By Adam Prudhomme
Staff Reporter
Described as a big old field party with live music, craft beer, food trucks and more, the MacKinnon Brother’s Back to the Farm music festival returns for its third year this Sunday from noon to 10 p.m.
Held at the MacKinnon Brothers Brewery on 1915 County Rd. 22 in Bath, the concert will feature 11 musical acts.
“We tried to have a little bit of everything without being too diverse or too unfocused,” said Chris Morris, festival co-ordinator. “It’s mostly rock, there’s a bluegrass band in there, there’s a folk duo, The Huaraches are like a surf-rock instrumental kind of band and the Mahones are like an Irish punk band. They’re a good drinking band, we’ve been wanting to get them on the bill for a couple of years.”
Also included on the bill are The Kodeines, The Relatives, Pete Deachman and Handsome Molly, Greg Ball, Lounge Act, Kris and Dee, The Wilderness, Needless Love Endorsement and Lost Cousins.
Along with music, craft beer will be a major focal point with eight breweries with cider and wine on site.
“We have sort of fallen into the tradition of releasing a new beer at each festival,” said Morris. “The first year we did Red Fox, last year was the Brothers House Ale, this year it doesn’t have a name yet, but it’s going to be like a Belgian style wheat beer and it’s going to be made 100 per cent from ingredients grown on our farm.”
Morris says they will decide on a name for the new product this week ahead of Sunday’s festival.
Tickets are $30 at the door, for the all ages event. Along with the music and craft beer there will be artisan vendors and games for kids including giant Jenga, foosball, frisbee and badminton. Free parking is available on the farm as well as a shuttle bus from Kingston.
Brewery tours will also be run throughout the day for $10.
“We’re raising money for a charity called Change for FIN, which is short for Families In Need,” said Morris. “They’re a relatively new charity in Kingston. They look to reduce the impact of violence on the lives of children, youth and their families. If you want to sign up for the tour it’s $10 and we give 100 per cent of that money to this charity.”
Last year the fundraising tours brought in $800 for the God Downie Fund for Brain Cancer Research.
Morris says the Back to the Farm music festival began as a ‘thank you’ event for those that supported the brewery and drew 800 people to its inaugural event. Last year doubled that amount with the hopes of seeing even more people show up for this Sunday’s show. It’s a rain-or-shine event.
A complete concert list can be found at www.BacktotheFarmweb.wordpress.com.