Sonic Boom in Calgary

It's fairly unlikely you'd have made it here without ever having heard of Jason's previous incarnation. So here you go, talk away...

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graemejw
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Joined: Tue Mar 27, 2012 3:37 pm

Sonic Boom in Calgary

Post by graemejw »

Had the very unexpected pleasure, in this musical desert known as Alberta, of seeing Sonic Boom on Saturday night. He was part of a small festival put together by some Calgarians featuring amongst others Damo Suzuki, SB, Dean & Britta/Cheval Sombre & Sun Araw.

There were about 500 people there in the strange setting of the British Legion club, some pretty spaced out music happening in a room full of military paraphernalia, faded photos of army veterans & a huge portrait of the Queen gazing down on the stage!!

The bar staff & glass collectors were mostly very old pensioners, who seemed quite oblivious to the cacophony enveloping them especially during the more exuberant warm up sets from local Calgary psyche bands.

Damo Suziuki sounded good, but the man is barely 5ft tall, so unless you were right at the front there was no chance of seeing him. Didn't recognise any Can numbers, just lots of free style grunting to a vaguely Krautrockish backing - good stuff though, I enjoyed it.

Sonic Boom played an hour long set, somewhat plagued by technical difficulties - Pete looked a bit frustrated at times - maybe the pressure of Her Majesty's icy glare bearing down on him. It seemed there was a hardcore of maybe 50 or so who knew what he was about, the idiot hipsters soon drifted off thankfully to go & be impossibly cool elsewhere in the building. I enjoyed the set immensely, havent seen SB/Spectrum live in about 20 years & never expected to see him here in Calgary (OK maybe at our fantastic Sled Island festival - but that was just an idle pipe dream). The set kicked off with Mary & weaved it's way through about 8 songs, a good mix of old & new. I did something I never do afterwards & went up to PK & just thanked him for the pleasure he has given me with is music, I've been listening to Spacemen 3 & the many derivations from them for 25+ years - nobody over here in my new Canadian home really knows much about him or them - it was nice to be back just for a short while.

D&B played a really good set of Galaxie 500 material, I have to admit to not listening to G500 much in recent years but was very surprised at how much of it i recognized & liked. Their spin-off group Cheval Sombre were also pretty cool, PK providing back up noise as well.

All in all, a very enjoyable evening.
runcible
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Joined: Thu Jan 01, 1970 1:00 am
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Re: Sonic Boom in Calgary

Post by runcible »

What a nice and informative review! Wish I had been there.

Welcome aboard Graeme...
eelnekwah
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Posts: 138
Joined: Thu Jan 01, 1970 1:00 am

Re: Sonic Boom in Calgary

Post by eelnekwah »

Thanks Graeme
Reading your review just brought a load of good memories come flooding back to me.
Was in Alberta with the British Army for an exercise (Mar /Apr 92 I think ) out of Medicine Hat . 3 friends and myself had been given about 8 days off to do as we pleased and had just arrived in Calgary after a mini road trip through the Rockies for a week .
Most squaddies just pitched up at the sandman hotel ( do they still exist ? ) but we decided to buck the trend.
After driving round we finally found somewhere , checked in .and went out to find a bar and see the sights.
As soon as we got out the front door we got chatting to some dear old lady and when she found out we were British soldiers she got so excited and promptly whisked us next door to the British Legion.
Pretty much as you described it - memorabilia , pictures etc
We spent the next 3 - 4 hours getting passed round all her friends - tripping the light fantastic on dance floor - ever growing mountain of beers lined up for us.
These people were so surprised / pleased to see some young brits in their club having fun

She did say to be careful though as we had found our way to the wrong side of town though
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