On the sultry evening of August 31, on my way up Brock Avenue, as I was dipping down under the railroad bridge, across the street there was an old blue and white VW bus sputtering and failing in an attempt to start.
I arrived in the Southern Cross bar to find Sarah Greene working behind the bar. She was supposed to host, but somehow, Scott Bradshaw had gotten the gig again.
There were several names already on the list. Number two was available but I didn’t want to go that early, so I tagged myself in at number seven, which was then last place.
Scott was telling Chaz that he’d moved four times over the summer and that he’d just moved back downtown from Eglinton and Yonge. He said that it was murder climbing that hill on a bike. I told him it just takes practice and that I cycle everywhere.
Chaz asked if I cycle in the winter as well, and I told him I do, though riding in snow storms like the one big one last winter were pretty tough. Chaz said that he draws the line at winter riding.
Scott was playing a Willie P. Bennett disc called “Blackie and the Rodeo King” that he’d brought in over the system. The album later inspired a band called “Blackie and the Rodeo Kings”. Scott said that the song is about two Gay native men, but that sure can’t be discerned from the lyrics.
A good friend of mine who died back in the 90s was married to an ex-girlfriend of Bennett. Mike liked Bennett’s music and gave me a cassette years ago. Nothing grabbed me from that, nor was I impressed all that much with what I heard that night. Some of it sounded a lot like early Bruce Cockburn, though it wasn’t as lyrically innovative or as musically interesting as that of Cockburn. Scott Bradshaw though seemed like he was in ecstasy and couldn’t say enough good things about Willie P. Bennett.
Scott kicked off the night with a cover of “Lace and Pretty Flowers”, the same Willie P. Bennett song he’d sung two weeks before. The song has kind of a “money can’t buy love message.” In the middle of the song he said that he should be playing harmonica at this point, or have a sideman, but he said he didn’t have the money. Ironic that the song claims that things won’t buy love but the singer claims that they do buy the artistically collaborative equivalent.
Of his second offering, Scott said that it was a cryptic type song that would be a good lead in for Erik Sedore – “… What I got is not enough for Saturday … Wait till Sunday comes, maybe I’ll have a little fun …”
When Erik Sedore sat in front of the mic, he declared, “It’s my turn so I can do whatever I want!” He said that he wanted to do two covers because they are very lyrical and he wanted to do them while he had the lyrics in his head. He started with Joni Mitchell’s “Hajira” – “ … I'm sitting in some café, a defector from the petty wars that shell shock love away, there's comfort in melancholy … In our possessive coupling so much could not be expressed, so now I'm returning to myself these things that you and I suppressed … Strains of Miles Davis coming through the snow and the pinewood trees …” It’s interesting that Erik said “Miles Davis” when Joni said “Benny Goodman”. They are two very different types of Jazz music. Also Erik said 27 years instead of Joni’s 30 years, I guess as a way of taking possession of the song.
Erik’s second cover was of Mark Kozelek’s “Carissa” – “ … Carissa burned to death last night in a freak accident fire in her yard in Brewster. Her daughter came home from a party and found her … An aerosol can blew up in the trash. Goddamn, what were the odds? … She vanished up in flames … Everyone's grieving, out of their minds, making arrangements and taking drugs. But I'm flying out there tomorrow because I need to give and get some hugs … Carissa was thirty-five. You don’t just raise two kids and take out the trash and die …”
The song is interesting because it’s a heartfelt reaction to a real occurrence, but it doesn’t have much of a melody. I double checked with the original recording by Sun Kil Moon just to be sure it wasn’t just the way Erik played it, but it wasn’t. Erik did the song justice, but the song just isn’t musically very interesting. It’s just a long talking song with some good guitar picking to help it along, but I think that Erik writes some better songs than this one.
When Erik was finished, he said, “I wanted to play these somewhere once.
Scott told him that his songs were very cinematic. Erik dismissed his statement by reminding him that he’d done covers, but I think Scott was responding to all he’d heard of Erik’s oeuvre on some Monday nights over this summer.
The next performer was Lailien, who sang two original songs with a high voice while accompanying himself on the piano. The first was called “Blue Love” – “ … ghostly tide sucked down slowly through a silent night …” His second song was entitled “Why the Flowers” – I wrote a song for you, I’ll sing it from the moon …”
Then came John P, accompanied by Chaz on the electric steel guitar. On his way to the stage, as John was passing my table, he greeted me and said, “It’s just us diehards tonight. At that time there were only six of us there besides Sarah and Scott. Both John and Chaz had high praise for Scott’s sound mixing. John did his calendar style folk song, which he said was slightly influenced by Paul Simon’s “April Come She Will” and Roger McGuinn’s “The Ballad of Easy Rider” – “ … December, she said she’d never come back, feel free to give my stuff away …”
John said that his next offering was kind of like a Lou Reed thing – “ … I called up the operator, I said, use a GPS, can you locate her? Don’t tell me it can’t be done. I just finished reading Bill C-51 …” I think that this kind of cultural reference is a big mistake in song writing, because it gives one’s song a shorter shelf life, because in a few years no one will remember what Bill C-51 was. And then later on he says – “ … You were drinking coffee with a Cheshire cat, you said this guy really knows where it’s at.” The rhyming of “cat” with “where it’s at” was already done by Bob Dylan in “Like A Rolling Stone” and I think it’s too distinctive to justifyably copy.
I’ve noticed this tendency before of John to lift phrases from classic songs. He did for instance in his song “Kaleidoscope Eyes”, which gets it’s title from a repeated phrase in John Lennon’s “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds”.
After John, Anthony was called to the stage, but he wasn’t in the room. He was outside having a conversation with someone about folk music. Scott went out to get him, but when he did come in he went into the wrong room. Cad came in and it turns out that he was the one Anthony had been talking to. Cad has always claimed to hate folk music.
When Anthony finally arrived he performed two of the five original songs he’s sung every time I’ve heard him play over the last five years. He does them very well and with a lot of style, but it was hard to make out the words while he was busy being soulful. He told us, “Old man and woman I knew …. Both passed away in city shelters … one blue shoe and one green shoe …” And then from the song – “I’m thinkin’ back in the day … no need to stay … ooooh!” That’s all I could discern. Between songs he said, “God damn! The place I come from called ‘The Ramp’ … Little girl never got past the age of seven … she said, ‘Anthony, what’s gonna happen to me is always meant for me …’” From his second song – “ … You think you’re so pretty, and I just know that you’re pretty …” This is a very good song, and so are the few others he plays, but I guess these were written before he was stricken with whatever mental illness he has that keeps him either homeless or sometimes homeless and that keeps him from writing new songs.
Scott commented that it’s the end of the summer and we need a little drama.
Following Anthony was Chaz, who started with an improvisation that he called “Right Now”. The piece began with slow, gentle sliding that built in tempo until it became dancey and ended up softly crazy. For the second half of Chaz’s share of the open stage, he asked Scott and No MSG to join him on guitar and piano as he played some basic Blues. I think No MSG had trouble getting into the groove. He’s more comfortable improvising on his own.
I was next. I started with my translation of Serge Gainsbourg’s “Strip Tease”, but first gave a little background. That it was the title song from a film of the same name, and that it starred Nico. That Nico had recorded the song but that it was sung by Juliette Greco, who John Paul Sartre had dubbed “the muse of existentialism”. No MSG added that she had also been the lover of Miles Davis. That was true too. John asked who directed the film, but I didn’t remember at the time. The director was Jacques Poitrenaud. From my version of the title song – “Would you like me to strip tease for you? What fantasy shall I be for you? As time goes on, day after day, my illusions are peeled away, and every night the summer’s gone once more, as all my leaves are scattered on the floor. And all of this, for what, for who? Is it for him? Is it for you? If it’s for you I do this strip tease, I think you really need to tell me, if you are, just between us, a bit voyeur, a little thug? But all of these are just chimeras, from my mouth to my lower areas, because no one, not even you, will get to touch the parts they view …”
My second offering was my own “Recurring Vision of a Myopic Third Eye” – “ … Suicide Seven-Eleven, a delicious hemlock Slurpie, free fill-up with cremation, a drive-through death for the sick or depressed, it’s now a less neurotic nation …” I screwed up a lot on the chords, but it seemed to go over okay anyway.
Then Avesta was called to the stage, but he seemed to have left and so Scott moved down the list to Eric Sorenson, who did two of his own songs. The first was called “Home” – “Well you’re home now, you can shake out the dust, take a moment to do what you must …” Before his second song, Eric asked if someone had a capo he could borrow, and someone always does. I don’t bother with a capo because I think it helps me learn more chords. Eric played a song that he did the week before called “Your Grey Skies”, which he said is a love song to a rain cloud. During the instrumental he said it needed a harmonica but since there wasn’t one he whistled instead.
After Eric was Dennis, who has an, I think British accent. He strums and sings very forcefully while delivering a lot of heavy lyrics – “ … We also talked about how we perceive existence … no time, no space, no age, no limit … escaping memory … my eyes were equally wide … but one was blind.
Following Dennis was Sonja Seiler, who did her set from the piano and started with a brand new song called “Slow Burn” – “ … I don’t need to know what you think when you hear this … when it’s our turn we might just have the embers, but I’ll be happy to be tending these fires.” Sonja’s second choice was a cover of “I Can’t Make You Love Me” by Mike Reid and Allen Shamblin – “ … I'll close my eyes, then I won't see the love you don't feel when you're holding me …”
Sonja remained onstage to do backup vocals in the first song of Bryan’s set. He said he’d wanted her to also play piano but she said she was too nervous. The song was entitled, “Steer You Right”, and he sang it in his usual fake cowboy accent. Bryan’s second song was one that he said he’d done before but that he’s got to keep doing it till it comes out right. Scott gave an enthusiastic monosyllabic agreement to that. The song was called “Choppin Wood”, and “wood” and “fire” in the lyrics served as metaphors I guess for the internal substance one builds up and sparks with perhaps one’s spirit to fuel love – “ … Let my heart forever melt and give me a warmth I’ve never felt …” The song was fairly long and I think he overworked the metaphor all the way through, thus beating it over our heads.
Next came Karen, a middle aged woman with short grey hair. She plugged in her acoustic guitar and stood up. Besides me, everyone else had sat down that night. She began with a cover of Gordon Lightfoot’s Early Morning Rain” and she picked it well. The microphone sounded fuzzy though and when she was done I called out to Scott to point it out, and Karen agreed. He made some adjustments. Karen’s next offering was a slow folk blues song that she said she wrote in Winnipeg – “It’s windy at Portage and Main, I’m all by myself again, so what else is new? … Tomorrow night in some other town because Mister Right is nowhere to be found …”
Scott commented that she was obviously a professional Folk singer who’s been touring a lot. She added that she’d raised a couple of kids since all of that.
Cad offered the view that the microphone causes people to have a southern accent and that the reason I don’t have a southern accent when I sing is because I don’t use a microphone.
Then it was time for No MSG. After he had all the stage lights turned off, Scott asked him if the vocal mic was okay. No MSG answered, “Don’t worry, everything’s good! I got it under control!” As he began to play, he almost immediately started singing, in a high voice – “And I see, I see lolalalolove … hahaheehahoo … and I see … Oh, that one goes here … oh sorry, sorry … that one goes there … here it goes …” The air conditioning was cold on my bare legs. I looked my watch and it was already half an hour past midnight, with nine of us in the room besides Scott and Sarah. No MSG continued and he seemed to be spending longer on the piece than usual. When he stopped, he declared, “I took some chances on that one!”
I don’t think he had any idea that he’d played the equivalent of two songs already when he went into another one – “Okay, we’ve got one of my favourite keys … one of my particular favourite … so how do I get out of here and find myself and find peace? How can I do that in one take? Is it really possible? Maybe it will happen …” He stood to play the last of it – “Hey! Oh! Woho whoa … I gotta go home … thank you!”
After No MSG was David Saint B., who had long curly hair and a pair of very shiny beige pants. He started with what he said was a song that he wrote in university. He told us that it was his first song and it was inspired by his second girlfriend. The song was entitled “You Make Me” – “ … Why is it an effort to wanna call you … Why is my heart so unconvinced … It started as a love song but it didn’t start with you …” When he was done, Brock Simpson called out, “That could be a hit! Get on it!”
David’s second song was called “Weathervane Woman” and he said it was inspired by listening to Bruce Springsteen – “ … I’m a building man, I can’t spend my life searchin for a world that don’t end …”
Following David was Brock Simpson, who said he’d just returned from working as a counsellor at a summer camp. Someone asked the name of the camp and he responded, “Camp Indifference on the Lake of Nihilism. The counsellors were all children and the campers were bankers.” Brock told us that, inspired by the approaching election, he was going to sing the folk standard, “Aragon Mill” – “ … the only tune I hear is the sound of the wind as she blows through the town, weave and spin, weave and spin. There's no children playing in the dark narrow streets and the loom has shut down, it's so quiet I can't sleep …”
Brock’s second piece was “Indian Prayer”, which he said Richie Havens didn’t write but he didn’t know who did. It was Tom Pacheco. Each line begins with “As long” and ends with something that will always be, such as “the grass shall grow” The conclusion of each verse is “This land shall be Indian”.
When Brock was finished it was 1:00. Scott was outside smoking a cigarette. Sarah went to get him but he asked her to play a song and buy some time while he finished his smoke. She said that the cigarette he was smoking was literally very long.
Sarah sang a song about an affair – “ … You’re all mine in the midnight time but guilty in the morning light …”
She joked about how whenever Scott hears that Sarah Greene is hosting, he swoops in and steals the gig.
Scott closed down the open stage, or the “open wound”, as he said someone named Jay Clark calls it, with his song, “Down Where the Lights Come On”.
Scott said that he has a gig every fourth Saturday at the Tranzac. I said, that it’s Sarah Greene’s gig now. Sarah joked that that should be true.
As I rode along Bloor Street, I came up behind David Saint B. who was riding his bike with no hands and singing at the top of his lungs. He had a helmet on but I recognized his shiny pants.
On Brock Avenue, a flatbed truck was backing up it seemed to haul away the dead VW bus that was still there.
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