Vancouver Music Review

It’s been over a week since Live at Squamish and that means we pretty much have summer wrapped up and are back in school and back to reality. The VMR decided to do a looking-back recap of the festival, here are some of our highlights! What are yours?

Hootenanny
This was the first year that a kick-off Friday night show was put into place and we had a total blast, and can’t wait to find out what might be in the works for next year because it can only get bigger and better.

Most Risquay Moment
The courageous Colleen Rennison (blues singer of No Sinner) scooping up a pair of tossed skivvies on the stage on all fours with her teeth… yup. It may have been the first 45 seconds of a very cheesy porno, but no, it was a moment on stage at Live at Squamish. And not a soul in the crowd missed it.

Best View
Although we realize that The Junction was a glorified smoke pit (although noone was allowed to advertise it as so) it really did have the best view. Grab a table, a beer, and you have yourself a musical picnic on the roof.

Best Stage
Headliners are great fun and all that jazz… but the real party this year could be found at the Meadow stage. The tiny little white tent tucked in between the bazaar, the edge of the sports grounds and the main walkway, here can be found some seriously good music. Maybe it’s my bias towards local talent rather than touring artists, but the Meadow stage is where it’s at. Tell your friends.

Best Headliner
What exactly counts as a headliner? Only mainstage after 8PM? Only the big font on the poster? I’m not sure, but my vote is in for Chromeo. Although the duo may not have attracted as large a crowd as some of the other headliners, they certainly did spur the best dance party. Not to mention they made just as much noise as a big band but with only 2 people, which leads me to my next award…

Best Duo
 The Harpoonist and the Axe Murderer.

Most Iconic Canadian Band
It was hard to categorize The Tragically Hip for us because we realize that they are not our generations music, yet we were genuinely excited for the experience of hearing them live. The Hip were exceptional and I think Gordon Downie is one of the most memorable performers I’ve seen.

Most Dedicated Fans
I’m sure that every girl in the front row of Mother Mother or City & Colour swears that they are the worlds most dedicated fan, but I have to give this one up to The Pack A.D. crowd. It wasn’t very big to start off with, it swelled a little bit but then Mother Mother started and it shrunk to a few dozen again. But those of us who stayed till the bitter end bared the sparsity and overlapping sound to get a full-effort show in the end.

Most Revealing Banter
Kathleen Edwards certainly is open with her private life, and her side-splitting banter was just one example (not to mention her incredibly personal and touching lyrics) She did manage to call out an attractive guy on taking his shirt off and putting it back on again, which gave the “go-ahead” for a few other men to start stripping. Thanks, Kathleen!

Best New Band Discovery
LP

Most Surprising Act
To be honest, I totally wrote off Lights as some Top 40 act that didn’t really fit in at Live at Squamish. I like her music but didn’t know what to expect in terms of a live performance. But Lights put on one heck of a show! Her voice is incredibly powerful, she and the rest of her band were some of the best musicians we saw that weekend, and she kept things interesting by playing old and new songs in an order I didn’t expect and even did a cover of Blondie’s “Heart of Glass”.