2011-01-01: Pleasing Squeezing revisited, with Ingrid Gatin and Fang!

Proving that some of their squeezy bills of 2010 were impossible to top, CFRO's Accordion Noir is proud to present a repeat bill from a show they and us hosted in May, this time at the Railway Club (579 Dunsmuir Street) with the sing-along sensation Fang and Winnipeg's squeezing siren Ingrid Gatin. Start the year off on a high note and see if we can top it in 2011!

All that plus at midnight we turn over the Railway's stage to Gold Stars Are For Suckers, who have nothing to do with great accordion music but can still give up a good time. $10 / $8 for Railway members.

2010-12-19: Creaking Planks at Memewar launch

The jug band of the damned shows its meagre warm and cuddly festive side as we help to celebrate the launch of the 12th issue of Memewar Magazine. We're on from 9:30-10:30 pm at the Railway Club, 579 Dunsmuir Street at Seymour (upstairs).

2010-12-18: Planks and friends at a Celtic/folk/rock holiday party!

The jug band of the damned doff our hats and join Cameron Gunn and a slew of musical friends for an intense, intimate evening at the Billy Bishop Legion Hall at 1407 Laburnum Street. Join us and Craic!, the Knackers, the Gentle Infidels and the WhiskeyDicks. Admission is $12 or $10 with a donation to the Vancouver Food Bank.

Wait, here's a newer copy:

2010-12-10: Planks play at Little Mountain Gallery FUN-raiser at theRickshaw

It's time to throw our weight behind a cause that's directly benefited us, the little Little Mountain Gallery where we've brought so many good times to so many. When the house falls, you can no longer call yourself a house band!

Denied its bread-and-butter, indie live music performance, by ossified regulations from No Fun City's Big Book of No Fun, the LMG is compelled to mount another fundraiser, charitably hosted by David Duprey at the Rickshaw Theatre (254 E. Hastings.)

Acts on the bill will include Zachary Gray (of the Zolas), Pineapple, Resorts, Dandi Wind and the SSRIs... along with the jug band of the damned, of course!

"THIS NIGHT WILL BE LIKE WASHING DOWN CAKE WITH MILK SHAKE..."

Your all-ages admission is a suggested $10 - $20 sliding scale fee but they want everyone to know that no one will be turned away!

2010-11-28: Creaking Planks at Cafe Montmartre

While we made some improbable new Portland friends at last month's Montmartre gig, we thought that we might like to stack the deck a bit and power-load the evening with an old friend -- Little Mountain Gallery arts godfather (which we'll in turn be shilling for Dec 10th at the Rickshaw) and incomparable comedic musical improviser Ehren Salazar. (4362 Main Street at 28th, by donation, 8-11 pm.)

2010-11-27: Creaking Planks at the Orange Party

In some form or another, East Vancouver has been seeing on-and-off Orange Parties (vs. mere lower-case orange parties) since approximately 1990, celebrating supreme orangitude by convening in orange buildings, wearing orange clothes, eating orange food, drinking orange drinks, swimming in orange hot tubs and listening to orange music. The Orange Art Society formed in 2002 and since then regular Orange Festivities have been well-known ("Why is everybody buying orange clothes this week?" asked Burcu, while those of us in the loop shared a wink) and loved among certain segments of East Van's Burner community, with representation from key members of the Fool's Society and frequently incorporating big noise from the Carnival Band.

This year, because life is too short to wear boring shoelaces, we are going to discover just how orange we can make our music. (We often play blue; the color wheel theory suggests that orange will be the opposite.)

As the party is taking place at a very orange private residence, it's not clear how much further we can disclose regarding the proceedings, but as a consolation for the tragically un-orange, our performance the following night is open to all!

2010-11-08: Planks play CoDev benefit at Spartacus with the Gram Partisans

The jug band of the damned joins forces with East Van's political folkies in the Gram Partisans, playing a benefit for CoDevelopment Canada. Spartacus Books, 684 E. Hastings, 8-10 pm, $10.

2010-10-30: Creaking Planks at Cafe Deux Soleils

Hot on the heels of our first costume ball of the season the night before, the jug band of the damned moves up the street (just a couple of blocks) to Cafe Deux Soleils (2096 Commercial Drive) to help raise some unruly spirits (from the remnants of the Parade of Lost Souls, no doubt) with the help of our delightfully dark friends Maria in the Shower and Jeff Andrew with his Crows at Midnight. 9 pm, $10.

2010-10-29: Creaking Planks play at Witches and Warlocks Critical Mass afterparty

What are you doing after this?

How about this?

Witches, warlocks and other Hallowe'en creatures that bump in the night, lend me your ear(wig)s! Our night to celebrate the powers of light and (mostly) the dark is nigh upon us! The cursedly Creaking Planks will begin the evening, after which Little Woo will alter the fabric of the space-time continuum, transporting us to "The Silent Kingdom" with shades of puppets.

The heresy of the Blackberry Woods will lead us into a Bacchanalian trance of dance madness, and the wizard known only as Timothy Wisdom will weave enchantments of endless motion until the late hours. Potions will be drunk and demon's gate spells will be cast.

The party rolls at the Grandview Legion Hall upstairs at 2205 Commercial Drive; admission is $10, or $8 if you arrive as part of Critical Mass. The carriages turn back into pumpkins at 2 am.

2010-10-24: Creaking Planks at Cafe Montmartre

The sun sets earlier and people enter an oasis of routine and everyday schedule between the end of summer and the start of holiday madness. Defying this so-called everydayness, the jug band of the damned takes to the Montmartre stage once again for the first time since May. By donation.

2010-09-28: Creaking Planks live on CaBaRadio

It was a cold, wet, late night at UBC, and as the witching hour approached we wondered if any of our fans would be hearing the three of us make merry music over the airwaves, courtesy of Teddy Smooth and E-roc at CiTR's CaBaRadio. Maybe not. But still -- there's always the Internet's long memory (sorry, tail) to fall back on. Thrill as we (eventually) reflect on our origins and quip regarding the recent Accordion Noir Festival! And enjoy three great tunes, including one recently exhumed while Stateside from the ancient past.

Here's the recording! And here's the playlist!

• Creaking Planks Trio - Insane in the Membrane (Cypress Hill): 12:57-16:30 (3:33)
• Creaking Planks Trio - CaBaRadio stinger: 16:31-16:40 (0:09)
• Creaking Planks Trio - Kiddie Closer (Nine Inch Nails): 16:41-20:34 (3:53)
• Creaking Planks Trio - (Hit Me) Baby One More Time (Britney Spears): 26:42-29:29 (2:47)

Bonus! Hear us simmer in the background as we promote a different radio station's affairs!

2010-09-24: Accordion Noir Festival Squeezebox Dance Party

The third annual Accordion Noir fest is upon us again, a whole week of festivities already underway (click here for full details) and as with the previous two years, the Creaking Planks simply had to log an appearance celebrating the bountiful local supply of the wonderful squeezy weirdness whose virtues the Accordion Noir radio show / podcast extols weekly. Otherwise put:

Friday, Septemeber 24th -- Vancouver's number one squeezebox dance party: Mezamazing, Maria in the Shower, the Orkestar Slivovica and the Creaking Planks!

This Friday night, we celebrate two of the greatest mechanical inventions of the 19th century: the accordion, brought to life in the hands of some of East Van's most bombastic purveyors of dance music from the Balkans and points further out in left field, and the bicycle, rolled along Vancouver's moist lanes and byways in defiance of the notion that the change of season has to bring with it a change in attitude.

Enjoy an earful of the sweet people-powered music that ruled over the pubs and campfires before steam power ruined everything, starting at 9 pm upstairs at the Grandview Legion Hall (2205 Commercial Drive) and running late into the night. Everyone can enjoy the show for the low price of $10, but helmet-clad Critical Mass riders pay only $8!

2010-09: Planks Island Tour with Uni & her Ukulele

What was previously alluded to can now be stated plainly: the Creaking Planks are returning to Vancouver Island, with fewer stops than last time -- only two, making for a killer weekend with our Californian uke-slinging pal.

Friday, Sept 10th, we'll be back at the Duncan Garage Showroom playing for an unruly crew of Long John and some of Duncan's finest connoisseurs of humourous musical mayhem.

Saturday, September 11th, we take on Victoria's Fort Cafe (742 Fort Street) not only with Uni in tow but also Victoria's own squeezebox madman David P. Smith headlining a thrilling night of killer tunes on outsider instruments -- doors at 7:30, music at 9.

Then, Sunday, September 12th, we return home for our second year at the Fringe Festival bar (you can catch us in the program!) at the St. Ambroise Fringe Bar at Agro Cafe (1363 Railspur Alley, Granville Island), where not only will Uni be joining us again, but also Dr. Steelhand's alter ego, Travis the Magician, promoting his Fringe show Things That Never Happen.

2010-09-07: Creaking Planks back at the Railway Club for more Memewar

On short notice all around, en lieu of visiting Gibsons again (RIP Wild Bistro! And too darn bad we missed the Gumboot train) we're joining our good friends at Memewar Magazine for another 'do celebrating their rag down at the Railway Club, (579 Dunsmuir Street, upstairs) with the Jeremy Braax Band, Brent Lawrence, and our new best friend for the next week, California's Uni & her Ukulele. (Stay tuned for more information about further upcoming shows with her, and for an account of our adventures in California!)

Things have been so hairy in the coming and going (everything except for Blackbox Squeezebeard, that is) we've even had a few good times come up on us so suddenly we didn't get a chance to talk them up here -- times like last week's other Railway appearance, at Redrick Sultan's tour send-off Aug 29th, the killer Steinberg summer party at the end of July, and our last intersection with our Memewar friends, playing a set of songs about cryptozoology to kids at the CNIB camp on Bowen Island. How awesome is that?

And then of course there's the Accordion Noir Festival coming up in a couple of weeks... but one post at a time, friends!!

2010-08-12: Planks play Alex Cieslik's "Outside Access" art opening at the Little Mountain Gallery

Alex "Scruffy Bigbass" Cieslik, who once had a painting stolen while playing guitarrón with Planks at that fateful Rouge et Noir cabaret, hasn't been seen much in a Plankian context since our Gibsons visit of June '09... but does have a new body of visual work ready to present to the public's scrutiny at the old Little Mountain Gallery (195 E. 26th Ave.) we've all logged so many hours into propping up. It's been Quite Some Time (two and a half years?!) since the last time we played an art opening there, but these strange little gigs were positively fundamental in the development of the Creaking Planks. I highly recommend playing art openings on a regular basis to all new bands!

The exhibition runs from Thurs Aug 12th through Thurs Aug 26th; we will however only be performing there opening night.

2010-08: Planks Cariboo tour

Did you see our Church set from last year's ArtsWells festival in the Barkerville ad on the inside front cover of this year's Summer Festival BC Musician issue?

Look a bit more closely...

Well, we had so much fun at last year's ArtsWells Festival at Wells and Barkerville, BC, we're going back this BC Day weekend.  Around 1:15 pm Saturday, July 31st, the Creaking Planks will be performing at the Sunset Theatre for just about an hour, following Blackbox Squeezebeard's hosting the "Bellows on Fire" accordion workshop at noon at the outdoor stage.

You'll see more Planks at the festival, including Blackbox hosting the mainstage Saturday night (featuring our friends from Fish & Bird, Geoff Berner, and The Burning Hell!) and being ritually shorn at Sunday's 1-Minute Play Contest to further fundraise for the festival beyond what we raised hosting the WellsAid concert earlier this summer... the question on everyone's lips is of course Will he have to be issued a new pirate codename?

Following the ArtsWells Festival, while we're all up in thar part of the world we've planned to join our favorite songwriter in his hometown, turning the tables, and join Raghu Lokanathan for a show in Valemount Tuesday, August 3rd, at the Anglican-United Church hall (1175 7 Ave).

The next day, Wed, Aug 4th, the Creaking Planks swing over to Prince George's ArtSpace (above Books & Company, 1685 3rd Ave) to play a show with Johnnie Ninety-Nine, our most northerly gig yet!

Time Will Tell: RIP Skulltits McGee, 2010-07-09

Over the course of the three nights of the B:C:Clettes' 2007 Rouge et Noir cabaret, three women asked if they could join the band and perform with us, one after each night's show. Anja never did, Lucy became a true Planks regular, and Glenna joined us on-stage on the following night rocking the percussive possibilities of a bike frame; when polled, the audience thought that it was not her but Scruffy Bigbass who was the fresh new Plank (as she was dressed to party while he was just in his civvies.)

Though we did lure Glenna out to a practice after the stupendous cabaret (her self-chosen pirate codename reflective of her taste in tattoo subjects and locations and fondness for the movie Anchorman), we never got another chance to perform with her; now we never will.

A day before her 28th birthday, emerging artist and competitive skateboarder Glenna Evans was killed Friday in North Vancouver when she failed to negotiate a turn at the bottom of a steep hill.

Our intersection was brief but remembered. She will be missed by a wide variety of small and vibrant communities, and the extended community of Planks is just one more star in the mourning constellation.

2010-06-13: Planks play at Velopalooza finale in Strathcona Park

Unless something goes very wrong (or, if you prefer to have a half-full view, very right), this is anticipated to be the last Creaking Planks performance on our home turf for just about three months. (Hope you got a copy of our CD to remember us by while the getting was good! Of course, our mux of live bootlegs should still be up, however long in the tooth it's getting.) The occasion is the closing party of the estimable Vancouver Velopaloloza festival of bicycles and bicycle culture, with which the CPs have been long (if loosely) associated, dating back to our performances at last year's Bicycle Music Fest, at the B:C:Clettes' Rouge et Noir Cabaret, at the RevPhil's "Bike Porn" film night and still earlier.

Speaking of "earlier", our set will be starting promptly at noon, in Strathcona Park (at Prior between Hawks and Raymur -- out behind the Casa Gelato!), for one half-hour, following a set from Buck and Jess and preceding sets by the likes of Ndidi Cascade, the Carnival Band, the Wonderful Diving Horses, The Thick of It and the Deadwax Collective.

For more information about the festival, please see their website.

2010 Winter/Spring -- What We Missed Telling You About PLUS a homophonic side project

For a season, from mid-December to mid-April, we temporarily lost control of our domain name (in fact, it switched off while I was in the middle of composing a promotional draft here!) and information about the Planks was unavailable from this site. We still played lots of great shows, however, and this is just an attempt to keep the historical record in order. Just because nothing turned up on the website didn't mean that we weren't busy little buccaneers!

2009-12-26 - the Maclean's Boxing Day party in Deep Cove.
2010-01-06 - at Bandidas' anniversary party.

2010-01-12 - Blackbox Squeezebeard on Melodies in Mind.
2010-01-14 - at Trees Organic Coffee.
2010-01-15 - featured at Beats on Broadway.

2010-01-16 - at One Two One Studios' launch.

2010-01-22 - A Night of Pleasing Squeezing with Renee de la Prade and Amber Lee Baker (the Accordion Babes), Gerry O'Brien, and Jack Garton of Maria in the Shower at Cafe Montmartre.

2010-02-26 - Dollhouse Tea Party.

2010-02-28 - Another Night of Pleasing Squeezing with Jeff Andrew, Marie-Josee Houle, Jason Webley at the LMG.

2010-03-28 - with Convertible Kids at the LMG.

2010-04-08 - with Raghu Lokanathan trio at the LMG.

2010-04-15 - Can You Hear Me Now? F*Word fundraiser at the Railway Club.

2010-04-21 - at Ubuntu LoCo at the HD Lab.

We've enjoyed a couple of shows since that we've mostly been able to keep you abreast about here, and are on the verge of splitting for the summer (one more -- set aside noon, June 13th!), but before we go we can tie some Plankian threads together with a Go-Your-Own-Waste presentation of the Music Waste festival featuring frequent CP collaborators Erin Graves and Ehren Salazar with bonafide Plank Eryn Holbrook (aka Daisy Jones-Locher of the santur) and marvelous improv outsider weirdo Aaron Read at the traditional Plank venue of the Little Mountain Gallery (195 E. 26th at Main). This Friday, June 4th! Only $5, and free for festival passholders! 8 pm 'til we're done! The most homophonic bill of the year: Erin, Ehren, Eryn and Aaron in Err On: the Side of Caution. It'll be a slice. (Actually, imagine a pizza divided into four slices, all of which are different flavours, and at least one slice of which isn't even pizza... but maybe apple pie.)

2010-05-31: Planks get good press, play Deet Street birthday party

The morning of the Cabaret of Wonders! we awoke to strange and marvelous news: the recording which we had debuted last June had garnered a positive review in Vancouver's free weekly arts paper of record, the Georgia Straight!

Attendees of early Creaking Planks shows—say, at the first Vancouver Zombiewalk after-party, where Rowan "Blackbox Squeezebeard" Lipkovits (accordion) and Lee Shoal (ukulele, kazoo) did somewhat halting covers of songs like the Kingston Trio’s "Zombie Jamboree" — could be forgiven for thinking the band a joke. A funny joke, and certainly an in-joke, but not a group you might turn to for the pleasures of polished musicianship, even of the jug-band variety. Well, here’s a surprise: as if to illustrate the truth of the saying that a fool who persists in his folly shall become wise, the Planks have benefited from playing innumerable shows locally and throughout the Pacific Northwest. While still richly swathed in irony, the traditionals on this CD (European and/or Yiddish folkie fare like "Tanz Tanz Yidelekh" and "Moscow Nights" and the absurdly deadpan covers—including a new recording of Lipkovits's delightful arrangement of the Minimalist Jug Band's "Dead Man's Pants"—are, in fact, quite beautifully conceived and credibly played.

That night, at the gobsmacking Cabaret of Wonders!, we sold our last two remaining copies of the suddenly-in-demand disc. Perhaps a reprinting will be in order -- though we may have seen the last of the limited-edition stylish metal containers.

But enough resting on our laurels! Moving on from past glories, an increasingly rump Planks (blasted summer travels -- and I'm up next!) will be wigglin' and groovin' tonight at the Railway Club (579 Dunsmuir Street) from 9:15 on with our Deet Street friends, including the slam poetry of Lara, the "folk/rock/blues stylings of the Dennis Pimm Jamtacular Experience", and our favorite -- a puppet show entitled "The Tragic Tale of Pierrot" presented by Carnival Sized Cinnamon Hearts. $7/5 for Railway members!

Bonus! A doodle from Chloe Ziner of the Mind of a Snail puppet troupe!

2010-05-27: Planks close Cabaret of Wonders

Back to the Little Mountain Gallery (195 E. 26th) for the second time this month, this time for a considerably more substantial bill -- hark, hark, the Cabaret of Wonders has come to town! This concerted return to vaudeville was spearheaded by our magical slide guitar player Dr. Steelhand and will feature the many improbable talents of, we are told...

• The incredible juggling and clown of Flying Not Falling!
• Scorching hot burlesque from 2009 Burlesque Hall of Fame Best Debut winner Melody Mangler!
• Musical hilarity from the legendary Ehren Salazar!
• Sideshow stunt brilliance from Sean Covernton!
• Mind reading by the unbelievable Dave Moses!
• Magic from Master of Ceremonies, Travis Bernhardt!

as well as a solo set from our own Blackbox Squeezebeard and a closing set from the jug band of the damned, the Creaking Planks!

Tickets at the door are a bafflingly low $15, $12 if reserved in advance!

2010-05-13: Accordion Noir presents... Still More Pleasing Squeezing

The latest installment in the Accordion Noir radio show's series of exciting alt-accordion concerts, this evening of Pleasing Squeezing (Thurs May 13th) returns to Cafe Montmartre (4362 Main Street at 28th Ave) with an exciting triple-bill: not only does the jug band of the damned return to its old squeezing grounds, but joining us are Fang, the new duo side-project of Barbara Adler (who last played with us there at last year's memorable Accordion Noir Festival launch party) and Winnipeg's fabulous Ingrid Gatin.  We play for tips at Montmartre, so you have no excuse not to join us and our joyful noise!

2010-05-08: Planks join Story and Cud Eastbound from PEI

Trying to get back into the swing of things, one typically strange Planks engagement has already slipped through our nets -- but here's our next show!  An early one, 6-8 pm this Saturday, at the Little Mountain Gallery (195 E. 26th at Main, where we've had so many good times.)  You pays your cover, you gets to enjoy not only the jug band of the damned but also (border delays willing) headliner of the 2009 Accordion Noir Festival, squeezepunk Sam "Story" Wright from PEI, as well as her traveling partner on the "Lost Tour", Cud Eastbound.

2010-04-11: Pirate party at the HD Lab with the Planks, Ursula, The Rough Sea and Jeff Andrew!

After a long and eventful absence, our website is back just in time for us to tip you off about a show we're playing tonight! Sometime soon we'll do a bit of looking back to make you netizens want to eat your hat in regret of what you've missed over the past few months, but in the meantime, there's no better time to jump right back in -- we've got plenty of shows in April and May.

We're the home team for tonight's show, with Jeff Andrew, Ursula and (part of) the Rough Sea all having been on the road for some time weaving and wending as the trade winds blew them. These strange currents deliver us all up (after many changes of plans over the past few months) at the HD Lab tonight, Sunday, April 11th, where the old Memelab formerly was: 1814 Pandora Street, upstairs, right by Free Geek. (Take a left at Chicken Death!) We'll be headlining (last), but things are expected to generally get underway around 8 pm.

And now, a poster!