If you ever thought Lethbridge audiences are too sedate, you weren’t at Canadian punk legends SNFU’s show at Bully’s Entertainment Centre, Sunday, June 21. 

They capped off an energetic night of punk/hardcore and metal, in the process proving, though the band is over 20 years old, that  they can still bring it. Singer Chi Pig was a marvel as he shook his shaggy blond mane— his Fu Manchu mustache making him look like a Chinese New Year’s lion hopped up on a potent mix of speed , adrenaline and beer. He found crazed kindred spirits in the front row where most of the local punks sung and shouted along with every word Chi Pig sang, though I couldn’t understand a word he said.

“I’m going to hang out with you afterwards,” he grinned at Richard Yarwood in the front row, who knew every word.

The punks bounced off each other like mohawked rubber balls, drummer Shane Smith was a blur resurrecting the spirit of John Bonham and guitarist Ken Goonie wasn’t perturbed  by Chi Pig’s antics. He didn’t miss  a note, even when, at times, Chi Pig grabbed his ass. Chi rolled all over the stage, licked the mic, stood on his head and donned a variety of weird masks and  abused a cyclops doll he held above his head — let's just say I pitied that poor doll, the things Chi Pig was pretending to do with it. The band wasn’t put off by the water bottles and alcohol flying through the air, neither was bassist Just Denis who was shook up at the beginning — a flying projectile may have hit him. 

It was impressive, while Chi Pig wasn’t leaping off massive stacks of speakers like he was when I saw SNFU at the U of L back in the day, he can still carry a wicked melody and has energy and then some.  It was a good time and worth being zombified early the next morning.

Friday is going to be full of tough choices. Default is playing at The Blarney Stone with Double Jack and Soul Side In, while there is going to be a party at Henotic with The Main Drag and the Fast Romantics along with Amelia Earhart. The former have a song in  the new Rock Band  game, so in honour of that there will be a Rock  Band competition as well. If you aren’t going up to Calgary for Sled Island this weekend, there is a lot to do right here. Not the least of which is  an open mic at the Wolf’s Den, June 26. Vancouver-based rock band Incura returns to Lethbridge to play two gigs—  at the Slice, June 27 with Jesse Northey and the Dandelions as well as Lustre Creame. They are also playing an all ages gig at the Moose Hall, June 26 with the Eyes of Isis and  Hollow Embrace.

And New West Theatre is going Hollywood  from june 26-July 25. Their new original production, “Soundtrack”  kicks off at the Yates Memorial Centre, Friday night. Nicolas Hanson directs an all-star cast including Scott Carpenter, Jessica Ens, Jocelyn Haub, Erica Hunt,  Duff MacDonald, Mark Nivet, Grahame Renyk and Kathy Zaborsky hit the stage with songs, dance, comedy and choreography from the world’s biggest films. There will songs from be ’80s hits, classics and modern blockbusters. It will be the “soundtrack” to your summer.

Call 403-329-7328 for tickets or go online at www.newwesttheatre.com.

 If you have to work for a living it might as well be making video games like Rock Band for Harmonix.

 That’s life for the Main Drag, a Cambridge  based band which is making their first visit to Western Canada at Henotic, June 26. Their song “A Jagged Gorgeous Winter” is one of the songs featured in the latest Rock Band video game, though its appearance has nothing to do with the band’s employment at its parent company Harmonix.

“They put out a call for music and they usually use people they know. So we threw our songs into the pot. We’re all in different departments there,” said  drummer John Drake who works in the public relations department of Harmonix.

It’s been a long and sometimes frustrating two years for Default, but they are looking forward to releasing their first CD on a major label in September. Their fourth full length CD will be released in on EMI. They are playing a handful of shows on weekends throughout the summer, including one at the Blarney Stone, June 26.

“We recorded it two years ago but our record label went bankrupt,” said Dallas Smith, lead singer of the Vancouver-based band, which formed in 1999. They have recorded a plethora of radio friendly alt-rock hits like “Wasting My Time,” “Count On Me,”, “Innocent Man,” “Deny” and “Sick and Tired.”

“It (the new CD) is pretty diverse. It has the ballads and the rock songs. We didn’t really change our sound, we just spent a lot more time on songwriting,” Smith said adding they have added seven of the new songs to their current set lists.