by JOHNSON CUMMINS

Now that we are officially cruising into the beginnings of summer, that can only mean one thing: it’s festival season. Probably the most important festival of the year finally sets down stakes in our jaunty little city, and I for one am splitting at the seams about it. That’s right, my furry friends, le Festival du Homard is finally upon us. The traps of our fisherman to the East are spilling over with these delicious crustacean-critters, so get your bib on and butter melted, and get ready to crack open those claws and dig into those succulent tails.

Unfortunately, this is supposed to be a “rock column,” so the powers that rest high up on the Mirror masthead have forced me to dedicate the better part of this column to the second-best festival in the city. Suoni Per Il Popolo is happening from June 1 to 25 at la Sala Rossa and Casa del Popolo. You can expect the best in free jazz, noise, electronica, psychedelia, musique actuelle and spoken word, all falling under the umbrella term that the Suoni peeps cooked up: “liberation music.” For three weeks out of the year, we’re going to be overrun with Arthur magazine-reading, blogaholic, thrift-store-shopping college-radio programmers from exotic locales like Champaign, Illinois, so get out there and have some laughs.

On Friday night, June 2, head over to la Sala and check out the Wharton Tiers Ensemble with the amazing Man Man from Philadelphia and Hogtown’s Creeping Nobodies. Tiers has produced some of underground music’s shining lights, including Sonic Youth, and moves away from the mixing board to get behind the drums while bringing five guitarists along (take that, Blue Öyster Cult!). Man Man’s oddball freakout may prove to upstage Tiers, though, as their performance at last year’s Pop Montreal was one of the highlights of that festival.

Sunday is a must for all the psych-heads out there, when Chicago’s Plastic Crimewave Sound meets the high-energy psych of Residual Echoes and Mammatus at Casa. On Tuesday, space is the place when the real heavyweight of the festival, the Sun Ra Arkestra, bring the joyful noise to la Sala. Since the mighty Sun Ra ascended to another planet in 1993, the band has been under the direction of alto-sax player Marshall Allen, and this show could be a once in a lifetime event. On Wednesday at 1 p.m., the Arkestra will conduct a workshop on improv music at la Sala, and best of all, it’s free. How fucking cool is that?!

Now, if you’re not one to repair ripped clothing with gaffer tape or wear army-surplus boots, and don’t necessarily find Nietzsche to be so peachy, you can skip Suoni and check out these gigs. Priestess plays Café Campus tonight with Fake Blood and Jesus and the Headliners. Ex-Chino and Fidget outfit Loadeded play at the smoke-free Barfly with Crackpot on Saturday. On Sunday, you can bug out with King Khan & the Shrines, the Adam Brown and Bloodshot Bill at le National. Tuesday, CPC Gangbangs play on the sixth day of the sixth month on the sixth year of our millennium at Théâtre Ste-Catherine. Hint: look out for flying knives!

HAPPY B-DAY, NICK THE PRICK… YA DOUCHE! jonathan.cummins@gmail.com

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