2008-11-30: Creaking Planks feature at Thundering Word Heard

Vancouver's favorite open mic series on and off since its inception under T.Paul Ste.Marie and DJ Dutch Boy in 2001, we first featured there slightly over a year ago, following a strong reception at the BC:Clettes Rouge et Noir cabaret, and probably spent as much time trying to jockey everyone into place on the cozy stage as we did playing.  We ended up performing several times over a period of a few weeks and then totally dropped off the radar for months.  Let's see if we can't stagger things out a bit this time!  Thundering Word is now hosted by Bill McNamara and Wanda Nowicki, and it doesn't just have featured performers -- it's also a fully fledged open mic!  Turn up to Cafe Montmartre (4362 Main at 28th) around 7:30 pm to sign up and you, too, could share our stage.  Though probably not while we're on it -- there's hardly room enough for us as it is!  DJ Cassady will get you hooked up and we'll see what spoken word / music fusion may result.  (I'm on the edge of my seat!)

We should be returning to Cafe Montmartre January 11th to be the filling in a Petunia sandwich again, but you'll be hearing more about that closer to the date.

Edit: Bill made a new drawing to promote our appearance this night!  We only just found out about it upon arrival, but it's a swell "Night on Bald Mountain" rendition of our "jug band of the damned" tag-line.  Stand back and enjoy!

2008-11-28: Creaking Planks back at Velofusion for Spartacus!

We must have made a good impression last month, since we've been invited back to play the same party again! (The "Velofusion" Critical Mass afterparty at the ANZA Club, 3 W. 8th at Ontario.) So to make up for past misdeeds, we're going to play the exact same set, but entirely in reverse -- undoing everything we did previously!  We'll pay for our stage time, dancers will lift their stomps right off the dancefloor and everyone will spit fountains of beer back into their little red plastic cups.  What do you mean that's crazy talk? I think it's a great idea!  But, admittedly, perhaps one whose time has not yet come.  OK, you won me over -- we'll mix things up with some different players and different charts, but don't think that the mere passage of Hallowe'en can hold back the Song of the Count!  The Planks set is slated for ~9-10 pm.

The Orkestar Slivovica must have done something good last month also, since they've been invited back, too!  It'll be like a little reunion.  Oh, how much can change over the course of 30 days!  Also taking the stage that night are The Heard, Vital Divine, and DJ sets from Bee Winter and Adrian Blackhurst's global funk & Balkan beats!  The proceedings are fundraising this time around for Spartacus Books, the little anarchist bookstore that could, not only home to Squeezebeard's monthly "57 Varieties" open stage and Vancouver's only Esperantist group but also the ultimate wellspring for Accordion Noir! Admission is $10, but only $5 if you arrive with the Critical Mass.

2008-11-24: with the Lawn Dogs at the Railway Club

As part of a noble (if irrelevant) lineage of shows going back to the spring's SeaBus pirate party and further yet to an appearance at the Railway in April of 2006 that Tamara Nile set up for us, the Creaking Planks (need I remind you: THE JUG BAND OF THE DAMNED!) are once again descending upon the stage of the Railway Club (579 Dunsmuir Street) like a plague of, I don't know, sizzling bacon bits hurtling hatefully from the angry sky.  We've been paired this time around with The Lawn Dogs, a band billed as the best-dressed bluegrass band on Bowen Island... at our most elegant and dandified, conversely, we wear basic BC:Clette black and red with costume facial hair in places and styles it should never, ever, be growing.  These baying hounds should be taking the early set ~9:30-10:30, leaving us to close the night in our fourth Railway appearance in as many months.  As Mike Zinger of Whiskey Jar would be inclined to exclaim... "Not bad!"

2008-11-04: with Sister DJ's Radio Band at Zawa

This is it -- we can see a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel the world has been trundling through for the past eight years.  The question is: is it the headlight of an approaching train or a flicker of the genuine illumination of hope and freedom?  The accordion has been used to propagandize for both sides of the US Presidential election (strangely not so for our three rounds of voting municipally, provincially in by-elections, or nationally -- surely an underutilized gambit!) and Blackbox Squeezebeard for one would like to keep things non-partisan.  That said, tonight's show has gotten caught up in optimistic posturing as a welcoming party for Barack Obama (who will surely be weighing in approval on our renditions of Bob Uker's songs about unemployment and hopelessness, albeit via the television in the corner broadcasting his acceptance speech.)  And if the unspeakable should happen, we plan to follow the edicts of Leonard Cohen, as put forth in his poem The Music Crept By Us: "However since it is / New Year's Eve / and I have lip cancer / I will place my / paper hat on my / concussion and dance."

Hype and bombast aside,  the show promises to be a lively one with an 8 pm opening set from The Ahs (aka Lovenschtein and Schteigel) for a half-hour, Riel Hahn's comedy at 8:30 for another 30 minutes, then an hour of the humourous nostalgia of Sister DJ's Radio Band, who kindly invited us to play for an hour (starting at 10 pm) following their set.  All this hosted by Dave Malicki, plus that business on the TV set. All this goes down at Zawa (formerly Zesty's) at 920 Commercial Drive, with doors at 7 pm, for only $5.

...

This show has struck a chord!  Coverage not only by S.R. Duncan's "The Drive Is Alive" and Allan Macinnis' "Alienated in Vancouver" blogs (first promotional, then a review!), but our show was also mentioned on the front page of the Monday, Nov 3rd issue of the Vancouver Sun!

...

And here we were!

Photo by Femke van Delft

2008-10-31: Creaking Planks at "Veloween" Critical Mass afterparty

What with our tremendous success last time around we figured that we'd be a shoe-in for next year's (May) Pirate Critical Mass afterparty and that we'd be hearing back from the (pedal-)powers that be at that point.  Perhaps remembering our Zombiewalk introduction into Vancouver, they've seen fit, however, to invite us back to join them for the Velofusion party this month on Hallowe'en!  (We are the Jug Band of the Damned, after all.  We're humbled and flattered, but I hope they don't think that this Squeezebeard is just a costume merkin!)  Things get underway around 8 pm, with admission stated as $10 or $5 if you arrive with the Critical Mass in costume!

Other performances slated for the evening include our hornier separated-at-birth pseudo-sibling band Blackberry Wood, the Balkan marching band the Orkestar Slivovica, Miss Titty Kitty (come now, that name speaks for itself -- but let's not forget just how many titties kitties have!), a final performance from the full slate of Inject before percussionist Amrit parts ways to tour around India... and, rumour has it, a host of ghostly folks who really know how to dance along to Thriller.  (A further rumour, depending on weather conditions and the wonderful impaired judgment of the mob mentality, has proposed a late-night naked costume bicycle ride.  One thing we don't have, folks, is boring gigs.)

...

Also, we had a great time at the Parade of Lost Souls Saturday then also at Montmartre Sunday night with Petunia (and then another great time in Strathcona with Alison and a hot bowl of her bors... I mean, blood soup.) We should be back there soon, and I don't just mean for our Thundering Word feature spot November 30th!

Next up -- Zawa's on Tuesday Nov 4th with Sister DJ's Radio Band, but more about that later!

Planks wrap up October: Parade of Lost Souls, Petunia at Montmartre

We had so much fun at Horace Phair VI that we couldn't keep still. (Especially Scruffy Bigbass, who had a claustrophobic call of the wild in the middle of past-midnight highway construction in the vicinity of Everett.)

This year, for HPVII, with under half as many Planks on board, things were a little more sedate for us...

though Nite Brite, The Pathogens and Oven Mitts were quite literally rocking the block while everyone else drank their head off with a pint of the homebrew Budd Dwyer ale on tap.

Then our timing belt broke in Olympia on the way back, but that's  a whole 'nuther story (and a happy departure to a Planks tradition of strewing dead automobiles across the West Coast.)  Do you have your copy of our HPVII mix yet?

...

A week later, we hunkered down with Whiskey Jar to wish our mutual friend Wyoming Johnny a very happy birthday, and tonight, Saturday October 25th, we are letting our online following (all other locals have already made up their minds about attending this regardless of our participation) know that, following a seasonal squash-mangling, we will be logging an appearance (an earful at least) at tonight's Parade of Lost Souls, from six to nine pm in the Black Zone (at the intersection of William and Maclean, for the living.)

Tomorrow night, Sunday Oct 26th, we take to Cafe Montmartre (4362 Main Street at E 28th Avenue) to join roots showman Petunia in a brief opening set around 8 pm... to be followed by a drunken pumpkin-carving contest.

And as for Hallowe'en?  Do keep posted... we have a special surprise in store.

HPVII Souvenir Mix

In honour of four years now of service and due diligence, an unlikely trio of Creaking Planks once again find themselves at the Horace Phair (: Know Your Ancient Grains, and Go Straight To The Foreskin) with music to share.  Though our Video In sessions of this Spring are tantalizingly not quite ready for prime time, we like the idea of leaving little bits of ourselves behind ("have you ever seen a leper / drinking Dr. Pepper?") as memorabilia even after we stop playing live and mosey along.  So, although there are no demo CDs this time around, we have compiled a virtual mix (originally conceived of, a bit too late, as a muxtape) to commemorate our times here in different configurations, consisting of live recordings of various Planks performances at various venues over our long and storied history.  They may not be our sharpest-ever takes on these tunes (only those within microphone range), but despite the occasional blue notes there are inspired passages here on some Planks rarities largely unheard on prior recordings and give an impression of breadth beyond the steamroller of our contemporary "power set" (also represented here), documenting our varying energies and confidence levels as we've matured as performers (and not, for instance, as humourists.) Here's the track listing:

• 1. Snazzy Portland (from the Solstice show in Victoria Feb 1st, 2008)
• 2. Sandwich Artist (from our Thundering Word Heard feature at Cafe Montmartre Oct 21st, 2007)
• 3. Re: Your Brains (from the Travis + Rowan PAVI session in the Spring of 2008)
• 4. Insane in the Membrane (from our Cafe Montmartre night Nov 7th, 2007)
• 5. Never Give A Puppy For Christmas (Solstice)
• 6. I Saw Polly In A Porny (from our set at the Penthouse Aug 10th, 2008)
• 7. Man Cougar / Lousy Lover (Penthouse... all run together)
• 8. Taking My Oyster For Walkies (Solstice)
• 9. Blown Away (A night of sad songs 2 at Blim April 23rd, 2005 -- our first show with Blackbox!)
• 10. Love Cats ... and the Song of the Count intro bonus! (Penthouse)
• 11. Osasa (Solstice)
• 12. Numbers and Names (Penthouse)
• 13. Closer / American Wedding (Penthouse)
• 14. Shakespeare's Got a Gun (Solstice)
• 15. O Superman (Montmartre)
• 16. Happy Birthday / Volga Boatmen medley (Solstice)

Here you go! As Douglas Adams might have said, share and enjoy.