Concert Reviews

Excitement about Vic Mensa’s concert turned into a disappointment for many fans when his show on June 7^th was cancelled. However, this cancellation came with a silver lining. MURAL Festival announced that Vic Mensa would join Playboi Carti and Pusha T as a surprise guest. At first, this sounded like a gift from the universe, until you realized that suddenly you were going to the festival.

After a great first night at Distorsion on Wednesday, things were looking good for the festival. Unfortunately, it made it hard to live up to that first night. Thursday started off poorly with the first band hitting the stage almost an hour late. With a four band bill and a start time of 9 p.m., time is precious. No one wants to be at a show late on a weeknight. 

This year, the Kalmunity Vibe Collective celebrates their 15-year anniversary. They have provided a creative outlet for musicians, singers, rappers, poets, and dancers by hosting a weekly improvisation night. They got together in 2003 at small venue called Sablo Cafe, founded by drummer Jah Sun, and since then has nurtured aspiring artists to go on stage and express themselves. Some of my closest friends have started with the collective, and now perform around the city, have written books, have put out albums and more.

Canada’s largest and longest running urban music collective Kalmunity celebrates 15 years of unity this week with a pool of talented story-tellers, spoken word poets and singers, including the organization’s declared National Treasure, D’Bi Young Antifrika.

The world-renowned dub poet and storyteller began her journey in the city of Montreal with the Kalmunity’s original members, the majority of which are still a part of the collective today. “To the people in this room, this is who I have become and for that, I say thank you,” the artist said to a crowd full of spectators at Petit Campus on Wednesday, May 2nd.

South By Southwest is at this point a festival that has pretty much everything. Starting as a music festival and then expanding to film, gaming, comedy, and tech, there's not much uncovered territory. This was my first year of attending what is arguably the U.S's largest most compact festival, and I have to say it's a bit overwhelming as a first-timer.

The CJLO contingency, consisting of our head, world music director, hip-hop director, and myself(the metal music director), got in Wednesday afternoon, and after settling in at the hotel we headed to the convention center, to pick up wristbands, because, yeah, we're important like that.

The dim lit glow of neon signs and colourful lights at Theatre Fairmount encapsulated the night of Baths’ concert—beginning with the delicate soloist Sasami, following with a smooth but rugged commotion from No Joy, and concluding the stroke of midnight through the voltaic, emotive harmonies of Baths. Each act brought to the stage a unique sound that the theatre would be foolish to forget.

Nardwuar told me he was going to see Shopping – a good pick indeed. I, however, was looking for a less hyped gig; a brief respite from the increasingly thick throngs of Hotel Vegas, as my energy had sunk with the sun.