Three Saturday's ago now, my buddies RCD, Buzzard and I went to the Edmonton Rock Music Festival held at the Heritage Amphitheatre in Hawrelak Park. This was the ninth edition of this festival which is a two day fest, but we only attended the Saturday. The Friday edition did have a couple of good bands including Sloan and the Odds. I had never been to this festival before as it is usually just a bunch of washed up has beens, but this year there was one band that I had to see and are from being washed up, I am speaking of The Pursuit Of Happiness.
The first band we caught was Darby Mills. Darby used to front the band the Headpins, but has now been a solo artist the past three years, with a new project called the Darby Mills Project. I've never been a fan of the Headpins but thought it would be fun to see her in concert. She did do a few Headpins songs like "Just One More Time" and of course their biggest hit "Don't It Make Ya Feel". Darby (the queen of scream) sounded good she still has a pretty good voice even at the age of 60. Most of her set though was made up of cover songs by the likes of Nazareth (Hair Of The Dog), the song made famous by Janis Joplin "Piece Of My Heart" and closing out her set with a version of the Allman Brothers Band's "Whipping Post".
Darby Mills.
Next up was Wide Mouth Mason from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. This would be my fifth time seeing them in concert. I was a little disappointed to not see Gordie Johnson of Big Sugar fame not playing bass with the band this time around. I just couldn't get into them this time. They were alright but nothing special.
Wide Mouth Mason.
Next was The Pursuit Of Happiness, this is the reason RCD and I were at this festival. This would be my sixth time seeing TPOH in concert. I was surprised that they weren't the headliners, but at least if we didn't want to stick around we could be home at a decent time.
TPOH led by Edmonton native Moe Berg on guitar and vocals put on a wicked show as they always do. They played pretty much the whole Love Junk album, but not only that they pulled out some other favourites like "Gretzky Rocks" from their 1995 Where's The Bone album, plus a couple of songs from The Downward Road album "Cigarette Dangles" one of my favourites of theirs and also "Pressing Lips" from said album. Another great song played was "Two Girls In One" from their sophomore album One-Sided Story. A nice surprise was hearing the song "Let My People Go" which was a B-side from the Love Junk era and only released on the Sex & Food: The Best Of TPOH album. Of course they left their biggest hit "I'm An Adult Now" until the very end. Such an amazing show. I would go see TPOH again anytime. A fun band that sounded great and looked to be having a blast on stage. It's a shame they only had an hour long set.
The Pursuit Of Happiness.
Prine Edward Island band Haywire were up next. I didn't even know this band was still around. This would be my second time seeing haywire in concert, the first time was when they opened for Helix back in 1987. I was never a fan of the band but have to say they were a lot of fun this time around. At one point during the show a guy in front of us was waving around a vinyl copy of Haywire's 1987 album Don't Just Stand There. Lead singer Paul MacAusland spotted the guy with the album and grabbed it from him and then proceeded to sign it and take it to each member of the band and had them autograph it as well, all while still playing a song. I thought that was pretty cool. I asked buddy if I could get a picture of his autographed album, so here is the picture. They sure looked a lot different back in 1987.
Haywire.
After Haywire is when I wasn't sure how I was going to enjoy the rest of the evening. Up next was Tommy Tutone (Tommy Heath), a pop band from the early 80's with one big hit, that being the song "867-5309/Jenny". It took me a fucking week to get that damn song out of my head. Other then that they were forgettable for the most part.
Tommy Tutone.
After their short set it was Greg Kihn. Again another band that had their hey days in the early 80's. When I think of Greg Kihn I just think of how often you see his records at garage sales, flea markets and the bargain bins at record shops. He obviously was huge at one time. I did recognize a few of his songs from his short set. Songs like "Jeopardy" from his Kihnspiracy album, and "The Breakup Song (They Don't Write 'Em)" from his Rockihnroll album. At 70 years old Greg Kihn looks and sounds pretty good. I'll give him that.
Greg Kihn.
Headlining the night was 80's teen idol Rick Springfield making this his second appearance in the Edmonton area in the past five months having played River Cree Casino in March.
Now I've never been a fan of Rick Springfield unlike my punk music loving brother Citrus. I've always made fun of my Bro. for his musical taste in Springfield, but hey a guilty pleasure is a guilty pleasure. Because of his liking Rick, I did read Springfield's memoir he wrote years ago, I found the book in a bargain bin for a few dollars and did read it. It was actually a decent read. Rick really did live the life in the 80's, between the drink, drugs, women and battling depression, it was an interesting read and gave me a respect for him.
Springfield and his band put on a great show I have to admit. Rick sounded great as did his back up band. I was surprised again at how many of his songs I actually did know, I figured the only song I would recognize is his hit "Jessie's Girl" from his 1981 album Working Class Dog. Even at 70 years old, Rick can still woo the women in attendance, as much of the front of the stage were ladies rocking out and blowing him kisses. And being Rick, he was loving it and working the crowd. Several times during his performance Rick would have a bouquet of roses in his strumming hand and pull off the big Pete Townshend windmill and smash the roses across the strings throwing rose petals all over the stage. Kind of a cool gimmick, just wish I could have got a picture of that, but to no avail.
Behind Rick and his band was a big screen projecting images and videos of Rick and his appearances in movies and of course clips of him in the soap opera General Hospital. I was quite surprised by how rocking his hour long set was, I wasn't expecting that at all. He did about a ten minute medley of some of his biggest hits, and then closing out the night with a bang playing "Don't Talk To Strangers", "Human Touch", "Love Somebody" and ending the set with "Jessie's Girl". I actually enjoyed his show, and at 70 years old Rick still has a good voice and looked to be having a lot of fun on stage performing.
All and all this was a very fun night out, beer prices were reasonable which was good as we indulged quite a bit, the crowd was awesome, though it wasn't near sold out, the weather held out ( as our summer has sucked ass), great venue, fun atmosphere, the smoking area was a fun place to hang out when things did get boring, and of course hanging out with a couple of great frineds made it a lot of fun. Good times!!!
Rick Springfield.
T-shirt.
