Sporting an innocuous panda with an interest in alphabet blocks, The Nix Dicksons’ latest EP is six tracks of standard indie rock fare, complete with a Hüsker Dü reference and the intentionally ironic use of harmonica. If you’ve got friends over to make vegan cupcakes, this would make fine background noise. Overall, the tracks are pretty good for a band just starting out, having not yet managed to quite escape the confines of Calgary’s indie music scene. (Yes, there is an “indie music scene” somewhere beneath the sea of cowboy hats.) Why they’ve called it The Panda EP and why that panda is so interested in letters, I’m still not sure, but these three Alberta boys churn out songs that are buoyant, spunky and almost as catchy as H1N1.

Published in Volume 64, Number 11 of The Uniter (November 12, 2009)