Sled Island 2025 - Diary #3

Motherhood at the #1 Legion in Calgary on June 19th

Ernest Hemmingway once titled a memoir A Moveable Feast, a description which depicts the vignettes of the parisian lives of young artists from the lost generation moving through a delectable buffet of artistic delicacies and formative struggles. For me, a gentle late-millenial/gen z cusp, it is a description for how I embedded myself into the rush of excitement and the garden of artistic delights that the 2025 Sled Island had to offer.

Right off the get-go, my anticipation for the 2025 festival surged with the announcement that the Kyoto punk band Otoboke Beaver had been chosen as the curators for this year’s festival. Slowly but steadily, this excitement built up as the line up got released. 

I was quick to get my tickets to some shows, primarily Otoboke Beaver and Xiu Xiu — but then temptation got the best of me and I got tickets for Tropical Fuck Storm and Emma Goldman. This was all prior to my return to Cups N Cakes Network, so it is an absolute delight to get to share my experience now. Truly a cherry on top of it all.

So, on the day of my lord Garfield’s birthday, I made my way to Calgary with my closest confidants (shout out to Ricky and B.G. for being the realest ones!) and quickly settled in at Palomino shortly after arriving. I wanted to catch Tebby and the Heavy because I kept missing their shows in Edmonton, so of course I had to see them in Calgary — Tebby sure knows how to put on a show, shredding and getting up on the audience to give them something to look at and talk about. And towards the end of the set, I ran into my first full show of the weekend: Tropical Fuck Storm. 

Here is my confession (forgive me, father, for I have sinned): I didn’t really listen to Tropical Fuck Storm prior to Sled Island. Originally this was a show I just wanted to go for openers like Sunglaciers and Motherhood which were among my most anticipated acts for the festival — I was pleasantly blown away by Truck Violence and Tropical Fuck Storm! Truck Violence was just such an intense hardcore act whose stage presence reminded me of Chat Pile, while Tropical Fuck Storm had one of the most full sounding sets I’ve ever heard. 

Day two is when things really got going for me, kicking things off with the panel on touring at the downtown library where I met up with my friend Vi Levitt (aka KERUB) before making my way to the Mint Records Showcase — probably one of the most stacked bills in the whole festival. From the energetic punk of Rebel Grrrlz to the critically acclaimed work of Ribbon Skirt, this show was non-stop good plain and simple. My personal highlights here would be Future Star being approached by a patron who felt personally touched by her storytelling and music halfway through the set and Ribbon Skirt’s incredible crowd work and performance.

Devours

Afterwards I made my way back to the Royal Canadian Legion for the Xiu Xiu show that also featured some of my most anticipated acts for the festival: MORRISMORRIS, KERUB, and Devours. I knew that there was some anxiety that people wouldn’t stick around since Xiu Xiu’s performance got bumped to the beginning of the show, but this didn’t happen. Once I switched to the upstairs to catch MORRISMORRIS, I saw how the room went from just a few people listening to the set to a whole room bumping to Morris Nguyen’s set. The energy kept up as KERUB took the stage next and kept the energy up with some glimpses into their new album Aphantasia which had people dancing nonstop. This all culminated in the much anticipated Devours feature at Sled Island, featuring Japandroid’s drummer David Prowse now accompanying Jeff Cancade on stage — for an electronic act, this added so much energy and sound dynamics that boosted the foundation of what Jeff had himself out to do originally. Needless to say, it was amazing to see Devours receive the warm welcome that he deserved in Cowtown.

On the last day of Sled, I had a slow morning with my crew grabbing some lunch at the delightful Vegan Street in Inglewood — HUGE shout out to Sergio who always takes care of me when I stop by, he alone is a highlight — and then cruised through the bookstores and consignment stores before B.G. and I made our way to Loophole Coffee Bar. Loophole Coffee Bar is an excellent space for hardcore or noise shows, with a lovely bookstore next door and Jack Saint Claire slinging drinks throughout the night. I had the pleasure to meet the up-and-coming crew of Emma Goldman, who are such welcoming and kind people aside from being incredible musicians. We got excited at watching the youth crew Pollux open the show with some incredible hardcore/metal, which built up the energy that carried from that to Emma Goldman’s and Grimelda’s sets.

My 2025 Sled ended with Otoboke Beaver, as a victory lap that basked in the glory of a giant floating beaver used for crowd surfing over the most intense punk and metal riffs that one could ever hear in their lives. Although the band has opened about some distress and mishaps during the set, I just commend them for how they carried through and stood for each other in such a hyped up show. Aside from curating an incredible festival, their own performance was a joy in itself.

As I drove my crew back to Edmonton, the only thing circling my mind was how I can’t wait to do it again next year.