Tuesday 11 March 2008

Snow it goes

Back from the weekend, and what a weekend it was - the snow was so bad by Saturday morning that we decided against driving to Montreal for our show at Club Lambi. Of course this was not an easy decision, and we hope to be out there soon to make up the date. Apologies to all involved.

Fortunately we were able to fill a local show's slot left empty by Montreal's Nymphets, who also decided against the trek. We played their slot at Wrongbar with Ugly Stick and Demon's Claws while they played ours at Lambi - I'd say that was a pretty fine solution to a lousy situation.

The shows were mostly notable to me for the difference they represented in terms of audience participation: our show in downtown Oshawa at the rather sketchy Atria was attended by a bunch of drunk kids out to have fun, and indeed there was audience involvement here such as I have never experienced before.

Special thanks to Al Cole for technical assistance.



By contrast, the last-minute show at the Wrongbar (Fort Polio's poster above) was playing to a big roomful of Queen West hipsters who stood about three metres from the stage and - except for a couple of brave shimmying ladies up front - didn't move at all. You can probably imagine which show was more fun to play. Nice room though.

Musical highlights included The Ancestors who I dug a great deal and who I would favourably compare to Stinking Lizaveta; and Ugly Stick, who No No Zero played our first show with, and who have almost totally transformed their sound, putting on a super set I was shocked and impressed by. I would also be remiss if I didn't mention that MOA were hilarious.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

The sound at Wrongbar is shit. The worst ever. The fact that people stood there had less to do with the crowd and more to do with the crappy sound. But then, Wrongbar is notorious for having bad sound for bands. NNZ was told about that very problem the night before, but decided to ignore that reality. So what can you expect?

Pius said...

I can only speak for myself but I didn't know about the possibility of our doing this show until about five hours before we played. Chris, Naz, and the soundman (whose name escapes me) were very nice and welcoming, and I can't say anything negative about the venue, myself.

People can stand still, dance, or lie on the floor or whatever. It's their choice, obviously. But it was a bummer, and it's hard to really rock out when you've got a roomful of people just staring back at you. Anyways, next Saturday will be quite different I hope.

Anonymous said...

The soundman gave the band a hard time when they set up. And then he had the balls to lecture one of the members of your band after they got off the stage. He lectured him like he was some little kid who's never plugged in a guitar. How can you say he was nice and welcoming?

You might have only known about the possibility of doing this show five hours before you had to play, but there was a discussion about how bad the sound at Wrongbar was just the night before. Your band went into it knowing the sound would suck, so that's your own fault. If you knowingly step in a pile of shit then chances are you're gonna stink.

Pius said...

One reason I'd say he was nice is that I spilled a beer on one of his cables before we played and he didn't freak out. But whatever, you seem to know a whole lot more about what was going on at the time than I did.