Have you been hybernating for the past two days? Looking for something fun to do tonight? Great - because there's a stellar indie rock show at the Horseshoe!

blogTO favourites Five Blank Pages are about to close the book on their current line-up. Rajiv and Chelen are moving on to pursue other projects, one of them being Rajiv's awesome new band Oh No Forest Fires.

Brampton popsters The Junction are helping Five Blank Pages send Rajiv and Chelen off with a smile. Newly freed from their Universal record deal, The Junction are working on new material and ready to take the world by storm all over again. I spoke with bassist Matt Jameson about Universal, their new material and about some current issues.

Keep reading for the complete interview.

Why are you called The Junction?

Matt Jameson: Before I was in the band, Mike and Brent named themselves "The Funky Junction", inspired by a Jamiroquai tune. By the time I joined they had dropped the funky part.

How would you describe your sound using only one word?

Diverse.

What inspires your music and lyrics?

Real situations and experiences. We pride ourselves on making music that comes from an honest place.

I see you're no longer with Universal. What happened?

Meeting them and signing was exciting. Making the record with them was cool. Everything after that (other than our publicist) was a train wreck. Our relationship went wrong when the one guy we had a relationship with left the company and our marketing managers weren't capable of picking up a phone. You can't do business with people like that.

Are you happy being indie again?

Extremely happy. We have the power and accountability back in our court. We're working on getting a new team (label) at the moment, and a smaller one seems to be the right fit.

Do you live in Toronto?

I live in the west end of Toronto and I love it. To me, driving is the worst and living in the city means I get to ride a bike everywhere.

How do you know Five Blank Pages?

From waaaaaay back. We're both from Brampton and have played with each other many, many times. We're stoked for tomorrow night's gig with them.

You've got new songs in the works. How would you describe the new songs?

I think that the next album is going to be a more cohesive and realized sound of us as a 3-piece. It seems everything we recorded beforehand had some form of an older track on it where this next record is completely new and is coming along really well.

What do you hope happens in 2008?

I hope we get to release a new record this year and that we're able to get abroad. Canada is a big country, but when you want to tour a record, Canada is not big enough to tour 12 months of the year. Hence, we need to get our music in new territories. As for the world, I hope the environment improves, and I just saw something about black focus schools in the paper the other day. I hope that doesn't go through because it's only more segregation which I feel is the root of racism. Stick to Black History Month, not changing the public education system.

Five Blank Pages, The Juntion, The Ghost is Dancing, The Vulcan Dub Squad
Saturday, February 2
The Horseshoe
370 Queen Street West
9pm, $8 at door

Call & Response is a series of Q&A's with artists from or playing in Toronto. Photo: David Waldman.