New partnership boosts Rockin’ River festival
Live Nation Canada helps country music fest bolster lineup
The sheriff is the same. But there’s a new deputy in town for the 2018 Rockin’ River Music Festival as founder Kenny Hess has partnered with Live Nation Canada to provide an even bigger event than in previous years.
Hess is beyond bullish on the new arrangement.
After eight years of successive growth, it was time to bring in Live Nation Canada to get to the next level.
“The Live Nation partnership gives us access to their wonderful financial prowess and, more than anything, their reach,” said Hess.
“Ryan Balaski and his team are incredible and have been able to really hone in on how to bring more to the event from their considerable experience with what works and doesn’t work. That, plus meeting up with kindred spirit Greg Adams of Sunfest Country Music Festival, has meant being able to work as a team.”
Add in Watershed (Gorge Amphitheatre, George, WA.) and the Camrose Country Music Festival, and suddenly there are four dates rather than one. In terms of buying power for securing talent, that’s a sweet spot. One reflected in this year’s Rockin’ River lineup of headliners like Joe Nichols, Eric Church, Brett Eldredge and Dallas Smith.
Having Canadian country darling Smith close out the festival is a clear statement that the local talent is ready to represent right up to headlining the mainstage. There was a time when that might not have been true, but Hess, Balaski and Smith — nominated for four CCMA Awards last week, including Male Artist of the Year, Apple Music Fans’ Choice, Single of the Year and Video of the Year — all say those days are gone.
“We played Merritt with Dierks Bentley and Chris Young, and it’s pretty cool to see Canadian artists getting to do things that they weren’t in the past, such as closeout festivals or headline on a Friday night at Sunfest,” said Smith. “It’s great to have your name up there with the American artists, and I think that really demonstrates how Canadian music has grown and really established itself in the past five years.”
While noting that Canuck country has long been top quality, Hess grudgingly admits that for promoters it’s about bums in seats, and that meant buyers were always looking for the better profile American artists. He would have loved to book an all-Canadian festival, but it wouldn’t have worked.
Live Nation Canada’s Balaski says things have changed, and country music is kicking up bushels of business.
“Based on the business we do at Rogers Arena and at the Commodore, I can tell you that country is alive and well in downtown Vancouver as much as it is in the Valley and interior,” said Balaski.
“It’s one of the reasons that we were actively looking at a country music festival to become involved with. Kenny has done an amazing job with all of his expertise as a lifelong B.C. country artist, now we’re making our long-term plan to add new enhancements to the site, rebuilding the old stage and so on.”
Both Balaski and Hess stress that the character of the site, from the river flowing through it to the easygoing nature of the grounds is not going to get changed.
The partnership is not about turning Rockin’ River into yet another big corporate, big dollar fiasco like some consider Pemberton or Squamish.
“This is never going to be a corporate event, it’s always going to be the Rockin’ River Music Festival with those unique niche character things that we do,” said Hess.
“It’s more about coming together to enhance the customer experience, so we’re not just selling the steak but adding to the sizzle too.”
Among the “sizzles” that fans can expect at this year’s event are a multi-tiered patio system with service and Western themed bars such as the Whiskey Wagon — in a chuck wagon-shaped site — and a lot more daytime activities to take in before the music really starts happening.
Hess mentions human foosball, the Donnie Grubb Band performing down at the river and other “little-but-effective” improvements.
Smith, who just dropped a brand new song from his followup to the best-selling 2016 release Side Effects, says he’ll be performing a set similar to what he lays down in an arena, not catering to just the hits like many festival sets tend to do.
Country listeners are always looking for a mix.
“You can hear that on country radio and the position it has assumed on the landscape of Canadian broadcasting,” said Smith.
“In the last six or seven
years, it has let in more influences from other genres, without going after the bubble gum hook that seems dominant in other genres. Country is where you go for a song that has a lyric and story that connects with the audience.”
Smith thinks that Canadian artists are doing particularly well in this regard because they don’t tread the triedand-true path of heading down to Nashville to write and record.
This can often lead to the sort of “committee” country albums that live large until the single dies and then all but vanish. Conversely, doing your own thing can give you an album like Side Effects, which has yielded five singles to date.
“For my 2012 debut, Jumped Right In, Joey Moi and I didn’t follow that traditional path and really set about to do something different,” said Smith.
“Joey came from a completely different world than his counterparts at that time, and we used Blake Shelton’s Honey Bee as the bar, and just kept on focusing on having the production match up to those big American releases. I think it really paid off and set the bar high.”
That bar is being reached by many of Smith’s Fraser Valley contemporaries, from Washboard Union to Madeline Merlo and more. Expect to hear many of these rising rock ’n’ twangers on the Rockin’ River stages in coming years.
Country is where you go for a song that has a lyric and story that connects with the audience.”
Dallas Smith