Another Roadside Attraction (festival)

Another Roadside Attraction was a travelling music-and-arts summer festival developed by The Tragically Hip, the first of which took place in 1993, followed by tours in 1995 and 1997. It promoted little-known bands (but sometimes included better known bands as well) and traveled across Canada.^[1][2] Each show usually lasted roughly eight hours.

The name was taken from a Tom Robbins novel; however, The Hip were originally thinking of calling it Heksenketel, which is Dutch for "witches' cauldron". Although that name was not used for the concert festival, it was later used as the title of a concert video recorded on the 1993 tour.^[3]

Over the years, the festival featured bands such as Blues Traveler, Sheryl Crow, Matthew Sweet, Rheostatics, Crash Vegas, Midnight Oil, Hothouse Flowers, World Party, Ziggy Marley & The Melody Makers, Spirit of the West, Eric's Trip, The Inbreds, Wilco, Pere Ubu, Ron Sexsmith, Los Lobos, and Spacehog. The tours often ended up in unconventional places: fairgrounds, racetracks, sometimes just open fields. However, almost every festival appearance sold out.

The first Another Roadside Attraction, in Winnipeg, Manitoba, was held at the Winnipeg Stadium. The acts performing included The Tragically Hip, Midnight Oil, Crash Vegas, Hothouse Flowers, and Daniel Lanois. These five acts also collaborated on a one-off charity single, "Land", in 1993 to protest forest clearcutting in British Columbia.

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