Music For The People

I headed to a couple of outdoors music festival on the week-end. On Saturday, after visiting Fort York, I headed north-west to the Junction Music Festival. The west-side of Dundas and Keele was blocked off for the main stage, leading to traffic snarl. But the east-side remained open with the smaller stages cordoned off on side streets.

I stopped at the "Pacific Avenue" stage around 2:30 p.m. to see The Two Koreas. The lead singer noted that this was the 2nd time in a decade that they've played in the sunshine. Certainly, their relentless punchy punk-pop would be more natural in some dark venue. Their audience for today included the youngish indie kids (the stage was sponsored by Wavelength) and the well-heeled mommy-and-me set. But given the neighbourly recognition for the band members (and their respective ages and growing waistlines), The Two Koreas wouldn't be too of out-of-place in the gentrified area. But they still played with fun and energy. No moshing from the crowd though, even if the singer did jump off the stage for the last song.

Meanwhile, Christie Pits Park was hosting the 3rd Bloor-Ossington Folk Festival. However, this didn't necessarily translate to roots and hippie music; the organizers meant folk in the sense of people. The festival has grown with arts and crafts vendors, a food station, and a beer tent and garden. The sky was threatening when duo AroarA came on at 7:30 pm. Though their drum machine and guitars may be too noisy for "folk music", the poetical lyrics taken from Alice Notley's In The Pines had lyricism and power. Their set was cut short when intense rain came down. Though some people stayed and encouraged them, with water falling on the equipment, Ariel Engle stopped half-way through #14 ("I was born to be a poet") and exclaimed: "I love to play music, guys, but I don't want to be electrocuted."

I returned on Sunday for Fiver and Julie Doiron and the Wrong Guys (members of Cancer Bat). With more rain coming, the performances were moved into the beer tent. But as it was composed of several canopies placed next to each other, the rain still poured down through the gaps to soak the ground. The damp atmosphere was perfect for Simone Schmidt's (Fiver) quiet story-telling (Oh Sienna, The Undertaker). Unless she was pulling our leg with her dead-pan intros, the latter must be the only known folk song about a WWE wrestler. It was getting too packed and wet so I left before Julie Doiron came on.