……..just looking for my little stack of money……….just remembered that I spent it all on violins……..
July 30th, 2005 Kenora, ON Harbourfest
…….7pm, Scott picks me up for an early ferry trip. I go in and out of road mode. Am I neither here nor where? Let’s settle for permanent summer camp mode. 6:30 am shuttle to airport, exact same flight to Winnipeg as we did a few days ago. Life is a circle, and I am a square. We drove in a van over airport runways, parts of the Vancouver airport I have never seen, all very strange.
Kenora-rain tent extravaganza. That is all my scribble notes say. Nothing about the big black security dude who was really nice to us, was rough with the fans, and works professionally as a cage fighter. Nothing in my notes about the HUGE circus tent we played in with bits of water dripping onto the stage. There is NO WAY to keep that amount of rain out. The opening act was playing Hocus Pocus when we arrived, with a heavily flanged guitar. I loved it. Trailer backstage, food, huge screaming audience; the perfect gig. We have played this one before, or one quite like it. Like it? Love it!
The BC Ferry back home crashed into a dock, and I watch it on CNN, Gives me something to rant about in the van. If I crashed out into the dock, I would be unpopular.
August 5th, 2005 Big Trout Lake, ON Kitch Nuhmay Koosib Inninuwug Arena
OK, here is a trip up to a Native Reserve town. This event has a $50 000 bingo prize, money dropped from an airplane, Trooper, and square dancing to top off the night.
Our little airplane ride was like a space bubble over the lakes. The landing strip was right at the edge of a lake. Imagine flying down towards a lake and magically landing between a strip on the ground between some trees. Miles upon miles of forever land of little trees. The young pilot guys were excellent and became our friends through the day and night. (as I write this, I find he, Logan, this pilot has sent me an Email from Panama!) A school bus with a German-accented Englishman school teacher arrived and speed-drove over the craziest bumps into the village. Everything was damaged on this bus, every seat with open upholstery, and it was a wonder that this bus survived that driving style at all. We all had great laughs at this insane carnival ride. Huge old beat school bus jumping in and out of HUGE pot holes at wild speeds. HOLD ON BOYS!!!!!! The potholes were so huge that you would bounce right into the air.
We landed at a big strange house-like building with 15 little bedrooms around two communal bathrooms, and a common room with oddly placed old furniture, kitchen and table where food was immediately set up for us. Pork chops, previously frozen vegetables and macaroni spam salad, and I had some corn flakes, and peanut butter toast as well. Excellent. Everything has to be flown into these remote villages, you know, even the spam for the salad. A couple of really nice native men were there to be sure we were taken care of, and the band had just enough time to get changed in one of the bizarrely arranged washrooms (the place was set-up to accommodate lots of people with shared bathrooms). The crew was at the arena madly untwandleing (I made that word up) a PA system, that also had to be flown up. The crazy bus took us to the extremely dusty arena where about 200 cans of pop awaited us backstage in the hockey change room. The leftover dinner was brought backstage as well, and Craig was happy about the pork chops.
There was a HUGE buzz through the PA, which concerned the promoter greatly, and our soundman, who is an amazing tech, fixed the system, displayed a few different emotions, as we sat backstage looking at all the pop. The crew had gone straight from the airplane to the gig to set it all up, skipping the dinner portion of the evening. I was blessed with excellent stage sound, saw a really shy crowd huddled in the darkness of the back of the room. Ra invited everyone to walk their chairs up to the front of the stage, and slowly I could see people appear towards us.
I walked around the arena afterwards, speaking with locals and amazing myself at the idea that nobody was driven to sweep the place out. We then crammed into trucks and all gathered in the truest of all dark middle-of-nowheres, at a gravel runway, while the small plane was being loaded with our stage gear and minor bits of luggage that we needed to get through the day. The chief and a few other friendly natives said their good-byes, and we flew back into Winnipeg after the gig, a surreal trip where the pilots turned down the lights so we could experience the completely psychedelic universe of Northern lights that we were engulfed in. I could see the odd bits of lights from remote villages below, but Northern Manitoba is pretty sparsely populated. Are you feeling this magical and just slightly over-the-top bizarre summer vibe from the air above Northern Manitoba?
At the Winnipeg airport, late into the night, we lounged in a far corner of a complex, in a lounge with wild red and blue ceiling lights and mega-boring magazines about nothing in particular, NO food, and we waited, and waited for a truck to arrive. We were there for quite a long time. The blue and red lights making me feel like a space ship was going to take off, and we were all going with it. This was the longest part of this rather long day. Very strange waiting room, great reclining chairs. A completely different run-down van took us to a hotel where the front desk girl was YELLING over the karaoke in the bar. A Chinese girl was singing quite insanely, and lots of people looked like they were ready to fight. I got up to the hotel room and made some soup (knor vegetable) in the coffee maker. There was NO other food anywhere. Thank GOD for packaged soups and coffee makers. The rock and roll cookbook comes in handy.
I know I lost some notes. At some point, the pilots, Logan and his buddies, visited us at another arena gig, had a great time, went to an after party, and Logan, who is a proper, nice-looking young pilot got sucker punched and his tooth went through his lip. Craig had to pound on the bastard that hit his new friend. This story bummed me out, and the pilot emailed us later saying he had a great time none the less, and will never forget it. He has become a real Trooper brother.
Personally, I do NOT go to late night parties in small towns, never did, and this notion has served me well. I will go out late on reserves, big cities, or vacation resorts, but not where goofs think that you are trying for their underage girlfriend’s affections (or whatever stupid shit they dream up).
August 6th, 2005 Ignace, ON Ignace Recreation Centre
Flew to Thunder Bay the next day. Quite a marvel of routing and flight bookings this summer! Good job, guys! Drove 3 hours in a black mini van to a really cool old hotel. Fun and lively front desk woman gave Scott free pizza, so Scott and I filled our ‘fridge and had a little hotel party. YAYYYYYYYY! The gig had thousands of 20-year-olds, about 40 of the girls onstage with hugs that don’t let go. The smoke machine was so intense that you couldn’t see exactly how many girls were on the stage, but you got a FEELING about it. And some of the girls got a FEELING about us as well. Greg, the cameraman, was running around like it was a war zone. Is this the gig where I kicked a cardboard box across the stage, leftover from Frankie’s drum solo and hit Greg right in the pants? Yes I do remember that. What a face he made. I kicked a box right from one side of the stage and nailed him in the crotch. I did apologize. Didn’t mean to. Our soundman was not having fun, as far as I could tell, and I have a note about a $6000 paint job that was really important at the time, whatever the hell that means now, I dunno. Confused, yes I am, thank you.
In the morning, I banged on every hotel room door that had any association with this glorious rock band of ours, (ours, meaning Canada’s) to tell all that The Shuffle Deamons were on TV. I went crazy, had all the doors open, the TVs cranked up and me dancing from room to room. I like The Shuffle Deamons quite a bit, I found out. I saw them in Nanaimo once and they had the whole crowd outside dancing in the street with 3 saxophones. Wonderful stuff. That is how MY town shows itself at night! Brag brag.
Craig forgot his underwear (thunder-wear!) in the hotel, and the front desk girl delivered them to the band, so we had no choice other than to put them on our van antennae, and Lord knows where they are today. I imagine this is one of those things that the Lord don’t wanna know. We had a pit stop at a groovy old general store that was more like a museum of pop culture antiques, toys and food packaging, and I bought an ice cream cone from the funny little chubby girl. Great Canadian moment with the giant long train rumbling by outside. Living inside of a postcard, I always say.
Ok, at the airport I finally gave into a certain BIG massively popular coffee and doughnut chain that is popping up everywhere and littering our great nation with paper cups. I avoid the place like the devil, cos I don’t believe that it exists, but man, you gotta eat something besides ice cream. And this is one of the restaurants that monopolizes some airport food scenes, so what are you gonna do? I may LOOK and act like Gandhi, but I gotta eat too. While waiting for an airplane, I sit there all day just looking at the stupid place, so I figure why stand in the big line-up for 15 minutes, see what all the fuss is about, and when I get to the till and the girl behind it says, “this till is closed.” I was the last guy there and I think she just didn’t like me. Some people do, she didn’t, poor little thing. There was no other till open, so the idea at the time, established by Miss Don’t-Like-Gogo was that I stand there until someone decides to talk to me. I told her that it would have been kinder to have mentioned that idea 15 minutes ago. She basically told me to F-off. What does she care? One minute you are getting hugged and screamed at, the next you’re told to eat it. What a life.
You know, when these big companies dry up the last of the Mom and Pop outfits that rely on their little bits of the food service markets, this is what we all have to look forward to. Employees who DON’T CARE ABOUT YOU. I don’t drink coffee (dirt juice) and could never go to another one in my life and never know the difference, so what do I care, other than to look out for my fellow man. I really shouldn’t be writing this stuff, should I? Ah what the hell, I didn’t name names.
Ok fly home, rush for the ferry, 3 teas, back to camping and boating…………..where EVERYONE loves me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
August 12th, 2005 Campbell River, BC Saratoga Speedway (all ages)
Summer is in full-swing now, has been for a while. Everyone I know here is all excited about the 2 big, well-advertised shows that we are playing on Vancouver Island. Rick (Tracy’s Mom’s husband, Tracy’s step-dad, I guess) cool guy, great old greaser, shows up having driven from Alberta in a 22′ long white 1971 Pontiac. So I guess I am going to Saratoga in grand style. HOT HOT HOT summer day out. No time to jump in the river that day, what a waste. Life can be cruel. I have one other car in my private entourage. Ra and Scott traveled together in a big black Yukon, Smitty was already on the Island with his truck, and I don’t know how Frankie or the crew got around. I was on my own, with a big mob of Island friends. So my private mob of people who love me enter the festival gates with Sweeny Todd playing and I recognize some rock musicians from my Vancouver days over 10 years ago. Rock and roll reunion time, also with Blaine Smith, the Trooper keyboard player I replaced, about as long ago as well. Somehow all the beer disappeared from backstage, and there was really no night-time lighting or snacks, so Ra mentioned this to the promoter. A band called Will, which is a singer guy with acoustic guitar and Pat Steward on drums, howled away, about 4500 people raged at our show, and I sat at Peter Freddett’s feet as Kim Mitchell played all we are. I call this a good summer vibe, a bit of a greaser-fest. Rick, the biggest old great greaser of them all, and my also step-father-in-law nodded a leave time near the end of the Kim Mitchell set and we, the people who still love me, glided back down the Island highway.
A concert like this can be the highlight of many people’s rock and roll careers. It was perfect. Yet, the next day was to be my favorite gig of the summer, perhaps of my entire association with Trooper.
August 13th, 2005 Duncan, BC Sunfest, Avalon Acres (all ages)
Oh please Lord, it is too late into the report for another epic. Lemme get another bowl of soup before I write this out………..
I was told that the two Island shows are charity gigs, so please keep guest list at a minimum. Ya. Ok, so I took my gang in with me through the back gate. No big secret. The promoter greeted us there, gave us passes, and was quite a gentleman about it, which I quite appreciated.
When I say my Gang, I am talking about Aunty Laura, Uncle Greg, Robert, Tacouchi and his fans, Mr. Chriss, Paige and Barry, Tanya, Jay, Logan, Johnny, David, Jeff, the Bradburrys, Dodie, Tracy-Lyn, of course, Olena………who else, dunno. I am the pied piper of the Island summer fun trip scene. Andy Warhol never had such a grand, and good-looking entourage.
My entourage got huger as the day went on. We met friends on the highway, had a motorhome with kids, a huge white cadillac, and by the time we stopped at the market beside the Cassidy airport, playing acoustic guitars and singing, our friend Paige, fresh back from the Queen Charlotte Islands (The Haida Guai!) appeared in her mini van. With her was Casey, ……..THAT is who is missing from the list!………..and as soon as he heard the acoustic guitar I strummed, he JUMPED out of the van and danced the wildest dance I have ever seen, getting really close to me, backing away, quickly…………this was the wildest dance I have ever seen. In all my years at dance class, watching a million plays and watching well over a thousand crowds at rock shows, and hippy festivals, Casey is the wildest dancer. Right in the parking lot of the market on the side of the highway.
Casey is about 55 years-old, has a cabin on a river at the Queen Charlottes Islands, has raised his family, dresses in nondescript grey hippy cottons, has teeth that need work, but only noticeable because he never stops smiling. In fact he looks like one of those great old paintings of the sun. To say he is a hippy is far too simplistic. He makes your standard hippy look like a banker. And can he dance! Every redneck behind the windshield of every truck in the parking lot was smiling. I am as shallow as the next clod in this society, and I half think, wow, I hope he doesn’t do anything too crazy and EMBARRASS me in front of the band tonight ! And I quickly trade the thought for a hope of the same. So I ask him what he is all about.
Casey explains that there is no balance; no good and evil; no black and white, no yin and yang. “IT IS ALL PEACE AND LOVE.” He is riding on a wave of love. No resistance. I got back into the Cadillac, back onto the highway, still strumming away, with Olena playing violin (as we did all camping season), and it struck me how remarkably DEEP that philosophy is. He is right you, know, IF YOU WANT HIM TO BE.
Ok, I have been a student of Peace and Love for quite a few years here, and I am committed to lifetime study of the subject. There are millions of people who can say IT IS ALL CRAP, and live it accordingly. Easy. But can you really say that IT IS ALL PEACE AND LOVE, and live up to it? You couldn’t even be pissed off at traffic without compromising your philosophy. Would it be a hard life? Would it be a breeze? Well, Casey just got into town and is on his way to a huge rock show for free. You tell me.
So with the huge white cadillac leading, my entourage winds around the field, down a wrong way dirt road through the woods, turns around somehow, back onto a field, and everyone parks, grabs their coolers, guitars and violins, and the promoter smiles us up and down. Wonderful! Even Aunty Laura is there, and Dodie (my MOM) and little Bobby with a GOGO RULES! T-Shirt, and Mr. Chriss, with several boxes of picnic food. He had ice cream, pies, HUGE tupperwares of the finest variety of fresh salads. Mr. Chriss is a beautiful guy. Same age as me, have known him my whole life, total enthusiast about everything, big bald glasses, laughs and gets excited about everything all the time. Is SO excited! EVERYTHING is an EVENT (as I write this he knocked on my studio door on his way to church cos it IS ASH WEDNESDAY!!!!!! YAAAAA!!!!!!)
WILL strums away on stage, with Pat Steward on Drums, and I find that my gang is totally self-sufficient. I don’t need to do anything. Everyone set up Mexican blankets, sat in a circle, passed around Mr. Chriss’ gourmet salads, and pies…….yum…the sun burning like crazy, and Casey dancing in front of the stage to the crowds delight. There was a bungee chord acting as security between the back stage and front of house, and I ventured out to listen to the mix, watch Casey dance with a mob of ladies who have also decided that it IS all peace and love. Casey takes a spill on his ass and recovers laughing his head off. Everyone loves him.
Trooper decided to limit the guests in the motorhome (our backstage) to give ourselves some quiet space, which was a great and well-respected idea. Yes, seriously great idea, thank you. I went back there to cool off a few times, and to store the acoustic instruments that I carry around with me all summer.
I used to go to what I called Hippy Fairs when I was a kid in the ’70s, have great laughs and try to profit by selling watermelon slices to the stoners. I invested and doubled my paper route money that way. This was a modern version of the same ideal, with modern people, in more of rock and roll, less crafty flair. This time I got to play keyboards rather than listen to fat hippies complain that my watermelon slices were too small. Everyone was smiling all day. My gang arrived about 4 hours before we were to play, and one by one the rest of the Troopers showed up, and I introduced them to everyone I could find, and discussed Casey’s idea about LIFE with Ra and Smitty.
I was told that a radio station on the island had a phone-in show later with the topic of exactly how severely the show was Trooper’s show, and their finest moment at that. I am still hearing people talk about this gig. My little nephews went right up front, and my proudest moment was seeing them rock out and look at me like “THAT is what Uncle does!!!!!” The sun set as we played, and I sat at Kim Mitchell’s feet that night for all we are. The guitar tech allowed it, groovy guy that he is, but I detected a look from Kim that he wasn’t quite so thrilled with me sitting there. Kim is not Casey. The Moog Taurus pedals shook the place nonetheless.
I met about half the crowd at the T-Shirt booth. These are my people. I later told Kim Mitchell that I LOVE YOU. He laughed and said “right on.” I figured that words are not to be wasted. I have met Kim many times, and I don’t need to say hey I like all we are…………
Love was in the air. Love is always in the air. The only real twist to the vibe was in watching the big promoter dude throwing kids off of the stage. Kids were landing on each other and one boy got a bit caught up in the barricade. This is exactly how people get hurt. I was informed later that the promoter is also the local sports coach, and those were all his team players. I never would have suspected that. Even so, it put a bit of a spook onto the crowd. The promoter is also a famous player from the NHL (National hockey league), and I have to say, I quite like the man. He introduced me to two other famous NHL players outside the dressing room, both big guys, total music enthusiasts. Scott could tell you all about them, but I apologize for not being good with names. (Gary Nilan?) Big-time hockey players in Canada are SERIOUSLY famous and well respected people. I often meet National Hockey League players at gigs, but I admit that I do not know who is who, but Scott sure does!
All of my guests behaved quite well, only one guy yelling at Smitty that he wasn’t loud enough, and when I got everyone back into the Cadillac to try to navigate the field, a friend of mine fell down, onto the ground and disappeared. It all happened quite quickly, cos he is a bit on the heavy side, and I figured that he fell down a hill, and that it was a good thing that I saw it happen. So I sprint the 20′ back to the Cadillac and tell everyone that he fell down a ravine, and that splash splash I hear water. Casey yells “HE’S IN THE WATER MAN!?!?!?!?’ and he jumps out of the Cadillac, glides down the ravine and somehow, in the pitch dark, finds the guy in an instant and says “GRAB MY ARM” so we can form a human chain and haul the guy up. We get him on his feet, I donate my swimming towel to wipe the mud off of his bald head, he strips down to his guanch and gets in the car repeating ‘WHAT HAPPENED.?!?!?!?”
Bad moment for my friend.
So, it was Casey, Mr. Peace and Love, that basically saved the guy’s life. I drove everyone home, quite tired, and I asked Casey about his life. He hadn’t been drinking or getting stoned, was totally sharp, told me about his sailing adventures, about his family, his hardships, his community work, his decisions in life, and his quest and success and finding happiness. If anyone had the impression back at the market that this cat was flakey, we all may be enlightened to see that there is a solid life behind the revolutionary philosophy.
I wish I had a photo of Casey to show you. He really looks like the wrinkled old sun. I often think of Casey, in fact, while visiting the band Nazareth, and philosophizing with their singer Dan McCafferty, (a really great friend), I saw great traces of the Casey spirit in him.
I wanted to take Casey to Protection Island the next day, but he had already left to continue on his journey…………….what did he say about riding a wave of love? He goes to a rock show for free, eats the best foods, is well respected, and off he goes down highway………..does that beat working a job you hate your life? Who knows.
So we take a little Trooper tour break, and the day after the outdoor Duncan Sunfest, I push forward a family picnic on Protection Island that has a line of 25 of us GOGOs mooning the sailboat race at the lighthouse. All the sailboats were deadlocked with no summer breeze to push them back towards the pub. The kids got to see the beach that their grandpa built with his bulldozer in 1960, and we got 17 people in the back of a pick-up truck, me driving, slowly. All the bicycles from my fab collection got used, zipped around on, and I sang campfire songs with 3 of my brothers, the first time we had all sung together since our rock band GRAPHICS split up 20 years ago. First time I had sang with my brother in 20 years. We had a professional singing group together back then and broke up on bad terms.
By 2am I was shuttling people back to town, across the glass-smooth Nanaimo Harbour, purple lights of the city reflecting on the flat sea, warm breeze gently whispering, in the Zodiac. This, I enjoy. Lots of people decided to camp out on our Protection Island lot, on the fresh new summer lawn, and Mr. Chriss’ leftover salads were a dream. In fact there was enough food to feed half of the Island, so I invited half the Island over. And this is why our lawn is stomped to death.
Into the river, into the sea. I didn’t get a whole lot of actual work done this summer.
I later heard that Casey paid his way through the summer by washing people windows. He would bless the water, so for the price of clean windows you also get your house blessed. Can’t get THAT out of the yellow pages.
What a guy.