Pitchfork: Les Georges Leningrad Gear Up for North American Tour: "We Are Stupid in a Brilliant Way!"

Les Georges Leningrad Gear Up for North American Tour: "We Are Stupid in a Brilliant Way!"

For Americans, things get interesting once you cross the Canadian border into Quebec. Public signage is primarily in French, road signs display distances in that metric system, and now more than ever, unsuspecting tourists may even enter a local Montreal club and witness the spectacle that is Les Georges Leningrad. The trio-- comprised of members Poney, Bobo, and Mingo-- recently released its second album Sur les Traces de Black Eskimo in October and are gearing up to bring their colorful brand of Canadian vidoquity out on the American road.

Compared to their wonderfully scattered debut, the new album, according to frontperson Poney, is "maybe not that much more of a 'structured' ship, but more a return to raw and primitive feelings such as love-beats or Paw-Paw dancing club." If this strange brand of accessibility intrigues you, yet your town happens to be absent from this tour, fear not: The band plans on embarking on a full U.S. tour in February of next year.

Speaking with Pitchfork via email, Poney talked a bit about the band's live show: "The live act is a period of time where we are allowed to release all the madness stuck inside. It goes into a lot of making fun of ourselves; putting us in uncomfortable and ridiculous positions. In one show, my costume was falling apart because it was badly sewn and I got almost naked and it was embarrassing." And if you're into more precise measurements like equations and formulas, Poney expresses the quality of their concerts thusly: "It's a mix of grotesque and sexiness, wacky and nasty, retarded and beautiful. We believe in making mistakes and laughing about them. We are stupid in a brilliant way. We rock the laugh off." Dates:

11-26 Hamilton, Ontario - The Casbah
11-28 Detroit, MI - Detroit Art Space
11-29 Cincinnati, OH - TBA
11-30 Columbia, MO - Mojo's (w/ The Arcade Fire, Bobby Conn)
12-01 Denton, TX - Hailey's (w/ Bobby Conn)
12-02 Austin, TX - Emo's (w/ Bobby Conn)
12-03 Houston, TX - Rudyard's (w/ Bobby Conn)
12-04 New Orleans, LA - Spell Caster Lodge (w/ Bobby Conn)
12-06 Atlanta, GA - Unicorn (w/ The Beach)
12-07 Chapel Hill, NC - Local 506
12-08 Baltimore, MD - Ottobar
12-09 Philadelphia, PA - Khyber
12-10 Brooklyn, NY - NorthSix
12-11 Portland, ME - Big Easy

Meanwhile, Les Georges Leningrad has more of its self-described petrochemical post-punk in the works. The band will split a seven-inch with Die Monitr Batss on Kill Rock Stars, and also contribute a track to a Birthday Party tribute coming soon from Three One G Records. Outside of LGL, Bobo and Mingo have become involved in a project called Cacao People, and Poney will appear on the new album by Fly Pan Am, the side project of Godspeed! You Black Emperor guitarist Roger Tellier-Craig.