The 56e edition of the Festival d’été de Québec (FEQ) has been in full swing since last Thursday, with the Plains of Abraham having already welcomed Nickleback (opening act), New York rap veteran 50 Cent, the Jonas Brothers and, last night, the old punks of The Offspring, who screamed in front of one of those oceans of festival-goers that the Capital knows how to bring together to applaud its favourite rock stars. Our first crowd baths, while waiting for the Quebec headliners Alexandra Strélinski and Karkwa, who will experience their first Plaines, Monday and Tuesday.
First obligatory stop, Place d’Youville. Even before the pandemic, the FEQ organization had decided to no longer erect a free stage on this square, even though it is close to the Plaines and the Pigeonnier (Place de la Francophonie), and which has given us so many beautiful moments of music over the years.
The festival is using the space again, let’s rejoice: now decorated like a biergarten, with picnic tables and a bit of shade (also welcome on this sunny day), it adds to the decor, the Palais Montcalm on one side, the Diamant on the other, the Portes Saint-Jean at the back of the stage. A glance at the lineup for this stage indicates that we’ll prefer local artists. Last Saturday night, the pop-R&B duo Rau_Ze filled the place, we were told. Mon Doux Saigneur could do just as well tonight, and the rap lineup (Soraï, Joe Rocca, Greenwoodz) on Thursday should also be a hit.
At 6 p.m., singer-songwriter San James (Marilyne Sénécal in civilian life) launched the first notes of her concert, under a blazing sun that made her regret having chosen to wear her black dress, “my worst decision since 1990,” she joked. Her melancholic pop song, which one imagines was composed during moments of insomnia, was perfectly transposed to the sunny hour of aperitif, lulling an audience scattered under the rare shaded spots of Place d’Youville – she should not be offended, all the concerts scheduled at 6 p.m. on this square also attracted only the most fervent festival-goers. The musician offered songs from her first album, Epiloguereleased last February by Rosemarie Records.
Then, head to the stage of the Place de l’Assemblée-Nationale, to catch the two enticing African offerings, the Congolese of Kin’Gongolo Kiniata and the orchestra of Malian Vieux Farka Touré. The Congolese have attracted festival-goers with their intense trance rhythms – since the international success, in the 2000s, of the collective Konono No.1, the Democratic Republic of Congo has continued to export this kind of formation focusing on percussion propelling simple melodic patterns that have the ability to imprint themselves in our cortex, which, in return, informs our lower limbs to dance with flexibility.
Kin’Gongolo Kiniata hits the nail on the head with accessible grooves, quite far from the complex polyrhythms of this region of the continent. Fuzz in the electric bass, melodies with four notes played on a small electric guitar in the style of a cigar box. Two percussionists and singers put on the show, but the star of the orchestra beats the time: this drummer is a formidable metronome, acting as the conductor of this train.
Festival-goers got a taste of more nuance thanks to composer, guitarist and singer Vieux Farka Touré, son of the legendary Ali Farka Touré, perhaps the greatest guitarist in the history of the African continent. Clearly, he had his fans, as the Place de l’Assemblée-Nationale was packed for his formidable singing tour (given the day before at Club Soda in Montreal), which he began with a handful of acoustic songs, before taking over the electric instrument. The drummer-percussionist duo lined up complex rhythms over which flowed the expert playing of Ali’s son, the most sophisticated of bluesmen.
As he played, the Plains could be heard rumbling under the guitars of Rise Against!, who were warming up the crowd for The Offspring. By the time they got to the front of the stage, the band had already played a curtain raiser. Come Out and Playtaken from the album Smashreleased thirty years ago already, which doesn’t make anyone who danced the pogo when this hit came out any younger.
A big night crowd, pretending that there would be no Monday morning after this concert, had gathered on the Plains. The atmosphere, already hot and humid, was galvanized by these refrains that the fans sang by heart, several taken from this Smash having marked the history of pop-punk in the same way as the Dookie by Green Day or even Punk in Drublic of NOFX. “You have the voices of angels!” guitarist Noodles told his audience, while singer Dexter Holland (whose eternally adolescent voice was still surprisingly accurate) admitted that his eyesight was no longer good enough to see the fans perched at the back, on top of the mounds. Another rock concert to go down in the annals of the FEQ.