Vancouver Punk Scene Comes Together For Devon Clifford Tribute

The students of Vancouver Film School’s Entertainment Business Management program class 18 are proud to announce the launch event for charity compilation album The Party Lives On, which is raising money for the Devon R.B. Clifford Memorial Foundation.

Five Vancouver area bands will be playing at the Rickshaw Theatre on February 21, 2013 as a tribute to Devon and a fundraiser to support this worthy cause.

The lineup of the night is at follows:
7:00 – Doors open
8:00 – A Fish Called Piranha
9:00 – The Vicious Cycles
10:00 – The Tranzmitors
11:00 – The Jolts

Tickets are $10 in advance and $15 at the door. This gets you entry to the event as well as a free download card for the album.

Tickets are available on the Rickshaw website.

Three years ago on April 18th, 2010, the Vancouver band which had its start in Abbotsford, You Say Party! We Say Die!, experienced a grave tragedy when their drummer Devon Clifford had an unexpected brain hemorrhage and collapsed on stage and died at the Rickshaw Theatre in Vancouver. To go back to the same venue and hold a concert in his honor is something that is very important for the Vancouver music scene and for all of Devon’s friends, family and fans.

Devon’s Abbotsford family set up the Devon R.B. Clifford Memorial Foundation in his memory. According to the foundation’s website, the goal of the Devon R. B. Clifford Memorial Foundation is to provide music lessons for teens and young adults who are financially disadvantaged. The Foundation is currently sponsoring lessons for eight students in a ten week “Rock Camp”. The Foundation will provide continued private lessons for those students that show talent and commitment.

You Say Party has had a long and sometimes difficult road back to the music scene since Devon’s untimely passing. There have been highs and lows but mostly there has been a need for healing.

Soon after Devon died, in June of 2010 the band made the much anticipated ‘Long List’ for Canada’s Polaris Music Prize and In August of 2010 the band performed their first concert since Devon’s sudden and tragic passing at Jubillee Park in Abbotsford.

In April, 2011 the band announced they would take a long hiatus from the music scene in order to recuperate emotionally.

In September of 2012 they took a tentative step back into the music scene appearing in Toronto in the PBR10 Concert Series.

In an exclusive interview with The Vancouver Sun Becky Ninkovic said, “The trauma just knocked us right off our courses.”

“For a while, with the reformation and new members and everything, we were all scrambling to find some way to channel that shock and that grief and that complicated mixture of emotions we were all going through. It was like no one knew what was the right thing to do.”

In October of 2012 their hit song, Laura Palmer’s Prom was featured in the soundtrack of the Richard Gere movie Arbitrage.

The band is slowly making its way back to doing what they shared so lovingly with Devon; his family is doing the best they can to make some sense of their loss and the foundation created in his name will help his name live on.

This tribute from his friends in the Vancouver punk scene is just one more example of the incredible empty space left by Devon’s passing and the ongoing commitment of his family and friends to keep his name alive.

The Party Lives On is available for download for only $10 at www.thepartyliveson.bandcamp.com with 100% of net proceeds going to the Devon R.B. Clifford Memorial Foundation.