Sloan

Being a Barenaked Ladies fan for over 10 years, naturally I’m on their mailing list; so I’ve known about the Ships & Dip cruise for quite sometime now. But because it would be for just one band I’d be going for, I decided to hold off until their line up started growing. Well, it did, thus, I decided to make the journey to support my beloved Sloan along side my beloved BNL.

As a long time fan, I just couldn't ask for anything more. At least 90% of all the set lists were made up of classic material. I thought the first show was totally going to be a one off thing with the total vintage list; but then as I found out during the second show, requesting songs was almost useless because they were going to play them anyway. And then, to top it off during the last show, I got to help out with Underwhelmed right before I had to head off for my BNL show.

On a personal note, on board, there were two original hardcore fans (myself and another girl) and we made damn sure that folks saw at least one of the three shows. The band actually thought they were bombing during their sets, but the reality of it is most of the passengers on board could only ever catch one show at a time (which probably made for seemingly low turnouts). When I finally got around with chatting with the people I referred to at least one show, they came out absolutely in love with what they saw. I even successfully made a brand new hardcore fan out of my one friend. Chris was genuinely thankful for our contributions, and we were more than happy to make sure they got the exposure they deserve.

All in all, I saw some of the best shows I’ve ever seen, and it was worth every penny to make the trek.

Oh, and BNL rocked, too; and the weather was very nice (for the most part, but I won’t get into that here). See you all in Sarnia!