BLOG-O-RAMAS

A friend of mine, Richard B. speaks of public transit as if it’ll be ground zero of an inevitable zombie outbreak. Everyday I begin to believe he may be closer to the truth than I want to admit. I find myself taking in more of the gruesome details that I must have blocked out in the past. Or are transiters getting more gruesome on their own? Last week, I watched a man on the subway platform empty his nose into a garbage can using the open air-single nostril technique. This is where you use your index finger to block one nostril as you blow like burning hell through the other one. Effective, but repulsive to witness. Well, this man gave quite the show as he cleared out each nostril, but had to stem the flow of snot as it clung to his nose for dear life. He pinched it with his index finger and thumb. Great technique… no, wait, he didn’t even clean his hands, not even on his coat, Gawd!!!!

A common one these days is the open air cough. Or the no-block hack. It’s a simple way to live, just cough in whatever direction your body is pointing. It’s almost as if the hacker is clearing a path through some imaginary clutter or snow bank. Like they’re picturing each cough to be a burst of flame making their journey that much smoother as they trudge through a charred, but open landscape. Meanwhile, they’re releasing the particles of their sickness into the very air we (I) breathe, setting them on their way towards the light and into my friggin’ lungs, a—–e!

This weekend we picked up the torch on the Hear, Comes The Cavalry (HCTC) sessions. I was happy to see and hear that they were much healthier. Especially as I’m developing an acute case of germaphobia.

Finished Atonement and moved on to reading another depressing book, The Cellist Of Sarajevo. Can’t seem to stop. Stop picking downer books, I mean.

My toe still throbs with a dull pain and my toe nail is slowly going black, but there are so many things to be thankful for… my life, for instance. Yesterday, I rented a car to bring some of the gear for Bri-ann Swan’s CD release show. Picked up the rental, loaded in the gear, drove home to send off files to Nicole Christian for her grant application, loaded more gear from home and then picked up the star of the show. And that’s when everything went so wrong. Within 10 minutes we found ourselves stuck at a light, the car at a stand still, smoke pouring out from under the hood as I tried to coax it to move forward. With a street car quickly approaching from behind I asked Bri-anne to take the wheel as I pushed the car out of the way.

“What do I do?”

“Huh?”

“I mean, I’ve never driven before”

Of course not. Mere machines are no match to Bri-anne’s psychic energy. Drew Barrymore in Firestarter? Nothing on our Swan.

But it could have happened to anyone, you say. Let me tell you, this is our second show I’m relating to you, but the first, the Friday previous, was threatened by the same forces of nature (a certain woman’s) that crushed the will of yesterday’s rental. Last Friday, I rented a passenger van to haul the gear and the band (minus our fearless – or rather fear inducing leader). Where was Bri-anne? Well, I received a call while loading up the vehicle. She was calling from somewhere downtown, the Go bus had succumbed to an early death and left Ms. Swan and the rest of the passengers on the roadside waiting until the replacement bus could come. We narrowly escaped finding ourselves thumbing our way to Hamilton.

Let me remind you that it was at a rehearsal for these very shows that I had a Pianet fall on my big toe. Coincidence? I’ll let you be the judge.

So I could tell you that despite missing our sound check at the Supermarket yesterday, Bri-anne Swan sang a lovely set of songs. Her voice was in fine form. Maybe it (her voice) feeds off the destruction of mechanical devices, I don’t know, but all I could do was make the sign of the cross and count my blessings.

Great opening set from Kirsten Jones, too. Whose performance was almost canceled due to sickness.

www.myspace.com/bri-anneswan

On a lighter note, Stop Drop will also be releasing their CD this week – Friday at The Reverb.

Out on Winterbeard Records. Who are those guys?

This week I’m tending to the remixing of Crookedhook’s EP. Why? Because I want to make the world a better place.

Last night I picked up Blindness (the book) and starting reading. Hey, it’s by a Portuguese guy, great, I’ll read it on the way to work. All fine until I tried to find it this morning. I shook my fist in the air and cursed K. when I realized she had taken it with her. My foray into reading something light and frothy has been pretty much bust so I decided to dive in with Blindness, full of despair and … darkness, as you can imagine. Tonight, I’ll try hiding it on her so I can sneak out with it in the morning.

“mitch…mitch…” she’ll whisper as she shakes me awake trying not to disturb A., “have you seen my book?”

“wha– uh… no, what book is that? hey, what time is it…” and so on.

Soooo, what DID you read this morning, Mitch? The Long and McQuade’s catalogue. Came in the mail today. It’s a light form of torture. Everything appears as something you would want, so I made a mental list of all the things I was going to purchase. By the time I got on the subway I had crumpled up the list and tossed it somewhere into that part of the brain that I don’t use. It’s vast. Hell, I’ll never access it there unless I get a brain injury or sleep on my left side for too long, in which case, I may be found mumbling a list of crappy microphones and their made-in-china prices while drooling into my warm cereal one morning while a lovely, but under paid nurse will be wiping my chin and referring to me as Mister Geeroo. I can’t wait.

Monday was tricky because I was out playing at a songwriter’s round (the night before) which had the bonus offer of free drinks. As I am without a car and I had to scrape the inside of my cranium to croak out what lyrics I never memorized in the first place, I decided to take full advantage of the beverages. I was drunk before I finished the first one. And happy. It had felt like a hard weekend following a tough week, I deserved it, right? By the end of the night I was able to stumble onto the transit with amp and bass in hand(s) and make what must have been the final subway train. I was “happy” enough to have handled the Vomit Comet if necessary, but I was relieved to make that train. On it, a couple was tearing through a McDonald’s meal, occasionally, the guy hugged his girlfriend (I’m assuming) and smothered her with kisses while she clumsily brushed him off preferring the crispy fries instead. I think they must have been a little drunk, too, or very pre-occupied because it took quite a while until they noticed me staring at them. They looked up in surprise to see my expression of absolute disgust. I sometimes can make faces that people interpret as judging, critical or something just this side of unpleasant, but at this point in time, I was indeed giving them the “how pathetic” stare, like I could smell their scent and found it quite unpleasant. After a bit, the guy returned to his fondling and she to her digging in. 

I’m sure they satisfy each other in every way, but this was far from consoling when I had to navigate my Monday with a pulsing pain directly behind my eyes for 12 hours.

Yesterday, I started it off with a fresh hair cut from the barber across the street. I walked towards the shop from my side of the street. The barber, George, was standing there, leaning against the door. We nodded to each other and I entered. 

“Lovely weather we’re having, no?” says George as he brushed off a chair for me.

“Yes… very warm.”

“It’s great for watching the beautiful girls go by.”  George intimates this while selecting from a wide variety of razor sharp scissors.

“uh…sure”

“Lots of nice, big tits…”

“Hey, I work across the street from you…” and I deftly steer us into talk about the meat shop that used to be here where I’m typing from now. By the time my haircut was done, I was beginning to think that George must be an expert. I’m referring to breast watching, of course. He’s been here for 45 years. He must have developed quite the eye for mammaries. Of course, I’m not sure what he could do with that skill other than continue watching them go by and comparing them to 45 years worth of other breasts he’s ogled. Well, anyway, he seemed quite happy with the announcement, so I can only assume that he’s satisfied with this role. I’ll see what happens with the next hair cut.

Back to remixing.

Tonight I’ll be playing (lead) guitar for Prince Perry – perhaps for the last time. I’ve been mistaken before, but we’re now at the point when it’s time to pass on the Heavy Duty-duty to the next sucker. Having faked my way through playing lead (gitter) for the last several months I’m more than happy to shift my role to the more comfortable “behind the scenes” . That’s where the couch is, right?

We’ll be bouncing through Prince Perry’s repertoire tonight at Mitzi’s Sister around 10pm.  I’ll be crying at the bar all the way up until that magic moment, if you’re looking for me. No better way to celebrate the official release of the CD that we worked so hard to make. Wait. Did we work hard on that one? Whatever.

Bri-anne Swan’s CDs have come in with some room to spare before her release shows. More on that later.

Working on a few projects that are more indirectly related to recording. More on that later.

My arm pits? More on that later, too.

Checking out a studio today to look at as a potential location for the next Cavaliers recording – this is before I head straight to the bar to weep. I love looking at places that have more equipment than we do. It’s like window shopping in the Fall when all the brown jackets come out. Love the browns. Although I think this place will have less on the “brown”, more on the blinking lights. The Christmas tree effect is very important, I’ve been told.

Searching for a vacuum cleaner at the moment. Anyone thinking of getting rid of theirs, consider me, please. I’ve got plans, let me tell you.

More on that later.

Had a last minute opportunity to tag along with the Cavaliers to play percussion for their set at Fred Eaglesmith’s Festival in Aylmer, Ontario. Their drummer couldn’t make it so they toned down the sound and very luckily a friend (and a great – a real – percussionist), Dave Gould was there, too. I asked him to bring his Cajone and some other percussive surprises. The fire bell counted as such, and the band loved it. Dave and I smashed stuff while they played their more subdued set, giggling half the time as bangles flew off the tambourine and trying to guess what percussion to play as the next song would start. The result was a more intimate set of music from the Cavaliers allowing them to let the words and melody sit on top of the mix and a great opportunity to let the harmonies melt into the open air. Their penchant for cranking up their amps when when backed up by a full drum kit brings about a different experience, however, last night their approach reeled the audience in with little effort.

After the concert people scattered to the various campgrounds to begin playing music by firelight until 4am. Pariselli (Cavaliers) managed to wound himself by forceably removing the cork from a wine bottle. The result left a bloody right eye. He looked better by morning.

K. and I brought a tent that we hadn’t set up in 10 years. We didn’t have a chance to air it out as it was so last minute. You can imagine, it was something to breathe in when we set it up in the near dark. Turns out, I was never able to lie straight across it – or I’ve grown another foot in the past decade. I spent the evening in an awkward position, flipping over every so often to relieve the hip.

Woke up – semi rested and was greeted by a scheduled parade through the campgrounds led by Washboard Hank – a parade drum strapped to his back, ropes leading down to his feet, one to work the drum, one for the cymbal. He played The Flintstones Theme on banjo while leading a line of children and their stunned parents like he was a junkyard Pied Piper.

Returning to the Slaughterhouse on Sunday to finish recording Stop Drop I found a voice mail asking if we sell pints of beef blood.

The answer is no.

Here’s Bjork in a bell dress. Of course.