Last year, ProgStorm emerged from the mists of Quebec’s rich metal scene as a new festival focused on progressive bands. The festival is now just over a week away from its second outing, which will feature performances by many groups beloved by The Progressive Subway. Promoters Eddy Levitsky and Jici Lord-Gauthier join Claire to reveal how two musicians planned a brand new festival, what’s next for their bands The Anchoret and Voidchaser, and whether or not they’ll be getting Angine de Poitrine for ProgStorm 2027.

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I’m joined today by the promoters of the ProgStorm festival in Montreal. Eddy and Jici, thank you for being here. I‘d love to hear how ProgStorm got started. What was the genesis of the festival?

Jici: It all started because me and my bandmates in Voidchaser got invited to ProgPower Europe in late 2024. We were so hyped about it. And at some point we said, why don’t we have this here in Montreal? There’s a lot of festivals, there’s a lot of great stuff, but why don’t we have a prog-specific festival going on? And at some point I said let’s just do it. At first I was naive. I thought it shouldn’t be very different from just producing a show, which I have [done] in the past for my own band, [but] it is indeed very different. That was the starting point. The next day I called Eddy and I told him “Hey, are you in?” And he had a couple of serious questions, but after a few minutes, he was 100% in. And we got to realize that we have a unique working relationship. And it’s been a pleasure to work with Eddy since the beginning.

Eddy: Same. It’s been a pleasure working on this with you. All I can say is that intrusive thought was very enticing. Growing up in the scene with my previous bands and [my current band], The Anchoret, we’re jealous of what’s happening outside North America. There’s a large sense of community and passion for music, and the festivals themselves become international hubs for people to kind of migrate to. You meet your friends once a year there. We look at that from our own perspective here, where we didn’t have much of that. We had Heavy Montreal for a couple of years and it stopped. And so we decided, why not? And then we started building the foundation for what became ProgStorm.

So you guys are getting ready for your second edition. What did you learn from the first year of the festival? What surprised you the most about planning a music festival? Were there any aspects that were a lot harder or easier than you were expecting?

Eddy: What we’ve learned is basically everything. The first edition was us kind of dipping our toes in the water. It’s a big learning experience. It was a project to see if we can even pull this off, and see if the public likes it. The first thing we’ve noticed, as Jici said, is that we work really well together, which is something that I wish for everyone, to find a partner in crime that [they] feel this comfortable working with. And we’ve developed a structure that really works for us and an understanding amongst us. And so this time around, it was easier on that front, because the structure was already established.

Jici: This is 100% the truth: we learned everything. We didn’t get education in the music industry, so we just learned from experience, by producing our own shows, by making connections with all of the right people. We’re still learning every day; we’re asking advice from people who have been in the industry for way longer than us. We make mistakes, but I think we’re very open to everything that we need to learn to do this for the long run. This is the second edition, but there’s going to be many more, hopefully.

My colleagues from the blog and I were really impressed when we saw the lineup for this year. You’re in a bigger venue now, you have bands that are beloved by the blog: Anciients, An Abstract Illusion, Cynic… Do you feel like you’re starting to get some name recognition to book these bigger bands? Do you think you’re sort of catching on after the first edition was well received?

Eddy: I want to say one thing, before we even talk about that. I feel like we just basically took the Top Ten Prog Subway list and brought those bands.

Do you guys want to keep doing that every year? Just go through our Top Ten.

Eddy: Send us your list ahead of time and we’ll figure it out. But no, it just so happened that we have the same pulse on the scene as you. We share the same love for the bands, the same passion. And word of mouth was very powerful. After the first edition, we had really good compliments, even [from] band members [who] were flying in from bigger venues. The day before they were playing Wacken or another huge festival, and they took a little detour just for the smaller fest, and they told us how well they were received. I think that’s the important part. As organizers, as promoters, as any industry professionals, this is not a job where you can bring in the CV and say, “here are my accomplishments”. You have to show who you are. You have to share that with people, have that community established.

Jici: Absolutely, we can see the difference [from] the first edition where we came literally out of nowhere: “Hey, we are two dudes with this idea of making a festival. Do you want to be part of it?” But now, some of the bands in this year’s lineup and next year’s lineup reached out to us. It’s wild to see some artists that we admire and now they’re actively suggesting that they be part of the festival in the future. This is a very special feeling. I feel like the ProgStorm name is making its own path and it’s really fun, really validating.

Do you envision the festival growing into a larger experience, or do you like the idea of keeping it as a smaller, more intimate festival compared to a lot of the larger ones in Europe and so on? 

Eddy: I think you kind of hit the nail on the head there. We like a very community-centered, intimate experience. We don’t know what the future brings, however, I really do think that we’re looking for that community aspect, kind of like a mid-sized festival. We’re not looking to expand outside or have an event that has thousands and thousands of people. We’re looking to present those mid-sized bands that we feel really deserve this platform and seldom get it.

Jici: It’s very important to us to make a super niche festival for a niche type of music. Everybody that’s going to the festival shares this super niche interest in rare bands. Of course, Cynic, Car Bomb, Pure Reason Revolution, they are big names for us. And having this venue, Club Soda, which is a 1,000 capacity venue, it’s a big one. We’ll see how it evolves from there, but I feel like this is the place where we want to be.

Quebec in general, and Montreal specifically, has a particularly rich tradition of heavy music. There’s a lot of bands coming from the area, there’s the legacy of the Heavy Montreal Festival. Would you guys say that local legacy influences the planning or the ethos of ProgStorm in any way, like which bands you might choose to reach out to, or how you approach planning the festival?

Jici: It has to be Montreal. There’s a scene. Some people call it the City of Excellence for heavy metal. The big heavy metal bands that are coming to Montreal, I’m sure most of them would agree with me that Montreal is always their biggest show. The people in Montreal are always very present, very excited, very loud during the shows. So for us it was natural to do this in Montreal. It’s a prog metal festival that’s not afraid to go into the more extreme subtypes of metal, and I’m sure that Montreal has a crowd for this kind of music. 

Eddy: There’s definitely something in the water in Montreal. Every act, every pop band where there’s just a little bit of prog sprinkled in. You can look at Angine de Poitrine. There’s always someone pushing the limits of whatever music is, and it just so happens that they come from the Quebec scene. As a local festival, part of our mission statement is to give that platform to bands that we see as huge, but they play in smaller venues or they can’t really break out. Having this festival helps us put a lens over those bands. Maybe we’re hoping to be responsible for the next technical death metal breakout. You know, that’s the dream.

Different festivals take different approaches to announcing their lineups. Some of them drop the whole lineup at once, like ProgPower USA. Others post a string of announcements. You opted for the latter approach. Was there any strategy behind this? Was it a logistical choice as you were working on assembling the lineup, or did you deliberately want to do it that way?

Jici: It was a psychological strategy. [laughs] When you watch a series and there’s one episode at a time, it’s frustrating, but it makes you think about it and imagine and dream. Some people were writing “Are you bringing Opeth”, “Are you bringing Dream Theater?” Obviously we’re not but it’s fun to see that people are projecting their favourite bands [onto] the lineup. It makes people think about it, and think about the music. And I think we should always think more about the music in our lives.

Eddy: Dropping all the bands in one shot would be a lot less work for me, because every graphic design element, every little picture has to be crafted in some way. Sometimes I have to wake up in the middle of the night just so that we can make that announcement the next morning with a visual. It’s something that we decided to do, to announce and have people interact. We believe this is what we would have wanted as fans, and that’s always our jumping point.

Jici: It’s also for the bands, because I think it’s important to showcase each one of them. The ones at the top of the poster, of course, but the ones at the bottom of the poster [too]. Also, one other thing is that for a festival, this is most of the content that we can use during the year to get more attention and get more followers, and obviously this is very important. 

You can always start posting memes too if you run out.

Eddy: It’s always a debate, because there’s a fine balance. For example you have a band, your music is great and you want to showcase your music, but you will always have more views and people interacting if you do a joke or a funny video. But then you become more the latter than showcasing your music, and it’s a fine line. So it was a conscious choice for us. It’s not that we’re serious guys. I think Jici is probably the biggest memelord that I know. It’s just that we try to showcase our content through crafting every image, writing so that it doesn’t look like we’re salesmen. Hopefully [that] is perceived as our love language to the fans going to the festival. That’s the effort we want to put in for you guys.

Jici, you’ve started your own booking and management company, Chaotic Good Music. Could you tell us about how that came to be, and what your vision is for your company?

Jici: This is a company that I created to centralize everything that I’m participating in. For the last four years I’ve been producing our own shows with my band Voidchaser, and this got me into the industry, into the production world. From there I gained experience, trying to find the right ways to promote music, the right ways to produce music. So I’ve been trying stuff with my own band, and then I offered help to some of my friends who are in other bands. From there, I realized that I had a passion about not only making music, but also managing artists and producing events like the shows which I did for Voidchaser, for [Eddy’s band] The Anchoret, for Omnivide, for An Abstract Illusion, and now for Ok Goodnight. And of course, ProgStorm, which I’m doing with Eddy. It’s been an adventure and it’s still just the very beginning, but it’s very rewarding, and it’s becoming kind of a job, kind of a second career.

Has your experience as musicians influenced how you manage the festival? Is there anything you’ve experienced along the way that gave you a strong feeling of how you do or don’t want to do things as promoters and organizers?

Eddy: Short answer is yes. The long answer is too long to say here. Everyone lives through bad stuff, especially in this industry. Things happen all the time, the margins are super small. You really don’t do this for money at all, but you try to kind of survive as a band, as a brand, with the passion [to] believe in your product, believe in your music, believe in yourself. The good experiences? People are so open and so friendly, and most of the time they really want to help out. ProgStorm, or even our bands, are proof of that. We just send cold emails, cold calls, and we more often than not get an actual honest answer and a great human connection. ProgStorm is basically a sum of all the help we got from industry people that we’ve just randomly met, or decided to reach out to. 

Jici: With our bands, we did so many shows, so many great shows and so many that were, um… 

Eddy: Learning experiences. 

Jici: Learning experiences, thank you Eddy. We know for a fact that it makes all the difference when, as a musician, you feel safe. Safe as in you’re going to get paid, safe as in you’re going to be respected, safe as in the venue or the promoter will take care of you in all of the ways that are needed. So for us, it’s so important to give safety to the bands. An artist who [doesn’t feel secure], it will show in the performance. And on the contrary, if the artist feels safe and respected, they will make the best performance they can. We know this, we feel this, we’ve experienced this as musicians. So we go way further than needed to take care of the artists.

Eddy: Because we’ve been there. I’ve showed up at a venue for my show and the doors were locked because that venue was closed and no one let me know. It’s important to make bands feel like they’re welcome at your house, like how you would treat a guest. With Jici’s Chaotic Good Music, I think that’s like his mission statement with all the acts and all the shows that he’ll be promoting, is to make people feel respected and safe and happy to be there.

Speaking of being musicians, what’s new in the world of Voidchaser and The Anchoret? Is there any new material or upcoming shows that you want people to keep an eye out for?

Eddy: 100%. We’re releasing an album. It will be released very early next year. It’s a great album that we’ve enjoyed working on, and we’re pushing the boundaries of ourselves as musicians. And we’re hoping that people resonate with that album as much as they resonated on the first one. But honestly, I can’t wait to get this out.

Your first album was super well-received by the Subway.

Eddy: The first album was also an intrusive thought that happened during Covid. If my first one was called It All Began With Loneliness, now we’re here, I’m not lonely anymore, and I feel surrounded and well-supported. It’s an album that belongs as much to everyone else as myself, and I’m excited to share that. 

Jici: I listened to the new The Anchoret. It’s amazing. 

Eddy: I paid him to say that.

Jici: And in the Voidchaser camp, we are actively preparing the upcoming album. It’s all composed, it’s all arranged. We’re going on tour this month, so we are preparing everything for a release next year. I hope Chad [Bernatchez, Voidchaser vocalist] won’t be mad at me if I say that the album is going to be like the part two of the one that we just released earlier this year, which was called Interstellar I. So I think it’s safe to say it’s going to be called Interstellar II. We’re really excited to start this new album cycle. Next year is going to be busy for both of us, I think.

Whether it’s underground, overground, metal, non-metal, what are your favourite [recent] releases?

Eddy: They didn’t pay me for this, but An Abstract Illusion is hands down, like just freaking amazing and cinematic and emotional, and it’s got the Blade Runner vibes. That’s an album I return to a lot. And I’m very much looking forward to the new Pure Reason Revolution release. It’s one of those bands like Anathema that stays with you, it’s an emotional connection, so I’m pretty sure that one’s going to be the one for me.

Jici: There’s so much great stuff to highlight and Eddy stole my answers. For me too, the new Pure Reason Revolution. It’s the band that I listened to the most last year. I also cannot count how many times I listened to the last EP from Omnivide. I’m so happy that they are receiving so [much] attention right now. They deserve all of it and even more. And Angine de Poitrine, I’m totally into the hype. I absolutely love what they’re doing, and I am absolutely proud of what they are doing [for] Quebec music. And I know it’s a debate, but I think they fit into the prog genre, and I think it’s very cool that they’re playing weird music all around the world to hundreds of thousands of people. 

Eddy: They have that King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard thing, that whether you like it or not, you have that respect. It’s just incredible, there’s so much musicianship, and we’re very proud for the legacy that it brings us.

Jici: I think now is a good time to announce that we will not have Angine de Poitrine in the lineup for next year.

I don’t know, sounds like reverse psychology.

Jici: We have tried.

Speaking of what’s next for the festival, do you intend to carry on with an annual event? Do you have any goals for what the festival might become going forward?

Eddy: I think the target is to keep doing what we’re doing for as long as we can. I feel like we have a very good format that people respond to very well, and I’m just hoping that hype is still something that happens 10 years from now.

Jici: When I think about it, my personal goal is to make Montreal, and even Canada, and the province of Quebec, a hot destination for prog music. For the artists and also for the fans from around the world. This year we have so many people coming from so far. This week we called each other because we saw that one person bought their tickets from South Korea. Every day we see people buying their tickets from Europe, from Vancouver, from everywhere in the United States, from South America. It’s very rewarding to see all of that.

Eddy: We’re just looking for Tourism Canada to jump in here and give us a hand. [laughs] But no, it’s such an honor to be part of the legacy that Montreal [has] regarding the arts and culture, and for hopefully carving a small space in Montreal for the really crazy niche prog metal people. That’s something that really is top of mind when I go to sleep. It’s really a point of pride, honestly, for Jici and myself. We started this interview by saying how jealous I was looking outside at all these communities, prog metal shows and festivals. We’ve done at least a little bit of something that kind of goes the same way, and I’m extremely proud. Hopefully we can, as Jici said, continue to be a destination for many more people coming in from South Korea or otherwise 

I’m really stoked. [A lot of our] blog writers are coming to the festival. For many of them it’s going to be their first time in Montreal, so I’m super excited to show them around the city and share the experience. I know we’re all really looking forward to it.

Eddy: You gotta share poutine places.

100%. Is there anything else you guys want us to know, with regards to the festival or any of your other endeavours?

Jici: We still have some tickets for this year’s edition. It’s getting lower and lower every day. This is not a marketing strategy. It’s real. We are afraid that people might miss the festival this year. To anyone reading this interview, get your tickets now. And also be on the lookout because we will, sooner than later, start selling early bird [tickets] for the 2027 edition. So I won’t say anything else for now.

Eddy: Except for the fact that we are definitely going to give you a very good reason to buy the early bird tickets. Is that a good way to say it, Jici? You’re not going to kill me?

Jici: Yeah, I’m not going to kill you.

ProgStorm will take place at Club Soda in Montreal on 21-23 August 2026. Event details and tickets are available at https://www.progstorm.com/. 

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