Besnard Lakes Blow The Power At FME 2010

 

The flight here was largely uneventful, save for a brief moment of panic at the airport in Montreal to get the connecting flight (I'd flown from Toronto). While waiting to board at the gate, the person working the gate let us know that we might not actually be able to land in Rouyn after all, seeing as there was a storm, and we might have to land in Val D'Or, Que. instead. 

 

This was a problem because there were several of us waiting to board this flight who'd been told someone was coming to meet us to take us to our hotel after we landed. But the staff assured us if we did have to land in Val D'Or, a bus would bring us back to Rouyn, which was "close by."

 

Well, after we landed successfully in Rouyn (there'd clearly been some kind of storm because the tarmac was covered in puddles), I wondered just what the flight attendant had meant by "close by" when I saw a road sign indicating Val D'Or was 86 kilometres away! That's pretty much the equivalent of driving from Toronto to Barrie, Ont. I guess it's all perspective.

 

FME kicked off Thursday evening at Cabaret De La Derniere Chance with a performance from Val D'Or's Chantal Archambault. This was kind of a big deal for Rouyn (and for her), since she's practically a hometown girl.

 

Archambault was celebrating the release of her Romance Des Couteaux (Knives' Romance) album. Her country rock is drawn equally from English-Canadian acts like Neil Young, traditional French-Canadian country, Hank Snow and even American acts like Johnny Cash. The venue was packed for her set, which was a sweltering sweatfest largely because it had no air conditioning. Nonetheless, I and most of the other people there seemed to enjoy her set. 

 

After some dinner, I headed to the Sirius stage on Rue 7e to check out some of the content there. Montreal's Ariel got things started. 

 

Their MySpace describes their music as "powerpop," but it's more like awful glam rock. When glam is done well, I have no problems with it, but when it's done poorly, I have absolutely no patience for it. 

 

Guitarist Philippe Lemire is insanely talented and the group can certainly play their instruments well, but that doesn't make up for the fact that singer/guitarist Ariel Coulombe (the group is presumably named after him) doesn't have much of a voice and... well... their songs are awful. Completely unimpressed, I left and went across the road to Agora Des Arts.

 

I was intrigued by the festival program's description of instrumental band Bateau Noir. Of course, any instrumental rock group coming from Montreal are inevitably going to be compared to the city's best-known post-rock export, Godspeed You! Black Emperor. But Bateau Noir are nothing like Godspeed in that they lack the symphonic instruments Efrim Menuck and company have. What they've got instead is a three-guitar attack and an extremely heavy sound that makes them much more akin to the likes of Chicago's Pelican, but with way more guitar. 

 

Not only were their songs great, but they were kept brief (no 20-minute wankfests), and their stage setup was different and intriguing. They all performed in a line at the front of the stage, as opposed to the usual guitarists and bassist at front, drummer at the rear formation. This meant they were kind of saying drummer J.F. Mineau's role was just as important as everyone else's. It was a refreshing approach and I'd like to see more bands do this.

 

After their set, I contemplated going back outside to the Sirius stage to see Vulgaires Machins, but was again curious about the next group at Agora. I was really glad I stayed.

 

GaBlé are a quartet (on this night they were a quintet) from Caen, France and they're definitely the most bizarre band I've ever seen. I can't even properly describe their sound and what I witnessed them do; it was that unique. 

 

They sung mostly in English and mixed indie rock elements with electronic beats and experimental music-making techniques that include ripping up wooden baskets, crinkling plastic bottles and honking airhorns. Most of their music seemed to be soundtracking short animated films they had playing on a screen behind them. They were hilarious and one even involved an animated piece of poo zapping a little creature to death with lightning. They rightly got a standing ovation from the crowd (it was a seated venue) after their performance. 

 

The next part of the evening would prove to be exceedingly frustrating for The Besnard Lakes. 

 

Although they're from Montreal, their French is limited and while singer/bassist Olga Goreas spent the first part of the show addressing the crowd in French, singer/guitarist Jace Lasek tried, gave up, and then lapsed back into English. That might have worked against them deep in the heart of northern Quebec, because after that they weren't getting the applause they deserved. 

 

That said, The Besnard Lakes seemed to have the audience completely mesmerized by their performance, which mostly consisted of tunes from this year's The Besnard Lakes Are The Roaring Night. 

 

That was until the power on their instruments blew out at the end of "And This Is What We Call Progress." It seemed the venue couldn't handle the sheer thunder of their instruments combined with their smoke machine and strobe lights. The band didn't quite know how to take this technical problem, but drummer Kevin Laing soon discovered that unlike the rest of the band, he still had power. 

 

"DRUM SOLO!" Lasek screamed, to which Laing replied with a hearty "Oh, fuck off." He obliged, though. Lasek spent the rest of the break yelling animal sounds into the crowd. I started yelling back and a bunch of other people soon followed suit. The set seemed to have descended into complete and total chaos. I then noticed that a good chunk of the venue was now empty, but this had happened before the power went out. What a shame. 

 

Things were soon fixed, though, and the band ran through a few more songs before… yup. The power went out again. Guitarist Richard White didn't quite know how to deal with this, threw up his hands and left the stage. After power was restored, he had to be called back to the stage by Goreas and the audience, who were shouting his name repeatedly.

 

Luckily, things went off without a hitch during The Besnard Lakes Are The Dark Horse's "And You Lied To Me." But it must have been one of the most frustrating sets The Besnard Lakes have ever played. Nonetheless, the technical problems weren't really their fault and they dealt with them with humour and grace. I'd heard them soundchecking earlier that afternoon and things seemed fine, so I'm not sure what the problem was. Maybe the addition of the smoke machine and strobes proved to be too much. 

 

After their set finished, I considered heading out to see what else was going on, but by that point it was already past midnight. Considering I had two more full days of show-hopping ahead of me and Saturday's events started at 9:30 a.m. and ran until 2 and I had a 6 a.m. flight home on Sunday, I opted to go back to the hotel and get some sleep.