(I got the idea for this series while sifting through the ‘piles’ of digital photos on my laptop. It occurred to me to share some of these great pics from some of my favourite concert sets from time to time. Until I get around to the next one, I invite you to peruse my ever-growing list of concerts page.)
My Son The Hurricane live at Bluesfest 2023
Artist: My Son The Hurricane When: July 12th, 2023 Where: SiriusXM stage, Ottawa Bluesfest, Lebreton Flats Park, Ottawa Context: So we’re exactly two weeks away from the first night of this year’s edition of Ottawa Bluesfest. For the longest time, I was debating whether or not to attend due to being initially underwhelmed by the lineup. But this, I realized, was truly due to the previous year being much more aligned to my own personal taste. In the end, I broke down and got a full festival pass, partially* because of sets like the one I am featuring today. I had never heard of Niagara, Ontario’s My Son The Hurricane before wandering over to the SiriusXM stage early on in the evening but it wasn’t long at all before I was caught up in their energy, right along with the rest of the crowd. Theirs was a mad mix of Mighty Mighty Bosstone ska punk, Jane’s Addiction cali surf rock, old school Chili Peppers gnarly funk, and whatever you call the racket that Rage and the Machine gets up to. They have a dozen or so members that make up a big sound, all contributing to a musical message of change, acceptance, and love. A set I’ll not soon forget, to be sure. Point of reference song: “Mr Holland’s locust”
Sylvie Kindree on vocalsChris Darling, Fraser Gauthier, and Alyssa ShanghamChris Sipos on guitarCooper Hannahson adding some beatsAshlee Standish on the keysRaphaël Désilets with his trumpetSylvie flirting with AlyssaRaphaël Désilets, Lisa Gudgeon, Chris Sipos, Victoria Cox, and Danno O’shea representing the bannerSylvie, Cooper, Justin, and CraigVictoria Cox on the baritone saxEquality!
*But also because I love live music and finally decided there were more than enough sets that I wanted to see to make the pass worth the money.
I’ve already written on these pages about how I got a job at my small town’s 7-Eleven in the spring of 1993 and how working there was part of the reason why that summer was one of the best of my life. I worked as many shifts as I could that summer and many of them would be of the overnight kind and I often found myself work with either Tori, Heather, or Michelle, the other new employees at store. I always had a blast on these shifts because these three young women were close to me in age and like me, they loved to have a laugh.
It was on one of these midnight shifts that I first heard this song on CFNY, the radio station to which we always had it tuned. It was this swirling, rocking number that mixed horns with racing guitars and a bopping, staccato rhythm and the vocalist rapped and spoke and shouted in a deep and dark voice. It always got my head bouncing and my feet tapping as I counted the bags of chips and packs of gum during our evening inventory counts. The problem was that I always seemed to be away from the radio, serving a customer or in the back, stocking the milk shelves, when the radio announcer came on to supply us with the name of the song and who it was that sung it. It got to the point where it became an ongoing joke: we would dance frantically around the empty store when the song came on and then laugh hysterically when we realized that we once again missed the 5 Ws. It was like the musical version of the Polkaroo*.
Finally, during one night shift right at the end of summer, I came out from the back after changing the syrup for one of the slurpee machines and Michelle excitedly put a slip of paper in my hands with the biggest smile on her face. She had scrawled on the paper in big looping script the words “Someday I suppose. The Mighty Mighty Bosstones.” I knew exactly what the words meant immediately and if I wasn’t so shy and awkward at the time, I would’ve given her a big hug.
Starting pretty much the very next day, the search was on. I went to our town’s only music store and didn’t find anything by the band. A few days later, I joined my parents on a shopping trip to the Oshawa Centre and hit the chain music stores (HMV, Sunrise, and Sam the Record Man) and likewise came up empty. Finally, I planned a solo trip back in to Oshawa to hit some of the independent stores downtown, specifically, the renowned Star Records**, and there found a copy of the Bosstones’ third album, “Don’t know how to party”, on CD. This album, along with Spirit of the West’s “Faithlift”, might have been the two CDs I listened to the most that fall, both for very different moods and reasons.
“Don’t know how to party” is really a misnomer because it really does party and it parties hard, especially track four of twelve. The song that introduced me to the band on all those midnight shifts is still my favourite by the Boston-based octet. “Someday I suppose” riffs hard on the ska punk theme, a pogo with a chainsaw, a plaid suit jacket with the arms ripped off and the tie tied around the head, Rambo-style. It’s an explosion of good vibes, of not giving a shit, of living in the moment and putting off the heavy lifting and the heavy thoughts for later.
“There was a verse
That I was gonna write
I haven’t yet
But there’s still a chance I might
An open book
That I still wanna close
I’ll find the time
Someday I suppose”
The horns, the bassline, Dicky Barrett roaring, and the image of Ben Carr hopping around like a man possessed. It all just makes me smile.
*Those who know, know.
**I’ve already written words about this trip and this particular store when I posted about Primus’s “My name is mud” for this very same list and series.
For the rest of the Best tunes of 1993 list, click here.
(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)
Artist: The Clash Album Title: London calling Year released: 1979 Year reissued: 2013 Details: 2 x180 gram
The skinny: As part of my efforts to increase my presence on my own Instagram page, I’ve created a few series that I’ve been trying to maintain on a regular basis. One of these is my Wednesday album cover collages, where, every week, I choose a theme upon which to gather a handful of album covers all in one shot. This past Wednesday, the theme was “Iconic” and of course, this very album cover was included in the photo. You can’t get much more iconic than what is arguably the best album by “the only band that matters”. Released in England in 1979, and in 1980 across the pond in the US, “London calling” was The Clash’s third studio LP. The double album includes many of the band’s most popular tunes – from the famous hidden track, “Train in vain”, to the Paul Simonon sung, “Guns of Brixton”, from the fun “Lost in the supermarket” to the anthemic title track. The reissue I purchased at one of my favourite locals, early on in my collecting days, just happens to be remastered and pressed to two 180 grams discs. But you can’t really go wrong here because it’s punk. The sound is secondary to Strummer’s messages and the band’s thunderous energy.
My (life in) music lists 