Gaye Bikers On Acid Trashateria, Guelph Ontario: 1988 I have a home-made cassette of Drill Your Own Hole. I have no idea where I got it from. But it's good driving music. Gaye Bikers were one of the greebo bands that came out of England around the same time as Zodiac Mindwarp and early Cult. As usual, most of this stuff didn't really leak across the Atlantic, so I was very surprised to show up at the venue and find out that the place was actually pretty packed. To be honest, I wouldn't be surprised if their name had something to do with it. They put on a great show, sweaty and raucous as a good greebo band should be, and the audience bounced around like wild things. However, it sounded absolutely nothing like the casette I had. To the point of wondering if it was mislabelled. So it turned out that a friend of mine who was at the show started talking to some of the band members over the merchandise tables. And they discovered that they are from the same part of England that he is. So there was much hanging out and drinking and at least one photograph taken of the band with the friend where everybody had their finger up their nose. They kept in touch afterwards and he hooked up with a couple of them on his next visit home to England. So it was through him that I heard that the album had been re-recorded by the record company and that even the band didn't recognize it upon it's release. I still have the cassette. Genitorturers Toronto, Ontario: 1993 I'm not entirely sure about the details of this show. I remember it as having been at Lee's Palace, but it's possible it was at the Opera House. I also can't find any reference to the date, so I'm pretty much guessing. I went to see the band because of course they had a gimmick and there had been some buzz about them. It was in the very early days of kink and fetish events, and I was amused at just how many people I knew who were there. Of course since they were all busted anyway, we ended up having a lot more conversations about their interests on other occasions and it was all very hush-hush and closeted. Now there are fetish nights every day of the freakin' week, at least if your fetish is wearing PVC and going to goth clubs. I thought the band was fun but not musically interesting enough to have been successful without the gimmick. Gen was also singing in an intentional gravel-voice that made me wince, I could see her having nodes by the end of the night. They did do a cover of Ace of Spades during the encore, however, so I gave them cool points for that. George Clinton Concert Hall, Toronto Ontario: 1991? Lollapalooza Barrie, Ontario: July 28 1994 I know it was the early 90's when I first saw this guy on stage. What an enormous production - it seemed like there was a ton of people up there all doing their thing. It was creative, impressive, theatrical and completely entertaining. I was completely fascinated and blown away. The Mighty Mighty Bosstones opened for the Concert Hall show. Not really my thing, but the rest of the audience seemed to be getting into it. The Lollapalooza gig was a harder sell, probably because all the chaos on stage had a harder time competing with the chaos off-stage, especially when they were half a mile away. It was still great though. What can I say? George Clinton is God. George Thoroughgood and the Destroyers Ted Reeves Arena, Toronto Ontario: 198? I think this was around 1983 or so. Ted Reeves Arena is a hockey rink/community centre in the east end of Toronto where I grew up. I'm not sure why I decided to go to this gig. I think an early interest in blues and rockabilly was just starting to form. Anyway, they had thrown up a stage on one end of the room and sold the show as general admission. It ended up being a really good show, with lots of energy. Thoroughgood bounces around the stage and just looks like he's having an absolute blast playing. I don't care what kind of music you play, having fun is going to make a really good impression. The opening band was an act called The Bopcats. When I mentioned their name to a friend of mine, she dismissed them as a "really band punk band". I dunno what band she had seen, because these guys turned out to be a really boppy rockabilly act. Go figure. God Module Saturnalia IV, Chicago IL: December 15 2002 This is one of those shows where I don't actually remember the headliner all that well. Blame the all-you-can drink ticket price. By the time the third band hit the stage, I was staggering around like a new-born camel. But I was the very soul of sobriety compared to Axel. He was pounding back the cheap red wine like it was beer. By the end of the night he was spilling as much as he drank, tripping on the stairs, getting into slurred debates with total strangers, bumping into everybody on the dancefloor and snogging half the girls in the place. Getting him home was an exercise in not getting him killed - he kept following me into the street when I was trying to hail a cab, careening off poles, cars, and my elbow, while insisting that he was just fine every time I grabbed him and tried to convince him he was safer on the sidewalk. On the way back to the place we were staying, he passed out cold and had to be hauled bodily up the stairs. The lineup for the show that year consisted of Rachael’s Surendne, Audra, Claire Voyant, Passion Play and the headliners God Module Goteki Catalyst Festival Toronto, Ontario: August 30 2003 Whitby Gothic Weekend, UK: November 2003 Convergence X Chicago, IL: May 7 2004 Disclaimer: I don't like bleepy music much. But I really like these guys. They are funny and artful and melodic. Their music makes you bounce. They are very good at what they do, and their live shows are entertaining and fun as hell, which is pretty much the opposite of most electronic shows. Seriously, check them out. You'll be glad you did. The Grapes of Wrath University of Guelph, Guelph ON: 1985? These guys were really popular Canadian band at some point in the 80's. Shortly before they hit it big they were touring across the country hitting all the Universities. At that point UofG was hosting afternoon concerts on Fridays. I happened to have a free period around that time so on a few occasions I would wander downstairs to the room where they were hosted. It was a weird affair, a mid-day concert in a room with no actual stage, just a small PA and rows of hard metal high-school-gymnasium folding chairs. The Grapes of Wrath is the only one of those free concerts that I actually remember, probably because they were the only band that ever went anywhere afterwards. Their big hit single hit the radio just a few months later. They have a folky kind of pop and I remember their video as having lots of slow-motion segments in it. As performers they were very professional and decently enthusiastic about what must have been a very odd gig - I recall them gently trying to get some audience interaction going which isn't too easy with a bunch of people eating sandwiches on their lunch break. The Grateful Dead Kingswood Music Theatre, Maple Ontario: June 21 1984 Rubber Bowl, Akron Ohio: July 2 1986 Copps Colliseum, Hamilton Ontario: March 21 1992 Yes, I have seen the Grateful Dead. More than once, even. See, I've known a lot of hippies in my life. A lot of hippies. In fact, back before all it seemed like all pagans were goths, it seemed like pretty much all pagans were also hippies. So when the Grateful Dead came to Canada after some rediculous length of time we went to see them play. Now the Kingswood is an outdoor music venue in an amusement park called Canada's Wonderland. I don't like the place much, it's too family oriented -- one of those Disney-style places where they regiment where you walk and try to be all clean and orderly. Give me a dirty loud ol' carny-style place any day. And on this particular day, it was full of hippies. Like real ones, who spent the previous 10 years wandering around in a bus with a couple of goats and a mushroom farm in the back. The kind that think "Don't Walk On The Grass" signs are a cute anachronism, and that the logical thing to do when faced with a fountain is to do a whole bunch of acid and then go wading in it. And there were hundreds of them. And it was utter chaos, and I thought it was hilarious. And of course, we scored ourselves some really good drugs and I thought it was even more hilarious. So I had a good time even though I could never figure out when one song ended and the next one began. (Maybe they didn't.) The second time was with one of the same friends - they were touring with Bob Dylan and Tom Petty and he really wanted to go see them. Since this involved a road trip and some camping I said sure, let's do it. So we did. The trip included picking up a hitchiker who brought us to the Rainbow Gathering, and a whole bunch more hippies. I really enjoyed Bob Dylan and although Tom Petty's recorded stuff doesn't do much for me I thought he was an excellent performer. The Grateful Dead, of course, kinda confused me, but I had a lot of fun anyway. Well, until I got rained on, and then I got cranky, but up to then it was good The third time was with the evil ex. Everybody in his house was going, and there were a bunch of people coming up from the states and there was going to be a big afterparty, did I want to go too. This time it was obvious that the appeal was kind of gone. The party was fun, and it was a hoot wandering around and watching the spontaneous drum circles breaking out in the hallways. But by this point I was going to a lot of pagan festivals, so the novelty of the audience had pretty much worn off. I'd pretty much given up all my recreational chemistry except for alcohol, and they don't really play boozer music. And since I was there with the evil ex, the company wasn't as nearly good. But it was kinda fun and I got to hang out with a bunch of Deadheads after the show and they're always an interesting time. But I knew I probably was going to take a pass on it the next time they rolled into town. And that's my story about how I ended up seeing the Grateful Dead in concert three times. The Gutter Demons Silver Dollar Room, Toronto Ontario: November 14 2003 El Mocambo, Toronto Ontario: March 18 2006 Hard, crunchy, psychobilly goodness. Not that wussy alt-country crap, but almost punk in their speed and energy. They fit right into any punk lineup and give the rest of the acts something to live up to. The first time I saw these guys was, I think, the first time they played Toronto. Silver Dollar holds about 120 people crammed, and they had a turnout of about 60. They were an enthusiastic crowd though, with a small but extremetly energetic group of guys slamming in front of the stage. They are a trio - drummer, guitarist/singer and upright bass. Holy crap do they play hard. The drummer beats his skins with all his strength and the bass player spanks the strings. They did about a 45 minute set, and I would have expected them to be exhausted at the end of it. They play hard, fast, loud and fast. Did I mention fast? They are all skinny little teenagers, and from the sound of the singer's voice I half expect him to be huge black man. Their encore included a hard-ass cover of Tainted Love that made me come close to actually liking the song. The second time was after they had been back to Toronto af few times and had managed to build up a bit of a following. They were there with a line-up of local bands taht seemed to have brought out everybody they had ever met in their life, the venue was packed. I walked in the door and some guy was screeching his head off over clanging guitars. It turned out to be Secret Handshake. They do kind of a west coast hardcore thing, but to be honest I didn't think they were pulling it off. And maybe I'm just getting old, but yelling "Fuck you" from the stage no longer feels like the act of rebellion that it once did. Second up was The Creepshow, who do a more standard psychobilly. They have a pretty catchy sound and they obviously went over really well with the audience. Next up was The Threat, another punk band. They weren't bad at all, but by this point I was impatient for The Gutter Demons to hit the stage. And "hit" is a petty good description of what they did. By the end of the first song both band and audience were drenched and there was an energetic mosh pit going on in front of the stage. I danced and jumped until my lungs fell out. They are definitely a show worth seeing.
Last Updated September 16 2007.
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