Tunnel Canary was first played on NTS on 10 July 2017. Songs played include Jihad.

Formed nearly 30 years ago at the height of Vancouver BC's early punk scene, amidst Canadian HARDCORE progenitors like D.O.A. and SUBHUMANS, TUNNEL CANARY emerged with a sound more in common with the then still incubating UK POWER ELECTRONICS scene and a militant attitude/lifestyle more in-line with straight edge hardcore or east-asian asceticism.

Influenced by avant-garde guitarists Fred Frith and Keith Rowe, contempory electronic composers like TUDOR, STOCKHAUSEN, and CAGE, and NO WAVE bands like MARS and DNA, TUNNEL CANARY produced a volatile and often violent mix of pure-noise, synthesizer music, free-improv, and confrontational performance art. Centered around the chaotic guitar antics and synth compositions of guitarist Aleh Kaheen(now: Nathan Holiday) coupled with the accusatory and often absolutely-hysterical caterwauling of vocalist Ebra Ziron, and supported by the tasteful and powerful bass punctuations of David Sheftel, TUNNEL CANARY’s unique sound sits somewhere in the spheres of POST-INDUSTRIAL, PROTO-POWER-ELECTRONICS, and NOISE.

American Noise Legend, and early TC ally GX JUPITTER LARSEN remembers the TUNNEL CANARY live experience:

“A Tunnel Canary show had layer after layer of racket fragments bouncing somewhere between the back of your teeth and your inner ear. They were the classical complaint against calm, and the archetypal battle against boredom. They made you realize there was more to punk than just safety pins and leather. I remember seeing them open up for a William Burroughs reading in 1981. They blew the PA in seconds! Nathan I know doesn’t care much for that one, but I remember Burroughs telling me how he loved it. We all loved it. Tunnel Canary was a wake-up call for those of us fortunate enough to catch them live in those early days. When we heard them we heard the future, and the future was going to be loud!”

Sound clips also at: www.punkhistorycanada.ca Text by Josh R. (rundownsun records)