"It's folk music if it's for the folks, right?" Stars lead singer Torquil Campbell mused to the crowd as his decidedly non-folk band Stars played the mainstage at the first day of the Calgary Folk Festival.
The Montreal-based dream poppers are the first major act in a long line of un-folk groups to both appear at and headline the 2010 edition of the just over three-decades-old festival. Acts as diverse as St. Vincent, the Swell Season, DJ Logic, Laura Marling and Roberta Flack will also take the stage throughout its four day run.
Rousing the audience with stirring versions of hits from their catalogue as well as select tracks from their recently released album, 'The Five Ghosts,' the group managed to balance levity with brevity by delivering sincere lyricism with heavy-handed bravado.
Campbell -- sporting a T-shirt featuring the mug of friend and Metric co-founder Jimmy Shaw -- did much of the preening for the group, emoting and engaging the audience while female vocal foil Amy Millan, juggling rhythm guitar duties as well, mostly laid low.
Of the new songs, lead single 'Fixed' was played with the sharpest precision, with Millan's ethereal vocals washing over the audience as the menacing grey skies above issued light showers.
Through no fault of their own, some of Stars' uptempo tunes fell flat against an audience who were mostly glued to lawn chairs and cheering loudest for slow burners like 'Your Ex-Lover Is Dead.' While such a response is contrary to the doctrine of most music festivals, it seemed to make sense at this one.
07/23/10 >> 
