Now that Magneta Lane are beginning to gain traction outside of Canada (or hell, outisde of Toronto), it seems like a good time for a career review.

Time and time again, reviews of The Constant Lover will praise Magneta Lane’s wealth of confidence and swagger. Such poise is uncommon for veteran bands, let alone those with a single release under their belts. But the story, practically a minor legend by now, goes further than that. Magneta Lane is not quite two years old, and the trio of college-age women have seen their fortunes rise precipitously through a combination of hard work, attitude and a lot of luck—the audience at their first downtown show happened to include someone from Paper Bad Records, who was sufficiently impressed to sign the band to a record label despite their near-complete lack of experience.

To be fair, Magneta Lane’s story veers dangerously towards cliche territory. All the same, there’s a definite scrappy underdog quality that everyone can get behind—and it helps that The Constant Lover is chock full of candy coated guitar pop of the New York hipster persuasion—a scene that is now spreading across the continent, thanks to the budding indie revolution. In this day and age, it’s getting harder and harder to pick out the Killers from the Controller.Controllers, so here’s a hint; for now, anyways, Magneta Lane plays for the good guys.

Blow It Out Your Ass, It’s Veruca Salt came out around the time internet music sites were just starting to figure out what kind of content they should put out. Back in those days, they just published tons of reviews—everything they could get their hands on, though it helped a lot if they were on recognizable labels. Addicted To Noise, Wall Of Sound, Onion AV Club—you could find short reviews of damned near anything on those sites, or so it seemed to teenaged ol’ me. This may explain why a lot of sites had reviews of Blow It Out Your Ass—because there wasn’t much to note about the four-track EP otherwise.

Except that it was the first thing Veruca Salt had put out since their smash debut, American Thighs (an interesting story mainly because it was out on mid-level indie label Caroline for all of nine days before DGC swallowed the band’s contract whole). So of course I bought myself a copy down by the old Tower Records that used to inhabit the corner of Queen and Yonge in Toronto. And then I promptly left it by the telephone booth on the subway platform of Union Station. Luckily, I figured out I’d forgotten something fairly quickly after the train left the station, so I doubled back and hoped my purchase would still be there. Nope.

But there are a lot of good samaritans out there in Toronto, and besides, what would you do if you found, say, two CDs from bands you’ve never heard of and look suspiciously like what the “younguns” listen to these days? So up one level to the ticket collector’s booth. I could see the Tower Records bag sitting beside the portly collector, so I figured I’d be okay, and that I hadn’t just thrown away thirty bucks. But first, to convince him.

“Um, hi, I sorta lost two CDs down on the platform and left the station, and I was wondering if anyone had picked them up or anything…”
“Well, we might have something around here. What did they look like?”

The first CD was Lush’s Lovelife. The second was Blow It Out Your Ass.

“Well, one CD has this guy in a greenhouse or something, holding up a giant pink circle that says ‘lush’ on it…”
“Yeah, and the second one…?”
“Um, well, it has these four people… on the cover… and, uh, they’re kinda dressed in toilet paper…”
“Hmmm. Was there a name on the CD?”

Of course he had the CDs. But I was a teenager. I didn’t think he’d get a huge kick out of all this and probably would’ve given me the CDs if I’d called him on it. So. A pause. Long and uncomfortable.

“Ummm… yeah. It kinda says… ‘Blow It Out Your Ass, It’s Veruca Salt.’ ”

It was as if I’d confirmed to the guy everything he might’ve thought was wrong with the music kids listened to today: it even had ASS on the cover! But no; he started laughing and handed me my CDs. “I just wanted to see if you’d say it, man.” Yeah, thanks. All I could say in reply was a sheepish, “I didn’t pick the name,” before I walked off to catch the next train home.

The Go! Team are poised for a potentially massive breakthrough in the States, it seems—with word that the band have finally inked a domestic record deal with heavy hitter Columbia Records, it will soon be possible for people to own Thunder, Lightning, Strike without paying import prices. The move to Columbia is especially advantageous for the band because of the label’s cash reserves, meaning the many uncleared samples on the album will no longer be a problem. In other words, the domestic release of the album will be largely the same as the original flavour, plus a couple of new tracks and the addition of vocals from frontwoman Ninja.

All this comes as the Go! Team continue their live invasion of North America, which touched down in the rainforest-like Lee’s Palace yesterday night. Closed for the past few weeks for renovations, Lee’s Palace reopened just in time for the show, which had sold out long ago. In retrospect, the weather conditions were near-perfect—the sweltering temperatures and humidity of the venue meant a lot of people couldn’t stop sweating even when standing still, so why not dance? Openers Ninja High School put up a valiant effort, but it’s unclear whether their high-energy white-bread hip hop act would’ve fared better in more temperate conditions, or if the frantic, sweaty and out-of-control nature of their show is par for the course. In any case, their energy was commendable but obviously amateurish when placed next to the Go! Team’s appearance some twenty minutes later.

Special treats abounded—the live debut of the Japan-only track “The Ice Storm,” a cameo singing appearance by dimunitive drummer Chi Fukami (already out of breath before she got to the mic, such was the breakneck pace of the show) and a couple of new songs in the mix. But of course the biggest treat, aside from the killer music, was Ninja—the most engaging and hyperactive person I’ve ever seen on a Toronto stage, and by a good country mile at that. At turns provoking and cheering the crowd on, she had a big hand in turning what could’ve been the traditional standoff Toronto crowd into one giant sweaty orgy of chanting and dancing and arm-waving.

If you have the chance to see the Go! Team and you turn it down, you’ll miss a mind-blowing show. You’ll also be an idiot.