bundle of songs the pair penned together.

And for a retired 63-year-old who spent most of his life dismissing his creative impulses, the collaboration could scarcely be more meaningful.

"I'm honoured that he would consider anything this old fart's got to say to him," Boyd said in a recent interview from his home in Winnipeg.

"If he thinks that anything I've got to say has some value, I'm really proud of that. It makes me feel really, really happy — it gives me a sense of validity.... Our relationship has improved a lot because of
that."

"I'm tremendously proud that he's not afraid to talk about me," he added. "Because you know, I'm a bit of a flawed character. But he loves me anyway. And I'm just as proud as can be about all that stuff."

Yet the elder Barber has always wielded an influence over his son's songwriting career, whether he knew it or not.

Del grew up merrily ensconced in his father's vinyl collection. He was particularly enamoured with John Prine, as well as such "classic Canadiana" as the Band and Neil Young. To this day, their tastes only
differ in degrees, with Boyd favouring the politicized blues bleakness of, for instance, James McMurtry, while Del prefers more hopeful material.

"His tastes lie slightly darker than mine, because he's twisted," Del said with a laugh in a recent interview in Toronto.

Then there was the influence of Boyd's own guitar work. Del says he was always private with his playing, only reluctantly letting his bluesy notes fill the house when Del was growing up. He's been playing more since he retired but still dismisses his prowess as quickly as Stevie Ray Vaughan's fingers climbed the fretboard.

"At my best, I think I had some skill when it came to guitar-playing but I didn't really have any talent...and I believe that Del has both," he said in one characteristically self-deprecating comment.

"It's the most annoying thing," said Del separately, shaking his head.
"He can play but he really struggles with having the confidence to play in front of me. And I grew up hearing him play. He's great....

"He's probably going to come up with some big project and usurp me of all my Barber-dom."

For now, it's the younger Barber who handles the music side of their collaborations.

Boyd's contribution was words. After that harrowing experience aboard the HMCS Kootenay, Boyd suffered post-traumatic stress disorder. Of course, he couldn't put a name on the condition until years later — "Back in those days, there was nothing but 'smarten up, go back to your job' kind of thing," he remembers sadly — but the effects of the damage were plain as day, especially at night.

Even now, Boyd has extra-lucid dreams occasionally ominous enough to startle him awake screaming. At some point, he began trying to write out the details of his dreams as best he could remember them, and eventually presented some of those stories and images to Del. Inspired, they began swapping lyrical ideas more regularly.

While the searching "Running on a Wire" was their only collaboration to make "Headwaters," Del hints that they have a bundle of other tunes so unique that they might make more sense as a separate release.

It all sounds great, but let's face it: there are those among us who would probably opt for dental surgery over the intimate, frustrating process of trying to write a song with one's parent.

And Del gets all that.

"It would've been (weird) to me five years ago, but it's all been pretty easy," said the 28-year-old, who speaks with a clear-eyed candour that would appear to be genetic.

He notes that the duo exchanges ideas via email, rather than sitting down together and trying to hash out tunes in real time.

"There's always space between us, which helps — be - Vancouver Province

Since the release of his 2010 album, Love Songs for the Last 20, the momentum hasn’t slowed for hometown hero Del Barber. After snagging a Juno nomination and a couple of Western Canadian Music
Awards — not to mention logging some 300 tour dates on the strength of that career-making release — the roots/country troubadour wasted no time recording a follow-up that’s even mightier than its
predecessor.

That record is Headwaters, which came out this past Tuesday via Six Shooter Records. When Uptown sat down with Del for coffee, the ink was still drying on his deal with the respected Toronto indie label, which is also home to fellow songwriting heavyweights such as Christine Fellows, Luke Doucet and Melissa McClelland.

"I signed the paperwork five days ago," he says with a laugh. "There’s a lot of smoke in this industry, so
it’s nice when something’s burning."

Indeed, to borrow a line from Almost Famous, it’s all happening for Del Barber. If Love Songs… was his introduction to the Canadian roots scene, Headwaters will no doubt confirm his place as a major player.
Barber’s third full-length album has a maturity and a wisdom that belies its creator’s 28 years — a result of spending months on the road, yes, but also from being challenged on his ‘absolute’ ideas.

"I have very strong opinions about what songs are supposed to be, but I know I’m not the authority on that for other songwriters," Barber says. "I always want the song to have a narrative that people can
understand, but I wanted to operate on more than just the literal level. Sometimes when I write, I don’t challenge myself musically enough. I don’t look at it hard enough."

It was Sam Kassirer, most famous for his work with Josh Ritter and David Wax Museum, who met Barber’s biggest requirement of a producer: someone who would make him look at his music harder.

"It was about putting my trust in someone else," he says. "What’s cool about bands is that they do that as a matter of practice. Singer/songwriters don’t do that as much as they probably should."

Recorded at Winnipeg’s Empire Studios as well as in a 19th-century farmhouse in Maine, Headwaters was definitely a new experience for Barber, who co-produced and recorded Love Songs… on a shoestring
budget. This time out, he was able to focus less on production and more on playing, as well as work with seasoned session musicians — "people I wouldn’t have necessarily chosen or known about," he says.
Best of all, he felt challenged by the sessions. It’s clear from this interview (and past ones) that Barber is someone who expects a lot of himself; he had no interest in staying within his established comfort zone.

"(With Love Songs…), there was no risk at all because I didn’t know if anyone would listen to it," he says
with a laugh. "But it’s not a bad pressure to have. A lot of artists say they make music for themselves or for the sake of making music, but I want to make it for the community that supported me. For me, it’s an
expression of community, not an expression of ego."

Fittingly, Headwaters is a record rooted in community. Ruminations on ‘where we’re from,’ his stories are not told through the pastel lens of Polaroid nostalgia; Barber examines the complex relationships with our
communities and hometowns — and explores the way our history dictates our future. (Indeed, Del has a John K. Samson-level preoccupation with place, specifically forgotten, boarded-up small towns.)

"I’d been working with the assumption that we’re not as free as we like to think we are — our history is living in us whether we like it or not," he says. "We can’t escape it. Headwaters, literally, is the place
where rivers begin. It’s a good metaphor for sources. You can’t get where you’re going unless you look at where you came from."

Of course, sometimes you can’t go home. Growing up in St. Norbert, a community that straddles the line between city and country, Barber has seen it happen: friends from school would leave in pursuit of greener
pastures (or, more accurately, brighter cities), only to find themselves longing for home.

"A lot of people realized they wanted to come back, but the decisions they made along the way have made it so they can’t," Barber reflects. It’s another theme explored on the record.

As for Barber, he maintained his Prairie roots despite working in 15 states and eight provinces, and
currently calls Winnipeg home (when he’s not following the yellow line, that is). His love for this city is evident, both on record and in conversation — but the prevailing attitude of its inhabitants frustrates him.

"We let ourselves be defined by it being this undesirable place to live or something. Everyone who lives here has to advocate for it or apologize for it, which I don’t understand," he says.

"I don’t have much patience for the complaints. I like being a tourist everywhere else. There’s so much character in Winnipeg — it’s a great place to live and write."

-- Jen Zoratti - Uptown

A year ago, Winnipeg musician Del Barber was a solo act. He had no manager, no producer and no one handled his publicity. Then, last year, he was shortlisted for a Juno and everything changed.

He had sent in the nomination for the award on a whim, borrowing money from his parents for the application. Barber heard his application had been successful when listening to CBC radio while
driving to Edmonton.

This explained to him why his BlackBerry was flooded with congratulatory notes.

Before hearing the radio announcement, Barber had called his mother to find out what the messages meant, but the phone call dropped before she could tell him.

The Juno nomination changed everything for Barber. Suddenly agents and managers were calling him and for the first time ever Barber worked with a producer to record his latest album Headwaters.
"It was freeing in every way," said Barber about working with a producer. "I was able to concentrate on my songs, rather than worry about the logistics of who was playing with me."

Barber's new manager and publicity agent also provide freedom.

"I don't have to worry about the business side anymore," said Barber, whose only goal has been to make playing music a sustainable career.

A recent interview with CBC's Jian Ghomeshi on Q has given Barber a lot of exposure.

It's been surreal, said Barber.

"It's my friends that keep me grounded, the ones who don't care if one of my songs does well," he said. "I've lost a few of them over the years. With all the travelling I do, I haven't been able to keep up with everyone. But I really treasure those who have kept in touch."

The 28-year-old has been on the road almost non-stop over the last 10 years, working in 15 states and eight provinces.

"I chased Jack Kerouac's ghost across the continent, working dozens of jobs," said Barber.

He planted trees in northern B.C., served coffee and breakfast in Georgia, and drove drug addicts
to their court dates in Winnipeg. He's worked as a mountain guide, a janitor, a construction worker, a groundskeeper, a landscaper, a farmer, a counsellor, an icemaker, a teacher's assistant, a driver,
a roofer, a fisherman. The list goes on.

Eventually, he ended up in Chicago where he began singing in front of open mics. And somewhere in between performing and writing hundreds of songs, Barber became home sick and returned to
Winnipeg, which is close to his hometown, the French community St. Norbert.

Although Barber spends most of the year touring, Winnipeg is where he'll stay based.

"It's my community," he said.

Barber brought his producer, Sam Kassirer from Maine, up to Winnipeg to record Headwaters.
"We recorded rough takes of 30 plus songs and with Kassirer's help I whittled the list down to 10," said Barber. "Writing to me is a daily practice, even when I'm not inspired."

He describes his latest record as an exercise in carefulness and intentionality.

"It needed to be traditional, contemporary, fresh and urgent in its scope," said Barber, adding the album is about searching for the source of one's desires.

Headwaters is Barber's third record in four years.

"My world has turned into managers, agents, airports, festivals and promoters," said Barber. "It's a grind, but I love the grind."
- The Regina Leader Post

Hot on the heels of his WCMA-winning Love Songs for the Last Twenty, Winnipeg native Barber serves up a winning debut for Six Shooter Records that seems tailored to cement his reputation as a rising star of the Canadian singer/songwriter set (and entrench him on the playlists of Canada’s national broadcaster). He writes great hooks, for one thing, and gets great support from producer/keyboardist Sam Kassirer and a skilled band in putting them across—songs like Can’t Turn
Around and Right Side of the Wrong only need one listen to become lodged in your head indefinitely. It’s certainly not a knock to say that Barber’s earnestly boyish voice and wide-eyed-yet-wise turns of lyrical phrase sure do remind me of Idahoan folk darling Josh Ritter, even if Barber occasionally lets his penchant for cleverness get a little thick, as on the metaphor-soaked Hen House Manifesto. If he seems to be playing ironically with someone else’s musical tropes on Soul of the
Land That’s Mine, with its evocations of Memphis and the Rio Grande, there’s plenty about Headwaters to instill faith that Barber’s just getting started blazing his trail. – Scott Lingley - Penguin Eggs

Independent alt-country artist Del Barber sheds his solitary man status on Headwaters. Released in May on Six Shooter Records, the Winnipeg singer-songwriter’s third studio album features seasoned session musicians and Maine-based producer Sam Kassirer.

“Sam produced the last couple Josh Ritter records and I was pretty into the sound of those records,” says Barber, 28.

“I wanted to make a more alternative sounding record and I wanted to work with a producer who would take the reins on the project and have strong opinions about things sonically. My opinions are really strong
about songs but not so much about sound.”

Sound-wise, Headwaters is musically moodier than 2010’s Juno-nominated album Love Songs for the Last 20. Despite paying more attention to production, nothing was lost in the storytelling department. The Waitress, for instance, concerns a small town girl who moves to the city and works at an all-night diner. The song is about the server accepting her lot in life.

“I think everyone at a certain point stops being completely idealistic about their dreams or what they thought they wanted from life,” Barber says.

“The subject matter I always write about is the urban/rural divide. A lot of my friends have moved from their small towns and then waxed nostalgic. They try to go back but there’s no work. In this case it was something else that made her stay away from home — she became too good at serving to quit and do anything else. It made her stuck, but at a certain point she got past feeling stuck and is at peace with working the night shift.”

City or country, Barber is preoccupied with place, particularly this province. Love Songs featured Home to Manitoba while Headwaters closes with Soul of the Land That’s Mine. His love for home is so strong that when Barber hits the road, he feels a little guilty.

“I have a feeling of infidelity with Manitoba,” Barber says.

“It’s like I have this beautiful wife but to live I have to cheat on her. My M.O. is to see the good in other places. That being said, I’m just a tourist, I’m not looking for anywhere else to live. Still, it’s hard when you’re always around people who are extending grace and charity. It makes it seem like life is easier everywhere else.” - Metro News

Headwaters marks the third album for the Winnipeg-based troubadour. Out of the 30 demos that were recorded, the ten that made the final cut are mostly pulsating narratives that hint here and there at other storytellers. I think of John Mellencamp on Can’t Turn Around, Cat Stevens on The Right Side of the Wrong, and others. Produced
by Sam Kassirer (Josh Ritter), Headwater‘s chronicles are enhanced by Del Barber’s passionate vocabulary, like when he asserts that "everything is never enough" or brilliantly mourns the homeland he abandoned on the closer Soul of the Land That’s Mine. Yes, Del Barber is one more singer-songwriter in the purest tradition of the classic troubadour, and one to look out for – I just know he’s got a real masterpiece in him. - Guillaume Moffet - Hour.ca

If Del Barber was born a few generations earlier, he would have been riding the rails. Part time employment would have kept him alive, but like so many of his influences and idols, traveling from town to town trading stories and chords with other folkies, and squeezing each and every drop from the fruit life provided would be what kept his heart beating.

More importantly, music fans would hear his songs and use his art as their windshield to new experiences.

Today we now live in an area where trips can be booked without leaving a desk and no place is too remote to be accessed easily or viewed completely. Wanderlust is a dying emotion now that we can “like” or “pin” any location to our profile without having to endure flights, boats and vaccines. Sadly, the unlimited potential at our fingertips is only trumped by the ever growing desire to dismiss adventure or expression of creativity.

That’s probably why a singer (and maybe the entire song writer genre) like Del, the 28-year-old son of a draft dodger and denizen of fate, can slip through the cracks.

Barber is a throwback, a storyteller that lets moments and emotions burn through his soul until they reach his fingertips and find a home with melody. There are endless numbers of songwriters trying to forget the past or simply steal from it, but Barber resides in the rarefied air (think Josh Ritter or Doug Paisley) of talent hoping only to fine tune proven recipes and results.

Barber’s previous work, especially the delightful Love Songs for the Last 20, showed potential that is fully realized on his effort (considering he was nominated for a Juno last time out, that is saying something).

Headwaters opens on a high note. “Love and Wine”, a duet with Catherine MacLellan, is a dark and sombre country tale delivered with beautiful harmonies, spare percussion and atmospheric steel work.

It’s a testament to his song writing and skill, but Barber uses a precise touch on every arrangement. Barber and his band pick up the pace early and often; “Can’t Turn Around” benefits from some heavier guitar and organs work, “Running On A Wire” is the most propulsive and the rich tones of “Queen of July” will make it a CBC staple for years (well, unless Harper simply replaces it with some Nickelback driven Sirius radio slot), but Barber also knows when less is more.

The albums biggest successes come when Del refuses to add any extra notes. The Summer ready, Prine worthy “Hen House Manifesto” is the obvious standout, but “Right Side Of The Wrong” is equally as powerful with its simple, pure story.

Headwaters isn’t written as a checkbox for your hashtag, online presence. The melodies and stories are for the living and deserve fresh air and tire raised gravel and sand. Barber wants you to hit the open road and explore, but he’s willing to settle for you seeing places through his eyes instead of your three inch screen. - Herohill

Del Barber sings about a diner waitress on his most recent album, Headwaters. Perhaps he’s singing about an unlucky “Unknown Legend”, a less fortunate woman still waiting to get swept away, still waiting to get out of town on the back of someone’s Harley. Here,
Barber tackles another song off Harvest Moon, the widely-covered, entrancing title track. His Canadian country twang is the perfect fit for “Harvest Moon”, and Barber injects the plaintive song with a fresh sense of urgency while staying faithful to the
original. -Jon Bernstein - Consequence of Sound

Headwaters
Del Barber (Six Shooter)
3.5 stars
Where did this guy come from? I'm sure there's a story, or nine - nine songs of melody, everyday desperation and occasional arrivals of harmony. A Winnipegger, but home on the roam, the worn-in Barber will appeal to fans of Jim Cuddy or Justin Rutledge (though he's less earnest than the latter and dustier than the former). He writes about
Monday-morning mirrors, streetlights that serve for stars, and often about fire: "Choking on the smoke, trying to get warm." There's thought to the arrangements; this stuff isn't rough cut. Barber's put in the miles. We get his trip. B.W. - The Globe and Mail

Winnipeg native Del Barber's third album, Headwaters, has movement – every song bounces and pops, while some jump for joy. Even the slower tracks ("Believe Me," "Soul of the Land That's Mine") feel alive and restless. Any workaday songwriter can add a handclap here or a tambourine shake there, but few can sustain such a high energy level across a full album. Barber's commitment to holding listeners' interest goes a long way. He songwriting isn't groundbreaking, stitched as it is with the familiar patterns of country/folk music (opening line on "Love and Wine": "I met her in the shadow of an old white pine"), but what he lacks in originality he makes up for in spirit. Creativity, it's rarely said, can be a real drag – too much effort exerted to stand out from the pack can leave a songwriter drained when it comes time to write actual melodies and hooks. Barber doesn't have that problem; he recalls his heroes, from Townes Van Zandt ("The Right Side of the Wrong") to pre-Yankee Hotel Foxtrot Wilco ("Everything is Not Enough") freely, honestly trying to match their styles instead of subverting them. At a time when artists like Grizzly Bear and Joanna Newsom are trying to make folk music "challenging" for the first time in its history, it's good to see the simplest pleasures of a man with his guitar are still alive and well. (Six Shooter) - Jesse Skinner - Exclaim!

DEL BARBER

Headwaters (Six Shooter)

HEADWATERS finds Winnipeg's wandering minstrel Del Barber expounding on the virtues of home, whether physically or spiritually. It's especially apparent on Soul of the Land That's Mine where he apologizes for constantly leaving his "home and native land."

On his third album in four years, the prolific Barber's acoustically-dominated folk-roots is vibrant and joyous. His amicable vocal feels as comfortable as worn-in Birkenstocks. The 10 songs here are enhanced by his lyrical prowess as evidenced by The Waitress ("Her dreams, they fell asleep on the top bunk/and woke up on the floor") or You Can't Turn Around ("Your cups filled up, but baby your thirst is gone").

Barber is possessed by a consummate wanderlust for life while questioning faith and seeking happiness only to realize maybe even everything is not enough (as he notes on the track, Everything is Not Enough). Headwaters is the finest work yet from one of Canada's most promising young troubadours. Four stars

-- Bruce Leperre - Winnipeg Free Press

Background/Composition:
Del Barber played The Garrison on Friday night as part of CMW's Manitoba Music Showcase. The Winnipeg singer/songwriter's Love Songs For The Last Twenty sophomore album was released in June 2010 and has been nominated for a 2011 Juno Award.

Grade: 82

Comment:
Barber's rootsy guitar sound was surprisingly fresh, as were his candid lyrics about both everyday and extraordinary occurrences. His clear, bright vocals and easy sense of humour made the 27-year-old prairie-born artist a true pleasure to watch.

Achievement of Rock 'n' Roll Expectations
80-100: Exceeds skill and knowledge expectations, i.e. rocked us so hard we peed our pants.
70-79: Achieves required skills and knowledge. Meets rock 'n' roll standard.
60-69: Demonstrates some skills. Approaches rock 'n' roll standard.
50-59: Demonstrates some required skills and knowledge in a limited way.
00-50: Has not demonstrated required skills or knowledge.

Learning Skills: E=Excellent, G=Good, S=Satisfactory, N=Sad Really

Oral And Visual Communication
Eye Contact: E
Pronunciation: E
Stage Presence: G
Stage Banter: E
Image: G
Appearance: G
Use Of Stage: S

Strengths/Weaknesses/Next Step:
Barber's connectedness with the audience stretched far beyond what one might expect from a solo performer. His cheeky banter and magnetic wit helped reaffirm that although Barber confessed, "I wish I was playing with my friends tonight."

Barber played his set with no additional musicians — his own chops and presence were more than enough to keep the Garrison's patrons tapping their toes.

Musical Analysis
Level Of Participation: E
Problem Solving: E
Teamwork: N/A
Work Habits: G
Organization: G
Audience Participation: G
Sound: E
Composition: E
Songs: G

Strengths/Weaknesses/Next Step:
Barber's delicate fingerpicking style and warm vocals filled The Garrison with rich sound. His expressive lyrics, with lines like "His laugh could hit the sky/He could smell how you were feeling" ("62 Richmond"), made the listener feel as though he or she knew the characters in each song. The multi-instrumentalist left the stage on a humorous note with "The Party Song," a dream-inspired track from his 2010 Where The City Ends LP.

Other Skills And Areas Of Interest
Charisma: G
Problem Solving: G
Teamwork: E
Sexiness: G
Haircut: G
Indie Rock Footwear: G
Nods To Disposable Fashion: E
Cool Equipment: G
Level Of Inebriation: G
Actual Ability: E

Strengths/Weaknesses/Next Step:
Barber's tasteful, western button-up shirt and elegant guitar (which, he told me via Twitter, is a 1992 Gibson J-45 made in Montana) contrasted sharply with his boyish bedhead. The artist successfully brought together the old and the new by drawing on traditional country and folk while endearing himself to a modern audience.

- Chart Attack

Uptown Magazine
Tales from the edge of town
Local singer/songwrit...
Tales from the edge of town
Local singer/songwriter Del Barber taps into his not-quite-city/not-quite-country upbringing on Where the City Ends
Jared Story

Tales from the edge of townAfter a string of slapdash home recordings, Del Barber figured it was time to stop mucking around and buckle down. This past April, the local singer/songwriter released his first proper album, Where the City Ends.

"I realized I had a cohesive group of songs and all the great albums I listen to have a pretty good narrative line through them," says Barber, 25. "I don't know if mine is as specific as I would like it to be, but I still like that there is some kind of notion of an album and not just a bunch of songs. So I thought I better just work harder on this one and actually release a record and give this whole thing a try - an honest, legitimate try. No more foreplay, you know?"

The album's title speaks to its theme. Growing up in St. Norbert, Barber was always quite aware of 'where the city ends.'

"I always think that Winnipeg is this amazing place because we have the Perimeter Highway and it kind of marks a distinct boundary between city life and rural life," Barber says. "All the other cities I've been to it's so ambiguous, the suburbs stretch for miles and miles and you can't tell where it ends.

"There are a lot of cultural things that are different between urban and rural life that nobody really spells out. I try to do that in a broad stroke. Growing up on the outskirts of town, the people from my school were mostly rural, farm kids. It was a strange situation for me, feeling like I was from the city, but all my influences were rural."

Not just a lyrical matter, Barber and bandmate/producer Jean-Paul Laurendeau tried to make the idea translate musically too, incorporating synthesizer and spacey electric guitar into the countrified folk mix.

Whether you're into old time or contemporary sounds, you'll love the record's rollicking last track, The Party Song. As quirky as it is catchy, the song speaks of a star-studded social gathering featuring the likes of Jesus, Karl Marx and Bob Dylan.

"I had a big pizza before bed and I had this wild dream about all these historical figures showing up to this major end-of-year party I was supposed to have," Barber says. "It turns out I didn't like them as much as I thought I would. All my friends left and I realized I missed my friends. I also realized I was spending way too much time thinking about these guys and obsessing about what they thought, making them out to be these heroes. As soon as I spent real time around them, I realized they were boring or just disgusting. In my dream, I saw Nietzsche across the room and after going to talk to him I realized he smelled terrible."

- Uptown

Del Barber is Winnipeg’s next great songwriter. In this, the second instalment of his self-proclaimed four-albums-in-four-years saga, the local singer-songwriter taps into melodies and stories that are instantly familiar. Steeped in the country music tradition, the songs on the disc are not only carried by traditional instrumentation and Barber’s golden, oft-twangy voice, but also place heavy emphasis on narrative and place. Cities come alive in the standout track Chicago and the melancholic Thunder Bay, and a lovelorn Barber introduces history, love and desire as characters following a Great Lakes breakup scene. In the campy Songwriter’s Lament, Barber croons, “I may not make 50 grand in the next 15 years ... but I can write pretty love songs.” And with that, he’s hit the nail on the head: this is good stuff. With Love Songs , Barber establishes himself not only as worthy contender of the burgeoning Winnipeg roots scene, but also as a cornerstone of local songwriting.

- The Uniter

DEL Barber wasn't sure why his phone kept ringing Tuesday morning.

The local singer-songwriter was on the Yellowhead Highway driving to the Yukon for a tour when his BlackBerry started buzzing non-stop.

"I started getting alerts. I just got a BlackBerry, which I'm very poor at using. I had someone help me connect to all my social media outlets, so I started getting messages saying congratulations and I didn't know what it was for. I called my sister and she didn't know what was going on, then through the minutiae I started adding up the facts before someone just came out and said it: "You're nominated for a Juno," he said.

Specifically, Barber's independent sophomore album, Love Songs for the Last Twenty, was named a Juno Award nominee in the roots & traditional album of the year: solo category.

"I feel like the ultimate underdog," says the first time nominee. "I have no record label. I don't even have a website. It's very humbling to get a nod like that."

The 27-year-old was one of five local artists and numerous expats whose names were read during the Juno nomination press conference in Toronto Tuesday.

Facing off against Barber in the solo roots album category is Wailin' Jennys member Ruth Moody, who received a nod for her debut solo album The Garden.

"I'm very excited. It's wonderful to have something recognized in this way, and it's really a bit different because it's a solo album. I'm thrilled and I'm honoured and I'm a fan of all of the songwriters in this category: Justin (Rutledge), Lynn (Miles), Old Man Luedecke and Del. I just think that is some über talent," said a cheerful Moody, 35, who was told of the announcement by her producer David Travers-Smith, also a nominee in the recording engineer of the year category, in part for his work on her album.

Other local artists up for Junos are a capella group Chic Gamine for roots & traditional album of the year: group for their sophomore release, City City; and Eagle & Hawk and Little Hawk, who will face off against each other in the aboriginal album of the year category for Rising Sun and Vigilance, respectively.

Moody won a Juno for her work with the Wailin' Jennys in 2005, Chic Gamine took home a trophy in 2009 and Eagle & Hawk scored an award in 2002.

Some former Manitobans are also up for awards.

Neil Young is nominated for artist of the year while his album Le Noise is up for adult alternative album of the year. Additionally, he is being honoured with the 2011 Allan Waters Humanitarian Award.

Luke Doucet's album, Steel City Trawler, is up against Young's in the adult alternative album of the year category; Starfield's The Saving One is a finalist for contemporary Christian/gospel album of the year; multiple-award winner James Ehnes is up for classical album of the year: large ensemble for his Mendelssohn Violin Concerto; Jocelyn Morlock's Exaudi is shortlisted for classical composition of the year; and pianist Earl MacDonald's Re: Visions, Works for Jazz Orchestra vies for traditional jazz album of the year.

rob.williams@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition February 2, 2011 D1
- Winnipeg Free Press

First-time Juno Award nominee Del Barber was shocked to learn his album Love Songs For The Last Twenty was shortlisted for best roots and traditional solo album.

"I did not see it coming," said the 27-year-old.

Barber learned about his nomination on CBC Radio while driving to Edmonton, which explained to him why his BlackBerry was being flooded with congratulatory notes.

Before hearing the announcement on radio, he called his mother to find out what the messages were about, but the phone call dropped before she could tell him.

Barber had sent his album to the Junos on a whim, and borrowed money from his parents for the application.

Love Songs For The Last Twenty is about home and what it means to be anchored to a place.

Growing up, Barber watched Winnipeg grow into his home town, a French community called St. Norbert.

"Every time I go home, I'm surprised how much it has changed," said Barber, who is on the road for eight months of the year.

Barber recently finished a tour of the Yukon, which turned out to be quite the adventure. After playing in Dawson City, Barber was invited to go dog sledding.

"When we were getting the ropes set up, the dogs were yelping with excitement to get going," said Barber. "But once we got moving along the river, they were absolutely quiet. It was like sailing."

Barber also played in Mayo, which is south of Whitehorse.

"All the pipes in my hotel were frozen, so there was no water in my hotel room," said Barber. "It was definitely their off-season."

Barber was in the Yukon on a tour organized by Home Routes, an association that arranges concert series performed to audiences in people's living rooms.

"There's so much intimacy," said Barber. "The people are sitting so close you might accidentally spit on them."

Through Home Routes, Barber was able to travel into the Arctic Circle to Old Crow, a fly-in-only Yukon community.

"It was amazing," said Barber, who drove up the Alaska Highway towards Whitehorse by himself.

Barber always travels alone as a one-man musician and said it is lonely on the road, so he enjoyed the level of human connections on his Home Routes tour through the Yukon.

Barber, a third cousin of blues-rocker Colin James, grew into his musical career gradually.

He played in bands while in high school, and, when he went to college in Chicago, he started playing open mics, which eventually led to bar gigs.

Barber returned to Winnipeg to make his first album, Where the City Ends.

"I wondered what I should I do, and realized I should maybe take it on tour," said Barber.

His CDs began to sell very well.

Last year, at the Winnipeg Folk Festival, he sold over 400.

"I thought 50 would be amazing," he said. With a Juno nomination, Barber has agents and managers approaching him now.

"I'm open to them," he said. "But I want to maintain my freedom."

Del Barber

Tonight

The Club

© Copyright (c) The Regina Leader-Post


Read more: http://www.leaderpost.com/entertainment/Barber+Juno+race/4375110/story.html#ixzz1Gb5JvOq0 - Leader-Post

Barber: he was born a ramblin' man.
Del Barber gets only one song to make an impression at 2011: The Concert, a New Year's variety show of Manitoba talent, Sunday at the Centennial Concert Hall.
The song he's chosen is a no-brainer for the rising folk/alt-country singer-songwriter, who just this month opened a concert for the Weakerthans.
Concert Preview
2011: The Concert
Centennial Concert Hall
Sunday at 8 p.m.
Tickets $20.11, $30 and $35 at 949-3999, www.wso.ca or Ticketmaster
Alone with his guitar, he'll sing Home to Manitoba, a track from his second independent album, the recent Love Songs for the Last 20.
"I'm going home to Manitoba/ the skies get wide, the rivers breathe," the chorus says. "I'm going home to Manitoba/ gonna put my weary heart at ease."
Home, rootedness and what it means to be anchored to a place are recurring themes for the rambling musician, who grew up in St. Norbert and is, on his father's side, a cousin of blues-rocker Colin James.
"I believe in the tradition of the troubadour who makes his way from town to town," says Barber, 27. "I live an apparently rootless kind of life. But I feel pretty certain about where I'm from... and I think the songs sound like the prairies."
Barber will sound like New Jersey, though, in a different incarnation on New Year's Eve at the Park Theatre when he fronts a band assembled to mimic the E Street Band.
In an evening called Del Barber is Springsteen (advance tickets $30 at 478-7275), he'll play electric and acoustic guitar -- and harmonica, of course -- and channel the Boss.
He'll do three sets, performing almost the whole album Born in the U.S.A. and lots of earlier material. It's the first time Barber has ever done a tribute show. He says he is "borderline obsessed" with Springsteen's blue-collar Americana.
Barber's other heroes include John Prine, Greg Brown and Townes Van Zandt -- performers, he says, who can hold the stage with the power of a song or a story. In that tradition, he roams the continent alone, sometimes sleeping in his car. He thinks his minstrel impulses may arise from his Irish heritage (his first name is actually Delaney).
He's been a rover for nearly three years, performing in every province and many U.S. states. He no longer has a fixed address. In the new year, he'll drive to the Yukon for a Home Routes tour of house concerts.
"I've played houses, church basements, honky-tonk bars, cafes, festivals, clubs with actual stages and sound systems, and I'm starting now to get into theatres," he says.
On Jan. 15, he has one of his most exciting gigs to date, opening for Texan singer-songwriter James McMurtry at a Chicago theatre. He's also booked for this spring's Prairie Scene festival in Ottawa.
For a year when he was 22, Barber attended a college in Chicago and paid his rent by playing open-mic nights. He calls that a "baptism by fire" that taught him how to command a crowd's attention.
Much of his music education, though, has happened as he's sat in the audience at the Winnipeg Folk Festival over the past decade, enraptured by artists such as Josh Ritter. This year, when he got an email inviting him to play the festival, he was so stunned that he thought it might be a prank.
He was flabbergasted when all his CDs sold out at the merchandise tent. "I sold almost 400 units," he says. "I thought 50 would be amazing."
A further thrill was chatting backstage with headliner John Hiatt. The veteran heartland rocker asked Barber how long he had been committed to his music full time. Barber told him how he'd been touring incessantly.
"He was like, 'You made the best decision.' Then he went onstage and played this amazing set -- pretty spellbinding," says Barber. "Those moments are something you cherish when you spend dozens and dozens of hours alone in the car."
alison.mayes@freepress.mb.ca - Winnipeg Free Press

BY KRIS KETONEN
THE CHRONICLE-JOURNAL
Del Barber is looking to
make up for his old, inaccessible
self.
“The problem is, I have a degree
in philosophy, and so I
spent a lot of time being inaccessible
just in conversation
and the way I approached relationships,
even,” the roots/folk
singer/songwriter said during
a recent Charlottetown tour
stop.
“I think music, and roots
music in particular, is supposed
to be accessible,” he
said. “It’s supposed to be things
people can get their teeth into.
“I think in terms of songwriting,
that’s what I think I’m
trying to do — just be a songwriter
and kind of follow in
that tradition.”
The 26-year-old Barber’s
show at the Apollo on Friday
night, with Scott Dunbar,
marks the fourth time Barber
has played through Thunder
Bay.
“I love it,” he said of
the city. “I try to come
back as much as I can;
it’s definitely on
the list of places
to go for me.
“It seems like it’s got a little
bit of grit.”
Little bit, sure.
“And it’s still pretty happening,”
Barber continued. “It’s a
little bit strange, because the
industry sort of surrounds
the waterfront —
or the failed industry, I
guess — so it’s got a little
bit of a lonesome
feeling
to it, as well.
“And then, for whatever reason,
people keep coming to my
show, so I’ve just gotten a great
response from there, you
know?”
Maybe Barber’s stuff is just
. . . good?
Laughter, then: “I’m starting
to maybe believe that that’s
possible. I’ve been a doubter
for a long time.”
What he said about Thunder
Bay and the lonesome feeling,
that’s the kind of thing Barber
notices about a city. He
thinks a lot about such
things, and his songs explore
them.
“I try to write
a lot about place,”
Barber said. “I’ve
got a new record coming out,
which is mostly about geography
and how people can’t easily
be separated from their
place. People aren’t as free as
they think they are. They have
a history, and the history kind
of makes them, and that
history is bound up in
their roots.”
For a further
example,
check out
Where the City Ends, his debut
album, which Barber said examined
how the urban and rural
worlds appear to be separate,
but in reality aren’t.
And while Barber’s tunes
may sound like love songs on
the surface, it’s really just a
format he likes to use to get at
other themes and ideas and
subjects.
“The love song format is really
accessible, you know?”
Barber said. “People can really
get into that kind of thing. People
want to hear heartbreak,
and they want to hear songs
about desire and things like
that. And I want to be really
open to people.
“I don’t want to be some
mysterious guy.”
The day of the interview
was a rough one for Barber.
Calls to his cell phone went
unanswered, voice mail full.
Then, a call was returned, but
not from Barber’s mobile —
rather, it was from a Charlottetown
restaurant.
Seems Barber had eaten
lunch there earlier and forgot
his phone. They didn’t know
how to get a hold of him.
Barber was reunited with
his phone later that day, after
his record label was informed,
though, so that was a bit of a
ray of light.
But still: “I’ve been wandering
around this town. I don’t
know, my computer crashed,
all these sorts of things,” Barber
said, laughing.
But he was keeping it all in
perspective.
“It’s going well, aside from
today,” Barber continued. “It’s
been really great. So one day
out of, whatever, 40 or 50 is
pretty good.” - The Chronicle Journal - Thunder Bay

Bringing it all back home
Local singer-songwriter Del Barber sticks to his roots on Love Songs for the Last 20
by Mike Duerksen (Volunteer)
Ask local singer-songwriter Del Barber what’s missing in music nowadays and he’ll tell you it’s the cohesive narratives that once formed the bedrock of celebrated songwriting.
“The thing that’s really hard to find right now is good stories on records,” the 26-year old said in mid-May over coffee at The Fyxx on Broadway.
“The indie music that I don’t understand, but that’s really influenced me, is all about abstracted lines and very poetic. It seems like everyone is afraid to say something very specific. The genre is very unsure of itself and doesn’t really know what it wants to say. It can say whatever it wants.”
If there is one thing to be said about the St. Norbert native, it’s that he doesn’t shy away from specific, local songwriting – at least not on his forthcoming album, Love Songs for the Last 20.
Recorded in the span of four weeks with co-producer Jean Paul Laurendeau at Broken Ground Productions, Barber’s sophomore effort will be released on June 18th at the West End Cultural Centre.
With one foot planted deeply in the country music tradition and the other dabbling in folk waters, the album is a confident and strident collection of prairie-bred Canadiana songs that deal with equal parts heartache, rootedness and the importance of place.
“Country music is supposed to be something that everyone can understand, it’s supposed to be universal in some way,” Barber said. “But good country music is also supposed to be willing to say something that’s local. It’s all about trying to be sincere. It’s not an easy thing to do, to be honest when you write.”
Barber’s folky 2009 debut Where the City Ends carried echoes of a desolate prairie boy finding his place in the world.
But on Love Songs for the Last 20, a more mature Barber has found his way home, embracing his history and showcasing his knack for quick-witted lyricism through artful storytelling.
On the standout track Chicago, a pedal steel guitar swells up and gently weeps as a lovelorn Barber breaks up with the mid-western metropolis he once called home.
Similarly, the aching tune Thunder Bay sees the songwriter’s inability to commit to – and love – any other place but home.
Good country music is supposed to be willing to say something that’s local. It’s all about trying to be sincere. It’s not an easy thing to do, to be honest when you write.
– Del Barber, musician
Track Record
Del Barber breaks Love Songs for the Last 20 down, song by song
“As Far As I Can Tell”
“I wrote it to try to sound like Springsteen, in terms of the beat. It doesn’t have a strong narrative thread like Springsteen stuff, but it has some lines that are intriguing.”
“Chicago”
“Me breaking up with Chicago – leaving that place and realizing I couldn’t be at home there because of where I was from. Chicago wasn’t going to satisfy. It didn’t have what I needed and I didn’t know what that was until I realized that I was from somewhere else.”
“Love Song for the Last 20”
“When I was on the road, my mom called me saying ‘I had a dream last night that you would call your next record Love Songs for the Last 20. In the dream, I asked you, the last 20 what? The last 20 years? The last $20?’ After the call, I started thinking about how we measure things and time. It’s definitely the most abstract song. It’s supposed to be a way into the record.”
“Miles and Years”
“Break-up song that turns into a song about history and how it’s alive and at work, always already informing your situation.”
“Home to Manitoba”
“It seems like there are no political undertones whatsoever, but to me it’s one of the most political songs I’ve written because it’s supposed to move someone into saying their home is good, and their history is good.”
“Coming Home with the Summer”
“I was working in the bush (tree-planting) with Luke Enns, who plays guitar for me now, and we’d spend every night on the dirt roads playing music. He had a wife and a kid at home but he was broke. I started thinking about trying to put myself in his shoes.”
“Story I Can Believe”
“A pile of stories, a picture song. I’m writing to a specific friend, and there’s a spirit of admitting and realizing that I don’t know what I’m doing.”
“If I Told You That I Loved You”
“A love song. It’s simple and campy. It has these core beliefs in it … I’m not just going to assume the archetypes of the masculine male and the feminine female make sense to me – that’s not anyone’s experience.”
“Songwriter’s Lament”
“I wanted to have at least one comedic, campy song on every record. There’s a lot of sad music out there. If I want people to believe my sombre feelings, I also need to capture some kind of comedy or way to laugh at myself.”
“Thunder Bay”
“It’s the sister to Chicago. I fell in love with Thunder Bay this year, just because it’s a depressed town. It was really easy for me to describe Thun - Uniter

Tales from the edge of town
Local singer/songwriter Del Barber taps into his not-quite-city/not-quite-country upbringing on Where the City Ends
Jared Story

Tales from the edge of townAfter a string of slapdash home recordings, Del Barber figured it was time to stop mucking around and buckle down. This past April, the local singer/songwriter released his first proper album, Where the City Ends.

"I realized I had a cohesive group of songs and all the great albums I listen to have a pretty good narrative line through them," says Barber, 25. "I don't know if mine is as specific as I would like it to be, but I still like that there is some kind of notion of an album and not just a bunch of songs. So I thought I better just work harder on this one and actually release a record and give this whole thing a try - an honest, legitimate try. No more foreplay, you know?"

The album's title speaks to its theme. Growing up in St. Norbert, Barber was always quite aware of 'where the city ends.'

"I always think that Winnipeg is this amazing place because we have the Perimeter Highway and it kind of marks a distinct boundary between city life and rural life," Barber says. "All the other cities I've been to it's so ambiguous, the suburbs stretch for miles and miles and you can't tell where it ends.

"There are a lot of cultural things that are different between urban and rural life that nobody really spells out. I try to do that in a broad stroke. Growing up on the outskirts of town, the people from my school were mostly rural, farm kids. It was a strange situation for me, feeling like I was from the city, but all my influences were rural."

Not just a lyrical matter, Barber and bandmate/producer Jean-Paul Laurendeau tried to make the idea translate musically too, incorporating synthesizer and spacey electric guitar into the countrified folk mix.

Whether you're into old time or contemporary sounds, you'll love the record's rollicking last track, The Party Song. As quirky as it is catchy, the song speaks of a star-studded social gathering featuring the likes of Jesus, Karl Marx and Bob Dylan.

"I had a big pizza before bed and I had this wild dream about all these historical figures showing up to this major end-of-year party I was supposed to have," Barber says. "It turns out I didn't like them as much as I thought I would. All my friends left and I realized I missed my friends. I also realized I was spending way too much time thinking about these guys and obsessing about what they thought, making them out to be these heroes. As soon as I spent real time around them, I realized they were boring or just disgusting. In my dream, I saw Nietzsche across the room and after going to talk to him I realized he smelled terrible." - Uptown Magazine

By Jonathan Dyck


“I’ve always thought of Winnipeg as a place that has distinct boundaries, like you get with the Perimeter Highway,” Del Barber says, sipping a drink at popular Wolseley watering hole Cousin’s. Last May, Barber sold out his album release party for his debut, Where the City Ends, at the Park Theatre. Since its release, Barber and his backing band have been playing local gigs and, most recently, Barber set out on his own for his first tour north of the border.


Although he grew up in Winnipeg, Barber spent some time living and studying in Chicago, a city that constantly brought up comparisons with his home town. “In cities like Chicago, you never know where the end is. Suburbs stretch as far the eye can see. I grew up in St. Norbert, where that line [between rural and urban life] seems blurrier. My high school was right on the southern tip of Winnipeg—half rural, half city kids. The river is also right there, so I grew up paddling that river all the time. One way leads downtown, the opposite direction leads to the country.”

Like other gutsy folk artists, Barber has learned to channel the ambiguity of his upbringing through songwriting. “I always felt a little two-faced—like I couldn’t be sincere either way and it was confusing, still is,” Barber says. “The songs [on Where the City Ends] express that state of confusion and I like that about them. I have roots and a sense of place but it’s not easy to narrate in a straightforward way.”
For Barber, the tension between urban and rural has much to do with the kind of music he grew to love and, consequently, the songs he started writing. “Folk and country music have a really hard time not coming off as kitschy or contrived because they sort of make too much of their histories and I don’t know if I really believe [the artists] mean what they say.”

“I want to imitate people in a way that’s not lazy,” Barber says. “There are traditional forms in country and folk music that you can enter into. The forms aren’t static things. For me, writing music is about learning to find myself in the tradition and marveling at albums like [Bruce Springsteen’s] Nebraska.”
Barber recently returned from touring eastern Canada, where he was featured at NXNE and brought into contact with other like-minded musicians. “I’ve toured the eastern and southern states to no great success—you know, fraternity parties and stuff—but this time around I’ve shared the bill with some great artists like the guy from Cuff the Duke and the Sunparlour Players,” Barber says.

These days it can be pretty tough for singer-songwriters to catch a break. Not only are there a lot of up-and-coming solo musicians but, according to Barber, the singer-songwriter title has become an unfortunate cliché that audiences have become accustomed to writing off. “I guess I don’t expect people to take singer-songwriters seriously. I don’t know if it’s the fault of the performers or the fans,” Barber says.

Still, Barber seems to enjoy flying solo and making do without a backing band. “I’m getting used to playing alone and trying to turn heads. With a band you don’t perform as much or tell stories like you would on your own.” Storytelling is an important craft for those who still consider themselves part of the country music tradition and, with his recent tour, Barber has become more aware of its importance. “I think about a quarter of my set on tour was just storytelling. Before [going on tour] I had this idea that I was supposed to be mysterious, like I was hiding something, but I’ve started doing the opposite and give people more than they’re comfortable with.”

For Barber, this means allowing for more interaction between him and the audience while he’s on stage. “I’m trying to show the audience that there’s an exchange happening between us,” Barber continues. “Bands like Arcade Fire have a more communal relationship with their audiences and, to me, that’s what’s so folksy about indie rock. That’s the country tradition being played out in another genre.” And for Barber this mutual exchange is one of the ingredients missing from most singer-songwriter performances. “I don’t think people expect to get that sense of community from a singer-songwriter, but I hope they realize that they’re giving something back. That’s something I hope comes across when I’m performing.”

Having just released his first album a couple months back, you might think Del Barber would be ready to take a break but, from the sounds of it, he’s even more ambitious than before. “I already have a new album finished,” Barber reveals, “and I’m hoping to record again soon.” Though Barber’s career as a folk musician has been an uphill battle, he gives no signs of slowing down. “I want to put out a new record every year for the next four years. That’s my goal.”

Vol. 20 No.4 August/September 2009 - Stylus Magazine

Del Barber is the writer of my new favourite tune. The Party Song, the final track on Where the City Ends is an upbeat folk number with quirky lyrics such as "Old Karl Marx is in the backyard getting high on the trampoline." Driven by catchy hand claps and big backing vocals, this is some real merrymaking music. Maybe I shouldn't be singling this song out, as the rest of the record doesn't quite have this beer-bash quality, but as far as alt-country records go, this one sounds pretty cheerful. Barber deals in sorrow as much as anyone, but even the sad tunes on Where the City Ends still seem uplifting.
— Jared Story - Uptown Magazine

Del Barber is the writer of my new favourite tune. The Party Song, the final track on Where the City Ends is an upbeat folk number with quirky lyrics such as "Old Karl Marx is in the backyard getting high on the trampoline." Driven by catchy hand claps and big backing vocals, this is some real merrymaking music. Maybe I shouldn't be singling this song out, as the rest of the record doesn't quite have this beer-bash quality, but as far as alt-country records go, this one sounds pretty cheerful. Barber deals in sorrow as much as anyone, but even the sad tunes on Where the City Ends still seem uplifting.
— Jared Story - Uptown Magazine

Del Barber / Love Songs For The Last 20 (Brokenground Productions)
WHEN local bard Delaney Barber hits the well-trod boards of the Winnipeg Folk Festival stages this weekend it will no doubt bring a smile to his face. Simply put, Barber's music is a perfect fit for the venerated festival -- this young fellow is a singer-songwriter in the truest, tie-dyed-in-the-wool sense.
Love Songs is as sincere and heartfelt as the day is long and the combination of friendly musicianship, personal yet engaging lyrics and great songs will likely have the album flying from the shelves of the on-site music store. If the Manitoba Homecoming 2010 planning folks haven't already, they should definitely try and work out a relationship with Barber to use his beautifully poignant Home To Manitoba as their unofficial theme ode.
Particularly outstanding are the sweet backing vocals of Nadine Klowak and the delicious pedal steel and Dobro work of ace picker Bill Western.
Totally worth a long listen and be sure to check him out in the flesh this weekend. You'll probably be smiling too. 'Ö'Ö'Ö'Ö
-- Jeff Monk
- Winnipeg Free Press

Del Barber at the West End Cultural Centre, Winnipeg, June 18. Ailsa Dyson concert photo for www.guttersnipenews.com
- text by eugene osudar/photos by Ailsa Dyson
the voice in the darkness
from an insignificant
big man
all pumped up
full of his muscular self
you bullies
you hecklers
don’t you see
The Power
can’t you feel
The Command
on stage
the adrenaline rushing/
coursing through
the veins
of the true
Big Man
Del Barber
at The WECC
Friday night
to nearly
300 music lovers,
friends and family
and one immense
arse,hole,
wanting to command
from the darkness
on the edge
of his sneering
(his envious)
frown.
bullies and hecklers
drunks and punks
of the internet age
i have heard
too many
of these voices
(recently)
at shows,
without pause
without a thought
of hesitation,
Del challenges,
“Just because you lift weights
doesn’t make you big,
you gotta be
on stage
to
be
Big.”
and that voice
that bully
shut his sneer
in the fear
he’s been exposed,
he’s microscopic.
deflated
of his phony
muscles.
and The Skinny
Big Man
all wound
up
ready to spring
un,
coil
twisting and turning
round the microphone
stand,
in command
Del’s towering
flying, soaring
Big and Mighty
and Passionate
on fire
i could feel the heat
on stage
playing, singing, blazing
and oh so proud
of his illimitable
talent
Woody Guthrie’s
wandering minstrel soul
as Mitch Podolak
said of Del Barber to me
many months ago
so many songs
are standards
just like Darren Day
said to me
of Del Barber’s songs
after the first
acoustic set
it’s already written
in my journal,
because i’m singing
along to so many
(nearly) every
song.
so it is written.
so it is truth.
these songs
are
standards.
and there’s no BS
about Del Barber
no two week
tours to Toronto
or Calgary
(those are just,
vacations)
Del Barber
is
the true one
in this Winnipeg
music scene
after his brilliant in-store
Wednesday afternoon
performance
at Into The Music
Del told me he has a tough, hard
Home Routes Tour
all the way from Winnipeg
in the heart of the icy winter
driving up to the Yukon
and back again
if you’re a true musician
with talent
with heart
you need to tour
4-6 months a year
and play the towns
and the cities
the ugliest dives
over and over
and over again
and build your audiences
all around this country
and beyond
it’s a circuit
and a grind
it’s a commitment
and belief
in one’s self
Faith.
Mantra,
in the talent
in the heart
of a minstrel
a poet
a writer
an artist
and
you have to meet
the challenges
of the assholes
head,on
dead,on
fight it
brawl it
Charles Bukowski
style
with words
with a poet’s
courage
and sometimes,
with your fists
and your face
cut the cowards
down! to their
microscopic
size.
they’re parasites.
feeding on the weak.
and dying
before The Big
and The Mighty
Voice and
Presence
on stage
The Woody Guthries
The Billy Braggs
The Del Barbers
of this world.
he’ll take his father’s
all wheel drive
truck
he’ll take his songs
his standards
he’ll take his
Woody Guthrie
heart and soul
he’ll take his passion
his belief
he’ll take his friends
and family
his manager’s belief, too
all the Love
he’ll take his courage
for the long,hard ride
and he’ll take on
every bully
every asshole
every loser
every jealous
man
and he’ll play
it
Big and Mighty
just like he did Wednesday
just like he did
Friday night at the WECC.
the hot hot 37 minute
acoustic set
Tell Me Where To Start
62 Richmond
The Party Song
Coming Home With The Summer
a Hoyt Axton cover, I Dream of Highways
Katy Sparrow
The Soul of a Land That’s Mine
and then the hour long
set with the band
Love Song For The Last Twenty
As Far As I Can Tell
Miles and Years
Chicago
Home To Manitoba
Love Is Just a Wrecking Ball
Thunder Bay
Where The City Ends
encore,
Neil Young’s Unknown Legend
Bruce Springsteen’s Dancing In The Dark
and then,
a second encore,
If I Told You I Love You
the players,
Del on acoustic guitar and harmonica
Alan Owen on fiddle
Nadine Klowak on harmony vocals and keys
Bill Western on pedal steel
Caleb Friesen on drums
Luke Enns on guitars
Jean Paul Laurendeau on bass
(and the new cd’s producer)
the highlights,
a new song about boyhood
hockey games
Gretzky and Messier
and today’s loves
Tell Me Where To Start
songs about a grandiose
liar, 62 Richmond
songs about philosophers
and writers at a party,
from a wild dream,
Nietzsche and Dylan and Jesus
Christ, The Party Song
and i’m just singing along
every one a standard!
a song for his guitar
player Luke and wife
body tingles and shivers
Coming Home
With The Summer
the Hoyt Axton cover is a song
his parents used to duet on,
and with Nadine, oh my,
i’m hearing Emmylou’s
sweet harmonies
the ones she sang with
Gram Parsons!
Katy Sparrow
more sweet harmonies,
again, i’m singing along
composed from a dream
Del’s father had.
- Guttersnipe

Okay I am not going to lie to you here…I am partial to Del Barber. I have never met Del, or even spoken to him face to face, but alas I got this guys back. Why you ask? He is a good old ‘pegger!

For those of you who are unaware of the term “pegger”, it is because you have not enjoyed a bone chilling winter and humid heat filled summer in Winnipeg. Yes, Del is currently in Winnipeg living the life of a prairie town talent. Winnipeg is quite well known for its arts scene despite (or due to) it’s location and Del, who’s music I am recently acquainted with, is one of those true talents. In correspondence with Del, he is a real guy just playing his folk tunes in great Canadiana style (yes, Canadiana, not Americana - although they just might be the same).

“Where the City Ends” is receiving finishing touches and awaiting an early snowfall release (hopefully this November/December). From what I have heard, it is classic countrified folk tunes written from a small town boy at heart - stories of his city, prairie homes, conversations and finding one’s place in the world. In looking over the lyrics for “Harvest”, you may think of a farm boy looking for his way in the world or a greater truth in it all - it’s not just love and loss here. While songwriting is a huge aspect of Barber, I think it can be lost without the music to back it up and his style of acoustic country is perfect, it almost begs to have you sit back on the porch and listen.

While I can lean towards sparse and at time lo-fi folk recordings, Barber brings well crafted songs that are skillfully written and built like a story that you want to read. One other item is his voice, it just fits…it is the voice of a performer, not hidden behind lush soundscapes or coming in beneath the surface of a song. His voice can actually carry a song, which can be refreshing in this new world swimming with singer-songwriters.

I hope you feel the same way, but after a few listens of “Harvest” and “Where the City Ends” I believe you will be sold as well. I wish I could give you a link to buy some of Del Barber’s work, but you will have to visit his MySpace page for now and travel to Winnipeg, Manitoba this winter for a CD Release!

Wait alongside me for that early snowfall and the sounds of a prairie winter, won’t you?

~Smansmith
- Slowcoustic

Del Barber

Delaney Barber is your new favourite singer-songwriter – you just don’t know it yet. Over the past four years, he has toured across much of the U.S. and plans to trek across Canada as well. Barber writes songs that are at once classic and contemporary, traditional and original. Imagine if James Taylor, Iron & Wine and The Cardinals made a record together and you’re starting to get an idea of what Barber’s music is all about. Delicate folk, roots and bedroom indie songs with subtle country nuances like pedal steel and electric guitar drift atop Barber’s acoustic guitar and golden voice. The 24-year-old is currently putting the finishing touches on his new record, Where The City Ends, due out in April. Do yourself a favour and check out Barber; you won’t be disappointed. Visit www.myspace.com/delbarber. - The Uniter

Prairie boy Del Barber will be bringing his big sound to the London Music Club Thursday.

Celebrate the honest, humorous sounds that Barber cooks up, from The Party Song to Love is Just a Wrecking Ball. And once you're hooked on all the tunes available on his Myspace (myspace.com/delbarber) pick up a hard copy of his latest release, titled Where the City Ends.

The disc dropped in May, and Barber threw a CD release party in Winnipeg to a sold-out (and spoiled) crowd. The great feedback has led to many a request at campus radio stations across the country, and the Forest City is lucky enough to have him perform both on-air and in-person this week. Wednesday night, lucky listeners caught a live performance on CHRW 94.9FM for The Folk, while tonight his sounds will fill the LMC's front room.

Barber offers thoughtful-and thought provoking-lyrics over a blend of indie, folk and country sounds. Hear it for yourself when he performs tonights at 9pm Cover is $7. Barber's special guests Courtney Farquhar of Toronto and Beth Prysnuk of London.

-Lori Mastronardi, Anna Coutts, Brain Wong - London Free Press

Western Canadian Music Award 2010 Nominees
Aboriginal Recording of the Year
Eagle & Hawk - The Great Unknown - MB
Leela Gilday - Calling All Warriors – NWT
Lost Priority - All That We Are - MB
Shane Yellowbird - It's About Time - AB
Wayne Lavallee - Trail of Tears – B.C.
Blues Recording of the Year
Colin James - Rooftops and Satellites – B.C.
David Gogo - Different Views – B.C.
Jim Byrnes - My Walking Stick – B.C.
Rich Hope & His Evil Doers - Rich Hope Is Gonna Whip It On Ya – B.C.
The Jimmy Zee Band - Devil Take Me Down – B.C.
Children’s Recording of the Year
Duplex! – Worser – B.C.
Gogo Bonkers - Love the Land – B.C.
Norman Foote - Love My New Shirt – B.C.
Peter Puffin's Whale Tales – Proud Like A Mountain - AB
The Kerplunks - Walk On – B.C.
Classical Composition of the Year
Elizabeth Raum - Prayer and Dance of Praise - SK
Jocelyn Morlock – Exaudi – B.C.
Malcolm Forsyth – Steps - AB
Sid Robinovitch - Adieu Babylon - MB
Stephen Chatman - Earth Songs – B.C.
Classical Recording of the Year
Fringe Percussion - Fringe Percussion – B.C.
Jeremy S. Brown - Rubbing Stone - AB
Mark Takeshi McGregor - Different Stones: Canadian Music for Multiple Flutes – B.C.
Musica Intima - Into Light – B.C.
University of British Columbia Singers - A Chatman Christmas – B.C.
Contemporary Christian/Gospel Recording of the Year
Amanda Falk - In Between the Now & Then - MB
Carolyn Arends - Love Was Here First – B.C.
FRESH IE – Inside - MB
Jon Buller - Light Up the Sky – B.C.
Sandon - Sonic Synthesis - SK
Country Recording of the Year
Doc Walker – Go - MB
Shane Chisholm - Hitchhiking Buddha - AB
Shane Yellowbird - It's About Time - AB
Six West - Beautiful Something – B.C.
Whiskey Jane - Things Left Unsaid – B.C.
Francophone Recording of the Year
Ariane Mahrÿke Lemire – Décousue - AB
Geneviève Toupin - Geneviève Toupin - MB
LuLu et le Matou - Le dragon Gaston - MB
Madame Diva - Madame Diva - MB
Shawn Jobin - Le premier pas (The First Step) - SK
Will Stroet - Dans mon jardin - B.C.
Independent Album of the Year
Colin James - Rooftops and Satellites - B.C.
Corb Lund - Losin' Lately Gambler - AB
Dan Mangan - Nice, Nice, Very Nice - B.C.
Dojo Workhorse - Weapons Grade Romantic - AB
Library Voices - Denim On Denim - SK
Instrumental Recording of the Year
Birds of Paradox - Birds of Paradox - B.C.
Ed Henderson – Intimate - B.C.
Hot Club Edmonton - Hot Club Edmonton - AB
Inhabitants – A Vacant Lot - B.C.
The Rakish Angles - The Rakish Angles - B.C.
Jazz Recording of the Year
John Hyde - John Hyde Quartet - AB
Karl Schwonik Quartet - Visions from the Farm - AB
Kent Sangster's Obsessions Octet – Melodia - AB
Sandro Dominelli - The Alvo Sessions - AB
Will Bonness - Subtle Fire - MB
Pop Recording of the Year
Laurell - Can't Stop Falling - B.C.
Maurice - Young People With Faces - B.C.
Michael Bernard Fitzgerald - The MBF Love LP - AB
Quinzy - Self-Defense - MB
The Latency - The Latency - B.C.
Rap/Hip Hop Recording of the Year
Cityreal - The Beginning - B.C.
Def 3 and Factor – Drumbo - SK
Grand Analog - Metropolis Is Burning - MB
MAGNUM K.I. - MAGNUM K.I. - MB
The Lytics - The Lytics - MB
Rock Recording of the Year
Bif Naked - The Promise - B.C.
Said the Whale - Islands Disappear - B.C.
The Dudes - Blood Guts Bruises Cuts - AB
The Weakerthans - Live at the Burton Cummings Theatre - MB
Yukon Blonde - Yukon Blonde - B.C.
You Say Party – XXXX - B.C.
Roots Duo/Group Recording of the Year
Annie Lou - Annie Lou - YT
Carolyn Mark & NQ Arbuckle - Let's Just Stay Here - B.C.
Dustin Bentall - Six Shooter - B.C.
The Sojourners - The Sojourners - B.C.
The Wailin' Jennys - Live at the Mauch Chunk Opera House - MB
Roots Solo Recording of the Year
Corb Lund - Losin' Lately Gambler - AB
Dan Mangan - Nice, Nice, Very Nice - B.C.
Del Barber - Where the City Ends - MB
Gordie Tentrees - Mercy or Sin - YT
John Wort Hannam - Queen's Hotel - AB
Songwriter of the Year
Colin James - B.C.
Corb Lund - AB
Dan Mangan - B.C.
Doc Walker (Chris Thorsteinson, Dave Wasyliw, and Murray Pulver) - MB
Dustin Bentall - B.C.
The Weakerthans (John K Samson and The Weakerthans) - MB
Urban Recording of the Year
Ian Alleyne - Dying To Be Free - AB
Maiko Watson – Sweet Vibration - MB
Politic Live/Mahogany Public - JALI Volume 1 - AB
Sonal - Lovely Day - AB
The Soulicitors - What you need - AB
World Recording of the Year
Alpha YaYa Diallo – Immé - B.C.
Bomba - Cuatro Caminos - AB
Casimiro Nhussi – Makonde - MB
George Koufogiannakis - Generations - Greek Oud Jazz - AB
Ivan Tucakov and Tambura Rasa - Tambura Rasa Beats - B.C.
Agency of the Year
Magnum Opus Management - YT
Paquin Entertainment - MB
PM GIGS Inc - AB
SL Feldman & Associates – B.C.
Best Album Design of the Year
Brooke Nelson - Where the City Ends (Del Barber)
Craig Medwyduk (Guppy Design ) - In The Lonesome Hours (Oh My Darling)
Michael Carroll and Greg Smith - Live At The Burton Cummings Theatre (The
Weakert - Western Canadian Music Awards

Make no mistake: in Manitoba, We Speak Music.
Nine Manitoban artists picked up 10 artistic awards at the 12th annual Western Canadian Music Awards, which were handed out at a gala awards ceremony Sunday night at the Club Regent Event Centre.
Alt-country troubadour Del Barber — dubbed Winnipeg's Golden Boy by the gala's host, CBC's Grant Lawrence — led the pack with two wins on the strength of this year's Prairieography, which won Roots Solo Recording of the Year, besting fellow Manitoban Ruth Moody's These Wilder Things. Barber was also named Songwriter of the Year for the song Big Smoke from the same album.
It's two more statues for Barber's trophy case; in 2011, the singer/songwriter picked up a pair of WCMAs for Independent Album of the Year and Roots Solo Recording of the Year for his Juno-nominated 2010 record Love Songs for the Last Twenty. He also won a 2013 WCMA for Roots Solo Recording of the Year for 2012's Headwaters.
"I grew up playing hockey and I love winning trophies," Barber said backstage. "It might be a solo award, but it was for a team effort. Particularly for this record; I write songs about the Prairies and I didn't expect people to care about them as much as they have. This record is opening up a lot of doors for me."
Roots Duo/Group Recording of the Year also went to a Manitoba act. The dulcet-voiced ladies of Sweet Alibi snatched up the award for We've Got To, beating out efforts by fellow Winnipeg outfits Little Miss Higgins & The Winnipeg Five and The Bros. Landreth.
Today We're Believers, the Juno-nominated outing from Winnipeg indie-pop experimentalists Royal Canoe, snagged the trophy for Independent Album of the Year. The band is on tour and wasn't able to accept its award. Today We're Believers was also up for Pop Recording of the Year but lost to fellow Winnipeg indie-poppers Imaginary Cities and their 2013 sophomore album Fall of Romance.
"We actually thought Royal Canoe would get it," 'Mag Cities' frontwoman Marti Sarbit laughed onstage when she accepted the award. Backstage, Sarbit and her partner-in-music Rusty Matyas were thrilled. "Obviously, we're really proud of this record and proud to be part of the Western Canadian music scene," said Matyas, who was also named Producer of the Year at the Western Canadian Music Industry Awards, which were handed out at a Ace Burpee-hosted brunch Saturday. Imaginary Cities won in this category in 2011 for its Polaris Music Prize-longlisted debut, Temporary Resident.
The Mariachi Ghost's nearly five-years-in-the-making self-titled debut was named World Recording of the Year. Backstage, bandleader Jorge Requena says he took the award as validation the group's forward-thinking fusion of traditional Mexican music and prog rock "could actually work." "We were inspired by people like Rodrigo Munoz and Marco Castillo who were able to play traditional music in this city and there was an audience for it," he said.
Local blues boys The Perpetrators won Blues Recording of the Year for 2013's Stick 'Em Up, the band's first record since 2008's live album Live at the High & Lonesome Club. "It'd been a long time since we'd made a record," frontman J Jason Nowicki said backstage. "It feels good to be back in the game." The Perps won in the same category in 2005 for The Gas and the Clutch.
Winnipeg indie rockers Federal Lights won Aboriginal Record of the Year for We Were Found in the Fog, besting fellow Manitobans Desiree Dorion and Cassidy Mann. "We're pretty pumped," a visibly shaken frontman Jean-Guy Roy said backstage, the win still sinking in. The band is planning to head into the studio to record a follow up this winter.
Veteran funk collective Moses Mayes picked up a WCMA for Urban Recording of the Year for its fifth album, 2013's Moses Mayes feat. Maiko Watson. The band previously won a WCMA for 2006's Second Ring.
Pop powerhouse marijoseé's sophomore album Pas tout cuit dans l'bec was feted with Francophone Recording of the Year. The francophone force is strong in Manitoba; three other acts — Chez Willi, Lulu et le Matou and Tresor Ezoman — were also nominated in that category. "Stiff competition! Those are my brothers and sisters," marijoseé said backstage. "This award is a great honour. We need events like this to convince us to stay home and make music where we're from."
Venerated children's entertainer and singer/songwriter Fred Penner was inducted into the Western Canadian Music Hall of Fame in recognition of his storied career. He crawled out of a log and into our living rooms every weekday during CBC's now-iconic Fred Penner's Place, which aired from 1985 to 1997. "My knees are almost healed," he joked, performing a crowd-pleasing suite of classics that included Take Good Care of Each Other and The Cat Came Back with all four of his now-grown children providing back-up vocals.
All 21 artistic awards were handed out at Sunday night's gala, which featured performances by Barber — who opened the show with an affecting performance of his WCMA-winning song — Penner, Deep Dark Woods, Dan Mangan, Federal Lights, marijoseé and more. Lawrence's opening monologue highlighted Manitoba's estimable contributions to the Canadian music scene, joking that everything in this town is named after Burton Cummings. "Soon, we're going to be flying into Cummings International — but that just sounds wrong," he quipped.
Manitoba also showed strong at Saturday's Western Canadian Music Industry Awards. The 2014 Industry Builder Award was awarded posthumously to the late, great local music champion Kevin Walters, who died in the summer. No one personified 'industry builder' quite like Walters, who helped found the Prairie Music Awards, the precursor to the WCMAs. He was a pillar of the local music scene; as such, the award has been renamed The Kevin Walters Industry Builder Award in his honour.
In addition to Matyas' win for Producer of the Year, The Park Theatre was named Live Music Venue of the Year, while Cam Loeppky was named Producer and Engineer of the year. Tim Jones picked up Manager of the Tear, while Ron Paley was honoured with the Heritage Award.
The 2015 Western Canadian Music Awards will take place during BreakOut West 2015 in Victoria, B.C. The festival will run concurrently with the 2015 edition of Rifflandia. - Winnipeg Free Press