Larger than life

There was a Gatineau invasion at Bar Robo a week ago, with a melange of folk and indie music courtesy of Okies, Videoman and Outside I'm A Giant. The trio of Quebec-based bands isn't only unknown to me -as far as I can recall I haven't even seen any of the members play in other outfits. First up, Hull trio Okies (who are also playing Le Petit Chicago in their hometown tonight, and will be at Pressed Feb. 18). Here's some hollowbody action with singer Marc-Antoine!



Keyboard action with Sam!



More guitar!



Thomas mans the traps.



Oklahoman action!



Extra Thomas!



The whole lot!



Montreal quartet Videoman brought a lot of energy to the stage. Here's guitarist Mitch!



Gripping action with Pasquale!



More Mitch and Pasquale!



Bass action with Tom!



Costa hits!



A shouty bit!



Things took a folkier turn with Outside I'm A Giant; here's mainman Jeremi!



Violin action with Ursula!



Steel action with Remi!



More Jeremi!



Giant action!



Outside action!



A fine evening of lovely music and weird hotdogs.

Through the haze

I try to get to every edition of Switched On Synths, and since the Friday of the 13th Edition promised something a bit more experimental I was more intrigued than usual. Ottawa's Big River Dream took the stage first, with a visual assist from Flone.av. Here's one of my Instagram pics from the evening.



Projection action with Flone.av!



Dreamy action!



Then Flone.av added some audio to their visual.



Adjusting action!



And so on!



The shouty bit!



On to Me Float and Hazy Montagne Mystique, a pair of Jeunesse Cosmique labelmates who teamed up for an improv set.



Electronic action!



It was pretty dark on stage so I had to set my camera's ISO to "extra-grit."



Once again Flone.av provided some projection.



Hazy vocal action!



Floaty vocal action!



Sometimes a little more disjointed than I like my sounds, but pretty cool anyway.

Return of the heavy

Last Saturday I made another trip to House of Targ for some birthday celebrating. Targ co-owner and heavy music standby Paul "Yogi" Granger is another year older and he reunited with his old Tokyosexwhale bandmates for one more gig. Boom Creek did the opening honours - here's bassist Wayne (also of the No-Men and Four Frames).



Guitar action with Ian!



Adam (of BlackBread) hits!



Former Dead City Rebel Neil works the floor!



And so on!



Extra Ian!



Ian sings!



Unbuttoned action!



Singalong action!



Extra Adam!



The whole lot!



Stucco-scraping action!



Creeky action!



Public Animal also played a killer set; I think Ian Blurton's tone gets better every time I see hime play live. Here he is with Eric on bass!



Keyboard action with Caitlyn!



Ryan hits!



Caitlyn sings!



Extra Eric!



More Ryan!



And so on!



Look over there action!



Bearded action!



Even more Caitlyn!



Animal action!



It was cool to see Tokyosexwhale again after six years; Julia has moved to Toronto and is drawing up a storm, J.P. is drumming with Loviatar and Paul is of course helping to run the show at Targ and playing in BlackBread. Here he is working the frets with his old trio!



Bass action with Julia!



J.P. hits!



Extra Paul!



Julia sings!



And so on!



Rhythm section action!



Even more J.P.!



A great night for fans of heavy guitar music.