By: Kate Ellis
YouTube sensation Only1Noah, along with Andy Brown and Brian Byrne, opened up this year’s New Music New Places at the ACCE’s amphitheatre on Sept. 24.
Noah Guthrie, 18, is a musician from Greer, S.C. who went viral after posting YouTube videos of himself playing guitar and singing two years ago. Known by most for his bluesy cover of LMFAO’s Sexy and I Know It, Guthrie has been featured on the Ellen Degeneres’ website, Clevver TV, and has been a guest on the Today Show.
“We have a great time just seeing him enjoy what he’s doing,” said David Guthrie, Noah’s father. “As a dad that’s all you can hope for.”
It was both of the Guthrie’s first time to Canada on a college and university tour. He will be playing Sheridan College, Waterloo and Mohawk in the days following Algonquin, playing five shows in four days.
“There’s a lot of YouTube guys and girls out there,” said Brown. “But he [Noah] has a great future ahead.”
Joining Noah was Byrne; lead singer of I, Mother Earth and self-described, “sometime-solo-guy.”
“I like the ease of singer-songwriter circles where you can talk in-between,” said Byrne. “It puts the artist at ease.”
Brown is a folk-rock singer songwriter from Fredericton, N.B. who flew to Ottawa just to play at the college. Brown is a two-time international song writing competition winner who is currently working on his second full-length album, titled Tin Man.
For those who had not really heard of Noah before, he left them satisfied.“I saw his I’m Sexy and I Know It video on YouTube, it went around my group of friends,” said Esther Brouwer, 22, third-year museum studies student. “I’m definitely going to look him up on YouTube later.”
For some, the promise of the amphitheater drew them in.
“[I had] never heard of Noah,” said Derek Prince, 20, second-year culinary arts student. “I came because they only unlock [the door to the amphitheater] once a year for concerts.”
Noah may have been the selling point for the show, but he was not the only talent playing that night.
“My favourite part was Andy Brown,” said Prince. “He was the highlight of the show.” Prince added that he liked Brown’s accent and how he included the crowd in his show by getting them to sing along.
New Music New Places is a monthly event put on by Algonquin College that features music and different places on campus. This month, the featured place on campus was the Algonquin Centre for Construction Excellence building amphitheatre.“This is a really, really cool spot,” said Noah. “I love that the stage was intimate.”
There are plans to showcase the commons building and the new theatre.
“The concept is we try to highlight the college,” said Bill Kitchen, events programmer, adding that the aim is to “deliver a cool experience for students” with no pun intended for the cold weather.
On Nov. 19, students can see Poor Young Things and Tim Chaisson play a free show in the Student Commons building.