Pitchfork

Thank the Hockey Gods for Ottawa, eh? Yes, Ottawa: you raised Tom Green, brought us the Tulip Festival, and wrote those vital Ottawa knee and ankle rules. Now maybe we can add "delivered most awesomely diverse music fest EVAH" to that litany of generosity. From July 7-16, the Canadian capital will open its doors to the Ottawa Blues Fest, putting the Fiery Furnaces and Broken Social Scene on the same bill as Nelly Furtado, Keb' Mo', Rihanna, Hawthorne Heights, Sister Sledge, and the New York Haitian Interdenominational Mass Choir. Whew!

The whole thing takes place on six stages at Ottawa's City Hall Festival Plaza and various other downtown locations. Last year's fest (which included the Black Eyed Peas, Neko Case, and loads more) brought out a respectable 220,000 fans. Which is, like, twice the population of Canada, or something. Single-day and full-fest passes are available now, and they're pretty durn cheap given the exchange rate.

A few kid-tested and/or P4k-approved highlights from this year's fest include: Broken Social Scene, the New Pornographers, the Fiery Furnaces, Wilco, Feist, Calexico, Jamie Lidell, Bell Orchestre, Metric, Holy Fuck, Nelly Furtado, Cadence Weapon, Controller.Controller, Jason Collett, Great Lake Swimmers, the M's, Amadou & Mariam, Seu Jorge, Rihanna, Kathleen Edwards, Mark Kozelek, the Stills, Son Volt, Hackensaw Boys, Konono No. 1, Ani DiFranco, Hawthorne Heights, Thornetta Davis, Rosanne Cash, KC's Boogie Blast ft. KC & the Sunshine Band (?!), Gloria Gaynor, Tavares, and, of course, Sister Sledge.

For a full schedule of performers and ticket information, click on that fancy-shmancy link below.