On the best way to Osheaga: Younger crowd invades métro

Article content material

This not-so-long and not-so-winding highway to Osheaga begins on the Vendôme métro station.

I spot three folks exterior Vendôme and it’s instantly clear the place they’re headed. They’re the precise age — let’s simply say they wouldn’t look misplaced on a college campus — however the true giveaway is that they seem like they’re prepared for one nice get together. They’re most positively not on their strategy to work.

Article content material

It’ll be a celebration, however it’s additionally about testing new music, they mentioned.

“I like the quantity new artists you’ll be able to uncover,” mentioned Christina De Angelis. “Clearly, you get drawn in by the names you realize after which there’s fairly just a few you don’t know. That’s what intrigues me.”

Her faves on Friday embody alt-rock band The Backseat Lovers and hip-hop star Joey Bada$$.

Her buddy Kieran King has been going to Osheaga for years, first together with his mother and father and now with is buddies.

“An out of doors live performance is a lot enjoyable,” mentioned King, who works as a waiter on the N.D.G. restaurant/wine bar Entre d’Eux. “I discover it loads higher than an indoor one. Additionally whoever is curating the artists is doing an excellent job of making a steadiness.”

Inside Vendôme, it appears solely acceptable on this week of Montreal prepare glitches, that the automated machine so as to add rides to your bus/metro move isn’t working, and so the STM staffer contained in the ticket sales space is pressured to assist about 20 folks on the similar time. Because the prepare goes towards Berri-UQAM, increasingly more Osheaga-ers hop on.

However the Osheaga vibe actually ramps up at Berri, the place all of the festival-goers flock in the identical course, towards the Yellow Line going to Jean-Drapeau Park. Within the tunnel is the place the screaming and yelling begins. Some unlucky souls are going within the fallacious course within the tunnel, headed from the Yellow Line prepare, strolling single-file, actually pushed up in opposition to the wall.

Then comes the crush to squeeze into the prepare to the island.

“Now we have to ensure we get in, so PUSH,” says one man to his buddy.

Packed in like sardines — or perhaps followers on the entrance of a stage at a music fest — another person shouts: “Are all of us on?”

The ultimate vacation spot is the Jean-Drapeau station, and most roughly sprint towards the pageant website.

Article content material

Toggle full display mode Earlier Gallery Picture

2. 

3. 

4. 

5. 

6. 

7. 

Subsequent Gallery Picture Toggle gallery captions

All 7 Images for Gallery

Operate Not Obtainable

Full Display screen will not be supported on this browser model.

You could use a special browser or machine to view this in full display.

OK

Amongst these hanging out exterior the métro is Aoife O’Connor, initially from Eire and right here with a bunch of associates she met whereas working in Banff.

“We simply determined to have a giant blow-out journey,” O’Connor mentioned. “Two of us our visas are ending and we’re leaving Canada. I’m going to Australia. Montreal is a metropolis we at all times needed to go to and we got here early to spend a while right here. We arrived Wednesday and we’ve had a little bit of enjoyable. It’s lovely. The bar scene and meals scene is unbelievable. It’s very European. I’ve heard about (Osheaga) since I moved to Canada. It’s bought a pleasant lineup, a very good location. Persons are pleasant. I’ve been to a couple music festivals in North America the place it’s been a little bit of a disappointment.”

Florence Mercadal, who moved to Montreal from France two years in the past, was dying to see French-Malian singer Aya Nakamura and was severely disillusioned when the artist cancelled her Friday night time look earlier this week.

“It was an enormous disappointment, however there are a great deal of different artists I really like, like Rüfüs du Sol, Kendrick Lamar, Billie Eilish,” mentioned Mercadal. “So we’ll nonetheless have enjoyable.”

Article content material

Then she began laughing and mentioned she will get three nights off from taking good care of her three-and-a-half year-old daughter, so it’s mainly a weekend vacay.

Kayla Thibeault works as a waitress at The Blind Pig pub on Ontario St. in Hochelaga-Maisonneuve and she or he gained two tickets to the fest on the bar, which is why she was right here along with her buddy Rosalie Deschênes.

“Typically the summer season goes by so quick and we don’t have an opportunity to participate within the cool issues which can be taking place in our metropolis,” mentioned Deschênes.

Some had been disillusioned by the Nakamura cancellation, however Thibeault and Deschênes had been really excited that Quebec star Charlotte Cardin can be changing Nakamura on Friday night. Plus, the value was proper for them.

[email protected]

twitter.com/brendanshowbiz