Ben Caplan
2019-07-03 20:00 - 22:00 (America/Halifax) | The Frolic’n Folk Pub & Grill, 4115 HWY 223, Iona, Nova Scotia, B2C 1A3, Canada
2019 ECMA Songwriter of the Year winner Ben Caplan leads off our Summer Series July 3rd.
Ben Caplan is a songwriter, performer and entertainer in the most time-honoured sense of the word. From the moment he walks onto the stage, you are filled with his infectious spirit, and captivating presence. You can feel Caplan’s comfort and ease as he strides in front of the crowd and begins the controlled collective descent into chaos.
In his latest project, Ben Caplan explores themes of immigration, loss, darkness, love, sex, and God. Caplan is touring with a fresh batch of songs which were originally composed for a new musical play called Old Stock: A Refugee Love Story. The award winning play had its international debut at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival where it won top festival honours, and has been a smash hit. The play has toured internationally including a seven-week run Off Broadway where it picked up a New York Times Critic’s Pick, and six Drama Desk Award nominations, among other accolades.
Between performances of the play, Caplan has been hitting the road to play concerts across Europe, Australia, and North America with a new lineup of musicians. The music from his theatre production has been turned into Caplan’s third studio album, titled Old Stock. The sound is rooted in Caplan’s resonant baritone voice, supported with the sounds of piano, accordion, organ, clarinet, saxophone, violin, drums, and the occasional banjo and acoustic guitar.
Ages: 19+

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Frolic'n Friday
2019-07-05 19:00 - 21:30
Colin Fowlie
Catch some live music at the pub each Friday this summer.
Kitchen open till 9PM, bar open till 2AM
No cover charge.

Matt Minglewood
2019-07-10 20:00 - 22:00
Matt Minglewood – genre – Northern Rock with a Canadianna feel, a musical hybrid with one foot steeped in the musical roots of blues & country and the other knee-deep in rock. To quote one fan “We had a blast! A cornucopia of awesomeness ” What’s in store at a Minglewood Show – tunes from Matt’s latest release ‘Fly Like Desperados’ , and old classic fan favourites, peppered with songs & stories.
Minglewood, known for his high octane shows will have you enjoying his brand of rock as it should be heard, wrenched from the heart and shot from the hip. For all music fans with a taste for the blues & rock, to witness this band is a feather in your cap. Joining Matt on stage & on his latest release ‘Fly Like Desperados’ is Moon McInnis on drums & vocals, the vivacious and extremely talented Emily Dingwall does the honors on bass and vocals, 19 year old Nick McInnis adds his immense talent on guitar and Jeff Stapleton tickling the keyboards & vocals. The youthfulness in the band has added a fiery spark to their shows.
Hope you got the opportunity to catch one of their shows, you won’t be disappointed.
Matt has released 14 recordings and has amassed numerous awards & accolades including two ECMA awards for 2018 ‘Blues Recording of the Year’ and the coveted ‘Fan’s Choice Entertainer of the Year’ awards. To name but a few of the awards he has amassed throughout his career include:
East Coast Music Awards
2018 Fans Choice ‘Entertainer of the Year’
2018 Blues Recording of the Year for ‘Fly Like Desperados’2008 Blues Recording of the Year for ‘The Story”
2006 Blues Recording of the Year for ‘Live at Last’
Lifetime Achievement Award
Maple Blues Awards
2015 Blues with a Feeling Award (Lifetime Achievement) 2013 Entertainer of the Year Award
Harvest Jazz & Blues Festival
2005 Dutch Mason Blues Award
Canadian Country Song of the Year
Me & The Boys 1986
Great Canadian Blues Award
CBC Radio Saturday Night with Holger Peterson
Honorary Doctorate from UCB
Two Juno Nominations & Three Gold Records
Bestowed with the Queens Jubilee Medal for his contribution to Canadian Music

Ages: 19+

Frolic'n Friday
2019-07-12 19:00 - 21:30
Wayne Bedecki
Catch some live music at the pub each Friday this summer.
Kitchen open till 9PM, bar open till 2AM
No cover charge.

Adam Baldwin
2019-07-17 20:00 - 22:00
There is a darkness in all of us, a force that tears us away from love and toward self-destruction, hell-bent on devouring the light we each hold precariously onto. And there are moments in our lives when we embrace that shadow self deeply enough that it threatens to consume us completely. A couple years ago, at his home beneath the MacDonald Bridge in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Adam Baldwin exiled himself from his friends and family to try to understand the substance abuse that had spun his life out of control. Writing until he couldn’t write anymore, he eventually distilled the 20+ songs that poured out of him into No Rest for the Wicked, a haunted reckoning of his relationship with his own wicked self. The result is no triumph, though it often sounds like one – opener “Half a Mind” explodes from the firepower of it’s snare shots into the kind of ‘80s-tinged, synth-heavy arena rock that begs for fist-pumping. Baldwin doesn’t bend reality to create a happy ending. Instead, he tells his story so far honestly, hunting down the beast in himself in order to hopefully figure out how to live with it.
While he turns his song-writing lens further inward on No Rest for the Wicked, he shoots for the rafters with bold, brash guitars, earth-shaking drums, and synths that by turns build doomy atmospheres or provide the rocket-fuel that propels a chorus to its interstellar heights. Recorded in Halifax and New York City by Gus Van Go and Werner F., the album builds on the promise of Baldwin’s award-winning No Telling When (Precisely Nineteen Eight-Five) and reveals a new sharpness to the skills he’s honed over the better part of 15 years, toughing it out on the road and in the studio, both solo and as part of Matt Mays’ band. During the writing process, he worked out song ideas over long drives through the streets of Dartmouth – “the gritty, sad, burnt out parts of the city,” he says – and Lawrencetown Beach, surrounded by the serenity of emptiness and the hum of the Atlantic Ocean. It was between these two places that the perspective of each song would manifest, presenting itself as either ghastly and anxiety-riddled or a vessel bound unsteadily toward calmer seas.
Each path is fraught and electrifying in equal measure. “Salvation” pulses with unsettling buzz-saw bass as a sinister voice hisses into our protagonist’s ear, trying to charm him into temptation. There’s a crack of light in the acoustic strum and shuffling tambourine of “Dark Beside the Dawn” as Baldwin hopes out loud that he might be capable of sustaining some brightness in his life while acknowledging its dual nature. “Delirious for Serious” rises and rises as its subject unravels through metallic jangles and flourishes from a muscled-up six-string. And “Shattered” arrives sweat-soaked and dance-ready, riding on a driving beat that belies a heartbreaking admission of guilt and recklessness. “Something wayward beckons toward a shallow grave,” Baldwin sings. “Is that your face in the wreckage?”
True to life, No Rest for the Wicked’s finale doesn’t provide any resolution to the conflict at its heart. The title track finds our ‘hero’ deep in the darkness at the edge of Dartmouth, coming to terms with the fact that floating wasted here, among the ghosts and shadows of the city, there is no peace to be found. As Baldwin, battling against the night, howls its coda, the song fades out on a jarring wave of feedback, leaving the future uncertain. But uncertainty holds the door open for hope, and any war between darkness and light is only lost when the fighting stops.
Ages: 19+
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Frolic'n Friday
2019-07-19 19:00 - 21:30
Chris Campbell
Catch some live music at the pub each Friday this summer.
Kitchen open till 9PM, bar open till 2AM
No cover charge.

The Town Heroes
2019-07-24 20:00 - 22:00
They’ve toured the world, released three critically acclaimed albums and won an array of industry awards. Anthemic choruses, 3-part harmonies, tender falsettos and big drums highlight their riff driven, dirty-yet-nuanced barrage of sound. On stage they move like intense caricatures – soaked in sweat, pushing every chord, note and beat to the limit. A structured wall of sound emerges; familiar yet distinctive. Camaraderie shows in their musicianship, their songwriting highlights what they are: friends playing music for the love of it, in it for the long haul.
Musically, TTH are reminiscent of the 90’s Alt-Rock bands they grew up listening to. Lyrically, at the root of every song is a passionate exploration of the things that make us all human. Whether good or bad, they’re the things that make us who we are: heartache, longing, society in the modern age, dreams and family.
Through comedic videos, social media hi-jinks, blogs, unexpected wardrobe, late night sandwich stands at music festivals, amusing acceptance speeches and interviews, the band has earned a reputation for making people laugh.
Though vastly different, the band has found a way to balance these two sides in a seamless, cohesive manner. They see it as a crucial, necessary part of what they do. In a world where so much negativity fills the news, where the media endlessly focuses on the bad, The Town Heroes want to bring something positive into it all – as small as it may be. They see it as necessary because it is – it’s who they are. That’s something they’ll never change.
For the past 6 years, TTH have played as a duo – Mike Ryan (guitar, vocals) and Bruce Gillis (drums) – captivating audiences with their remarkably full sound and energetic performances. With a desire to push the envelope even more, in November 2016 the band expanded to become a 4-piece, adding Aaron Green (guitars) and Tori Cameron (bass) to the band. The new lineup reflects and effectively captures the growth, vision, and musical progression of the band.
Ages: 19+
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Frolic'n Friday
2019-07-26 19:00 - 21:30
Joseph Gillis
Catch some live music at the pub each Friday this summer.
Kitchen open till 9PM, bar open till 2AM
No cover charge.

Port Cities 2nd Show
2019-07-30 20:00 - 22:00
In the brief period of time since Port Cities unleashed their incendiary debut—a wildly self-assured collection of sparkling, rootsy pop that showcases the Nova Scotia trio’s devotion to songwriting—the band’s been hard at work bringing it to the masses. They’ve continued to explore and evolve their ambitious pop sound, melding diverse musical backgrounds to create an alchemy that’s part art, part songwriting science, and all magic: the nimble dynamism of Breagh MacKinnon’s smoky, jazz-indebted delivery, Dylan Guthro’s simmering and soulful R&B swagger, and Carleton Stone’s razor-sharp, romantic rock ‘n’ roll. In 2018, that memory-making mix of unforgettable melodies, high-flying harmonies, and electrifying heart on Port Cities is set to reach audiences worldwide.
It’s a chemistry that’s been perfected during the 100+ dates they’ve toured in the past year, in hotel rooms and songwriter circles, in vans rolling through foreign countries to rowdy pubs, and on the fog-bound shores of Canada’s misty east coast. It’s helped lead the band to numerous accolades, including a whopping five Nova Scotia Music Awards, a SOCAN #1 Award (for “Back to the Bottom”), and stints at #1 on CBC and Spotify charts. Port Cities has amassed over 1.5 million streams internationally, showcased at The Great Escape, Focus Wales, and the Reeperbahn Festival, and will be releasing their debut in the U.K. and Germany this year.
Beyond Port Cities’ deep devotion to their craft, their success is largely built on a simple but timeless approach: a good song is a good song is a good song. Whether it’s awash with synthesizer (“Sound of Your Voice”), pumped up with an overdriven crunch (“Where Have You Been”), or stripped down to the bare essentials with just an acoustic guitar and three voices. No matter what music the melody might call for, the best song always wins.
Ages: 19+

Port Cities
2019-07-31 20:00 - 22:00

Frolic'n Friday
2019-08-02 19:00 - 21:30
Ian MacDougall
Catch some live music at the pub each Friday this summer.
Kitchen open till 9PM, bar open till 2AM
No cover charge.

Tim Baker (of Hey Rosetta!) with The Weather Station
2019-08-05 20:00 - 22:00
At the end of 2017, twelve years after their inception, the multi-award winning band, Hey Rosetta! went on hiatus, after selling 10,000 tickets to five farewell shows. For the band’s principal songwriter and lead vocalist Tim Baker, this was the start of a new chapter.
On his debut solo album Forever Overhead, Baker warmly welcomes you to it. The first words we hear him sing, on the first single “Dance,” is akin to a toast: “here’s to the other side.” What follows are eleven songs that centre on kinship and show that Baker’s sharp songwriting, the heart of Hey Rosetta!, is as affecting as ever.
When crafting the album, Baker drew from 70s songwriters, like Jackson Browne and Randy Newman, whose music filled his childhood home and from his contemporaries (Feist, Leif Vollebekk, The Barr Brothers). Produced by Marcus Paquin (The National, Local Natives), Forever Overhead blends piano ballads with ebullient folk-rock tracks featuring Liam O’Neill (Suuns), Ben Whiteley (The Weather Station), as well as Mishka Stein & Joe Grass (Patrick Watson).
In the album’s opening track “Dance,” Baker moves alongside soft piano chords as buoyant, 70s pop style instrumentation and a piercing guitar riff steadily build, bolstering his words of longing. He sings of connectivity and the tender emotions that are coupled with glances across a gym’s confetti-lined linoleum floor, the air thick with potential. Like Forever Overhead as a whole, Baker brings beauty and hope into listeners’ lives.
Ages: 19+

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Frolic'n Friday
2019-08-09 19:00 - 21:30
Tyler & Abby Mullendore
Catch some live music at the pub each Friday this summer.
Kitchen open till 9PM, bar open till 2AM
No cover charge.

Villages
2019-08-14 20:00 - 22:00
Villages is an indie folk group heavily inspired by the spirit of the Maritimes. However, creating music inspired by their Cape Breton roots seemed like a long shot when the members first started performing together. Back in the late aughts, Matt Ellis, Travis Ellis, Jon Pearo and Archie Rankin formed the indie rock group Mardeen and fled Cape Breton Island for Halifax. Aiming to participate in a music community with a penchant for melodic indie rock, the group strove to carry on the torch of their heroes in Sloan, The Super Friendz and Thrush Hermit.
After releasing several acclaimed albums and EP’s, there was a turning point in that endeavour. “One late night, a few years back, a singalong of Rankin Family tunes broke out” says vocalist Matt Ellis. “I remember saying to the rest of the band that we need to write something that evokes the sound of home.” Soon after that night, Ellis wrote just that song. It was called “Hymn After Hymn” and it captured the Maritimes musically and lyrically in a new and authentic way. This song was followed by a burst of creative output and the group quickly jumped into the studio to record these songs with east coast stalwart and producer Joel Plaskett. “Joel has such a strong knowledge of folk music from the UK and Ireland, he really brought our songs to life”. The problem was, these new songs had nothing in common with the edgy indie rock that Mardeen is known for. These songs needed their own home.
Inspired by an essay that comic artist Kate Beaton wrote about her hometown in Cape Breton, the project was named Villages. The group released their first single in October 2016 and have been writing, recording, and touring in the time since.
In March 2019, Villages released their self-titled debut album. Recorded at their home studio in rural Nova Scotia with producer Thomas Stajcer (Joel Plaskett, Erin Costello), and mixed by Kevin Ratterman (My Morning Jacket, Basia Bulat), Villages solidifies the group’s vision in capturing the spirit of the Maritimes in a fresh, yet familiar way. Combining Celtic and British folk music influences with the atmospheric arrangements of groups like the War on Drugs and Fleet Foxes, Villages’ debut record is just the first step of a journey into rediscovery and reinvention.
Ages: 19+

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Frolic'n Friday
2019-08-16 19:00 - 21:30
Jordan Musycsyn
Catch some live music at the pub each Friday this summer.
Kitchen open till 9PM, bar open till 2AM
No cover charge.

Lucy MacNeil
2019-08-21 20:00 - 22:00
The only girl in a family of five boys, Lucy MacNeil can be described as the heart of The Barra MacNeils. Her crystalline vocals are immediately identifiable with the group’s quintessential sound.
For Lucy, music has always had a heartbeat and she recalls it as the centre of her childhood
home where family, neighbours and visiting musicians were often known to gather — the perfect rhythm of everyone’s feet tapping with the music would lull her to sleep on many nights.
Lucy’s own musical journey officially began when she was 9 years old, but even before that she was step dancing alongside her mother, a well-known local dancer and teacher. Her career with The Barra MacNeils has seen her opening tours for international stars such as Celine Dion, Kenny Rogers and fellow Canadian Rita MacNeil. Yet, with all the many rich and rewarding experiences Lucy’s fondest memory of performing took place in grade 10 at Memorial High School. A contestant in the winter carnival pageant, she put together a performance for the talent portion that drew on all her talents – singing “The legend of the St. Anne’s Reel” playing the fiddle between verses and then ending with a step dance routine. The remarkable effort would lead to her very first standing ovation.
A devoted mother of two talented young girls, Lucy finds time to enjoy life’s simple pleasures, from sharing recipes with her mom, and getting car care advice from her dad, chatting with old friends or dancing to the infectious latin rhythms in her ZUMBA class. Lucy MacNeil looks forward to discovering where music and her extraordinary life will lead her next.
Ages: 19+

J.P. Cormier
2019-08-28 20:00 - 22:00
Nobody really knows who J.P. Cormier is for sure. That’s to be expected, believe me.
In 1974 he was a five year old boy, discovering an innate talent for playing the guitar, I had a little hand in that, guiding him through the beginning stages. He learned faster than I could teach.
By the mid eighties, not out of his teens, he was a sideman for bands and artists of many different genres in Alabama, Tennessee, Mississippi, and all across the deep south. As he travelled and worked he added more and more instruments to his arsenal of capabilities. He became indispensable to the bands he worked for.
In the early Nineties, he became a sideman for one of Canada’s favourite sons, Stompin’ Tom Connors and also became a staple of the recordings at Studio H in Halifax. His work with the CBC there, spanned musical, production and arranging duties.
All this before he was 20.
In the mid nineties he reentered the musical scene of his beloved East Coast and the Island called Cape Breton. He exploded onto the trad music scene there as a fiddler, performing some of the most difficult music ever produced by legends like Winston Fitzgerald and Angus Chisholm with a facility that stunned onlookers. Especially those who knew he wasn’t born there, but born in Ontario to Cape Breton parents. Somehow, some way, his music was the real thing, sounding like he had been steeped continually in a handed-down brew of family tradition from the old country.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
His previous gig was in Nashville playing mandolin and banjo in a grammy nominated bluegrass gospel band and performing on the Opry, and playing television shows with the likes of Waylon Jennings. All those people also thought he was one of them, American, reared in the ways of bluegrass, old time and Americana music. They knew he was from Canada, but it just didn’t seem possible.
Then in 1997, something amazing happened.
An album released in Canada, out of nowhere, called Another Morning. This time it was him as a songwriter and a lead singer.
And what a songwriter he turned out to be. Some of the performances on that album are literally part of the musical vocabulary today in the East Coast. Songs like the title cut, and Kelly’s Mountain, The Molly May (co written with his cousin Gervais) and others. It inspired, 25 years ago, some of the biggest names in the business today. People like Dave Gunning, Matt Andersen, David Myles, Joel Plaskett, all of which will tell you: that record changed things.
The Canadian industry thought so too, and it received a juno nomination and won an ECMA.
And that was just the beginning.
36 years later after stepping on stage as professional union musician for the first time at the tender age of 13, JP is still going, and frighteningly, still getting better.
16 albums followed the success of Another Morning, winning 12 more ECMA’s, another Juno nomination, a Canadian Folk Music Award and 5 Music Nova Scotia Awards. Each album was a snapshot of each thing that he can do. There are fiddle albums, Mandolin, Banjo, Guitar, tribute records, songwriting collections, a purely astounding spectrum of talent and musical vision.
His catalogue of recordings and the 150 or so records he’s produced on other artists, resemble the tapestry he weaves in live performance. Where he used to carry 3 and 4 piece bands, he tours alone now.
Just him and the instruments.
People still leave his shows confused, amazed and wondering what they just saw. Did they see a storyteller? A Songwriter? Arguably one of the best guitar players in the business today? Someone who crosses the lines between different instruments like there are no lines? Who was that masked man, anyway?
Accolades aside, and there are many from people like Chet Atkins, Marty Stuart, Waylon Jennings, Gordon Lightfoot; JP sees himself as just a performer. He’s shy, but has a razor sharp wit and lightning sense of humour. He can be reserved or edgy to the point no return. He speaks for soldiers, first responders, other artists, the forgotten and lost. He speaks sometimes only for himself and refuses rebuttal.
Of all the things he is, foremost he is an entertainer. I think one of the best. After you’ve seen what he does, I’m certain you will too.
Ages: 19+

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Mo Kenney
2019-10-11 20:00 - 22:00
“I am demented and all my friends are scared of me,” Mo Kenney sings on a beloved, unreleased staple of her live shows. “I am an alien waiting for my family.” Connection—the rare times we have and hold onto it tenuously, the lack or loss of it, the search for it, and even the creeping feeling that it may be unattainable—is a defining theme of the Dartmouth, Nova Scotia songwriter’s body of work. It’s no stretch to imagine that it’s maybe the main reason her fans are so passionately drawn to her as an artist and performer, either. In a world where connection becomes increasingly scarce, there’s a quixotic stubbornness in Kenney’s songs, an insistence that forging a bond is worth all the unavoidable pain and heartbreak and self-destruction that might be wrought from it. And there are few songwriters who are able to create such unforgettable melodies while communicating just how rough the ride can be.
Throughout Kenney’s own rough ride, from troubled teenagerdom and teaching herself Elliott Smith songs in her small-town bedroom to battling with her demons on 2017’s eclectic and brash The Details, music has remained constant. At 17, she stunned Maritime rock ‘n’ roll legend Joel Plaskett with a couple songs recorded at her friend’s high school, eventually leading to a long-running collaborative relationship between the two. In 2012, she released her self-titled debut, a powerful first impression that melds her extraordinary knack for nuance—the dreamy, award-winning folk tune “Sucker,” for example—and a clear bent toward sounds more incendiary and ambitious that shows up on the driving kiss-off “Déjà Vu” and her cover of Bowie’s “Five Years,” which explodes with an interstellar crescendo worthy of the Starman. She expands that vibe on In My Dreams, venting existential frustration by almost gleefully urging the listener to blow her head off on the hazy pop of “Take Me Outside,” dabbling in spacey prog rock for the stomping “Mountains to the Mess,” and stylishly sowing sorrow on the title track over subtle, ‘60s-tinged piano, convinced that she’s hallucinated an absent lover.
Kenney pathologically mines the most shadowy corners of herself in order to surface with something unflinchingly honest, but The Details found her exploring uncharted territory. It traces her own strange, devastating, and ultimately hopeful trip through the trials and tribulations of booze-fuelled breakdowns, clouds of depression, and disintegrating relationships. It sounds as fraught as the subject matter demands. “On The Roof” seethes with suffocating anxiety and punchy guitar; the jangle of “Unglued” is deceptively sunshiney, the way someone might force a smile as they’re falling apart; and “Feelin’ Good” offers some real redemption in its weird, soothing sparseness, but feels tentative, as though Kenney is aware things could still unravel at any moment.
It’s this willingness to bare so much of herself—not all, mind you—on record and on stage that draws in fans from all over the world, people far and wide who feel like aliens themselves, looking to connect with anyone or anything. And that illuminates a comforting truth: sometimes the fear that you don’t belong in this world is the most human feeling you can feel. With a touring history that’s seen her play her tunes for swaths of the United States, Europe, Australia, and the UK, the future will find Kenney continuing to tour as much as possible, expanding her sonic reach here on Earth and perhaps beyond, beamed up somewhere deep in the cosmos among other beings like her.

Garnet Rogers
2019-10-27 20:00 - 22:00
In a darkened bedroom, lit only by the amber glow from an old floor model radio, two young brothers aged 6 and 12 lay in their beds, listening to the country music broadcasts from the Grand Ol’ Opry, and practiced their harmonies. Two years later, the youngest one was playing the definitive 8-year-old’s version of “Desolation Row” on his ukulele. He soon abandoned that instrument to teach himself the flute, violin and guitar.
Within ten years, and barely out of high school, Garnet Rogers was on the road as a full-time working musician with his older brother Stan. Together they formed what has come to be accepted as one of the most influential acts in North American folk music.
Since then, Garnet Rogers has established himself as ‘One of the major talents of our time”. Hailed by the Boston Globe as a “charismatic performer and singer”, Garnet is a man with a powerful physical presence – close to six and a half feet tall – with a voice to match. With his “smooth, dark baritone” (Washington Post) his incredible range, and thoughtful, dramatic phrasing, Garnet is widely considered by fans and critics alike to be one of the finest singers anywhere. His music, like the man himself, is literate, passionate, highly sensitive, and deeply purposeful. Cinematic in detail, his songs “give expression to the unspoken vocabulary of the heart” (Kitchener Waterloo Record). An optimist at heart, Garnet sings extraordinary songs about people who are not obvious heroes and of the small victories of the everyday. As memorable as his songs, his over-the-top humour and lightning-quick wit moves his audience from tears to laughter and back again.
“Garnet Rogers is capable of awe-inspiring and unpredictable stuff – and that includes more than just music”
Resolutely independent, Garnet Rogers has turned down offers from major labels to do his music his own way.

Brandon Collier at The Frolic
2019-11-10 17:00 - 20:00
Join us Sunday night for an evening of sing along songs.
Brandon is an up & coming talent, with a wealth of songs.
Kitchen open till 8PM, bar 12AM
Cheers!

New Years Eve (Eve) with Pretty Archie
2019-12-30 21:00 - 2019-12-31 02:00
SOLD OUT!

Doors open at 4PM. No reservations. General Admission Seating. Ticket gets you entrance, party favours, champagne, midnight snacks & a guaranteed good time!
Pretty Archie is a Canadiana band from Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. Long time friends Brian Cathcart (Lead Vocals, Guitar), Matt McNeil (Mandolin, Guitar), Colin Gillis (Harmonica, Bass, Vocals), Redmond MacDougall (Banjo, Percussion, Vocals) and recently added Scott MacLean (Guitar, Mandolin) make up the band. Always jamming together growing up, they guys decided in 2012 to form a band. The band chose the name Pretty Archie after a local (Cape Breton) character known for playing with 2 strings outside shopping malls in any weather and not always (or ever) in key. The guys thought the name Pretty Archie embodied the love of playing and performing music along with representing their hometown.
With the release of Hanging On, Pretty Archie showcase a genre-bending mix of folk, bluegrass, country, rock and vintage soul, all underpinned the band’s east coast roots, that’s absolutely impossible to pigeonhole. Hanging On has been nominated for Music Nova Scotia’s Americana/Bluegrass Album of the Year.
Ages 19+

New Years Eve with Pretty Archie
2019-12-31 21:00 - 2020-01-01 02:00
Doors open at 4PM. No reservations. General Admission Seating. Ticket gets you entrance, party favours, champagne, midnight snacks, fireworks & a guaranteed good time!
Pretty Archie is a Canadiana band from Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. Long time friends Brian Cathcart (Lead Vocals, Guitar), Matt McNeil (Mandolin, Guitar), Colin Gillis (Harmonica, Bass, Vocals), Redmond MacDougall (Banjo, Percussion, Vocals) and recently added Scott MacLean (Guitar, Mandolin) make up the band. Always jamming together growing up, they guys decided in 2012 to form a band. The band chose the name Pretty Archie after a local (Cape Breton) character known for playing with 2 strings outside shopping malls in any weather and not always (or ever) in key. The guys thought the name Pretty Archie embodied the love of playing and performing music along with representing their hometown.
With the release of Hanging On, Pretty Archie showcase a genre-bending mix of folk, bluegrass, country, rock and vintage soul, all underpinned the band’s east coast roots, that’s absolutely impossible to pigeonhole. Hanging On has been nominated for Music Nova Scotia’s Americana/Bluegrass Album of the Year.
Ages 19+

New Year's Day Levee
2020-01-01 14:00 - 17:00
Come celebrate the new year at the Frolic and Folk Pub & Grill.
Music from 2-5PM (TBA)
$5 cover charge for adults at the door.
Cheers!

Woody Woodburn
2020-02-14 19:00 - 21:00
Born & raised in Mississauga, ON, Canada, Woody cut his teeth on the Canadian music industry with his band in the mid 90’s. Drawn to the small town lifestyle of his roots in Cape Breton, NS, he now calls his home Rockwood, ON.
After many years struggling to find a place in the corporate world, he has now found a renewed passion & love for music and will not let anything stand in his way. The music is much more than Top 40. The kind of melodies that linger in your head well after you’ve heard them. He gives life to your own struggles. Like listening to an old friend. Woody is an unassuming, humble guy that will surprise you with his powerful voice. A voice that combined with with the real & “come from the heart” lyrics will leave you more hopeful & inspired in your life.
The EP “Better Man Today” is Woody’s first solo work and is available now!
No cover.
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Tap Take Over Songwriters Circle - POSTPONED
2020-04-10 20:00 - 22:00
POSTPONED – CREDITS AND OR REFUNDS WILL BE ISSUED

Back By Popular Demand with a Sold Out Show Last Year, Sociable Entertainment and The Frolic & Folk Presents
Breton Brewing Tap Take Over Songwriters Circle with Jordan Musycysn, Mike McKenna Jr, & Carmen Townsend
Enjoy A Night Of Great Entertainment & Breton Brewing Finest Brews!

Showtime: 8:00pm

Advance Tickets: $15.00

Door Prize: Two Tickets To Breton Brewing Beer & Music Festival – Under The Breton Sky 2020, also with Evening Giveaways & More.

Get Them Before They Sell Out!

Lloyd Spiegel - POSTPONED
2020-04-19 20:00 - 22:00
POSTPONED – CREDIT OR REFUNDS WILL BE ISSUED
Somewhere between songwriter, social worker and truth-seeker, sits 11X Australian Blues Award winner, Lloyd Spiegel. Named one of the top Australian guitarists of all time, Lloyd blends comedy, storytelling and jaw-dropping guitar chops to provide one of the most unique, solo, acoustic concert experiences in the world.
Picking up the guitar at age 4 and playing his first professional show at age 10, Lloyd can’t remember a time before playing guitar. By 16 he was on tour in the United States and has since performed at major festivals and iconic Juke Joints around the globe. He has supported the likes of Ray Charles, Bob Dylan and Etta James on tour and has sat with the founding fathers of modern blues including Brownie McGhee, who taught him the most important part of being a blues musician: connecting with everyday people.
Growing up in the music business, Lloyd is passionate about promoting the blues scene and mentoring the next generation. He has taken countless young artists under his wing who have since become multi-award winning performers in their own right and he has been an advocate for blues in Australia.
Quotes:
“A revelation, the consummate performer, an Oz Blues & Roots icon.” – Rolling Stone Australia
“A guitarist almost without peer, Spiegel deconstructs how the blues guitar is supposed to operate, makes sweet love to it, then kicks it out the back door” .– Australian Guitar Player Magazine
“Lloyd Spiegel…guitar magic and great stories. This show is value for money! Go, be amazed!”– Terry Seguin, CBC

Steve Poltz (all ages show 4PM) - POSTPONED
2020-05-02 16:00 - 18:00
POSTPONED – CREDIT OR REFUNDS WILL BE ISSUED
Throughout over three decades in music, Steve Poltz did it all and more—often shared by way of his rockin’ countrified folk slices of sardonic Americana (hatched in Halifax). Of course, he co-wrote Jewel’s multiplatinum Hot 100-topping megahit “You Were Meant For Me,” but he also went on a whale watch with her and a few federales that turned into a drug bust. The two still share the story at every festival they play together. He made his bones as the frontman for underground legends The Rugburns, who burned rubber crisscrossing the continent on marathon tours and still pop up once in a while for the rare and quickly sold out reunion gig.
In 20 years since his full-length solo debut, One Left Shoe, he blessed the world’s ears with twelve solo records, spanning the acclaimed 2010 Dreamhouse and most recently Folk Singer in 2015. NPR summed it up best, “Critics and fans alike now regard Poltz as a talented and prolific songwriter.” By 2016, he survived a stroke, endured anything the music industry could throw at him, and still performed like “280 days a year.”
However, he still never lived in Nashville, which represents a turning point in the story and the genesis of his 2018 Red House Records debut, Shine On…
“My girlfriend Sharon sold the condo we were living in, and I was ready to live in a van, which seemed like a good idea for one night—then I decided I wanted a kitchen and a closet,” he admits. “Sharon wanted to move to Nashville, because she thought it would be good for me. It caused a huge fight. I’d been in San Diego since 1980, and that’s where I cut my musical teeth. I thought I’d never leave. In fact, at the height of our fight, I said, ‘I’m not leaving San Diego. I am San Diego!’ This makes me laugh now. As soon as I got to Nashville, I immediately knew I wanted to make a record in ‘Music City’.”
So, the man who once protested “I am San Diego” made Shine On in his new home of Nashville with one of its elder statesmen behind the board, Will Kimbrough [Emmylou Harris, Rodney Crowell]. Holing up in the studio at Kimbrough’s house, nothing would be off limits. Together, they unlocked the kind of creative chemistry you only hear about in band bios—but for real.
“I respect Will so much, and I’d always wanted to work with him,” says Steve. “Like two mad scientists, we just took our time and had fun. We didn’t overthink things. Everything felt organic. We ate soul food and drank lots of really good coffee. We tried out weird sounds, and the songs always started with voice and guitar—no click track, just how I’d play them. I road tested many of them, and they were ripe for the picking when recording time came around.”
Evoking themes of “hope, love, contemplation, celebration of Wednesday, pharmacists, and the fact that windows are not inanimate objects and they sometimes have conversations with each other,” the record represents Steve at his most inspired and insightful. The opener and title track “Shine On” pairs a delicate vocal with lithely plucked acoustic strings as he urges, “Shine on, shine on.”
“The song was a gift,” he recalls. “I woke up really early in Encinitas, California at Sharon’s sister’s house. The sun was just coming up. I was all alone in perfect solitude. My guitar was there. The sky was gorgeous. I wrote it as a poem. Everyone always told me, ‘Never start a record with a really slow song.’ So, seeing that I have O.D.D. (Oppositional Defiance Disorder), I started my record with one. I love the mood it sets. It’s almost like my mission statement, trying to find some semblance of positivity and light in a sometimes ruthless world.”
On “Pharmacist,” rustling guitar and harmonica propel a tale of “this dude having a crush on his pharmacist.” It also serves as an extension of his friendship with neighbor Scot Sax—with whom he shares the podcast “One Hit Neighbors” (since they’ve both had one hit song). Meanwhile, he joined forces with Molly Tuttle on “4th of July,” which, of course, came to life on the 3rd of July. “Ballin On Wednesday” drew its title and chorus from a diner checkout girl (with a super cool gold tooth) who Steve paid with a $100 bill and she replied, “Oooh, ballin’ on a Wednesday.” The finale “All Things Shine” skips along on sparse instrumentation as Steve sends a message.
“‘All Things Shine’ came about after one of the many mass shootings on this planet,” he sighs. “I was feeling overwhelmed. So, I wanted to put my feelings into words and melody. I was thinking that even if we’re feeling hopeless that there is still beauty. All things shine in their own way.”
Who could contend that?
In the end, for everything you can call him “searcher, smartass, movie freak, lover of technology, news junkie, baseball fan to nth degree, lapsed catholic who still believes in god even though all his friends are atheists and think he’s an idiot, and maker of fun,” you might just call Steve that little light in the dark we all need in this day and age.
Or Nashville’s Canadian Jiminy Cricket…
“I hope Shine On makes listeners smile and feel welcome, and they want to share it with their friends,” he leaves off. “Music means energy to me. All things. It connects us, makes us move, helps us relax, and inspires us to change things up.”

An Evening with Steve Poltz - POSTPONED
2020-05-02 20:00 - 22:00

Madison Violet - POSTPONED
2020-05-15 20:00 - 22:00
POSTPONED – CREDIT OR REFUNDS WILL BE ISSUED
After 20 years together, Juno nominated singer-songwriting duo, Madison Violet, are as much wanderers as they are musicians. It is a career filled with endless roads stretching into the horizon, winding through changing landscapes, each kilometer traveled carrying with it the promise of inspiration. Perhaps that is the secret of what has made Madison Violet such an enduring band. Because with each new town, each new venue, their curiosity grows, their love of music deepens, their desire to push musical boundaries expands.
It is believed that the spark that ignited Madison Violet’s irrepressible curiosity came from an unlikely source; while sitting in Brenley’s grandmother’s kitchen in Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, filled to bursting with family, friends, instruments (and maybe even a foe or two), and miles from their adopted home of Toronto, Ontario, two musicians looked at each over the flickering light of the old wood stove and knew that theirs would be an unconventional journey. Inspired by their heritage, emboldened by their vision, Lisa MacIsaac and Brenley MacEachern decided that they would create a sound that would have it’s roots in their past while continually exploring new sounds. From the beginning, the multi-instrumentalists have carried authenticity with them like a talisman, writing all of their own music and lyrics, believing that the best way to connect to their audiences was to treat them like old friends sharing a secret and a smile. As vocalists they have an innate ability to break your heart, slyly knowing that their soaring harmonies will mend it, often all in the span of one song.
​The shared belief in themselves and their fearlessness to follow their dreams did eventually pay off and accolades and awards soon became synonymous with Madison Violet; including a Juno nomination, a Canadian Folk Music Award for Best Vocal Group Album of the Year and a Critic’s Choice Award from Country Music People’s Magazine. Their songs have been featured in the notorious music magazine MOJO’s Top 10 Playlist, and received a mass of acclaim from outlets such as the BBC, the CBC, Maverick Magazine and NPR, and have earned the duo the Grand Prize in the Maxell John Lennon Song Writing Contest (which was voted on by a panel of distinguished artists including Elton John, Tim McGraw, Black Eyed Peas, Fergie, John Legend, Enrique Iglesias and Mary J.Blige). Madison Violet were on Germany’s WDR’s list of ‘Best Bands of All Time’ and with a bit of a departure from their rootsy sound, their single ‘These Ships’ was released in 2014 on one of the largest dance labels in the U.S., Ultra Records, garnering over 1,000,000 plays on Spotify. Madison Violet has 9 studio albums to their credit including the new Christmas classic “Sleigh Bells in the Snow” featuring their friend and collaborator Ron Sexsmith, singing on Frosty the Snowman.
In March 2019, Madison Violet will release their latest album “Everything’s Shifting”. The album is a heartfelt examination of how memory can splinter a heart, how loss shapes perspective and how sometimes, no matter how hard you try, you can’t have love without regret. It is an album to be listened to on the open road, with the windows rolled down: a love letter to their fans, from two wanderers who continue to follow the melodies wherever they lead.

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Open in Spotify

The Town Heroes (Acoustic)
2020-07-24 20:00 - 22:00
They’ve toured the world, released three critically acclaimed albums and won an array of industry awards. Anthemic choruses, 3-part harmonies, tender falsettos and big drums highlight their riff driven, dirty-yet-nuanced barrage of sound. On stage they move like intense caricatures – soaked in sweat, pushing every chord, note and beat to the limit. A structured wall of sound emerges; familiar yet distinctive. Camaraderie shows in their musicianship, their songwriting highlights what they are: friends playing music for the love of it, in it for the long haul.
Musically, TTH are reminiscent of the 90’s Alt-Rock bands they grew up listening to. Lyrically, at the root of every song is a passionate exploration of the things that make us all human. Whether good or bad, they’re the things that make us who we are: heartache, longing, society in the modern age, dreams and family.
Through comedic videos, social media hi-jinks, blogs, unexpected wardrobe, late night sandwich stands at music festivals, amusing acceptance speeches and interviews, the band has earned a reputation for making people laugh.
Though vastly different, the band has found a way to balance these two sides in a seamless, cohesive manner. They see it as a crucial, necessary part of what they do. In a world where so much negativity fills the news, where the media endlessly focuses on the bad, The Town Heroes want to bring something positive into it all – as small as it may be. They see it as necessary because it is – it’s who they are. That’s something they’ll never change.

Open in Spotify
Open in Spotify
Open in Spotify
