Pop, drop and roll

This year, Pop Montreal was, in short, fucking amazing. And I’m not just saying this because I think fondly of the people who run it. In fact, I was prepared to be underwhelmed as I usually am with most music festivals. In fact, on the whole, I kind of hate music festivals. As a reformed music journalist whose job it was to always be up on the next shit, most of my festival experiences have been a game of “Chase the buzz band.” Which means a lot of running around, scheduling and trying to catch what’s supposed to be “the next hot act” all the while thinking, “When can I leave this hot act to make sure I make it to the next-next hot act?” While it’s fun to think you’re on the bleeding edge of culture, pretty soon you realize that it’s an empty pursuit; the edge is constantly changing and chasing it won’t get you any closer to some great musical revelation. Ultimately, my experience ends up being watching a collection of haircuts posturing on stage. Boooooring!

No, this year I made it a point not to search for what was new and exciting and now, but what was real. Okay, I know the word “real” is about as overused and powerless as the word “revolution,” regurgitated to the point where it’s lost its meaning, but it’s really the only way to describe what I was looking for. This time, when I go to see a band I think, “I don’t care what blogs have their digital tongues on your taints, or about how cool and weird and rare your musical references are, I want to get the feeling that you’re really saying something. I want the feeling that you’re doing this not just because you love to do it, but that even if you were broke and destitute and were dying of some incurable disease you would still do it because you have to.”

I got what I asked for. This year’s festival had some moments of genuineness that truly impressed me. Spoken word pioneer and punk legend Lydia Lunch, for example, was real. While at some points I felt clobbered by her politics and wondered how much she was preaching to the converted by criticizing war and the current American regime in her pieces (saying you hate Bush to a room full of indie rockers is like going to a Black Panthers meeting and saying apartheid sucks), it was great to see someone so convicted, so raw, so convincing, so honest and with a vision that extended beyond her role as an artist and entertainer. One of my favourite moments came during the Q&A when someone asked, “Why are there still so few women in punk rock?” to which Lunch spryly replied, “Maybe they’re doing better things like being doctors or lawyers or architects.” Good point.

The Persuasions’ appearance at the Symposium was phenomenal. Not only were they extremely talented and impressive to hear, they exuded such warmth and positive energy that it was inspiring. For example, on the topic of cover songs, in the midst of explaining why Aretha Franklin was so great because she took other people’s songs and put her own special twist on them, they’d just break out into an a cappella version of “Mona Lisa” that not only demonstrated their point but enraptured the crowd. Then, when it was over, they’d be in the audience talking to people, and suddenly break out into song again. Then, even on the street as they waited for their ride to take them back to the hotel, again they sang. This was not a, “We’re here because we have to be” or a “We’re doing this to get paid,” rather “It’s who we are and what we do.”

But my whole experience wasn’t just about watching legends perform. There was some exciting new shit out there too. The second night of the Baltimore Round Robin party brought together several different acts on six different stages set up around the perimeter of the loft space Eastern Bloc. As one band finished a song, another would start across the room, and the sweaty hipster mass would migrate like a herd of ironically spectacled, black-and-white-striped-shirted, American-Apparel-legging-ed zebras. The combination of hyper energetic epic synth pop of Dan Deacon and the bratty hardcore of the Death Set were nicely counterpointed by moments of complete mayhem (a band with dayglo shark’s heads) and cringy awkwardness (painfully cheap spoken word) and sheer insanity (a fucked up clown doing a creepy modern dance in the middle of the room)—heck, there was even a birthday cake.

The best thing was, if you didn’t like the current act, who cares! Just wait one minute and there will be something different. I hereby proclaim this anything-goes psychedelic ADD freakshow the future of all loft parties

Riff-Raff@sympatico.ca