Indie Week Day 2

Matt Blais at Monarch’s Pub

Matt Blais

Day 2 of Indie Week began with a visit to Monarch’s Pub to check out Matt Blais who we’d chatted with the night before at Cherry Cola’s. We did an Emerging Artist profile with Blais recently which you can read here. Blais is a pop singer/songwriter heavily influenced by Springsteen.

Little Foot Long Foot at Cherry Colas

LFLF is a T-Mak World favourite and we see as many of their shows as we can catch. Heavy and bluesy, led by the powerful vocals and guitar of Joan Smith and the thunderous drums of Isaac Klein, Little Foot is one of the premier bands in the city.  LFLF won a prize of studio time at Iguana Studios for their set on Friday. Of the many shows we’ve seen, it was one of their best.

Frankie McQueen at Hideout

Frankie McQueen was one of the two great discoveries of Indie Week. The Calgary based power trio plays heavy blues rock. The band is Scotty Charles on vocals and guitar, Corey Adams on bass and Connor Muth on drums. As well as some great original songs, they played an extended jam version of The Black Keys’ I’ve Got Mine that killed. Here’s a video for Drown the Sound when they were a four piece below. Check it out!!

After Frankie McQueen was Lumberjunk at the Rivoli and caught the end of Angela Saini’s set.

LumberJunk at Rivoli

We love LumberJunk. We first caught them last year at the Horseshoe by accident when In My Coma’s show was delayed and have now seen them a few times since.  It’s soulful bluesy rock and roll played by exceptional musicians.

Open Air at Hideout

The other great find of Indie Week 2013 was Open Air from Calgary. Open Air first entered our consciousness back in early July when they played a series of shows with One Bad Son in Alberta and One Bad Son tweeted about it. Using the logic that anyone who plays a show with One Bad Son has the potential to be a band that we’d want to know about, we looked up Open Air and found their video for Snake Charmer. They were officially on our radar ever since. So while Open Air was a great discovery, it wasn’t totally unexpected and they were definitely on our pre-Indie Week Recommendation list for a reason. Open Air’s friends Frankie McQueen were fantastic and we’d love to see them every time they get back to the area and they get a very strong Honourable Mention, but the Gig of this Night has to be Open Air. Highlight of the set was their song Sirens which still hasn’t been recorded. Guys, that needs to change!! Get in the studio and get that song out, even as a demo. A video of Sirens will be part of Day 3 coverage.

Open Air is frontman Steven Mansfield on lead vocals, Garrett Greenhall on lead guitar, Steve Lilley on guitar and keyboards, Tyler Bourne on bass and Josh Hearnden on drums. Great guys all, as we got the chance to find out later. The music is classic 70’s styled blues rock. Page, Hendrix, Holiday, Iommi, Blackmore, take your pick, it’s all in there. Really strong original songs, great riffs and scorching guitar solos.  These guys have a VERY bright future. Check out their song Preacher Man and the video for Snake Charmer below.

 Snake Charmer

We went back to Cage 292 to see Blackdog Ballroom but they were running very later and the band ahead of them was just going on. We decided instead to call it a night and will try to catch Blackdog Ballroom again on November 9th at Cherry Colas. Blackdog Ballroom played Lee’s Palace previously and you can read about that show here.

Gig of the Night – Open Air

By Steve Mallinson

Author: Steve Mallinson