by Arnold Lim
One of the biggest events on Vancouver Island is back.
Thousands of music fans will descend upon the West Shore Parks and Recreation, July 11 to 13 when Tom Cochrane, The Cult, Billy Talent, Sloan, Our Lady Peace, Mother Mother and many more bands take over the lower soccer fields for the biggest local music festival of the year.
“The people on the Island love rock and here we are happy every year to bring that to people of the West Shore,” said Melanie Ransome of Atomique Productions, which runs the festival. “Every year we got the chance to expand, because the people of the Island want to have an event like this.”
Atomique expects 37,500 people to attend over the three days. The event has grown from 12,500 fans for the one-day concert in 2012 to 20,000 over two days last year.
“We seem to have a growing fan base, which is exciting. We have a ton of Seattle concert goers and (Vancouver) concert goers. It is (also) a nice way to show another part of the Island,” Ransome said. “We display downtown Victoria for Rifflandia and it is Colwood’s chance to sing with Rock the Shores. It is a very local event, but it is an awesome way to show people from out of town what it is all about.”
Colwood Mayor Carol Hamilton also looks forward to the new visitors the larger-than-life event will bring to her neck of the woods this weekend.
“It is an opportunity that the West Shore doesn’t see too often. Downtown they have all kinds of music festivals and events and cultural opportunities, so this has been a great opportunity to turn the tables,” she said. “(It) gets the downtown folks coming in our direction.”
Guitarist-vocalist Chris Murphy of Toronto band Sloan, which performs Saturday night (July 12), plans to arrive a few days early and said he looks forward to getting to know the area.
Come show time, he said, as much fun as the fans will have, he will reciprocate.
“I always have fun. I have fun playing greatest hits, have fun showing off our newest songs … I just like to work,” Murphy said.
The multiple Juno-nominated and award-winning quartet make their return to Victoria after playing Rifflandia two years ago.
Murphy said he and his fellow band members not only look forward to the spectacle of performing in front of a big crowd of fans who not only sing along and know the words, but playing for new fans who may not have grown up with their music.
“We are my own favourite band, because as a fan of music I feel like we do everything I want a band to do, except succeed internationally and commercially,” he said, half jokingly. “We make a living and don’t have to deal with fame. It is perfect.”
--taken from: Victoria News
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