Skip to content

Tag: Bluesfest

Bluesfest Day 3: Arrested!

What a day of music!  Started at 6:00 at the main festival grounds for The Stills from Montreal.  I’ve only recently gotten into these guys, but really enjoyed their showing here.

Then we trekked across town to York Street for The Proclaimers who were great, but really I only know 2 songs of theirs, and they played them – so cool, I guess.  The big blowout performance of the day for me goes to Arrested Development.  What a blast – York Street was packed with people dancing their brains out.  This show made all the running around totally worth it!  I had a permanent smile on the whole show – the dancing, the singing, the rapping, the beats and the band, and what a party vibe it was!

Then we hiked back over to Lebreton for some Jackson Browne, and I scooted over to the Subway (you’ll always be The River Stage to me) Stage for a quick look at Steve Earle.  Both shows were great from what I saw, but really nothing at this point for me could even hold a candle to what had happened at York Street earlier.

That is until I hit Maverick’s at midnight for Peter Murphy!  I never really knew anything about this guy – other than he was with BauHaus, and had a track on the Pump Up The Volume (great movie!) soundtrack.  After a late start, due to some issues with the sound system which forced them to scale back the show a bit, Peter took the stage and had the audience wrapped around his finger for the hour and a half show.  That voice!  That sound!  The band was solid, and Peter’s vocal power and stage presence was just incredible.  I’m so glad to have gotten a chance to see him at such an intimate space.  Thanks to my good friend Jordan for the recommendation!

Only missed one show that I really wanted to see, DeVotchKa.  The timing just didn’t work out – still, not bad for the amount of running around we did.

Tonight will be pretty light in terms of schedule – Hey Rosetta! at 7pm and then one of the acts I’ve most been looking forward to, Matisyahu at 9:30!  I actually won two free tickets from Matis for tonight (I’m still blown away by the direct message from him over twitter!) – I’m so looking forward to this – I think I’m going to have to get right down front for a change!

Below is a video of Arrested Development performing their hit Mr. Wendall.  Sorry for the shakey camera – hey, you try taking video on a still camera with no image stabilization and a party as rockin’ as this going on all around you!

Bluesfest Day 2: Relentless!

Ben Harper blew us all away last night, and that’s just about all there is to say about Day 2.  Oh, except that Metric FUCKING ROCKED, proving that they deserved the upgrade to the bigger stage this year, and Holy Fuck was just, well, holy fuck they were good – I loved the garage sale of instuments they work with.

I’ve never seen Ben Harper play live before, and to be honest, I never really even knew much of his stuff. I’ve known OF him for years of course, and I know some of his songs, but I just never really spent much time with his music. Well, with last night as an introduction, that’s sure to change. What a great performer – he laid it all out for us, and the crowd loved him and he was so appreciative and obviously loving every minute up there. Highlight of my night was the cover of Queen’s Under Pressure, one of my favourite songs.

Emily Haines of Metric was in a super-chatty-good mood last night and was interacting a lot with the crowd. I only caught a bit of their show last year, but I think they benefited from the bigger stage and the bigger crowd due to the exposure from the recent release of their album, Fantasies. If nothing else (and there’s lots to love about the “church of” Metric live show), Emily is a lot of fun to watch, frolicking around the stage in an aerobic display of stage antics that takes the wind out of you just watching.

Missed a few things I’d hoped to see – I got down to the site a bit later than expected, so I didn’t get a chance to catch my friend Marie-Josee Houle, and there was just too much overlap of good shows to catch my other good friend Ana Miura, or Iron & Wine.  I also didn’t make it down to see RJD2 as I’d hoped – was just too tired and couldn’t find a companion to join me for the show and wasn’t feeling like drinking alone.

Tonight will be spent running back-and-forth between venues: The Stills at LeBreton, then The Proclaimers and Arrested Development at York Street, then back to LeBreton for DeVotchKa, Jackson Browne, and maybe a bit of Steve Earle and King Sunny Ade. Then if all goes well, back down to Mavericks for Peter Murphy. Phew!

Included below is a video of Ben Harper and Relentless7 playing an amazing cover of Queen’s Under Pressure – I know, the video is piss-poor quality and really shakey and has terrible sound, but well, that’s what you get.

Bluesfest Day 1: Aftermath

What a great kickoff to an amazing festival!  Had a blast last night.  Started out with Amanda Rheaume, a festival favourite, who kicked it off in style on the Rogers Stage, just as the sky cleared after a very short torential rain pour that threatened to dampen Day 1 (and caused some pretty nasty little mud pits to form – here’s hoping a couple of dry days will fix those up!)

Part way through her set, I did my usual first-day wander around the festival grounds to get a feel for things and orient myself to the slight variations in layout from last year – not much different, some porta-potties in different locations, a few different tents, a bit more food and some slight variations on the positioning of the Gold Circle areas and such.

Next up was Amos the Transparent, Ottawa natives who were happy to be home playing to a crowd that was happy to have them back.  I really enjoyed their set, though it highlighted an aspect of the annual Lawn Chair debate that is one of my biggest peeves about the whole situation:  the fact that a huge section right in front of the stage is filled up and blocked off by people who are not even fans of these guys, these people have just setup early to reserve their spots for Jeff Beck, causing a great big dead space right in front of the stage with no dancing or movement at all, with the band’s actual fans pushed back or to the side.  DAMN YOU LAWN CHAIRS!

Back over at the Rogers Stage, The Black Keys played big rockin’ crunchy guitar tunes to a lawn chair-less crowd that was happy to be shoulder-to-shoulder and bouncing around to their great big sound.  Definitely the highlight of the night for me, this two-piece (Drums and Guitar/Vocals) from Akron Ohio rock hard to pump out sound that would be impressive from a five-piece band.

Jeff Beck is definitely a guitar god, and there was some impressive wailing going on at the main stage last night, but to me this stuff is headphone music – endless guitar solos just don’t cut it for me.  So I took a tour over to the Black Sheep Stage and caught Sergent Garcia from Paris, who had the crowd literally jumping from front to back with their Cuban dance party vibe, a great end to the first night.

No pictures or videos from last night, since I realized right before I was leaving the house that the battery in my camera was dead.  I’ll try to do better the rest of the week, I promise.

Tonight, I’ve got a big old list of bands to see and a big old dilemma over whether or not to catch George Clinton down at York Street, whose show will overlap both Metric and Iron & Wine at the main festival grounds.  Think I’ll have to make a game-time decision once I get down there and see how I feel.

Bluesfest 2009: Day 1

Gonna be scrambling to see everything again this year (did you see my possibly impossible list?), and getting right to it on the first day!  Here’s the rundown of day 1 for me:

6:00pm – Amanda Rheaume
7:00pm – Amos the Transparent
8:00pm – The Black Keys
9:30pm – Jeff Beck

So I’ll just be running back and forth between the two main stages, which isn’t too bad…  There’s some other stuff I’d like to see at the smaller stages, like Monkey Junk, Eric Lindell, Tympanic… but there’s only so much I can do!  I know, I know, there’s some actual BLUES being played at the other stages that I really should see…  Actually, I’ve seen Amanda Rheaume before, so maybe I’ll take a run over to  the Subway “you’ll always be the River Stage to me” Stage for a bit.  We’ll see.  Hopefully the weather holds off for what promises to be an excellent kickoff to Bluesfest 2009 – see you at Lebreton!

Bluesfest: The Scourge of Lawnchairs

On this first day of Bluesfest 2009, which also happens to be the kickoff to the annual Bluesfest Lawn Chair debate, let’s get things started with Peter Simpson of The Big Beat’s take on the issue:

The Official Big Beat Position is that lawn chairs should be banned from Bluesfest. They are a menace. They’re boring for the performers, they take up too much room and too many lawn chair sitters have an inexplicable belief that they’re entitled to a clear view of the stage.

The festival is getting bigger all the time, and surely it’s now big enough that a lawn-chair ban could be sustained. If a few hundred people choose not to come because they can’t stand or sit on the ground, so be it. And perhaps there are ways to accommodate the small number of [People in Lawn Chairs] who are genuinely, medically unable to stand for long periods. There are tens of thousands of more people who are legion enough to make the festival a success without the sitting few.

Click through for the rest, including some anecdotes of incidents involving lawn chairs and the people in them. I’m with Peter on this on – lawn chairs have no business at a festival of this size. No other festival allows them. They’re a hassle, they take up too much space, and they’re potentially dangerous. And worst of all is the attitude that the people in the chairs bring with them. Hey man, lighten up – it’s a concert – get up and dance and leave the lawn chairs at home!

Bluesfest 2009: My Possibly Impossible List of Bands to see at Bluesfest

I’ve been working on my Bluesfest schedule, an annual act of futility since all bets are off once the festival is actually underway – between overlapping shows, meeting up with random people who have different priorities, and just plain exhaustion and/or drunkenness, it’s damn near impossible to catch everything you set out to during the fest.

This year’s addition of the Byward Blues shows in the Market area really throw a wrench into the works – I’d love to catch more of the shows down there, but when there’s stuff going on at both sites, I can’t imagine finding a way between them that would be convenient and quick enough.  Some of the late night shows will be good though – I’m glad that Thunderheist is doing a late show on July 12, since earlier in the day they’re scheduled against Girl Talk – a difficult choice I wasn’t looking forward to making.

Without further adieu, what follows is my Possibly Impossible List of Bands I want to see at Bluesfest 2009:

The Black Keys
Jeff Beck
Marie-Josee Houle
Holy Fuck
Ana Miura
Metric
George Clinton and Parliament
Iron & Wine
Ben Harper and Relentless7
RJD2
Graham Walsh (HOLY FUCK) DJ Set
The Stills
The Proclaimers
Sam Roberts Band
Arrested Development
DeVotchKa
Jackson Browne
United Steel Workers of Montreal
Hey Rosetta!
Lee Scratch Perry
Matisyahu
Land of Talk
King Khan & BBQ Show
Girl Talk
Neko Case
Thunderheist
Broken Social Scene
Joe Cocker
Los Lonely Boys
Thunderheist
Mistress Barbara
Kid Koala
Stone Temple Pilots
Ice Cube
Xavier Rudd
Spam Allstars
Arkells
Silent Disco
K’NAAN
KISS
Skydiggers
Shout Out Out Out Out
Busta Rhymes
LIVE
Mick Taylor
Styx
Les Claypool
CAKE
Hollerado
Ludacris
Drive-By Truckers
Lynyrd Skynyrd
Handsome Furs
The Dead Weather
Yeah Yeah Yeahs

Bluesfest – Days 5,6,7,8

Oh man, what a week… I’m so wrecked right now.  Been going out every night after Bluesfest and drinking until the wee hours, then getting up and dragging myself to work in the morning(ish).

So no time to write.  Or really do anything.  My poor dog is feeling neglected – we just celebrated an anniversary – I adopted her 11 years ago this week!  I’m gonna have to spend some serious time with her next week to make up…  My house is a mess – no time to clean – it’s getting pretty bad.  I’m sure my girlfriend is feeling a bit neglected too.  Or maybe she’s glad to have me out of the house and not bothering her.  Not sure – could go either way.

Anyway, been seeing lots of shows.  Here’s a quick rundown: on Monday I rushed down to catch The D’urbervilles at 6:00 – they were really great, but played a really short set – only 35 mins… so that was a bit disappointing.  Caught Matthew Good after – who was really great – I’ve never seen him live but been meaning to for a while.  The headliner for the night was James Taylor, who I wasn’t sure how much I was going to care about, and when he started out I was worried it was going to be a bit of a snorefest, but once the show got rolling I ended up really enjoying it.

Tuesday I caught The Most Serene Republic – who I’d never heard of before, but I bumped into some friends when I got there and one of them said they were good so we checked them out – and they didn’t disappoint.

The plan for the rest of the evening involved trying to catch three acts who were playing on three stages at the same time – Tokyo Police Club, Michael Franti & Spearhead and Stars.  We started at The Black Sheep Stage for Tokyo Police Club – who were great – and after a half hour we headed over to The Roots Stage for Michael Franti.

And holy cow – what an incredible show they put on – the crowd was so enthusiastic and Michael Franti had us all in the palm of his hand – everyone was jumping around and dancing and having a great time.  We quickly forgot about the rest of our plan and stayed at Roots for most of the performance.

We did eventually make it over to The River stage for the last two songs of Stars, who were great – but a much mellower performance and we kinda felt like we were missing out on the craziness back at Roots so as soon as Stars wrapped up we managed to rush back and catch another song of Franti who were going overtime.

Wednesday I arrived a little early and caught a bit of JW Jones Band while enjoying my dinner and a beverage and waiting for some of the gang to show up.  I met up with the gang over at The Black Sheep stage for Hayden who we enjoyed while sitting in the grass half-listening-half-chatting.

At 9:00 I really wanted to check out Kid Beyond inside the theatre in the war museum – but nobody else seemed all that interested so I went in by myself intending to just catch a half our or so and then head out for the 9:30 shows.  Kid B’s performance blew my mind – I ended up staying for the whole show – it was really an incredible experience and I was glad I made it out.

I caught up with everyone else over at The Roots stage for CALEXICO who were great – but the next highlight of the evening was a total surprise – one of our group had walked over to Black Sheep stage to use the bathrooms and texted the rest of us that the music was really good over there.  Sure enough, Grupo Fantasma were just about the most fun we’d had all week.  When they wrapped up at 11:00 the audience cheered and chanted their name for 10-15 minutes after.  You could tell they really regretted that they couldn’t do an encore – damn Ottawa City ByLaws!

Thursday night I found out that Kid Beyond was playing again at The River stage so I told everyone they should check him out.  Unfortunately his performance didn’t transfer well to the outdoor stage – it was a totally different feeling and kind of a bit disappointing.  Too bad – the indoor venue was just so much better for what he was doing.  The Black Crowes were the headliners and they just put on such an incredible show – only disappointment was that they didn’t play two of their biggest songs:  Hard To Handle and She Talks To Angels.  Thought they may have been saving them for an encore, but they played right till 11:00 and didn’t get to do one.  Oh well, the whole show rocked so the songs weren’t terribly missed – just noted.

Finally the weekend is here – no more having to get up for work the next day.  Tonight I’m really looking forward to Metric.  I can’t believe there’s only a few nights left – and I have to take Saturday off because of a stupid DJ gig… oh well – I’ll be out on Sunday for Disco night to send the week out with a bang.

Bluesfest – Days 2,3,4

Holy crap I’m tired.  and sore.  4 days of walking/standing/dancing is starting to take its toll.  Also the weather has been phenomenal, but the sun gets hard to take after a while.  Gotta remember to drink more water and less beer.  Less beer for sure – Bluesfest is not going to be good for my summer physique.

Highlights so far:  The Wailers last night were amazing.  Snoop Dogg was a blast.  Infected Mushroom definitely did not help with the noise complaint issues.  Ladytron was great (and loud) as well.  I wish I would have spent more time at Zappa, but they were on at the same time as Steely Dan and it was a tough decision so I just followed the crowd.

Spent most of Lucinda Williams’ set sitting near the merch tent and eating/drinking – but from what I caught, she seemed to put on a good show.

Caught a few songs towards the end of Les Breastfeeders set – great name – and they were definitely rocking.

Unfortunately Feist was kinda boring – I had heard good things about her live performances, but I suppose she’d do better in a more intimate environment.

Been trying to spend bits of time at the smaller stages watching bands I haven’t heard of just for the bluesville experience of it and have been having limited success – I keep getting caught up hanging out with friends and eating/drinking.  Gotta spend more time with the music!

Sadly missed:  I really wish I could have caught The Weakerthans who were on at the same time as The Wailers.  Also would have liked to see more of Widespread Panic – also on at the same time as The Wailers – though I did see their big finale which was impressive.

Lots of great stuff left to see – tonight I’m hoping to make it in time to catch The D’urbervilles, then the big acts are Matthew Good and James Taylor.

Will try to get pictures and vids up soon.