Since its birth in 2002 Pop Montreal has boasted locals like Broken Social Scene and Arcade Fire. Ever expanding, this North Atlantic fall fest has gone on to include international characters like Patti Smith and Nick Cave whilst fostering the upstarts and the unusual. At the beginning of every crispy maple leafy autumn the fixed-gears are chained outside more than 50 venues across the city. It’s your last chance to see and be seen before it gets so Arctic that everyone is unrecognisable, hiding behind scarves, chullos, ushankas and the like. Butthole Surfers, Yo La Tengo, Fever Ray, Kid Koala and Faust were amongst this year’s biggest names.

Thursday, Cabaret du Musée
Hunched over a tiny guitar (the homemade ‘chu’), held high to the chest like a mid-sixties iconoclast, London’s very own Micachu and the Shapes seemed genuinely touched to declare we were their favourite Canadian audience. The staggeringly tight syncopation and innovative rhythmic structures complemented by growly, sustained vocals left the crowd hyped, intrigued and thirsty.

The night’s headline act in fact debuted at Pop Montreal in 2007, Clues had a look somewhere between Tom Verlaine and the ghost of Ian Curtis but their sound didn’t match their stark and goulish deportment. Songwriterly chord progressions descended chromatically and preppier riffs jerked the shoulders. Their mirrored, symmetrical band set up (two keyboards facing each other and two drummers battling in tandem) formed a power house with Alden at the helm uttering shiny, vulnerable vocals. Their three minute songs put them firmly in the pop tradition with more than a hint of New Wave agitation. Their rousing anthemic choruses suit the live gig and recall the indie belters of the Arcade Fire. ‘Ledmonton’ and ‘You Have my Eyes Now’ have a live magnetism and simplicity that is perhaps lost on their record.

Friday, Le National
Friday was the trilogy of hate: Aids Wolf, Duchess Says and Teenage Jesus and the Jerks. Chloe at the front of Aids Wolf delivers her famous ‘flamejob scream’ and molests various unsuspecting audience members. Next up, the Duchess of Duchess Says spits beer on the kids and clambers around the sound desk while some nerdy white-fro guy in ‘the mosh’ takes off his shirt. Half nudity makes him a little ‘douchey’ – he’d have been better with tackle-out, embracing the true heathen haine of the evening.

Circa 11.30pm, New York old agers, Teenage Jesus and the Jerks rock up on the quasi-vaudeville theatre set. Famed for their aggressive confrontational ways, they kept it austere and direct – short shots of song and minimal instrumentation. Drummer Jim Sclavunos looms ominously over on a basic kit of little more than snare, ride and bass and Lydia declaims that ‘the fun is over’. Their no shit performance and aggressive riffs drove a monotonous nihilism only under-cut when Lydia dwindles off stage with her unlikely hand bag slung over the shoulder. Keeping it authentic, at least...

Saturday, Theatre Outremont
The festival’s expansion brought more experimental projects this year like ‘Ope-Raw’ from Teen Sleuth and the Freed Cyborg. Here to support Diamanda Galas, Jerusalem in my Heart are another Montreal-based act. Fronted by the producer of Clues, Radwan Moumneh hollered in shattering middle-eastern vocals and played shawm-like instruments backed by an installation of a beheading. A performance so genuinely unearthing that many an audience member fled and suggested more than a weekend of posing.

Pop Montreal, Quebec, Canada, 1st-4th October