Ten minute tea with Afternoon Tea. Spend ten minutes with Afternoon Tea. In the time it takes to boil one kettle, and let one cup of tea steep, we will have your daily art + music fix covered. Take your afternoon tea break with our Afternoon Tea curators.
Today’s tea + soundtrack + visuals is curated by The Pairs. Tied together by family and soaring harmonies, The Pairs share stories of life’s hope, hilarity, and hardship. Pull up a seat around their lively kitchen table for a unique blend of music that will hug your eardrums and make you want to groove.
A smattering of feelings and self-doubt, “Superhuman” tells a personal yet relatable story of realizing how we get caught up in the way we’re being perceived by others instead of truly experiencing life and all the feelings that come with living. We’re not perfect, so why do we put so much energy towards trying to convince people that we are? This song marks the intention to try and drop the hyper perfectionism and accept ourselves as fallible and human.
“Superhuman” reminds us that we can be wrong, that we can make mistakes, that we can say things that hurt people, and that none of that makes us bad people, or unlovable. Stream + share the brand new track now:
One Piece of Music
The song we chose to share is “You and I” by Valerie June. We had the fortune of seeing Valerie June, an incredibly accomplished Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter from Memphis, present the keynote speech at this year’s Folk Alliance International conference in Kansas City. She shared her music and impactful, thought-provoking words with the attendees of the conference, and we all left with the question “who do we want to be?” In a world of looming threats around every corner and a long list of distractions and reasons to give up, she encourages us to remember the power we hold in our individual actions. Her music has an effortless quality to it and the bluesy, Appalachian tunes somehow make us simultaneously want to relax on a porch on a summer day and dance arm in arm with the people we love.
One Visual
The art piece we’re sharing is “Octopus Garden 2” by Steve Watson. Steve is The Pair’s member, Hillary’s late father and London, Ontario-based visual artist. Steve began his artistic career with large psychedelic, ink and water-colour, collage-scapes and later moved into acrylic on canvas, underwater scenes without dropping the psychedelic edge. “Octopus Garden 2” was the last painting Steve completed before he passed away from a short battle with lung cancer in the summer of 2012. This particular painting was memorialized in a large mural in downtown London by Steve’s friend, Ryan Mahy and other London artists and friends. Steve’s death was a monumental force in the forming of The Pairs. It brought Hillary and Renee and Noelle closer together through the pain they all felt in the loss of a father and the loss of a close family friend, and music was a form of healing.
One Type of Tea
Our choice of tea pairs well with the “feels” that our song and art stir up for us. As a band we’ve had many a road trip together, and Pairs’ drummer, Steve Plimmer (aka Plim), will often bring with him a thermos of Earl Grey with vanilla soy milk. He’ll open it up and we’ll pass it around and all comment on how yummy the combination was as if we’ve forgotten from the last time. The smell of bergamot and vanilla will drift around the van and we’ll probably be listening to joyful music and staring out at whatever country-side we’re zooming past. It’s a comforting drink that brings back comforting memories of the travels we’ve shared together over the years of The Pairs.
Tea + Me 