Hot property

by JOHNSON CUMMINS

One of the worst trends to happen in the Montreal music scene in the past year is the loss of great venues due to noise complaints, or just plain greedy landlords. With eyes constantly on punk rock co-op club Katacombes, the owners have to keep their Is dotted and Ts crossed at all times. Following last year’s spring cleaning of the lower Main, Katacombes’ largely punk clientele is still considered an eyesore in the increasingly tourist-friendly pocket of real estate.

Meanwhile, the Main Hall’s uncertain future as a live venue is still tangled up in a pile of bureaucratic red tape, and the space is largely laying dormant despite the overwhelming support of most of its immediate Mile-End neighbours.

The latest venue to get cut off at the knees after mere months of existence is art/live music/party space lab.synthèse, the management of which was forced to cancel shows last week, including the Istvan Kantor performance. Future shows will not be held at its current digs, but plans have already begun to look for a new, permanent venue to hold shows, parties, exhibitions, spoken-word performances and so forth. Good luck is sent out to the fine folks at lab.synthèse.

On a happier note, one of the venues that is still going strong and just three weeks shy of celebrating its eighth anniversary is rock ’n’ roll hotspot l’Escogriffe. With some of the best booking in Montreal, l’Esco’s success could be attributed to their passion and the audacity to go against the trends by providing a stage, albeit a tiny one, for some of the best garage, underground rock ’n’ roll and punk rock this city has to offer. At the tail end of their seventh year, you can check out Bloodshot Bill and the Bootlegs’ efforts with Slim Sandy on Saturday night. On Wednesday, head down to l’Esco to check out one of Montreal’s swampiest and most demented bands, Demon’s Claws.

On Friday night, the big show is of course the return of psych warlords Black Mountain at la Sala Rossa with Bon Iver. Ticket holders are strongly urged to show up early and check out the Echoplex-laden psych of Toronto’s Quest for Fire, who blew people away at last year’s Pop Montreal. No real surprise, considering this all-star band features members from No No Zero, the Deadly Snakes and Cursed. If you weren’t able to squeeze into the Black Mountain show, you can check out Quest for Fire on Saturday night at Blackdot.

A definite do-not-miss would be, for my money, America’s best living songwriter, Steve Earle, with Allison Moorer at Théâtre Outremont on Saturday night. Memories of Earle’s 2005 show at Club Soda can still give my goosebumps a good workout.

Further amazing big-name news that may or may not deserve a blurb in a punk rock column is a rare gig from Kiss’s Ace Frehley on Monday night at Metropolis. Being a full-fledged member of the Kiss Army, I’ll be there with bells on, and if Ace can just stand up for the entire hour, I’ll be happy.

SHOCK ME—PUT ON YOUR BLACK LEATHER…JONATHAN.CUMMINS@GMAIL.COM