Nadia Elkharadly: Come Together, Right Now

It was a sad night in Toronto this past Monday.  Leaf nation had to endure the biggest disappointment they’ve faced since ye old strike of 2012; the Toronto Maple Leafs lost their shot at the Stanley Cup.  Losing a 4-1 lead over Boston, the humiliation was solidified into a 4-5 loss in overtime.  The city was quiet, the dejection palpable in the downtown streets.  But for those of us lucky enough to be at Cherry Cola’s that same night, the disappointment was distracted and then washed away by a completely different form of entertainment; The Bobcast.

Nadia Elkharadly: Music Festival – Where dreams and nightmares come true

This past weekend, my fellow Soundgarden fangirl Emy and I flew down to Washington D.C. to get our quarterly dose of SG music love at the DC 101 Chili Cook Off.  I am definitely no stranger to a music festival; I’ve been to several, both at home and in the U.S. since delving into this music journalist world.  As a result, I’ve developed an idea of what makes a good music festival, and what kind of a clusterfuck a bad one can be.  And let me tell you, DC 101 (a rock radio station in Washington) needs to go back to festival planning school, because they put on a pretty shitty festival.

Nadia Elkharadly: The Reality of Reality TV

I realized as I sat down to write this column that I’d written two very serious columns back to back.  I’m not a very serious person, or at least I try very hard not to be, so, frankly, I figured it was time to tackle a far more inane subject, one that’s near and dear to all of our hearts: Reality Television!  I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that I’d had a brief brush with that television phenomenon that is sweeping the globe.  I won’t go into specifics about the show I did, mostly because it’s kind of embarrassing, but also because if you really want to watch it, it’s not that difficult to find and you, my lovely readers, are surely up to the challenge if your urge to see it is so great.

Nadia Elkharadly: The Why of it All

I’m not sure what it is about being a single, 30-something year old woman, but I’ve never felt more scrutinized in my life than I have been now.  My face, my weight, what I wear, what I do, and don’t even get me started on my romantic life (or lack thereof – that’s probably a column unto itself).  What I do, or, should I say, the many things I do, seems to be something of great interest to many people.  Moreso, the “why” of what I do seems to be of great interest to many people, in both negative and positive ways.

Nadia Elkharadly: Human Respect

I hate the news sometimes.  I know that probably sounds like a vapid and ignorant thing to say, but I truly do.  Purveyors of news of the current events variety strike me as fear mongerers and scandal spreaders far more often than they seem to be sharing actual pertinent information.  But maybe that sentiment is just my attempt at hoping that we live in a better world that we actually do.  Turning on a local news channel, clicking into CBC Newsworld on my blackberry, or listening to newsbreaks in the car on the way home from work; I can’t escape all the truly horrible things that are happening in this world, both near and far.

Nadia Elkharadly: My Toronto

I’ve often called myself a Toronto snob.  I was born and raised in this city, and no matter where else I go in the world, I’ll always think of it as home.  I love Toronto so very much.  There’s no better reminder of how much I love this city than when visitors from far away places come to the city, and I get a chance to show them my Toronto.  Not the CN Tower, the Skydome (I will never call it by its other corporate name thank you!)  I’m talking about the fun little places that I have come to love, and love showing off to people who come to town.

Nadia Elkharadly: Canadian Music Week – The good, the bad and the ugly

It’s April and another Canadian music Week has come and gone.  Cold weather, late nights, new and old friends and of course copious amounts of alcohol – it’s all behind us now.  What’s not behind us is the apparent mixed reviews and outright controversy that this year’s CMW has been bringing out in fans, artists, organizers and everyone else who participated in some way shape or form.  My idea for this column seems to have already been scooped by The Torontoist.  But instead of lamenting the fact that these writers clearly didn’t drink as much or party as hard as I did and actually managed to meet a deadline, I wanted to build on and add to all the great points that were made in that article.

Nadia Elkharadly: A Week of Great Music

If there’s one thing that I’ve learned in my journey of becoming a…something in this crazy music/entertainment/out of the box industry, it’s that sometimes you can’t do everything by yourself.  There are many times when you just need a little help from your friends.  One of the most recent, frankly one of the nicest examples of that exact thing happened just last night – it was the Bobcast.

Nadia Elkharadly: Haters gonna hate

The idea for this column came about last night when I received an email of a peculiar nature.  The email in question was angry in tone, derogatory in content and evidently written in the heat of the moment by someone who had become very incensed by something that the person thought I had done to him/her.  The email, in actuality, was hate mail, in response to a review that I had written.  It wasn’t the first piece of hate mail I’d ever received, and the more I choose to push myself into the public eye, the more likely it is that it won’t be the last.  But it did get me thinking about publicity, the internet and how hate proliferates so easily when the two come together.

Nadia Elkharadly: Payin’ the Indie Dues – Singin’ the Indie Blues

Hello, my name is Nadia and I’m a music addict.  The past couple of years I’ve been making it my (side) business to learn about, discover and most of all support local music.  I spend more nights out at bars than I do at home, always going out to listen to this or that band, checking out this singer or this guitarist, all to help nurture the thriving music scene we have right here in Toronto.  In doing so, I’ve gotten to know so many bright and talented musicians and artists, some who are just starting out, and some who have been at it for over a decade.  The dedication and perseverance that everyone I meet possesses is inspiring, and I honestly spend a lot time wondering why all of these great people aren’t wildly famous – many of them certainly deserve to be.