Thanks to an overwhelmingly successful crowd-funding campaign last fall, the Victoria Ska & Reggae Fest is thrilled to present some of our best free programming ever.

Kobo Town, founded in 2004, blends Canadian and Caribbean cultures through the contemporary reimagining of calypso music. Founder, Drew Gonsalves, grew up in Trinidad and moved to Ottawa when he was 13 with his Québécois mother. Caught between two worlds, Gonsalves turned to music and poetry, eventually creating Kobo Town as his artistic outlet. Their performance at last year's fest proved to be a highlight, it ending with the sold-out crowd chanting and embracing in a group hug after the final notes were played.

Dope Soda is one of the dopest acts on Vancouver Island and not afraid to admit it. Combining snappy horns with cunning lyrics, these guys are sure to impress. Co-lead singers Dave St. Jean (also known as Dave DiRT) and Matt Carter swap vocal duties with horns and keys, never missing a beat in the process. They pull in influences from jazz, punk, and Jamaican music, all the while bringing as much energy to the stage as they do musicianship.

Who says the prairies can’t breed great reggae bands? Certainly not Tasman Jude, who hail from Grande Prairie, Alberta, and are one of the most exciting young talents in the Canadian reggae scene today. Their downhome, roots approach to reggae has taken the group across Canada, Australia, and the Caribbean.

Boomshack has quickly proven itself to be one of the hottest groups in Vancouver Island's groove-music scene. Blurring the lines between soul, jazz, Latin, and reggae, Boomshack come with a bag of soulful tunes backed by air-tight rhythms and a blasting horn-section.