Lollapalooza emailed the complete festival schedule to its mailing list subscribers today, and although Perry has once again put together what looks like it will be a great festival, I want to bring your attention to another festival happening the same weekend, August 7th-9th. Now in it’s eleventh year the Wolfe Island Music Festival will once again feature festival favourites and big names like Holy Fuck, and the usual smattering of the local Kingston scene with acts like P.S. I Love You, The Rural Alberta Advantage who we’ve talked about before and a personal favourite of mine Ohbijou.

So if you’re low on funds, don’t want to drive the twelve hours from Toronto, or like me currently don’t have a passport, why not come down and camp on a beutiful rural island where lake Ontario meets the St. Lawrence seaway. It’s only a twenty minute free ferry-ride from downtown Kingston. This is the music festival equivalent of giving up the fast pace of the city for some relaxation in the country; you won’t have to rush between the stages (there’s only one), so you won’t miss a beat. Plus I plan to bring lots of wine to share.

Here’s a sampling of the festival’s performers to listen to while you plan your trip to the nation’s first capital:

Ohbijou – Black Ice from the recently released Beacons LP

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Woodhands – I Wasn’t Made for Fighting

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PS I Love You – 2012

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Full lineup after the jump…

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Recently I managed to get my hands on Hometowns by The Rural Alberta Advantage and it has been on high rotation ever since.So when I was perusing the interweb and found an article describing a band I had never heard of before as a cross between the RAA and The Postal Service (another one of my all time favorites) I just had to check it out.My efforts were rewarded with a wonderful little jem of an EP called frankencottage by the Dark Mean.

Frankencottage – Dark Mean

Frankencottage – Dark Mean

Dark Mean are a couple of high school friends who initially scored a play for a local artist Rebecca Nada-Rajah and in 2008 “The Constant K Determines the Fate of the Universe” debuted to excellent reviews. This spurred the band into sitting down and recording the following four songs at Vibewrangler in Hamilton.

While the similarities between the RAA and TPS may be a bit overplayed, there is little doubt that this band has a certain je ne sais quoi and are worth keeping an eye on.

They will be touring Southern Ontario extensively this summer and if they are in your neck of the woods make sure to check them out. Also their EP is available from their website so check it out.

PS, sorry this post took so long, lets never fight again…

Being born and raised on the East Coast of Canada, to me Alberta was where you went to pay off student loans or make cash money to send back to your defeatist-have-not fellow Nova Scotians. A concept album about rural Alberta sounded about as appealing as the latest Nickleback effort. Torontonian group, the Rural Alberta Advantage, have made such an album work with Hometowns. I haven’t managed to get a copy of it yet (it’s available on their website: www.theraa.com), but from what I’ve heard at their recent concert in Ottawa at Cafe Dekcuf and in the songs I have managed to track down, they manage to combine oil, wild roses and the Rockies with a good dose of heartbreak (and  drumming well beyond your average alt-country fare) to craft what I can only assume is an accurate portrayal of life in the Texas of the North.

The Rural Alberta Advantage – Don’t Haunt This Place

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The Rural Alberta Advantage – Frank, AB

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The Rural Alberta Advantage – Sleep All Day (Green Go Remix)

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