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Phew. Was worried you weren't going to mention Zeus for a second there.

Sloan was great at NXNE. definitely not phoning anything in. Depends on the gig I guess...

I won't be around to see any of them. Oh well. Gonna see some other sweet bands at Osheaga instead.

I haven't read anything about these three shows here so thought I'd post something. Tonight at Chamberfest Late Night - Creaking Tree String Quartet. 10:30 at Saint Brigid's Friday night at Chamberfest Late Night - Art of Time Ensemble Korngold: Source and Inspiration Danny Michel Martin Tielli John Southworth Present Korngold Suite for 2 Violins, Cello and Piano Left Hand, Op. 23 10:30 PM Saint Brigid's Centre for the Arts - Kildare Room Saturday night at the Black Sheep - Brad Barr is opening for 2 other acts.

There was a beer in the news over the weekend because it was packaged in roadkill or something gross like that. Look it up (then post it here)

Would love to, but got free osheaga passes so will have to wait another year. Wish they held it on a not-so-busy weekend. That Sloan rumour looks possible, they're in New Glasgow on Saturday....

When things go right (IE when things go normally, or when the safety systems of an aircraft and the training of the pilot work as expected) air shows can be great PR and recruitment devices. Crashes with injury are bad though. Obviously.

they were small portions - they were asked to provide 3 forkfuls, ended up being about 5 trips to the dish to finish each.

Why were you dealing with scalpers at Bluesfest?

Chromewaves is running a contest for tickets.....

they could have taken that ugly chick out of the top left

My awesome landlord is the CCOC properties all over town cheap and friendly

would this ruling be applicable to the G20 peeps since this decision happened after the detainment?

Old Ottawa South A fine place to settle down But I've since relocated To charming Centretown

if you want a roomie who's dreamy and hunky why not settle with kyla and the love machine gentlemonkey

A job, they say, can be hard to find Unless you're rimming Davey's behind

This rhyme made be laugh a lot Good luck finding a place to store your cot

Fire your booking agent.

Nice, I actually laughed out loud.

It's the Flag with a stealie and signatures. Or isn't it, Basher?

I bought one, $30

The Good: Roger Hodgson - I loved this whole set. Grew up on just as much Supertramp as Queen and the sound was awesome, his voice was super clear, and his band was tight. Great show. Andrew Bird - Didn't know if he'd have a band with him. He showed up solo and played a flawless show. So intricate and melodic. Furthur - Really good sound, really good setlist, really good performance. Weezer - So fun and tight. They have way too many bad songs, but at least they played them well and could coast til the next awesome song. Crazy to see that the former drummer is now the lead guitarist. Sweet chops on most of the solos, Four Horsemen (Metallica), Hot For Teacher (Van Halen), and the MGMT / Gaga encore was super fun. Never knew Rivers was such an engaging frontman. He was manic, all over the place. And a great surprise to find out that Bell and the bassist could hold their own singing lead too. Hollerado - These guys are the real deal. They’re semi-local but played the largest stage in the evening like they owned the place. Nice catchy poppy rock. Great stage presence, good sense of humour, and they invited the now-famous Dubé brothers on stage to sing Twist & Shout. Hollerado is only going to get bigger and better, good for them. Flaming Lips - The worst Flaming Lips show I’ve seen (out of 5 shows) but still a much better *show* than most other acts at Bluesfest. Setlist wasn’t great, and I was really drunk, but fun times, amazing visuals. Arcade Fire - Again, the worst Arcade Fire show I’ve seen (out of 5 shows) but still the new songs sounded great for the most part. They lost a bit of momentum with the new songs but still made up for it with enthusiasm. Crap sound where I was standing (midway between stage and soundboard. All bass, no treble). Old Crow Medicine Show - They made that stage their bitch. Such a great time, even if I’m not a dancing kind of fellow. My other festival favourites - Planet Smashers, John Butler Trio, Tusks, Woodhands Other good stuff - The beer! The sunsets! The sound at the Subway Stage! The friendly volunteers! The bike lock-up! The iPhone app! The security! The Not Great But Not Bad: Rush - Hey, I’ve seen Tom Sawyer live now. Sweet. Iron Maiden - I didn’t want to hear new songs. Sorry. Thanks for playing Fear of the Dark though, that was awesome. Levon Helm - Hey Levon, your hearing is still good right? Surely you can tell that your keyboard player can’t sing right? Kinda wish I had stayed away from this show and left my Band memories where they were - pristine and perfect on albums. The Bad: Black Sheep Comedy Tent - This was a brutal “addition†to the festival. Big ugly white tent on the spot where the best open-air shows had happened for the past few years. The sound inside was boomy and inconsistent. There was a screen and speakers set up outside the tent, which was fine if you wanted to sit back on the hill and watch TV, but by giving people this option it meant people didn’t have to go inside and get engaged in the show. So many great bands played to sparse crowds in this uninviting eyesore of a stage. Bring back the proven awesome Black Sheep Stage! Ditch the comedy! (Great musicians opening for comics at a music festival? Sure it's worked at other festivals, but it seemed insulting to have great talents open for ‘The Canadian Comedy Show’) Swell Season sound - They couldn’t hear themselves over the 3-prong attack of Ozomatli, Levon Helm and Rush. Surely someone is getting in shit at Bluesfest for this programming mistake. Islands / Woodhands promotion / scheduling - Not until the afternoon did Bluesfest (or anyone else) find out that the sometimes-great band Islands was playing at 6:30. Instead the schedule listed a band called Island (no s) playing at the same time as Woodhands, with the headliner going on at 8:15. At least Woodhands and the headliner (Marianas Trench) had good write-ups in the artist bio section of the Bluesfest website. There was no mention of Islands anywhere. I think Nick Thorburn was bummed about all this and that’s why his band’s show was so lacklustre. Another thing that ticked me off about this situation was that one day previous, the two headliners wanted to go on 15 minutes earlier. Press releases were issued, the CBC and Citizen (and maybe more) immediately got this information out to people. One day later a small Canadian indie band wasn’t even promoted, while the other two had their previously-scheduled timeslots corrected more than hours later from where they were scheduled previously. If it wasn’t for Twitter nobody would have known this before getting to the site. I’ll argue that a small indie band needs much more help attracting people to a stage than Santana. Whether it was Bluesfest not issuing any corrections that afternoon or if it was the media deciding that it didn’t matter, it still didn’t sit right. Or maybe it doesn’t matter at all. Woodhands played a wicked set and Marianas Trench were going to suck hard no matter when or where they played. Still felt bad for Islands.

Have you tried Zip.ca?

For the record nobody that I know at the fest was subject to any kind of search or shakedown inside the festival grounds. All the volunteers I talked to were super friendly. And the only negatives I can blame on Bluesfest Corp is the stupid tent and the sound bleed.

What access were you expecting Zero? Jesus. Stop whining.