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  • Review: Montreal + Osheaga

    (photo taken by the Dentyne Gum crew who snapped our photo and then gave us a card indicating where we can download it from. Cool!)

    So after we packed the car up, we headed for Montreal. Let it be noted that in the future, if I arrange to pick up Vero from home, and then double back to pick up Carrie at the Schwarma Palace on Rideau Street, I should use my head beforehand and realize that Vero’s office of work (which she just walked 20 minutes from) is RIGHT NEXT TO THE SCHWARMA PALACE!!! Vero was not impressed that he had to bust her ass all the way home for me to drive back to her office.

    After munching on an excellent schwarma, we hit the road, stopped to grab some beer (hey did you know Rickard’s has a wheat beer called Rickard’s White? It’s delish.) and kept moving.

    Lucky for me, I thought about checking out craigslist.com to find some tickets to the Osheaga Festival instead of paying the $95 from the ticket booth. Sure enough, I found a guy selling his tickets at $50 a pop. BONUS!

    We couldn’t get in touch with him on the phone so I headed to his pad. I knocked, I rang the doorbell, I did that again and no answer. Dang it, he must have sold the tickets on me! However, my patience won out and the guy runs out of the washroom with a towel wrapped around him.

    Now, I’m not gay, but this guy definitely had a physique I was jealous of. I was laughing to myself as I knew Carrie and Vero were missing out by sitting down the street in the car. I was contemplating going to get them while he changed into some clothes but whatever. They’ve all seen hot men wrapped in towels before (aka Philipp and I).

    After picking up the tickets, we headed to Philipp’s, hit the ground running with a few beer, contemplated how we could climb up to his rooftop patio considering it was under construction and the entrance was blocked, and then decided to head out into the town.

    I love Montreal. It has a different vibe at night than Ottawa. We were walking down the street and I heard some excellent stand-up bass and we decided to walk over and enter a jazz club. This place was hopping with an excellent jazz band. Unfortunately for us, it was closing time and they only stayed for another song. After dancing to some oldies, we continued onto another bar called Miami (which supposedly is usually good to go to) but at that hour, there was no one so we headed out to some night club and danced the night away. Personal highlight from that evening was the guy who started dancing with us and then proceeds to throw water into his own face…along with the ice! After some good laughs, we headed home and crashed.

    Man, it was a hot night in Montreal. I didn’t get too much sleep which I had to counteract somehow for the next day. It’s funny how the weather can change on a dime during September as the next night was cold.

    On Saturday we got in touch with Matt and Karilee who were coming to the festival and we made plans to meet up around 5PM. After going to the Fameux Restaurant for some smoked meat sandwiches, we headed out down St. Denis to check out some vinyl record stores. Vero picked up some excellent choices, including a suggested Top Gun soundtrack!

    We then headed out to H&M which was on the other side of town. After walking for awhile, we ended up in the mall, grabbed some much needed juice to replenish our strength and went into H&M. I was dismayed at first when I realized we came out all that way for nothing as it was a womens/children’s clothing only shop! However, the cashier heard our dismay and informed us the mens shop was up one level. Vero and I headed out there in search of the brown corduroy jacket that I passed up in New York City. Unfortunately for me, anything associated with clothing and New York City has a curse on it and sure enough, they did not have a size that fit me. The one I tried on was snug but I did the ‘bend over and tie your shoe’ test and it wasn’t happening.

    Upset, we left and headed back home as it was getting late and I realized that I had forgotten the tickets in my car so there was no way we would make the 5PM deadline. Vero ended up heading ahead without me to meet up with Karilee, Ann and Matt.

    We reached the festival grounds (which is on Parc Jean-Drapeau Island) which was home to Expo ’67. Hey, that’s forty years ago! Crazy. I saw the biosphere which was cool. The festival grounds had a slew of vendors and very cool artwork strewn about. The two main stages were set up right next to another so they didn’t have any lag time between bands. I liked this setup more than the Bluesfest setup which had a stage on the opposite end of the field. This way, you could technically plant yourself between the two stages and have a great view of both.

    We watched Stars play (Montreal band) who were alright. They picked up near the end. We then were watching Feist but decided to tour the grounds for some excitement and sat down for awhile. I was anxious to buy a Pumpkins t-shirt but we don’t live in a world of cheap tour shirts any longer and they were $45. I scoffed at the price and realized it wasn’t for me.

    After Feist, we headed to the Vice Magazine corn roast which didn’t have any corn at all! I believe that it was held in the afternoon and this was the reason for no corn upon our arrival around 7PM but the others didn’t seem to follow my line of thinking. We then stood in line forever for a steak sandwich and then headed back to find a good spot to watch the Pumpkins. We could see Damien Rice’s set from where we were standing which I enjoyed instead of just hanging out for an hour without anything to do. Unfortunately, we misjudged the weather and a cold snap hit us and Vero was super cold. I think she ended up with a cold the next day. 🙁

    The Pumpkins rocked and then we left and headed back home where Philipp and I watched a hilarious Ali G video (must have been a compilation of his British show) while Carrie and Vero slept. The next day we toured around the area to get some poutine (22 different varieties! BEAUTY!) and checked out a few record shops. I found this great one around the block from Philipp’s place although they didn’t have any Pumpkins vinyl that I was in search for.

    In the end, another great weekend was had in Montreal. I love that place. Thanks to Philipp and Jean for the great company.

  • Review: The Smashing Pumpkins at Osheaga 2007

    (photo taken from the Montreal Gazette)

    The Pumpkins were on fire tonight. I think I would put this concert at #2 in the three concerts that I’ve seen (#1 being held by the Mellon Collie tour of ’96).

    They had an amazing setlist which consisted of a lot of Zeitgeist material as well as some oldies/goodies. My favourite part about the Pumpkins is when they go into their random jam sessions or revamp some of their songs. Bullet With Butterfly Wings used to be like this back in the Adore/Machina touring days but has since made it back to its original incarnation. Heavy Metal Machine (Machina) was victim to the revamping and I thought it was a beautiful way to lose of my hearing. I’m kidding..actually, the concert wasn’t that loud at all now that I think about it. No ringing of the ears afterwards. This may have to do with the fact that it’s an outdoor festival.

    The new light show is pretty swell also although Vero complained that it was in her eyes most of the time so she had a hard time seeing the stage and the people up there. I had no such problem although there were two tall guys in my line of vision for the concert.

    While I would have liked to hear Starz and Zero (which made it onto the setlist of the next night’s concert in Toronto), I was impressed with the choice of songs (catering to both the old and new fans) and the sheer power in the music that night. Billy was in a great mood that night…even laughing during a portion of United States. Speaking about United States, the PA system conked out for 10 seconds right when it builds up to the apex of eardrum splitting rock riffs…unfortunate, but at least it only lasted 10 seconds.

    Setlist:
    United States (with Star Spangled Banner AND O Canada being played!)
    Bullet with Butterfly Wings
    That’s the Way (My Love Is) – New single…it’ll be a hit for the pseudo-fans
    Neverlost
    Hummer
    Stand Inside Your Love
    Tonight Tonight
    Tarantula – this track was awesome. I love everything about this tune. It is visceral. Vero said it was the highlight of her night.
    Glass and The Ghost Children – A revamped tune (which I thought was Gossamer at first). I like this version better than the original.
    By Starlight -> To Sheila (with full band as opposed to acoustic only)
    1979 (solo acoustic)
    Superchrist – A new song which probably stemmed from jam sessions to Gossamer. Very cool.
    Doomsday Clock
    Heavy Metal Machine (!!!)
    Encore: Today

  • Review: Rob Zombie’s Halloween

    Mike managed to score the workprint of Rob Zombie’s Halloween last night so we sat down to watch it. I was hunting around on the weekend for my original Halloween movie but cannot seem to find it. Does anyone out there have my copy? It’s the one on VHS.

    I didn’t know really what to expect as I had heard some mixed reviews about the film and Halloween is by far my favourite horror series (next to Evil Dead of course!). Mike Myers instills fear into me like no other. He’s just some guy walking towards you with a knife. Yikes!

    The film has a LOT of back story to Michael Myers…pretty well the entire first half of the film is dedicated to showing what environment Michael grew up in and how it made him into a monster. While I enjoyed Mr. Zombie’s portrayal of a twisted environment creating this crazy guy, I must admit that I preferred the mystique of just some random killer coming out of nowhere and attacking the town on Halloween night. I read a great review of the film at Ain’t It Cool News and they hit the nail on the head when they were talking about how everything needs an explanation nowadays, including Star Wars and the prequels. It used to be enough to know that Darth Vader was a bad ass and no one really know how he became one. But then the prequels come along and you see him as a kid and see what he had to go through which transformed him. Meh. What am I saying? I like the prequels so I can’t put them down, but let’s get back to Halloween. I didn’t care for the extended intro to the back story of Michael. While I think it was well done and I understand what Mr. Zombie was trying to do with his remake of Halloween, I think it would have been best if you left him as a killer with no story.

    Onto the rest of the film…it pretty well is the original Halloween film and I must admit that I was on the edge of my seat for the entire time that Michael Myers is on his killing spree. It was a great feeling to once again have the fear in me while watching a Halloween film (which pretty well left me years ago…ugh…Halloween: Resurrection anyone? Michael Myers also had a new degree of viciousness to him which was brought to us by our main man Tyler Zane (who played Sabretooth in the X-Men films). It’s like he moved a little quicker and little rougher than our lumbering friend from previous films. And I liked it.

    Turns out that the work print version has a totally different ending than the theatrical cut so I suppose I’ll have to rent the actual version when it comes out next year. I have read about both endings and think the theatrical one would probably be better.

    Anyhoo…it was amazing and I’m glad Rob Zombie did a bang up job. It’s definitely the best Halloween movie in awhile.

  • Let There Be Pork!

    Saturday consisted of taking a bike ride around Orleans with Vero to pick up odds and ends. You just can’t ignore a beautiful day.

    We also whipped out the Grilling Cookbook (a book my parents gave to me years ago and I never opened it until today) to find something good to make for supper. After Vero warned me to be prepared for the costs of trying new recipes (read: spices cost quite a bit!), we headed to the grocery store to stock up.

    We ended up making some stuffed pork chops (with onions, apple and bread crumbs) and BBQed some corn with some coriander/butter sauce.

    On The Corn: It was a waste. I couldn’t taste the butter and I had fear that this would happen considering I was applying it to the corn before BBQing. Wouldn’t try it again. What I would try is mixing the butter up with the spices and applying AFTER it’s done.

    On The Pork Chops: We all know I’m not one with the kitchen. So I was amazed that I could actually slide open a pork chop and stuff items inside! It was like a giant pork pocket! I was impressed. These things were massive once Vero was done stuffing them. We marinated them, stuffed them, closed it with toothpicks and grilled them.

    In the end, they were tasty but for future note – don’t put too many bread crumbs inside as it made it pretty pasty.

    Regaling in our amazing culinary skills, we retired to the living room to watch Cinderella Man. Cinderella Man is based on a true story about James Braddock; a boxer during the Depression who makes a comeback which basically saves his family from starvation. It was a touching tale and you can’t go wrong with some boxing matches here and there. I really enjoyed Russell Crowe in this role, but Renee Zellwegger…meh, not so much. Highly entertaining film though and it gets the Palmer/Cantin stamp of approval.

    After that we popped in an episode of Jekyll (which we love!). We started with Episode #4 and then onto #5 but I pretty well conked out as soon as #5 started up. I woke up to Vero screaming “I KNEW IT!” and here I am bewildered saying “Wha, what?”. Turns out I missed a big revelation of the series. With that knowledge in mind, we stopped the episode so we could watch it another day.

    Sunday had me go around the house doing some chores such as washing the car. Boy, is it ever hard to get the bugs off the front of the car! I still have to go and attack them again with a good hard arm.

    I then brought Vero and Chantal out to a wedding in Metcalfe and on the way I discovered the greatest back roads to traverse across the city. Never again will I travel the main streets if I can avoid them! I ended up using the same back roads to get to Maren and Allan-Paul’s place where I was kindly invited over to a family dinner along with guitar playing and some boccie ball. While Allan-Paul and I didn’t win at boccie ball, the dinner was marvelous. Maren doesn’t shy away from making extravagant meals – sausage, ribs, mac & cheese, coleslaw…was there salad? Probably. Corn on the cob, home made ice cream, cookies…it was indulgent! One day I shall invite the Danes over to dinner in Orleans but I must admit that I feel inadequate in my culinary skills department to match the sheer amazingness of these meals!

    I jammed a bit with Mike and Johnny afterwards which was a good time. I then convinced Maren(or was it Maren convincing me?) to watch the Michael Jackson video ‘Moonwalker’ which documented his music videos and tours over the years. Maren is the biggest Michael Jackson fan there ever was and I must admit that you have to give him some credit for being a dominant force before the 90s hit and he just became weird in the public eye. 50 million albums sold is not an easy feat my friends.

    On Monday, I started painting the garage door again (thanks to Mike for putting a few coats of paint on the door while I was away) and I think it only needs one more coat at this point. Mike also helped out with taping the front door and I primed it. Instead of letting my day waste away into a heap of painting, I decided to take the rest of the afternoon and relax. Mike and I ate an amazing meal that Maren prepared for us and then I spent the afternoon scanning a bunch of photos from my parents photo albums. Vero then came over that evening for a feed of pickerel and we watched the rest of the Jekyll mini-series.

    The series is phenomenal and from what I can tell, it’s going to be continued. Very cool storyline and I have found the television format brings a lot more to film than actual 2 hour films do. You have to cram a lot of information into a two hour period and with that, you must sacrifice a lot…including character development. With a mini-series, you essentially get a six hour movie which is fantastiche!

    iplaying: Gravedancer – Velvet Revolver (Libertad)

  • Review: Ferris Bueller’s Day Off

    A nice way to cap off the summer was to head to the Westboro Beach with a lawnchair, a few beers, and friends to catch the final movie night in which they played Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.

    What a great spot to watch a movie! Even though we were seated right next to the Parkway with cars driving by, the speakers were loud enough to allow us to hear every word, and the vista of the Ottawa River along with the sun going down behind the movie screen was amazing.

    Now, everyone will laugh when they read this but before the film started, I noted that I wasn’t sure if I’ve ever seen the beginning of Ferris Bueller before. Yes yes, I know it’s on TBS every four hours but I think I had only caught bits and pieces of it throughout the years.

    To my surprise I had actually missed out on a whole lot more than I thought! I figured I had never seen the first hour of the film. Imagine! After laughing at the film, I realized that this is the quintessential 80s comedy. Oh Ferris…where art thou now (fast fact, rumour of a sequel coming out. No joke.)

    After the film, we headed to the Elgin Street Diner for some excellent poutine before heading home.

    If they air more films at the Westboro Beach next year, I am in. It was such a good time.

  • Anyone Want to See The Pumpkins?

    Against my better wishes to see the Pumpkins play in a proper venue on their own tour, I’ve realized that this probably won’t happen in the near future and I may end up missing them on their Zeitgeist tour.

    That being said, I’m pretty well going to go to the Saturday show of the Osheaga Festival on September 8, 2007. If anyone is interested in going with me, let me know!

    Other acts are playing on the Saturday including Peter, Bjorn and John!

    www.osheaga.com

  • Where Were You?

    I suppose the death of Princess Diana was the equivalent to other major moments in history (like the assassination of JFK) where everyone can pinpoint exactly where they were at that moment in time.

    As soon as I heard it was the ten year anniversary of her death this morning it hit me like a ton of bricks…not because of Princess Diana, but because it reminded me of where I was when I heard.

    Flashback Ten Years Ago. A few pounds lighter, probably a similar haircut and fresh into school after leaving Kapuskasing. After the first few days in school I decided to take the bus down to Oshawa to visit Carol who had also started college. Let me tell you what bus NOT to take when traveling from Oshawa to Ottawa – the milk run bus. I didn’t know…I was new to the bus system. Turns out that the milk run bus takes 6.5 hours to get to Oshawa because it stops at every little stop along the way, whereas it’s a lot faster to take the express bus to Toronto and catch the GO-Train back. I laugh at this now because years later Carol would come up to visit (and get a ride back home for Christmas) and I forgot to tell her not to take the milk run bus and she ended up next to some crazy person.

    Anyhow, there I was with Carol in her new residence building in Oshawa becoming jealous by the minute considering Algonquin College had nothing of the kind to offer me. We were in some room (perhaps her own?) having a few drinks with people when someone ran into the room and proclaimed “Princess Diana just died in a car accident!” and then he ran off.

    That was odd. Why would anyone say that of all things?

    Turns out it was true after we consulted the television set. So here was a bunch of drunk new college students watching the television for up to date news. I don’t remember watching too much of it because I didn’t really know much about Princess Diana.

    It’s amazing how vividly I can picture this memory in my mind’s eye. I’m sure Carol can add a bunch of other thoughts (probably who came in and told us and whatever else she can remember from that night).

    Anyhow, on another note, holy mackerel, I’ve been in Ottawa ten years now. That is crazy. In that time I’ve completed school, started a job and went back to school. Full circle mes amis?

    iplaying: Persuasion of You – Collective Soul (Afterwords)

  • RIP: Grandpa Earl

    I just found out that Rob’s grandfather Earl passed away last Sunday. Unfortunately I was on the road at that time or else I would have headed down to Paisley in this time of need.

    I met Grandpa Earl 9 years ago (Lord, has it been that long?!) and he was a kind old man. He sure liked to play cards! I remember first playing cards with him in his kitchen along with a few others and noticed that he was dealing from the bottom of the deck! I didn’t want to call him on it in his own kitchen but he sure was sneaky! 😉 I think I let him know about it at Rob’s wedding but he feigned ignorance.

    Through the years I spent some interesting weekends with the Beech Clan, like our Thankgiving trip to Marmora where Grandpa Earl had a good laugh when Rob’s mom dressed Rob and I up in a pig and dog outfit and we went to a party on the campground. Let it be known that we aren’t talking about us being kids here…I was probably 23 at this time! We toured around in that RV for the entire day and we all had a splendid time.

    I grew to take a liking to this great man as he welcomed me into his life of having fun and playing a good game of euchre. I never got to know my own grandfathers and I always thought of Grandpa Earl as an honorary grandfather. My thoughts go out to the Beech Clan at this time and I know you’re out there having a grand old time playing cards Grandpa Earl.

  • How To Access Archives

    I’m starting to update my blog with the East Coast Trip but I’ve noticed that the previous entries have pushed past the page limit.

    So for those of you who are not familiar as to how you can access past entries, just look on the right hand menu column at a spot called Archives. There you can click on a certain month and it will show you every entry for that given month. Hence, if you wish to see all of the entries for this month of August 2007, then just click and read away!

    I’ve updated a bunch of blog entries but I like to keep them in chronological order for future archival purposes. While you’re at it, have some fun and read previous entries! That’s what this website is always about – documenting my daily life for the future to peruse.

  • Review: Young Modern – Silverchair

    The long anticipated fifth album by Silverchair does not disappoint. Silverchair have come so far from the alternative band on teenagers (has it already been a decade with them?!). Their last album Diorama was an amazing piece of work – one where you can tell Daniel Johns was learning piano which I find to be a major turning point in the style of music that a band writes (compared to guitar-based only). It introduced different elements and more complex themes into their music.

    After a hiatus of 5 years, they have returned with Young Modern which does not disappoint. At first listen there were a few standout tracks but I must admit that I kept coming back for more and more and more during my holidays. I really enjoy this album. It isn’t a heavy hitting album but I almost find that some of their tracks remind me of the psychedelic times of The Beatles. There are some songs which just go against the norm that you can’t help but fall in love with them. There are some straight out rockers, and some soft tunes as well.

    It’s a minimalist album which offers a maximum of enjoyment. Pick it up and you won’t be disappointed (unless you’re stuck in the 90s and don’t have an open mind to what Silverchair should be, or become. They are definitely not the band who sings on Frogstomp.)

    iplaying: Mindreader – Silverchair (Young Modern)