Pre-pandemic atmosphere with the Cowboys Fringants

The Cowboys Fringants gave the first of a series of three shows at the Bell Center on Thursday night and offered a boosted reunion that lived up to the expectations of the 11,500 fans who had been hoping for them for months.

Josée Lapointe
Press

Since the start of the pandemic, the Cowboys Fringants had given just five shows: two in suburban venues this fall and three at festivals last summer – there was no question of the quartet performing in rooms where distanced people could neither drink nor dance. And these shows at the Bell Center, which should bring together at least 30,000 people in three evenings – an additional one is moreover announced for December 27 -, showed that they were right to wait, since they were able to offer a show in a pre-pandemic atmosphere.

It was the fiery Émile Bilodeau who set the table for the group in the first part. “We adapt all the time, he said after his song. Metarmorphosis. Me, during the pandemic, I adapted: I sang in paddling pools, in vans. But there, we see the light at the end of the tunnel, we are at the Bell Center! ”

Hear the crowd singing How are you at the end of his frenzied performance, while the pit continued to fill with spectators, could only give shivers of joy and emotion. Thrills that spread even more when the Cowboys arrived on stage at 8:50 p.m., to the sound of the very apropos intro. In business.

” The Cowboys Fringants are back in business / We’re back in business », Says the refrain of the song… and the Cowboys train started not to stop for two good hours.

“It’s a rolling fire tonight, we got so bored that we want to play as many tunes as possible! ”, Launched singer Karl Tremblay after some of the 22 songs that were chained at full speed.

The energy of the four members of the group was in fact irresistible – you had to see Jérôme Dupras, Jean-François Pauzé and Karl Tremblay jump as if they had held back for a year and a half, you had to see the ardor of Marie-Anick Lépine on the violin, banjo or accordion, to feel it in our turn. So it didn’t take long for the audience, more than ready too, to jump, clap, turn on the phone lights, carried by a repertoire of incomparable strength.

Pirate songs (Straight ahead), drinking songs (Crossing), nice songs losers (My boyfriend Rémi), indignant songs (Houses all the same, winter is approaching), ironic songs (The demonstration), but also more tragic apocalyptic songs (Nothing, 8 seconds), the Cowboys Fringants deployed all their paraphernalia at a frantic pace, supported by a group of four musicians, on guitars, drums and brass.

Of Ti-ass To America is crying, the 11,500 people gathered Thursday evening did not pray to sing, and their voices spread in the enclosure, despite the mask. And when the entire Bell Center sang On my shoulder throughout, even the stoic Karl seemed moved.

“It’s so beautiful to hear you,” repeated the singer several times, who thanked the audience for still being there after 25 years. “It’s extraordinary, it’s touching. Thank you for following an old succession group. ”

The last part of the show was boosted, and no one sat down again from Happy ordeal. Everywhere in the stands, the spectators were standing, while on the ground the rather compact crowd continued to dance. The party continued like this, with the deceptively naive and cheerful As long as we have love, then recall, three classics, The shack to Hector, Merchant Navy and Shooting Stars, in a moment of joyful and moving communion.

“It’s fun to come back to the stage with everyone dancing and moving, as in the past,” Karl had slipped just before the encore. The pandemic may not be over, and of course its shadow has hovered over us all evening. But the phenomenal Cowboys took us on a wonderful and beneficial journey through time, and above all showed us what the present weather can look like. Frankly, a cathartic evening that we will not soon forget.