Wavelength celebrates its first anniversary with Wavelength 50 (Feb. 9–11), featuring 19 bands playing at Ted’s Wrecking Yard and its main-floor space, Barcode. (This becomes an annual tradition for the Toronto music community, continuing to this day as the Wavelength Winter Festival.) In line with Wavelength’s trademark numerical chronicling, the organizers — who are continually amazed by Wavelength’s ongoing existence — also celebrate their 18th-month anniversary with Wavelength 75 (Aug. 5), a day-long show upstairs at Ted’s headlined by the Constantines. That summer, Broken Social Scene develop their full-band sound at Ted’s Wrecking Yard, playing one of their earliest shows as part of Wavelength.
But tragedy strikes that October when Ted’s Wrecking Yard suddenly closes down, the club evicted by its landlord due to arrears in rent. This comes just weeks after the sale and planned renovation of the El Mocambo — a Toronto rock’n’roll landmark that had been another welcoming venue for emerging indie bands since the early ‘90s — resulting in a devastating double-whammy for the local music community. Wavelength accepts a generous offer to relocate its Sunday night series to well-established rock club Lee’s Palace, on Bloor Street West in the Annex.
Memorable shows:
- Anthemic Ontario post-punk band the Constantines blow away a capacity crowd that includes most of Toronto’s music journalists; a critical buzz ensues and within a week, they are signed to Three Gut Records (WL 49, Feb. 4, 2001 @ Ted’s Wrecking Yard)
- Future American indie superstar Sufjan Stevens plays for a dozen people – the scene was then small enough that everyone else was seeing Mogwai at a bigger venue the same night (WL 56, March 25, 2001 @ TWY)
- 2SLGBTQ+ indie-pop collective the Hidden Cameras play one of their earliest gigs, joined by dancers dressed up as ghosts (WL 80, Sept. 9, 2001 @ TWY)
- Toronto post-rock pioneers Do Make Say Think make a momentous underplay at Ted’s Wrecking Yard, five days after 9/11 (WL 81, Sept. 16, 2001 @ TWY)
- The first Wavelength at Lee’s features hardcore band Femme Fatale, including Jesse F. Keeler, later of Death From Above 1979 (WL 88, Nov. 4, 2001 @ Lee’s Palace)