Filed under: Concerts and Tours, News, Exclusive
Frank Yang, Chromewaves
ROUYN-NORANDA, QUEBEC - From California's
Coachella to Chicago's
Lollapalooza to Montreal's
Osheaga, there's a certain formula for a successful North American summer music festival: lure every available A-list artist to a popular travel destination, pack the schedule with round-the-clock performances across multiple stages, get corporate sponsors to underwrite the expense, and pray that it doesn't rain. Given that it's located in a remote mining municipality a good eight-hour drive north from both Toronto and Montreal, the
Festival Emergent de Musique (FME) is seemingly at a distinct disadvantage when it comes to attracting both big-name acts and music-loving tourists. But this four-day event -- which took over town this Labour Day weekend -- has managed to hit its 10th anniversary by adhering to a simple but highly effective strategy: provide a festival experience you're just not going to find anywhere else. As the festival's name suggests, FME's mission is to showcase emerging regional artists, most of whom are unknown outside their native Quebec. (In fact, a fair share of this year's line-up could be described as One Degree of
Karkwa, as the 2010 Polaris Music Prize winners' frontman,
Louis-Jean Cormier, performed solo, while percussionist
Julien Sagot turned in a set of smoky, Gainsbourgian art-rock on a Saturday-night bill at the Paramount Theatre opening for
Marie-Pierre Arthur, whose band includes Karkwa keyboardist François Lafontaine.) The quality of year's headliners, however, exemplified FME's increasing renown and reach: indie-pop queen
Feist and reunited orchestro-rock overlords
Godspeed You! Black Emperor (a band known for being particularly picky about where it plays). Other notable visitors included Montreal prog-pop outfit
Plants and Animals, rising indie-rock dramatists
Half Moon Run, and doom-folk oracle
Timber Timbre.
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