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Since Tuesday, I’ve slept a maximum of 4 to 5 hours a night while having to go to work the next morning. I’ve gotten my purse stolen. My wrist is stamped with various layers of entrance stamps. My mom is all troubled because I haven’t been able to find the time to talk to her in almost a week. My futon is feeling a little depressive because I haven’t been able to sit on it in a while. My back aches. My eyes feel like they’re about to fall off because I’ve been looking at computer screens and focusing into view finder, then editing the said pictures. They’re constantly opened, scared they’ll miss out on a single second of all the action. They haven’t had much time to recover. My head is scattered and I’ve been having an increasingly hard time forming coherent thoughts. I haven’t been able to eat a complete meal until this morning; partly because I haven’t had time, and partly because I’ve been nauseous 90% of the week. But that’s the way things are popping in Montreal these days. And to be completely honest, I love every second of it. Don’t regret a single moment of missed quality time with my red bedsheets.

I must admit that I don’t usually go this hardcore at things in general. I have a tendency to listen to my body and give it exactly what it needs. Amazingly, this week, it has decided to cooperate with the abuse and given it’s all to make the Pop Montreal Festival one of the best times of my life: musically, photographically, people-wise and fun-wise. My friends came down from Fredericton to play the festival, which allowed me to see them briefly and reminisce on what it feels like to be amongst a crowd of people who know exactly who you are. I’ve also had the immense pleasure of meeting some new friends and spend time with some people I don’t nearly see often enough.

On the photographic side of things, I’ve been blessed to be able to photograph some amazingly beautiful musicians while they were playing superb music. I’ve taken at least 800 shots in the last 3 days. Obviously, the volume plays its part, but some of these shots I screamed out in visual pleasure when I played them back on my computer. I still have a lot of editing to do on them, but mostly, it’s a matter of choosing the best ones of the bunch, which is probably the hardest part of it all. Follow this link to see what I’ve posted so far. Feel free to leave comments. I love it when people comment.

Musically, well musically is the best part. Wednesday, I went to see The Olympic Symphonium at O Patro Vys. I’ve listened to their CD countless times, and just love it. I know these guys, and I know how talented they are, so it shouldn’t have been so surprising, but it was. Surprisingly beautiful. They just sounded so good. At least 10 times better than on the CD (and the CD sounds GREAT). So excellent!

After that was over, I went over at Casa del Popolo to hear Torngat play. I’ve seen these guys a few times already, but this was truly a fantastic performance. It was fun, Casa was full of people, and the band sounded tight. These guys really have their shit together. The musicians are brilliant and their music, unique. The evening ended in an upsetting and shocking way as I turned around to find out I had just gotten my purse stolen.

Thursday, I went out to Barfly to see Share. It was my first time in the tiny and grungy venue. The guys sounded great and played to a crowd of mostly Maritimer people, who gave them a warm Montreal welcome. When I say that this was a fun show, I mean that it was literally… fun. Andrew told little tidbits of stories between songs and the last song was publicly accompanied by teasing and constant beating claps from almost every member of the audience.

As soon as this short set was over, I hurried over to the Sold-Out show of Owen Pallett’s Final Fantasy. This tall and skinny man stood there on the stage accompanied by a friend of his who did some great animated projections on a middle-school-style projector with gels. My jaw was hanging as the musical virtuoso proceeded to play, with his violin and sometimes keyboard, looping tracks that swelled up to a fully coordinate and perfectly executed orchestral sound. Not only is this guy’s music absolutely groundbreaking and brilliant, but put him alone on a stage with a few pedals and an instrument, and he finds ways to give a shining performance. He blew my mind. Seriously.

Friday night, I went to see The Luyas at O Patro Vys. These guys are one of my favorite local bands. The music is beautiful and so are the musicians playing it. Last night was probably not the best show I’ve seen by them, but it was great nonetheless. It had been a while since I had the chance to check them out and was not disappointed in the least. They managed to offer the crowd a few new songs in their short 30 minute set.

Between work and these shows, it’s been a crazy week. Little can words describe how truly fulfilling and amazing the past three days have been. It’s not even over yet, and I already feel a bit nostalgic about the whole experience. When I said that this is better than Christmas and summer enrolled into one, it was an understatement. The only bad thing in all of this would be that I still haven’t found a successful way to be at more than one place at the time. The Pop Montreal Festival is so loaded with incredibly amazing bands, that I feel as though I can’t fully enjoy all that it has to offer. If I have any suggestion for the organizing committee, it would be to give us an inch and make it last a bit longer. This way, those of us who truly enjoy every minute of it, could enjoy more bands and musical action. Too many great bands, not enough time.

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