It’s passion that has brought them this far ,and it’s that same passion that will see Jay McFarlane of 2-Tone Music Productions under the big tent at the Rainy River Walleye Tournament this Friday night to keep spirits high and make sure everyone has a good time.
While McFarlane isn’t the creator of the brand, he has become its face in Fort Frances and the rest of the Rainy River District over the past few years. Since his beginnings with 2-Tone in Thunder Bay in 2004, McFarlane has found himself DJing for them on and off over the years until fate brought him back into their orbit in 2016.
“In 2016, through some family medical stuff, I was brought to Thunder Bay,” McFarlane explained.
“I needed to work some extra hours, and I’ve always been connected to 2-Tone, we stayed friends over the years. These guys are like my brothers, so Andy [Richert, 2-Tone Music Productions owner/operator] got me retrained and I started doing gigs back in 2016, because the technology had changed. When I first started we were doing CD’s, and now it’s completely digital.”
With the training under his belt once more, McFarlane recalls that they then received a call to DJ for Atikokan’s prom in 2017. Since McFarlane was going to be on the road back to Fort Frances at that point, he took the job and played for the high school students before lugging his equipment back home and putting it away in storage. That event, and the location of his stored gear, was the turning point for the expansion of 2-Tone into what it is today.
“Through [the prom] we ended up doing a wedding in Atikokan and after that I had been storing some gear at the time in my house, and people started seeing it in the background of pictures and stuff, and I started getting requests from people if I’d ever DJ in town,” McFarlane said.
“So officially in January 2018, we launched 2-Tone Fort Frances.”
With a huge district to service, McFarlane said he’s worked as far afield as Balmertown, though he usually works between Rainy River and Atikokan. In that time, and across those gigs and beyond, 2-Tone Music has been recognized several times for its service, including a handful of Reader’s Choice awards from The Chronicle Journal in Thunder Bay. 2-Tone is also a regular fixture in Fort Frances at the Royal Canadian Legion, as well as throughout the district, but McFarlane noted that Rainy River holds a special place in his heart as he gears up to return for Friday night’s entertainment slot at the Rainy River Walleye Tournament.
“Rainy River was actually one of my first shows,” he shared.
“At the time I had known the Rec Director, I actually booked an ugly Christmas sweater party there, and that was one of my first gigs. Then we got invited back to do the $10,000 Dance through the Rainy River Curling Club multiple years in a row, including one where I travelled through a blizzard to get there.”
McFarlane shared that all of the individuals who DJ for 2-Tone Music Productions do it because they are passionate about it, not because it is their primary job.
“This is our second job, across the board,” he said.
“Even the guy who owns the company has a full-time job. This is a complete passion project that started in our 20s and has continued, some of these guys we’re talking 30 years in the business.”
To that end, even despite the local chapter’s more recent emergence into the scene, McFarlane says its thanks to the communities they play and the support they receive there that keep them going and have helped them to reach the heights they have so far.
“We’re really part of the community,” he said.
“We have multiple community attachments, not just me but even the owner’s family. There are community ties and we love northwestern Ontario. The fun thing about the Rainy River Walleye Tournament is, honestly, it’s very eclectic. That’s the thing that we offer, with the selection that we have and the ability that we have, especially nowadays as all our tracks are completely licensed, we have music for any taste. At the Rainy River Walleye Tournament I get requests for everything from Dr. Hook to 50 Cent to Dua Lipa.”
McFarlane stressed that 2-Tone could not do what they do without the immense support they receive from the community, and encourages everyone to come out to the Rainy RiveR Walleye Tournament tent this Friday evening, September 15, 2023, from 9:00 p.m. to 1:00 a.m. to enjoy some great music and a fun time.
“I would love to see more people get out to the Friday night,” he said.
“Saturday is usually big, Friday is the lower attended night, but I bring out the lights, I bring the music, bring the hits. I love the opportunity to show people our style of DJing. I’m not digging on any of the other DJs out there. We just offer a different set-up, a different style, and we’ve been getting a lot of praise for that. It’s been really nice getting out to do more and more shows. And we can’t thank the Rainy River District enough for that.”
Tickets for 2-Tone Music Productions night of entertainment at the Rainy River Walleye Tournament are $15 at the door. The show is age of majority, and two pieces of government ID will be required for entry, where one must be photo ID.
