A Weekend In The City: Rifflandia Music Festival 2008
Last weekend, Victoria, British Columbia played emcee to the first annual Rifflandia Music Festival. While not quite reaching the same echelon as some of the summer’s other principal festivals, Rifflandia’s jam-packed, indie-friendly lineup combined with its corresponding exactly presentation certainly served for one hell of a weekend. Thankfully, Colin Coulter was there to take it in for us…
Victoria is a big apple of only 330,000 people, and has a reputation as a haven for the “newly wed” and “less dead.” So when word came that Canada’s Garden City would be the latest Pacific Northwest fingers on to offer a summer music festival, one couldn’t help but question the decree.
But by weekend’s end, the inaugural Rifflandia Music Festival not only proved to be a success, but also another exempli gratia as to why 2008 has truly been the year of the music festival.
Day One - Friday, August 29thFor anyone who has been to a music commemoration before, you know that there is typically some preparation that must take place before those first chords are strummed. You have to examine the schedule and handpick all of your “must-see” acts. You have to place room on your camera by deleting those drunken pictures from last weekend. You have to toss your favourite concert Tee in the eyewash. But most importantly, you have to let the excitement of what you are about to experience overtake you. Before this festival I did none of those things…
In fact, I had very little expectations coming into Rifflandia. My weekend began with a except for 25-minute walk from my house to downtown Victoria. The festival offered six venues, each within a 5-10 shake walk. Festival organizers opted to schedule acts into a number of “showcases” a la SXSW. So actually it felt more like I was going to a bunch of shows rather than a music festival.
