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SATE, the fifty first state. Where the status quo, inhibitions, and rules do not apply. Everyone should spend time with SATE, to reenergize their world.

Boots & Bourbon Saloon hosted the album release party for Runaway Angel on April 22nd and of course, it didn’t disappoint.

East coast rockers, The Trews, are wrapping up a coast to coast acoustic tour which has seen them play various venues across the country. Saturday night the tour made its stop in London, ON, at the London Music Hall. Now, let me start by saying, I love this venue; amazing sound, amazing lighting and not really a bad spot to sit or stand in the place. London is lucky to have this world-class venue and it seems more and more acts are signing up to play there.

The Trews perform to a sold out crowd at The London Music Hall – photo: Bill Woodcock

The Trews brought a powerful show, and any one of the capacity crowd who were there, will likely tell you that it was an amazing night. From the moment they hit the stage, with a thunderous roar from the crowd, they were rocking. As a guy who has covered a lot of country music events lately, it was a refreshing change of pace. Having been a big The Trews fan for many years, I was excited to see how a stripped down acoustic set would be. Not only was I impressed, but I would go out and say this show likely made my top 5 all time concerts, and I have been to a few over the years.

The Trews perform to a sold out crowd at The London Music Hall – photo: Bill Woodcock

They opened the show with, “The Power of Positive Drinking”, and the hits just kept rolling from there. Highlights of the show, for me, included all their classics with a different sound to them being done acoustically. “Hope and Ruin”, “Yearning”, “Poor Ol Broken Hearted Me”, all had the crowd singing along so loud, that at times you could hear them overpowering the amazing sound system of the London Music Hall.

The Trews perform to a sold out crowd at The London Music Hall – photo: Bill Woodcock

One part of the show that gave me goosebumps was when they took a few minutes to explain the story behind their fan favorite,  “Highway of Heroes”, and then played it. This song has become an iconic song in Canada, and particularly Ontario, where the Highway of Heroes saw a lot of soldiers make their final journeys home from serving our country overseas. This particular song truly affected me, as they performed it, letting the crowd sing the chorus a few times. I don’t think there was a single person in the place that didn’t belt out the words. It truly honors our fallen heroes and will for many generations to come.

The Trews perform to a sold out crowd at The London Music Hall – photo: Bill Woodcock

@thetrews what an amazing night! @londonmusichall @FM96Rocks @SoundCheckBlg @strutent #highwayofheros #thankyou pic.twitter.com/0T53dKp0v8

— Bill Woodcock (@BillWoodcock) March 13, 2016

After being on the stage for the best part of two and a half hours, they finally gave the crowd the word that the show was ending. Someone yelled out and asked if they could do it again tomorrow, to which they replied, “sure!”. The Trews left the stage but the crowd wasn’t done yet. They chanted and cheered for a few minutes and the boys of The Trews came back out and gave a solid acapella performance of, “Ish and Mag”, to start what would be a two song encore. To wrap up the show it was time for, “Not Ready to Go”, which, judging by their reaction, the crowd was not ready to go!   All amazing things must come to an end, however, and we can hope The Trews make their way back to the London area soon.

Bill Woodcock – @BillWoodcock

MORE PHOTOS…

The Trews perform to a sold out crowd at The London Music Hall – photo: Bill Woodcock

The Trews perform to a sold out crowd at The London Music Hall – photo: Bill Woodcock

The Trews perform to a sold out crowd at The London Music Hall – photo: Bill Woodcock

The Trews perform to a sold out crowd at The London Music Hall – photo: Bill Woodcock

The Trews perform to a sold out crowd at The London Music Hall – photo: Bill Woodcock

The Trews perform to a sold out crowd at The London Music Hall – photo: Bill Woodcock

A night of authenticity, honor, heartfelt appreciation and admiration was surrounding the audience as Frankie Ballard performed a memorable show at the historic Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa on Saturday night. This was one of the stops on his National Tour. 

First thing you think about Vegas sure isn’t Country Music. But let me tell you after Wednesday nights performance by Rascal Flatts at The Joint, I think Country should own Sin City.

It was late November and Autumn Hill, Jason Benoit and River Town Saints played four shows on a quick little jaunt across Ontario with the first stop in Ottawa then off to Hamilton, Kitchener and London to close things out.   Four fantastic nights of music.  We were made it to three of the shows and well we all agreed that all were fantastic.

So it’s no big secret that Justin Beiber is on his way home to play a special acoustic set at the Danforth Music Hall on Monday night (Dec 7th) aka Purpose In Toronto.   When it was announced on Tuesday it quickly became the most coveted ticket this holiday season.  

Cast in Cadence is a solo project which morphed into a touring band. Originally just Ryan MacIntyre in Toronto the now four piece call Ottawa home. We had a chance to chat with the band before their Hope Volley Ball Show where they opened for Sam Roberts. HOPE is committed to raising money for local Ottawa charities and over the years has donated more than 3.5 million dollars to over 110 charities. HOPE,  “Helping Other People Everywhere”. Thanks to Sean Sisk for shooting this one for me!

SC: How’d the Hope Volleyball show come together?

CIC: The Hope show is one we’ve wanted to play for years, as does any local Ottawa band. Sunshine, beer and jams with over 20,000 people….who wouldn’t want to play it!? However, the organizers have kept the opening slots available only for local bands who have taken a winning place in radio station, Live 885’s “Big Money Shot” (a battle of the bands). We were fortunate to take second place this year along side our friends Lemon Cash and the Lionyls.

SC: Can you tell me about the first show you played together?

CIC: So Cast In Cadence actually started as a solo project by myself (Ryan MacIntyre) in which I was writing and recording pretty well everything myself in the studio. Our latest album “Vocation” was my second release and I decided I no longer wanted to be a “one man wolf pack” nor did I want to be perceived as a solo project. So I searched Ottawa and surrounding cities for solid musicians who have similar tastes in music and want to do this seriously. I found the guys (Nick Marson – drums, Skyler Radmore – bass/vocals, Adam Traversy – lead guitar/vocals) just before sending the album off for post production and just in time to throw a show together have group pics taken for the album. Our first gig was at Zaphods (in june of 2014). I think we rehearsed maybe twice before that show but the boys killed it anyways and I remember having a smile the entire set. I hadn’t had that much on stage in a long while.

SC: Last show you attended as a fan?

CIC: Well technically the very last show I attended as a fan would have been at Hope watching Sam Roberts (whom we had the chance to sit down and have a beer with coolest dude in the biz!). Before that would have been a ton of my all time fav bands at Montebello’s “Rock Fest” last Month in June. I caught Sublime with Rome, Deftones, Offspring, Rancid, Mad Caddies, The Pixies and a ton of other bands I can’t remember for reasons we’ll leave unspoken. It was an amazing weekend and I highly recommend checking out this fest to any rock fan who hasn’t been yet. Take a nap before you go though, you’ll need it! 😉

SC: Where did you record Vocation?

CIC: All of Vocation was tracked at Drive Studios in Toronto with Flatliners’ producer/former manager, Steve Rizun except for “Coming Down” recorded here in Ottawa @ Pebble Studio (mainly because I wanted real people to track the violin/cello part vs. using synth) with engineer extraordinaire Mike Bond and “Slacker” which was recorded at The Armoury Studio in Vancouver in 2012 with engineer Paul Dutil as a sort of spontaneous/last minute recording session on my drive to Los Angeles.

SC: This started as a solo project, how did working with a band change the writing process?

CIC: Immensely! Normally I’m just chill’n out alone in a quiet room with an acoustic guitar and whatever I can scribble lyrics onto (if my lyric book isn’t on hand). Ill come up with a few ideas and the song is written. With these guys there are ideas musically I never would have conjured on my own. Of course there are times when collaborating where we’ll reach a disagreement on a certain part or idea but through this process we always come out with a final product better than any of us would have created otherwise. This has happened for songs like “Out The Door”, our latest single “On Your Way” and a brand new song not yet recorded “A Million Miles” which was pretty well written in an hour and started with Sky and Adam repeating a simple/cool little riff on their guitars.

SC: Did the 88.5 contest change the opportunities available to the band?

CIC: Absolutely. For one we wouldn’t have had the opportunity to do this show with Sam Roberts, or even this interview for that matter. Its given us the clout required to say we’re not just a hobby garage band, we’re serious about this and we’re writing songs which we believe rock fans want to hear and are now slowly being able to thanks to Live and other stations now spinning us. Plus, it’s pretty rad to turn on your car and hear yourself on the radio.

SC: When are you coming back to play Toronto?

CIC: Well considering our guitarist just moved there (and is making the commute for rehearsals) sooner than later is my guess. 😉 We’re in talks with the guys at The Horseshoe and will hopefully be lining something up before the summer’s out. I’ve seen many shows there, love that bar!

SC: And I have to ask… what’s the origin of the band name.

CIC: Unfortunately there’s no awe-inspiring story behind the meaning of the name “Cast In Cadence”. Quite simply, I always loved the name Cadence and was originally going with that until I searched it on Youtube and Myspace and realised how many other artist were under this alias. So I wanted to find a name no one on the planet had ever used before. Something completely original. I then came up with “In Cadence” but still found other musicians using this. It was in Beijing China 2010, I was playing a festival with a band I was drumming for. I was showing them and fellow bands from the festival the mixes of the first CIC album “Serotonin” and telling them about my quest for originality name dilemma over a few drinks in a hotel room. Somewhere in the mix of Chinese beer and rusty trombone jokes (delivered by the good fellas in an amazing Swedish punk band, Los Polados, check them out!) I blurted out “Cast” In Cadence and we all loved it. I made a Facebook page the very next day, and we all know when you make anything Facebook official now a days it’s a done deal. So here we are, Cast In Cadence. 😉

Thanks to Ryan for talking with us and I’m hoping I get a chance to see them live myself, soon.

Well,  It was the last day of the bid weekend.  Most say they save the best for last.  It’s pretty tough to top Eric Church and Dallas Smith as headliners.   But when you get Thomas Rhett & Florida Georgia Line ya at least have a shot.   And lets just say these guys came to party.   I am a HUGE Thomas Rhett fan and have been for years (5 or 6 now at least) I can still remember seeing him take the stage in Chicago at Joe’s on Weed St.  Performing after Brad Paisley’s big Wrigley Field gig as the after party to maybe 300 people and then witnessing the show yesterday.