Booche

I haven't posted my travel logs in a long time.  In honour of our good friend Bradm (who enjoyed my travel logs and loved it when this board was more active) I'm going to start posting them again.  Though I don't have anything solid on the horizon right now I did just get back from China, so here goes:
102317
I think this might be my record for most miles travelled versus least time prepping.  Getting randomly yanked off the street and thrown into an airplane would have been the only way I could have been any less prepared as I was when we left Ottawa for China this morning.  When I woke up at 7am I hadn’t even started packing yet, and our curfew for leaving the house to take the cat to the sitters was 9:30.  (Heather’s mom again; she seems to be getting slightly less annoyed by the chore every time).  
Frankly I hadn’t given the trip hardly a thought.  Leading up to today I had been busy getting a proposal together for a new book idea which completely distracted me from any thoughts of vacation.  After plugging away for the last week or so I had finished my rough draft at midnight last night and gone straight to bed.  
(This all completely falls in with the fact that I booked the trip to China with hardly a thought as well.  A while back I saw a post on facebook advertising an Air China seat sale to Hong Kong priced at just $501 per person, return from Montreal.  I told Heather about it, we shrugged and booked it.  How could we not?  Imagine how I felt when a few weeks later I saw another post advertising the same flights at just $400, these ones time departing from Ottawa!  Can’t win them all.)
Of course I got it together and packed with time to spare.  We dropped the cat off and made sure he was happy before circling the car around to the bus station where I left Heather and all of our luggage to stand in line for the Montreal bus.  I drove home, pounded a quick tall-boy and power-walked back to the Greyhound station, joining Heather in the Montreal line in thirty minutes flat.
And here we are sitting on the bus.  I’ve gone over the book proposal for a quick proof-read and will send it in from the airport.  Then maybe I can start to relax and think about Honk Kong.
Though I suspect I’ll just head straight to the nearest airport lounge and think about ordering a few drinks.
 

yeah, they played like a hurricane at massey hall.  was a fun encore.    
this band is infectious.  cool that y'all like them too.    
re: barr bros ... a definite hillside 17 highlight.  that would be a fun double bill.  

the FUCKING HORROR   Over the last few days I've just been trying to process this incredible loss to the extended social circle I am a part of as well as the extended community of music fans and musicians everywhere. It has been almost impossible to sit down and put fingers to keyboard because I really wish I could pretend it wasn't real.   Brad was, well Brad. A total one of a kind. Legit, straight up unicorn. Based on the many many talks we had about an endless variety of music, I feel that Brad captured and held captive that amazing and beautiful feeling of positivity and endless possibility in terms of his experience of music.( Not to say he wasn't opinionated about things. He certainly would tell you how he felt. Straight faced. No bullshit.) But he was far less jaded than I or (especially) my older music fanatic friends. I feel like he really was just searching for the beauty in the music all the time. I'm sure everyone can picture Brad's facial expression after a set of music he loved. When it came to music, he was passionate. Constanty. In a way I wish I could be.   That positivity was all around Brad's character. Guaranteed big hug, a cheers, maybe a shot. We could both go off on whatever guitar player or band had been blowing our minds in between having seen each other. When Brad retired I remember congratulating him and he had the best response... (imagine BradM voice) "Well Dave, in the 90's I didn't go out so much, I didn't have a girlfriend, and I didn't have a hard drug habit. So I saved a lot of money". Indeed! Every time I think about that, I laugh.   As a musician, you really couldn't ask for anything more. Someone who pays close attention but is really actively seeking the beauty out of every moment. That being said, if you really stunk it up and managed to talk with Brad before he left, he wouldn't bullshit you.    His mark on the Ottawa music community was massive. So much so that I think any of us will have a hard time even comprehending the scope of it. I'll tell my story, but then just imagine the hundreds of other musicians and thousands of listeners that were gifted so much by Brad.   I'm very fortunate that Brad took an interest in every musical thing I did or tried to do. If it weren't for Brad, there would likely have never been any nero reunion shows. Because I had to figure out how to play that stuff somehow! lol. I can't tell you how many times I have been thanking Brad at my desk while trying to figure out how I played something.    That's really just completely secondary though to the real gifts I got from Brad. I am a completely disorganized mess in terms of my music. I also have failed to plan ahead in any aspect of it. I'm so thankful that Brad recorded things that surely would have slipped into the ether.    Brad was at almost every show that I ever performed in Ottawa. He also made it to a bunch of Toronto ones. Just going back and looking at a couple of things I found an early solo show with a song I had written for my infant son. Totally something I had lost track of. I was able to download it and email my now 12 year old son the song to hear. That is really something. Really a gift that Brad gave me.  He also recorded a show that was a day after my grandfather passed. I did a cover of Daniel Lanois "the maker". I remember playing a solo in it and thinking about my grandfather and the bigger picture kinda stuff. Upon relistening, the solo isn't great. hahaha. But I know what was happening for me in that moment and I can go back and experience it. Thanks to Brad. Take those kinds of moments and multiply it by the hundreds of musicians he recorded. He really gave a lot.    I'll miss him very much.

Yep pink tie dye dress second in from the rail walkway. Right beside c-towns who is hiding behind his beer glass  In addition to Todd from Fat Cats and our friend who shall forever remain anonymous.
On another page in the book i was also able to find Large Marge, livingstoned and flymykitehigh
Some cool finds. But the book was well worth the purchase even before I stumbled upon that gravy

Sunglasses , pink tie dye. What do I win?

Thinking maybe I'd like to put this on my Christmas wishlist. Looks like it would be quite the collection. Last book I purchased by Blakesberg documented the GD50 shows. To my pleasant surprise I found myself and crew in one of the crowd photos months later. 
https://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.jambase.com/article/jay-blakesberg-announces-new-book-eyes-world-grateful-dead-photography-1965-1995&ved=0ahUKEwiz2I217LvXAhVJ74MKHWf3D7AQFgjHATAm&usg=AOvVaw30tKMaGZsIaFGEdF58w4IM

Check out our old drummer Nicks' recording of The Oct 31 2009 show by Mustashat at The Imperial Pub in Toronto, ON
It is available for download/stream at:
https://archive.org/details/mustashat2009-10-31
Thanks to Bradm for helping me with uploading shows to the archive, editing the tracks and naming them to etree standards.
 

... went to see War on Drugs couple weeks ago at Massey Hall.  really liked them.  they sound like modern dylan. 
 

I suspect a lot of you guys know this story but I think it was after this Dave Matthews show in 2001 when, on public transport back to Ottawa... well I hadn't really enjoyed the show and may have been venting a bit. I spotted a lanky fellow freak in a Phish t-shirt... and announced to everyone in the immediate vicinity "Now there's someone that knows good music". I told him about how nero was playing afterward, downtown and told him he should go see the show.
Years later and every now and then he'd sling his arm around me, reminiscing about that fateful night. It almost became comical, trying to remember who owed whom a round since the last show, since the last shared moment of musical magic, since the last exchange of the broadest of shit-eating grins. I think we've all heard that line from him "THIS is why I tape!" and everyone who did hear it couldn't help but feel that infectious unbridled joy.
Over the years his love of live music and enthusiasm for the next show never wavered. The number of friends he met and embraced along the way was and remains a shining example of the kind of unconditional friendship and love that we should all strive for. Farewell Brad, thank you for the legacy, the memories and the love.
 

Absolutely crushing and devastating. I woke up today hoping it was all a bad dream. Prior to moving to Kanata, Brad was at every occurrence of my being onstage and was beyond supportive. Brad helped me gain some confidence needed to keep on keeping on with regards to opening yourself up to a crowd of drunken revellers and for that I am eternally grateful. I cant believe there wont be one more hug and I am emotionally bracing the last one we shared in August.
Aloha BradM
 

That's what the guy said. He was standing a few feet away from me on the bus, and he had a Phil and Friends t-shirt on. I had a Phish t-shirt on, and we made eye/t-shirt contact, recognizing the common ground we had both tread on.
The "they" he was referring to was the Dave Matthews Band, and we were on our way back from seeing them at the Corel Centre.
"No, they're not," I replied.
"Well, if you like Phish, you have to check out 'nero'," he said.
That was the second time I'd heard that band's name that day; earlier, I'd had a reply from a guy I had e-mailed, who was looking for people to fill out a jamband he was forming. He didn't need a guitar player, but told me to check out 'nero' if I liked jammy guitar stuff.
"They're playing downtown tonight. You should come out," my bus-buddy said.
OK, I took the twice-hearing-of-a-band-I-didn't-know-in-one-day as a Sign, and went along.
It was a tiny, upstairs bar, and the decor was more like a biker hangout than a Nice Place. There was a stage over in the corner, with a trio of musicians' gear on.
The band started playing, and I was hooked. Walls of emotion-filled music wafted over me, wrapped around me, and then went through me. I don't think I'd ever been that close to something like that.
Time passed, and the band finished. Being a guitar player and a gearhead, I noticed something unusual: the guitarist's amp.
"Hi, I'm Brad," I introduced myself.
"Hi, I'm Dave," he replied.
"What model of Dr. Z is that?" I asked.
"Wow...most people don't know it's not a Zenith..."
Can you say "fast friends"? I thought you could...
Can you remember where you were or what you doing three years ago? I can: all of the all of the above happened on Tuesday, August 7, 2001, three years ago, today.
I walked away from the bar, The Whipping Post, with a couple of things: knowledge of a new (to me) band I liked a lot, a website to go to (then called The Phish Sanctuary), and a couple of new friends, including the guy I talked to him on the bus: Davey Boy.
I had spent most of the '90s living a quiet life. I might go to a show or two, but hardly ever a club; I didn't know many bands, and had a pretty small circle of friends. Some of my "hibernation" was due to a hangover from a pretty tough few years at school, but a lot of it was, I think, shyness, and the paralysis induced by a feeling of safety.
Since then, well, words almost fail me. I've made more friends, seen more shows (125 days with shows in 2003, alone), and done more in the past three years than I'd done in the ten years before. I don't amalgate well (there's a certain bit of loner in my psyche), but this community has, without thinking, I believe, it's just the way it works, welcomed me, and allowed me to grow and do what I can and be what I am (and have become). It's given me so much, and allowed me to give back so much, that, I can't (and don't want to) imagine what my life would be (and would have been) without all of it.
Bring on the next three years! (Well, after I get through celebrating the anniversary at GTB tonight. :
{{{{{{{{{all of you}}}}}}}}}
Aloha,
BRAD (Been Reminiscing About Daves)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1AWV3F8muI
 
 

An Indonesian group has covered "Insurrection" by Ottawa's The Souljazz Orchestra:
Aloha,
Brad

I just saw their show in Buffalo on Wednesday night. Unbelievable musicianship across the stage during all 3 sets.
So many notes played. Its kind of hard to put the experience into words.
 

Looks like I know what I am going to be doing, simply have to figure out where......................
https://www.jambase.com/article/john-mclaughlin-jimmy-herring-announce-free-webcast-featuring-4th-show-tour

Looks like I know what I am going to be doing, simply have to figure out where......................
https://www.jambase.com/article/john-mclaughlin-jimmy-herring-announce-free-webcast-featuring-4th-show-tour

Are we really so old and out of touch that NO ONE has mentioned that Kamasi Washington jammed on some Dead tunes?
Head to the 13 minute part and forget this show is at Red Rocks and buddy is jamming on Wolf along with Melvin Seals.................
 
 

Fuck you Davey Boy 2.0 - fucku
 

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/see-bob-dylan-cover-tom-pettys-learning-to-fly-in-concert-w509872
 
 
 
 

that was probably the best pub for catching bands back then and yes the Wellington was its name before it became Scherzo
I have a vague notion that the lineup was down the street that night but I may be misundermembering or something