On March 8, 2015, Wayne Hunt and I played a three-song set at the Carleton Music Bar. Wayne has been playing this festival for a few years now and each year he invites different musicians to occupancy him – this year, it was me with the Maschine. It was a pleasure to play live with one of the best songwriters that I’ve ever met.
The March Hare is a touring festival that originated in Cornerbrook, Newfoundland is 1988 and showcases Newfoundland & Labrador arts across the country. Hailing from Newfoundland, Wayne’s music fits right in. He has a collection of smokin’ tunes but he narrowed down to three for us to play together at the Festival. Wayne was really interested in the Maschine and integrating it in with his folk music. It’s an interesting juxtapose for sure and we spent a lot of the time practicing just getting the right samples for Maschine. Two of the songs (Bonfire Night; The Symphony) are a little more laid back while the final song, Little Harbour Deep is (in Wayne’s words) “a little more industrial”. We drew a lot of inspiration of drum patterns and samples from Lorde and her producer Joel Little.
It was the first time I had played live in a very long time – and the first with Maschine / without a bass guitar. It’s a very cool feeling to have my first performance in years in front of a sold-out crowd at my favourite music bar in Halifax. Overall, the March Hare was a blast and I’d love to play in front of all those salty Newfoudlanders again. See the performance of the set here: