BY Khoa Tran

Toronto’s The Great Lake Swimmers kicked off their 2012 tour supporting the (very) newly-released New Wild Everywhere, the band’s first album since 2009‘s  Lost Channels, at Montreal’s L’Astral on Thursday night.

With nearly a decade of experience dating back to their eponymous album released in 2003, the members of the Great Lake Swimmers are no strangers to the stage, and Thursday night’s show, in front of a large audience at the downtown Montreal venue, featured a bare minimum of early-tour hiccups. Tony Dekker’s voice was in fine form; his smooth delivery is reminiscent of Iron and Wine, or a youthful, more polished Neil Young. The rest of the lineup backing Dekker consisted of Miranda Mulholland on violin and backing vocals, Greg Millson on drums, Bret Higgins on double bass, and Erik Arnesen on guitar and banjo.

And with nearly a decade of recording and touring experience under the band’s collective belt, the band’s audience certainly isn’t comprised of strangers to the band’s music, either. While the setlist of over a dozen songs was a mix of older songs, as well as selections from New Wild Everywhere, some of the more vocal members of the audience were calling for “Your Rocky Spine,” from 2007‘s Onigara, early on in the set. To this, Dekker responded “it’s coming,” and the song was played mid-set, to quite possibly the most positive reaction of the evening. The band also won points with the Montreal crowd with their French-language song “les Champs de progéniture.”

Opening in a one-off fashion for the Great Lake Swimmers was The Killing Kindness, from Peterborough, Ontario, eaturing an impressive style blending traditional folk and country music, including a sombre, and strangely appropriate minor-key re-imagining of “You Are My Sunshine.” Benj Rowland of the Kindness Killers later joined the Great Lake Swimmers onstage for a spontaneous rendition of “Ballad of a Fisherman.”

After this energetic and auspicious beginning, the tour will jump immediately across the pond to a number of dates throughout western Europe, before returning to Canada and the United States in May.