Graven - Spring Tour - Anecdotes

Graven - and the Zaphodic night.

Matty pulled out his well stickered guitar - strummed a few chords. Ben followed with a some quick banjo licks. Brandon plug in - you could hear the electric pulse, and the smooth flow of feedback. I've seen and heard this before, but something was different. There was a sonic beat flowing over and through the sound and weaving into the song. St. Cat was there - riding his stool - king of the the drum kit. It was a great show.

Graven did good -the bachlorette party girls surged forward and flung garter belts toward the boys. The just strummed harder and better than ever.

SQ slowly drifted to domestics - he shunned the imports for the bitter bang of a cheap 50. Fisheye followed suit, and Dox popped a few more caps off some quarts.

We kept our eye out for French all night. After the show I saw his bike outside of the Barefax strip club. I waited for a bit and Sweaty and French came out. They had meant to go to the Graven show, but they'd stepped in for a peek at the peelers - and got distracted.

I gave Sweaty a lift - (he crashed on my couch before heading back to the Falls tomorrow).
We saw French moments later. He had a stripper sitting on the handle bars of his dirty old bike, weaving through the drunken market crowd.

Cigarette Run

French got me started on cigarettes.

He'd always have packs of various little mini-cigars (Colts). We'd spark these at parties. And he used to sell American cigarettes out back of the school (Marlboros). Also, his dad hand cranked his own cigarettes with a little rolling machine. His dad would crank them and say: "I'm getting my exercise". Somedays we'd smoke those.

In gym class we had to do this run called "the run". It was a 4 mile course up a dirt road. We would run down the road to the train tracks, that were up the top of a hill, and then turn around and head back to school. Somedays we'd take the whole period to get it done. Other days the gym teacher would ride behind us in his Chevy Bronco and yell and honk at us; on those days we'd actually run.

French held the school records for "the run". French would put on his beat up Chuck Taylors, run to the tracks, smoke a dart, and then run past us heading back the other way laughing like a maniac. Every year, on the day of "the run", we'd see him at the top of the hill blowing smoke rings waiting for us to catch up. This convinced me that smoking was okay.

I quit cold turkey 15 years ago, but every once in a while I'll crave one those bitter American Cigs that French prefers.

Mustangs, Mixed Tapes and Making Out

I was looking through French's journal from high-school and came across a list of songs entitled Mix Tape for the Honeys:

Try - Blue Rodeo
More Than Words - Extreme
Don't Know What You Got... - Cinderella
Every Rose Has It's Thorns - Poison
Angie - Rolling Stones
...and a Tonne of Phil Collins

Weird mix. I remember asking him about this tape. His response was that it was a "deal sealer". I asked him to explain further. He said: "That when he was cruising with the honeys he'd put it on and the honeys'd be happy, maybe even think they were in love".

French had a 1968 Ford Mustang 428 Cobra Jet - the tape was just for back-up I guess. I had a 1986 rusty Honda Civic, or my grandpa's Chevy truck with a comfy bench seat.

I needed to get a mixed-tape of my own.

French, Fists and Cottage Rock

We gathered a fine group of lads for the latest Graven show on Saturday: Japan Dan, Bill "Double Fist" Henry, the Dox, Old Ollie, and Sweaty.

Things got warmed up early with Texting Mackenzie - a little power trio from Guelph. Sweaty musta yelled "Gay-welph" a dozen times; laughing like it was a great new joke each time.

Graven hit the stage - we hit a few more Baltikas.

Matty was in fine form. Yelling, whooping, humming and singing - then dashing in some Gord Downie like improvised lyrics. At times he pulled out some Plaskett-style falsetto; all the while pumping out original Graven vibes.

A noted irony of the night was watching a fine creative band sing, and in the background, through the window, hordes of teen dancing queens lined up to get into some throbbing club.

Sweaty was anxious all night because French never showed up. After the most excellent show we all headed out to the street. There was French with his guitar, harmonica, and an open guitar case. He'd been playing just up the block; busking a few bucks from the kids lined up outside the dance club.

French plays pretty obscure songs. Turns out the kids gotta little sick of hearing Fred Eaglesmith tunes all night. This big lad tried to push his guitar case closed. French handed Sweaty his guitar, grabbed the goon and twisted him up tight and quick into a brutal wrist lock, tossed him down to the sidewalk, then stepped on his head and packed up his gear.

A couple of the goon's buddies tried to step in. Double Fist surged forward snarlin'. Dox held him back by the collar. Lucky he didn't slip outta his coat.

Japan Dan snapped a few pics. French picked up the goon and kicked him the ass for good measure.

Dox spoke to the goons and his pals: "Don't you boys have a home to go to?" The look on his face said more than his words.

Matty handed the head goon a Graven CD and they shuffled off down the street.

Taylor and Martin

Bruce Fish wanted me to come by a couple of summers ago to meet Taylor and Martin. When he mentioned this I thought it'd be his usual good-natured weirdness; maybe he'd named the dump bears Taylor and Martin. I swung on by to meet him and his new friends soon afterwards.

I sat in his little shelter on the crest of the massive chasm of junk. He said, "This is Taylor". He handed me a beautiful beat up guitar from a grimy case. It was a Taylor acoustic with quite a few dings in her. I looked at him and he held up "Martin". This was a 1970's Martin dreadnaught guitar. Well worn: There was a hole below the pick guard that made it look like Willy Nelson's guitar. There was also a smaller hole top side.

He'd found them deep in the dump pit. They'd rolled off a truck that had been used to clean out an abandoned cottage north of Kingston.

French had come by a few weeks before and had carefully reset, re-strung and re-tuned these beauties. They were kept in in locked steel shed. "Cuz they're special", said Bruce Fish.

He continued: "Now you boys got guitars to play when you come by. I'm hoping someone will throw out a drum kit soon".

Rose lit a fire in an old oil drum. Bruce Fish handed me a pick and we sang and strummed a few old songs from our high school days. Those guitars had a warm full tone. Bruce Fish and I sounded pretty good, for a dump band.

The dump has opened up for cottage season this past weekend. Time to head up and see Rose, Bruce Fish, Taylor and Martin.

Battle Warrior

My wife had a baby on Monday: we call him Warrior. You gotta be a warrior in this world; sometimes with words; sometimes with prayers; sometimes with fists.

He has a big forelock of white hair. A distinct birthmark that flows back at least four generations in my family . I was worried at first. Nobody likes to get teased, and this mark will provide a lot of fodder (I know). Playground bullies can be rough. My oldest son said: "They can tease him; can't stop that, but how many kids have two big brothers that are going to be at least 6'5. They won't tease him long, or often".

French added: "Yeah any of these lads get in trouble and ol'Uncle French will show up".

I feel better.

Post Script:

French's boy is doing well. He is playing Lacrosse, so we'll check on him this summer. Bruce Fish promised to build a playground in the dump for all my sons to play in. This could be fun summer.

Post Post Script:  Warrior is good - almost a year old.



Check out this fine place:

http://canvaschild.blogspot.com/2011/04/imperfect-prose-on-thursdays-on-why-i.html

Circa 1987

Last night I was flipping through French's beat-up journal (he takes a lot of pride in this fact) and I found this poem. I try to use these insights, and my on recollections of being a teen; as I teach day to day. Too many teachers seem to have forgotten that they were ever teenagers. It was one of the first ones he wrote

bathe,
yes bathe
in the simmering
hatred

I feel it,

here
in this broken desk
here
in this moldy school

two girls
i dumped
hate me
hate each other

makes me hate this class

by "French" April 1987

Fair enough French - Fair Enough.