Ski bums, sex, murder -- and music?
Whistler, the new homegrown television series that premieres tomorrow night on CTV, is hitching a ride on The O.C . bandwagon. The creators of this 13-part drama are hoping they can take obscure Canadian indie bands and turn them into mainstream hits in the same way that the soapy U.S. teen drama made stars out of the Killers and Modest Mouse.
"I think we've easily got a dozen acts that will be huge in a year from now, or even a few months," says show creator and executive producer Kelly Senecal, who selected most of the pre-recorded music for the soundtrack from his own collection. "Catlow could be the next Death Cab for Cutie."
Catlow who?
That's what they said five years ago, when Death Cab for Cutie was just another rock band from Seattle getting little to no radio play.
Then came The O.C., a nighttime soap that has become almost as well known for its music sequences as its steamy storylines. Seth Cohen, the show's resident music nerd, dropped the band's name. "Don't diss the Death Cabs," he told another character. Then the band performed live in an episode. Almost immediately, Death Cab for Cutie sold 200,000 copies of its CD Transatlanticism (about 10 times more than any of its previous discs) and the big labels came knocking. (The band signed with Atlantic.)
The O.C. has grown into an alternative-music pop-culture phenomenon. In three seasons, the hit Fox series has released five CD compilations. Although Death Cab for Cutie has probably been the greatest beneficiary of the so-called O.C. effect, the show has substantially boosted the profile of other indie bands (the Killers, the Thrills and Modest Mouse all signed with major labels after being on the show) and broken a number of complete unknowns such as British trip-pop singer Jem. Now even established artists such as U2, Beck and Coldplay are debuting new songs on the show.
The all-Canadian Whistler soundtrack, which will be released later this summer by Universal Music Canada, features an eclectic roster of Canadian artists such as Pilate, Hawksley Workman, the Organ and the Waking Eyes. Most of the music, says Senecal, is catchy alternative rock in the "shoe-gazer-pop vein, à la Radiohead, Spiritualized, Flaming Lips and Mercury Rev."
If Whistler's musical backdrop proves to be a hit with viewers, Vancouver singer-songwriter Natasha Thirsk is one of the artists with the most to gain. The series uses six tracks from Kiss the World, the debut album for Catlow, her new solo project. It also features almost every song from the two albums she produced with bassist Jennifer Deon when they formed the Dirtmitts.
"I can't wait until it airs in the U.S.," says Thirsk, who has had her music licensed for other television shows such as 24 and The L Word. "That's when the real royalties start coming in." (Whistler is also being broadcast on the N, the U.S. nighttime cable network for teens.) Ordinary Day, Whistler's recurring theme song, is from the Dirtmitts' 2002 album Get On. "I wanted a song that felt happy, but had a creepy undertone," Senecal says of the dreamy pop tune with a catchy melody, twinkly guitar and faint discordant screeches.
The show -- a mystery set in the British Columbia mountain-resort town that revolves around the murder of a gold-medal-winning snowboarder soon after he returns home from the 2006 Olympic Winter Games -- does not have any name-dropping music nerds similar to The O.C.'s Seth in the cast. The music was all pre-recorded (unlike The O.C., which also commissions original songs). And there will not be any live performances in the show, at least in the first season (it has already been green-lit for a second).
