When: October 22 1999, 7:00pm
Who:From This Day Forward, Team Craig and Three Orange Whips
The first band up was Team Craig They played a couple covers and a few of thier own. One thing to say about these guys, despite thier 'on again-off again' antics they've really matured and evolved from thier long-ago minor-niner days. Finally got those drums outta the house Phil? TC is pretty darn good if I may say so myself. Pop-punk, good beat, and probably excellent lyrics but those damn mikes, you couldn't hear a thing. Hopefully these guys will snag enough attention to play a big town show with mikes that don't suck.
From This Day Forward stormed onstage with their usual extreme intensity, with one exception, a new drummer. Don't know what exactly happened with Josh Dyck, but the replacement, Howie Joyce from Unarmed seems to know what he's doing. I still can't believe Matt Laforge, he seems to have something down his pants. He didn't stop moving for a second, while he continually walked and ran and jumped and nearly flew into the crowd. It seems Adam Solomonian's bad luck with strings "Dadario!!!!" surpasses even The Swing Set when Matt Ford yelled out; "Anyone got an A string?" Again the mikes sucked and I could hear only the lyrics they shouted, but with thier final song, "Won't Back Down." it worked out for the best. As Laforge had mentioned earlier it was "A fan favourite" so mostly everyone sang along, no need for mikes. The highlight of the show was Ford dedicating the set to Heather Sadler, she will be sadly missed, but certainly not forgotten. Not by any stretch of the imagination.
Finally was the band I had been waiting for, which again was marred by technical difficulties. THREE ORANGE WHIPS! Headliners of the night, I got what I paid for out of the night. When I came to the show, I knew it was ska but I had never even imagined that it would be this great, and I'm not sucking up cuz they're friends of mine. (Really! I'm not!) When I heard ska, I figured a couple trumpets, maybe a sax thrown in, and it was that! That and a whole lot more. It had a trombone and even the accordion. (Your Mum was right Terris, those lessons would pay off some day!!) It was fast, it was upbeat, it was oozing charm, it made me realize again, that I can't skank. I discovered this during a SkankTanks show and it still was evidently true. So instead I just sat back and took pictures as everyone else danced. These guys really weren't bad, lyrics that included throwing in some Canadian content with the mention of TVO and American culture with the evil's of Walmart crap i.e. "RCA bottom of the top line. Day old, garbage heap." The sound was only augmented by thier outfits. Pete(Trombone)Matt(Alto Sax) and Terris(Accordian and Tenor Sax) wore bright orange shirts and black ties with thier 'Foundation' Blair(Guitar, vocals) Adam(Drums, Vocals) and Andrew Elkington(Bass and Vocals) wearing Black shirts with orange ties. All that with the added bonus of orange tinted glasses.. Very classy! With the promise of even wilder outfits as thier fame and cashflow soars. Bright orange suits? Hmmmm...
Some side notes, I brought my sister to her first punk show. One of the things I should have considered the fact that these shows always start an hour later than they're supposed to. Another thing I should have considered was the fact that even small mosh pits can get a little rowdy. It was basically an attempt to open her to new music, something that didn't contain the phrase. "Hit me baby one more time!" Or "Living Livida Loca." I think she liked it. I don't think I've reformed her into a huge punk fan but hopefully next time she's in struggle whether to listen to the latest crap from Twitney or a decent ska tune she might give her own local scene a second glance.