OLP Herald Nostalgia in Ottawa

I walked into the TD Place with hesitation.

The weather was peculiar and I wondered if this trip to Ottawa would be worth my time and attention. I’ve seen both main acts on this bill multiple times and neither act was screaming at me as tremendously relevant right now.

I took a seat as Matt Good began his third song. The weather had slowed traffic to a crawl and I had such diminished expectations that I was reluctant to be there. I had missed the Ascot Royals, the up and coming Brantford-based rag tag group made up of natives of the UK, Israel and Canada. From all accounts, they put on a hell of an opening act, including an extremely energetic performance by lead vocalist Jimmy Chauveau.

I looked around and noticed just how incredibly full this venue seemed to be. Truth be told, this was my first time sitting at TD Place since it became TD Place and since the spectacular redevelopment of Lansdowne Park. And then it dawned on me…I had sat at this venue before. I had watched Out Lady Peace in this very room when it was known as the Ottawa Civic Centre while they toured on the Gravity Tour…that was at least 15 years ago. For a moment I felt old.

But for the remainder of the night…I felt young again.

As Matt Good blasted meticulously through classics like Hello Time Bomb, Apparitions, Weapon and no shortage of other successful hits, he sprinkled the set list with new numbers from his forthcoming album and each song sounded fresh and as passionate as he has been known to be.

Matter of fact, as someone who has seen Matt Good on no less than five or six occasions, I can tell you that this was one of the best and most articulate performances I had seen, and that might be because he was opening….sometimes a man has something to prove.

As the audience awaited Our Lady Peace, I was ready to go home. Matt Good said more and proved more in forty minutes than most artists do in a tour. How could Our Lady Peace live up to this? How could anything live up to Matt Good’s always stirring and heartfelt Apparitions, which never ceases to remind me of those moments when I felt lost or worse, those moments when those I love felt lost and I lost them.

And then OLP hit the stage. The audience buzzed with anticipation. Could this be as good as it once was?

Truthfully, it was at least three songs before I felt the energy. Tone and pitch are sometimes questionable at a live show. Superman’s Dead just didn’t hit the chords with me that it used to

…And then it happened.

All of a sudden I was fifteen years old all over again. As songs from last 90s masterpieces Clumsy and Happiness…Is Not A Fish That You Can Catch filled me with nostalgic memories of being a loner in elementary school and making mix cassettes filled with songs I thought showed off my emotional side. Cassettes that I would use to impress girls…if I ever had the courage to talk to them.

I remember playing Clumsy until it needed to be replaced, so of course it was emotional recalling just how much this band once meant to me.

I remember living in a park in mallorytown when my mother’s marriage went through a pretty dark patch, and her and I singing their songs to each other around a campfire that we were lucky to have.

I remember seeing this concert in this very room and holding up my pay-as-you-go flip phone so that my mom could hear them sing 4AM because we couldn’t afford a second ticket so she waited outside in our shitbox car.

I remembered how Gravity being released was the biggest and most important moment in a summer full of angst and emotional upheaval as I briefly experienced homelessness, and all I had to focus on was my favourite band.

I remember thinking that life was waiting for me…even if it was all messed up.

So an acoustic version of Somewhere Out There, coupled with a moving rendition of Are You Sad?, and surprise covers of Neil Young, the Tragically Hip and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs only further made this concert moving and significant.

Blasting through some heavier-than-epected new numbers and finishing with Starseed and an all-star signalong with Matt Good, all I could think was even if this band isn’t dominating the radio, they sure as shit don’t get nearly enough respect for their craftsmanship.

I’m 15 years old, moved to tears by a song on a CD I bought from a pawn shop because I couldn’t possibly afford a new one. And with the blink of an eye I am 30 years old, performing my own music and I’ve attended in the neighbourhood of 200 plus concerts and festivals and seen thousands of bands.