Pouncing and rolling around on stage with legs in the air, Rainbow Surprise Kitten clawed in International Cat Day a few hours early Thursday night with a legendary shake-it-up rock-out in the misty rain.<\/p>\n
Rain and thunder! Or the fear of it, anyway, was the unofficial pre-opener for the 46th<\/sup> annual Edmonton Folk Music Festival \u2014 tens of thousands of Gallagher Park hill bags heavier with assorted rubber gear and towels on a generally lovely cloudy day that did not encourage free-range beer chugging. More like under-blanket snuggling.<\/p>\n I even brought a plastic baggie and non-smudge pens for my 20th<\/sup> century-style notepad!<\/p>\n Opening up at 6:36 p.m. after the festival blessing was the charming and spirited Aysanabee, \u201cOji-Cree, Sucker Clan of the Sandy Lake First Nation\u201d in answer to \u201cwhere ya from?\u201d<\/p>\n Now based in Toronto, he mushroom-gathers prestige indie Juno wins and Polaris noms with his upbeat Elder-channelling, gravel-revving voice full of hope and trying to figure it all out. Relatable, singalong resistance.<\/p>\n The set opened with the recorded spoken word Interlude 9 of album Watin, named for the musician\u2019s grandfather, explaining words in their language, including \u201cNosuk, nosuk magizokege means my grandchildren are growing up,\u201d and \u201cEbiisay ketizgo, that means heaven.\u201d<\/p>\n The band introduced themselves playing the slow-rising Dream Catcher, the pounder Nomads, followed by the energetic Bringing the Fire.<\/p>\n Asking who\u2019d seen them in 2023, Aysanabee waved left and right over the verdant rise of raincoat witnesses.<\/p>\n \u201cWe played over there, we played over there,\u201d he said from the big stage under the 46 \u2014\u00a0a number of encouragement from the divine realm. \u201cNow we\u2019re playing here! Thanks for selling out Thursday \u2014\u00a0that\u2019s you!\u201d<\/p>\n All weekend, actually, congrats all around.<\/p>\n Aysanabee rocked Edmonton Folk Music Fest 2025 Thursday night.<\/p>\n Impossible to ignore at Aysanabee\u2019s side was singer Lala Noel in her blood-orange-slice earrings, backing up his distinct voice with Dark Side of the Moon, OG Star Trek choral heights and this very infectious smile.<\/p>\n Miles Gibbons did a nice job on the looping drums, Dean Aivaliotis on keys, with Nick Tateishi playing guitar, all together through a dozen countries in the last year and change.<\/p>\n Uh oh \u2014\u00a0was that thunder? Nope, just a couple volunteers rolling plastic garbage bins along.<\/p>\n Leading in the mournful Without You off the new EP, Aysanabee spoke of his ever-present grandfather, \u201cwho finished his journey last year.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen people close to you move on they kind of leave this space,\u201d said the singer, hoping he can live up a certain sense of duty he feels to tradition.<\/p>\n Noel\u2019s voice especially shot into the clouds here, the band closing up the fest\u2019s first set with the explosive We Were Here, happy children dancing all over the hill.<\/p>\n \u201cWe don\u2019t have Northern Cree with us,\u201d he smiled. \u201cWe don\u2019t have a 12-piece band. We don\u2019t have Nickelback\u2019s pyro \u2014\u00a0but this is the way it was written.\u201d<\/p>\n As emcee Cam Hayden noted, Aysanabee plays sessions at 6 p.m. and 7:40 p.m. at Stage 6 Friday if you missed this.<\/p>\n Next up, after School of Song talent, the always charming and lovely Serena Ryder emerged with a dulcimer, plopped down front and centre, and asked how we were doing to a wave of cheers.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m feeling a whole lotta \u2018whoo\u2019 as well,\u201d she grinned, breaking with \u201cI am on a lonely road and I am travelling\u201d into a terrific rendition of Joni Mitchell\u2019s All I Want, noting the legendary singer played this same space in \u201994.<\/p>\n Under that big, flat-brim hat she\u2019s been wearing way longer than all those beardo-suspender \u2018hot folk\u2019 \u201cla-la-la\u201d acts, her band emerged. This included a pair of backup singers and killer guitarist Joan Smith together playing a good dozen songs of joy and survival under a fluffy stampede of low-hanging eastbound clouds.<\/p>\n Serena Ryder at Edmonton Folk Music Festival Thursday. Fish Griwkowsky, Postmedia<\/p>\n \u201cIf you feel like singing, if you feel like dancing, that would fill my heart up with explosions,\u201d said the 42-year-old Torontonian, casting the usual \u201cget up!\u201d lure at the lake of tarpbutts. And some rise as she leaned into Ice Age, all about escaping clinical loneliness. Then, the slightly ska, singalong It\u2019s No Mistake, leading into the punchy Got Your Number.<\/p>\n Candy was peppy fare, followed by the Dolly-Alanis-ish Weak in the Knees from 2006 and had me saying out loud, \u201cI love Serena Ryder,\u201d which has always been true.<\/p>\n \u201cThe weather is doing some stuff tonight,\u201d Ryder noted between waving at people she knew and praising the upcoming headliner, inviting up Aysanabee to fill in for Steve Earle\u2019s vocals on the seven-years-sober-celebrating Better Now.<\/p>\n During their banter, he noted how he used to think burned food was good for you (and not carcinogenic) and also that his mom always cut the ends off ham, for some reason.<\/p>\n When he asked her why, she didn\u2019t know, so they followed a trail back to grandmother.<\/p>\n \u201cShe said, \u2018Our oven\u2019s just too small!\u2019 \u201d Aysanabee laughed.<\/p>\n Point being, it\u2019s good to figure out why we do things and move on and grow. This felt like the metaphor of the weekend, which Ryder kept summoning, then made fun of herself for bringing up too many times \u2014\u00a0but it\u2019s a good story!<\/p>\n The upbeat Used to You was followed by kickass dance floor hit Electric Love and the very folk festy Stompa as the sun went to bed. Yay!<\/p>\n This delivered us to the glamorous, fashionably late-to-the-stage Rainbow Kitten Surprise, who summoned an up-and-dancing youth crowd singing along for the rest of the night to Ela Melo\u2019s street-level dramatic indie-rock and Southeastern U.S. cussin\u2019.<\/p>\n A massive gesture of trans representation in this only-partially retrograde provincial wasteland of insecurity, tens of thousands of people dancing on the hill felt like a warm blanket of resistance. And as with Robert Plant last year, festival producer Terry Wickham and fam watched the show from the first row.<\/p>\n No less than 18 songs started with the bouncy-wistful When It Lands, the swirly-spicey country-rap Fever Pitch, then the bar anthem Wasted \u2014\u00a0blonde-coiffed Melo floating around stage between strobes and orange spotlights, echoed by hundreds of voices on Devil Like Me with bearded Darrick Bozzy Keller and Ethan Goodpaster rocking along on guitar.<\/p>\n The new 100 Summers led into reliable hits like the sassy-sad Hide, the up-close crowd fully going for rap-infused Dang, a truly sexy and vulnerable number.<\/p>\n Awesome force of nature Maddie Bouton\u2019s popcorn bass was a big part of the twitchy rocker Goodnight Chicago. Then, within the whirlwind of Matchbox, Melo declared in lyric, \u201cEverybody I know wants to be a star,\u201d Keller joining in singing.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is the Edmonton folk fest, is it not?\u201d Melo sassed, noting the upcoming, f-bomb peppered All That and More (Sailboat) was written \u201cdown in the mountains of North Carolina,\u201d y\u2019all.<\/p>\n Everything was singalong from this point: the screamy Cocaine Jesus; the very sad and super-gripping First Class with a pinch of country and Celtic; the brand new, bittersweet Tropics.<\/p>\n Shouting out to the crew and volunteers \u2014 hats off \u2014\u00a0Melo took us home past curfew with Superstar and then Run, one of the most blues-metal closers to a folk fest ever, the sparkle-faced singer leaping off the drum riser in her cocktail dress.<\/p>\n To climax, Freefall summoned the devil, Melo rolling around like a kitten in panties under a slight, psychedelic drizzle that looked like snow, drumsticks flying a la Metallica out into the roaring masses.<\/p>\n As Melo said earlier, \u201cYou light yours, we\u2019ll light our and we\u2019ll burn together.\u201d<\/p>\n And this is just Thursday, mind you. Hot damn.<\/p>\n fgriwkowsky@postmedia.com<\/a><\/p>\n<\/span><\/div>\n
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