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Posts Tagged ‘Ottawa Bluesfest’

Bluesfest Day 5: Quality Time With Seal and Nickelback

Photograph by Patrick Doyle

Fun fact: Seal has eight studio albums. EIGHT! Forgive me if you already knew this, but I suppose this is why he so easily commanded the stage at RBC Royal Bank Bluesfest. He’s a legitimate international superstar and we were lucky enough to score an interview with him prior to taking the stage. (Another Seal surprise? He has to be at least 6’4. And built like a quarterback.)

After sitting down with Nickelback for a full hour in our recent “Nickelback In Sixty” special (which you can watch here), seeing them backstage at Bluesfest was something like a family reunion. And no reunion is complete without bear hugs, which drummer Daniel Adair voraciously threw upon Matt Wells when he first saw him, knocking the both of them over into a chair.

Matt spoke with Chad and Daniel at length about music, life, how the tour is going and what the deal was with that floating stage of theirs on the previous tour. The elaborate stage picked them up and carried them out and over top of the crowd and in Chad’s words, was powered by “the hand of Zeus.” Without going into too many specifics about dollars and cents, he also let us know that it cost well over SEVEN FIGURES to produce. That’s a lot of nickels. (Sorry.)

There have been a few interviews that we wanted to score during our time at Bluesfest that didn’t materialize, which is simply the way it goes at festivals. Unfortunately for us (but mostly Matt), Norah Jones was one of them. She did, however, partake in some of our Tornado Potatoes, which are exactly what you think they would be:

Norah took to the main stage to close the evening and sweetly serenaded the hearts and minds of thousands who showed up to watch her. As for Matt, although he didn’t get to interview one of his biggest music crushes, he can at least say that the two of them shared a salty snack.

RBC Royal Bank Bluesfest goes until July 15. For the full schedule head to http://www.ottawabluesfest.ca and be sure to follow us on Twitter @MuchMore for real time coverage of all our #Bluesfest antics.

- Sarah Dawley

Posted: July 12th, 2012 | Category: Music | Comments: No Comments
Tags: Bluesfest, matt wells, nickelback, Norah Jones, Ottawa Bluesfest, Seal

Bluesfest Day 4: All About the Hidden Gems

Day four at RBC Royal Bank Bluesfest and the name of the game is “hurry up and wait.” But if you’ve got copious amounts of time to kill, an outdoor music festival with multiple stages in the middle of a gorgeous summer day in the nation’s capital is probably where you’d want to be. As we waited for interviews to be confirmed, we actually got a chance to sit back and enjoy the tunes. Here are two finds that blew us away:

The PepTides

We actually first encountered this group as we were taking a shortcut from one stage to another via the Canadian War Museum, when a four-part harmony of voices sliced through the air and stopped dead in our tracks. These four singers, a keyboardist and a guitar player all dressed in outfits reminiscent of a 1950s Sears catalogue immediately put us into a trance.

The PepTides actually have 10 members in total, a few more of whom we saw during their performance on the Bluesfest main stage later in the afternoon. Mixing their stunning vocals with funk beats underneath a soulful sound, an abundance of theatrical dance moves and kitschy quirks, they defy any genre or description. One must simply see them to believe them.

http://www.thepeptides.com

Lukas Nelson

The Electro Stage at Bluesfest has more than lived up to its name this year, hosting some of the biggest names in electronic music including Chromeo, MSTRKRFT, Dj Illo, Tommy Lee and DJ Aero and so on, although not all of the acts scheduled here fit that bill.

Lukas Nelson sounds like both he and his guitar have been picked up and dipped into the soul of rock-n-roll. By the time he had strummed his third chord we had dropped everything and ran out to watch, as Willie Nelson’s son invoked the gritty soul of his father’s musical abilities with a badass blues style that is distinctly his own.

http://www.promiseofthereal.com/

RBC Royal Bank Bluesfest goes until July 15. For the full schedule head to http://www.ottawabluesfest.ca and be sure to follow us on Twitter @MuchMore for real time coverage of all our #Bluesfest antics.

- Sarah Dawley

Posted: July 10th, 2012 | Category: Music | Comments: No Comments
Tags: Bluesfest, Lukas Nelson, matt wells, Ottawa Bluesfest, The PepTides

Bluesfest Day 3: Metal Mania

Photograph by Patrick Doyle

Day three of our journey at RBC Royal Bank Bluesfest and we’re starting to feel overwhelmingly at home amidst chest-rattling bass and portable toilets. This is concerning on multiple levels, but there is still much more to see and many more people to talk to. We soldier on.

It’s early evening, so we make our way to the catering tent to grab some grub and as we sit down, Matt says to me under his breath: “Iron Maiden. That’s Iron Maiden. We are eating beside Iron Maiden.” I glance over and sure enough, there is a table full of legends casually enjoying dinner right beside us. I realize this might not seem like such a big deal at first; even rock stars need to eat, right? But one must understand the complete transformation backstage that the presence of this band at the festival inspired. When we arrived to the site, our all-access passes were suddenly more like some-but-not-ALL-access passes. Huge semi-trucks were positioned rather conveniently in front of an area we had spent the past two days roaming about and shooting footage in. So by the time we managed to find an alternate route to the catering tent, seeing the band eating IN there was (to say the least) unexpected.

Photograph by Patrick Doyle

As we finished up our meal, it was time for another legend to take the stage. With copious amounts of stage blood, grotesque masks and a live python, 64-year-old Alice Cooper created one of the most elaborate stage shows I’ve ever seen. He was even brutally beheaded by a guillotine. You know what that’s called? Commitment. Thankfully he was reincarnated (in a Senators jersey, much to the crowd’s delight) for one last song. Did I mention this man is 64 years old?

Photograph by Patrick Doyle

Securing interviews at a festival takes equal parts skill, perseverance and luck. There are multiple levels of clearance you must suffer through and plenty of red-tape hurdles that must be jumped over. Thankfully, the Bluesfest team are pros at this and have managed to score us exclusive face time with some of the biggest names on the bill every year, Alice Cooper included. Matt sat down with him on his tour bus and chatted about everything you would normally chat with Alice Cooper about. You know, things like how he taught Lou Reed how to golf and what it was like the first time he ever saw Pink Floyd live. (Spoiler alert: at first he thought it was just going to be some guy named Floyd dressed up in pink.)

- Sarah Dawley

Posted: July 9th, 2012 | Category: Music | Comments: No Comments
Tags: Alice Cooper, Bluesfest, Iron Maiden, matt wells, MuchMore, Ottawa Bluesfest

Bluesfest Day 2: A Dallas Green Drive-By & Late Nights With Tommy Lee

Photograph by Patrick Doyle

Day two at RBC Royal Bank Bluesfest and it is HOT. All the snacks I have responsibly packed and brought to the venue are melted. By 5:00 P.M. this has escalated to the “wow, I didn’t know the inside of my back of my ears could sweat” kind of hot. Get the picture? It’s hot.

As they all do here at Bluesfest, our day begins with all six of us on the back of an impressively resilient golf cart. We’re scouting for the perfect place to shoot a segment with Matt and settle in a nice spot by the gorgeous Ottawa River, which wraps itself around the Bluesfest site.

As we’re working, we see another golf cart careening down the pathway towards us. It stops and the driver smiles at us. It’s takes us a minute to fully recognize him in this unexpected context. It’s Dallas Green also known as City and Colour. “Our interview is at 6:30 right?” he asks. We confirm, and with a gentlemanlike tip of his hat he steps on the gas and heads off.

We end up interviewing him behind the stage where he will be performing later that night in the relentless heat, where Matt Wells does his best to shade Dallas from the sun’s blinding glare. Music journalist by day, cabana boy by early evening.

Dallas takes us on a tour of his trailer and we learn that he owns so many blue shirts it’s become a painful process trying to choose one to wear. Jokes aside, when Matt finishes the interview he tells me that it has “restored” him. Good music and the people who are passionate about it will do that to you.

We’ve got a few hours to relax and enjoy the festival and I decide to head over to the River Stage to watch Arkells, Hamilton’s greatest gift to indie rock, which proves to be the best decision I make all day (packing a chocolate bar in my purse on a 35-degree day, not so much). The 2012 Juno Award winners for “Group of the Year” quickly win the crowd over, an easy task considering that at least the first five rows are loyally singing along with every word.

Matt decides to watch the City and Colour show and tells me a story that makes me love Dallas Green even more than I already do. Dallas tells the crowd to put up their cameras and/or cell phones into the air. The massive crowd obliges. “Great,” he says, “now put them in your pocket.” He says for this next song – just this one – he wants everyone to forget about recording it or taking a photo of it. He wants them to be present in the moment and simply enjoy it. They do.

The sun has set and we all meet up at the Electro Stage, where Tommy Lee will be spinning with DJ Aero. Yes, that Tommy Lee. The legendary drummer from Mötley Crüe, spinning an electro set. We wait for over 45 minutes backstage after the show is done for Tommy to come out of his trailer but as we suspected would be the case, it was WELL worth the wait. He is full of energy, tells us some amazing stories and drops a lot of f-bombs. He very eloquently explains how spinning electronic music was a natural progression for him, we talk about his controversial Facebook post about hating when fans ask him for a photo, and he and Matt brainstorm ideas for kick ass children’s birthday parties. Such is an interview with Tommy Lee.

- Sarah Dawley

Photography by Patrick Doyle

Posted: July 7th, 2012 | Category: Music | Comments: No Comments
Tags: Arkells, Bluesfest, City and Colour, Dallas Green, matt wells, Ottawa Bluesfest, Tommy Lee

MuchMore Does Bluesfest 2012: Day One

First things first: RBC Royal Bank Bluesfest in Ottawa isn’t your typical music festival. Whereas most aim to please a specific genre or typical crowd of people, the Bluesfest lineup caters to literally any taste, at any age whether you’re into rock, pop, dance, rap, folk or blues. Forget your standard festival food; the frozen burgers and greasy fries. Bluesfest boasts everything from shawarma and tacos to jerk chicken and philly cheesesteaks. Your music festival spans the course of a summer weekend? That’s cute. Bluesfest lasts for TWELVE DAYS. Straight.

The festival has grown from a one-stage, three-day event to a multi-staged, 12-day showcase, boasting some of the biggest names in music. And after our incredible experience at this powerhouse of a festival last year (which you can watch here), we jumped at the chance to experience all that this year has to offer.

Right after landing in Ottawa, we get a phone call. Our interview with Carly Rae Jepsen needs to happen, like… now. We pack up our equipment and six people into two vans and it’s off to the races again. Our Bluesfest 2012 journey has officially begun.

In the front seat during the short trip from the hotel to the site, Matt is going over his notes for Carly Rae Jepsen and looks back at me, beaming with pride about his first question. He’s going to find out what kind of wild antics went down on the tour bus while she was traveling the country with Hanson. I’m not exactly sure what he’s envisioning, since I assume they practiced harmonizing while playing with kittens and were all in bed by 11 P.M. But maybe I’m wrong.

Despite not feeling well, Carly Rae Jepsen was a total sweetheart. She spoke about her love for Joni Mitchell and what it’s been like seeing her single “Call Me Maybe” skyrocket to the top of the charts around the world. Much to Matt’s dismay, she insisted that her fiestas with the “MMMBop” boys did not include any booze and/or groupies. After an awkward yet brutally endearing fist-bump with Matt, we wrapped up the interview and she headed to the stage. Once her set was done, she hung around backstage for the rest of the evening and I even spotted her in the crowd enjoying LMFAO’s set at the end of the night.

Although Skyblu is out with a back injury, it didn’t stop Redfoo and the rest of the LMFAO gang (including the incredible dancers from Quest Crew) from getting a jam-packed crowd jumping and screaming. After mass amounts of lasers, bright lights, inflatable zebras and crotch shots, we wrapped up and headed back to our hotel, slightly confused and very sweaty.

There’s still plenty of RBC Royal Bank Bluesfest to go, including performances from City and Colour, Alice Cooper, Iron Maiden MSTRKRFT, Norah Jones, Seal, Down With Webster, I Mother Earth, Nickelback and more. For the full schedule head to http://www.ottawabluesfest.ca.

- Sarah Dawley

Photography by Patrick Doyle

Posted: July 6th, 2012 | Category: Music | Comments: No Comments
Tags: Bluesfest, Carly Rae Jepsen, Charles Bradley, LMFAO, matt wells, Ottawa Bluesfest

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Posts Tagged ‘Ottawa Bluesfest’

Bluesfest Day 5: Quality Time With Seal and Nickelback

Bluesfest Day 4: All About the Hidden Gems

Bluesfest Day 3: Metal Mania

Bluesfest Day 2: A Dallas Green Drive-By & Late Nights With Tommy Lee

MuchMore Does Bluesfest 2012: Day One

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