Day 2:

After a semi-decent sleep and waking up a little hungover we dragged ourselves out of the room for what we initially thought was complimentary breakfast but really wasn’t and ended up paying a pretty pricy cost – not exactly the best way to start the day especially when you’re feeling a bit woozy from the night before but oh well, it was kind of said and done by the time we found out.

Anyhow, so we finally check out and find the next room to stay in and once that was settled we ended up meeting up again with the Deforesters and having some nice craft beer at Benelux. I had one of their home brews titled “Uber-Kiwi” which is a golden light Kolsch perfect for the warm (albeit cloudy) weather that day. I had only one beer before I decided to move over to Katacombes where a comedian friend of mine (who also runs an independent concert promotion company called Little Monkey Press) was hosting a matinee comedy show on the patio with various comedians taking the floor for some laughs. The show featured both Montreal and Toronto talent which was unfortunately interrupted by some rain that kept pouring in randomly but it still didn’t dampen the crowd’s spirits however it did soak me up a bit so I had to return to my hotel room to change and take a little nap before the second night began.

Waking up a little later than I planned to, I dashed out to make it out for Audio Visceral, the first band on the night’s list at Foufones Electriques. I’m not entirely sure where I had heard of these guys before but it seemed like a good choice to start the night and they were pretty fun to watch – a combination of pop-punk and party rock this trio is and they didn’t disappoint. Their relatively short set was played %110 and you can tell they were having fun the whole time they were on stage.

Another quick jog to the outdoors Pabst Stage and I managed to catch Survay Says! beginning their set filled with their brand of ska pop-punk that was met with a warm reception despite the gloomy weather of the day. The band had a tight performance and they definitely shined during their moment on stage and didn’t let anything get in the way of them stealing the early evening with their repertoire.

Again, going back up Ste-Catherines to Theatre Ste-Catherines to catch the Fort Worth quartet Not Half Bad (who really were not half bad!) then back again to Foufs for the melodic/hardcore awesomeness of Trigger Happy (a.k.a The Almighty Trigger Happy) and then back – again - to Theatre Ste-Catharines for Bonvivant, a solid punk band from Montreal. Honestly these guys killed it onstage and never left us (the crowd) hanging anytime during the set. The only regrettable thing is that their set was too short but nevertheless it led to the next awesome band, Snacks.

Oddly enough, Snacks and Bonvivant released a 7” inch split during Pouzzafest and so in a way you could say that it was the release party. Snacks also is fronted by a member who also plays in London’s crust-punk band Wasted Potential (who were in the crowd themselves) and it’s a good dose of pop punk goodness that anyone would enjoy if you are into the genre or not. The first song in I was digging it and continued to do so all the way through their set – great melodies, solos and the overall performance really spoke for itself and I’ll definitely be checking them again when they are in town.

This far into the night I finally went to Piranha Bar for my first and only time of the whole Festival to catch Direct Hit!. A tightly packed venue on the second floor of a bar that features a restaurant called Frite Alors! in the basement with a stage. After squeezing through the crowd (which included members of The Bruce Lee Band and Jeff Rosenstock) to grab a beverage of the alcoholic type I watched the band take over the venue with tracks from “Brainless God” and “DomeSplitter” and a rare sight of a temporary 4th member helping out to play Bass for the band which was Rachel Feldmann of Lipstick Homicide. The crowd loved it and showed it by singing along to tracks like “On & On” and “Buried Alive”, one of the best sets of the night for sure.

With no time to spare I again had to race down Ste. Catharines all the way back down to Foufs to catch 88 Fingers Louie, one of the main headliners of the entire festival. On the way down though I randomly ran into an old family friend who happened to just be in the city at the exact same time and moment for his brother’s bachelor party. Weird enough, it’s not the first time I’ve ran into family friends in a French city (2011 in Paris to be exact!). A short conversation ensued and we parted ways which led me to miss the first couple of songs to 88 Fingers Louie’s set but I still made it for most of the set anyways. These guys have had an awkward career from their get-go in 1993 , especially with conflicting schedules for a couple of the members who eventually went to form Rise Against but their set showed no signs of wear and tear even with more than 2 decades up their sleeves by playing various tracks from “Behind Bars”, “Back on the Streets” and “88 Fingers Up Your Ass”.

Guitarist Dan Wlekinski never spared a moment with his guitar solos and on stage antics which included the classic spinning the guitar around his neck (must be great with that wireless transmitter, totally jealous). Frontman Denis Buckley seemed to be enjoying his time on stage also by cracking the odd joke here and there and poking fun at himself even by explaining that since entering Quebec he was only 135 pounds but after eating so many poutines he’s become a lot fatter in such a short time.

About quarter after midnight I managed to catch Success for their set at the TRH Bar which apparently is supposed to stand for “Trash” Bar from what various people told me through the night. The venue features an indoor half pipe with cool boards and designs all hanging on the wall, there aren’t enough intuitive venues like that were you can just sit on the pipe and watch the set start to finish. My buddy was doing sound for these guys and recently recorded their debut full-length album “Radio Recovery” at his studio, Drive Studios, so it was only fitting that he do their sound for the night. Another cool mix of pop-punk (the festival was sure filled with pop-punk acts), they spared no time to play a vast amount of tracks from “Radio Recovery” in the relatively short time they were scheduled to play. Interesting songwriting combined with their performance brought a memorable set which was validated through their previous weeks of touring through the U.S.

Exhausted as hell, I still had one last performance to catch before I called in a night. It actually fit in perfectly at a small venue on Saint-Denis where it conveniently was right across the hotel I was staying in. The venue was L’Exit and like Piranha Bar, Foufones Electriques and TRH Bar the stage was on the second floor which kind of sucks for load in and outs for bands and it gets to you after a while when you’re constantly going up and down these stairs, I’m not sure who designed these venues but It’s very annoying.

Rants aside, Joey Cape actually announced a secret Pouzza set on his Facebook Page and he was going to play L’Exit at 1 am which turned out to not really be a secret since the place was packed by then. Finally getting on stage to the joy of a cheering crowd with his co-performer Brian Wahlstrom they spent a couple of awkward minutes fumbling with the sound (monitors were feedbacking pretty badly) but eventually got started with their set.
And a set it was, clocking in over 1 hour and 45 minutes.

Playing a similar show to the previous night with a few minor changes such as “International You Day” which was originally a No Use For A Name song but Joey had done a split with the late Tony Sly back in 2004 called Acoustic and that song was included on the album. Appearances by Hugo Mudie of The Sainte Catherines (and also the organizer of the whole festival F.Y.I) who went on to sing with Joey “Montreal” which appeared on 2011’s “Joey Cape Doesn’t Play Well With Others” . The crowd appeared to slowly start thinning out at about 2 am but many still stayed to watch the performance of “Razor Burn”, “Making Friends” “To All My Friends” these three were brilliantly sung by the whole crowd. Anything from ‘It’s so small, It’s so small!” to a slower and more intimate version of “She has a new man, I have a new Moustache!” to “To All My Friends, To All My Friends!” everyone gave it their all to those tracks especially and at that hour and after a few beers you couldn’t help to just sing along with the person next to you.

I stayed all through the end and quickly chatted with Joey, a great guy and always has time to talk with anyone, anytime at his shows. Best way to end the Saturday night or Sunday morning, whichever way you want to look at it.

At that point I ran into my buds and we decided to get some late night food at Dagwoods which is like a sort of Subway type of sandwich restaurant. At that time it was the only realistically close and open restaurant which conveniently (not) was filled with loud and somewhat annoying club-goers but we just humbly ate our sandwiches and crashed for the night. Hilariously though our hotel was so cramped that one of my friends couldn’t fit his air mattress on the floor due to the cramped place so he ended up inflating it only half way and slept with half the mattress folded on top of him, it was really funny watching him struggle to get comfortable and banging his head on the wall a couple of times. Nice.