A band with deep roots in Trail is looking for a little hometown support as they aim for the top in Searchlight 2018.
Scarlet Sway, which includes Trail natives Karli Harrison and Kim and Jordan Fines, has entered a song in CBC’s annual music hunt for Canada’s best undiscovered talent.
The band, which also includes Parker Mossop, Aaron Marchuk and Dan Smart, has played extensively in the Peace Region for the past four years but made a visit to the Kootenays last spring to perform during Silver City Days.
Now they’re hoping their entry into Searchlight 2018 can propel the group to even greater destinations.
The rules require contestants, open to any Canadian resident, to submit an audio recording featuring an original song composition. Then it’s up to the fans to help the entry advance through the competition.
The band has entered the song “Room of Mirrors.”
scarlet sway – room of mirrors
“The song was a group effort,” explained Harrison. “Lyrically it started from my journal. I wrote it at the end of a relationship when I realized we were both going in different directions. I knew I wanted to focus most of my energy on music whereas he was getting ready to settle down.
“The song starts out ‘flirting with the comforts of a simple home.’ It goes through the struggle of deciding between settling or pushing past a comfort zone and moving forward.
“We started off with a couple verses that I had written and Kim was able to, as always, quite literally finish my sentence … or lyrics as it were.
“Musically we all came up with it together. Generally, the way we write is someone brings a somewhat solid idea to the group and then we all work through the rest.”
The first round of voting at www.cbcmusic.ca/searchlight will begin on Tuesday, Feb. 13 (noon PST) until Feb. 28. After that round is complete the top 50 will move to Round 2 with another request for public votes. That round will yield five finalists, which will be reviewed by a judging panel to determine the grand prize winner.
The public can vote once per posted song per day during the opening round.
The winning group/musician of Searchlight 2018 will receive a prestigious placement at the week-long 2018 Allan Slaight JUNO Master Class in Toronto, Canada’s premiere artist development program (valued at approximately $100,000), as well as an industry showcase to cap the week.
The winning group/musician will also win a trip to the 2019 JUNO Awards to perform at JUNOFest and take in all the festivities, including the awards show. As well as a week-long recording residency at Studio Bell in the National Music Centre in Calgary and a performance at the 2018 CBC Music Festival at Echo Beach in Toronto.
Since their appearance at Silver City Days, Harrison said the band has been busy planning another tour.
“We had an excellent time playing and the home crowd (for Silver City Days) was amazing. We have cordless microphones so we were able to dance through the crowd. In the gymnasium, you can imagine there would be a lot of room to do that.
“For the most part, we’ve been playing in the Peace Region at local shows, we played a VIP show for Journey, as well as some local festivals around the area – GrizzFest with Simple Plan and Tom Cochrane headlining, headlining The Big Chill, and playing Canola Fest.
“This year we’re in the works of planning another tour this time throughout the Okanagan and West Coast. We’ve been writing for the past year for our upcoming EP (extended play record). We’ll be recording in the next few months so we’ll hopefully be able to release it soon after.”
The band, which formed in 2014 at a karaoke night in Dawson Creek, features Kim and Karli on vocals, Jordan Fines on guitar, Smart on bass, Mossop on drums and Marchuk on keyboards and trumpet.
“My sister was there with Jordan when our former bassist approached Kim after hearing her sing and asked if she sang aside from karaoke.”
That’s when Scarlet Sway took flight. Now it’ll be up to the fans to help them soar even higher.
