Canadian Winter

Canadian Winter are a group of Hamilton, ON musicians headed up by Kobi Annobil, an MC hailing from Woking, which is south of London in the UK, and Just Wait Till February chronicles his arrival, bumpy integration and eventual personal acceptance into Canadian society. Kobi's MC style won't find anyone mistaking him for a lyrical wizard following in the footsteps of a Rakim or a Jay-Z, yet his undeniable charisma helps bring his conversational narratives focusing on the minutiae of daily life, reminiscent in style to early material by the Streets, to the forefront. Just Wait Till February's chronological journey begins with the excitement of the butterflies in Kobi's belly as he arrives at Pearson airport and encounters the dazzling lights of Toronto ("City Lights"), yet he also takes pains to highlight the lows. We know he abhors the winter months from the title alone, but the cold metaphor has infinite permutations. Like many recent immigrants, he desperately misses his family and friends, struggles to find decent accommodations and takes low-paying dead-end jobs before, in his case, finding community and love in Hamilton. Steel Town even gets its own appropriately Cannibal Ox-style, The Cold Vein posse ode, "Paupers & Royalty." The record could have sounded incredibly mundane and overwhelmingly depressing, but Kobi (who already had a deal to write a semi-autobiographical book before arriving in Canada) is a gifted wordsmith. He sprinkles self-deprecating humour into entries like "GO Bus Shorty," "The Housewarming" and "Northpole at Night," adapting to the country and dropping phrases like "all plaid everything" and musing on patience-testing line-ups outside Tim Hortons as he settles down. Kobi's helped immensely by the community of musicians and hip-hop producers who not only helped him deliver a bonafide, consistently interesting hip-hop record, but in the life transition the album so vividly chronicles.