Calgary Bands For Cause Part 2

There are couple things that I feel deserve mention, along with the door donations for this event we also ran a silent auction, we had some amazing items up for auction. "Calgary Bands for Charities" has an awesome Silent Auction team and soon you will be able to learn more about these ladies through the Charity's facebook page. Due to space constrictions I can not go through the list of donors but huge thanks to everyone involved. The Kings Head Pub themselves donated an awesome pub crawl package and Terry Bharti donated a slinky, which Dany B of More Bad News so generously paid $20 for. Awesome job! As well, in order to transition from one band to another, you need a good MC. Filling the position for this event was Eric Paulin lead singer of Flatline Phoenix, Eric did a great job despite hobbling around in a cast from a speaker jumping incident, funnily enough which occured while performing at the Kings Head Pub on a prior night. Shout outs as well to the crew who efficiently changed over the bands. Being that this event was held on Father's Day we did not know what to expect but it was the musicians themselves that embraced this event, not only did they perform but they also donated cash & bought silent auction items. It was something special to watch Freedom Jak from Arcane Sugar join in with Noize Pollution for a Skid Row tune, check out the video further down this blog post. Numerous musicians that were not able to play also came out to show their support, even just to stop in, make a donation and talk to a few people, there were fans and other guests there but the coming together of different Genres of Musicians, as well as the Original and Cover bands all under one roof is an amazing thing to witness.

First Band up for the second half of the event was Suzie X, I wrote about them in the Calgary Bands for Slave Lake blog post featuring Trish Carmody on vocals with some great vetern musicians backing her up, this Alt. Rock band is so amazing to watch. Performing songs like Lump, Creep, Zombie and Man in a Box, they do not disappoint. Suzie X can be found through their facebook page. I believe you can also catch Trish performing with The Kevin Castator Band. Kevin is Trish's father and he was featured in part 1 of this blog post. They are both wicked musicians.

Band number 13 of the day is called InForLife, another local Original Band, these guys were also featured in my Calgary Bands for Slave Lake Blog Post and you can find a couple video of them on my youtube. I have them on my Reverbnation playlist as well, great band. You can also find another photo album on my facebook page of them opening for the Ozzy Osbourne Experience (a wicked tribute band out of Edmonton) InForLife can be found through their facebook page and group as well as Reverbnation and their youtube channel.

Following behind InForLife another of my favorite bands Flatline Phoenix, I still rarely miss a show these guys do, I have written about these guys a couple of times now, in the Calgary Bands for Slave Lake blog post as well as the WICKEDAWESOME Fundraiser one. Featuring Eric, our MC, a young new talent backed up by vetern musicians these guys are just a fun time, down to earth people who love to play Rock N Roll. You can find numerous video of them on my youtube.

Suicide Blonde was next up, it never fails to amaze me that the second this band hits the stage people fill the dance floor, doing a montage of some of the most dancable music ever written, these guys are a rockin good time. Kicking it off with some Black Eyes Peas I Got A Feeling, then Beautiful People, an awesome Marylin Manson tune, straight into Katy Perry I Kissed a Girl, throw in some Rock n Roll Part 2 by Gary Glitter, then finish off with some Rolling Stones, Pick Floyd, The Romantics and John Cougar. You never leave the dance floor. These guys are all amazing long time Calgary musicians. The Drummer Brian Cymbaluk & Axe Music donated the Backline for this event, as well as a guitar signed by Papa Roach, Buck Cherry & My Darkest Days. Brian & Axe Music have stepped up for every one of Calgary Bands For Charties events.You can find Suicide Blonde through their facebook page but Brian always posts upcoming events to the venue page as well as the Live Music Rocks & Lives in Calgary Group.

So to go from one extreme to another we had up next Arcane Sugar, these guys were also featured in my Calgary Bands for Slave Lake Blog post, they are a punk, indy, metal influenced band. They performed some of their originals and the metal queen in me loved them. They can be found through their website www.arcanesugar.com and have a lot of video posted on youtube as well as this one I shot:

Silentpanic, okay I will admit it, my all time favorite Calgary Band. Silentpanic has been featured in all of my fundraiser blog posts to date, because they are always one of the first to step up. I have quite a few video of them on my youtube and you can listen to them on Reverbnation and Youtube, as well as through their website www.themusicofsilentpanic.com. They also have a facebook page. On a side note, as they were taking the stage at this event, and Ty, the Singer, was strapping on his guitar, the strap lock failed sending Ty's beloved guitar crashing to the stage floor. Breaking it. Ty was heartbroken. I believe it was Matt Merlin (someone correct me if I'm wrong) that stepped in and lent Ty his guitar. Ty managed to pull off an awesome performance, even in his heartbroken state. On a happy note, directly after this event, Jamie Warren, our band co-ordinator was able to fix the guitar and have it back to Ty good as new in record time. Jamie is awesome! Next band of the night was also a performer and featured in my Calgary Bands for Slave Lake Blog post.

Cliffhanger , fronted by Marla Carlisle , these guys and gal performed some awesome tunes, such as Heartbreaker, 500 Miles , One Way or Another, and What's Up. I think these are guys are great and my friends that have seen them have nothing but good to say about them. Well worth the effort to look them up and catch a show. Join their facebook page to be invited to their events and check out the video of One way or Another on my youtube.

Up next was one of our Special Guest All-Star bands Noize Pollution, doing an 80's and 90's tribute, this was their second show. This All-Star band is made up of Jeff Evans, Jamie Landry, Terry Talbot, Jamie Warren & Kevin Perrett. Some of the bands these guys have been in include, Noize Boyz, Smash LA, Sugarpuss,Bush League, Sonic Addiction, Crued and 1-900. You can find out more about these guys through their facebook page and you can catch them every long weekend at the Voodoo Lounge. I shot three videos of these guys. This one being my favorite:

The next band I had never in my life heard of , until they hit the stage. Another All-Star surprise band. AFD, Appetite for Destruction, a Gun & Roses tribute made up of Reed Shimozawa and Jamie Warren of Bush League, Terry Talbot, who along with Reed played in one of Calgary's biggest cover bands back in the day, Smash LA, I still have my cassette tape haha, Eddie Tiegs, who I have seen perform with numerous Calgary bands & James Nation of Venom Rain on vocals. What a wicked line up and the perfect singer for this act. They performed Sweet Child O Mine, Nighttrain, which you can find on my youtube, Mr Brownstone with some help on the vocals from our MC Eric Paulin. I can not wait to see these guys again. Check out this video of them:

Which brings us to Mr Furious, who I actually missed tonight due to writing this but if I didn't stop going out and shooting more video and taking more pictures I would never get it written. My apologies to all the bands I have missed out on in the last week. Mr Furious also performed at Calgary bands for Slave Lake, these guys are a heavy metal meltdown. Absolutely love them. Playing music from the 70's right through to the 90's, and every once in a while some new stuff, these guys go back to the heart of my teenage years. Featuring Whiskey Dave on vocals, The Rev on bass and vocals, KellytheBastard on guitar and Rick Lucas on drums, these guys are a must see for any heavy metal fan. Check out the awesome video I shot of them doing Ace of Spades on my youtube.

By this time I had been on my feet, in three inch heels shooting video and pictures for 11 1/2 hours. I was dead tired and I was done but we had one more band to round out the night. I remember groaning and thinking one video a couple pics and I am outta here. Then the Rustic Brothers hit the stage. Exactly as the name sounds, these guys are cozy, comfortable and they drew me in completely. I ended up staying and watching them for as long as I could. I don't know a lot about this band but I intend to learn a lot more, made up of amazing musicians Randy Hutchings, Curtis Cripps, Geoff Brock & Andrzei Ryszka. These guys are an amazing Calgary-Roots Band. Add Rustic Brothers as a friend on facebook to find out where they are playing. You can also catch Curtis Cripps on Wednesdays at Morgans playing in Three Way with Greg Cox and Gil Tougas , two of Calgary's finest musicians. Here is the video I shot of Rustic Brothers, it was the perfect wind down to a long day.

Calgary Bands for Cause was an amazing event, one that I will never forget and was privileged and honored to be a part of. Calgary Bands for Charities is taking a short break from fundraising until the fall. Over the summer we will be setting up the structure of the organization and creating the facebook page that I mentioned in part one. I will be taking a short break from the blog while I focus on helping with the Charity page and set up. Once that is done watch for more blogs from me regarding whats going on in the live music scene in Calgary. In the meantime you can click like on my KariReding-calgarylivemusic.blogspot.com page and check out the video's and pictures I shoot while I'm out and about. I also post some of my favorite upcoming events on there. For other music happenings in Calgary be sure to check out the facebook group Live Music Rocks & Lives in Calgary. Have a great summer eveyone, see you at an event real soon!

Calgary Bands For Cause Part 1

Calgary Bands for Cause Benefit 4 Fundraiser was held on Sunday June 19, 2011 at the Kings Head Pub Calgary (9116 Macleod Trail S), all proceeds were split between four local charities The CJAY 92 Kids fund, Calgary Women's Emergency Shelter, Calgary Interfaith Foodbank & The Calgary Humane Society. This benefit ran from 2pm - 2am and featured 22 local bands. The Kings Head Pub Calgary is an awesome live music venue and the management and staff worked very hard to make this event a success. You can find them through their facebook group Kings Head Pub Calgary or their website www.kingsheadpub.ca! The third fundraiser in a series organized by "Calgary Bands for Charities", The first one "Calgary Bands for Japan" was a massive 2 day event featuring 34 bands , the second "Calgary Bands for Slave Lake" was cozier with only 14 bands. Putting this one, at least in size, right down the middle somewhere. We raised $4000 at this benefit, bringing "Calgary Bands for Charties" fundraising total to $19785.00 in a 14 week period. There are far too many people involved to mention everyone by name but a huge thank you to everyone involved for working their butts off to make this happen. Watch in the coming weeks for the "Calgary Bands for Charity" facebook page where you will be able to see all the volunteers, bands, venues and organizers involved in these events. A special thank you to my good friend Terry-Lee Bharti who had the dream and pulled us all together to make it happen.

It all started at 2pm with a local acoustic solo artist Kevin Castator. He performed some of his original music for us, you can find a video of him on my youtube channel, details regarding my other sites and pages will be at the end of this blog post. Kevin is very easy to listen to and was the perfect opener for a Sunday afternoon event, you can find most of Kevin's music at Reverbnation under The Kevin Castator Band.

Next up was Whyte Wydow..fronted by Jessy Davidson, watch the video in this blog post and I am sure you will agree, this woman can wail! These guys and gal performed a mix of covers and originals and I enjoyed every one of them. From the Double Vision Foreigner cover to Escape, an original Whyte Wydow tune. Whyte Wydow is currently going through some line up changes and are promising us a killer new sound. These guys have a facebook page and can also be found on reverbnation.

Third set of the night (day?) featured a husband and wife team who regularily play around Calgary with a band called BlackSnake Moan..performng for us under the name Spirt Quest, Dawn and Shane used to perform under this name quite frequently a few years back and had put it to rest, we are very happy that they have revived it. We like to call them a modern day Sonny and Cher..Dawn has an amazing voice and they have some awesome originals, the one that stood out for me was the one that I recorded, the very first song Shane wrote specifically for Dawn to sing called "Fires of Hell" You can find BlackSnake Moan on reverbnation and you can find my video of them on my youtube channel.

On we go, Due to "life happening" the next time slot was a struggle to fill but after posting on my facebook wall the need for someone, anyone, even a guy and a guitar..that's exactly what we ended up with, Holmz Grown! I do not have any info on this guy other than his name was Chris and he's a pretty great singer and guitar player. Special thank you to Scott Duiven for bringing him to us. There is also a video of Chris on my youtube channel, I hope to learn more about him for future events and blog posts.

The next band up is called All Hands on Jane. Two young Calgary girls who I saw perform at the Boonstock Band Warz here in Calgary. I believe this benefit was the girls 8th or 9th public performance. With Teri on guitar and main vocals and Tess on Drums and back up vocals, these ladies performed 6 of their originals..the video I recorded is of their song Breaking Hearts. All hands on Jane has been playing around Calgary on an increasingly regular basis. You can find All Hands on Jane through their facebook page as well as myspace. These girls are young and just starting out and I am really looking forward to watching them grow. Great job girls!

How do you follow two very sweet talented young girls..how about with some high energy glam rock courtesy of Lixx and Kisses. I previously wrote about these guys when they performed at Calgary Bands for Slave Lake..this full costume and make up 80's tribute band knows how to party, not only did they perform some of my very favorite 80's tunes like Looks that Kill,Round and Round & Talk Dirty to me, as well as one of my all time favorite tunes Fantasy, which I recorded and posted to my youtube as well. There is at least one video per band that performed at this event posted to my youtube, with unfortunate exception of one, which did not turn out, all 31 videos I shot are posted to my youtube channel. Lixx and Kisses once again stuck around for the duration and can be seen dancing, jigging and moshing their way through the day in most of the Calgary Bands for Cause Videos.

I have also written about this next band before in my WICKEDAWESOME fundraiser blog post. Stanger Than Fiction, these guys are a really rocking band doing a great range of tunes, still don't know much about this bands background, other than Carrin is a smoking singer and Matt , the guitar player, used to play in Silentpanic, Stranger than Fiction can be found gigging all over the city. Check out their group on facebook for more information. Every song they performed on this day was awesome but my favorites were All my Life and Pretender. Here's a peak at what this band is capable of:

Next we went into an acoustic version of More Bad News, these guys play around town alot but I haven't had a chance to catch up with them yet, I hear the full out version of the band is awesome and I do intend to catch up with them soon, I however loved the acoustic stuff they did. So much so that I am posting their video as well!

Songs like Have you ever seen the Rain, as seen on the video, Till I am Myself Again, Heart of Gold, Yellow, they even threw in That's Alright. Love that Elvis tune! Keep track of where these guys are playing through their facebook page.

Next up and running along a similar vein was The Hot Tamales. I have absolutely no info on this band and unfortunately their's was the only video that the sound was too distorted for me to post. These guys were great to watch, one of the only bands I have seen with a female bass player, she also did some singing, they did an awesome version of Jackson, that even Johnny and June would have been proud of! As well they did Hard Days Night, Waiting on the World to Change and a few others, I hope to get a chance to see these guys again and find out more about them.

Berkley Shea and the County Boys..what can I say about Berkley that I didn't say when I blogged about him in the Rock the Cure blog post..oh ya , Berkley showed up and informed us that the County Boys could not make it, so he hired an accordian player, and he could'nt make it, so we had Berkley and his guitar and some songs he didn't know the guitar parts for. A little disconcerting for the organizers of the event, but Berkley assured us he was ready to go. And he was, when Berkley hits the stage an east coast kitchen party atmosphere just permeates the bar. If you don't want to watch all 31 videos :o) I strongly recomend you do not skip over the Berkley Shea video, featuring him performing The Night that Paddy Murphy Died and Lixx and Kisses doing the jig!

Last band Im going to talk about in part one is a local Original band called Kingdom of Few, I had never seen them live before this event but at the urging of mutual friends I listened to the songs they have posted on reverbnation and found some video on youtube. These guys are awesome and I listen to them at least once a day! This band is modern rock n roll all the way. I just can't say enough about them. Performing five (?) of their originals, they included my two very favorite songs Rich Man and On the Corner, check out the video I have posted here, as well as the one for Deloreon, which is also a very rockin tune, on my youtube.

That wraps up the first half of the day, all my video shot for the first 11 bands that performed can be found on my Karisoccermom youtube channel or for the entire photo album of the event as well as a youtube link to my vidoes you can go to my facebook page Kari Reding-calgarylivemusic.blogspot.com. Read on in part 2 for the rest of the amazing talent that donated their time to this event.