SUM 41 AND BILLY TALENT

Yesterday we went to see two amazing (Canadian!) musicians, Sum 41 and Billy Talent, at Vogue theatre. First of all let me say that I have never been so hot in a venue. Ben even made a comment at one point that "even though the theatre is really old, can't they have air conditioning?" Everyone got very sweaty and a number of boys took off their shirts. I am not surprised it heated up in there though, considering the high energy sets of both bands! It was an incredible show despite the near heat stroke. Another thing I noticed was that both bands kept spitting on the stage. I'll admit I've never seen this before and was a little confused. Do you know any other bands that do that? I don't really get it..

Sum 41

    The current members of Sum 41 are Deryck Whibley (vocals and guitar), Steve Jocz (drums), Tom Thacker (guitar and vocals) and Jason McCaslin (bass and vocals), though the band has had a couple of former members that appear on their earlier albums.

    The band's first full-length album was released in 2001, and was titled All Killer No Filler. The singles off of this album, "Fat Lip", "In Too Deep" and "Motivation", became wildly popular and landed the band a top spot on Billboard's Top 200 Chart. I'm sure everyone remember that year when those songs were playing everywhere. That year the band toured with well-respected rock bands such as Blink 182 and The Offspring.

   The band's next album, Does This Look Infected?, was released shortly after their first album, in 2002. The band's goal was to evolve their sound and make their lyrics a more serious tone. The songs off this album did just that with singles "Still Waiting", "The Hell Song" and "Over My Head".

    In 2004, the band released their next album Chuck, in honour of Charles Pelletier, a UN peacekeeper that kept them safe on a trip to Congo during a civil war.

    In 2005 Sum 41 released a live album and in 2006 former guitar player Dave Baksh announced that he was leaving the band due to "creative differences". It wasn't until 2007 that Sum released their next album and single of the same name, Underclass Hero. Other songs on the album were clearly politically motivated and became slightly controversial. Nonetheless the band began the Strength in Numbers Tour in October of the same year with Finger Eleven and Die Mannequin. Whibley suffered an injury during the tour though and had to reschedule in 2008.

   Between this time and present, the band worked on individual projects, both professional and personal. So it wasn't until early this year that they released their newest album Screaming Bloody Murder along with it's single of the same name. One of my favourite songs off the new album is "Jessica Kill" which, sadly, they didn't play last night :(

  I've heard a lot of theories on how the band came up with their name but the most popular one seems to be that the band's first time on Warped Tour was 41 days into the summer. I have also heard that the band formed 41 days into the summer. And the sum of the word "fuck" is 41 (6+21+3+11). I think I'll believe the first one..

    The band did a lot of their older, more popular songs, but talked a fair deal about their new album. They also took a pause from playing their own music to give a mini tribute to metal music, playing some classic metal tunes from popular bands like Metallica.

The crowd giving the 41 salute!

Billy Talent

     Billy Talent formed in 1993, originally calling themselves Pezz. The band members are Ben Kowalewicz (vocals), Ian D'Sa (guitar and vocals), Jon Gallant (bass) and Aaron Solowoniuk (drums). The band played for nearly a decade before finally reaching mainstream success. In 1999 the band changed their name from Pezz because a band in the U.S. had the same name and had released a single before them. The name Billy Talent was taken from a Michael Turner novel called Hard Core Logo, in which there is a guitarist by that name. The band didn't release their first album until 2004 after being signed to Atlantic Records and Warner Music. The self-titled album, with singles like "Try Honesty", "The Ex" and "River Below", earned the band well-deserved success and they played sold-out shows throughout their 2004 tour. In 2006, Aaron Solowoniuk revealed that he had multiple sclerosis (the theme of the band's song "This is How it Goes"), but with medication, would not have to stop playing for Billy Talent!

    In 2006 they released Billy Talent II, which was mostly recorded at The Warehouse in Vancouver. The band describes this album as being more mature and less angry than the first. The band toured until 2008 with bands like Rise Against, Anti-Flag and My Chemical Romance.

    Billy Talent III was released in 2009 with singles "Rusted From the Rain" and "Saint Veronika".

    Their set was so energetic and it really flaunted the band's talents! They are such an amazing band to see live. They know how to perform to get the crowd moving, and the singer has an incredible voice that does everything it can do on the album and more!

    At one point during the show Ben brought up the recent Vancouver riots, commenting that it was a really stupid thing to do. This prompted audience members to jokingly threaten to riot when they didn't take a song request. Ben also said that they are working on their new "bad-ass" album and they would be back in Vancouver for that tour!!

    Ben even made a comment about his underwear being uncomfortable and adjusted himself onstage.

    Throughout the show, Ben kept tapping  his head and telling people in the crowd to be careful. I thought this was kind of funny considering how musicians usually don't tell the audience to hold back. Not that it worked, but it was a nice thought :)

Behind Jon is a Canucks t-shirt on the amp. Ben commented on how Vancouver welcomed the world for the 2010 Olympics then rioted over the loss of the Stanley Cup Final. Ben defends Vancouver in saying that only a few morons rioted while the rest of Vancouver watched in shock. Meanwhile, the crowd booed him for being a Toronto Maple Leafs fan :P

We also got a video of Billy Talent performing Saint Veronika live:

Sadly, Billy Talent didn't come back on stage for an encore even though the crowd cheered loudly for their return. I thought the crowd's chanting was a little sad though. It lasted for about thirty seconds before the words just fell into cheers. Either way, it was an amazing night and a kick-ass concert! It is also important to add that all of the money raised from ticket sales went towards a friend of the band's in need of funding due to a medical situation. It's always nice when you get to enjoy a show and help people simultaneously!