Fat Albert's Visits Cabbagetown

            On the evening of May 25^th, I arrived at the Steelworkers Hall at 25 Cecil Street, and saw Ruth Jenkins talking on her phone in the little garden in front of the Steelworkers Dental Office. When she saw me she said, “Christian! It’s cancelled!”

I joined her to find out what was going on. She was on the phone with Glen Garry, but she explained to me that management had booked the room we usually have and the room that tends to be our alternative and we couldn’t take the upstairs room because there were no chairs. Glen was suggesting that we all go over to the Cabbagetown Community Arts Centre. An alternative that Ruth and I discussed was the little park in which we were standing. There is a long, semi-circular mortared stone bench for seating and a couple of picnic tables off to the side under a tree. It would have been ideal for an outdoor show on such a warm evening. When Mary Milne arrived, she was “gobsmacked” over the cancellation. She agreed that an outdoor open stage would be a good alternative. A few more people arrived, such as Bob Allen, Andrea Hatala and Bridget. Glen called Ruth and asked to speak to Mary. He convinced her to go to the space at 422 Parliament, above where the Ben Wicks restaurant used to be. I decided that everything being tossed into Cabbagetown for a night might make for an interesting review, so I decided to go. It took me thirteen minutes to get there on my bike. I saw Glen arriving just as I was locking my bike, so I was the second one there, beating Bob Allen’s car and its passengers by ten minutes. I helped set up some folding chairs.

The Cabbagetown Community Arts Centre has been serving the community since 1979. They offer after school music programs for young people and Glen is one of the teachers, in addition to being on the board. This is why he gets to use the space gratis for a weekly jam that he holds there and why he was able to hold Fat Albert’s there in this emergency situation. He said that the only reason he doesn’t just move Fat Albert’s there for good is because the CCAC is right now only living at that address from month to month, with an uncertain future in terms of having a permanent home. Glen didn’t want to put too much into setting up until after 20:00 because there was a music lesson going on in one of the little rooms.

I had put myself on the list for number three, but somehow the first two people on the list hadn’t arrived yet. If they could sign in telekinetically then why couldn’t they play telekinetically? It’s a mystery! So Glen asked me to go first. I played before a small group, and perhaps because of that felt less stage fright about my guitar playing and made fewer mistakes than the time before.

I stood between the stage and the audience and sang “Time of Yeah Yeah Yeah”, which is my translation of Serge Gainsbourg’s “Le Temps Des Yoyos” – “ … Time of the yo-yo now has its epitaph, while the cradle rocks and rolls the time of yeah yeah yeah. Though all must change, I will never change, but in exchange, I’ll meet you halfway. Time of the yo-yo never wore a mask, but come incognito to play yeah yeah yeah.”

Then I did my song “Paranoiac Utopia” – “A painful shedding of skin today as Parkdale’s paranoiac armour has been circumcised, only later to be reattached with the brain tissue solder of airplane glue …”

After me was Bob Allen, with guitar help from Glen Gary and acoustic bass playing by Tom Daniels, who commented, “Fat Albert’s isn’t very fat tonight!”

Bob sang “North To Alaska” by Mike Phillips – “ … Sam crossed the majestic mountains to the valleys far below. He talked to his team of huskies as he mushed on through the snow with the northern lights running wild in the land of the midnight sun. Yes Sam McCord was a mighty man in the year 1901 …”

There were nine of us in the room when the song began, but more arrived before it was over, including Tom Hamilton, the violinist, who immediately joined Bob on stage to help him out on Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues”. Tom and Glen each got two solos distributed throughout the song and in the folds of the verses.

Then came Bridget, who like Bob, only got a vocal microphone. Glen didn’t bother on this emergency occasion with setting up a full sound system for performers. Because everything was quieter, Tom Hamilton pointed out before accompanying Bridget that he had attached a homemade mute to his fiddle so as not to overwhelm.

Bridget’s first original song was an ode to spring – “Like a baby coming out of its mother’s womb … the fragrances of joy that the springtime brings, it’s a beautiful thing … all the little birds are about to fly …”

Her second song was entitled, “So Alive” – “Oh honey do you love me like I love you, oh darling my poor heart is ravished over you … and that’s the only reason why I feel so alive … oh honey and you got me feeling so distraught … oh darling my poor heart is breaking over you … I feel so alive …” Now that’s a bi-polar song!

Next up was Brian Rosen, who started with “Something In The Water” by Brooke Fraser – “I wear a demeanour made of bright pretty things … There’s something in the water that makes me love you like I do … I’ve got halos made of summer …”

Brian finished his set with one of his favourites to sing, “Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms” by Thomas Moore.

Following Brian was Marianne Peck, with help from Glen and the two Toms. First though, Glen’s guitar was out of tune and he had a frustrating couple of minutes before he exclaimed, “I’d have a big career if not for this tuning bullshit!”

As she so often does, Marianne sang “Your Cheating Heart” by Hank Williams. She still reads the words when she sings, but I wonder if she really needs to. Everyone on stage sang along as well, and of course, accompanying Marianne is another opportunity for Glen and Tom to get solos.

Marianne’s second choice was “Could I Have This Dance” by Wayland Holyfield and Bob House. Everyone on stage joined in to sing the final chorus.

It was now time for this week’s featured performer, Lillian Kim. She was joined on piano by Peter James and by the rest of the Fat Albert’s stage regulars with their respective instruments. Glen also found a cable so Lillian could plug in her guitar.

Tom Hamilton mentioned, I don’t know why, that Gillian Anderson wants to be the next 007 as Jane Bond. That might be interesting, but then so would Pee Wee Herman be interesting as Bridget Jones.

When Lillian introduced her band, Peter James corrected her and insisted that his stage name for this gig was Tony Escobar.

She told us that her first song was about second chances – “Can I tell you that I need you … I did not mean to compromise you … Give me something to hang on to …”

Lillian told us she’d found a fledgling bird in the back yard and didn’t know what to do until she was told that it had fallen from a nest and that it’s parents would continue to bring it food until it learned to fly. I didn’t tell her that it might become cat food before that happens though.

Her next song was called “Bird With A Broken Wing” – “They say life isn’t fair, that we really shouldn’t care … I saw your name on a bus, so it made me think of us … how we fell from that blue sky and held each other that night … She’s a bird with a broken wing, you can hear it every time she sings …”

From “Summer Song” – “Midsummer afternoon when you stole my heart in two … I waited for you … I’m still waiting for you … You said a million things that made my heart just sing …

Then a song inspired by a Rumi story on soul mates. Lillian clarified that in this definition, anyone that changes your life is a soul mate – “I spent my whole life searching for what I didn’t know … all change is good…”

Lillian asked if anyone has had their heart smashed – “I watch the clock, it’s half past eight, twenty-four hours, I still wait … did you see me …”

From “Mistakes” – “I’ve made my mistakes, I’ve come so far … to get things to move, to get things to change … I move on back to living in a cage …”

Lillian’s final song had the title, “Wish You the Best” – “Looking at the sky from the corner of the street … The flutter’s still inside of me every time I hear your name … When you looked into my eyes, I knew that I was done …”

Lillian Kim’s songs have some good melodies and her voice carries them well. In every song though, she takes the length of a verse to sing out the melody non-verbally as a type of instrumental break with heartfelt, extended “ooh”s or “whoah”s. This would be okay on one or two songs, but to do it every time gets a little tired. Her lyrics tend toward romantic clichés of heartbreak that aren’t very artfully composed and so they are the weakest part of her song writing.

The first performer after the feature was Peter James and he was joined on stage by the two Toms. Tom Daniels though was reluctant to accompany Peter because he knew that he would probably be improvising on the piano and that it would be very difficult to lay down any bass for his noodling. Tom Hamilton, however, dismissed Tom Daniels’s misgivings and encouraged him to sit in.

On Peter’s second improvisation, bass-Tom gave up on playing, while fiddle-Tom was enjoying the chance to play along.

My mind drifted while Peter was playing to the next time I perform at Fat Albert’s to a larger crowd and whether or not I should try using the microphone for “Paranoiac Utopia”. The thought came to me that for me to amplify myself to cover up the fact that people aren’t paying attention is like a singer wearing cologne because the audience hasn’t taken a bath.

Next was Glen Gary, with Tom Daniels and Tom Hamilton.

Glen’s first choice was the Jimmy McHugh and Dorothy Fields song, “On The Sunny Side Of The Street” – “ … I used to walk in the shade with my blues on parade …” Tom Hamilton sang harmony.

Then Glen played T-Bone Walker’s “Stormy Monday”. At one point in the middle, Glen sang “Gotta get that harmonica up here right now!” Ruth Jenkins joined him on stage. Later in the song, Tom Hamilton took a solo that made everyone applaud.

When it was over, Tom Hamilton wanted to make sure that everyone knew that it was T-Bone Walker who wrote the song.

After Glen was Ruth Jenkins and so everyone that was already on stage stayed there.

Ruth began with Ian Tyson’s “Someday Soon” – “ … My parents cannot stand him because he rides the rodeo, my father says that he will leave me crying … and when he comes to call my pa aint got a good word to say, guess it’s cause he was just as wild in his younger day … He loves his damned old rodeo as much as he loves me …”

Ruth’s second offering was “Autumn Leaves”, which is Johnny Mercer’s adaptation of the Jacques Prevert and Joseph Kozma song “Les Feuilles Mortes”.

The second to last performer of the night was Wendy Chairnstrom, who started with Paul Simon’s “59^th Street Bridge Song” – “ … Got no deeds to do, no promises to keep, I’m dappled and drowsy and ready to sleep, let the morning time drop all its petals on me, life I love you, all is groovy!”

Wendy chose to just read the lyrics to the second piece she did. Maybe she hadn’t learned to play Joni Mitchell’s “cactus Tree” yet – “ … He has heard her off to starboard in the breaking and the breathing of the water weeds while she was busy being free … She has brought them to her senses, they have laughed inside her laughter, now she rallies her defences for she fears that one will ask her for eternity … Her heart is full and hollow like a cactus tree …”

The grand finale of the night was a performance by Honey Novick.  She told us that when she was a teenager she’d heard Merle Haggard’s “Okie From Muskogee” and she thought it was a horrible song. Later though she heard something beautiful by the same man. Then she sang, “Nobody’s Darling But Mine”, which Merle Haggard had recorded, but which he did not write. It was written by Jimmie Davis.

Then, with Tom Hamilton’s violin playing along, Honey sang her annual rendition of George and Ira Gershwin’s “Summertime”. When she got to the last verse, she stepped back from the microphone and belted it out. Then she scatted the melody for the length of a verse and sang the final verse again.

When she came over to say hello to me I told her that I’ve always thought that the lyrics to “Summertime” should be sung to the tune of “Danny Boy”. She looked at me like I was strange and said “oh … kay” the way we do when someone has said something absurd. But I was serious. Switching the two songs actually sounds good.

            I left Cabbagetown and actually got home more than an hour earlier than I usually do after a night at Fat Albert’s.