Lemon Bucket Orkestra is helming Lemon Aid which goes Friday, December 27th and Saturday, December 28th at The Opera House in Toronto. It’s a two-night party to raise funds for international non-profits chosen by the artists performing. Each band will donate half their fees to a charity of their choosing which makes it the most diverse fundraiser of the season. The festival features a variety of great musicians on back to back nights. An extension of Lemon Bucket Orkestra will play Lemon-Aid when Balaklava Blues takes to the stage along with various other offshoots of LBO. LM2’s Dyan Bowker was fortunate to speak with LBO’s Mark Marczyk ahead of the festival.
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Doing shows around the holidays is certainly not unfamiliar to Lemon Bucket Orkestra. Marczyk said, “We’ve been sort of doing shows around Christmas and New Years. We just decided it’s about time that we do something. Bring together a bunch of different artists rather than just doing our own show. Lemon Aid is sort of what came out of that….We decided to just say ‘let’s create a platform for artists to donate to the causes that they want to be donating to’.So each of the artists that’s on the bill is going to be donating to a charity of their choice. ”
Balaklava Blues is a more politically charged outlet than LBO which functions towards purposes of greater awareness and catharsis. Marczyk stated, “It was sort of created out of like a desire to share experience rather than utility. But you’re right in so far as Lemon Bucket just didn’t feel like the right form to express sort of our experiences in Eastern Ukraine. Particularly doing humanitarian aid work over there. Being involved with soldiers who are staving off Russian invasion that very little of the world really knows about.”
Marczyk continued, “We lived through a real revolution. Where we were literally fighting for our lives in the attempt to get rid of a corrupt president. When the stakes are that high and when in the end it’s all said and done, the president is successfully removed. There are thousands of casualties.”
Lemon Bucket Orkestra
Moskittto Bar is showcased on Lemon Aid and features a founding Lemon Bucket member. A lot of Lemon Bucket tendrils extend to a lot of acts on the bill. All side projects are touched on with Mark during our conversation. Lemon Bucket Orkestra’s act transitioned from busking to what it presently is. The last ten years has seen the volume of crowds outgrow the spaces they had ie/ house concerts.
Through it all, the band never lost their perspective or sense of community they have developed. Marczyk quipped, “Anyone who knows us knows that we’re pretty bad at maintaining a rockstar persona. There’s not too much of that. It’s pretty common for you to walk into a venue no matter how big it is and walk up to the bar. Lemon Bucket member having a drink and talking to some friends before the show. As opposed to being backstage and waiting for the big entrance. That’s the way that the band was created.”
Marczyk continued, “Feels like everything just sucks in and everybody feels that kind of intimacy. Of natural sound, of voice, of one another….This feeling of home. But at the same time, those boundaries of what your home can be are infinitely expanded. And what’s music about if not that?”
Lemon Bucket Orkestra is the microcosm but the macrocosm is the cultural mosaic of Toronto. Marczyk stated, “We’re here, this is strong, and this is Toronto. To us, this is exactly what it is. It’s not everything that somebody else tells us it is. Or the airwaves that won’t play our music say it is. Toronto is alive, it’s well, and this is what it is.”
Lemon Aid
The band have gone through a number of different permutations both sonically and with the roster that comprises the group. Marczyk said, “The first album Cheeky was like we weren’t even thinking about anything. It was like let’s just record these first six songs that we know. Get in the studio and it was like, get in there and have no idea what we’re doing but let’s do it. We had a friend of ours, a fan Dan who just basically sponsored it for us to get it out there. We’re just so grateful to him for like getting that opportunity.” Mark went into detail about how each record is a unique snapshot in time. Doing so with thoughtful descriptions as we conversed.
Lemon Bucket Orkestra is forever. The members that got tattoos on tour with Olar are no longer even in the band. There have been around 40 members through the band’s history and it remains a perpetual part of their life. “Leaves it’s mark on you and stays with you” as Mark put it. Old friends Marczyk hasn’t seen in years are still surprised that he’s touring with Lemon Bucket. Many don’t see it as a sustainable endeavor. Yet here we are, days out from Lemon-Aid and LBO is still firing on all cylinders.
Mark Marczyk
In summation, Marczyk stated “I’m hoping that Toronto comes out to the Opera House for Lemon Aid. We booked two nights this time. The last few shows we’ve done at The Opera House, we’ve sold them out. We decided, let’s actually just make a festival. Why limit ourselves to one day? Let’s have two days, let’s get five or six bands, and let’s see what we can do to raise some money for some valuable causes at this time of year. It just so happens that it’s also the thirtieth anniversary of The Opera House. A lot of people have really divergent feelings about The Opera House…….For us The Opera House was the first sort of large venue that opened it’s doors to us.”
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