The Never-Ending Tour: Encores

ENCORES:

Just when I thought I was done, this was the victory lap.

Nov. 10, 2018 Forch’s Record Store, Cambridge

I didn’t get a lot of invitations on this tour; 95% of it I booked myself. This one came from a random stranger who messaged me on FB and told me to get in touch with this record store in Cambridge. The owner was immediately enthusiastic and the date was made.

I’m amazed whenever I find a well-stocked record store in a major urban centre, so to find one in the exurb of Cambridge seems like a miracle. This is a miniature version of Toronto’s Sonic Boom, with premium vinyl, a solid used section, gear, memorabilia, etc. There’s no real plan for this gig, so—much like my gig in the Lindsay bike store or the bar in Saint John without a P.A.—I just wait until at least five people show up and I start talking. About a dozen eventually congregate. I do the full reading—which I can do on autopilot by now—and then take a couple of questions. The singer from the very first Hip tribute band, Almost Hip, shows up. A guy arrives with a copy of Have Not Been the Same to sign. All in, this is a lovely, low-key, low-stress gig. The opposite of just about everything I've done in the last six months.

May 15, 2019 Creemore Springs Brewery, Creemore

Mark Howard

One of my favourite interviews for the book was with Mark Howard, who produced Day For Night. At the end of our conversation, he told me he’d been working on a memoir and was wondering what he should do with it. I gave him my editor’s contact. A year later, his book Listen Up came out on ECW, and we were scheduled to do two book events together.

This one is in farm country between Barrie and Collingwood, home to a well-known brewery. Turns out the town also has a very well-run bookstore that puts on regular events, a community hall that regularly books A-list Canadian acts (Joel Plaskett, Sarah Harmer, Rheostatics, Stars, etc.), and an excellent French restaurant. Not bad for a town of 1,100 people. It’s also home to the New Farm, an organic operation run by Brent Preston and Gillian Flies; Preston wrote a bestselling memoir about the farm’s founding. He’s been hired to interview Mark and I onstage at the brewery.

Mark comes to my house and we carpool to Creemore. He’s living in Toronto these days after years in the States, mostly California. He recently survived a bad case of melanoma, having been saved by Canadian health care. The car ride to Creemore and back is a total gift, with stories about his health struggles, very off-the-record stories about many of the artists he’s worked with, either with his longtime mentor Daniel Lanois or on his own, and about why he doesn't work with Lanois anymore. He's helped make some of my favourite records ever: Neville Brothers' Yellow Moon; Lanois's Acadie; Emmylou Harris's Wrecking Ball; Tom Waits's Real Gone, and the only Bob Dylan record I like, Time Out of Mind.

We meet Brent and Gillian for dinner at the French restaurant. The event is well-attended, maybe 30 people—several of whom come from Collingwood, including my parents and some of their friends. This event is an effortless joy, and inspiring on many levels. I’m very grateful to all involved.

May 22, 2019 Horseshoe Tavern, Toronto

This is Mark Howard’s Toronto book launch, and he asked me to be the interviewer. It’s his night; I’m not here to talk about my book at all. He’s decorated the Shoe with many of his photographs, some of which are in the book. Despite good promotion and advance press, this event isn’t any better attended than our event in Creemore. Score one for the small towns. 

June 22, 2019 Meehan’s Public House, Atlanta

The paperback came out in May. I had no plans to do any promo other than piggybacking on Mark Howard. The book had done well. The tour had been an amazing experience, but it turns out I didn’t need to do it for the book to do as well as it did. With the paperback, I figured I’d gladly accept any invitations (see above), but didn’t feel the need to hustle. I spoke to some classes at Bishop Strachan School. Another school visit fizzled in the planning stages. But then I got an email from Atlanta: a Canadian there, Marty Seed, who owned a bar where he held a big pre-Canada Day party every year. (Expats, he said, often went back to Canada for part of the summer, so he held his party a week before July 1.)

Atlanta?! After my Buffalo gig went so well, I had considered doing something in NYC or Boston or Chicago. Maybe Texas. But never Atlanta. Marty had booked the Strictly Hip, the group of lovely guys who had brought me to Buffalo, and he offered to put me up at a hotel. The publisher agreed to cover the plane ticket. I could not refuse.

Shortly before the trip, the Strictly Hip had to cancel due to health concerns. That made my presence there somewhat less relevant, but the invitation still stood. Marty scrambled and considered hiring a Canadian act, but eventually settled on a local cover band, as well as country duo Twin Kennedy, twin sisters from Powell Creek, B.C., who now live in Nashville. I shipped some books to Marty’s bar, and hopped on a plane.

Ebenezer Baptist Church, Atlanta, home of MLK

I don’t know much about Atlanta, but figured I’d give myself a full day to explore it, and maximize the trip. I’m not interested in the Coca-Cola Museum or the aquarium, but I somehow forgot that this is Martin Luther King Jr.’s hometown: I associate him with various cities during the Civil Rights Movement, but not his own. King’s old neighbourhood, including his original church, have been well preserved and are well worth the visit. The National Center for Civil Rights is also really well done, although understandably focused primarily on African-Americans in the 1950s and 60s. Indigenous genocide: not so much.

Kim Richey at Eddie's Attic in Decatur

I’d scoured local live music listings sites to find out who was playing while I’d be in town. Not much, it turns out. I was missing Operators by a couple of days, and Rose Cousins by one. Fortunately, all roads pointed me to Eddie’s Attic in the suburb of Decatur, where Americana songwriter Kim Richey was playing. I’d known the Ohioan’s name for the last 20 years, but had never heard her music. A few listens to her 2018 album Edgeland sealed the deal, so I bought tickets before I left. Listening to the rest of her discography, it was clear this was someone who continued to improve with each record; this was a lifer at the top of her game. Decatur is a long subway ride away from downtown Atlanta; as far away from the core as my far-east childhood home in Scarborough was from Yonge Street. Outside the venue is a lovely town square with some kind of family festival happening; on stage is a rock-solid disco funk band doing covers of Chic, Diana Ross and others. Inside the venue is an ideal listening room, tailor made for singer-songwriters who tell stories. Richey is rock solid and witty, with a great band behind her. I almost never stand in line to get merchandise signed after a show, but felt a strange compulsion to tell her how I ended up at her gig. She was very nice about it. 

Nadia Theodore, Canadian consulate in Atlanta

The expat party starts the next day around noon, at a bar in a suburban parking lot. I don’t know anyone there and don’t have much to do. Awkward. It doesn’t get much better when it comes time to perform. Marty gives a great introduction, and the lovely Canadian consulate in Atlanta, Nadia Theodore, conducts a short interview. But other than maybe five or six people standing near the stage, no one else cares: this is a talkative bar in the middle of the afternoon, long before the live music outside starts to roll. I cut my reading down to about two minutes, and call it a day. That said, I do sell a couple of books. 

The stage and road hockey in parking lot of
Meehan's Public House

Hanging out for the rest of the day helped me sell a few more. Turns out Canadians living in the American South are very excited to meet other Canadians. I meet a white woman from BC who tells me she’s an “African-American archaeologist” on the verge of retirement and can’t wait to get back north. I meet a woman from Hamilton who moved to L.A. in 1992 and attended a bunch of Kim Campbell parties there, before meeting an Atlanta guy and moving here. I meet a couple who used to live down the street from my high school. The Atlanta Curling Association is eager to recruit some Canucks. Two guys from Calgary love my Louis Riel shirt. I meet a French-Canadian couple from Gatineau who were transferred down here and are raising three kids in ESL. I meet an ex-military man who bought Road Apples on a whim while posted on a German base in 1990, and took Up to Here with him to Iraq in the 2000s. Now he teaches school in Chattanooga, and inspired two students to play “Wheat Kings” for him at a talent show. He didn’t know Downie had put out solo albums; I quickly set him straight. I’m really sad the Strictly Hip didn’t make it here today, for a whole bunch of reasons. Their replacement is a decent wedding band, who are a bit out of their element; they clearly don’t know any Canadian songs, and take a wild guess by introducing Modern English’s “I Melt With You” as a Canuck classic. 

Howard Finster, one of many self-portraits

At the end of the night, Marty is exceedingly gracious and thankful, and keeps going on about what a gentleman and a professional I am—I’m not entirely sure why, other than the fact that I always responded promptly and I wasn’t a dick. Professionally speaking, this whole event has been a bit of a bust, and I’m going to have to ship books back to Canada. 

But whatever. All I ever wanted was an adventure.

The next day I pick up a rental car and head to Howard Finster’s place in Summerville, northwest of Atlanta. Finster was a famous and eccentric folk artist known to rock audiences for his album covers (R.E.M.’s Reckoning, Talking Heads’ Little Creatures), and for his appearance in the doc Athens, Ga. When he was in his 40s, he had a vision in which God told him to make 5,000 works of art before he died. He ended up with more than 50,000, which fill his property, known as Paradise Gardens. 

Paradise Gardens

This place has to be seen to be believed. It’s both inspiring and maddening: the man’s vision and work ethic are undeniable and there is much beauty to be found, but there’s also a whole bunch of junk just lying around, like a mountain of discarded bicycle parts, or Finster’s abandoned workshop filled with broken glass. No matter: it’s all part of the package, and this is the Weird America I’m always seeking out.

From there I drive straight to Athens. I wasn’t sure what Athens would have to offer me in 2019; it’s not like I’m going to bump into Michael Stipe in the street. 

Paradise Gardens

But I saw there was a weekend-long street festival happening, and playing on the Sunday afternoon was something called Pylon Re-enactment Society. Was this some kind of tribute to Pylon, the late 70s local legends who were R.E.M.’s biggest influence? Turns out it’s original singer Vanessa Hay with younger players (i.e. people in their 40s) revisiting her old songbook and adding new originals. Never in my life did I think I would get to see Pylon, never mind in 2019. 

Sadly closed for renos while I was there

I check into my hotel, where R.E.M.’s “Seven Chinese Brothers” is playing in the lobby. In my room is a copy of local music mag Flagpole, which has been around since the 80s. There’s a neo-vintage radio in the room; the local college station comes in loud and clear, and the programming is fantastic. Across the street from the hotel is the town visitors’ centre, where a woman hands me a walking-tour map of the city’s musical history. This is insane: does this embrace of local music exist in Toronto? Montreal? Vancouver? Hell, even New York? The hotel loans me a bike and I head out to find Weaver D’s (the deli with the slogan “Automatic for the People”), the railroad truss from the cover of Murmur, the church where R.E.M. filmed their segment of Athens, Ga., the record store where Peter Buck worked, etc. 

Murmurs of glory

The stage at the street festival is set up outside the 40-Watt Club, whose marquee lists upcoming shows by Black Flag and Kristin Hersh. The P.A. is playing the Athens, Ga., soundtrack. What year is this, anyway?!

Pylon Re-Enactment Society; Vanessa Hay (right)

Pylon—sorry, Pylon Re-Enactment Society—are fucking fantastic. Vanessa Hay is dressed like a sixtysomething woman who just stepped away from her garden, but sings like an 18-year-old who’s excited to be on the mic for the first time. Her band of young whippersnappers (people my age) give it their all, and this punchy post-disco dance party from the new wave era leaps to life. I can’t believe how good it sounds. 

I hang out side stage after to be a total fanboy, and end up talking to guitarist Jason Nesmith, with whom I have several mutual friends in Toronto, it turns out. He introduces me to a British fellow, Tom Ashton, who had a band in the 80s before moving here to be with his American wife. What was the band, I ask? “The March Violets.” “I know your drummer!” For years at Maclean’s I worked with Andrew Tolson, the photo editor who helmed the office band, and would occasionally regale us with tales of living in Britain in the 80s and how his band ended up in a John Hughes movie. Tom and I take a photo together and send it to Andrew, who is suitably freaked out. To top off the evening, I head to a bar where a klezmer band with a Japanese cojon player is interspersing Yiddish tunes with “Feel Like Making Love” in an entirely different key and tempo. I’ve clearly found my people.

Athens primer

And the entire reason I’m seeing all this in R.E.M.’s hometown because I flew to Atlanta to talk about the Tragically Hip. 

 

FINAL NOTE: All photos by me. Apologies for any/all copy editing mistakes, especially when I stray in and out of never-ending present tense. 

Also in this series: Spring; Summer; East Coast; Western Canada

Fin (apologies to Jean-Pierre Ferland)