Rockin’ the Rock 2023 featured Canadian icons and trailblazers

LITTLE CURRENT—Over the course of two days this past weekend, Flatrock Entertainment’s Kelly and Craig Timmermans brought some of the most important names of the past six decades in Canadian rock music to their Harbour View Road concert grounds for Rockin’ the Rock 2023 (RtR).

Headliners Haywire on Friday night and Aldo Nova on Saturday night topped each lineup with outstanding shows, but that was no easy task as the bar was set high by the opening acts.

Pop Machine was the standout on Friday, given that the ages of that entire band totaled together would be hard put to rival that of some of the following band’s lead singers. The young Sudbury group has made it their mission to bring classic rock to a new generation of fans, and they did it well (although in truth, their RtR audience’s median age was probably closer to that of their grandparents than their parents).

Punk rock legends Carole Pope and Rough Trade were next up and a bit of a case in point. Lead singer Pope is firmly ensconced in Canadian rock royalty’s lineup. Currently on the Polaris Prize shortlist, her work has been recognized with multiple JUNO Awards, a Genie, gold, platinum and double platinum record sales and she has been inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame. Among the names she has performed with can be found such luminaries as David Bowie and Elton John. One of her latest projects includes composing ‘Rough Trade, the Musical.’

Ms. Pope’s performance was a testimony to the invigorating nectar of live performance. Despite being 77 years old, her voice and stage presence remain as powerful as when she first brought her New Wave sexually charged music to life in the bars of Yorkville during the late ‘60s, going on to ascend the heights. One of the first openly gay artists to make it in the mainstream, her music cracked boundaries wide open.

Ms. Pope’s songs transcend the limitations of sexual boundaries and labels, however, touching deep into the psyche of heterosexual and gay listeners alike. The audience reaction to the teen “gay” anthem ‘High School Confidential’ and ‘All Touch and No Contact’ played witness to that truth. Ms. Pope prefaced the former with the tongue in cheek comment, “I feel like a bit of a perv” singing about a high school crush—but her performance was anything but apologetic, and the crowd literally went wild.

The Expositor caught up with the artist following her show for a short conversation about the industry today and how she finds the road these days.

“We don’t do that much now,” she said. “But it’s still a lot of fun.”

“I am working on a musical ‘Rough Trade, the Musical’,” she said.

As for advice for young people entering the music industry today. “You have to perform live,” she said, “‘cause that is the only way you are going to make money. You are not going to make money from making albums and films, that sort of thing.”

As for AI. “I think it is scary, but I don’ think it is going to replace singers,” she said. “There has to be some kind of control. But I saw that Indiana Jones movie with Harrison Ford and it was great.”

“You own your own image,” said Ms. Pope, noting that it is probably wise to take steps to protect that image, given the current state of technology.

As for budding songwriters, the pathway remains the same, even if the environment has changed somewhat from when she started out. “Keep writing,” she said. “Keep writing until you learn to write better. Write what works for you.”

“There is a way more crap out there because anybody can write albums now,” she said. “I find a lot on indie radio. I am always excited to hear something I like.” Despite more than five decades in the industry, even rock legends get pumped when they step on stage and can discover delight in a new song.

Either of the closing acts, SAGA or Haywire, could easily have been the headliners, putting forward driving performances that kept the audience rocking. Saturday’s bands followed closely in the same vein.

Conversation with another artist performing at the festival (during a sudden torrential thunderstorm earlier on Saturday—thankfully clearing up by the time they took to the stage later that evening) revealed a sometimes-hidden truth about rock musicians who are generally saddled with a rough and rowdy rep. “This is terrible for us,” he said as the rain pounded down on the car that was taking a couple of the musicians to Sheguiandah for “supplies.” When asked “don’t you still get paid?” his reply in that unguarded moment was instant. “But the audience doesn’t come out—and that’s the whole point of doing this, isn’t it?”

Performing artists live to perform, even as they perform to live. That was a recurring theme in conversations with artists throughout the weekend. It is what drives a bone-tired artist who has just endured the hell of a 12-hour multi-airport journey to step out on stage before a live audience to give more than seems humanly possible and that energy transmits to their audience.