Bluesfest, First Weekend Recap

In light of the fact that I'm already three days behind, I thought I'd just make one big weekend update in an attempt to get all caught up again.


After our set on Friday, I caught most of Bela Fleck and the Flecktones. It was a pretty incredible; these guys are all phenomenal musicians. Highlights from their set were a 4-5 minute bass solo from Victor Wooten, and an extended banjo bit from Bela, which was pretty wild.


I didn't get to see much of George Thorogood's set, but from what I did catch, it sounded like it would have been a pretty good show to be up front for.

Which brings us to Saturday. Fortunately, there wasn't anything early on that I was really itching to go see, so I took most of the day to relax a bit and headed down for around 6pm. Unfortunately though, I didn't have my camera with me, so there are no pictures. Anyway, I caught some of Jetplanes of Abraham, Sarah Harmer (whose set might have been a little more conducive to a smaller stage), Michael Franti, and then some of Manu Chao. And as if that wasn't enough music already, afterwards we headed over to catch the Bible All-Stars and Evil Farm Children at this little navy mess on Victoria Island. Good times, a really good show by both bands, and it was nice to catch a show away from all the crowds of the festival.


I got a bit of an earlier start on Sunday, and B wasn't volunteering until 9pm, so I headed down early & we met up to catch My Dad Vs Yours in the afternoon. These guys are fantastic & they played a really great set, which culminated with Ben (TRS's own Commodore 64) having a bass guitar wig-out from all the excitement.


Then it was over to the River stage for F!ght F!ght F!ght, and then Ukrania. Admittedly, all the people sitting down made it a bit of a low-energy show for the first little while. Then out came a Ukranian dance group, which was an awesome touch.


I caught a little bit of Joel Plaskett and Shout Out Out Out Out, but was more or less waiting for the White Stripes. And man, they did not disappoint at all. Most of their set was devoid of all the big hits, which was awesome. In fact, I think they only played two or three hits the whole night. The rest of the show was mostly grimy garage rock, which was fantastic. I have a whole new respect for those guys.


I started watching the show from relatively close up (where this photo was taken) but moved back after a few songs to get away from the horde of people. This is pretty much the only non-blurry photo there was, and oddly I could see better from further back anyway.

So there we go, that brings us to Monday, which I'll get to next time.