Hagen leads The Extreme Tour into Camrose

Local recording artist Jill Hagen will be leading The Extreme Tour into City Center Camrose for a Music on Main performance this Thursday.

Hagen makes up one-fourth of The Extreme Tour, along with The Burn Ins, The Lacks and Joal Kamps.

"They are bands that play a mixture of rock and roll, pop rock and punk, all of which is Christian rooted," said The Extreme Tour event coordinator Curtis Bessette.

The bands will begin playing at 6 p.m. and should be finished by 9.

The north half of 50 Street will be closed to traffic starting at 5 p.m.

The Extreme Tour started as a grassroots project of "The Extreme," a cultural outreach project started by Ted Bruun and a small group of other Idaho residents in 1994. The purpose of The Extreme Tour was to use extreme sports and music events held in communities across Idaho (which later became around the United States and now around the world) to reach at-risk and counter culture youth with services and resources that would assist them in making positive and healthy decisions for a successful and victorious life.

The bands who are part of The Extreme Tour will be accompanied to Camrose by extreme skateboarders, who will be competing at the Camrose Skate Park Aug. 15 starting at 5 p.m.

"The band members will be there to promote the show the following night," said Bessette.

The Extreme Tour is a faith-based effort, however, the events are not religious events aimed at a religious market. Rather, they are extreme sports and music events aimed at a mainstream market and held in mainstream venues and settings.

The Extreme Tour is now, in terms of the number of communities visited in a year, the largest and longest running extreme sports and music tour in the world. The tour visits a little over 100 communities each year in the United States, a number that is set to go up dramatically as it reaches out internationally.

The Extreme Tour is being sponsored in Camrose by City Center Camrose, The Open Door and local churches working together.