Je lui ai lancè qu’y avait pas juste une
Façon de voir la vie en pleine face
J’me reconnaissais pas
Dans le seconde
Fondent les neiges éternelles
Nos yuex inondent
Le ciel . . .
— Karkwa “Dans le seconde”
I blurted out that there wasn’t just one
way to see life — right to her face
I didn’t recognize myself
In that split second
The eternal snows melt
Our eyes flood
The sky . . .
Merci beaucoup Danny Payne and Raison d’être Media. Merci beaucoup Sandy Boutin and FME. Merci beaucoup Rouyn-Noranda. Merci. Merci. Merci. Merci.
I’ve been in La Belle Province four years in the past seven years — 2019, 2022, 2024 and 2026. So, we’re talking about 40, 43, 45 and 47. Each trip has been different. And that should be obvious; after all, each of those years have been very different. But this trip felt desperately needed.
During my first time up in 2024, I chatted with a driver, who was my kind of guy, a quick-witted relisher of irony. The first time I encountered this driver, he told me “Everyone who comes up here catches the FME fever. They get it and they can’t wait to come back up.” Well, my friend, I guess I’ve had the FME fever for some time.
But what makes a festival a unique experience? The people. My fellow Anglophones were a super sweet bunch. And the locals! I’ll always remember a tipsy local saying to me as he was dapping me up: “You’re telling others about us? About us?!!! Holy shit!”
Festival staff were warm, friendly, and they made sure that everything worked as it should, including having 80 artists play in clubs and makeshift venues across town, and having roughly 150 or so music industry professionals from both the Francophone and Anglophone worlds.
And add the food, the beer and the after parties. It was a blast, y’all.
Je t’aime la belle province. Je t’aime Rouyn-Noranda. Je t’aime FME. Je t’aime Montréal. Au revoir. Auf wiedersehen! Tots zien! Farewell. Let’s do this again soon.
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