AV & The Inner City is a six piece, all-female, Soul, Roots and Blues-infused vocal group from Edmonton’s inner city. Embracing the diversity and wide ranging musical backgrounds of each of its members, AV & The Inner City creates a Roots-Soul blend of R&B and non-religious Gospel style music that is easy to sing along with, and hard to forget. Their inception story is as captivating as their music: the group formed after each member attended and performed at a series of socially distanced porch concerts hosted by AV (Ann Vriend) during the pandemic. Garnering accolades early on, the group took home the Edmonton Folk Music Festival’s “Emerging Artist Award” during their inaugural Western Canada tour in the summer of 2023, and this year received a feature in Porter Airlines in-flight magazine, Edmonton’s Edify Magazine, spins on CBC and CKUA, and reached 20,000 streams on Spotify in their first three months as a group. Featuring JUNO-nominated Indigenous vocalist Debbie Houle, Jazz singer and musicologist Johwanna Alleyne, Crystal Eyo of pop/R&B group “Mercy Funk”, Czech Republic songwriter Alenka Lundell, and multi-instrumentalist Jenn Dahlen– all under the guidance of award-winning Canadian Blues/Roots artist, AV (Ann Vriend)– the group is a mosaic of diverse Canadian talent.
Written by AV, “Lion at the Gate” was recorded at Riverdale Recorders, located just down the street from where the group began in Edmonton’s inner city neighborhood of McCauley, and was co-produced by AV and Elie Mercier.
About “Lion at the Gate”:
Soulful and dynamic, AV and the Inner City’s third single, “Lion at the Gate”, is an encouraging and hopeful song about recognizing habits that keep people in their own way– and then overcoming those self-imposed obstacles. Weaving elements of Roots and Soul into their enveloping Gospel harmonies the track was written long before the pandemic, and remained unreleased until it found its perfect fit within the group’s collective sound. Using the symbol of a lion standing before a gate the song focuses on self-sabotage and the fears that keep people from fulfillment, while offering a message of hope and encouragement that one can always make it past the lion. From its melodic, sparse vocal and piano focused introduction, “Lion at the Gate” rapidly blooms into a powerful anthem with powerful vocal harmonies in a gospel-choir arrangement style. Though the instrumentation of the non-vocal elements is intentionally sparse (piano, bass, and drums) the striking group vocals and AV’s soaring voice unite to create an unbelievably full-bodied sound.
The cover artwork for the song features a photo of the Northern Lights, taken this past summer in the greater Edmonton area, which quite strikingly resembles a lion, and which was serendipitously captured by a partner of one of the band members just as the group was looking for an image to fit their song. The song’s final refrain, “you can make it go,” closes the song with a sense of empowerment and triumph, and the realization that the very lion itself can seem less terrifying as it is recognized and named.
Quote: “Lion at the Gate” is a Soul-Roots song with Gospel-style all-female vocals about conquering your fears, and reducing the power of the scary “lion at the gate.” – AV & The Inner City
Show Dates:
October 25, 2024 – Prince George, BC – Coldsnap Festival – Tickets
November 23, 2024 – Calgary, AB – The Nickelodeon Music Club – Tickets
January 25, 2025 – Red Deer, AB – On The Edge Concert Series – Tickets
Summer Canadian Festivals TBA
Biography:
“AV & the Inner City” is a Soul/Roots group which formed during the COVID19 pandemic in the inner city of Edmonton, Canada. Only three years old, the group has just completed their first summer tour, which included the Vancouver Island Music Festival, the Calgary Folk Music Festival, and most recently, the Edmonton Folk Music Festival, at which they received an “Emerging Artist Award” based on their performance. In Calgary, the group received a rave review from former Nickelodeon promoter Vic Bell, who stated: “Soul and gospel singing ruled…. This was an act that could have closed the Main Stage any night of the festival. They earned a full house standing ovation.”
AV & the Inner City is made up of 6 singers: band leader and multi award-winning singer-songwriter AV (Ann Vriend), Debbie Houle (co-founder of the Juno-nominated Indigenous vocal group “Asani”), jazz radio host, jazz singer, and professional pickle company owner Johwanna Alleyne (company: Mojo Jojo Pickles and Preserves); Crystal Eyo, a communications business owner and lead singer and songwriter of Edmonton pop/RnB band “Mercy Funk”, ESL teacher Alenka Lundell, who fronted and wrote songs for bands in her home country of Czech (formerly Czechoslovakia); and Jenn Dahlen, a guitar player, singer, and clarinetist, who also has sung background vocals for American singer-songwriter Jennifer Berezan.
From April 2020 until October 2021, on every Sunday that the pandemic restrictions and weather would allow AV hosted and performed nearly 60 free concerts on her front porch in the inner city neighbourhood of McCauley, often with guests, including the 6 above mentioned singers. The “porch concerts” often also featured other acts and bands who came from all parts of Edmonton, and though informal in nature, the “porch concerts” were a much needed life-line of music and social interaction for both performers and audience members alike. In the early summer of 2021, the vocalists became an official, rehearsed act; performing AV’s original songs with a cover song or two thrown in for good measure, and 3 part harmony soul/gospel style arrangements based around her voice and keyboard playing. The group released their first two singles in 2024, which have already been streamed over 20,000 times on Spotify.
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