I’m sitting in Twiggs coffee shop in North Bay. Across the
street is an LCBO where three cop cruisers just rolled up to hassle a drunk
dude staggering around the sidewalk. It’s raining. I’m looking down at my right
wrist, which is covered in blue, red, green and black stamps from the shows I
went to see yesterday at FME. I wish I was back in Rouyn-Noranda.
On Friday, after a continental breakfast at the DevilleMotel, I received an e-mail notification about a pool party with free chips and
beer hosted by Bonsound that was running until 5. I didn’t know what Bonsound
was, but I do know a great deal about
free chips and beer. I had a look at the attached map and it seemed pretty far
away from my hotel. Luckily, the fella they had me sharing a room with, Colin Medley, returned to the room at that moment to tell me he had just gone for a
ride using a bike from a rental service within a 5 minute walk from our hotel.
I walked down, grabbed my free bike, and started pedaling
furiously. As it turns out the location of the party was right around the
corner from the bike rental place. After three years of driving a taxi, you’d
think I’d be able to read a goddamn map.
From now on, for any trip I go on, the first thing I’m
packing is a bathing suit. I’ve been caught without swim trunks too many times
when the opportunity to swim arises.
The house Bonsound rented for the party was right on the
lake (apparently you can swim in the
lake, you’re just not supposed to touch the bottom). It had a colourful
treehouse and a kidney-shaped pool in the backyard. Inside, the fridge was full
of beer with another cooler of beer outside. Beer everywhere.
Most of the attendees were media and industry types, but the
party lacked the forced atmosphere of typical industry mixers. It was a casual
way to meet people and talk about my favourite subject: myself.
Due to my lack of swimsuit, I was uncertain about whether or
not to jump in the pool. With some words of encouragement from Maude Charest
(FME’s anglo media liaison), I stripped down to my underwear and executed a
perfect cannonball. Maude said if the pool was bigger, she’d challenge me to a
race. I said we could have a breath-holding competition instead. It never
materialized; I think real recognized real and we both understood the potential
for drowning with such competitive spirits involved. I swam around for a bit
then I made my way down to the dock and smoked a joint with a bunch of music media and label people.
Just as I was planning on leaving to return the bike I had
borrowed, the organizers brought out a ton of poutine from Chez Morasse. Great
timing, but Chez Morasse is an inescapable presence at FME. It seems there are
literally no other restaurants in Rouyn-Noranda. If I was staying in town for
the rest of the weekend, it would make more financial and logistical sense to
just rent a room next to the grill.
As I stood over the poutine, loading up my plate with
forkful after forkful, one of the organizers of the party was looking at me
with an expression of mild annoyance. “Don’t judge me bro,” I told him, my
plate overflowing with poutine.
The first band I went to see was Bernhari at Cabaret de la Dernière Chance. The guitar player from Jimmy Hunt’s band, whose playing I had
enjoyed so much on Thursday, also plays in Bernhari. Félix informed me produced
both Hunt’s and Bernhari’s albums. He then informed me that he had just taken
MDMA for the first time.
They sounded fantastic; I could hear all the instruments,
and despite the fact that the band had some very loud passages in their music mixed
with extremely soft vocals, there were no feedback issues and the vocals were
clear and audible the entire time. Their music kind of set the tone for the
evening for me, as pretty much every band I watched had a strong element of post
rock running through it.
After that, it was off to le Petit Théatre Du Vieux Noranda
to catch sludge-rock band Les Indiens. Yet another beautiful venue! I can’t
recall any of the specific decorative flourishes, but this space was large,
clean, sleek and modern-looking on the inside. Before Les Indiens started,
there was a projector set up that showed a video of clips edited together from
Thursday night. The Shoeclack guys were pretty impressed with the rapidity and
quality of the edit.
As far as Les Indiens’ set goes, I felt moved to make my way
up to the front of the stage during their first song and pump my fist for a bit
as the guitarist and bassist locked into a riff and hoisted their guitars to
the sky. I kind of lost interest a bit after that though, as I didn’t like the
sounds their keyboardist was using and I found the lead singer’s vocals to be
lacking in both power and virtuosity. A few other Sudburians were feeling the
same way I think, so we took a walk over to Andrew Knapp’s van to let Momo out
for a bit.
As we hung out there, Max and Ashlyne showed up and I tried
to rally people to get food. No one else was hungry, but Ashlyne mentioned that
there was a sign up the street that said “Hot Dogs Gratuit”, and had an address
underneath it. Naturally, I had to check it out.
I started walking down what I thought was the street where
the hot dogs were, but after about five minutes I got a feeling I was going in
the wrong direction. I passed a couple of thirtysomething ladies parking their
car and asked them if they knew where the free hot dogs were? They thought
maybe I was mistaken because their friend had been walking around with a sign
offering free hugs earlier.
“Lady,” I said, “I think I know the difference between a hot
dog and a hug.”
As it turns out, they were locals and they were kind enough
to stand there and answer some of my questions about the town’s history and why
it has so many amazing music venues despite the fact that the population is
only 50,000 (supporting the arts is a big part of life there). We started
walking back to where I had seen the “Hot Dogs Gratuit” sign and sure enough it
was real. They gave me directions to the address, and decided not to accompany
me as they had a concert to attend. For my part, seeking out free hot dogs
seemed the most worthy use of my time.
Turns out nothing is really far away in Rouyn-Noranda. After
about two minutes of walking, I found the location of the free hot dogs, which
were being served in front of an old church. A young man came up and shook my
hand, mentioning the free hot dogs and pop. I responded, “I know all about the
hot dogs man; that’s the whole reason I’m here.”
“How many hot dogs would you like? One, Two?”
Usually at these sorts of things it’s a one hot dog max
scenario, so I was pretty surprised. “I can have two?” The guy responded, “You
can have three if you want man.” I thought about it for a moment, “Tell you
what, if I eat two and want more, maybe I’ll get a third. I can’t just stand
here eating hot dogs all night.” (Even though I could totally stand in one place and eat hot dogs all night).
While waiting for my hot dogs, I figured I’d make a little
small talk. “So, what’s going on in here tonight?”
“What do you mean?” said the young man, handing me a red
Solo cup ¼ full of Pepsi.
“Like, is there a show in here or something?”
“Well,” he said, “there’s no show but we are spreading the
word of God if you have a minute to listen.”
Now, it takes a lot of balls to proselytize to someone
wearing a tank top with flamingoes and palm trees on it and a half-empty can of
Boréal Rousse sticking out of the chest pocket of his jean jacket. I glanced over at
the grill. It wouldn’t be long before the hot dogs were done.
His friends looked nervous, “You don’t need to talk about
this stuff; you can just have a hot dog,” but, the kid who gave me the Pepsi
was already off and running, “Do you believe in God?” “Would you consider
yourself a good person?” “Have you ever lied?” “Have you ever stolen?” “Have
you ever looked at a woman with lust in your heart?”
I didn’t really know what to do; the first two questions
weren’t as cut and dried as he was making them out to be, but I wanted to speed
things along so I could get my hot dogs. So, I answered both in the
affirmative, thinking that if I could somehow convince him I was already a
Christian, maybe he would leave me alone and I could get my hot dogs and go. I
told him I was raised Roman Catholic, that I went to catholic school, and that
I was confirmed. None of this dissuaded him in any way from continuing on with
his message.
My food came off the grill, and I felt like I was engaged in
some bizarre race to see whether he could finish his thoughts on sin and God’s
infinite capacity for forgiveness before I was done stuffing my fat face.
Clearly he didn’t know who he was dealing with.
As he told me about how we are all evil in God’s eyes
because many of our actions are in direct contravention of the rules set forth
in the Ten Commandments, I was gazing philosophically over his left shoulder
while eating half a hot dog in each bite.
Even if he had left a spot in the conversation open for me
to respond, there was no way I possibly could, as my mouth was too full, so I
just grunted while he preached.
After about two minutes, I finished chewing just in time to
catch him taking a breath and said, “mister, your thoughts and mine are so
diametrically opposed that there’s no possible way we’ll ever see eye to eye on
these matters. Thank you very much for the hot dogs.”
I then turned and walked away to catch the Feather back at
Agora Des Arts (the church that had been converted into a music venue). One
neat decorative touch at Agora that I forgot to mention in yesterday’s entry is
that there were unraveled cassette tapes hanging from the ceiling everywhere in
the converted church, and the FME sign behind the stage was made out of
cassette tapes as well. THIS is my kind of church.
The Feather were a very disciplined 6-piece band. They
incorporated odd time signatures and polyrhythm into their sound, which was
very melodic and consonant, but interspersed with occasional moments of
heaviness and subtle dissonance. They had two guitars, keyboards, bass, drums
and a vibraphone. They were the first band I saw that sang in English, which is
odd because they reminded me of a darker version of one of the only franco
bands I’m familiar with: Tricot Machine.
After that, I went outside to catch a breather and met up
with Félix, who since I had last spoken to him, had taken another hit of M.
“I’m not tripping, but I really need to find Andrew…I mean, I’m not freaking
out, but I’d feel a lot better if I had my buddy here.” So, I went off to find
Andrew, who was hanging out with Maxshlyne & sent him back to calm Félix
down. I didn’t see the two of them apart from each other for the remainder of
the night.
After that, I saw my favourite band of my time at FME:
Fontarabie. They were a 9 piece band featuring three guitars, bass, drums, two
keyboardists, and a utility man who played trombone, trumpet, vibraphone and
aux percussion. Their arrangements were highly nuanced, with many passages
using volume-swelled electric guitars in the same way strings would typically
be used in an orchestra. The depth of instrumental interplay, counterpoint, and
heavy use of dynamic shifts in the songs made for an exiting performance, and I
honestly could have watched them play for another hour even though their set
was already over an hour long. I also had finagled a pretty dope seat and was
enjoying the respite from standing, but regardless, it’s pretty rare nowadays
to see a rock band both this ambitious and meticulous.
Feeling pretty sure that I wouldn’t top that experience, I
briefly contemplated going back the hotel and calling it an early night since I
had to catch a 9AM bus to North Bay. However, my words to Christian from
Thursday began to echo in my head, “Tomorrow night, I will party like an
animal…”
So, I made my way down to the Paramount, where Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra were performing. The Paramount is an old movie
theatre that has been converted into a concert and performance space. Inside,
it still has the gilding and flowing crimson curtains that I recall from the
movie theatres of my youth.
I spotted photographer Graeme Phillips, whom I had met
earlier at the Bonsound party, near the front of the stage along with my
roommate Colin, and went down to say hey. I wondered aloud why more people
weren’t standing up near the front. My question was answered immediately upon
the start of their set, when the guitar player’s amp nearly rendered me deaf.
I made my way back toward the sound booth and watched the
rest of the show from there, where the volume was more manageable and the mix
less guitar-heavy. I have a predisposition to prefer bands where I can pick out
the individual parts of their performances, which is not at all the point of a
lot of Mt. Zion’s material as far as I could tell. I did enjoy the sheer sonic
force of the band, but found myself frustrated by the fact that I couldn’t tell
what each player was doing. I also couldn’t help feeling like there were
melodies I was supposed to be hearing that I wasn’t.
At some point, I spotted Peter Zwarich and Lara Bradley near
the front and went down and greeted them. They had just got to town and were
heading over to see the Vibrators. I was trying to casually flirt with some
girl so I stayed behind for a bit, but it’s pretty hard to chat up a broad when
all the sonic space in the room is pretty much occupied.
The Vibrators were back at Cabaret La Dernière Chance. They
were the last band of the night, and the last band I saw at FME. Their
singer/bassist seemed to know just how to stand so the shadows would menacingly
highlight his weathered and gaunt face. He was genuinely scary for a minute.
They had a healthy mix of bouncy hooks and heavier, more
plodding fare. It gave the audience an opportunity to both mosh and dance.
Things almost got out of control for a bit as I spotted two young bucks pushing
each other aggressively. I stepped in and separated them before they could mix
it up and yelled “Fuckin’ Stop!” I was a foot taller than both of them so they
actually did fuckin stop. During the Vibrators’ encore (which pushed the end of
the show to 3:30 AM), I felt compelled to get in there and dance during the
Vibrators’ encore as the girl I was standing beside was beset by a couple of
meatheads, one of whom decided he wanted to stand in the exact spot where I was
already standing. Women are few and far between at a punk show.
I wrapped up my night wandering around Rouyn-Noranda with
Félix, Andrew and Momo. We eventually made our way back around to Chez Morasse,
which is apparently the nexus of every route in the entire goddamn town, and
parted ways from there. When I eventually did make it back to my hotel and set
my alarm for 8AM, the clock on my phone read 6AM.
As I sit here in this coffee shop in North Bay, this all
seems like it transpired last week, not last night. This whole summer has been
filled with amazing experiences and honestly I just don’t want it to end. But,
if the summer truly must end, FME is
a great way to cap it off. If you are a music fan, or simply a fan of cool
things, there’s no cooler place or better place to catch interesting music than
FME.
