ISHMAEL N. DARO
Arts Writer

It takes a village to create the music of Ohbijou. What started with Casey Mecija and a guitar soon involved her sister Jennifer on violin and organ and eventually blossomed into the six person — sometimes seven person — band that it is today.

Ohbijou’s orchestral pop is as beautiful as it is overwhelming. Mecija’s singing ranges from sugary sweet to raw and powerful. But although her vocals are clearly the focal point, the music gets help from the rest of the band and the various instruments they contribute, from cello to trumpet to glockenspiel.

“We’ve played all across Canada already a couple times and we’re used to squeezing onto small stages,” said Heather Kirby, who plays bass and banjo. She sipped her beer casually while singer Mecija nursed a mug of tea next to her. (A rough night in Thunder Bay two nights earlier had left her wary of strong drink.)

The pair took some time to chat before playing at Amigos Cantina on Nov. 15 with Saskatoon’s Slow Down Molasses, themselves an eight-person band.

Ohbijou gained notoriety after the 2006 debut album Swift Feet for Troubling Times and recently followed it up with Beacons. The band has been touring for the last several months and is currently swinging through Western Canada for the third time promoting the new album.

“This album was a long time in the making and we had various experiences with it, highs and lows, and as cliché as it sounds, following the beacon to finish it.”

To record Beacons, the Toronto band left the city in search of more natural surroundings, recording parts at a cottage in Alberta.

“We have a song ”˜Thunderlove’ that’s on the record and I was asked to do vocals out on the porch at night when the water was moving and the crickets were going,” said Mecija. “You can hear that in the microphone and it’s pretty ambient and reminiscent of nature and our time up at the cottage.”

In the five years the band has been playing together, they have cultivated a strong following across the country and recently completed their first European tour. There seems to be a sense of momentum to Ohbijou.

“We have been touring Canada quite a bit and each show seems to get bigger,” said Mecija. “And we do see some people who are familiar faces who come to us and say hello.”

For instance, after the Saskatoon show, the band was even invited to someone’s house for breakfast the next day.

Ohbijou keeps in touch with fans through various ways online, including social networks and blogging the tour. They have even scheduled “Internet time” during which band members update the group’s blog or post messages on Twitter. During a recent show in Montreal, thieves broke into the band’s van and took some instruments. And when they shared this news with fans, there was a big response.

“We twittered about it — tweeted about it,” Kirby corrected herself, “and there were a bunch of responses of people asking details about it, saying that they’d go around looking in pawn shops and look out for it.”

Ohbijou clearly don’t take this devotion from their fans lightly. After the Saskatoon show, each band member worked the crowd, chatting amiably and answering any questions people had — and there were plenty of them. After the encore, the bulk of the audience didn’t leave for about 20 or so minutes, and when they did it was often with an album or a new T-shirt.

Talking to the band and watching them interact with fans, one gets a sense that they are just really nice people, as cheesy as that sounds. On the long van rides, Mecija’s sister Jennifer knits, Anissa Hart develops Flash applications, Jamie Bunton takes lots of vitamins and eats granola bars and the band all play Boggle on an iPhone.

The close friendships among bandmates seeps into the music as well. Watching them onstage, they clearly have fun together, creating a cosy atmosphere between fans and the band.

“We’ve invested a certain amount of time and care and love for each other and playing music together. I think that definitely begets a quality in a band that an audience can feel and probably appreciate,” said Mecija. “I feel like if you don’t like each other then you make crappy records.” Ohbijou plan to release a third album soon, applying what they have learned while touring Beacons.

“A big goal of ours is to record a really good next record. Take everything we’ve learned from touring this record and everything we’ve learned from playing live and translate all of those, sort of, um—” Mejica faltered looking for the word.

“Experiences?” asked Kirby.

“Experiences! Thank you,” Mecija laughed. “Turn those experiences into an amazing third record.”