Battle of the Bands Comes to KPU

101.7 CIVL radio will bring four local bands together to compete on campus

A Battle of the Bands is coming to the Grassroots Cafe. The event will be hosted by 101.7 CIVL Radio, the radio station at the University of the Fraser Valley. Admission to the event “was discussed at $5 at the door,” Kwantlen Student Association events coordinator Matt Hunt said in an email, but there will be “Two-for-one admission if showing proof of being a student at Kwantlen.”

Four bands—Gravity Pistol, MG Graveyard, Stereo Anthems, and Paravel—will congregate in the Cafe on the June 23 to compete for first place. The show, which will start at 8:30 p.m., will also be the Grassroots’ first late-night live music event.

“I think it’s a cool event that students will be interested in attending, and it just adds to student life on campus,” says KSA president Alex McGowan. “It’s of no cost to us and it just creates an extra event, so we figured, why not?”

CIVL reached out to KPU with the desire to host shows in cities other than Abbotsford, where they are based and have been active for years. The Surrey battle is just one of three other showdowns that CIVL are planning, with others taking place in Mission and Aldergrove. The battles are being held in preparation for the Fraser Valley Music Awards on July 16 in Abbotsford.

Aaron Levy, station manager of CIVL Radio, says that the Surrey Battle of the Bands is “not predetermined to be one type of music,” although most of them play rock music. Gravity Pistol is a grunge rock three-piece, MG Graveyard is four people who describe themselves as “a hard mix of rock, grunge, blues and rockabilly sounds.” The Stereo Anthems are three members making blues rock, and Paravel—a newly-renamed band under frontman Patrick Jolicoeur—is folk rock.

The only other common thread between the four bands is that they are all from the Fraser Valley, an attribute that CIVL finds in all the artists it supports. The radio station decided to use KPU as a venue because it is “student-oriented,” which is relevant to them as a campus community radio station, particularly one that is looking to branch out.

“It’s our mandate and goal to promote, support, and engage in arts and alternative content,” says Levy. “There has always been a lack of opportunities for musicians in the Fraser Valley and we are the Fraser Valley’s campus community radio station. So we see it as an important function of what we do, to help make sure that artists have an opportunity to perform in the community.”

He also believes that, “It’s good that people will be travelling to Grassroots from outside of Surrey and outside of Abbotsford,” as it will bring different locales together for an evening of live entertainment.