Oh what a night!

This is the #YegSwap debrief and recap. So, if you were there (thanks for coming) let me know if I forget to mention something, please tell us your own thoughts about the night, and let me know if there are blog posts/photos/video out there I haven’t linked to. Also, tell us if you still love your new stuff or if you’ve already got swapper’s remorse.

Also, before I forget, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you to our volunteers (We love you!), our musicians, The ARTery (which we need to talk about more at a future date), and thanks from me to the other organizers.

I’m going to say, even though it was said a bunch of times (including when Scott and Adam introduced our final act of the night, The Joe), that the 1st annual #YegSwap was a success.

This was an event put on by The League of Extraordinary Media, which (right now) includes this blog, the podcasts The Unknown Studio and User Created Content, and TrueBritl.com, a blog by iNews880′s Twitter star, Brittney Le Blanc. To quickly sum up what The League is all about: our blogs and podcasts have joined forces to take our Edmonton-related musings into the real world. Mayhaps there will be cross-posting of content too. Hey, we’ve got to compete with the “real” media, you know.

the edmontonian‘s co-founder, Sally, and Brittney thought a swap meet would be a good time. That this idea came about after an afternoon of home shopping channel viewing is somehow relevant.

I was, of course, on board right away. Not only could it be fun, it could be a way to join together some of Edmonton’s online “newsrooms.” And pay homage to a local community cable show so enjoyed by myself in my Toronto days.

We were fortunate enough to land some amazing musical talent for the night. I do not know where a lineup like this will be heard for a mere $2.

Lyra Brown opened things up in the perfect way. The crowd was still coming in and the swap area had just been run-over for the first time. Her beautiful and poetic songs were the right note to start things with.

A beatbox from her boyfriend on one song spiced up her set, showing more versatility. Lyra is a young talent that is going to be playing to much bigger crowds, for a much bigger ticket price soon. She’s next at The Hydeaway and not to be missed.

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The Mystery Ponies rocked the crowd after the second swap of the night, cranking up the amps to 11. They are starting to tour around Edmonton and will next be at Ceili’s (which has recently amped up its live music). You are going to want to hear them. You are going to be rocked and, likely, rolled. You are also going to want to keep up on what the Ponies’ Pepe is doing. And yes, our Sally is their lead singer.

There’s a great story to our final musical performance of the night. The Joe was instantly on board to play#YegSwap. The only trouble was he was playing Calgary that week and would only be getting into Edmonton Saturday night, about 9pm.  Thankfully we wanted him to close out the show from the get-go.

His bus was a little late, but The Unknown Studio’s Adam was waiting patiently at the Greyhound station. You can’t get more hardcore than running from the bus station to the stage, wife and luggage in tow. (Bethany is awesome!) The crowd that rummaged through the swap area to close the night was in store for a blistering set of lyrics from one of Edmonton’s masters of the microphone. That he was likely exhausted from traveling didn’t hurt The Joe at all, and I know he won over new fans. Hear this Edmonton rap star next at Edmonton Poetry Festival (back at The ARTery).

Lyra was folk-pop (as I call it), The Mystery Ponies are real rock, and The Joe is rap. Not your typical lineup for a show. The League, however, didn’t want the same genre all night, didn’t want the same sound. We didn’t want this to be a folk show or a rock show or a whatever show, we wanted it to be an Edmonton show. That’s not normally how things are done.

We like music from all genres (I bet your iPod says the same thing about you.) and we hoped rock fans would be won over by Lyra’s poetic voice, the ‘Ponies would blow away people normally inclined to something a little softer, and The Joe would just blow everyone away. I think we were right.

As for the main event, the swapping, I was blown away. Sure, we thought people would come to the party (at the fabulous ARTery) and we figured they’d bring a mix of good-quality and hilariously cheesy items. I didn’t think we’d have so much that 100+ people couldn’t take most of it.

(Don’t worry, we donated the books via new friends from CJSR’s Adamant Eve and Terra Informa, and other goods were dropped, not in the dumpster but, at a Value Village.)

But there was A LOT of really good stuff, including an espresso machine, a fondue set, nice clothes and shoes (I don’t know who brought the bras!), movies, records, CDs, toys, The Clapper (via @karenunland), glasses and dishware, a tent, and dozens of other things that people excitedly tweeted about snagging.

I also couldn’t believe how many people were asking League members when we were doing the next swap. We didn’t really plan for that. The “1st annual” on our posters was actually a little tongue-in-cheek jab at events that proclaim they are the first annual, never knowing if they’ll do it again.

But from the turnout, the response, and all the great stuff we have lying around our homes that’s just dying for a new owner, I think Edmonton could handle another swap meet. We’ll have to put that on our list of possible events, when the League meets next at our secret headquarters.

First on our agenda, however, is discussing whether we are more like the Justice League, Justice Society or the Super Friends.