THE CANADIAN MUSIC SCENE

Favourite New Artist Metric The Marble Index The Stills The Trews The Waking Eyes The Weakerthans and the winner is... The Trews

Favourite New Single Alert Status Read - Matthew Good One Thing - Finger Eleven River Below - Billy Talent So Far So Good - Thornley Someday - Nickelback Still In Love Song - The Stills and the winner is... River Below - Billy Talent

Favourite New Album Auf Der Maur - Auf Der Maur Billy Talent - Billy Talent Come Again - Thornley Seven Circles - The Tea Party The Long Road - Nickelback White Light Rock & Roll Review - Matthew Good and the winner is... Billy Talent - Billy Talent

NXNE Favourite Indie Band Alexisonfire C'Mon Death From Above 1979 Despistados Matt Mays The Illuminati and the winner is... Alexisonfire

A full Kool Haus of over 2,500 attended this year's CASBY awards. The crowd was fired up by a active and great performance by Finger Eleven. Enter our hosts for the evening, Ricky, Bubbles, and Julian. I think the Trailer Park Boys are perfect hosts to match with the performers at the CASBYs, judging from the audience I think they would agree. After announcing the Favourite New Single the winners of the Favourite New Artist award, The Trews took the stage giving the fans that voted for them just what they wanted. Following The Trews was Ian Blurton's new band, C'Mon. The Favourite New Artist award was presented followed by Thornley as they just plain rocked the place. As Bubbles would say, "That was fucking awesome...". I recommend you catch them in Burlington, London or Toronto before they head back out west. Following Thornley was a band from the PEG, The Waking Eyes. Matt Peters and Myron Schultz formally from "The Pets" recruited Rusty Matyas and borrowed their name from some Pink Floyd lyrics. Check out their CD, Combing The Clouds. After the presentation of the NXNE Favourite New Indie Band award it was time for Bubbles to work up the crowd with his rendition of RUSH's "Closer to the Heart". Bubbles was rolling along just fine until one major screw up which resulted with a resounding, "Fuck" and the song abruptly came to an end. However Ricky and Julian managed to calm Bubbles down and suggested that he play a Trailer Park favourite, "Liquor and Whores". This was well received by the audience. The Stills based out of Montreal and The Marble Index based out of Hamilton kept the evening rocking along leading up to the last award for Favourite New Album. The final act of the night is Mississauga's own, Billy Talent. One word, Intense! Billy Talent definitely was a crowd favourite with a very active mosh pit. The band was definitely fired up after receiving the Favourite New Album and Single awards. Breaking with tradition the band played a third song before closing out the awards. Final words on the CASBY awards: The line up of bands was exceptional, this can be attested to by the awards show being sold-out. Many accolades must go to The EDGE 102.1 FM, they consistently support new and Canadian talent. I can only see these awards getting bigger every year and I am excited with the great new talent popping up around the country. Thank you Kelly and all at the EDGE for affording me the opportunity to cover the CASBY awards, here's to next year! Not knowing that food was going to be provided Brent and myself headed to Harbour Sixty Steakhouse. From another interview on this site, Harbour Sixty was one of Howard Ungerleider's (Lighting and Production Director for RUSH) top ten restaurants in the world. All I can say is I look forward to some day trying his other recommendations, it was brilliant! Thanks to Janice and Lisa for looking after us (p.s. the rib on the bone, simply unbelievable).

Trebas Institute	North By North East	Long & McQuade
The EDGE 102.1