...most of October I had trouble remembering your name...
NICK KRGOVICH and LARISSA LOYVA are the only constant from the early days of P:ano. There's been lineup changes and incarnations since 2000 but they're still making the same great music they did when we recorded them in that damp East Van Basement.
They came to us at a young age (similar to the Ids). Nick was a 17 year old highschool student and Larissa was a little bit older. We saw them at the Brickyard with a couple of bands but the only one we could remember was P:ano. They had elements of all the bands we were into: Low, Yo La Tengo, Belle and Sebastian. One thing that Colin and I were fascinated by was the maturity of his song writing. To us, it was crazy that no one had recorded this band or even approached them to record.
Over the next 6 months Colin recorded their debut album: When It's Dark and It's Summer. He brought in all his friends from the Vancouver music scene: Josh Wells, Ida Nilsen, Andy Herfst, Stefan Udell and others I can't recall. We recorded this one on our 16 track 1 inch to achieve that munchy dark sound we so love on all our favourite albums. Colin knew what he was doing this time as 5 years had passed since the Id's and he'd recorded dozens of great bands in the meantime. From the start it was clear Nick was endlessy creative and wasn't interested in the status quo. Colin and Nick pushed each other to make something they could never have achieved on their own. Highlights from that album were All of November, Tut Tut and Dinosaurs but honestly this is an entity unto itself not just a collection of singles. Languidly beautiful intros and codas bookend stunningly written pop songs on this amazing debut. I was just far enough removed from the proceedings to fully comprehend the magnitude of this musical watershed of form and function.
After we had finished the album no labels were interested in putting it out. Today the mere thought of this seems ludicrus but back then nobody gave a shit. We had to take things into our own hands so Terry started our label Hi-Fidelity with the sole purpose of making this amazing piece of art availble to the public. We were very proud to have this as our first proper release. This time around it was one of the highest selling albums on our indie distributor, Scratch Records (a little different scenario from Nettwerk).
People loved this album and even though it's now out of print it's one of the best albums to come out of Vancouver in the last 6 years. Like Sean (the Ids), Nick also started off as a nice naive kid from the burbs whose personality changed but is now back on track and he's even turned into a respectable adult - albeit one who writes amazing songs. They toured the west coast of the USA with this album and even though many substantial offers were dangled before their eyes none ever transpired. No, they didn't get a coveted spot on the OC soundtrack but Nick eventually wrote a song called OC.
When it came time to record their sophomore album, The Den, things got a little tense but we won't get into that here. It's all behind us and we're glad to say this tale didn't include drug addiction but instead it was about big budgets, late nights and gargantuan ambitions.
Hive-Fidelity put out those two albums before they buckled to the pressure of the much maligned major-indie label. Thankfully they didn't sign to Nettwerk but the much superior (ethically and aesthetically) Mint Records. At present they are happily churning out pop gems for that imprint and we are all still friends.
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