July 26th re-cap

The marathon weekend of site updates continues with last weeks supper show review.

We started out with the Wreck of the Edmuns Fitzgerald led by King Dinosaur... a dog of a song that I will never play again.

King Dinosaur did a noble job but as some mentioned that song is fucked... I don't know what you can do... Kill some verses or speed it up. Kudos to the Rheostatics for their ability to make that song fly.

Next up Weave Cleveland, a master guitar player and a fine singer hit a few covers and an original song.

12 tandem Repeats still reeling from another slaughter at the hands of "the wreck of the E.F" started with much turbo power and perhaps took a few songs to find the groove. Apparently there was a fantastic version of "Saskatchewan" although I am still afraid to check out that tape. Simian Special came out to sing "Bent" as a duet with S. Robertson and then "Maiden" and 21TR had found their legs... Just in time to close the show with "last call".

Oh yea, there was a free emergency poncho giveaway that nobody won so S. Robertson stripped and danced and played with the sexy plastic while singing Mr. Greenie.

July 19 re-cap

The stalwart Willingdon Black missed the show due to an "upper body injury", and Hobbs came late due to a long session in the studio.

That left Super Robertson, Alvaro Rojas and Aaron Joyce to work a bass, guitar, drums, Slide guitar and clarinet.

Fire-Man and Chris Hicks opened the show with the new Super Robertson Supper Show theme song, Rojas joining them on bass and Robertson wisely stayed off the drums. But then it was time to rip it up and rip it up they did with Fire-Man somehow staying on the stage to blow horn for the first number "Tasmania go find another sucker".

Then a Blues number with Robertson screeching his vocals in a drunken like drawl. The drums and the room fell silent and the crew performed a medley from 21 Tandem Repeats "the ocean is life" doing Ode to Hummingbirds, Ode to Sun and Visions of Milan with just bass, slide and vocals. Then they kicked her back up for the song "Mr Greenie" which was around the time the Hobbs came into the room... An overzealous Robertson exclaimed "Hobbs is in the house!" and the crowd cheered. Hobbs then strolled casually back to the bar and ordered a beer.

Well what to you know it was 8:05 time to set up for the sprint.

Out on Dunsmuir street we set up a finish line ribbon waited for a red light... about 15 people lined up and sprinted.
The gold Medal went to Dave Parchomchuk the Silver to S. Robertson and the bronze to Dustin Rilcof. Even a diving Pockets couldn't make up at the finish line. The race generated quite the interest from passers by and there was cheering for the victor.


So back to the club... Robertson sprints up and across the room and dives behind the curtain and almost knocks over Fire-Man who is helping out the jam with some horn. Then pockets and Robertson duel in stories with pockets winning that round pushing Robertson on to the clarinet to double Fire-Man's horn parts.

Then Robertson on bass, Rojas on Guitar, Joyce on slide, Hobbs on drums the band hit three ROADBED numbers Bent, Bengal Tiger (dedicated to the ailing WB) and a special request DEEP FRIED.

As far as an hour of chaos goes that was one of the good ones.

Damn Skippy, If WB is having this much fun it must have been one king hell show.

We could even pretend that the show started with the number Bay City Kitty and carried on from there.

The truth is that there was a rather bad disaster at the start of the show... We can say that Super Robertson was to blame for an unfortunate incident on the drums. It is an arguable point but we can leave it at that, and a lesson has been learned.

Aaron Joyce joined 21TR with a slide guitar and it was a real treat.

Next week we sprint at 8:10 PM sharp

Peter Lolly seems to be challenging SNAPSHOT for Photo supremacy.

< http://lolley.ardist.com/photo/default.asp?ShowSub=People/Peter/Supper%20Show/>

July 5 re-cap

A good time was had by S. Robertson until the next morning when he was suffering from sleep deprivation.

Then you wonder why, has S Robertson just cracked a beer an begun writing in a blog at 10:40PM.

Is it because he feels some duty to the ritual of the show? Or is rather the ritual of the blog? Or is he just a confused simple son of a bitch?

Sim Special came out to sing and we attempted the Wreck of the Edmunds Fitzgerald and a few Supersimian songs.

A guy with curly hair and glasses noted that the last act was superb... Shockk on drums, W.B. on Guitar, SR on Bass, Fire-Man on horn (did i just write that!) all while Pockets and SR exchanged stories about their fathers.

I don't know what the hell I'm doing some days except for Wednesdays I go down to the Railway Club and try to continue the Super Robertson Supper Show for some strange reason or another.

Alvaro Rojas returns to the Supper Show Stage tomorrow night and I might even bring a clarinet

June 28 re-cap

After the show I talked to a woman named Christine, a friend of Alvaro Rojas, who said her favorite part was when Super Robertson ran laps around the room.

I asked her if we were to graph her favorite part on the y axis to the show time on the x axis, then how far would the second peak be from the top peak.

She didn't answer that question due to some reasons we can only speculate on.

Another member of the audience was intrigued by Mr. Willingdon Black and wanted to hear him sing more.

There seemed to be a lot of laughs last night so I guess all went well.

June-21 Re-cap

During the 21TR set 2 Fine performers "Rachel" and "Anne" came up and started dancing... then they started play fighting and ripped each others clothes off.

Other musical entertainment happened but for some reason I can't recall it.

June 14 re-cap

Well I had spent the day walking around the neighborhood with my daughter getting signatures for a petition to try to have some influence on the monstrosity of a building that is set to go in behind my building between my window and the mountains.

CT had taken some letters to city hall earlier in the day and was running late. The Oliers were also fighting for their playoff lives. I was running late and I ran into a joint getting the signatures from one of the more friendly hippie type neighbor's.

Willingdon Black was all set up and ready to go when I burst onto the scene with 10 minutes to go until show time. Now I usually ask WB "how's it going" to which he replies "adequate". I made mention a few days before about his answer to which he replied Perhaps a new question is in order. So I hit him with "So WB you been keeping with the doctrine?", a fancy new way of saying what's up... This confused Black. I had a drum kit to set up, and the game was on...Somebody asked What's happening tonight... Hell I don't know there is still 2 minutes till show time lets not rush into anything. Then Shockk showed up I made a slight joke about being glad he was there to help finish setting up the drums... He said "you are not glad to see me" ( a good leader spends time alienating his crew before a big show)

Turns out Alvaro Rojas brought a band of Mike Magnison on drums and Cory Curtis on bass and him on guitar. I told them to take the stage and went back to watch the last 8 minutes of the Oilers/ Hurricanes game. Then people came back and started harassing me for the show starting 5 minutes late and me being back at the bar not ready to do My regular intro where I speak on the mic... I have a regular intro???... Yes indeed hey there is some music I raced up to the stage asked Alvaro if they had a name or if it mattered... He said I didn't matter so I introduced them as some band from Germany that begins with the letter S and raced back to the game.

They were excellent and provided a great suspense soundtrack for the last 5 minutes of the game which ended in a tie set for overtime... I came back out and for the first time in the day had a moment to stop and enjoy life. The band was kicking it up so I decided it was time for a workout... Time for some aerobics but then the band stopped me like a bad check... Probably a good thing. Alvaro asked for the game score and they played some more.

There is a new character in the novel that is the Supper show... A long haired skinny postal worker who has nothing good to say about any band playing... He walked by and said "what the hell are you listening to this Surf shit for?". Classic!

The boys ended their set an we tried 2.5 minutes of extreme poetry... I had no disguise so I put a sweater over my head.

21 tandem repeats took the stage with Shockk on drums. We took some heckling from the folks at 1124 east 10th ave, which gives me an idea for another show.... We could have a mic in the audience and have heckle night.

Of the songs 21TR played I was Hey Rock's livingroom I didn't bother to sing the end line "never bring things to my attention I apologize" as my story about Bill and Greg took a different turn. After the show I was scolded by some audience members for missing that, which I guess means that people are listening and enjoying which is about the best news of the night.

I tried to explain how I became Super Robertson but the truth is a long and fragmented story that I could only touch upon while Black, Rojas and Shockk held it down.

Edmonton won in overtime while we were playing... I was offered an update during our set, and I tried to take the shockk approach "who cares hockey sucks we have music here"... Pockets said "but it is good news" and that little part of my heart felt some joy.

What happened on June 7

BEER YOGA

that's what happened.

Everybody was nice and loose after that.

Shockk on drums

The may 31 2006 version of the Supper show saw Skockk on Drums.

It always shocks me when somebody says "I didn't know shockk could play drums". Listen to track 1 of last Dance @ the shockcenter, and you will hear that patented Shockk energy from those lightning fast appendages of his.

There was no special guest this week although Fire-Man did over-honk during the drum solo portion of the song "Wastelands".

21 Tandem Repeats brought out some new tunes this week and one of them saw Willingdon Black on lead vocals. I believe the song was called "Heidi Stopover", it was a groovy number with some fine black'n'blues vocal melodies.

The gracious crowd came to listen that night and at times overwhelmed the band with vigorous applause.

A fine show indeed

Earl Parrish

Now that the show is good the blog of the show needs to be destroyed

Well Don Alder is a monster of a Guitar player for sure... That was the main lesson of the show a few weeks back.

It looks like this Bloody blog has gone to the dogs.

Last week City Wide Walkie Talkie slipped out of their rehearsal spot for a very rare appearance playing 3 songs. It was cool shit.

Roger Dean Young helped celebrate Bob Dylan's 65 Birthday by dong a Dylan number backed by the Supper Show All star band.

Black- Who almost missed the show probably wished he did when he saw 2 honking keyboards in his patented stage spot.

Roger Dean Young- Was hoping to remain low key and watch a basketball game and then sing a song but got unfortunately drawn into SR's antics.

Hobbs- Played a stalwart set on Drums.

Rojas- Continued in his quest to lengthen songs and was later met with a Knuckel sanwich.

Robertson- is slowly discovering how to keep the attention of the crowd to the great peril of 21 tandem repeats as a fine song machine.

Fire-Man- Honked the a flat horn and had a few good runs.

Jack freelance- Roasted S Robertson with some fine heckling

May 10th Re-Cap

Cam Dilworth went over to a friends place and lost track of time and forgot to show up for his Supper show appearance. He is really sorry, he practiced and everything, he was all ready, it was going to be great.

A project called Wolf Mountain stomped down some fine noise but perhaps got thrown off a bit when S Robertson, encouraged by JLS the soundman, got on the Mic and delivered a rap about Wolf's howling for their ladies across a canyon. It was around that time that things got weird. The whole thing wound down to nothing and Robertson slipped off the stage and then Wolf Mountain left the stage.

Thank the lord Fire-Man was present with his elaborate Bugle horn. The anxious crowd was immediatly soothed with an A flat jam where Robertson issued and explanation laden apology.

In fact Robertson spent a lot of the evening running his jaw about all his yesterdays.

21 tandem Repeats just keep getting better and better with Alvaro Rojas adding a thicker, fatter and more versatile spine. Not to be outdone Willingdon Black cut into longer solo's fueling speculation that he's looking to push 21 tandem repeats to become "THE ULTIMATE JAM BAND". Robertson denies this saying "Black is no fool, He's a song man and you media jackasses are just showing your ignorance by speculating on issues like these".

Coming May 10th

Cam Dilworth of the Neins circa is coming down to the Supper Show to play a show titled Artist Artisan.

The idea being that the audience will sketch him as he plays.

21 tandem repeats will stomp some tunes down as well.

So be ready to sketch

The Last 2 weeks Supper show

You are probably wondering what happened to this here promising blog that has once again fallen to the wayside.

But no... possibly something so juicy happened that nobody had the balls to report on it.

It's true, our main man Willingdon black stole the show 2 weeks ago that would be Wednesday April 19th. opening the show alone on a unicycle Mr. Black read a hilarious story that could have been fiction but was so strange it must have been real... the crowd was in stitches. Then during the 21 tandem repeats set the band played the Classic WASTELANDS and Willingdon Black put down the guitar jumped behind the curtain and came out in a tree costume... it was then that some foxy lumberjack came up on stage and chopped him down in a scene reminiscent of X rated jello wrestling all the time Alvaro Rojas kept the bass line thumping.

On April 26 2006, Shockk sat in on drums and the Land of Deborah played a set. the big news was the arrival of the Supper show drum kit, which Super Robertson christened with a jam and a piece read by Kevin (smith).

Highlights of the set included the song "Saskatchewan"... look for it on a PODCAST coming soon.

Last weeks Supper show recap

The supper show on April 12th was a fine 21 Tandem Repeats show with Chris from Baboon torture division doing an interesting take on "Sweet Home Alabama".
For the most part the show made a good live recording... ultimately it would make a fine podcast.... things to do!

The band played a varied set focusing on some new tunes and pulling out the classic "Mr. Greenie" from THE OCEAN IS LIFE.

Next week, or at least tomorrow, we will have a set from Baboon Torture Division. The guy is a true maniac who has in past supper show performances... been a flower who plucked himself to death doing "she loves me she loves me not", performed as a mime rock act and threw himself headfirst off the stage, and most recently worked the puppets for the fabulous supper show awards show.

look for another gold medal performance.

The Supper Show likes you! It really likes you!

The Supper Show celebrated its first anniversary last Wednesday night with the inaugural Supper Show awards. Far from being an obsequious display of backslapping and self-puffery, the glittering spectacle honoured those whose presence, participation, and punctuality have made the Supper Show the weekly cultural phenomenon that it is every, er, week.

21 Tandem Repeats warmed up the crowd for about 20 minutes, soothing jittery nerves with numbers such as "Fuse Lit Bombs" and "Melanoma," a relatively new song that bears the unmistakable Velvet Touch of Willingdon Black.

Finally some puppets took the podium and announced the start of the award ceremony. The first award went to Mule Hughes for Best Impersonation of a Puppet. A convergence of cosmic importance occurred when The Mule finally met his puppet double and, being so moved and obviously stricken, warbled a verse of "Working Man" with the house band of Rojas/Hobbs/Black.

The awards continued in a similar vein, with appearances from the Penus Puppet, Baboon Torture Division, Shockk (who accepted awards both for himself and on behalf of Land of Deborah), CT, Andrew Parker (an upset winner for Best Horn Player), Eyes, Snapshot, King Dinosaur, Pockets, Fireman, the Railway waitrixes...basically the pantheon of the Supper Show universe.

Apologies to those who were passed over in this report. They certainly didn't lack for kudos last Wednesday. At the Super Robertson Supper Show, everyone's a winner!

The supper show night before feeling

Somewhat afraid to disturb the flow of fine re-caps posted but disruption is what is needed on some nights.

think of a clear river flowing and then you take a stick and jab at the riverbed and watch the silt cloud up the water and flow downstream. Next thing you know a fish comes in to see what new thing might have been exposed in his world.

I'd say the jabbing was last Wednesday when the goal was to make it through the night without me playing the acoustic guitar meaning that we wouldn't play the stuff we rehearse... It was definitely a stick in the riverbed.

I didn't even have a drummer lined up yet Mule Hughes and Simian were in the house. I could have done a better job of using the talent but I think in some weird way it was some sort of a test for the 21tr crew. A chance to assess our skills and shine light on the strengths and weaknesses.

Wednesday march 22 we go back to the egg, where the biggest risk could be a few new songs that are perhaps under rehearsed... Sounds pretty comfortable.

S Robertson

March 15, 2006 Recap

Well...

Special Ides of March show, featuring the assassination of my ego; after playing almost weekly for a year in this venue with this group, the bar staff still have no idea that I'm in the frigging band.

Just jamming tonight. Not sure if any of it was any good.

Rob 'Mule' Hughes, just back from hanging out with Voivod in Montreal, took a welcome turn on the drums.

Then Super stripped to reveal that he was wearing a bra while the band played Iron Maiden's 'Running Free.'




ACM.

March 8 Recap

Decent enough crowd. The Eric Eyes band started off, and did a creditable job.

21TR were solid. Horn jam was brief but wide ranging; even denizins of that elegant Railway backroom got a blast.

I had the rest of the week off, and was in a bouyant mood. The talk turned to puppet shows. I foolishly guaranteed Pockets that I would deliver a puppet show based on a radio play called 'Practical Alternatives,' penned by Mule Hughes and produced by the elusive JR McClelland.

I featured in it as the Mad Scientist.

Stay tuned.




ACM.

March 1, 2006 Recap

Only the hardcore Supperholics in the crowd tonight. Pity, as Super brought cream horns.

I think it was Pete Townshend who once said, after The Who had delivered a great show to a sparse crowd, "we were playing for the people who weren't there."

This is perhaps a tough but crucial step in the evolution of a band; the ability to legitimately make people feel that they may have missed something worthwhile if they don't show up.

This evening's show was a good one. I thought the band recorded some personal bests with some of the tunes, particularly the newish 'Melasoma.'

There was also a pretty good jam thrown in, featuring a smoking walking bass groove by Alvaro Rojas, with some nifty spoken word stuff by Pockets and a woman whose name I don't know. Hobbs was in top casually-killing mode, and WB had a good time for once in his life, though he was careful not to show it.

Then there was a brief but insane three-man horn jam, led by a dapper Fireman.

The evening ended with a kind of made-up-on-the-spot punk tune. Not sure what that was all about.

Anyway, I liked it.



ACM.

FEB. 22nd Recap

Lots of gear on stage tonight. There were a lot of bands on the late bill, and the stage was like a Surrey pawnshop.

As for the show....where's the Mule when you need him? I'm sure he'd be able to give a pithy summary of the evening.

The thing with these kinds of blogs is that you want to be positive, but at some point it comes across as smileyfaced PR. Maybe it was just me, but there was a bit of a Team-Canada-playing-Switzerland-in-Turin vibe in the air.

21TR were drummerless, and though the formula has worked in the past, it seemed a bit laboured tonight. Shockk is pretty much indestructible in any guise, including Interior Design, which he offered up on this occasion. There was a jam at the end with A. Rojas on bass, Shockk on guitar, a Pronger-like WB on 2nd guitar, and Super on drums and vocals.

I've never been completely sold on drummers as vocalists. Ringo Starr would belt out the odd tune in the Beatlemania days, a gimmick that was reprised by Peter Criss and Kiss (although I think he generally stepped out from the kit for his balladeering). Then there was Don Henley, Triumph, and of course the guy from Night Ranger. I think Levon Helm pulled it off okay with the Band.

Of course the greatest vocal performance by a drummer took place a few years back at Cafe Du Soleil, when a black-fingernailed R. Hughes, playing in a trio called 'Restore' with Super and the Shockker, belted out his suburban anthem 'Fort' ("You couldn't find it, asshole, even if you tried!").

We could've used a bit of that tonight.



ACM.