Sled Island presents: Alex Cameron

This show is SOLD OUT of advance tickets! If you haven't already purchased a ticket, you can still attend with a full festival pass (subject to capacity). Tickets for other select shows are still available while quantities last! Visit SledIsland.com.

Alex Cameron

Alex Cameron’s music can make you cringe and choke up in the same moment. A storyteller with a vivid imagination for relatable — if sometimes slimy — characters, Cameron got his start with 2013’s Jumping the Shark. The collection of bleak bedroom pop saw him embody the persona of a failed, aging lounge singer to spin yarns that drew from dark real-life experiences. 

The resulting attention netted him tours with Angel Olsen, Mac Demarco and Unknown Mortal Orchestra, a gig songwriting for The Killers and a partnership with Secretly Canadian that began with Jumping the Shark’s re-release in 2016. 

His second album Forced Witness announced Cameron’s true arrival with a full band including his saxophonist and business partner Roy Molloy. It expanded his arsenal of characters to include an online creep contemplating the end, a wannabe Marlon Brando and an existentially romantic dude who just got “shat on by an eagle”  — that last one is a duet alongside Olsen with a video starring Jemima Kirke, Cameron’s collaborator and romantic partner going forward. 

Cameron was originally slated, pre-pandemic, to appear at Sled Island in support of his third album Miami Memory, a synth-pop/dive-bar rock opus. The disc melds his ability to conjure blue imagery (analingus is compared to eating oysters) with moving ruminations on familial responsibility, finding true love and the dignity of sex work. A master of building characters with extreme specificity, his work feels true because he goes places that are graphic and eyebrow-raising, not in spite of it.

Up next is March’s Oxy Music, another rich tapestry of character embodiment, this time largely focusing on a man disillusioned in part due to the opioid crisis. Kirke again directs and stars in a clip for lead single “Best Life,” a best-yet visual collaboration between the couple that is building great expectations for the full release. Sled Island 2022 will be one of audiences’ first chances to see the songs on stage, brought to life in duo form by Cameron and Molloy.

Aladean Kheroufi

Smooth-as-silk songwriter Aladean Kheroufi pairs a breathy coo with a bed of laidback-lounge pop. Less retro than timeless, his style is exemplified best on this year’s single LOVE! .​.​. (is the answer) b​/​w Every Girl, which veers from waltzy longing to rapturous desire across its two tracks.

Thus Owls

The ongoing creative project of Erika and Simon Angell, Thus Owls’ latest album encompasses the duo’s jazz and improv roots. Each of the band's projects involves new collaborators, and the sound is constantly evolving. Who Would Hold You If The Sky Betrayed Us? adds a trio of saxophones, bringing elements of jazz and classical to the existing base of synths, keys, guitar, and drums.

Clea Anaïs

Clea Anaïs imbues nostalgic soundscapes with a refreshing and sophisticated pop sound. On their debut record Circle Zero, the multifaceted artist finds harmony between emotionally vulnerable lyricism and genre-defying instrumentation. Anaïs has honed their craft as a member of RALEIGH, Reuben and the Dark and Astral Swans, and now has a live set that is equal parts bombast and intimacy.

 

About Sled Island

The Sled Island Music & Arts Festival is a five-day, multi-venue festival taking place June 22 - 26, 2022. The full lineup and schedule is available at SledIsland.com.

Everyone has the right to feel safe and included at Sled Island. All festival attendees agree to abide by Sled Island's safer spaces and inclusion policy, which can be found here.

Sled Island acknowledges Calgary as the traditional territory of the Blackfoot and the people of the Treaty 7 region in Southern Alberta, which includes the Siksika, the Piikani, the Kainai, the Tsuut’ina and the Ĩyãħé Nakoda First Nations, including the Chiniki, Bearspaw and Wesley First Nations. Calgary is also home to Métis Nation of Alberta, Region III.

Please note: This is an 18+ event.