LUCIDMEDIA

Cutting Edge Music Festival – Saturday Review

Written by Andrew Skinner Tuesday, 04 August 2009 10:25

By the time I got to Bingeman’s Park in Kitchener, the Cutting Edge Music Festival was bathed in sun and fun already, it was the people’s best chance yet this year to show off their tattoos. Our movements somewhat corralled along tall black fences, it was a pleasant area that from the road dips down into what feels like a valley of trees and fields overlooked by a huge water slide.

As usual at a festival like this it took the better part of a day for the partying young to get through the gates, set up their tents and move out to join the music. In this case, they had to lug huge quantities of beer, coolers, jugs of water, tents, blankets and all kinds of other party maximizers up a pretty substantial hill to the camping area, which was a full city by about 5 o’clock. Some complained of the long lineup, but it was all part of the effort for a summer blast.

The Balance started off the day at noon though many people weren’t yet attending performances. Still, they gave it their all and played like there were hundreds of people in the crowd. Next were local rockers Desperate Union, and from the Greater Cobourg Area, the Gentlemen Husbands. Things started to pick up a little in the crowds with the Tyler Schwende Band, Isle of Thieves, and Rosedale who did an A-ha rendition of “Take me on,” sure to get some attention.

Praised by The Hours’ George Stroumboulopoulos were Dame, the holy moly rock babe band made up of Ali, Kayla and Katee, and now a bit of a crowd started to form along with the day’s beautiful warm winds. Followed by The Good Times Band, and then the tattooed arms and blue eyes band The Stereos got a little more hip hoppy for the last two songs when Jhevon Paris came out to join them and said, “Somebody told me this was a party town, but it seems really quiet out there.” Keepin’ 6 on at 4.30 is when the ska hardcore dancing circle started.

One could see where the day would end up, as hardcore music became the order with Dead and Divine’s thundering. No matter what, it was a hard act to follow for the Snips with horns and trombones on the Budweiser stage. Such heavy sounds pleased the crowd, and Divine handing out piles of free CD’s doesn’t hurt either.

After The Artist’s Life at 6 pm came Baptized in Blood who wanted to party with everyone and chanted “F*** s*** up!” in screeching vocals. You could often see Cutting Edge performers walking around or joining the audience and I was surprised to see Andrew W. K. and Protest the Hero socializing and signing autographs in the lounge tent, although Moe the drummer assured me they were staying at a local motel and not camping.

The Bronx had poetic words about the friendship of Canada and America, and a warning before launching into a heavy tune that “They will kill us all!” Those who couldn’t quite handle the pit still had the well used and nearby basket ball hoop for lighter body bumping.

Kingdoms punk Hutton loves his fans, which he proved by twice climbing out into the crowd ordering everyone to pile into him, scorching out lyrics and managing to crawl back. He did a great job pumping up the crowd and telling them that his bouncer friends were bored and that we should all give them something to do.

Holy man Andrew W. K. knows how to tease the crowd’s senses mastering empathy through self deprecation. At one point playing some light piano he stopped and said “I feel like I gotta puke.” The sincerity comes across also when he talks about his flight being cancelled and having to drive all the way from New York in a Lincoln Town Car. “Of all the things people can do. We decided to be here. And you decided to be here,” he said. “Pretend tonight is the last night you’re going to be alive and go crazy.” And everybody did.

Just before Protest the Hero went on, the Budweiser truck ran out of beer, something I thought was impossible and so would you if you saw this truck. But this had nothing to do with the ‘Protest! Protest!’ chant. PTH’s words were provocative badness pushing boundaries of decency rather unlike every other band. We are told some guy wearing a PTH T-shirt was arrested for raping a young girl recently, but one band member says this story was made-up. “This song is for the guys, don’t rape anyone tonight,” they shouted adding, “I saw a T-shirt today that I thought said F*** Canada, but no, it said F*** Cancer.” Proving that they can do and say whatever they want, as long as there’s some correction, it’s implied can everyone else let loose for an hour. Somehow someone’s wallet ended up on stage, and despite all Rody Walker’s best efforts it was an impossible task to return it to a sea of waving arms.

He brought someone on stage named Enrique to do a Michael Jackson dance in the late singer’s honour, but the dance didn’t really succeed, “He died a long time ago as far as I’m concerned,” Walker said. It is amazing to watch from atop the Bud truck the swirling vortex of the slam mosh pit rotate and I dare not even mention Woodstock in the same breath. Carried by paramedics, I saw a man strapped to a stretcher who appeared so big that it is amazing to me he ever could have surfed any crowd.

This was about as far from Thunderheist’s Donna Summers inspired Isis as you can be. It was a gearing down and fresh start. It wasn’t a Chinese buffet restaurant and wedding hall but set up to imitate, successfully I would say, a dance club -the Smirnoff Dance Warehouse that was somewhat outside the fenced park. Like the ancient goddess, Isis stands straight clapping “Jerk it.” Her disarming funny personality was probably just what the crowds needed to ease into this different scene, as things wound down by the main stages around 11 o’clock, and there was just a very light rain begin to fall as she went up.