Wolf Parade

Alongside their friends in Arcade Fire, Wolf Parade helped turn Montreal into a North American indie-rock mecca in the mid-2000s. But the band began as a happy accident. Shortly after departing his group Frog Eyes in 2003, Spencer Krug recruited Dan Boeckner to write songs for a forthcoming gig Krug had landed. Their self-titled debut EP followed a few months later. It showcased what would become Wolf Parade’s signature throughout their discography: with songwriting duties split between the keyboardist Krug and the guitarist Boeckner, each taking turns singing. Krug wrote operatic, epic rock ballads while Boeckner preferred concise, dance-inspired jams. Their first full-length, Apologies to the Queen Mary, became an instant classic in the burgeoning Canadian indie-rock scene and introduced wider audiences to the band’s prog-inspired sound. Hot Hot Heat guitarist Dante DeCaro joined the band for the Queen Mary tour, though he had departed by the time the group returned from a hiatus with 2020’s Thin Mind. That project found the band returning to their original lineup, with Spencer Krug generating the basslines on his synthesizer in DeCaro's absence.