Summer Archive

The French Invasion

by Émilie Côté Montreal is now home to a growing population of French newcomers. But what’s the allure of Quebec, and does it live up to expectations? [full text]

Waste Not

by Alex Hutchinson Don’t call it bullshit—manure can power farms, heat homes and run engines. Presenting the twenty-first century’s most undervalued hope for renewable energy. [full text]

Where Have All the Monologues Gone?

by Sheila Heti Once, all that stood between you and the part you wanted was the right monologue. [full text]

The Eh-List

by John Semley You’ve heard of grindhouse, blaxploitation and kung fu flicks. But Canada has its own unique B-movie tradition—Canuxploitation—and new directors are catching on. [full text]

Things That Make Us Muslim

by Rahat Kurd At the height of Michaelmania, everyone moonwalked—even Muslim kids in Hamilton, Ontario. [full text]

The Intelligent Universe

by Abou Farman The next stage in evolution—a machine consciousness able to manipulate time and space—is just around the corner. The catch: humans will no longer be in charge. [full text]

Mud and Butterflies

by Mark Mann Why do Swallowtails and Sulphurs swarm Alberta’s oil rigs? [full text]

Adult Language

by Salvatore Ciolfi The internet has changed the way porn writers depict sex. How one man nearly became a scribe of smut. [full text]

The Music We Hate: Online Supplement

by Various Online companion essays to our print-only “The Music We Hate” feature: Daniel Johnston, Destroyer, Belle and Sebastian, Lady Gaga, Timber Timbre, the xx and more. [full text]

Dear Maisonneuve

by Various Letters from our readers. [full text]

The Music We Hate

by the Editors Seven top music critics take on the worst bands in the world. [full text]

The Music We Hate: Broken Social Scene

by Chandler Levack There is more to Toronto’s music than a mediocre band with one good album.” [full text]

The Music We Hate: Radiohead

by Carl Wilson Radiohead’s Intelligent Musicianship is always up in my face. It’s like being distracted, mid-act, by the fine detailing of a partner’s high-end labial cosmetic surgery.” [full text]

The Music We Hate: Sufjan Stevens

by Sean Michaels There’s too much Sufjan in every Sufjan song. His Achilles heel—his Trojan calcaneus! his Pelean hoof!—is his penchant for excess.” [full text]

The Music We Hate: Neon Indian

by Sarah Liss Neon Indian trade in hollow revivalism. The songs on their 2009 debut Psychic Chasms add up to a smug, kitschy, Ray Ban dress-up party.” [full text]

The Music We Hate: Joanna Newsom

by Ryan McNutt Newsom’s music doesn’t care two figs what I think about it. It neither asks nor demands anything of its listener.” [full text]

The Music We Hate: Animal Collective

by Michael Barclay Animal Collective embody the entitled millennial generation, products of a coddled culture that gives undue praise to minimal effort and cherishes signifiers over content.” [full text]

The Music We Hate: Sonic Youth

by Dave Morris  Welcome to the post–Sonic Youth era: where getting in bed with corporate America is no longer frowned upon but practically mandatory.” [full text]

No More Mr. Bad Guy

by Rebecca Rosenblum Authors always treat evil as an incomprehensible, barely-human force waiting to be defeated—but that’s pure fiction. It’s high time we saw villains as people too.

Editor’s Cut

by Andrew Steinmetz A new short story.

Urban Haiku

by David Seymour Eight poems.
Tenth Anniversary: Spring

ISSUE 43 Tenth Anniversary: Spring 2012

online content:

also in this issue:

  • Face the Music

    by Tim Falconer How can someone who passionately loves music also be a terrible singer? Tim Falconer takes up voice lessons—and discovers the surprising science of tone deafness.
  • The Big Job

    by Deni Y. Béchard As a teenager, Deni Y. Béchard went to Vancouver to live with his father, an ex-con with a penchant for telling tall tales. He met a man desperate to forget the past.
  • The Homesickness of Astronauts

    by Johanna Skibsrud "She felt a great sadness. She would remember next to nothing of this, even soon."
  • [see full issue contents]