Stripdown @ REDs – Edmonton AB – June 21st ’06 – Past

Just a little back story first off here… Stripdown was a Showcase event put on by the radio station The Bear 100.3, the venue Reds (now the Edmonton Events Centre), PunkTV and The Sound Radio. In order to be in the event you had to receive online votes at The Sound Radio and you were also judged based on the songs that you posted on your profile. Sixteen bands in total we’re selected (out of a hundred or more) and of the sixteen we we’re one of them. Thanks to every one who voted.

The event was over a two day period, a Thursday and Friday night; eight bands would play each night. The Thursday consisted of Living Illusion (Edmonton, AB), Stereo Therapy (Edmonton, AB), Flood of Fire (Vancouver, BC), Disaster Bloom (Edmonton, AB), Face First (Edmonton, AB), AutoBody (Calgary, AB), Cold Driven (Armstrong, BC), and Gone Savage (Edmonton, AB). Playing on the Friday was The Omega Theory (Edmonton, AB), Chyshuga (Calgary, AB), Keep 6 (Edmonton, AB), Lipth (Edmonton, AB), Radio for Help (Sherwood Park, AB), Jets to Theory (Edmonton, AB), Strada (Calgary, AB), and Whitfield (Vancouver, BC).

Jay and I arrived pretty early at Reds (the venue where the showcase was taking place); I chatted with Mike Dilts (promoter) for a bit and discussed the night’s events. There would be a group of Judges watching all the bands and giving critiques (also the best band would win radio airplay plus other stuff). After my conversation I made my way into the game room to play some Drum Hero (like guitar hero), just basically needed to kill some time.

While I was there I saw Billy Nickel, the lead singer from Cold Driven, I started up a conversation and we hit it off and talked for a good while. Eventually, I got hungry so I headed down to the food court to grab some food with Mark (our bass player). While there, we met up with the Shane (also from Cold Driven) and basically talked about the music industry for the next hour.

Once we got back to Reds all the bands had to pull their play times from a hat (we got a decent set time) followed by getting some pictures taking by Dixon Christie. Our set time wasn’t too bad, it was at 9:00 and the event started at 7:00. I told the guys what time our set was and we just basically had to wait around til the show started, I gave Mike Dilts a hand setting up stuff to kill more time (lots of waiting around).

Once the bands started playing and we headed to the green room to get ready for our turn to hit the stage. We watched and listened to some of the bands that played before us, every one at this event was good; it was essentially a showcase of some of the best independent bands in Western Canada.

When it was our turn to hit the stage we hit it hard. Played lots of our fast hard hitting songs and rocked out. Kept our energy high and just had a wicked time. I even used a beer to play my guitar; after our set was over I felt that we had set the bar for the rest of the evening and I think the crowd even thought so too.

Long story short, we didn’t win the event, and neither did Cold Driven. The winners were mostly on the Friday night, but all in all the entire event was a great experience. For me, other than playing the show itself, the entire night was spent hanging out with the guys from Cold Driven, drinking beers and discussing different ideas for our two bands to work together on future ideas so even though we didn’t win the event, I’m sure something great will come of it.

🙂

Happy and Fulfilled,
Shane Lamotte