Folk Festival Review: The Alvvays of Toronto prepare to close their opening night at the Calgary Folk Music Festival

t playing folk festivals. So thank you for having us. "

Alvvays singer, Molly Rankin, said this shortly after suggesting that sofas be placed near the stage, which could be a bit too folky like indie-pop tore in his game Thursday night on the main stage.

The Toronto-based group was closer to what was largely a sweet opening night of the Calgary Folk Music Festival, with the crowd The energy levels began to fall due to a brief but disturbing bad weather that soaked the field and, at one point, deposited a fairly large tree branch among the tarpaulins.

Alvvays makes waves powerfully pop-pop from his tunes.As the band's songs in general, Rankin's voice can be both piercing and sweet while she's riding all the fury of On Thursday, she and the band maintained a cool distance with the audience while dyna putting an exciting set with skill and efficiency. Now two albums and enjoying an enviable reputation as critics' critics, the five-piece act seems to embody indie-cool: The pace was relentless, between-chit-cat song has been minimized and Rankin gave not one, but two He gave shouts to Chad VanGaalen, the most indie-cool gifted of Calgary, who was performing on stage at about the same time.

But none of this prevents Rankin, the genius of pop. a songwriter, especially on obsessing Forget About Life and opening the gallop game, Hey. Shouts of beautifully noisy guitars and raucous guitar strokes framed the incredible Lollipop (For Jim) and Your Type has become a paid pop-punk gem that has reached a little over two minutes. The band's most popular song, Marry Me, Archie (recently proclaimed 98th of the 100 best songs of the century by Rolling Stone Magazine) was launched in the middle of the evening with little ceremony, while the Dreams Tonight group's icy ballad exploded Heights.

At the moment Rankin and co. In 1965, Michael and Tanya Trotter of The War and Treaty performed on the main stage at the opening night of the evening. the Calgary Folk Festival on Thursday, July 26, 2018. Gavin Young / Postmedia

Gavin Young /

Postmedia

There was an act that could have separated the clouds by the power of their soulful exuberance, that is the duo The War and Treaty, which opened on Thursday. 39, main line of the festival. Originally from Michigan, the band specializes in a mix of soul and gospel, blues and R & B powered solely by their own singing and sparse piano. But the great harmonized voices and charm of Tanya Blound Trotter and Michael Trotter Jr. have helped fill Prince's soaked fields with a festive warmth. Despite the occasional indulgence of the pair for the platitudes of motivational speech, the absolute power of these voices and Trotter's sure hand draw memorable R & B melodies that keep the sound too serious. The Ho Hi Ho, Fire Set My Soul on Fire and Sensual Are you ready to love me, Baby were suitably exciting, but it was the slow soul ballads – Til the Morning, Little New Bern and a soul-crushing a capella race by Perfect Ending – that seemed to help convince the sun to break the clouds momentarily.

While War and Treaty offered bits of raw exuberance through its harmonies, The Milk Carton Kids represented folk music at its most skillful and melodious level. The popular L.A. duo, composed of Joey Ryan and Kenneth Pattengale, is an accomplished outfit that relies on sparkling harmonies and nostalgic melodies. But while they 're certainly animated by Ryan' s sense of dry humor, kids are undoubtedly more in the mood than the excitement onstage. Even when they are backed by the strength of their five-part backup group, the pieces rarely exceed a gentle hype. Still, it's hard not to be impressed by the mere craft both display in a live setting, cleverly negotiating the dark twang of Like it must be, the desire, Roy Orbison-esque the anxiety of I & # 39; Been Loving You and the discreet drama of the promised land, which Springsteen recalls today. The key here is control. Even when the One More for the Road, in a freezing motion, turned into a jam excursion on Thursday night, Ryan and Pattengale kept a strange and measured calm

Pbadenger, the British folklore project Mike Rosenberg, seems to follow the same path as the third act of the night. Afterall, he fills his acoustic solo with tunes such as the beautiful and fragile Fairytales & Firesides and studies of melancholy characters like David and To Be Free, a touching ode to the precarious travels of his grandparents from Europe to America. after the Second World War. Before starting this song, the lovable singer asked the audience to be very quiet. They were. Rosenberg cut his teeth while walking the streets and entertaining noisy pub crowds in England, he is also a consummate showman. His crescendo run through Simon and Garfunkel's Sound of Silence, for example, was a great success. By the time he was channeling his inner Frank Turner for the I Hate and Anthemic Scare Away the Dark reprimand, the crowd was fully engaged and on his feet. "It does not have to be good, but really strong," he said at one point, convincing us to sing.

Thursday night on Prince's Island Park was often good, but rarely strong. The folk purists should have been happy with the first three acts, while the indie-pop album of Alvvays was a good reminder of the many nuances of "folk music" coming over the next three days. The 1945 Folk Music Festival runs until Sunday at Prince's Island Park.