MONDAY 9^TH MARCH

So blue you could cut your teeth on it land speed record horizon this is sky. Frozen white lakes rivers straddle silt brown grey hills ice tights valleys on and on .This is Greenland. Jackson Pollock’d be proud.

Gay air hostesses lean over with Clamato juice, no free booze only budget to notch up hours.We think of Anthony on the Air Canada flight getting wasted. Bastard.

 We ‘re going down,industrial zone trucks lego land, warehouses for miles,ice trucker paradise. I think of those guys with their bad backs and loneliness.An announcement casually says;

“We’re just going to stay in the air for a moment as they clear debris on the runway from the previous plane”

Er WTF? Wretch forward changing course dangle for more time.Sigh try not to look too concerned.

 Now we’re in a film, or an indie band, so many hats, chequered shirts and beards. It’s fucking cold, because of the weight limit I’m wearing all the clothes I own,lucky strike. Marc picks up his bass at the fragile section. Broken headstock. Fuck. My guitar’s ok but the keyboard’s got a broken key. Ok this is going well.

 The cab takes us  over a high bypass, classic Toronto shot ahead the CN Tower, the 80’s slightly retro looking sky scrapers, sax solo, no sign of the wind machine yet but I might have to use Vees’ Vaseline on my shades

  
Up Spadina Avenue (pronounced Spid-die-na) past China town up to Kensington Market, onto Nassau St. The cool bit , we’ve lucked out, bo-ho three storey houses wooden slatted fronts, market shops  fruit and nut collages’ piled outside, rows of vintage shops, I ‘m excited, graffiti, cafes, bars,  cross between the Wild West, Brighton and Berlin. It smells good the sun’s shining.You could sit in a caff writing a novel here but those guys must still be in bed it’s pretty empty.

 This is porch country.The house next door to Kellys’, my friend where we stay, is blue and purple. We smile at the Chinese guy next door sweeping his front and the girl on the other side smoking on her stoop. We take the key from the ‘mail-box’. Feels good.

Ok gotta get that bass sorted. 4 muskateers’ first mission,  guitar shop via ‘metro’ and ‘streetcar', looking like strays  playing  guitars we can’t afford I pretend I’m a country star strumming those ones with the metal body, me and Anthony jamm laughing like tourists. The assistants probably hate us. I wonder when I’ll be able to buy the guitars I want? Bass repair guy says it’ll be done Friday.

 Kellys’ boyfriends’ recommended a place across the street “Mexi-Tacos” for nachos , dinner and Mexican beer. It feels like 8 pm even though its’ earlier, our heads are fucked already our British beer o’clock kicks in and we start to get wasted. I feel light headed  a mixture of drinking psychologically in the day and being over tired.This feels really good too. We meet Kelly from work, last time I saw her was in my living room dancing to Voodoo Ray around 3am.It’s good to see her here, I’m nearly just as drunk.

 We’re on the hunt, scavangers, picking up more gigs,chewing down. We head back to where the action is predator out.

 So we’re walking down the road minding our own business, there’s a fight outside a bar. One of them’s a spit for Whoopie Goldberg or maybe we’re still in that ‘movie’. She is definitely not sober and trying to use her fists like a man inescapably being very much a girl. We slow down like we’re on the motorway cruising past an accident avoiding the scene but being morbidly curious. We watch this woman in bad camouflage pants and a record bag round her shoulders wobble cross the road then hit the pavement next to a bin. She picks herself up shouting the surreal loudly we follow her zig zags in the opposite directions along the road  and go into the world of ‘Glassmores’, a blues ‘joint’.

    In here it doesn’t get any less surreal. A social club type place with Chinese owners, long put up tables looking like a canteen in a truckers caff, about 10 people .One‘s so intent on head-nodding furiously to the sax solo I think he’s taking the piss and have to watch him for the whole song just to make sure.The singer‘s doing the spazz jazz robot dancing, in her 40s wearing a Katherine Hepburn style suit, I like her she’s got a good voice and she seems a bit crazy, I shake a bit at the thought of my future. There’s a balding sax player hunched pianist and bearded drummer. Then in walks ( of course remember this is a ‘movie’) the Whoopie Goldberg lookalikie. stumbling over to the band she stands straight in front of them, one hand resting on the edge of those tables that you’d paste wallpaper on swaying  and starts shouting;

“I love you !I LOVE YOU!”

 For one song I guess that could be ok they are musicians after all but 4 songs in and as “All of Me“ kicks in, she’s still professing her undying. The novelty, sincerity  and the bands’ patience starts to wear off. Poor Whoopie gets shown the door.. again. Will she ever learn? We leave, the show’s obviously over and cross the road to El Mocambo to go get another gig.

  Yvonne the promoter‘s fucking funny. Welsh lady, blonde hair pink ends, cross between Pam Hogg and Debbie Harry.She makes us laugh, picks Marc up on the English/British thing and we hustle to play on Friday night. Job done we head over to ‘Ronnies‘ bar across the road on Nassau St with Kelly and her lovely long blonde hair and Jonny her flatmate with a big amazing beard.

 It’s dark and loaded in here groovers climb the walls, reminds me of Dalston on a Sat night. We drink Weis Beir watching the drunk Canadians not be particularly different to the drunk Brits but wearing a lot more clothes and there’re moose antlers on the wall. Jonny‘s managed to get us another gig at the Smiling Buddah where his friend does a Wed night and says he’ll lend Marc his bass for the show, as well as a power adaptor and any other shit we need. What a guy.We‘re relieved if the other gig comes off we’re laughing. We go to sleep listening to “Heavy Vegetable”. Even if they were bad I would still like them.

TUESDAY

We enter the world of the Spinagel.This is it.Spinach and Ricotta bagel, see how clever that is ? Bagel is too small a word. We eat it with a cod dumpling on the side. My world is now in decline I‘ve tasted that soft… succulent… greasy greatness  I know I‘ll be searching for it’s replacement forever. We listen to the Upside–Down and get a tip for a bus to Niagra Falls.

Hop on the bus Gus and get yourself free. This is casino bus land they clean you out later in return for the cheap fare. We overcome logistical nightmares to get outside the China Centre to meet Anthony just in time for the 2 o’clock bus. We slowly realize (as they do) that we are NOT Chinese Canadians. Only other non-Chinese face on the coach is a fat American guy with a baseball hat. We’re trying to blend. The driver turns round starts making a fuss about us not having ID more of his gang're queuing up we’re in the last few seats obviously taking up space.I kinda get the feeling they don’t want us here. We’re just not giving out the dollar sign today. We hop off the bus jetlag’s setting in things are becoming a little difficult to negotiate.

 We decide to head to the lake instead, manageable.The tram driver asks us what band we are, says he’ll check us out on myspace.

It’s still fucking freezing but by the water it’s windy too.We get a sharp shock of well needed air, we're inflatables.Pumped up we cruise round the harbour, tourists.Drizzle and wind freezing ice in the lake, fog over the skyscrapers, wide horizon, kitsch cruise boats moored not going anywhere today. I like a bit of bleak. Feels like the scene where the exes meet up.

 “Niagra would’ve been shit today” 

we say.

 As much as I love a bit of freezing wind we’re English and need a sit down tea and cake scenario.Welcome to the glorious world of “Tim Hortons”..Wow what a guy! Not ONLY a 70’s hockey star but he has his own ‘restaurant’. Ronald Mc Donald just can’t compete HE didn’t even PLAY hockey. Ok so I was skeptical at first but like an addict  I can’t live without Tim by the end Sour cream donught and vanilla cappuccino.Sweet as sick.A Canadian back in England asks if I‘d had “Tims’ Bits” there, (er the holes from the donughts) God I was REAlly sorry  I didn’t know about them then.

 A guy walks into the place. White shades, real player cool as fuck. Starts making a scene says he can’t open the toilet door, that it’s locked. The girls behind the counter are pretty wet. They mumble something inaudible about it not being locked (they’re right it’s not I‘ve tried it’s just a bit 'sticky'). He kicks off saying ;

“I don’t want to be ignored! I used to work in Tim Hortons! I know the customer’s always right! I shouldn’t be treated like this! “

ETC
 

 He’s got a big ass chip and he’s asserting his new found power now finally being on the other side of the counter and he’s definately feeling a bit of a dick as he just didn’t push the door hard enough and he looks pretty hard.

 Ok so I’ve seen that movie with Michael Douglas, you know the one where he gets out of his car on the motorway in rush hour totally freaks out in the fast food place? this is it.Marc pipes up that I had trouble with the door too. The guy feels a bit better, strength in numbers, someone’s on his side. He leaves feeling less invalidated. Phew luckily we’re not in that film. You see Tim’s is the place for the action. It‘s a wet Tuesday and it does feel like there’s not much to do round here.

 We find a tourist shop, browse around the maple syrup then find ourselves tardised inside the foyer of the Sheraton Hotel. We take pictures of eachother on different chairs. Pretty lame but fun.

 There’s a big glass window that overlooks a courtyard, a real waterfall- up- a- mountain scene with proper pines.You look at the view from the warm on a big wicker rocking chair reading the paper. All these business men don’t even have to go hiking.Genius. We get a guy to take our picture in front of it. He says;

” Yeah I got everything in! It looks great! ” 

We check it as we’re walking away there’s just a blur of light. The guy’s way too crazy to go back and ask again.

 We decide to walk through the emerald city back up to Kensington Market, we stop by a huge phallic gold skyscraper. You can imagine the thought behind it ;

” I know.. we’re like really rich.. the company who‘re gonna rent this are gonna be like REALLY rich.. Lets make it like …frikkin GOLD ! HELL YEAH !”

 We take our picture in front of it. We’re well impressed.

 We’re living the high life now we want lobster (ok it’s cheap here).We face it look it in the eye as it sits on a plate waggling its tied claws and eyes on stalks for the last time, pleading. Not as bad as the story someone told me of eating a fish in Tokyo as it was being filleted alive on their plate, or in the same place swallowing little fishes alive so they tickle your tummy as they swim around. Me and Vee look disturbed. We eat the lobster when it arrives without thinking only pausing to wonder what makes it turn from black to pink.Animals.

We head back ‘home’.I’m drinking lime juice, voice tired, get ready for gig tomorrow. I’m listening to freaks in my band, looking at the CN tower from the living room window glowing red and blue. Slay me with your words, put me up into your tree. Headbang in your mind. Biker boys walk past. Listen to Canadian radio, to our EP skip, Kaius ,have a word off on facebook play off on You Tube. Cameo, Black Sabbath, Fleetwood Mac. The freaks drink plum wine and rum. I can’t. Fucking annoying. Marc and Anthony head out to Ronnies for late drinks and smokes.I fall asleep wishing I wasn’t the singer.

WEDNESDAY

Up at 8.Go for a run.The freak in the freezing up and down Kensington market past the hospital over into the suburban roads with the 4 or 5 storey houses, too early for Bohemia. Shops, cafes shut only a couple of people from round here off to work. I’m fucked the last of my get up and go gone for a minute. Back to bed. Must remember to pace myself..Jetlag comes in waves. I sleep and dream of 80’s power haircuts. Hangover crowd get coffee. I do singing practise. I’m such a good girl beat me now.Listen to Sebadoh “Bubble and scrape” and watch Star Wars Xmas Special.

We get 2 trams down to Union Station to the Fairmont Royal York Hotel to conference land.It’s time to get passes register and get corporate.

 The hotel’s all a bit bad glamour, chandeliers, mezzanines and rooms called things like The Territories Room, The Ontario Room. the obligatory long corridors of faun and brown carpet, swirls of indeterminate flowers and leaves and dark maple panels to take the edge off the glitz that hurts the eye and mind.We get bumphed up with bags and books like our first day at school and get out of there quick to get to the gig.

At ‘Smiling Buddah’ more beards and a hell of a lot of woolly beanies. There’s a name for them here but was one of those words that just wouldn’t go in.

 We watch “Pace the Stairs” 2 little brothers and their cute drummer mate scream, yelp and roll on the floor with their pants showing.Me and Anthony work out that this is ‘screamo’. They’re a cross between the Mars Volta and Slint. Pretty entertaining. I chat to the singer after, he tells me;

“I ve been in bands since I was ten”

Jeez that must be a whole like 6 years tops maybe?

“..I‘m pretty deaf”.

Not as deaf as me I think.

 Anthony’s pretty off it. He’s been hanging out with his Canadian uncles who live here and they‘ve been intoxicating him. He’s pretty paranoid by now after all the ‘intense’ music and asks me for a hug. Times are hard.I feel like we’re in Metallica. This is just the beginning of this feeling..

Then we play. Nothing works, midi out of sync with the keyboard, power supplies don’t match up. This is the first time we’ve used this shit abroad now Vee‘s here on keyboards. We have to give it up. All the good sounds we’ve programmed on the computer are all wasted. We have to put up with the preset, slightly changed by Marc in 30 seconds on the Korg Poly 900.Oh well we tried. You learn.Fucking losers. Need to buy a keyboard we can travel with. Something light. We play well considering the lack of what we’re used to. A rehearsal really. Iron out the kinks.We find out when we get back to London that our keyboard was actually broken from the flight.Nice.Helpful.

 A video of a clown playing a guitar loops behind us.. about right.

I’m feeling the moose, feeling the cold. We get why everyone looks like they’re still outside or up a tree I’m just glad I don’t smoke.

 Then come Terrahale, a girl singing on drums and two guys playing expensive guitars made to sound crap.

We’re drinking Molson. Jonny, Kelly’s flatmate with the amazing beard, tells me it’s shit beer the teenagers buy when they first get drunk not knowing any better. Sounds about right. I think it’s great.You can imagine the drunk guy from the Simpsons ordering a dozen of them.I’m so in.

 Then the Magic People from Boston hit the stage. A wild card.I like the singer. He calmed me down before I went on stage. We couldn’t find the tuner so I asked him if he had one. He just looked at me blankly and said in his American drawl;

“ Do you think the Beatles had a tuner? “

I think I’m in love.He got changed on stage out of his hoodie and proceeded to put on a short sleeved hoodie with green bits of PVC on it, open at the front with his beer gut hanging out and arm warmers.

Anthony leans over to me stoned and says;

“You’re not going to make any new friends with a physique like that”

 They sound like John Carpenter and Lou Reed playing Logans Run. The singer on bass playing a bass drum with his foot, and a guy with a huge handlebar moustache playing an Arp Quartet. People left.

The singer goes;

“This one’s about Dave Lee Roth!”

then later;

“Feel free to leave and go to bed.. we’ll just keep playing… this one’s about kittens..”

Amazing.We danced in the empty space in front of them as the room cleared.

THURSDAY

I can feel the business burning, we’ve got meetings to go to. Breakfast first. We go to the hot place on Kellys’ recommendation, Saving Grace on Dundas, with the even hotter waiter and the hot poached eggs and bacon and broccoli and sweet potato.Vee has smoked salmon tart, Anthony has French toast with bananas and maple syrup, dripping. Marc and Vee go pick up the bass get the keyboard sorted, me and Ant get a cab back to the hotel to rock the conference look.

  We’re rushing. End up at the wrong place,  get another cab to the right place. Not awake yet. Wish I’d been on the cappuccino side of the table and not the green tea one.A security guard on the door says we can’t get in it’s overcrowded. Fuck.Fuck. Can’t believe it after all that.Won’t. We loiter and when she wanders off we slip into the back.Pros.The room’s heaving with anticipation and frustration. Musicians. This is schmooze till you lose. Anthony’s chilling with his eyes closed.

 Everyone we meet’s friendly, the Brits a bit more edgy, apart from the cool head of Domino Records, who goes;

“Great ! Brits !lets go to the pub”.

Nice.I like this guy a lot.

 The Canadians are relaxed and helpful as are the thousands of delegates from LA,you can spot the difference in the tans. We come away with cards like it’s Xmas .

 This is the land of the silver fox. So many possibilities here and so many men balding.

 Me and Anthony are a bit bored.We’ve wandered round the hotel full of black suits. We need to rock,there’s a piano on the mezzanine,dangerous with all these loose loser musos around. We’re baited. Outside the lifts opening and shutting we start playing. I sing a song I wrote on the piano over Xmas, Anthony’s doing harmonies. A photographer comes over says he works for some big photographic agency in Canada shows me some beautiful shots of Madonna and Hockey games. He can’t come to a show as he’s shooting Gene Simmons  but ‘ll come when we play in August. Steve Dormer you can look him up.He was a nice man.

 There’s too much looking around what can I do for you. The business looking for the next big thing the musicians wanting to be the next big thing. I feel a little sick and giddy with the biziness. The record industry shaking on its last legs everyone talking but nobody saying anything except get out there tour stay on the internet at all times. Fuck I need an  iphone or a blackberry. Some delegate was literally speechless when I said I didn’t have one. I’m off down the shops now.

DIY ‘s the only way. We feel the force. People are back-slapping. We’re high fiving and low fiving.. a lot. It’s become a bit of a sad joke that we still find it funny as we say it in a Borat voice.

 Me and Anthony talk about heavy childhoods and the story about The Stones playing at El Mocambo in the 70’s , where we’re confirmed to play tomorrow. Apparently the Canadian Prime Minister and his bi-polar wife were at the gig (this is the 70s) and she ends up hanging out a bit ‘too’ much with Jagger and co. He gets jealous, as the story goes. and eventually divorces her.

Anthony says;

“I love women who are bi-polar. They re so attractive”.

 Marc and Vee turn up and join us for more coffee refills in the Library Bar with red walls and books that nobody wants.

It feels like winter. It’s been snowing today. We’re on one big band bonding trip, better than paintballing or rockclimbing. High Five.

FRIDAY

It’s always all about PR.We enter the hype PR stunt word off between Gene Simmons and Bob Leftz a journo/blogger. They’ve been exchanging e-mails slagging eachother off for a few days now and today they’re going to have a face off. We go like everyone else for the fun of it? Gene gets to publisise his new label and Bob gets to er.. get his name known.

Gene keeps saying;

“So who are you anyway ?”

There’s a “Meet the Brits” thing going on in The Territories room. We're not invited. I guess for delegates not bands to steal the free booze and food, so we sneak in assertively.  By the look of it we’re pretty much the only Brits there. We spot our old pal Howard from 93ft east days and overhear someone next to us mention our old label boss.We do eat the free food and drink the free booze so I think we fulfill our British role pretty well.

 Marc and Vee head off to see Bloc Party,Anthony's at his Uncles and I head back to Kellys’ last chance to hang out with her while she packs for SXSW tomorrow.Bitch. We wanted to go couldn’t afford it.Choices choices,Canada won this time. I get my shit together for the gig tonight at El Mocambo. We’re on at 2am. Pretty hardcore. We arrive about half 1 with a tee-shirts-off band playing ska punk.. the Johnsons.. awful breakfast music because it feels like its about 8 in the morning, we all had to have a bit of a rock n roll lie down before we came.

We play to a bunch of hardcore skaters who are going nuts jumping up and down punching the air, someone’s throwing a leather jacket around and some drunk girls  stage invade with their handbags still on.Amazing gig. Nice one Randys mates;)

 We ‘ll definitely be back playing here. I can feel the spectre of Jagger on the stage. We watch Malloy, another UK band from our local Shoreditch. We shout:

“SHORE- DITCH!”

at them affectionately.

We eat more Chinese food with our instruments stuck behind our chairs in the corner.I get to bed around 6.

SATURDAY

Marc and Anthony head back to the conference to another meeting, Me and Vee stay in the area catching up on sleep and water. I head out shades on it’s way too bright light. Everyone else is sunny Saturday shopping mode market’s heaving with enthusiasm and consumerism. I‘m mango smoothie and a spinagel for the last time. Feel like shit, red eye without the camera. Back to Kellys to sleep some more.Another gig tonight.So dull having to look after your voice, I wanna just get fucked like these guys‘ve been doing. I ‘ll get into trouble later for this.

Tonight we play Rok Boutique. Get a cab down there they tell us there’s no soundcheck come back later. Disappointment, could’ve done without the unnecessary. Back to Kellys’ again, strange sleep patterns too much partying we‘re whacked out, don’t know where we’re at at all.We’re doing the zig zag eyes open head up.

 It’s sound engineer nightmare, DI boxes fucked, patched in wrong, we’re still suffering our curse keyboard sync shit.Poor marc’s sorting it out trying to keep it together.Stress. We play 5 songs before they make us stop due to their scheduling. Frustrating. Well show’s over I can get wasted.

  Walter Mitty and the Realists ,blue eyed twinkle in their eye cute irish boys play after. We laugh outside a lot with them. I’m now finally drunk. Thank fuck for that. I neck as much plum wine from marcs’ bag and beer as I can to make up for my days of abstaining.

Anthonys’ relatives want to go to Grossmans, the weird jazz place.His Uncles, Aunts and cousins from Trinidad buy me tequila and crisps. Anthony buys me organic beer.I’m trying to be funny over waves of giggling hyena hysteria.I leave my coat behind. It’s dark as we cross the road to El Mocambo to find Marc and Vee who ‘re supposed to be there watching Bloc Party singer DJ. They’d gone back to the house.We go in, keep the party going.

 I end up going for Chinese food again with Anthony and his cousins. We‘re basically in China town so keep walking past these restaurants late at night.I‘m starving, I’ve hardly eaten all day. Deep fried spicy chicken wings, pork, pak choi and Singapore noodles. Incredible.Bit of a weird day.

SUNDAY

Our last day. L. I go back to Grossmans, find my coat in a lost belongings box by the door. The guy at the bar doesn’t even look up as I take my coat from the top of the pile, there‘re a lot of hats and scarves and jumpers in it, I look down again for a moment hands tempted by my jumble mentality then put my coat on and leave.

Cram in last minutes market time buy stuff drink coffee in the sun. Marc and Vee do silly cool sunglasses 5 dollars each. I do vintage shops quick must have bargain brown wool coat for $15 from an old hippie lady with long gray hair who tells me the coat reminds her of her 60s’London days.I find a Mexican childs’ 50s’ tourist round skirt $40 with a sequined peacock and sombreros on it, a waistcoat with tassles for $7. There’s an entire shop with things for $10. Anthony’s impressed as he holds up a slightly dodgy jumper eagerly. 

 Well that was the last quick stop before the airport’ bye bye Canada’ one more stop apple fritter Tim Hortons and up in the air. See you in the summer back in August on our way to the US.Next time I want to see some moose and maybe we’ll even get to Niagra.Yeah it would've been shit anyway.