yesterday was a scorcher, so the mister and i decided to head to the beach to try and find some relief. if you haven’t already been, sugar beach, is a good (new) ‘urban beach’ option in the city. it’s a bit further west than the uber popular hTo park, so it’s a little less busy. it’s nestled behind the redpath refinery (hence the name) and there is a bike path along most of queen’s quay making it easy to get there. pack yourself a lunch, and a LOT of water. you’ll need it.

oh, and perhaps not best to bike 10kms round trip to get there and home. sweaty. betty.

ra ra riot opened the show, and they were awesome. i was excited to see them open on such a big show, i mean, to open for tegan and sara AND city and colour. amazing! high fives to the band. even more amazing was watching both tegan and sara rock out to their set from the sidelines. so cute and so supportive!

i’ve chosen to avoid writing about the next band. they were perhaps the most boringest, most repetitive act i’ve ever had the misfortune of seeing live. i know, it sounds harsh, but they did have a really catchy song out last year…so i really expected more. (cough-wintersleep-cough). as an aside, d kept calling them ‘wintersale’, which at the very least kept me amused while trying to determine if they were still playing the same song, or if this was yet another that sounded the same…

next up? tegan and sara! yaaaaay! the ladies were just as lovely as they’ve been all of the other times we’ve seen them. the set was super fun, they played the most popular songs from all of their albums. their slowed down version of ‘walking with a ghost’ was rad, and their acoustic version of ‘feel it in my bones’ pleased the crowd as usual. when they left the stage i had an inkling they’d be back up with city and colour some sort of performance, dallas green and the ladies are good friends, so it seemed a no brainer. aaand i was right! more on that later.

city and colour closed out the show, and colour me impressed! to date, i’ve always liked a few of their songs, but i really wasn’t prepared for the amazingness of dallas green’s voice. boy can sing! like plaster you against the wall vocals with the prettiest acoustic guitar riffs. i’ve definitely been converted. entire city and colour albums will be added to my itunes this week! towards the end of the show dallas asked for his two ‘friends’ to join him onstage to sing one of his newest songs. apparently tegan only learned it the day before. love improved performances. dallas explained that he had written the song about the oil spill. you can see the video i captured below. apologies for some of the shakiness, d and i had retreated from the front of the stage for a little sitting break halfway through their more mellow set, i had to hold the camera above my head for this. long story short: my arms were burning.

all in all it was a fantastic, albeit long (clocking in over 5 hours!) night. you can check out all of my other photos from the show here.

i actually really liked the movie. given it was a kelly slater surf movie, i was expecting the usual surf movie tricks along with some tropical soundtrack, but this movie was different. it got into the tahitian culture and history, and also explained how the islands were formed and what causes waves…all in 3D! some of the footage and effects were incredible – the underwater shots in particular, you actually felt as though you were swimming along with the fish and the sea turtles. and the footage of some of the waves crashing was pretty impressive too. 3D just keeps getting better and better for me. the movie isn’t overly long. it clocks in just under an hour, and was the perfect way to kill some time on a rainy sunday afternoon. if you find yourself in the area and are looking for something to do, i would deffo recommend you see it.

perhaps my only complaint were the 3D glasses themselves. damn, they were heavy…and huge. i spent most of the movie holding my fingers under the nose piece to keep the glasses from crushing me. aside from the weight, they were really fashionable and cool…er…maybe not so much.

of course, what festival wouldn’t be complete without some ghetto games and rides, complete with carnies to run them? could not love it more. and you best believe they just made me more excited to get to the ex this year!

small side note: we’re 3/3 on roasted corn at this summer’s festivals. here’s to hoping with close out the season with a perfect record! yum.

can’t wait to spend some proper time with her this weekend.

sanding and staining party at my place, anyone?

while we were reveling in the awesness of the synthesizer for a few of the acts on friday night (yes, we’re all eighties-babies!), i decided on my next silkscreen project. a synth tee! likey? okay, so it probs wont look exactly like what i’ve mocked up in less than five mins, in a non-adobe program…but you get the idea. what size should i put you down for?