MUSIC PREVIEW: Kanye vs. Kenny
At least the Oilers won the home opener against the Godless Flames – so now can we stow all the crap about the new arena already? All is forgiven! Again Edmonton has two arena shows on the same night – and not very much crossover audience between Kanye West (at Rogers Place) and Kenny Rogers […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Top 7 UP+DT acts
This weekend’s primary offering is a bevy of insanely good gigs courtesy of the fourth annual offering of the Up + Downtown Music Festival. With acts ranging from folk to punk to garage to psychedelic, there’s a little something for almost everyone. But little something is probably not giving the festival programmers enough credit, because […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Dixie Chicks stick to their guns
Look on the bright side of a Donald Trump presidency – our music scene will get better because so many great American artists will move to Canada! Maybe we can welcome the Dixie Chicks, too – in Edmonton to play Rogers Place Thursday night. These Texas-bred country-bluegrass women Natalie Maines, Emily Robison and Martie Maguire […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Airbourne the new hell’s bellringer
With the aging AC/DC in flinders, it falls to the next generation to carry the torch of timeless balls-to-the-walls rock ‘n’ roll. The world needs this. Enter Sandman … whoops, wrong band. Enter Airbourne, the young and eager hard rock quartet that sounds an awful lot like AC/DC. Helps they’re from Australia. Playing at the […]
INTERVIEW: Peaches reaches and teaches
In the art of exploring gender with bold musical statements, Peaches is way ahead of her time – but “that’s probably for other people to answer,” she says. So what say you, other people? There is a consensus. Peaches makes Lady Gaga look like Selena Gomez – and was doing her thing long before Lady […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Country rockets launch Rogers Place
What we have here is a “perfect storm” of Big Gigs occurring on one weekend. Something’s gonna blow. Could Rogers Place have picked a better headliner for its opening concert on Friday night than Keith Urban? He’s a favourite in this market, and a hunka hunka burnin’ love to women the world over. Fun fact: […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Sonic Boom blows up genres
It’s really very simple: If you like listening to the alternative rock radio station Sonic 102.9, you’re going to love Sonic Boom. This last festival of summer is like listening to Sonic minus the commercials – plus being at the mercy of the elements, food that’s bad for you, there’s line-ups for everything, and you […]
WEEKEND MUSIC: Big hand for Fitz
In the middle of festival season, a rare weekend without one finds Edmonton with a cadenced assortment of gigs both big and small. From Demi Lovato and Nick Jonas, and Volbeat, at Rexall Place, to a couple of gigs at the River Cree, to the smaller but equally vital smaller venues, there’s a little something […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: No bad blues
One of the great things about the blues is that it can be played by musicians who’ve never met or who don’t even know the same songs. One of the bad things about the blues is that it can be played by musicians who’ve never met or who don’t even know the same songs. That’s […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: The Rock must go on
The letdown for all the folkies from the Edmonton Folk Music Festival is indeed palpable. There are a number of well-heeled mavens in the city who believe, and it’s quite possibly true, that the vast majority of folkies don’t go to many shows the rest of the year. It makes sense. After all, 100,000 people […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: The Courage of the Tragically Hip
The Tragically Hip comes to Edmonton for likely the last time Thursday and Saturday – and rave reviews have been pouring in since the tour opened in Vancouver last week. That’s rather unsurprising given the nature of this tour. In May, singer Gord Downie was diagnosed with one of the deadliest forms of brain cancer. […]
MUSIC PREVIEW: Golden age of music venues
It seems like not all that long ago the local music scene was in disarray, with venue after venue closing within a very short span. And now here we are in the middle of 2016 and there’s a plethora of new and cool stages around the city to check out the rich tapestry that makes […]
