EXCLUSIVE: Northlane Canadian Tour Blog #3

21 September 2012 | 3:20 pm | Staff Writer
Originally Appeared In

Fast rising Australian metallers Northlane are enjoying a breakout 18 months. Beginning with last year’s impressive studio album ‘Discoveries’, the band is quickly creating a strong reputation - both locally and internationally.

Fast rising Australian metallers Northlane are enjoying a breakout 18 months. Beginning with last year’s impressive studio album ‘Discoveries’, the band is quickly creating a strong reputation - both locally and internationally.

Northlane are currently touring Canada with Obey the Brave, Stray from the Path, Backtrack and Counterparts.

Killyourstereo.com is proud to present and host an EXCLUSIVE series of tour blogs from the group, continuing with Northlane’s third entry, written courtesy of guitarist Josh Smith:

"Rolling into Montreal was almost just like being in France. The boulevards, train stations, road signs, cafes, traffic lights and streetlights all look the same. The people also speak French. This was a really cool city and the moment we were in the Quebec province it was like being in another country. We started off our afternoon by going to a place called Schwartz’s. It was a 2 part deli – restaurant and takeaway specializing in Montreal smoked meat sandwiches. Apparently there was a TV series and musical made about it or something like that, and for a very good reason. This 80 year old establishment served me up the most delicious sandwich I’d ever had. Way better than the Philly Cheesteak roll I had in Kitchener (and I didn’t think that was possible). I don’t even know what to compare it to.

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Following on from this I dropped into a café to get my first espresso coffee in weeks which ruled. What a great afternoon. We walked back to the venue and found out that the show had sold out. It was upstairs in a Spanish club called La Salla Rossa, and on a big boulevard. Montreal is notorious for van break-ins, and even though it was on a main road we still took all our stuff into the venue. Although it was a pain in the ass this course of action could have averted disaster. When we were just about to open the show we were told that Backtrack’s van had been broken into. It was right near ours and there was glass everywhere, right across the road from the venue. Stuff like this really irks me. Like touring bands don’t have it hard enough already, without worrying about people stealing their shit. Anyway, the Backtrack dudes didn’t seem to concerned and pretty much stole the show, their set was one of the craziest I’ve ever seen. French Canadians love to pit. It was mental and dangerous to watch.

We had two consecutive days off after the Montreal show so we had a cabin booked at a caravan park halfway between Montreal and Quebec City where the next show was at, in a town called Trois Riviers. We called ahead to have it left open for us because we’d be turning up real late at something like 2am. We rocked up to the park at about 2.30am and the cabin we thought was ours was locked and we couldn’t break into it. So we had to wake up the park owners. It turned out that the park was part of a chain and the cabin that was reserved for us was at another park 5 hours away. After much discussion and trying to bridge the language gap they gave us two rooms to sleep in anyway, which was super nice of them. I still feel bad for waking them up at such a brutal hour.

The next day we went into town and bought lots of liquor, and then had a bonfire in at the caravan park which ended up a really rowdy night. I wish the other bands had been there. This wasn’t enough though, the next day we went and bought a bunch of BB guns and fireworks and set up a firing range in the vicinity of our cabins and set off fireworks too which was real fun. Just some shinfo, the fireworks were bought from a hobby store that had a few adult toys scattered around. If that wasn’t weird enough, one of them was a stuffed giraffe made for the concealment a girl’s best friend. After we got sick of shooting things off the front porch we had a BB skirmish and I got shot in the throat which really hurt. A lot. This left a huge mess of literally thousands of BB pellets everywhere and broken glass bottles we’d shot up which was a bitch to clean up. We did a pretty crap job so I’m half expecting a phone call from the park in the next few days. We left the park this morning and we are currently en route to Quebec City. The countryside is absolutely breathtaking. I love Canada."

Fans can read Northlane’s previous tour blogs here:

You can catch Northlane on tour with Parkway Drive, I Killed the Prom Queen and Survival this December. And, as part of Soundwave 2013.

Discoveries’ is available for purchase via UNFD.