Saturday at the Brampton Indie Arts Festival was an all-day affair, but I was forced to miss most of the daytime festivities due to less than exemplary health. I strolled in at 7:30 p.m.
to find Toronto DJ duo InsideAmind setting up their gear on the second stage. The first half of the set started tentatively, as the two DJs felt out their audience, encouraging participation as they built anticipation with ambient atmospherics. After the slow start, however, Steptone and Prof.
Fingers picked up the pace. The duo alternated spots, swapping records on their two turntables with lightning speed, dispatching snare hits and stuttering beats with refreshing unpredictability. By the end of their set, the sparse crowd seemed to have forgotten about the flat start and was won over by the vigourous finale.
Audience participation looked like it was going to be a major factor in anarchic pop quintet Matias' set. Singer Matias Rozenberg handed out an assortment of noisemakers and dollar store instruments to the audience, who were encouraged to play along to the sweet, shambling pop songs. Unfortunately, just when it looked like it was going to turn into a lively, fun set, the plug was pulled on the band as their allotted time was up.
Moving over to the main stage, I learned that the organizers were having trouble contacting ex-Devo main man Mark Mothersbaugh, whom they had slated for a Q A session with the festival goers. They might as well have forgone it. When they finally got him on the line through a mic'ed cellphone, only two awkward questions were asked of him.
I sought refuge from this messy situation at the second stage, where The Ghost Is Dancing launched into a set of shiny, big band indie pop. It was a spirited performance, catchy and melodic, but a tad predictable. After all, by now I think everyone's used to hearing huge, linear hooks pounded out by a guitar-keyboard combo.
Back on the main stage, meanwhile, something completely different was going on the abrasive performance art of Istvan Kantor. The main thrust of the piece was centred on destroying structure of any kind. To an industrial electroclash soundtrack, a uniformed Kantor, with a red band affixed to his arm a la the SS, destroyed a wooden dresser on the stage.
While this was going on, jarring images were projected on a screen above him and slogans such as "I enjoy my self inflicted isolation" would occasionally flash by. Another "soldier" joined him on stage, waving a large red flag, and tried to make a structure out of the broken shards of wood that once used to be the dresser. Kantor then levelled the soldier's makeshift construction, and the cycle would repeat.
The gentle folk of Barzin provided a soothing respite from all this red-eyed intensity, after which I hurried back to the main stage to catch the festival's finale, a performance by festival director Rich Marsella's own musical project, Friendly Rich And The Lollipop People. The 10-member collective ran through a meticulously crafted set of deranged vaudeville songs for the duration of a thoroughly entertaining show. A puppeteer stood at the side of the stage, manipulating marionettes in synch with the music.
But the star of the show was the animated vocalist and conductor, Marsella, who appeared to be channeling a 1920s rabbinical school dropout who had given up on life and admitted himself into an asylum.
This extremely theatrical affair was a fitting and extravagant end to the festival. Throughout the three days I was present, the main auditorium was never in any danger of reaching capacity, although it's a given that it would easily have done so had the fest been in Toronto.
Not enough has been said about the ridiculous diversity of this festival. Not only were the acts widely varied, there was also local film, performance and visual art to be enjoyed. It's not often that a folk act shares a bill with a nihilistic performance artist and a musical satire of the movie Jaws.
Events like these are hard to keep quiet. Hopefully, in a couple of years, a ticket to the event will be hard to obtain.
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