Scene and Heard with Will McGuirk

!Kid @ Johnny Bs tonight.

NEW ROCK TUESDAY - TONIGHT!
9:15 - Doug Hell
10:15 - These Three Cities
11:15 - Exclamation Kid!

Johnny Bs should be one rockaway joint tonight with local singer/songwriter Doug Hell whose tracks are loaded like a neutron bomb....plus the four superheros of Exclamation Kid bringing their powers of rock to the tip top tippity top of the bill.
The These Three Cities are the dark horse but for $5 its less risky than a night at Rama...there theres always the chance some has-been country star with a face full of botox is gonna hit you up for some spare change... and you'll reply with Change the record Gambler Man... there will be scuffling and a whole lot of 'splaining to do with the border patrol...
save yrself the hassle and shop JBs for a finful of fun.

Blue Coupe scoop

The Sadies and John Doe join the Country Club

A drunken retort has resulted in a collaboration between the First Gentlemen of Americana, The Sadies, and ex-X John Doe. Country Club is an album of covers with four originals. Extra guests include Exene Cervenka, Kathleen Edwards (last seen all cuddled up to Bryan Adams, close as a beard), Bob Egan of Blue Rodeo and Bruce and Margaret Good.
Songs made famous by Waylon Jennings, Johnny Cash, Hank Snow, Tammy Wynette, Hank Williams and Kris Kristofferson.... outlaw country really... are included.
Kristofferson's Help Me Make It Through The Night should be a treat.
The disc drops April 14 on Outside. The Sadies w/ John Doe play the Legendary Horseshoe April 30.

Shotgun Jimmie shoots a viddie.

Kat Rocket take off again

Whoo hoo!!!!  D-Rock's best kept secret is about to be blown open. Kat Rocket who are one of the roots of Broken Social Scene is reuniting for a gig at Sneaky Dee's. Mark May 24 on your calendar. Its just been announced so I''ll get more details soon.
BUt for now its a triple Whoo Hoo!!!!

Coffee, tea and me!!

There is a Fundraiser for the Literacy Council & Avocation Employment Alliance at Isabella's Saturday (March 28). It's in the form of a 24 hour read-a-thon and I'm signed up for it. Readings begin at noon and continue until noon on Sunday. I think I'll be reading in the night. Drop by in the early afternoon and pick up a schedule and then come by later... stay up all night with coffee and books. There may be music. If I am allowed I intend to read from Ulysses by James Joyce, my fellow Dubliner.

ps: For those seeking my weekly column in-paper its online. I have no idea why it diddn't run but will find out Monday. Follow the links at durhamregion.com.

I can wonder what Julie's doing at The 'Shoe

Julie Doiron and her band (which includes the shoeless Shwakat Fred Squires) plays the Legendary Horseshoe tonight. Her old Eric Trip pal Rick White will join her and $100 will open.
Wow. That will rock.
Julie will also play the Montreal House in Peterborough April 5.

KIngs Vs Queens

I cup my head in my hand, rest my elbow on the table and tap away with one finger on the keyboard...bored??? This morning on CBC's Q Gordon Lightfoot was being interviewed by Jian Ghomesi. Jian also landed the only Cancon interview with Leonard Cohen. It will air in April but there was a piece on it in Saturday's Globe And Mail, National Post.
Neil Young is on the road but not likely to be playing in Oshawa nor will Cohen, also on the road. I checked Lightfoot's schedule...not in Oshawa either.
Joel Plaskett dropped his triple album Three this week. He's playing in Cobourg. Big up to Becky Choquette for getting him on stage at the Park Playhouse there. Plaskett will be playing May 25. Cowboy Junkies are playing there May 5th.
So I checked the sites here in the D-Rock for some gigs...
and we have coming up....
Some Blue Oyster Cult has-beens, a band called Fuck The Facts, and ex- Rheostatic Tim Vesley and his Violet Archers.
And I wonder how to keep writing about a music scene that isn't. Oh I can write about music...lots of stories, lots of music, lots going on...but the focus is not on Durham. There is nothing here that excites. Its a dead zone for live music.
So I will continue to track our D-Rockers as they trek on out of here and establish themselves elsewhere. But more and more it looks like I too will have to walk the walk and talk the talk in Toronto. More dispatches from the road with the subtext of encouraging you to spend your few dollars in Hogtown and not in Durham.
Go see Champion Heartache. They're ggrrrreat!! and they are playing at the Legendary Horseshoe. Queen Street is lovely at this time of the year. Lots nicer and way more fun than the Ent. District that is King Street in Oshawa. You can trust me. I've been on both. You've probably only been on Queen. Well you're not missing anything on King. Nothing there.
Sports are covered big time in Durham. Some folks even get to go to the Olympics to cover what the D-Jocks are doing. But the D-Rock...making waves at CMW in Toronto, SXSE in Texas, JUNOs in Vancouver... are they not stories worth covering, worth reading, worth documenting, worth paying for. Guess not.
Being a music writer in Shwaville sucks.

ps. I know that in the world at this time this is a very very minor minor complaint I have...I'm still making it though. Writing about music in Oshawa is on par with covering the soccer beat in the States.

pss. Just heard ol' CCR fogie John Fogerty is going to tour Canada...Hamilton, Toronto... KIngston...sans Shwaville though. Anyway we sure weren't born the fortunate ones. Looks like another road trip.

psss. Keep on rocking in the free world. Man!

Junior Boys play it modest

"I make records that are about Canada, very much so," he said. "I feel like my records are more inward-looking on a national level than a lot of Canadian musicians. Musically, (there's) vast open spaces and (we're) always trying to be a little more polite in our music than if we were European.
Jeremy Greenspan - Junior Boys

At the Crossroads

By Gordon Lightfoot

When first I did appear upon this native soil
All up and down this country at labor I did toil
I slumbered in the moonlight and I rose with the sun
I rambled through the canyons where the cold rivers run

When first I did come down where the land meets the sea
The people said Who are you and what would your name be
I said I have no home and I am no man's son
'Twas inland I was born and from inland that I come

In the good land I was young and I was strong
No one dared to call me son
Happy just to see my day's work done
See my day's work done

So I swung an axe as a timberjack
And I worked the Quebec mines
And on the golden prairie I rode the big combines
I sailed the maritime waters of many a seaport town
Built the highways and the byways to the western salmon grounds

I've gazed upon the good times I've seen the bad times too
Felt many a cold and bitter wind and many a mornin' dew
I've watched the country growin' like a fair and mighty thing
And on the still of a summer night I've heard the mountains ring

In the good land I was young and I was strong
No one dared to call me son
Happy just to see my day's work done
See my day's work done

But now the seeds are planted and the gates are open wide
The old ways are forgotten there's no place left to hide
And the legacy I'm leavin' you is not very hard to find
You'll see it all around you at this crossroads of time
In the sweet soil it's a-growin' At the crossroads of time