When Shed Island decided to close the doors on their summer festival after a refreshing three year run, there was a void left in the St. John’s summer schedule that the music community was eager to see filled.

Lucky for us, it was only one Shed Island-less summer in 2017 before the same ambitious spirit swept a new cast of organizers to the plate to take a swing at the festival racket.

We’re ecstatic to say that the newest St. John’s arts and music festival is Out of Earshot, and it will be happening August 23rd-25th, 2018.

The announcement of the festival comes one year after the release of Fresh Riot in 2016. Fresh Riot was a compilation project that collected recordings of many new St. John’s bands and served as a celebration for “all the women, queer, trans and marginalized pals who have picked up instruments for the first time and taken up space in the spirit of making our community more inclusive”.

As the next step in a natural progression, the concept of Out of Earshot has come to fruition from the same wheelhouse as Fresh Riot. The festival idea was initiated by Jess Barry, the same vital organizer who sparked Fresh Riot, and soon a determined team came together to put Out of Earshot in motion. Joining Barry is the growing contributive company of Pepa Chan, Nicole Squires, Sarah Harris, Nicole Boggan, Riley Pike, Maria Peddle and Becky Gibson.

Out of Earshot will commence their inauguration with a dual show festival fundraiser this Saturday, December 16th in St. John’s.

The festivities begin with an all ages showcase at 7PM featuring music from Nick Bendzsa of Dormitories, Door Lock (Maggie Burton and Chris McGee), Kira Sheppard, and readings from Eva Crocker and Allison Graves

The back-to-back party continues at 10:30PM with a 19+ gig at Bar None featuring Renders, Ribbon Tied, Conditioner, and Hard Ticket

Each show is $10 or PWYC, or can take in the whole double feature for $15.

Check out the facebook event here.