The Squamidian Report – May 27 / 06
Issue #208
Also in this issue:
The Ontarion
Hi All,
In last week’s Squamidian, Greg was talking about the bands he saw way back when. The late 60’s certainly had some great music and great bands. Then as the 70’s led into the 80’s, music seemed to go down the toilet. Even county music went sour, with what they called ‘new country’ taking over. And that stuff sucked big time. As a bit of an ‘in’ joke, Greg mentioned Whiskey Sam, the band I was in. His time frame was a bit out. We were together during the late 70’s and early to mid 80’s, draw your own conclusions. We played a mix of old country, folk, bluegrass and 50’s rock. Our sound was mostly acoustic with a lot of 3-part harmony. I think that set us apart from most of the hotel bands of that era. It also limited us to small, fairly easy going places.
We played the local rural hotels in and around the Waterloo Region area. Some of those placed were not all that great to be in, others were fairly nice. One of the ugly things about playing in hotels in those days was the smoke from people smoking. There were nights I’d come home and strip down to my unmentionables outside before coming in because my cloths and me stunk so badly. And being allergic to the stuff sure didn’t help.
We had started out as a duet, Joe and I. I’ll use first names only to protect the innocent. There wasn’t a whole lot of commercial sale ability in a folk duo so we brought in Alex, an incredibly good lead guitar player who was also incredibly intelligent and incredibly shy. It would take a lot of effort to get him to enter into a conversation but once he got started you could see how smart that guy was. In fact, while he was working at menial jobs at that time, he had a doctorate in nuclear physics. So that made us a trio doing 3-part harmony. Our sale ability went up but we still needed a drummer for that beat that listeners seemed to want. We found Jerry, who had been in a 50’s rock band and was looking for something that would let him have more ‘at home’ time. The chemistry worked and we grew to be quite popular on the hotel circuit. We would never rise above being just a small time weekend band but we had a lot of fun.
As all band do, we split up in the end. Alex decided to go back to school and the person who replace him played a completely different style of music. Joe liked that direction but I didn’t. Personalities started to clash and we ended up going our separate ways. For a year or so after that I played in another 4 piece band called ‘Some People’s Children’ that include Nova Scotia Sus, and her friend and Squamidian reader Sue in Cambridge. We had a nice sound but our lives all drifted in different directions. Didn’t play much for a long time after that. Then, just a year before moving to the west coast I ran into a woman that I’d played with (musically) when I was in my teens. Her mother and my uncle had had a small country band up in the Arthur, Mt Forrest, Shelburne area. I ended up playing mandolin in her country / bluegrass band. Since moving to the coast, I’ve been playing with Wild Wood Warren and our sound is as good if not better than it was in any of the bands I was in. Perhaps age has mellowed us or maybe my hearing has deteriorated but I think we sound pretty good. In fact, I invite any one of you to come on out and join in one of our jam sessions.
In the folk duet setup, I played 12-string guitar. In the trio I switched to playing base to add some drive to our sound, as well as some 4-string banjo. When we became a 4-piece band I traded the banjo for the mandolin. The music Warren and I do incorporates the mandolin, and we have added the base just recently. Warren plays a 12-string as well as a mean harmonica. That base guitar had sat in the back of the closet for years, totally forgotten about. Then after dislocating my shoulder and doing some muscle damage to the arm last November, I discovered that I couldn’t get my arm over my 6-string Ovation. I could, with some difficulty get my arm over my mandolin because it’s body is only a couple of inches deep. So on a whim I tried holding the base as it is a solid body, only an inch or so deep. That worked and we have incorporated it into our mountain music sound, having a lot of fun doing so. So it turns out there was a silver lining in that dislocated arm cloud. Go figure! And thanks for awakening the memories Greg, Some of that stuff I haven’t thought about in years.
*
Sue had to turn in her laptop computer. As an auditor she lived with the thing 24 hours a day and couldn’t get along without it, but it belonged to Audit and now she is in a branch. So now she is without one and feeling a bit lost. There are some ‘on line’ courses she needs to take and she has no way of going on line or checking personal Email now. So I went out and bought us a new laptop. I won’t say what make or model as that will just get every one telling me I should have bought this or that make or model. Anyway, it has one of those wide 15.4 screens with that new bright finish, a gig of ram, a high end mobile processor, graphics card, SATA hard drive, everything CD/DVD and so on. She will make good use of it once she gets it a week from now when she comes home for the weekend. I’ll make good use of it when I travel back home or need to take a computer with me somewhere. Heck, you always need a computer with you, don’t you?
I’ve spent most of my evenings this week setting it up, loading software, that kind of thing. Not a bad way to spend a few evenings. The only thing that bugs me is that you can’t just purchase laptop components and assemble the thing yourself. You have to buy some company’s idea of what you want, or what they want you to want. But at least there is a new toy to play with until Sue takes it up to Prince George after the next time she is home.
doug
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unoccupied
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Hello
everyone!
I’ll
start off by thanking Karin’s daughter Jen for all the internet sites regarding
the band “Dublin Corporation”. Unfortunately, none of the sites panned out for
me. They wouldn’t open directly from the e-mail that Karin forwarded but I did
manage to get a couple of them open by entering the address directly. The only
one that showed a direct reference to the band was no more than a list of 400
and some band names in alphabetical order. Unless the Dublin Corporation finds
out I’m looking for them it looks like they are a lost cause for me. It was
just a really good band that I thought would be interesting to check out the
history of. The only thing I was able to establish was that the Dublin
Corporation actually was a band direct from Ireland and they played across
Canada. I remember seeing (and hearing) them two or three times and it would be
cool to find one of their records if they made any. Oh well, there’s always the
flea markets or e-bay… you never know! LOL!
*
Well,
“American Idol” is over for another season. Did anyone watch that series? Carole
and I watched the series because we enjoy seeing the development of new talent.
The winner was a guy from Birmingham Alabama with a bit of an unusual voice. He
likes “soul” music and has a pretty good sound for that type of music even if
he is a white guy. He reminded me of a young “Rat Pak” style singer. I think
he’ll turn out to be a Vegas singer after the recording career cools down a
little. His name is Taylor Hicks and I’m going to be sure to check out his
first CD. I hope he stays true to his roots as a soul singer. The world could
use a new “Soul Man”.
Well, I
rode my first Harley today. I went out for a short ride after supper with my
cousin. After we cleared the city limits he suggested we trade bikes. He took
my Suzuki and I his Harley “Standard”. The Harley weighs in at approximately
750 lbs and my bike is only 375 lbs so the feel of riding each is quite
different. I had never ridden a Harley before so I was glad that I had lots of
open road to practice on. This machine is pretty much the top of the line for
Harley and I felt honoured that Randy would trust me with it when it had just
turned 1,000 kms. It’s brand new and a real beauty. Randy is leaving this
coming Sunday for BC on his new machine. I really like the colour he’s chosen,
it’s called “Black Cherry” and can be compared to a burgundy. Finally, a Hog
that’s not BLACK! Nothing wrong with black but it seems that Harley makes more
bikes that colour than any other. Randy is riding across the top of the
northern states rather than our Canadian prairies. He has made the trip four
times in the past and just thought he’d enjoy a change of scenery. He plans to
ride 700 miles a day and figures he’ll arrive in Victoria after five full days.
He’s got a good friend that is a sergeant on the Central Saanich PD and I guess
they’ll be touring the island. Even though his new Hog is quite comfortable, I
don’t think I’d like to ride all that way alone. He’d rather have some company
and asked me to go along but I really don’t think my backside would appreciate
the kind of punishment it would take on my style of motorcycle. The dual
purpose motorcycle isn’t designed for long distance riding. I thanked him for
the offer but I’m afraid he’s going solo on this trip. I did tell him to look
you up Doug if he feels like seeing some logging roads up close. He said he’s
likely not going to have time to do any side trips other than what he’s planned
already but said THANKS anyway! I think he’s just afraid he’ll like it and want
to trade that Harley for a “real bike”! LOL! I’m helped him change his oil for
the trip tonight and it was a lesson in engineering to say the least. I think
that Harley Davidson purposely makes it difficult to get at the drain and
filler plugs etc so Hog owners don’t like to tackle doing their own service
work. Service and parts for Harley are very expensive. HD probably makes more
money on their parts and service than they do on sales. If an oil and filter
change for my little Suzuki is $50.00 I can only guess at the cost of the same
work on a Harley.
Oh well,
after a few skinned knuckles and a couple of curse words the Harley’s ready for
the ride west. I wish Randy a safe ride and a fun trip but I don’t really envy
him traveling alone. I’m sure he’ll be just fine and will enjoy the holiday. I
look forward to hearing about his adventure upon his return.
We are in
for a run of 5 days of pure sunshine and warm temperatures and I’m sure I’ll
get some time on the bike myself but it’ll be a short trip when compared to
riding to BC.
I guess
that’s about it for this week folks. Thanks for tuning in and I look forward to
talking to you all again next time in “The Ontarion Report”!
Bye for now… Greg.
PS:
Something To Think About>
Leonardo
da Vinci invented the scissors.
****
The Family and the Squamidian sites:
http://members.shaw.ca/doug_b/ and http://www.thedougsite.ca
Have a good one..
the
doug
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