You are currently browsing the monthly archive for November 2009.
Regina was revisited in the same manner we had previously left it, through the luxurious Quality Inn on East Victoria Avenue (Trans-Canada) 20 minutes out of the downtown core. The previous 11 hours was spent taking stock of what we had accomplished on our 3 week tour of Canada. We had done a lot in the short time that we were on the road. Almost 10,000 kilometres of prairie, boreal forest, St. Lawrence River scenery and maritime warmth all in a few short weeks with a even shorter financial supplies. Not many people have done what we had done. Sure, there have been greater adventures, longer trips under far more epic circumstances, but I would still argue our merits grand. Even greater still was our accomplishment as a band, a single entity with the sole purpose of traveling the grand nation of Canada and performing in cities at every possible opportunity. I could say I toured Canada in a band with some pretty amazing people. Not many people can claim to say the same. But my greatest feeling of accomplishment was personal, of course. I had sacrificed a lot, as much as anyone else in the band with me, and I had come back surviving the whole thing in one piece.
The Last 500 km (via qmass)
The homestretch felt undeniably timeless. The last 500 kilometres would be long. I recall a similar feeling going back to last year in August of 2008 when Endangered Ape first set out on the road. Our first tour was a 5 day stint in British Columbia and the American Northwest with Portland, Oregon being our last performance. In order to arrive back in Lethbridge in time for a performance, we had to resort to extreme measures, a nonstop, over-night cruise from Portland to Lethbridge. I had felt the same type of restless anxiety as I had been feeling on the way back from Regina. I was eager to be back on familiar soil with familiar faces to flaunt our achievements for. I could take a shower in my own home, sleep in the comforts of my own bed and not have to live out of a duffle bag. More importantly, I was keen on sharing my experiences with all my colleagues and loyal followers! I pictured a crowd welling upon us, eyes gleaming and waiting on every word as we retold the stories and mishaps of our adventure. The illustrious travellers had returned!
Mammoth Cave Festival
Our return would not be complete without a celebration. So, quite fittingly, a one-day music festival of unparalleled size was organized coinciding with our return on Victoria Day. Mammoth Cave Fest, as it would be called, showcased a bevy of musical groups from the local music scene, Alberta and beyond. Check out the link to the concert reviews, as they can do more justice for the event than I can. All in all, it was a great celebration of local music and also a reconfirming display of friendship from everyone who came out to support us. It was possibly one of the best highlights of out trip.
Endangered Ape played Sudbury, Ontario on May 15th, 2009 to a welcoming audience, but chilly venue manager looking to squeeze a bit more out of us for his own ends. The event culminated with the 3 a.m. departure from the Sudbury venue and from the city itself. No one had slept since the following morning and we had the dark, unforgiving roads of northern Ontario to deal with. I had been worrying over the course of the trip of the slim chance of an accident with our van. The chance was of course, just as good as the car next to us that we would be involved in some sort of mishap. Road conditions, driver blunder and even a drunk driver could lead to a disaster on the road. The thought of the majority of our equipment and instruments packed in the back cascading over us in a violent impact created shivers down my spine every time I dosed off in the course of a long haul. If the force of the initial crash traveling at high speeds on the highway didn’t kill us, the inertial crash of the gear in the back certainly would crush us like bugs in our own vehicle. It wasn’t that I had no faith in anyone driving; it was the thought of a simple, random impact, like hitting another car or a tree, made me uneasy.
It was with this gruesome thought that I slipped into unconsciousness for the early morning. When I awoke, we were in a blizzard, why anxiety heightened. Given Murphy’s Law, this was the prime time for an accident. We were only a few days from home, in the middle of nowhere, with no way to call for aid in the event of an accident. Miraculously, we made the trip to Thunder Bay unscathed, but with an unfortunate casualty none the less; a bird hit the windshield, getting caught in the wipers and causing quite a stir with our driver.
We returned to The Apollo, the bar and musician compound that let us play and spend the night in the first stage of our tour. On our previous arrival in the city, we were greeted with a home cooked meal and a night of friendly conversation with the owner of The Apollo. Tonight, we were to play at the Black Pirate’s Pub, an antagonistic rival in the Thunder Bay music scene. Apparently Thunder Bay was too small a market to have two live music bars in the city, so a seemingly unending battle to attract crowds and business existed between the two. Endangered Ape had unwittingly found itself in the middle of a turf-war on the north shores of Lake Superior. It was a simple mistake through the process of booking shows months in advanced from Lethbridge that we had found ourselves booked in at two competing venues in one town. It actually is not an uncommon occurrence. In Calgary alone, we had played at the Palomino, Broken City, and The Ship and Anchor, just to name a few. What I was upset about was the level of hospitality we were given as an outside band by the proprietors of The Apollo. They definitely went above and beyond in feeding us, letting us sleep in the hostel above the venue for free and being genuinely kind to us all. Playing for their competitors, especially in an economic environment seemed classless. In a system where cooperation and group networking was essential, it felt like we were putting that initial solidarity at stake for future help in the area and beyond. Thankfully, the owners’ of The Apollo were understanding of the situation. What a classy bunch of people there.
The social misunderstanding didn’t really apply that night when all was said and done. We played to about 6 people, none of which were extremely interested in any of the bands playing that night. We ended up playing our set at Black Pirates Pub, then immediately hauled our gear down the street to the Apollo to set up for another set. Afterwards, while the night was winding down, we had a very topical discussion at the bar regarding bands meeting an untimely end from car accidents. It would seem that my chronic worry of van accidents was not trivial as accidents on the road have spelt doom for many a touring group. Ignoring some of the bigger names in music history that have died in accidents on the road (i.e. Marc Bolan, B. Doon, Cliff Burton), stories of touring bands from all corners of North America pop up in magazine articles and internet news sites. A passing search of the topic can be found in a matter of seconds. Examples come from all corners of the continent. At the time of this writing, you can search the internet and find recent stories of bands involved in serious accident:
Six-Piece Pop group from Chicago
Mall Rock band in wreck from September
Christian Rock band involved in a less than graceful collision
Even school marching bands are not safe from random accidents!
The list goes on, but from a short search, a number of bands can easily be found that experienced some sort of touring tragedy.
Between all of us, we could name off a few dozen bands that had been in serious accidents. I was acquaintances with a few musicians that were involved in a fatal van accident while on tour in Alabama. If anyone was around the Edmonton punk/hardcore scene in 2002, they would have heard about the fatal crash that killed two members of the band, Compromise. Personally, that is the closest I’ve been to an accident on tour, and that’s probably as close as I’d want to keep that experience.
Sobered with the night’s topic and reflecting on the reckless departure from Sudbury the past night, we decided to cut the trip back home in half to keep us roadworthy and safe. It was probably a good idea. I didn’t want anyone talking about us in some empty bar years from now talking about how senseless and utterly stupid our deaths would have been. So, in a rather un-climatic fashion, the last show of our cross Canada tour had ended with us alone in a quiet, empty bar in Thunder Bay, thinking about home and what we had been through together on the long, and sometimes unforgiving road.
Sudbury.
Our last visit to the city culminated in a late night visit to a local Travelodge following a 12-hour journey through the dark forests of Northern Ontario. The drive itself had almost driven us mad. This time, arriving from the south from Toronto only 5 hours away, we were in much better spirits for our show.
As for Sudbury itself, it was basically what I expected from an isolated, resource-specific mining town. We didn’t manage to see the Big Nickel or the butterfly gallery at the Science North Centre as a regular group of tourists do. As a touring band, sightseeing is only an occasional luxury afforded by a day off driving or a few hours to burn. Having managed spending time in Toronto, Ottawa and Halifax, we were not that disappointed.
The stereotypical Sudbury landscape (drivewiser.ca)
My knowledge of the city prior to visiting was its environmental legacy brought on by the years of mining, the use of the surrounding land to run practice tests for the Apollo moon landings and of course, Sudbury being the birthplace of Shania Twain (She was actually born in Windsor, then raised in Timmins, ON) Two of those points correspond to nickel. The other, my misunderstanding of popular country singers from Canada. I would be at some advantage if I was in the city to for precious metals, but I was here for music, and there wasn’t a lot I knew about it here. Elgin Street neighbours onto an extensive rail park built in the centre of the city. It was built to support the large mining operations that are synonymous with the region and it was in this neighbourhood, slightly dilapidated by lack of use and away from heavier traffic, where Endangered Ape would be spending the night playing. A few years earlier, a clever entrepreneur in the area brought a city block’s worth of building along Elgin, transforming it into a sort of multifaceted entertainment compound for the neighbourhood. On the north end of the street, we have The Laughing Buddha, a vegetarian restaurant, then Sportsbury Bar & Grill, then finally The TowneHouse, the drive bar slated to be our next forum of performance. By far, this was the dankest venue we’d play on tour. A thick layer of dust covered the bar. Torn flyers, crunchy from years of moist acrid breath hung tenuously off black walls. The ghosts of a hundred other bands before us wafted upon stage. Speaking of ghosts, I am quite certain the building was haunted. There was reason enough for some spirits to be floating around. In the basement were beds and accommodations for visiting bands needing a place to sleep for the night. It was dirty, but an invaluable location for anyone needing validation or legitimization for their rock ‘n’ roll image. I was more concerned with breathing in black mould during the night. A friend of ours, Garreth from The Famines, an Edmonton-based band that toured Sudbury, had told us of the bout of pubic lice he had recieved from sleeping in the accommodations at The Townehouse. It is a perfect location for partying, which I’m sure has happened there a millions times before, but I wouldn’t want to sleep them. Take a look for yourself.
Adam and Evan searching for bedbugs at The Townehouse
Performance-wise, our set was fantastic. We played with vigour, energy and skill to an engaged and enthusiast crowd. We were met with applause after every song. Things were looking good until we ended our set. We finished our last song, said our thanks to the small crowd and began clearing off our equipment for the next band to take stage when a surly local made his way to the front of the stage. He appeared belligerent and began ordering us to continue playing. It took me a few seconds to realize that this was the manager of the bar commanding the band play on for another 20 minutes. After parlaying his frustrations to Paul, our ambassador, a stunned and confused Endangered Ape began to play an extended set of our B-grade material. It was a cluttered mess of unrehearsed mush, but it seemed to have appeased the manager enough to convince him to pay us for our troubles. There is a standard in many bars that require performers to play one, two, even three hours of material per night. It’s not unheard of for a band to play 3-sets in a night, causing many to learn other musician’s material, perpetuating the use of cover bands in live music venues. Endangered Ape was simply not that kind of band, preferring to perform original music in short bursts, preferably 20 minutes or shorter, in order to keep the audience’s attention and awe the entire time. With a supporting group or 2 or 3 other bands playing the same night, the venue still gets about 3 hours of entertainment to retain patrons, but with some more energy and variety for good measure. The Townehouse, with its temperamental entertainment manager, did not seem to follow that philosophy, and the communication between band intentions and venue expectations were not made clear. Luckily, we had our beloved Paul again to iron out the wrinkles left in the manager’s feathers, and the situation was contained for the time being. Still, the situation was very strained, strained to the point that, after consultation with fellow band members, an immediate strategic withdrawal was staged in the early morning hours. So, with bar patrons still mulling about, the members of Endangered Ape snuck down to the band quarters in the basement and began to collect our things.
Thus, in the cool morning lull of Northern Ontario, we set out to our next objective: Thunder Bay and Home.
We had reached the geographical and symbolic climax of our tour with the performances in Halifax and too, found ourselves at the climax of the narrative laid out here on The Movable Beast. The zenith of our long journey had come on stage at Halifax’s Gus’ Pub, now we had nowhere to go but back from whence we came.
We said our goodbyes to the members of the Stolen Minks, our hosts in Halifax for the past 3 nights, with intricately constructed gift baskets we had put together in the van outside the venue. I hope they liked them, I think I was too embarrassed to ever ask them, seeing as their hospitality during our stay in the Maritimes went beyond what any token of appreciation could give.
Early Wednesday morning, we all piled back into the Cream Dream for our 4,717 kilometre return to Lethbridge. The ride through Nova Scotia and New Brunswick was pleasant, for the most part, until we hit upon a snag with our vehicle. Up until this point, there hadn’t been any notable troubles with our van, but for some reason that morning, the Cream Dream decided to shut down entirely about 50 kilometres outside of Fredericton. The hair on the back of our necks jumped to attention as, for some unexplained reason, the van began to slow and chug to a stop on the side of the road. A slight tinge of panic ran through us all, but after the initial shock, we were not entirely surprised our 1979 Ford Econoline succumbed to the pressures of the road. A phone call was made to the tower’s, water was rationed and handed out, and we started to pray. There comes a time in any extended trip where the voyager gets a little anxious to get home. This was our day to feel impatient. We had gone as far as we had hoped and now that it was accomplished, we wanted to make some distance back to home.
Van Troubles
This van breakdown was almost unbearable for us. How long would we have to wait? How much would it cost to get our van moving again? I had already spent my last dollar in Halifax buying a tiny salad and was living off of handouts and good will. Would this put me and the group out indefinitely? You could imagine my relief when the old motor putted back to life after a few minutes of sitting. Apparently, there had been a simple fuel pump blockage that needed to flush itself out so we could get back on the road again. The road after that was calm, the weather was fine and a renewed sense of hope came over us.
We arrived in Laval, Quebec in the late hour in search for a hotel to rest up for our journey back to Ontario. As the rest of the group slipped into the franchise hotel room, I was charged again with sleeping in the van, both as an active method against my chronic snoring and also to protect our valuables left inside. In such unknown territory, with an unknown language, the best strategy to get us through would be to circle the wagons, as it were and be ever vigilant against our perceived thieves and biker gangs. This was not the mysterious, dark forests of the Canadian Shield we were up against; this was the urban jungle, an imagined foe greater in power and in threats. Luckily, due to my brave and resolute guard (i.e. my loud snoring), our van and our persons were left unmolested the entire trip.
The night of May 14th found us trapped in the labyrinths of the Golden Horseshoe, the Canadian Megalopolis radiating from Toronto around Lake Ontario. This area of about 4,000 kilometres in its core region holds about 25% of Canada’s population. With such a huge concentration of citizens in such cramped density, much like that of the BosWash urban build up in the US or the Tokyo-Nagoya-Osaka corridor, The Golden Horseshoe is site of several auxiliary municipalities existing in support of the city of Toronto. Tucked away in the south western corner of the GTA (Greater Toronto Area), Burlington, ON defines the suburban banality to the fullest. I’ve come to notice, in each city that I’ve visited in North America, a particular road seems to snake out of the core that processes all the uncoordinated commercialism and uninspired land planning that our cities have had the unpleasant history of possessing. It seems like every city has one; the road full of strip malls, making its way away from the city like a vine of cheap land and box-style buildings. In Edmonton AB, there’s Calgary Trail; in Winnipeg MB, there Pembina Highway; Lethbridge has its Mayor Magrath Drive. They are the pinnacle of the car-culture craze, an eyesore, and a planning strategy that builds for a quick buck. Sure, the infrastructure is in place and shoppers will tend to shop in the same vicinity if the shops are there, but aesthetically speaking, they all look like a tangled mess of parking lots, boxes stores, and pollution. Burlington ON appeared to be an entire community based on this concept. Shouldered by Hamilton to the south, and the indefatigable city of Toronto, Burlington had become during its history a suburb of two larger metropolitan areas. The town consisted of suburban developments, strip malls, automobile dealerships and hotels for the business traveller on a budget and looking for something less pricey than a room in the Big Smoke. It was a city that had found itself swallowed up by the unrelenting growth of the nation’s largest metropolitan area.
Our show venue felt as manufactured as most of Burlington. Located in a strip mall next to a Home Hardware and carpet dealership, The “Legendary Red Rooster Vintage Cafe” was neither legendary, nor vintage. We had gotten the gig through the kind help of the Hot Blood Bombers, who we had met up with after leaving them to their own devices in Montreal. While we were in Halifax, our tour partners had busked lucratively on Toronto streets, drunk themselves near penniless and had a few semi-successful shows in the Toronto area. The reason for such a terrible venue in Burlington was simply to fit a show into an otherwise empty night. If we were spending money driving all the way there anyway, we might as well make a few dollars while we were at it. The Bombers had managed to squeeze us in that night with another 4 bands playing, so it was going to be a long night. The bands we were playing with were awful. There was a full-on hard rock band replete with thousand dollar wireless microphones and at least a dozen boxes full of merchandise. Another band was a jazz-influenced, soft rock band that clashes with the entire night. I suppose it didn’t really matter, there was a total of about 6 people in the bar that night talking over all of us in disinterest. For the experience alone, the night was memorable, only if to expose me to the worse touring bands might have to deal with when they are trying to make their mark. Having a bar to play might be the most important objective for a band at a particular time in their existence, and unfortunately, there are consequences to wanting that. Consequences, like having to endure disinterested audience members, receiving little monetary compensation for performance, or just having to deal with the realization that all your hard work and your artistic endeavours will only get you a free meal and a lot of bored faces at the end of the day. No glamour at the “Red Rooster” this night.
James from Amelia Earhart took pictures of the show that night. You may tell the subtle signs of exasperation on our faces as we perform. Enjoy!
Attempting Audience 'Clapping'/Participation
Begging the Audience for any Response Whatsoever
The Hot Blood Bombers cookin' at the Red Rooster
If there is one aspect that made the May 2009 Endangered Ape tour a reality, it has to be the successful utilization of the internet to connect ourselves across Canada to like-minded participants in the independent music scene. Without it nothing would have happened. There would be no bookings, no bands would have shared bills with us, no hotel rooms would have been reserved after late night drives. The internet enabled us to form networks across time zones and enter into the musical enclaves of several different Canadian cities. With no high-budget promotions, or large scale hype backing us, all we had was the Do-It-Yourself (DIY) ethos to make connections via the internet. Now, I should be more specific, as it was his initial idea and creative project from Day 1, Paul (bassist) did the vast majority of communicating with players in other cities. Irrespective, the medium was an invaluable tool in planning our tour.
The Internet
The tools used were predominantly social networking sites on the web, specifically Myspace.com, Facebook.com and alternative music/culture boardrooms utilized by Endangered Ape members, Paul & Evan. If you have a band or a musician operating today, there is a high chance that you maintain a profile for bands on Myspace.com. For those who may not know its potential, creating a webpage on this site is easy, free and can provide visitors a wealth of information regarding your group. Visitors can view band pictures, listen to songs and see performance schedules. Most importantly, featured on every band’s Myspace page is a listing of band friends and supporters following the specific band. This allows for a networking with people of similar music tastes and allows exposure to new bands previously unknown to the internet visitor. This site was instrumental in creating new networks between our band and bands of a similar genre across Canada.
With these connections made, another social networking site was used to strengthen these rapports with other bands. Facebook.com was used to email and send information regarding our intentions of a tour to applicable players in the music scene. Show bookings at venues, tour scheduling and band interviews gave us an idea of what we could plan for on our 3 weeks on tour. This organization was all done by members of the band without outside promotional agents or employed manager.
Finally, to get a sense of the culture and climate of certain urban music scenes in Canada and beyond, community-based “bulletin board” websites were employed to establish a barometer for what was to be expected on tour. Researching tour tips, finding out the latest information on bands and other helpful information was all taken from user feedbacks and comment threads. This forum is really useful for getting the unbiased opinion of participating music fans on a variety of subjects. Some of the sites that were used were Terminalboredom.com & weirdcanada.com, just to name a few.
The reason why I wanted to mention the impact the internet had on organizing and managing our tour for May was that it was primary tool we used in organizing a totally independent endeavour with the resources we had available. This Do-it-yourself ethos, brought to the forefront of independent music philosophy by early American hardcore groups (such as indie music demagogue, Ian Mackaye and his Dischord record label), has evolved in such a way that bands today are using the same self-reliance to produce music and tour, but just with a different set of tools at their disposal.
It might not be as simple as writing a few songs, then harassing music promoters the world over for a chance to play Carnegie Hall or a similar alternative, but correctly utilizing the internet can definitely give a leg up on establishing contacts to other towns and resources otherwise untapped by the unknowing musician.
Typical Halifax Homes
I was born at the old Grace Maternity Hospital on Halifax’s South Side in 1982. My Father was stationed at Canada’s extensive Maritime Naval Base at the time aboard the HMCS Athabaskan, a Canadian destroyer operating in the Atlantic at the time. I was eventually baptised in the ship’s chapel and had my name engraved on the ship’s bell. Since then, I’ve been always meaning to return and try to get a chance to see the ship again. I was happy to notice when we left our accommodations on the first morning that the Naval Base (CFB Halifax) was located just down the hill from us. A majority of Halifax is basically one large Canadian Forces base in one respect or another. CFB Halifax, Stadacona, CFB Shearwater and CFAD Bedford (ammunition depot) are all located within the Halifax Metropolitan area. For the amount of land delegated to National Defence (DND) and other government agencies, I was surprised not to find more residents being employed in this type of work.
Industry Forecast, Halifax
- Employment By Sector, Halifax (Source: Greater Halifax Partnership)
Only about 10,500 people work in some capacity for National Defence in 2005, making up only about a small percent of the total employment in the HRM (Halifax Regional Municipality). Like most Canadian cities, the Service sector holds the majority of jobs for the region both in manpower and GDP. Looks seem to be deceiving in terms of physical presence versus the actual economic impact the Canadian Forces has in Halifax, but it would be hard to find another Canadian city with such a pronounced military history or presence.
The other attraction I was impressed with was the volume historical buildings around the downtown core. I may be hitting some serious clichés, but it was like walking in a museum. I’ve always loved the historic legacy of the everyday world; the modest homes that have stood for centuries, the ancient streets and heritage that lives within the modern world that functions in and around it. Ancient buildings with little plaques explaining their significance now home to another generation of locals, the blocks of public housing that served as a woefully inadequate substitution for the displaced residents of Africville. The city is a fountain of Canadian identity, folklore and the tourist-friendly environments that were as welcoming as a warm chair next to the fire after a day’s work catching lobsters. The streets were clean and colourful, the storefronts lining the downtown core were quirky and enticing. Halifax, or at least the downtown core running from The Citadel at the southern end to Richmond and the North End, was just plain cute.
Poster for May 12th show at Gus' Pub (taken from show promoter)
Gus’ Pub is located on North End, up onto of the embankment that rises southwest from the harbour. The Pub itself is situated on the corner of North Street and Argicola. It is the premiere local music venue for smaller indie rock acts to play, whether local or on tour. The show was booked graciously by The Stolen Minks through the booking agent at the pub, B.A. Johnston. Mr. Johnston himself tours the country extensively, playing Lethbridge a total of 3 times in 2 years to promote his records and music. He is a consummate entertainer and gentleman, and a example that one can tour Canada by car often without succumbing to the meltdowns of financial and emotional hardship on the road. Performing were Amelia Earhart and Endangered Ape, representing Alberta with Room Doom and The Stolen Minks representing Halifax. There is a great paradox in the relationship between audiences and local bands that seems to permeate from each city I’ve played in. Local audiences tend not to be greatly interested in touring bands that might possibly come their way. There is, of course, the exception for bands with greater publicity and greater popularity brought on by industry media outlets such as print or the internet. With this exception however, people will usually not bother taking the chance of watching an unknown musician or band perform. The potential audience would run the risk not enjoying the genre or content of the visiting group and would then be throwing away their time, money and patience. It is a tricky conundrum indeed. Now, if a new variable is entered into the stand-off between touring band and local, namely a local band, then the chances for a success turn out to the visiting band’s performance is greatly heightened. The local band brings with it friends, fans and family that are familiar and supportive of their music. In the frequent event that bands are booked to play together on the same night (even huge Rock n Roll acts frequently tour countries with opening bands supporting them), touring bands unknown to the region or city will still have a sizable audience in attendance to play to if they are playing with a local act.
Gus' Pub interior
Local acts bring people to the venue and often stay to see what a touring band sounds like. For the show at Gus’ Pub on May 12th, we were lucky enough to have 2 great local bands playing with us to support our tour. Cupcakes were even made to entice people to come early to see all the bands and not miss out on any festivities, so the success of the event in terms of audience turnout was assured. As for Endangered Ape’s set, we played a bit haphazardly, mostly due to the PA system malfunctioning and not producing much sound from the microphones and also due to the fact that we had neglected to write a set-list to keep tracks of the songs we wanted to perform for the night. There was a bit of confusion there, but for the most part, the audience in Halifax were very gracious and kind to us. I can’t believe how friendly everyone was and how welcoming they were, I think we all left a piece of our hearts out there.
The City of Halifax has a quirky fascination with the events surrounding the 1917 SS Mont-Blanc disaster that transformed the community in its identity and physical make up. The story has been told countless times in Canadian folklore. The story of the doomed vessel, packed full of wartime munitions and set ablaze by a collision is the subject of countless books, songs and one memorable piece of Heritage Canada mythology no one watching television in this country 15+ years ago could forget.
The details of the monumental explosion are quite interesting, as explained in Laura M. MacDonald’s “Curse of the Narrows”, an account of the event and subsequent consequences to the city. “Deflagration is the cycle of burning and disintegration accelerated by containments. When any fuel iginites, it gives off gas and heat, which further expands the gas…Explosives are classified by whether they have the ability to detonate as well as deflagrate…every substance in the Mont Blanc’s cargo was engineered to blow up.” (MacDonald 2005)
As for the blast itself, the North End of Halifax harbour was annihilated and debris was showered across the town; “…The anchor snapped its chain and separated, sending the 1,140-pound shank whirling through the skies over Richmond Hill and across the city for 235 miles, until it landed on the other side of the peninsula of Halifax across the Northwest Arm. The aft cannon shot off he stern and arched over the harbour and Dartmouth’s North End for three miles, landing next to a small lake. Every building within a mile was severely damaged.” (MacDonald 2005)
Endangered Ape came into Halifax hoping to create a bang of our own, but we had a bit of down time to burn before we could play at Gus’s Pub on May 12th. I shouldn’t actually say, down time, because every minute we spent in town was great. Being that there were a total of 7 people traveling in our entourage, sleeping arrangements would be something of a challenge for us for the next 2 days staying in Halifax. Luckily, we had the help of some of the finest individuals aiding us on our stay in town, that being the members of The Stolen Minks. Kent and I were quartered for our stay at the cozy Halifax home of Tiina, bassist/vocalist of the band. I was, of course, segregated away from the rest of the house due to my snoring problems. Regardless, Kent and I were treated to a roof over our head, internet connection and food in a fabulous neighbourhood near the waterfront. We were staying in a classic Halifax townhouse, the classic block-shaped townhouse colourfully painted in all sorts of colours down near the harbour.
The street we were staying on was right off of North Street, which cut through the middle of Halifax and onward to Dartmouth via the Angus L. MacDonald Bridge. North of the bridge lays the Narrows, the bottleneck within Halifax Harbour that separates Bedford Basin with the outer reaches of the Harbour. It was within here that the explosion took place in 1917. Much of Richmond, the neighbourhood situated above the Narrows on the Southeast slope, was levelled in the early morning of December 6th. An interesting result of the clean up and reconstruction of the area was the use of a particular brick purchase en masse by rebuilding authorities that can be seen on many of the houses now lining the streets of the Richmond area. You can determine which houses were damaged and to what extent by the shape and colour of these building bricks close to the foundation of homes. Today, memorials and murals deck the sides of buildings and adorn city parks with the names and brief telling of that day. There was a momentous event here and no one will let you forget it. There is, of course, mention of it in tourist guides and sight-seeing tours also which tell the tale again and again to the city’s guests (One story was told by Tiina about a tour guide mispronouncing the word ‘explosion’ to his flock of tourists one day, referring to it as the Halifax “K’splosion”). But, I digress.
I met up with Paul and Jane traveling along Gottington Street heading towards downtown. Everything is within walking distance if you live along the crest of Halifax’s inner core. The waterfront is available for morning jaunts, there is shopping and businesses nearby, Dalhousie University is just a 10 minute walk south along Maynard Street and from downtown. Even with so many amenities in close proximity, Halifax did not possess the same urban commotion other cities had. Sure, it is notably smaller in population than many other centres we had visited before, but the atmosphere is markedly calm. After an afternoon of walking up and down the sloped streets, I was feeling pretty happy about our accomplishments. We had traveled the majority of Canada in a few days without any significant incident. We were at the geographical climax of our journey, the salty piers of Halifax Harbour. The task itself seemed quite daunting and we had our share of sacrifices within the members of Endangered Ape. Now, in light of our accomplishments, it was very satisfying. My first afternoon in town ended with a great sense of success, we made it to the end of the road and the only thing left to do was return triumphantly back home. In the meantime, we had to get to the gig.
Cutting a rug in Reflections
Our first night in Halifax had us play the strangest “show” of Endangered Ape’s existence. Every Monday night there is an phenomenon that occurs known as “Rockin’ 4 Dollars”, a special event aimed to provide cheat entertainment for patrons and fabled riches for any brave performer at a place called Reflections, Halifax’s premiere Gay & Lesbian Bar. “Rockin’ 4 Dollars” is explained like this: Every Monday night, any and all local Halifax bands are invited to come down to the club and perform a maximum of 15 minutes for the partrons. Bands only need to sign up prior to the night of performance and they get to play whatever they would like. The only catch is that no one gets paid for playing; the only compensation is a chance at the end of the night to win a lottery against the other participating bands. $100 is entered into the pot and bands get a chance to win it by spinning a wheel of prizes at the end of the night. If no band spins onto the grand prize, the money is kept for the next week with an additional $100 added to the pot and so on. Other prizes include having food tossed at bands, winning beer prizes and even winning baked goods from event organizers. Our night, the pot was up to $500, a juicy prize for the 7 of our traveling in the van would love to have. I personally was running dangerously low on funds, having spent most of it along our trip in gas stations and restaurants. Endangered Ape needed to win that money. We played our mini-set of 3 songs, sandwiched between an all-girl folk duo from Guelph and a funk-metal fusion band replete with dijirido. After waiting for all participating bands to finish, (I think there were 15 in all) it was time for everyone to spin the win for a chance to win. The 2nd band that spun won the $500. We were deflated. Out of pride, cheap daught or both, Paul spun the wheel anyway, only to win “a pat on the back” from the MC. Talk about disappointment.
Reflections Pub, Halifax
To tell you the truth, Endangered Ape’s night at Reflections was great. We had a great time drinking cheap beer, watching Paul drink too much and hanging out with the Halifax locals, including Erica and Stephanie from The Stolen Minks. They can play a mean game of ping pong.
Enjoying the comfortable Halifax concrete.
We had a blast.
(Yes, that was a tip of the hat to 1917)
Mother’s Day, 2009 –
We spent the night after our show in Moncton at a lovely home accommodated by Stolen Minks drummer and all around nice person, Erica Butler. We were lucky enough as a group to be invited to stay at her parents’ home and, never being ones to give up an offer like that on the road, jumped at the chance for the gracious hospitality. I can’t say I knew exactly where it was located in town, as I was much too tired and distracted to keep track of where we were going, but I reckoned it was in the south east across the river. For sleeping arrangements I was naturally segregated from the rest of the group and quartered in a guest room on the first floor. Not a bad deal, sleeping in a nice soft bed by myself instead of a floor!
Bridge Street, Sackville New Brunswick (Thanks to SimonP)
The trip to Sackville, New Brunswick itself was fairly forgettable and short. The weather was overcast and cold, covering most of the countryside in a hazy fog hampering us a view of the countryside. Irrespective of the increment weather, I was still pretty excited about our show that day. We were booked to play at a small art gallery in the center of town to inaugurate an annual art/music festival that transpires there every summer. The festival itself is known as ‘Sappyfest’, a cheeky moniker established by the fact that it is organized by Sappy Records, a local independent record label set up by Julie Dorian of Eric’s Trip fame. The festival itself has been happening for about 5 years or so, if I’m not mistaken. Sackville, being a popular college town for many in the Maritimes (Mount Allison University), has been a focal point in art and music in southern New Brunswick. Strut’s Gallery, the artist-run art space where SappyFest would be held, is an example groups of local artists locating, organizing and managing forums for their work in circumstances where conventional studios or galleries are either too expensive or too exclusive to operate with.
Outside of Strut's Gallery, Sackville NB
Strut’s Gallery itself is located along Lorne Street on a fairly unused town road shared with a lumber store and I think a tire repair garage. The town itself is tiny; only about 6000 permanent residents live here when classes are done in the summer and the gallery was literally a few seconds of driving from the Trans-Canada exit into town. To say it was quiet would be an understatement. With the exception of the minimal activity around the Gallery, and the peppering of humans at the cafe around the corner, there wasn’t much happening in Sackville that day. Mind you, it was freezing out, replete with a driving rain that chilled us all to the bone, so I imagine that kept the locals hunkered down in their fisherman’s homes overlooking Chignecto Bay as well. They even have covered bridges, for Pete’s sake! Still, Sackville is a tiny, but quaint town I had envisioned as a typical Maritime community.
Taking a breather in the gallery
As for the show, I thought it went pretty well more so than the night before at the 5 Points Pub in Moncton. Today’s show was during the afternoon, which gave the members the wonderful hope that we could finish our obligations early and not have to endure the gruelling multi-hour wait in a bar at a ridiculously late hour of the night. A lot of us were morning people, what can I say? Slowly trickling into the converted venue were a number of local music lovers tempted by intriguing art, 6 bands and free BBQ’ed hotdogs provided outside. The first band to go on was Amelia Earhart, the band our drummer Ryan and fellow traveller James were performing as along the tour when the opportunity arose. As I recall, Ryan was feeling terrible and was woken up from a nap in the van about 5 minutes before he went on. The band played well, but the notable moment of their set was when Ryan phoned his mom behind his drum kit and asked the audience to yell ‘Happy Mother’s Day’ into the receiver. How cute. Endangered Ape was up next, and I provided my usual antics including more audience participation. I’m not sure if the people there were really fans of our style of music, it is a bit jarring, I admit. Naturally, I tried to make most of them uncomfortable with my confrontational performances. After us played Construction & Destruction, a two- piece girl/boy folk duo, completely opposite of our music style. After that, Weird Weather from Peterborough, ON, who nice tunes, but were ultimately forgettable as I can’t really recall anything about them other than being a pleasant, Neil Young-inspired 4-piece.
The Stolen Minks played after and played an outstanding bit of garage rock that everybody in the audience enjoyed. And why wouldn’t they? Check out their myspace page and listen to some of their songs. Very catchy! While you are at it, check out Dog Day’s myspace page as well, the band that ended the show that afternoon. Both bands represent signature music styles that can be found in many independent (not signed to any major record labels) rock bands today. The Stolen Minks can be described as a garage rock revival group in vogue in many music scenes around North America and Europe today while Dog Day expresses a certain sweet melancholia distinct in sound from the Halifax music scene reminiscent of many early ‘90s bands from the region. Both are exemplary examples of what is coming out of the Halifax indie music scene right now, and if you didn’t know that already, now you do. Dog Day themselves have been operating a tour blog themselves. If you are at all interested, click here!
So, with the bands wrapping up and formal gratitude expressed for letting us play in Sackville, Endangered Ape hopped back into the trusty (and rusty) van to go out onto the road once more. Out of the parking lot, our cream coloured vehicle turned right and past a hillside park dedicated to participants of Canada’s wars. The guns were misted wet by the rains of the day, and the green grass of the park was untouched by any curious pedestrians walking along the paths. We got back on the Trans-Canada (Highway 2) and proceeded to travel down the road to Amherst to have dinner with the members of the Minks at a dilapidated Greek pizza joint in the middle of town. Finishing that, we followed Erica’s dented silver minivan the 213 kilometres south to Halifax amongst the glow of tiny Acadian communities in the night.
One element of our May ’09 tour that gave me nothing but endless sorrow and pain was the inclusion to bring along with us a portable GPS display to ‘help’ us on our trip. These handheld devices are designed with the basic traveler in thought, aiding in navigation and location with the touch of only a few buttons. Its purpose is to ease the less-directional savvy tourists among their travels through unknown territory, making maps and stops at the gas station for directions utterly useless. But, not all journeys are made to be so smooth and products stating themselves to be the answer to every wrong turn do not always lead to the right destination. I would argue that these new GPS navigation systems designed to help travelers are not all that they are cut out to be. The average device has software flaws, lacks human intuition needs for unexpected situations and at the root of it all, these little creatures destroy the very essence and passion that is traveling.
Garmin GPS (source: Garmin)
The GPS unit we used was a Garmin Nuvi, a gift to Paul from his parents as inauguration to our journey. A thoughtful gift as it was, I soon found myself hating the little critter. Why, you ask? The Garmin provides near-instantaneous navigation solutions to any destination in North America. There are options for points of interest and amenities to be programmed into your route to provide helpful detours. Paths can even be saved into the system to be revisited on trips again and again. Well, they are certainly helpful if an emergency were to arise on your trip, but looks, or boast, can be deceiving. It is not the wonder weapon for travelers.
First is the path selection process, a frustrating little bit of technology we good intentions that falls flat sometimes. For the most part, road ways and paths are pretty up to date, providing fairly accurate positioning for its user. This Garmin model is a standard civilian design, so constant pinpoint accuracy is, of course, not going to be achieved, nor expected. However, there are times when outdated map layers downloaded into the device fail to express roads constructed since its programming, any construction zones or detours that must be made in real world scenarios. This lack of simultaneous connectivity to updates or road changes led to a few frustrated afternoons within cities and a few hours lost time running in circles. The Garmin also possesses a feature where you can select the shortest route in distance or shortest route in estimated time as calculated by metadata joined to each roadway. The shortest distance doesn’t necessarily mean the smartest route as we found out traveling many country roads in Ontario and Quebec and we suffered the consequences of the non-intuitive Garmin. Likewise for the ‘shortest route in estimated time’ option, which did not account for traffic or construction. Perhaps newer generations of these systems can operate with more interconnectivity with local road and service reports to generate alternate routes in case of recent road developments.
This lack of human intuition causes some real problems for traveling within cities especially. With no real-time problem solving programming, the user is at the whim of out-of-date information and route planning that only is able to display about 30 seconds of path at a time. The system does not know about path obstacles, and more importantly, it makes the user (driver) fixated on the GPS system for solutions, instead of observing their surroundings. It makes for lazy path finding. In the city, it commands attention from its users, which can be dangerous in high congested areas. In long distance driving, I found that the trips seemed to take longer as I constantly checked the position of our tiny, digitalized animated vehicle inching along the conceptual highway on screen. It took my eyes off the road and the sights moving by us, which is a terrible shame in retrospect. I missed a lot, I’m sure.
Now, the crux of my issue is not a missed turn or a lost afternoon finding the right way out of a city. It goes to the foundation of what travelling means to me. What if Columbus had one of these little GPS gizmos hen he made out for his trip to the East Indies? Or if Frodo had a Garmin while making his way along his quest through Middle Earth? There is a certain air of adventure that comes from travelling into the unknown. A sense of danger and thrill comes from not knowing your exact location. There is a sense of discovery when you finally manage to find your destination. There is a sense of accomplishment and a triumph over the dark, mysterious world. I don’t understand why anyone would want to take that from an adventure. In our case, we had shows booked almost every night, and we had to be at venues to load in and get set up. But, we had an address for each venue and we often had hours and hours of waiting to burn that could be used finding a location by conventional means. Had we lost our ability to travel on our own? Had the search for efficiency surpassed our love for adventure? Had our insecurities of the unknown and our desire to conquer all in our taken gotten the better of us. Alas! I have to admit, the matter doesn’t need the melodrama, but I think it’s a shame that we’ve taken away some of the magic that travelling provides. GPS technology is great, but give it to the surveyors, police and emergency workers. Next time I’m on a road trip, I taking a good ol’ fashioned map, some gas and a renewed sense of adventure and that’s it!
I’ve listed some websites that review the Garmin we used as well as some of its competitors for anyone interested.
We infiltrated the Maritimes next to the town of Edmundston, a small community situated a few miles from the Maine/New Brunswick border. A predominantly francophone (93% French) town of about 16,000 people, the town made a perfect stop to stretch our legs and grab something to eat. Alas, the best we could find for traditional, homemade region cuisine in lovely Edmundston was grabbing a few loaves of bread at the local Walmart. I think all of us in the van were interested in enjoying some unique Maritime experiences while we were out there, but by the time we hit New Brunswick, exhaustion, low funds and disinterested had taken the drive or fascination from us. Instead, we relaxed with our snacks on the lonely curb next to the bookstore, happy to be out of our cramped vehicle and in the tepid Maritime air. We kept to ourselves as families walked with children in tow, chatting to themselves in a language none of us could understand or confidently answer. I found out a interesting little bit of history about La Ville d’Edmundston. The area around the town north of the Madawaska River was actually its own tiny country from 1783 to 1842. The Republic of Madawaska, as it was called, was made up of a mix of displaced American and British settlers that were caught up in an interesting border dispute following the American Revolution and the Treaty of Paris in 1783. Within this pocket of territorial ambiguity, a small, unrecognized republic operated, while both the governments of England and America claiming it as its own.
Flag of the Republic of Madawaska (Wikipedia.com)
The disagreement went on until hostilities brought things to ahead with the undeclared, often overlooked Aroostook War of 1838-39, which in turn formalized through treaty the border today. Needless to say, this interesting bit of information was lost to us in Endangered Ape. Our sights were on our show for the night, Moncton.
We were to play with local band, Thee Requiems and Halifax’s Stolen Minks, who generously booked and planned our Maritime leg of the tour. The road to Moncton was largely uneventful, most of us staring out windows or dozing off in the back, using equipment as ad hoc pillows. The rolling hills of the Appalachians crated a verdant landscape that tumbled endlessly into the hazy forever. I had become amazed by the endless vastness of our country and of its isolated communities that seemed to speckle it like constellations on across a green plane. I had always assumed that the Maritimes was a cramped corner of Canada, with gently rolling hills and dairy farms. Northern New Brunswick did not fit this pattern. From what I had seen on our trip, there was much more to it. Along Highway 2 (Trans-Canada), I could see only forest and the occasional road sign. Canada doesn’t have the endless coastline of build up and sprawl like the American East, nor the density of Europe and Asia. It is more a network of urban and semi-urban islands floating in a huge ocean of green, grey and blue. Beautiful and intimidating. My impression of Moncton was of a town fallen on some harder times. This assumption may have been misguided, I must admit, as the majority of our time was spent on St. George Boulevard where the venue was located. We had a few hours to burn before the other bands would show up, so we decided to stroll down Main Street for some adventure. It was a quiet Saturday night as we made our way down the narrow, winding street. The occasional group of young people shuffled outside the doorways of bars talking amongst themselves and left myself, Paul, Evan and Jane to walk down the brick laden sidewalk in search of a cafe or anything of interest. There had been news of growth and development in the ‘Moncton Miracle’, but perhaps my eyes were not sharp enough to catch up on it. Perhaps it was an off night. That being said, I did enjoy the solitude it gave us, walking along the empty streets north of the Petitcodiac River, nicknamed ‘The Chocolate River’, which runs through the middle of the city. After the heavy rain started coming down upon us, and Kent was propositioned by a prostitute while looking for food, we all started to think that perhaps, the river was made out of something less sweet than chocolate.
The Moncton Tower, by day. (source: adventuresofsaraandmorgan.com)
Regardless, we were on the trip of our lives and we weren’t going to be bothered by a little rain. We met the members of Thee Requiems outside the bar we were going play at, called the Five Points Pub, a stylish little room replete with martinis and expensive wine with a tiny little corner to work as our stage. Our initial venue closed down only a few days before we showed up in Moncton, so a replacement was quickly booked. In these semi-professional settings, venues like bars or community halls often feel through on their part of the bargain. Without big money contracts or promotion deals, improvisation frequently saved the day. The Five Points Pub wasn’t an ideal place to play, but for us in Endangered Ape, performing was at the forefront in our motives. The performance itself was the usual strange, perverted sideshow act it always is, highlighted by a very cramped playing area for 6 performers, one noticeably intoxicated elderly woman and a few dozen confused and irritated regulars to the bar. The Stolen Minks went on after us and delivered a solid set that made us feel better for even showing up to such a bizarre town. Thee Requiems finished off the night with a very amusing tune pleading audience members to buy their CD while meowing like cats into the microphone. It was weird and different, something we learned to appreciate from bands we’ve played with. After we had all packed up our gear and had a few drinks out of the cold rain, we were taken down to a neat little cafe down the road from the bar that served food after hours. It had been an old laundry mat converted into a single-room storefront with bar and bay window peering onto the quiet rainy street. That cafe came to define Moncton for me: A quiet, sleepy town that had perhaps seen better days. Wide streets and old buildings housing small, locally-owned businesses. Unintentional in any marketing ploy but enduring to both locals and tourists.
