So I was walking around my town's annual Canada Day celebration called the Friendship Festival (not cheesy at all, I know!) which was your usual carnival affair, it had games, rides, food that is so bad it can kill you but you'll eat anyway (because come on! It's a festival!) and some live bands. In years past we've had bands such as Hedley, Finger Eleven, Our Lady Peace, and some other fairly big names. Lately, however, that's kind of changed, so this year we had nothing but local bands that I had honestly never heard of before reading their names. So that said, I really didn't plan on checking out any of the live music this year, but as I was walking around I heard an incredibly powerful woman's voice backed by some decent guitarwork. I immediately took off for the stage, but I was with my family, niece and nephew included, and I'm kind of the dedicated family photographer so I decided I would stay with them and take some pictures of the kids while I walked around.

Almost an hour went by before we were just about ready to go, so I let everyone know and decided to take off for the stage hoping that the band I had heard was still playing. Luckily, as I came closer to the stage, I realized that they were still playing, so I booked it over there camera in hand to listen to them and snap some pictures of them. When I finally rounded the corner I was a bit... disappointed. Not by the band, who I now knew as the Weekend Riot Club,because they not only sounded great, but they looked like they were playing for thousands, I was more disappointed in the crowd. I stepped into the courtyard they were playing in and walked past maybe two dozen people who were just enjoying the shade and planted myself in front of the stage a good 50 feet in front of anyone else in the area. It came as a bit of a shock to me that so few people were here, yet lead singer Melissa Marchese was singing as if the crowd was packed and screaming for the band to play louder. There was an enthusiasm that I have not seen in some time, and one that I have seen bands playing in front of 20,000 not match, yet I seemed like the only person really into what I was hearing there.

Needless to say, I loved every second that I heard and saw, but herein lies my problem. I showed just in time to hear about 90 seconds of them playing before their time on stage was up and the show was over... ouch. Despite the time I heard them being so short, for me it was 90 seconds of unexpected bliss, having never really expected to hear walk into anything so damn good, and alittle heartbroken that I didn't show up to cheer them on earlier. I guess that is part of this though, having heard and seen the passion that they put into their music despite having a silent crowd made me want to make more people aware of them, to give them a chance so that the next time I see them I won't be the only person who is enjoying their music, as nice as it was to have a usually crowded concert area be so open to me as a (amateur) photographer.

Looking them on online later I found a few songs of theirs, and the fact that they are releasing their first studio album later this year, which has me pretty excited. Listening to their recorded music, I'm not sure if they are a band that I would have payed any attention to if I had heard that first, but the way that they played live that day made me excited to see them in the future, and yeah, they now have a supporter in me. I love getting excited about music, especially because it happens so infrequently for me, so stumbling upon someone that I like on a hot, frankly, quite boring day at my local festival was a really nice surprise. Needless to say this has also sent me into a kick where I'm starting to search for good local bands in my area, though that search has so far come up empty, but hopefully at some time I will. Until then I will just hope to stumble into some more music that I like in the most random of ways.

I'll end this little blog with a song, as I said they are so damn great live, so this song doesn't quite do them justice, but it should give you a bit of an idea.

Random music fever! Catch it!