NXNE (North By Northeast) 2012 – Final Event Review

5 days. 4 Movie Reviews, 16 Band Interviews, 30 articles, 51 bands reviewed. Can you beat that?

June 20 2012 – North By Northeast (NXNE) 2012 offered Toronto 5 days of glorious music. We had a wonderful ride and although our coverage focused strictly on rock music and movies we discovered some new excellent music during our journeys at NXNE. Here is a recap of all our activities and our closing thoughts.

We started our coverage by announcing the big headliner for NXNE 2012 The Flaming Lips. We then asked our Senior Editor, Steve, to weed through the hundred of band bios and come up with a suggested list of bands to watch. Mix a bit of luck, randomness, and having Steve like the song the band had on their bio yielded our T-MAK World  preview article with a handy .pdf document of who to watch on each day and each time slot. On that article we also identified our 5 “must-see shows” of the festival (they were Filligar, Bella Clava, Little Foot Long Foot, TimeGiant and The Blue Stones).

Steve Hill at NXNE 2012

When all was said and done we had seen a total of 51 bands/artists and broke down all of them on our daily recap articles:

Wed. June 13 Concert Recap  we saw The Parkdale Hookers, Wise Young & King, July Talk, Vorasek, Avery Island, Steve Hill, The Aves, The Balconies, Ponctuation, Bella Clava, The One Look Donnybrook, Rabid Whole, The Scarlet Fever

Thu. June 14 Concert Recap we saw Always, Beliefs, The Black Owls, Boxer The Horse, Champion Lover, Cousins, Decent Lovers, Elk, Gloryhound, Grounders, Jane’s Party, The Cunninghams, The Dead Ships, The Lad Classic

Fri. June 15 Concert Recap we saw Bella Clava, Cousin, Darlings Of Chelsea, TimeGiant, Sumo Cyco, The Blue Stones, 1st You Get The Sugar, Ill Scarlett, Secret Broadcast, The Boxing Lesson

Sat. June 16 Concert Recap we saw A Primitive Evolution, Ain’t No Love, Black Wing Halo, Fast Romantics, Little Foot Long Foot, Mad Ones, Poor Young Things, Sara Johnston, Yukon Blonde, Platinum Blonde, Shawn Brady, Holly McNarland 

The Balconies at NXNE 2012

We also interviewed 16 bands as part of our ongoing Emerging Artist Spotlight series.We found 15 fantastic rock bands and even talked to 1 hip-hop/reggae artist (Derrick Ashong). Here is the full list of our interviews:

Terry (editor in chief) – We produced 30 articles saw 51 bands in 4 days – what more can a music lover want (aside from a Pink Floyd reunion tour). Memorable sets include Wise, Young & King, Vorasek, The Blue Stones, The Boxing Lesson, The Black Owls, The Darlings of Chelsea, and an epic set from Toronto’s next big hard rock band TimeGiant who also blew us away at Canada Music Week 2012. TimeGiant is winner of T-Mak World’s BEST GIG OF NXNE 2012. Congratulations guys.

The venue that I enjoyed being at the most was The Hideout, so kudos to that location for its good vibe, excellent bands, and lovely staff. I personally want to thank Damien Nelson, Julie MacFarlane and Jill Angelstad from Flip Publicity for enabling us to cover this amazing event, and we look forward to being Toronto’s one stop shop for Rock at NXNE 2013. Those three ladies are among the best PR managers I have ever dealt with. Finally I want to thank my partners in crime Steve Mallinson and John Dash for putting in countless hours at NXNE and sharing my vision of making T-Mak World Toronto’s best rock blog. We did it boys!