Steve's Blog
Tuesday July 28, 2009

Hi everyone

What a weekend! Saturday brought a huge storm to the Mission Folk Music Festival (causing the cancellation of the Saturday evening show) and spectacular lightning with the fireworks in town at Shorefest.

Mission was incredible, even more so for the music than for the storm. A full recovery was made on Sunday and all the performers scheduled for a Saturday concert got to play Main Stage except for the Tenores de Neoneli from Sardinia whose flight left at 11am on Sunday. There were many musical highlights, and one of the best-received bands of the whole weekend was The Outside Track, who are playing tonight at St. James Hall, 3214 West 10th Avenue. www.theoutsidetrack.com

For a look at some photos from Mission, please visit gallery.me.com/steveedge3#100056

The Outside Track, Tuesday July 28th, 8pm St. James Hall

This young band carries on the fine traditions of powerful Celtic music at the Rogue. The Outside Track is a Pan-Celtic quintet from Canada, Scotland and Ireland playing traditional and contemporary tunes and songs on flute, harp, accordion and fiddle - with lyrics in English, French and Gaelic. This band does it all! The line-up is Scottish champion accordion player Fiona Black, and champion harper Aillie Robertson, alongside Cape Breton fiddler Mairi Rankin (yes, she's a cousin of those other Rankins) and BC's own Norah Rendell (formerly with Cleia / Maenads / Shirleys) on flute and vocals, with Irish guitarist Cillian O'Dallaigh. They certainly had the crowd dancing at Mission on Sunday night, and received many hoots and hollers of appreciation throughout their excellent set.

The weather is expected to be scorchingly hot all day, and the hall gets little ventilation, so we are looking at the possibility of moving their first set outside the hall tonight. It would then be an acoustic, unplugged set, with excellent viewing places on the outside patios. We may have to move inside for the second set as the sun goes down just before 9pm. We will have free ziploc bags of ice cubes available in covered coolers at various places around the hall, and we encourage you to use the latest issue of the Rogue Folk Review as a fan.

Please come along to enjoy this fine band. We cannot cancel the show at this late stage without losing a great deal of money so your support is absolutely vital - and will be much appreciated. We will do our utmost to keep you as cool as possible, and the music will be way cool!

Depending on how this experiment goes tonight - and if the weather stays this hot - we might have to look at a similar set up for the Fred Eaglesmith show on Sunday. Consequently there will be a second Weekly Update later this week.

Shorefest, Live on Shore fm 104 and atop The Bathhouse in English Bay, Wednesday July 29th, 6:30 - 9pm

Another outdoor concert, this time with B.C.'s Dustin Bentall opening for his father, Barney Bentall, and then 54-40 will perform unplugged for the 3rd and final set. Stick around for the Celebration of Light fireworks show at 10pm. Or if you can't get to the West End, tune in on Shore 104 and don't miss a note. This event is part of our ongoing link with Vancouver's newest radio station, Shore 104. Their motto is Roots, Rock and Rhythm, and their playlist is definitely the coolest on commercial radio in this part of the world. By a country mile. In between songs you'll often hear Colin Linden playing a few guitar licks and talking about the station, and Jim Byrnes has a great new Blues show on Saturday nights (pre-empted again this week for the Shorefest / Celebration of Light simulcast.) Tune in and hear some great music on your car radio or at home and see what we mean when we say it's the best commercial radio station around. They support The Rogue, too, and we helped them to get their license. We hope that Shorefest will be just the beginning of a long and fruitful - and music-full) relationship!

See you tonight!
Steve