The Vatikan - Toronto, ON

Hive Magazine party, October 2

Montreal's Unicorns were the featured attraction at the party for Hive Magazine at the Vatikan last Thursday, but the band's budget-psych vibe was barely audible in most parts of the goth-metal hangout. When audience chatter started drowning out the tunes, Unicorns vocalist/keyboardist Nicholas "Neil" Diamonds decided he'd had enough and leapt offstage into the audience. "I trashed some fucking equipment, attacked a suburban ingrate, threw some fucking metal shit out there and broke our synthesizer," Diamonds admits.

The person who suffered the brunt of Diamonds's attack was just as stunned as everyone else.

"When Nick started telling the audience to 'go fuck yourselves,'" says the Unicorns fan who wishes to be known only as Conrad, "I thought it was just typical Unicorns tongue-in-cheek banter. But then he jumped offstage and attacked me with the microphone stand."

Evidently the attack hasn't soured Conrad on the Unicorns. "I'm actually going to see them next week in Montreal! I just hope they can play without their synthesizer."

from nowtoronto.com Music Notes, October 9 - October 15, 2003

SINGLE HORN HIJINX
MONTREAL'S UNICORNS ARE SISSIES WHO FIGHT BACK

BY SARAH LISS

FROM THE OUTSIDE, THE UNICORNS seem like your stereotypical sissy-boy indie rock band. With a bubble-letters-'n'-rainbows aesthetic that could be cribbed from an 80s teenybopper's puffy-painted sweatshirt, goofy lo-fi jangle tunes and a penchant for recorder hooks, the Montreal duo-turned-trio strike me as the last people who'd start a riot.

So how to explain the brawl that went down a mere month ago when the band played a magazine launch party at the Vatikan? Vocalist/keyboardist Nick "Niel" Diamonds lost his beans and assaulted an audience member with a mike stand.

That's some intense Altamont-style shit, dude. But it only happened cuz the scrawny musicians have such thin skins, explains Unicorn Alden Ginger.

"We were playing onstage and nobody gave a shit. We're pretty sensitive guys, and Nick was taking it pretty seriously," Ginger recalls over the phone after a relatively tame gig out in Halifax. "Something triggered his anger, and he trashed a bunch of stuff. I watched and kept playing, because I wasn't bolstered enough to take part in the fight. Apparently, one of the audience members required some stitches, which is unfortunate.

"Maybe our music does have kind of a weird, emotional edge to it that borders on schizophrenia. There's some dementia in there. I just hope it doesn't turn into a Nirvana-type thing."

Don't think the mayhem was a one-off deal . The Unicorns have a knack for provoking their audience. Last time I caught 'em, at Montreal's Jupiter Room in May, an insanely drunk fan climbed up on a table and started screeching about Kurt Cobain being alive.

from nowtoronto.com Music Feature, November 6 - November 12, 2003