At 18e edition, the Alternative Gala of Independent Music of Quebec (GAMIQ) fiercely preserved its eternal adolescent spirit, making its annual awards ceremony at the Plaza Theater a grand, disheveled and interminably long celebration of the richness of the musical scene Quebecois. The post-punk group La Sécurité distinguished itself by winning two Lucien prizes, including that of Revelation 2023, a remix tied to the young trio Population II. Folk singer-songwriter Arielle Soucy won the first prize of her career, that of Hope 2024, while Elisapie was crowned Artist of the Year.
On the sidewalk in front of the Plaza Theater, rue Saint-Hubert, snow falls on musicians and cultural workers in line. The conversations, already lively, continue even more intensely inside, along the bar on the mezzanine and on the floor, where people step on each other’s toes. When artists climb on stage to push us the bill, the crowd falls silent a little, the better to resume the conversation at the time of the distribution of the prizes, a majority of them ending up in the hands of musicians who this evening picked up their first distinction in career.
Élisapie, Arielle Soucy, La Sécurité and Population II, a superb quartet of lucky winners, who illustrate the great creative gap in our musical scene. Presented first in Salluit, then in Rouyn-Noranda during the FME, the rereadings (in Inuktitut) of her classics (Led Zep, Blondie, Cohen, Metallica, etc.), brought together on her fourth album, Inuktitut, published on September 15, struck people’s minds. By launching this magnificent first album in French entitled There’s nothing I’m notfolk artist Arielle Soucy has moved from privacy to the spotlight.
For their part, Population II (album Free electrons from Quebecstill very hot) and La Sécurité (his bilingual album Stay Safe! earned the group the Lucien for Indie-Rock Album of the Year) are among the most beautiful stage beasts of the day, as they demonstrated barely two weeks ago by sharing the bill of the Mothland evening, scheduled at Sala Rossa during M for Montreal.
At the end of 2023, the GAMIQ has distributed no less than 36 awards, especially for albums and mini-albums of the year in a range of musical genres, half of them having not been recognized by the gala. ADISQ. Let’s start the series of winners with them: in the Post-rock / Post-punk category, glory to the album Water, It Feels Like It’s Growing by the excellent Atsuko Chiba, published by Mothland, named Record Label of the Year. In the Punk Album department, the Lucien was given to Enfants Sauvages for Arrhythmiadischarge of eighteen brief songs recorded “in one day like the first Black Sabbath”, underlines the quintet from Quebec.
Also from the capital is Get The Shot, a hardcore/metal orchestra winner of the Lucien for Album of the Year in this category thanks to Merciless Destruction. Let us thank GAMIQ for making room for electronic music; at Super Plage, the Lucien of the Electro Album (for Magic at midnight). For Volume IIFlore Laurentienne wins that of the Experimental Album, Vanille that of the Folk Album (for the so sweet The meadow), and Hauterive, a duo formed by the scholars Mara Tremblay and Catherine Durand, that of the Country Album.
In bulk, other celebrated musicians. Composer and singer Olivia Khoury, jazz EP of the year (Portraits) ; Antoine Corriveau (Single of the year for Panic is a flower) ; Fuudge, Rock album (…that a nightmare becomes so real) ; Roberto Lopez, Albumworld (Ritual) ; Sheenah Ko, Pop album (Future Is Now). BAIE, Pépé and his guitar, Luis Clavis, Lysandre and Grand Public also enjoyed the applause reserved for the winners. In addition to the musical categories, the GAMIQ rewards four music video designers and awards eight “industrial” prizes, including that of Festival of the Year, awarded to La Noce (de bois). When the big man of the event, Patrice Caron, took to the podium to present the finalists in the Independent Media of the Year category, he launched into a tirade denouncing the Facebooks and Instagrams of this world, where “all the world [dans la salle est présent]but the media are not there, because a billionaire doesn’t want to. […] Media that work their butts off to talk about your music. Support your local media! », he chanted, before decreeing that all the competitors were going to win a Lucien, let’s name them: the alternative radio stations CFAK, CHOQ.CA, CHYZ 94.3, CISM 89.3 FM, the electronic media ecoutedonc. ca, The Bad Crew and The Auditory Canal.
Hosted for a second time by columnist and journalist Émilie Rioux, the ceremony, musically animated by the Margaret Tractor house orchestra, was punctuated by performances by around ten artists, including Calamine (winner of the Lucien for hip album -hop of the year for Lesbian woke on autotune), DVTR (Videoclip of the year), Shauit (Trad album of the year for Natukun), Population II and Naïma Frank (soul/R&B EP of the year, Little girl grows up). A posthumous tribute was paid by the GAMIQ organization to Karl Tremblay, singer of the Cowboys Fringants, whose national tribute ceremony was held on November 28 at the Bell Centre.