Marc Houle - Personal Photos

Music

"So recently I was back home in Canada and I decided to clean out a closet full of my old stuff."

Ahead of the release of his new album 'Cola Party' on June 27th, Marc Houle had a rummage around in his closet (no, not a euphemism…) and pulled out a range of weird and wonderful surprises. We wanted to know more so we picked a selection of images that peaked our curiosity and let Marc explain away. Here's what he had to say about his task;

"It was so funny to see all this random crap that I accumulated over the years but together it sorta painted a picture of who I was. I donated lots of it to charity but I wanted to document it all so I took a photo of everything. So here are the first of a hundred things I found";

I have a bunch of old video game systems in boxes ready to go – It was mostly due to the Atari Adventures night I had at 13 Below in WIndsor where we would set up video games throughout the club so people could play the oldies and I would play New wave and electro as the soundtrack with my friend Scott. Great times!

I had an obsession with collecting old board games – I used to go to thrift shops and buy so many of them. It's really a lost artform. All those specially designed pieces, cards and the boards themselves are all great works of art. If I had a giant building I would get all the boards framed and hung. Oh – Stop thief – When that first came out it was AMAZING – the sounds of footsteps, clues – all generated from a calculator with a speaker. very spooky.

Ha – My grandparents had this at their place for us to play with when we were little. It was sorta like legos but more abstract. We used to make pyramids and throw balls at them to break them down…Pyramid bowling.

When I was younger I was amazed by the elaborate playmobil sets they had in the window of the toy store. It was either legos or playmobil for most kids and since playmobil were way expensive I never wanted them. I think Magda brought me this one as a gift when she was first playing in Europe.

When I was young everyone wore wristbands. I always had white ones so obviously when I found these atari wristbands I had to snap them up – The yellow stuff isn't' sweat or anything – don't worry.

Another fine gift from one of Magda's tours. His name is New Wave Dave if i remember….Me being into New Wave….get it?

Haha – why do i have these….I dunno. My mom was into Elvis growing up so 70's elvis and black velvet and Vegas are all sorta stuck somewhere in my head. Still sealed!

I spent more time on my commodore 64 than anything else. I was programming it, connecting to BBSs with the 300 baud modem and playing every game i could get my hands on. The sounds of the C64 sunk into my head and set the course for all future sounds i would end up loving. I loved this pin until i accidentally washed it.

These were the first portable electronic games and i loved them. I used to carry the hockey one around all the time. The hockey one was better cause it had red LEDs that glowed so well in the dark.

He-Man head….My brother had every single He-man figure made and we always had random MOTU body parts around the house. I loved the weapons the best. Looks like He-Man in an avalanche.

'Cola Party' is released on June 27th via Items & Things.