Cameron Carpenter's Big Adventures At CMW

By Cam Carpenter

As per usual, FYI lured intrepid socialite, sports enthusiast and ever-present Indie Week Programmer, Cameron Carpenter to cover the late night CMW parties. A man known to burn the midnight candle and be on deck the next day with his trademark smile, he files a series of reports from about town, naming names and extolling the virtues of musicians playing stages during CMW's end-to-end Festival.

Saturday

The lobby was a little quieter on Saturday as for many of the attendees it is travel day; however, I did still manage to see Elliot Lefko from Goldenvoice and catch up with  Evenko's Patrick Guay.

It was then time for the 15th Annual Music Nova Scotia Tiki Lounge party at the Rivoli, hosted by Mike Campbell along with MNS's Serge Samson. There was a lot of buzz about the performers this year during the industry-only portion of the night, and the crowd kept building long after the doors opened to the public.

Spotted during the event were Onta Shiroh Kawaguchi from Creativeman in Tokyo, Michael Bisping from A.S.S. Concerts Germany, Andre Noblat from CoMA Fest in Brazil, Indica's Franz Schuller, Believe's Georges Tremblay, Brooks and Fiona Diamond and family, Pheromone's Kim Cooke, Warner's Steve Kane and Steve Coady, Classified and of course our very own Hall of Famer David Farrell. It was great to see City Councillors Mary-Margaret McMahon and Josh Colle drop by to catch some non-Toronto music.  

Next door, at the Horseshoe, I managed to see The Standstills, The Static Shift (hot off their appearance on The Launch), Attica Riots and Canadian rock royalty the Northern Pikes, all represented by the APA Agency led by Ralph James and Jack Ross.

Over at the Bovine, I saw a late-night set from Uni, and then Brazil's Trampa took the stage at 3 AM closing the night at the 8th Birthday party at Cherry Cola's. 

Friday

Started the day off with a quick visit to the hotel where I saw Billboard's Karen Bliss, producer Eddie Kramer, CMW's Gary Taylor, ‎Montreal publicist Kataryna Wnek, Coalition's Eric Lawrence and Rob Lanni, Buffalo promo legend Bruce Moser, local rockers Phantom Atlantic, The Bloom Effect's Fiona Bloom and APA's Jack Ross. 

eOne and Last Gang hosted their annual afternoon event at their beautiful downtown offices, and it was great to catch up with Jonny and Renee from The Standstills who were talking about their upcoming tour with Sebastian Bach. Vancouver's Lyle Chausse was there with his artist, Whale and The Wolf, and MRG Concert team Justin Kwan and Timur Inceoglu were also spotted. 

Over at the Indie Week offices, Darryl Hurs and his team (myself included) hosted our annual event where Indie Week alumni drop by for some Hop City and Jack Daniel's hospitality. 

Belgium's Victoria + Jean kicked off the night of great music with their intense set at The Painted Lady. We also caught Ottawa's Harea Band and ‎North Carolina's Grown Up Avenger, and by a weird coincidence all the Indie Week alumni.

Down at The Bovine, it was three parties at once as the rooftop Tiki Bar revellers partied away to classic soul and funk, the main floor rocked with Starcrawler and DJ Vania was spinning his usual eclectic mix of tunes. 

Thursday

All days should begin like Thursday morning with a fine breakfast spread, Mimosas and great music compliments of Jodie Ferneyhough and his team at CCS Rights Management. We spotted Joanne Setterington from Indoor Recess, Epitaph's Tonni Maruyama, producer Karen Kosowski, Feldman's Jordan Powley, Polaris Prize founder Steve Jordan, Arts - Craft's Emy Eligh and MROC's Julian Train enjoying the sounds of Mattie Leon, Maia and. Echlo. 

Next up was the Inside Pocket party at The Rivoli where Daemon Grey, League of Wolves, Havelin and Maia performed, and company founder Gavin Brown was also seen on stage playing drums and keyboards. Staffers Brendan McCarney, Dajuan Martineau and Dan Hand were on hand to welcome such guests as Imprint's Jesse Coburn and Grayson Mathews and Chris Corless.

Bonsound staged their annual afternoon event The Supermarket which included a fierce performance from Belgium's It It Anita. Host Gourmet Delice entertained Planetary's Adam Lewis, SSA Musics Kurt Schmel and Kelly Plante and Robert Singerman from LyricFind.

Around the corner at The Hideout, Patrick Zulinov and Scott Rondeau staged an afternoon event for Music Heals which raises money and awareness for music therapy programs across Canada.

Down at The Velvet Underground, Embrace and Paradigm presented an evening of music featuring Poesy, Jon Bryant, Drama Music. Langston Francis and New City. Paradigm's Rob Zifarelli, Sean Murray and Adam Countryman were both on hand and I also spotted Warped Tour founder Kevin Lyman, publicist Melanie Kaye, producer Hill Kourkoutis, Embrace's Ewan Exall and Bovine owner Darryl Fine. 

The last stop of the evening was the completely sold-out Horseshoe show by July Talk who played a rare and fantastic club show. City of London's Cory Crossman was on hand as were musician Stuart Cameron, Universal's Jon Box and producer Garth Richardson. 

Wednesday

The hotel started buzzing Wednesday afternoon, and I spotted Sony's Sean Cordner, musicians Luther Mallory and Dylan Hennessy, Mediabase's Brett Gelfant, Doug Elliott from 94.9 The Rock, FYI's Kerry Doole, Michael McCarty from Socan, RPM's India Coran, artist manager Graham Stairs and radio doctor J.J. Jo‎hnston.

Next stop was the Songwriters Association of Canada's post-AGM reception at The Vault at 1 King West. It was great to catch up with President Emeritus Eddie Schwartz, Northern Pike Bryan Potvin, songwriters Stan Meissner, Dav Doyle, Angela Saini and Robyn ‎Dell'Unto.

Back at the hotel, I ran into manager Jake Gold, Bob Lefsetz, Ole's Andy Hawke, Bell Media's Tyson Parker and the National Music Centre team of Rob Braide, Kym Butler and Andrew Mosker. 

Brazil's rockers Trampa started the night off at the Bovine which was filled with fans and media, including Indie Can Radio's Joe Chishom, Unpeeled's John MacNeil and Scott Burns from Rock Source. Vancouver's Dopey's Robe was next with their groovy psych-rock. Yellowknife's NAHGA was a one-man show at Cherry Cola's with his shredding guitar accompanied by beats and samples. Next up was Redcoat who rocked the Bathurst venue.

France's Slim Paul played another great set at The Paddock and impressed both Mike Campbell (hot off The Carleton win as ECMA Venue of the Year) and Six Shooter's Shauna de Cartier. 

The Tiki Bar at the Bovine was very Montreal with Sony's ‎Stephane Drolet, Stingray's Patrick Binette and Frederick Ranger and Greenland's Daniel Webster.

The last stop was The Horseshoe where the bands had finished, but the front bar was still packed with eOne's Nathan Quinn and ‎Scott Givens and The Field's Cherie Sinclair who was honoured on Sunday night at The Prism Prize.