Toronto Update!

After our London show on March 13th with Hot Hot Heat, we had 10 days off in Toronto until our next show (which was last Thursday, March 25th at the Rivoli). We all coordinated our own places to stay in town. I ended up staying with my good friend Jessie who I first met up in Dawson City. That was when I came up to the music festival three years ago when Ladyhawk and Jon-Rae and the River headlined the show. She has a beagle named Rosie and her roommate Brette has an old cat named Stripe. I am in animal heaven.

We sorted out a jam space here in town at Queen and Bathurst. Once Joel got back from a quick trip to visit his family in Chatam, we began rehearsing as a four piece band. During that time however, we had a chance to go check out Niagara Falls which was a first for Henry, Joseph, and Jessie!

Henry was in town until the 20th but he left for Europe to vacation with his lady friend who is going to school over there. I won’t get into the specifics, but basically we opted to play as a four piece until Henry’s return. Joseph has reconfigured his guitar parts and I’ve taken over some of the guitar harmonies on keyboard.

Rehearsing each afternoon, sorting out band business by day, taking Rosie for walks, and a little too much partying has been the majority. Other than that, I’ve also been fitting in some writing sessions with Casey Marshall and Neil Sanderson to come up with a few more tracks. I’m in the process of demoing at the EMI studios here in town.

The one other crazy event was I was invited to play a set at the dinner/gala for the inductee’s of the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame. I initially agreed, thinking I could play my own songs, but then a week or so before the show I got an email with a list of all the inducted songs. I was told that that was the material i was suppose to perform. Naturally, I got a little stressed when I saw that the majority of the songs were either French Canadian, by a fellow named Robert Charlebois, and some others, or were from the other main inductee, Rush.

Nevertheless, I set to work putting together a set of the tracks, including Rush’s “Closer to the Heart”, “Limelight”, some of Charlebois work, and the other obvious choice, the “Hockey Night In Canada Theme”. It was a trip to think I’d be playing all the songs to the artists themselves.

When the evening came on the 27th, I was as nervous as could be. I met and chatted with Alex from Rush before the show. After the dinner, I was introduced on stage in front of 200-300 industry folk, artists, and songwriters and then I did my thing. When I finished, I got a chance to meet all the guys from Rush. Geddy Lee was especially thrilled with my rendition of Limelight where I jazzed it up and changed the time signature dramatically. I got a pic with the guys and then proceeded to finally take advantage of all the free booze.

I ended up meeting Ron Sexsmith, who I’ve always been a big fan of. We partied in the bar until 1 am or so when I finally left and shared a cab back east with a nice woman from a band called Prairie Oyster. She was one of the Hall of Fame board members and shared some stories of the old days when the band toured across Canada.

The day before my stressful solo show, Bend Sinister played our first of four shows with Toronto band Dragonette in Hamilton. The big talk of this show was that apparently Joel looks identical (and has the same name) to the bass player in Dragonette. While I didn’t photograph them together, I did get this picture of Joel with a fake version of Dragonette Joel:

The show went well, but, as with many opening slots, people were appreciative of our tunes but tended to hang back from the front. Also, since it was all ages and in a bad part of town, there were tons of teen girls with their mom’s everywhere. We had to leave halfway through Dragonette’s set to get our gear back to the jam space before 12 because the evening before, a window in our van got smashed by someone trying to do the old ‘smash and grab’. I would be more choked about it but they only succeeded in the smashing and didn’t grab anything… The window is still broken though and covered in cardboard, cause we phoned around and it is almost $700 to replace. I am going to look into more today, but that’s the word.

Joseph and I have a solo show tonight at a place called Mitzi’s Sister in the Toronto neighborhood of Parkdale. Then we play Ottawa, Montreal and London this weekend. That’s all for now but I’ll keep you posted soon!

Dan