Altsounds - TORONTO FREEDOM FESTIVAL 2009

GANJA FEST 2009!!

TORONTO FREEDOM FESTIVAL 2009

Last year it rained pretty much the whole time, yet people were dedicated enough to smoke it up through the rain! This year the Sun, my friend; was shining brightly majority of the time. There were a few casual showers in the mix but nothing like last year! The turnout for the 2009 Toronto Freedom Festival was quadruple the size of its predecessors, I am estimating over thirty thousand people! I’m sure the Global Marijuana March was crazy! As always I miss it, maybe next year I’ll make it in time. I could barely see the other stages as I tried walking through the crowd. All I saw were people, joints, bongs, blunts, food vendors, Ganja accessory booths and umbrellas! The air was a mixture of the different types of Marijuana being burned. Just wandering through the clouds you get high! Far more potent this year, due to more people blazing at Queen’s Park North, right behind the government buildings. Not as many Popo’s this time around! I guess they realized the stoners are not going to cause a riot; all they wanna do is smoke trees legally in peace. When they say it’s the largest Ganja Festival/March in the world they are not lying! You really had to be there to understand exactly what I am saying.

There were speakers at the “Eye Weekly Voices Of Freedom Stage” discussing different issues facing Cannabis Culture educating the public on the medicinal uses, Legalization etc. Marc Emery the self proclaimed “Prince Of Pot” returned this year, other speakers lending their voices were Alison Myrden for “Law Enforcement Against Prohibition” and NDP party member Dana Larson who is hosting the first ever “Vansterdam Ganja Games and Marijuana Bowl” July 2 – 5th in Vancouver. I didn’t get to check any of the jibbers because I was covering the music, I am only one person. The Toronto Freedom festival has something for everyone! If you are not interested in listening to people talk, you could always head over to check a film at the Freedom Film Festival Pavilion. Screening this year was Ron Mann’s “Know Your Mushrooms”, “Fuel” by Adam Bialo and “Hollyweed: Movies and Marijuana” by Stuart Samuels. Amongst the films and jibbers there was more music. The main stage was one of three music stages, they had the “BPM (Playa Mexico) Electronic Stage" where DJ’s spun some insane house electro beats and the “Solid Soldiers - Drum ‘N Bass Stage”, where they had a “Spin it Up competition” for MC’s and DJ’s the prize was a chance to perform.

Now let’s get to the performances I actually saw! Made it to Queen’s Park just in time to catch the first band I was interested in seeing, Rebel Emergency! I always wanted to see them live again from time when I saw them at NXNE 06’. Back then they were called “Panic and The Rebel Emergency” don’t know why they dropped the Panic. I’m thinking it could be a band member that left but that could be lie, either way I will find out when I do an interview with the larries. Rebel Emergency is…Roddy (vocals), Geoff (guitar), Neil (bass) and Jeremy (drums). What stood out about this band was their high energy performance and chill tunes. Toronto based Rebel Emergency started out with “Here I Am” a tune off of their self titled five track EP. Getting into the groove filled with enthusiasm; you can tell they loved that stage, well most of them anyway. At times it seemed as though Bassist Neil was going to pass out! Resembling some of the crowd, who were looking seriously burned out! It appeared these larries had a challenge on their hands, to get these stoners to move and jam along with them.

The band was really good they all kept the sounds tight everything just blended together and sounded right. The backup vocals were in perfect harmony with lead vocals. Lead vocals by Roddy Soul were fabuloso, he deserves major props because there was some crazy ass technical difficulties during the tune ‘Sunriser’ he just kept singing as if there was no problem. Everyone could hear the tech issue but the show must go on, eventually they fixed the problem. Looking forward to hearing the new record tentatively titled “Love Ain’t Free” due out soontime.

Rebel Emergency played a few more tunes and then it was time for the 420 countdown. I migrated up on stage to film along with a few others and realized there were far more people in attendance than I thought! As the countdown began you could see more and more clouds of smoke, soon enough it turned into a thicker layer of smoke creating a hazy mind altering atmosphere! Whoever didn’t know what was going on; they probably figured it out when passing the park. They most likely got a serious Ganja Slap at that moment in time!

Once the 420 toke celebrations subsided, Rebel Emergency hit the stage again, the crowd was hyped! They loved the fact R.E was going to play a few more tunes! The band can give each other daps! They accomplished by getting the crowd all keyed up for the 420 countdown and kept the vibe flowing. The crowd was jamming along, all of their tunes are catchy and the last tune “Wander Far Away” was stuck in my brain for the rest of the day, it’s still there! During the tune right before the end ofo the song, front larrie Roddy takes off his shirt, brings out a surf board and literally surfs the crowd! The crowd held him up, brought him mid way through the crowd and turned him around all without injury. I wish I took pictures but I was filming the tune for Fridae TV where you can see it for yourself. The crowd surf was awesome; he stood up a few times and all, a great way to end a set! How could the other performers top that?

The next artist to hit the main stage was a Disc Jockey who spins the illest tunes! He is DJ Jam, official DJ to Snoop Dogg and Dr. Dre; he’s been their tour DJ from time. DJ Jam was dropping classic California tunes, all of my favorite old school Rap and Hip Hop tunes. He was smoking some Canadian Kush once someone brought him a blunt on stage and the crowd respected that! As Jam was spinning I was wandering around the Park checking out the scene. There was a little break circle that was getting the attention at the time, this middle aged white dude he looked European was totally zoned out and couldn’t dance to save his life! It was too funny, he reminded me of the real life ‘Borat’ I once ran into (not dudeface this was a real guy!).

After DJ Jam’s set, a Vancouver based hip hop group hit the stage they are called Sweatshop Union. They’ve been around the Canadian scene for a while now but I have never seen them live. At first I was like what the fuck is this! You would never assume these larries were rappers, especially larrie in the red, white and yellow trucker hat with the Burt Reynolds mustache! Its like he just rolled off the set of the ‘Trailer Park Boys’.

Each of the larries flow was alright they opened the set with a track called “Gold Rush” off their current record “Water Street”. What I didn’t like was the usual white boy rapper nasal sound in a few of them. Another thing is, during a few tracks they were a little too extra. It came off as contrived fake energy instead of a genuine liveliness. Not everyone in the group was on the same page; a few were a little dimmer than others when it came to charisma. The tracks could be better, I give them daps for trying to instill a positive message within their rhymes and they did compliment each other with the backup vocals when one was doing a verse. They need to lay off all hand actions, do more than just wave hands in the air! I swear it was getting old very fast and my A.D.D was kicking in, I was waiting for the WOW factor but yeah they didn't have it.

After that set I had to migrate around, it was still pretty crowded but now I could see the other stages. I spotted a few larries kicking around a hackey sack, there was a girl hula hooping with people standing and watching mostly creepy dudes! There was this one larrie who made me laugh he was decked out in a suit and was wearing black shades and black gloves wandering around jibbering to randoms! Uh there’s no snow outside and it wasn’t that cold! I tried to follow him with the camera to get a full shot but I lost him in the crowd.

Dj Dopey hit the stage next to spin some tunes for the people. I could check him anytime he’s a Toronto DJ and I needed to save what little space on both memory cards for one more band and they were “The Stoned”. I should have just stayed at the Drum ‘N Bass Stage they were dropping some hot beats and people were jamming. ‘The Stoned’ looked the part but really didn’t like them much. The lead singer’s vocals sounded as if there was a rabbit stuck in his throat or he had some monster hair ball preventing crisp sounds from migrating out. The guitars were wicked! As always you can usually count on the guitars. The drummer sucked he was off beat and it sounded all jumbled at the beginning. I was dying, so I took a few pictures and dipped to chill in the media tent to hear how it all played out. I must say the highlight of that band was when they sang this line “What’s wrong with my bong, what’s wrong with my bong!” I have no clue what tune it was but it was amusing!

Words can only say so much, you have to experience the Toronto Freedom Festival for yourself to get the complete effect. Last year I was thinking “Harold and Kumar” new adventures but really “Harold & Kumar” should team up with “Cheech and Chong” to find the world’s largest bong! That would be one hilarious film. ©2009FRIDAE™

www.torontofreedomfestival.com
www.hightimes.com
www.myspace.com/rebelemergencymusic
www.djjam.com
www.sweatshopunion.com
www.cannabisculture.com
www.youtube.com/fridaetv
www.danalarson.com
www.kontaktfp.ca/fuel/index.html
www.knowyourmushrooms.com
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