Scott Helman at Toronto’s Revolution Recording
When Canadian Musician
catches up with Helman, he’s
taking a break from tracking at Toronto’s
Revolution Recording. Hôtel de Ville is
about 80 per cent complete at this point,
with all of the songs written but some still
being pieced together.
Were it not for the success of “Bunga-
low,” the nearly three-year gap between the
introductory EP and full-length debut might
seem odd (who wouldn’t want to milk as much
as possible out of a hit like that?) – but that’s es-
pecially so with Helman, who signed with Warner
Music Canada when he was just 15. Evidently, they
saw that certain something in him early on, and it
makes sense that they’d be very calculated with their
marketing of such a promising, unique, and, well, just
plain marketable young artist.
So how does Helman, now 21, feel about the
timeline and trajectory thus far? Well, if patience is a vir-
tue, he’s pretty virtuous.
“You start with a plan, but you restructure it to fit
what you need to do to get to the next level and do the
next record,” he says of something he learned over the
course of his first-ever release cycle. “I put out [Augusta] and
just let it do its thing.”
That’s more than a bit euphemistic. Helman and his
band were on the road for a good part of two years supporting
the release, which gradually and consistently earned its maker
award nominations (including JUNO and MMVA nods), accolades
(like being the first-ever winner of Spotify Canada’s Emerge