Chad Nantais: Zero Ground

Last night John and I ventured over to Flux Bistro in Gastown for the Zero Ground album release party. Man, there’s nothing like hearing and experiencing live music.

Chad Nantais composed the entire album on his computer some time ago and after some suggestions from colleagues, he decided to bring it out into the real world. With a six-piece band, he delivered four of Zero Ground’s original songs to a very captive and crowded house.

Zero Ground is the soundtrack to a modern world where machines allow one person to re-create what was once accomplished by an entire band, and technology can create as emotional a connection as a human.

The tunes are instrumental with jazzy, funky riffs flowing from more than just guitars, drums, and piano. Chad has a history as a DJ, spinning hip-hop and house music but also a closeness to Motown since growing up back East. All of these elements come into play and it was really interesting to see it all meld together after only ever sampling a few electronic tracks online.

I must say though, after his “War Games” reference before launching into the tune “Shall We Play a Game” I was pretty sold. There are definitely great things in Chad’s future and we were pretty lucky to be a part of his exclusive premiere audience last night.

You can sample Chad’s tunes on his website or MySpace, but the CD is available for purchase at Zulu and RedCat Records. It’s also up on iTunes and CDBaby for online orders that ship by mail. He’s also up on the Podsafe Music Network so this could be very useful for all you podcasters out there.