SOUNDTRACK: RHEOSTATICS–Fall Nationals The Horseshoe Tavern Toronto, ON. Night 5 of 13 (November 14, 2003).
This was the 5th night of the Rheostatics 13 night Fall Nationals run at the Horseshoe. Rheostatics Live has recordings of nights 1, 3, 4, 5 and 7.
It’s Big R night (see below).
There’s an introduction by J.C. who says he used to be the owner of the legendary Horseshoe Tavern “but as of tonight I am the owner of the R club.” As he’s saying there’s a burst of “It’s Not the End of the World from Super Furry Animals–probably a mistake).
“Last night this band was here and they didn’t sing a single lead vocal the entire night.” J.C. also mentions upcoming shows at the Horseshoe: Skydiggers will be doing an annual residency, Luther Wright, The Sadies, Royal City, Northern Pikes and the last two Watchmen shows ever.”
Then back to Rheos: “Next Wed will be the wheel of fortune–all requests by spinning the great wheel and next Thursday is all covers night.” I’d love to see the set lists from these nights.
One of the greatest legendary Canadian bands:
“Power Ballad for Ozzy” is fairly mellow with lots of acoustic guitars. It segues right into “PIN” where Martin recites “In the dirty boulevard” during the end chords.
“Aliens” brings a bit more loudness. In the middle of the song, someone starts playing the melody for “When Winter Comes.” The band starts grooving it but Martin will not be hijacked and he finishes “Aliens.”
A funky, percussion-heavy version of “Marginalized” is followed by a sweet “Loving Arms.”
As Dave starts playing the opening jazzy guitar to “I Dig Music,” Martin sings “The bed’s to big without you” (which fits pretty well).
Then you hear Dave say, “please sir don’t touch the setlist.”
Mike: “It’s still drying. It’s like an infomercial for inverted reading.”
Dave: “Did it feel good to touch?”
“The Tarleks” has a really raucous guitar ending with lots of noisy loud chords.
Dave explains that “Tonight is giant R night. The giant R was in Martin’s parents basement for the last 13 years–Otobicoke cultural prison–since the “Aliens” video.” And since they’re returning to the olden says they’ll do an old song: Woodstuck.” There’s a false start, wrong temp, but then they play a solid version. Martin repeats “Hippie child” and Dave says “little protest song there.”
Then we learn that Dave is now playing drums.
Tim: “All because Michael showed up late for practice one day.” [rim shot].
Dave: “Anyone else want a rim shot–it’s not what you think–it’s the first thing they teach you in amateur drummer school.”
Tim sings “Here comes the Image” with MPW on keys with a great solo.
Someone shouts “Bad Time to Be Poor” which is followed by someone else shouting “Yeah! ‘Bad Time to be Poor!”
But they play a ripping version of “Fishtailin'” which Dave says they recorded in the Bahamas. Someone growls and Dave says it’s about a giant cat–the mascot of the Bahamas.
The first surprise comes when Tim starts playing the then there the bassline that can only be a cover of “Teenage FBI” (!) by Guided By Voice. They play a respectable version of the song with Tom on lead vocals.
Dave: “Yup, Guided By Voices. Since we can’t be there we figured we’d simulate the experience.” (GBV were at the Opera House in Toronto that night). Were doing a covers night next Thursday so were working through a few tonight. From then on someone keeps shouting “Horses” but they will not hear that song. Next song is “From that up and coming Greenwich Village folk duo Simon & Garfunkel. It ends with someone loudly going “doh duh duh doh duh duh doh duh duh doh…as wrote.”
Someone yells do you plan to do any Rush covers? Martin says, “If we had enough time I so wanted to do “Closer to the Heart” or “Red Barchetta.” Mike says they might have time. And Dave says, “No but we’ll do about four I Mother Earth tunes. Mike says, “Why because that’s the equivalence weight?”
One more scream for “Bad Time to be Poor” Martin says, “Okay, we know.”
Mike asks if anyone knows what a ballyhoo is: When they sweep the lights over the audience like at the beginning of a game show. He says the stars are doing that tonight–whatever he’s talking about.
Then Martin says to Dave: “I see you’re selling hockey cards of yourself”
Dave: Sold out! Just get a picture of yourself, charge 50 cents, people will buy anything.
Martin: “Dirty player… you see how mean he looks on that card.”
Dave: But off the ice, the meanest are the most loving and good to their fellow citizens.”
Mike: “When you play you’re not a goon, right?”
Dave: “Just a dirty suck.”
Martin: “You told me you’re a fun loving player. You jab people, but its friendly.”
Dave: “A gentle tickle.”
Martin: “Some of them don’t have a sense of humor. Some of them should try harder to get a sense of humor.
Dave: Kenny Linesman was called “the rat.” Me I’m more of a monkey. I’ll bite you, but I’m a monkey. I’m not all bad.”
They finally play “Bad Time to Be Poor” and then a rocking “CCYPA.” And then after a wild and rocking intro to “Song of the Garden.” the song rocks too.
Then Martin says, “Gonna slow burn on this one.” It’s one of the best versions of “Stolen Car” I’ve heard–the climactic section is so intense. I love the way Martin sings “drive a… way!” at the end.
Before “RDA” Dave says, “Send this one out to Bono, coz he’s the man.” Martin says “Rock Death America starts with R.” Dave has a wild middle section in which he starts yelling thing like:
“Gonna be in a big fucking band with big fucking people playing for big fucking people, big beautiful guns, big beautiful hockey pucks made of fudge. It’s a silly war, it’s an insidious war, it’s a stupid war.” At the end, Mike says, “Good rocking, Dave.”
Staying political, Dave says, “Congratulation to the Liberal dynasty, the Liberal monopoly, the Liberal empire of Canada. Don’t fucking get it wrong. “We’re gonna gave to retire this song because it was written about a bunch of assholes in the past. We’ll have to put it behind us.” Sadly People in the States need to bring it back for Betsy DeVos and her own shitty people. “Hands Off Our Schools” is an outtake from 2067 : “Hands off our schools politician scum.” At the end of the song Tim says , “you lose. ha ha.”
Tim says, “We’re going try to put music back in the schools. Next Tuesday we’re raising money for an alternative public school for their music program.”
After the encore Dave says, “We’d like to thank The Imponderables for playing before us. Up and coming young funnymen.” Then
Dave: We have T-shirts Fall Nationals T-shirts. Martin’s two solo records and 2 of my books and most of our CDs. Hockey cards sold out. We have mugs too so if you don’t like us buy a mug and throw it as us. Nothing says I hate you like a mug to the head.
Martin: nothing says you’ve made it more than having a cup of coffee with your band’s name on it in the morning. You know, Chapters won’t stock my album [Operation Infinite Joy] because they think the image on the front might offend some people. [Boos].
Dave: “We were supposed to do an in store there but we got bumped for Lady Di’s butler. Double lame.”
Anybody here from the prairers? Really? All of them! A rocking excellent version of Saskatchewan that segues into “The Mayor of Simpleton” with MPW on drums and vocals. It’s pretty good although his vocals are too quiet and he forgets some words and he seems winded by the end. A quiet “Little Bird” is followed by a moody and intense “Shaved Head.”
Dave thanks George Stroumboulopoulos for nominating Whale Music for Best Canadian album for the CBC.
During the second encore break, Serena Ryder comes out and yells at the crowd to get the band back up there. Then she sings a cool, spooky version of “Digital Beach.” It’s followed by a fun bouncy version of “Mumbletypeg.”
There’s some discussion and you hear Mike say “So many songs. There’s a bullion of them and you just cant think of one, sometimes.” Not sure what they were talking about playing but they settle on “In This Town” and then a wild version of “Me and Stupid.” They play a verse and MPW stops the song. Dave says “Sounded pretty good to me MPW Dot Com. Dave starts talking about the fish in the song: “when those pike start going when they start thrashing you can hear them a mile away.”
For the final song, they thank Canadians and Americans “we’re gonna do a Ron Koop song.” Koop sang “Introducing Happiness” the night before.
As they head out they announce, “Tomorrow night, Tim Vebron and Rheostar. You don’t wanna miss it.”
Tim Vebron and Rheostar were the Rheostatics dressing up in crazy outfits playing synth songs. You can see some pictures here. Wish there wad a recording of it.
[READ: December 30, 2016] Pinball 1973
In the introduction of this book. Murakami devotes a page to Pinball and says he wrote a sequel the following year. He was still running the jazz bar. Soon after finishing this he decide to stop writing at his kitchen table and then wrote his first full length A Wild Sheep Chase which “I consider to be the true beginning my career as a novelist.”
He describes the text as “a novel about pinball,” but also explores themes of loneliness and companionship, purposelessness, and destiny. As with the other books in the “Trilogy of the Rat” series, three of the characters include the protagonist, a nameless first-person narrator, his friend The Rat, and J, the owner of the bar where they often spend time.
The plot is sort of beside the point although it is more present than in Hear the Wind.
Before the story starts properly we get this little introduction in which the narrator says the story is about “me” but also about a guy called “Rat.” That autumn the two of them were living four hundred miles apart. This novel begins in 1973.
The story begins with Pinball and Raymond Moloney. In 1931 Moloney made the very first pinball machine (this is true). (more…)
I had posted about this record back in 
I Just Read About That... 