As some of you have noticed my missives are arriving more like morse code than a steady stream. I wonder what they’re saying on the code level. My creative energies have gone elsewhere as I attempt to channel the spirit of all things I don’t get at all. I don’t look back on much that I’ve written but when I do I hope to find a general sense of hope and beauty in there somewhere. As each prognosis is delivered to me with stiffer lips and shakier hands I still try to hear only the good parts. If I stop thinking too hard the good feeling will eventually come to me. It is a sophisticated form of denial. I’ll try to write in the next little while but I’m hopping off sometimes to have some fun with the family. To all of you I know and all the anonymous lurkers . . . Merry Christmas, Chanukah, Quansa or whatever excuse you have to decorate, shine a light, eat, drink, think, rest, and love each other.
posted by Craig Northey at 11:45 PM

Clapping on the 1 and the 3 with that "stand in one place dance". The one where you bring your right heel in to meet your left heel on the 1 and put your foot back where it was on the two. Repeat this same move on the 3 and 4 with the left heel coming into the right and then back out. Your shoulders naturally sway with the movement of the feet but not too much. This is the grade 8 boy dance of the seventies. It can be played with no emotion or be exaggerated to indicate "being into it". It is not a dance for risk takers. It is not a dance for dancers. Frequently this dance is performed by those who know not where the beat is. The music may be making you move but the cause does not produce a related effect. Its like a fire hydrant opening onto a hot summer street inspiring a child to do pushups. Frolic and abandon don't enter into the equation. Music is on. Find a way to show that you can participate. No one needs to teach you this dance. It is the "doing up seat belt instructions on the plane" dance.
The greasers had those big Dayton boots in grade 8. The grade 8 boy dance was perfect for economy of movement. What was paramount for those boys was to avoid looking "gay" in the process of "dancing" but at the same time make the dumb and beautiful girls think they were open minded. The very dumb and very beautiful actually fell for the grease balls who stood outside the gym calling all the other boys fags, spitting and smoking. The grade 8 dance also worked for any particularly shy and/or insecure types. The girl would pretend to never look at you and be dancing "just because you asked" and you could feel good that your inexperience went undetected. Inexperience disguised by the grade 8 two step. Sure there were the humpers, helicopters, karate men and legs akimbo floppers but the wind up toy vibe pretty much ruled. Some had bootlegged jungle juice that fueled terpsichorean experimentation. Others hoped that someone would buy into their unique program. In those days that's what it took to be labeled a good dancer. There was no video to learn the moves from. There was a vacuum over the spread of dance culture into the suburbs. Generations before had built their sense of cool around dance. Early seventies rock came with no real guide to movement.
Our children now have it made. Its all pretty slick and awesome. I mean...people really know how to shake it now. The best and most athletic elements of dance are all back and the tempo is up. A boy doesn't even have to wait for a slow dance to "grind" his teen boner relentlessly against a girl's undulating pelvis or ass. Copping a feel to the power of ten. "I was just dancing with him mom!". Greasy middle aged guys are paying for tamer lap dances because they still don't have any more than their grade 8 70?s chops.
I was right up front tonight at the Doug & the Slugs 25th anniversary show at the Commodore Ballroom. They were the R&B influenced, swinger chic & smart ass "Tubes" of Canada. Truly original. It was a hippie art school street rat collision. A fat joint and a stiff bourbon. Boogie satire, insult comedy, urban cleverness and a steamroller of a party. I got my first break in the biz working follow spot at a Slugs/Brandon Wolf New Years Eve show at the Holiday Inn Harbourside in Vancouver -- thanks be to my brother Colin Nairne. My first $20 as a roadie. There I was, tonight, standing in the crowd as the reel of standard grossly overplayed 70's and 80's bar rock set the peeps up perfectly for a Slugfest. You see there can be no vintage Slugs without a crowd to tear into and build up again in their image. The crowd must first be placed in a generic, "crowd enjoying a pleasant night out" state. The Slugs, Doug Bennett in particular, always needed mediocrity and boredom to work against.
The moment that, for me, defined the Slugs came quick and with typical Bennett "flying mallet" subtlety -- he in his "Danforth" black suit. I had made note of the grade 8 two step happening all around me up until this point. All in their comfort zones. Receded domes, wire rimmed glasses and compensatory facial hair rocked from foot to foot through "Roadhouse Blues" and "Switchin' to Glide". Commercial Drive mean green smoke snaked its way under noses and above pleasant smiles. An air of genuine pre-Christmas good will pervaded the all-star nightclubbers reunion ball. The next generation of grown kids was there to see what their dads and moms had done with their wild years. This complacency would not be allowed. Feeling good required so much more. After Richard Baker locked into the perfect boogie riff that anchors "Chinatown Calculation" the crowd roared and the band dove in after him. Doug stopped them cold and told the crowd that he'd have none of this "shuffling from foot to foot or pleasantly rocking back and forth". He instructed the quintessential 40 something grade 8 in the front row to "find a fucking real woman and dance with her!". "Spin around!" "Do something! This is a great swingin' riff!". It was time to have fun redefining one"s comfort zone. I guess the Slugs were all about that. No pretension. Low art and great heart. Not THE cutting edge but definitely A cutting edge. It was all a joke. All fun at their expense and your expense. They were their own fashion culture. I loved "the Tubes" for all the same reasons. Tonight Johnny Burton sported the cheesy shiny smoking jacket and large medallion. Simon mercilessly wielded the silver Roland handheld KX5 synthesizer (with breath controller) while wearing a beret, yellow sport jacket and clam diggers. The lion tamer in a Thomas Dolby BetaMax video. The sound coming out of that thing was scary. It was once a staple of bland radio pop but I think Simon has now understood the true musical evil lurking inside that 80"s synth. He played it as if he was living back when it was almost cool and he played with the idea of what it was now -- worth $30 on ebay. The Strap-On keyboard was cool for the first and last time in that one instant. It was the instant I couldn't understand why it was there at all. The Buddha had been punched in the face. This was a moment that was not happening anywhere else. A unique person was making a movement that was not in the script of standard cool moves. The grade 8 dance was busted.
Bless these Slugs.
Waves of hits kept rolling out and with each one those hippie barons of business (in the audience) redefined their personal boundaries and took a few steps outside the matrix of the old grade 8 two step -- the dance that was a symptom demonstrating that a gray wool had grown over their inner engine. They'll remember tonight. . . when doing something stupid, strange and fun was what was asked of them. In 70's rock n' roll terms they were all great dancers by the end of the night. No clapping on the 1 & 3.
posted by Craig Northey at 2:19 AM

You’ve noticed. The entries are further apart lately. I’m trying to figure it out too. If anybody wants a really good dose of the Craigspeak please buy the current issue of NUVO magazine (Trudeau on the cover). Its the first time I’ve had my magazine work illustrated by a painter. Feels and looks good. Its at the back of the magazine in a section called “last Writes”. I’ve also got the conclusion of my two part article on recording in the newest Canadian Musician. My friend Vince Ditrich has the article opposite mine so when the magazine is closed our pictures are kissing.
Sorry about the tardiness on getting images, sound and video up on the website. No promises but things are looking up. Watch for a big Craig announcement (at least in my world) coming up in this next week. Its information that doesn’t really effect anybody but me but I since I AM me its means something to me. OK...OK...you twisted my arm ...enough already. My dear friend and manager of the last 14 years of my life, Chris Blake (Blake & Bradford: Odds, Toad the Wet Sprocket, Marcy Playground, the Tan. Llama), has decided to try something other than the music business. He told me some months back and I didn't try looking for someone else for awhile. My heart wasn't in it. Then it became obvious that I needed somebody. That somebody is Mary Boutette who will be handling my affairs under the flag of Macklam/Feldman management.
I will provide more details as soon as we draft an "official" release. I'm excited about it and I'm really happy my pal Chris is following his muse instead of grinding it out in the music business salt mines when he doesn't really need any more salt. I love him. I truly do. All of you who have met him will agree a finer man could never be. I will write a nice big piece on him one day. He should be very afraid. Those of you in the Ottawa area may have spotted his surfer's physique, dashing gray mane, and elegant goatee in the crowd at recent '67's games. He drove all the way from his native California to do some woodworking research in the Ontario countryside. He easily wins the honourary Canadian award for this year by leaving that moderately tropical climate and driving thousands of kilometres to make dovetail joints, and watch junior hockey in subzero Ontario.

Sharkskin spent last week recording the next Blair Packham solo record. It was a pleasure and an honour to be asked to play on such great songs. Colin Nairne recorded the tracking at Bakerstreet in N.Vancouver and our buddy Paul Myers stopped by to lay out some stinging guitar on my favourite old Gretsch.

Gigs to watch out for? Well yes. Here are some random dates that may or not be 100% right and may or may not contain nuts.

- Private party in N.Vancouver with Sharkskin. Norm Fisher on bass. Try to find it.

- Recording what should be the last tracks on the Northey/Valenzuela sessions in Vancouver from Dec 14 to 18.

- New Years eve at the Devonian Gardens in Calgary with Colin James Band.
- Jan 9,10 Craig Northey Power Trio with the Deadly Vipers (a new band featuring Craig, Doug Elliott, Pat Steward and Colleen Jaméz at Mt.Washington BC.

- Jan 13th in Seattle with Colin James Band (check his website for more accurate listings)
- Jan 14th in Partland OR with Colin James

- Jan 28th Ann Arbor MI with Colin

- Jan 29th London Ontario with Colin and Bryan Adams

- Jan 30 Halifax, Sir James Dunn Theatre,Craig solo with the Bluebird North tour
- Jan 31 Montreal Craig with BBN, Venue TBA
- Feb 1 Wakefield PQ, the Black Sheep Inn, Craig with Bluebird North

- Feb 3 Ottawa, National Arts Centre, Craig BBNorth

- Feb 4 Kingston Ont, Octave Theatre, Craig with BBN

- Feb 5 Guelph Ont, River Run Centre, Craig with BBN

- Feb 6 & 7, Toronto Ont, Hugh's Room, Craig with BBN

I think the dates on the first BBNorth might be a day off but accuracy is not what I'm going for here, I just want to warn you and then get you to do some work on your own. Give the people the tools to work the land and don't just give them the food.

I will be back to my old hat tricks with the English language as soon as I can muster a good idea or a full hour to pound away until one falls out.



posted by Craig Northey at 12:59 AM