050209 The Tragically Hip, Montreal, QC

On May 2nd, 2009 I drove from Ottawa to Montreal to see The Tragically Hip at Metropolis.  Although Montreal has a lot of great small-to-midsized venues, when bands come to town that ought to be playing the Centre Bell but wants to play somewhere more intimate they always seem to book into Metropolis.  The semi-regular opportunity to see arena-level bands in a nice, 2,000-person capacity balconied theatre easily pushes Metropolis to the top of my preferred Montreal concert halls…

043010 Mark Knopfler, Montreal, QC

On April 30th, 2010 I woke up in some hotel or another in Montreal following an orchestral Peter Gabriel concert at the big hockey rink downtown. I have no idea how I spent my day – though I suspect it involved a significant amount of poutine – but I know I spent my evening in the presence of one of my favourite rock guitar players, the great Mark Knopfler…