Edmonton's loss is Lethbridge's gain as the cancellation of the Tail Creek Music festival left a lot of pissed off fans and bands looking for other gigs. Particularly Detroit rockets Pop Evil, who traveled down the road to play a late announced gig at Average Joes, June 27.

 The Detroit area rockers put on an energetic set of modern rock with a touch of metal for a good sized excitable crowd eager to jump around and sing along with downtuned, upbeat, radio ready modern rock.

“I hope you learned something about Pop Evil– “ We don’t cancel fucking shows,” shouted lead singer Leigh Kakaty, thanking “each and every one of you for coming out.”

 He asked how many people were planning on seeing them at Tail Creek and received a lot of applause.

 They played big, loud, arena rock style modern rock on a smaller stage, making several hundred people feel like they were part of a  crowd of several thousand.

Drummer Chachi Riot was an absolute powerhouse, standing up on an elevated drum riser and crashing his kit, which had a Detroit Red Wings logo emblazoned on the bass drum, breaking a cymbal and drums sticks in the process.

He was a blur on stage, brutalizing his kit as both the guitarists Davey Grahs, Nick Fuelling and bassist  Matt DiRito jumped up on the drum riser with him.

While they get played a lot on modern rock stations, I wasn’t as familiar with them as their rambunctious, bouncing fans who were singing along with almost every song.

Kakaty said they have a new CD coming out soon and lead the band through one of the new songs called “Tell Me The Way.”

One prominent hit was  “Torn To Pieces,” which had the crowd singing along.

 The fans were having as much of a sweaty good time on the floor as the band was on stage.