Taverne Tour, Ever Heard Of It?

If you haven’t, Taverne tour is an annual winter musical festival that happens for a weekend in early February in Montreal. The festival highlights local venues and musical talent, domestic and international.

Photos shot by Delaney Augustine

Montreal has a wide variety of festivals that focus on highlighting local artists and local venues—some festivals of note include Tiny Fest, Expo 88, or even Plateausheaga (a neighbourhood play on the famous Montreal music festival Osheaga). The scale of Taverne Tour, however, is considerable. In the early winter, it’s impossible to walk through Montreal’s artistically rich neighbourhoods and not see a poster for promoting the festival placed for those who still look at posters, which is precisely the audience for the festival.

So few of my friends knew that the festival was happening, but the venues were packed full of people who are in the know about local artists, and packed with people who still read posters to discover new shows. Outside of the venues, smoking cigarettes, were impeccably dressed Montrealers keen to both the local scene and the artists touring for the festival that I had never heard of; bands like Wombo a post-synth punk three piece from Louisville, Kentucky with trance like riffs and ethereal vocals or The Drin, equally trance inducing from Ohio.

The festival spans an impressive 20 venues around the city. Shows are often running at these venues simultaneously, consequently, it isn’t possible to catch loads of new artists. There also isn’t a day pass or a weekend pass, both of which would really make a difference. Though some of the venues are far away from each other, and it feels like a different animal moving from venue to venue in the Quebec winter than it does in the scorching heat of a typical festival ground, a lot of the venues are short walks from each other and the exploration of new artists is one of the most enjoyable parts of any music festival.

Though it’s still a music festival in the winter where you don’t have to wear a snowsuit, so for that sake alone it deserves flowers.

The 3-day festival spans from Thursday to Saturday, and the artists span a variety of genres from Jazz to Hyper-Pop, with touring artists primarily being from Quebec, anglophone Canada, or the United States. The largest percentage of artists, however, are homegrown. Though Montreal isn’t the largest exporter of culture, which is unfortunate for the rest of the world, it is a major hub of musical talent. Almost all of the standout performances that I saw over the weekend were from Montreal-based artists.

Stand Outs:

Ribbon Skirt, a Montreal-based band and the opener at one of the venues on the first day of the festival, gave one of the best performances of the weekend. It was an experience reminiscent of performance art, transfixing and poetic, beyond the experience of a rock concert. Sonically, the band played so well, if the music didn’t feel so vibrantly alive, it could be mistaken for a recording. The shoe gaze, grunge elements mixed perfectly with the mature angst.

The frontwoman’s performance was ethereal, with her long brown hair at times obscuring her face in a very 90s Alanis Morissette Jagged Little Pill way. The lyrics were emotionally pointed, and at times ironic, “they want 2000s Buffy Marie,” Tashiina sings in a long tartan skirt with combat boots on. Rock music as high art.

In complete contrast to Ribbon Skirt, Montreal-based punk band No Waves, who in 2024 played at Osheaga, was much more raw in their sound. At a show the night before, Angel, the guitarist and dual vocalist of No Waves, stood as close to the stage at The Wesleys show as was reasonable, taking photos, requesting songs, and dancing in complete support, immediately shifting the swaying crowd to something more energetic. Something mirrored at the No Waves concert.

What was most noteworthy about their performance was the authenticity in No Waves’ music and their love for their audience. Sam, the drummer, while wearing a wool wizard hat, thanked his parents for being in the audience of the show, “Shout out to the OGs”. In a break between songs, a voice shouted from the audience, “Angel for President,” and the guitarist endearingly rambled about his desire to battle someone with the Pokémon cards that he brought to the show. The energy of the audience was only rivalled by the energy of the show. There was crowd surfing, and moshing, and singing, and people tying the shoes of people whose laces they accidentally stepped on and untied. Despite the energy of the punk music, the audience carried an aura of peace and camaraderie.   

The Festival was filled with artists with exceptional talent. Toronto’s Packs played an anticipated show, Montreal’s La Sécurité dazzled their audience with upbeat art pop, to images of construction — an inside joke for Montrealers. And the show for the American band The Drin, the final show of the festival, was filled with performers from the festival supporting artists and dancing to the post-synth sounds.

Montreal has a unique relationship to its music scene and to developing musical talent. In the past years, there has been an affront to music venues: La Divan Orange, the Diving Bell and La Tulipe all being closed due to noise complaints despite being pre-existing venues. It felt special to experience a group of artists and art connoisseurs who support each other, and a community that feeds itself. While Toronto is definitely the leading exporter of Canadian music, Taverne Tour highlights what Montreal has to offer musically both to artists looking to performance in it’s vast array of spaces and for people who enjoy good music.