Forgery League

We uploaded the first ‘official’ Flickershow MP3 today: “Suit Impostor Prophesy”. Yay!

Went out to see a friend’s band the other night. When we arrived, we were informed that we’d missed seeing a girl who’d shown up earlier and looked exactly like Julian. The two were never seen together, so people drew the obvious conclusion. “Don’t go out with her,” Jason warned me, “‘cause she’s actually Julian and it’ll totally fuck up your band’s interpersonal dynamics. Don’t sleep with the Julian-woman.” I reassured him that this would not occur.

It’s nice having a musical crowd to hang out with, yes.

The phone was ringing and I tried to answer it. The phone, a new cordless, would not pick up properly. (This is a normal occurrence for us. I have bad phone-answering juju, no matter what we have for a phone.) Fine. A bit later, my pager went off, showing a number I didn’t recognize.

I pick up the phone and try to call the number. Six digits in (we have big-city 10 digit dialling here), I hear a click and a friend’s voice mail kicks in. “Hi! This is Elizabeth…” then the connection turns staticky. I hang up and try again. Was that the right number? I start dialling. Again, before I’ve finished, it kicks over, and craps out before I can leave a message. I dial again, and again, and keys are rearranging themselves. What’s the 9 doing down there on the left? Argh! I hang up, try again, get as far as the 2 and it comes out as an exclamation point.

Now, this isn’t something our phone normally does. At this point I remember something I’ve read about dreaming: you can often tell you’re dreaming because machines malfunction in strange ways. Aha. I must be dreaming, I reason. I look at the phone, and think: I bet I could fit that in my mouth. And as it turns out, I can.

Moral: Even if you have a lucid dream, it doesn’t mean you’ll be in a frame of mind to think of anything worthwhile to do.

Saw Bullfrog and Medeski Martin & Wood last night. Phenomenal. :D The stage at Harbourfront Centre is a crap venue, particularly when it rains, but it was a fine, fine show.

Sean arrived home from India on Monday afternoon. Plenty of stories. First order of business (after the obvious) was grocery shopping, as I’d been scraping the bottom of the barrel. I don’t think I’ll ever eat barbecue sauce again.

Sean kept watching all the busy, harried li’l North Americans rush about, and whispering, “go! go! gotta make my meeting!” and “deadlines!” and “just a few more years! my life can wait!” with a mischievous grin.

Back at home: “I had the weirdest shit.” In paroxysms of gasping-for-breath laughter.

Curtains are coming! We’re having ‘em sewn at one of the two dozen little fabric shops around the corner on Queen. This neighbourhood does rock.

Julian and I played at a cabaret fundraiser last night (for an Environmental Studies student who’s canoeing to Tuktoyaktuk[!] as part of her Master’s). We actually went on ahead of schedule, proof that the gig was organized by non-musicicans. Good show! Did “Lullaby For Alice” which we haven’t done in ages.

I’ve been starting to work on my own songs again, too, and as usual the stuff I have in mind is inspired in large part by the artists I’m currently obsessing over. This time that means Rufus Wainwright and Sarah Slean, who both mix modern pop with a big dose of cabaret show-tuney sensibility. I’d love to write some stuff that’s as much fun to sing while flouncing around the apartment or on stage… something that merits a video like “Sweet Ones”. *suppresses surge of costume envy*

Julian came by to record last night, and we laid down a demo version of “Gold Thieves”. It’s a good ole hurtin’ song. Who knew we could be so country?

“Suit Impostor Prophesy” may take a little longer. We have yet to decide on a “fast” song to kick the demo off - maybe “Idiot Grin” or “Threshold Interrupt”.

Julian and I hit the open stage again tonight - we played “Ruins The Story” and “Threshold Interrupt”, both songs we hadn’t touched in a while. For “Interrupt” we got the house drummer to sit in, which was a first… Both Julian and I played and sang with freakish intensity, spurred on by the loudness. I have no idea if I hit any notes at all, but damn, we had energy, and damn, it was fun.

Plenty of kind words, especially from our host. It was a pretty darn good night all round. The Oasis is definitely my favorite of the open stages we’ve played at. It has lots of great performers, while being unintimidating for newcomers, and the variety of different acts keeps things interesting. Possibly best of all, several instrumentalists are on hand, willing to sit in on a song or two - it’s all very free-flowing and inviting.

I think it’s time to start writing out chord charts so people can play along with us. Yay!

I dropped by the Toronto Reference Library today. Designed by Raymond Moriyama, it’s one of the loveliest interiors in the city: huge, airy, impressive and yet intimate, with plenty of natural light, water sculptures decorating the ground floor, and generous skylit reading areas. The north end has a stunning view of Rosedale Valley and the uptown towers of Yonge Street. The only real downer (aside from the rather bleak expanses of blank brick on the outside) is the fact that all the upper floors ring a giant atrium, making it necessary to walk all the way around them if you’re headed for the opposite corner.

It’s part of a period in architecture that I particularly love, for reasons I can’t quite put my finger on: those buildings that were built by governments in the 1960s and ‘70s. Although they vary widely, there’s a distinctive feel to them, and some common elements, like the use of 45-degree angles and circular forms, lots of brick and warm colours, and vanes to cut down glare and break up blank ceilings.

Those subways that were built in the ‘60s and ‘70s are great examples. I happened on a book about the Montreal Metro recently that was full of this sort of thing: strikingly patterned concrete, angled walls, integrated art and so on. The contemporary stations I’ve seen in Boston and other cities are similar. (Check out Matt McLauchlin’s loving tribute, Montréal By Metro.)

In Toronto, the 1978 Spadina Line is the prime example, with eight unique stations (most of which, unfortunately, are in the median of a minor expressway). Eglinton West is warm and welcoming; Glencairn is quiet and curiously intimate, with lots of small walls to break up its space; Lawrence West has a mezzanine decorated in bright primary colours, while walls of plain concrete lend its platform a quiet dignity; Dupont, probably the most remarked-upon, is mysterious, simultaneously cave-like and futuristic with its round corners and giant circular lights. In their day, all the stations sported original artworks, though some have faded and some have had to be dismantled, notably Yorkdale’s vaulted ceiling of rainbow neon designed by Michael Hayden.

So what is it that I find so appealing about this era? I think it’s a feeling of genuine optimism and civic-mindedness. I’ve only lived in Toronto itself for a couple of years, but it didn’t take long to notice the sense many have of the 1970s as a kind of golden, enlightened age. New expressways were turned back by those living in their path; plans to scrap the city’s streetcar network were abandoned; alienating high-rise housing projects gave way to sensibly planned new neighborhoods. The future seemed bright and human.

I think we could use a little more of that right about now.

It’s been an impulsive day. I went out shopping for a mirrored cabinet for the bathroom. A rare item in these parts, it seems: I came up empty-handed.

On the way, however, I happened on an HMV. Now, HMV isn’t my usual haunt for record shopping - I prefer to shop at the little independents - but on a whim I stopped in. For a good while I wandered around from section to section, checking out everything that caught my eye, desperately trying to remember the name of an apparently amazing acoustic guitarist someone recommended. Rather lovely jazzy-bossa-trip-step somethingorother on the store speakers. (Jazzanova, I think?)

I picked up some Prokofiev, since there wasn’t any in my collection yet. Also got the new Sarah Slean album, Night Bugs after hearing bits and pieces on the radio - the harmonies on the poppy closing track, “Bank Accounts”, nearly had me in tears at the listening booth. (So did “L’autre valse d’Amelie” from the Amélie soundtrack, which I must also get sometime.)

Bay station - an older fellow was playing accordion there, something slow and sweet. He seemed even a little surprised when I dropped a loonie in the tray in front of him. Funny: in the days surrounding our move, I was reserved, even distant, shutting myself off from everything while I got my head wrapped around this new lifestyle, living mostly in my head. It feels like I’ve returned, now. I’ve found myself making more contact with people around me, noticing them more, starting up conversations with people panhandling on the street…

(Man! That Sarah Slean tune is still going through my head. And I just realized that one line in the chorus ends with the harmony and main melody a major seventh apart. Yow.)

In the afternoon J came by and we practiced a bit before heading to the Oasis for the weekly open stage. I’d never been there before, and I was immediately impressed - by the comfy surroundings, the smoke-free back room, the diverse tapas menu, the sound, and the diversity of the acts. It was a nice change from the parade of acoustic guitars at other places we’ve been. Oh, there were guitars, including ours, and they made some great sounds in the hands of our fellow musicians. But there were several duos and bands (the stage setup generally includes a drum kit), one woman who sang to prerecorded accompaniment (much better than that makes it sound), and a rather odd fellow who did a sort of stand-up comedy (I had to wonder if it was an act, or whether he was Really Like That). As with any open stage, the acts varied wildly in experience and skill, but regardless, it was always fun.

J and I played two of his: “My Apology” and “Suit Impostor Prophesy”. I played better - miles and miles better - than I’ve ever played on stage before, and stayed fairly relaxed all the way through. Partly, it may have been that I was playing better, but generally, I just wasn’t worried any longer about what everyone might think of us. Before I would have cringed every time I squeaked on a high note or played out of key. Now, I just let it flow - easier now that the music is coming much more from my hands than from thinking about each note. It’s like learning to crawl, then walk, then run.

At this rate, I should be airborne soon. I wonder what that would sound like…

It’s finally sunk in.
Back on the first of January 2000, even with the rollover of the Great Year Odometer, the world didn’t seem any different.
“It’s a funny feeling,” I wrote then, “knowing that I and the rest of my relatives will bear a year starting with ‘2’ on their tombstones. You don’t usually think of your grandma being part of the 21st century - but she is, as much as you are…
“And it’s funny to think of that state of mind we had - I’m not sure when it’ll fully leave… the feeling that on the stroke of midnight, 31 Dec 1999, all the brick buildings in the world would turn to glass, all the cars would turn into airships, all the planes to rockets and the subways to maglevs…”
And again in 2001, it still didn’t feel like a new century.
Last night, we were at my grandmother’s place having dinner, and watched the first couple of innings of Game 3 of the World Series in New York City. And finally, it felt like The Future: George W. Bush throwing the first pitch - probably the longest minute in the entire lives of most of the security people there, the patriotic messages and memorials, the ads for United Airlines and gene-research firms, the jet flyovers…
I always used to mentally picture the decades as a series of impressions of colour and tone and shape, running from left to right, the synthesis of many visual memories of images and styles. For the 20th century, the years up to about 1930 were sepiatoned, then black and white and pale blue. The Thirties were deep wine red, the Forties black and white and deeper blue. The Fifties were sunny yellow and pink and white, the Sixties bright primary red and white, shading into psychedelic paisley purples and dark reds. The Seventies were pale yellow and off-white, then darkened to the sleek boxy black of consumer electronics in the early Eighties. Pastels and silvers and rough, chaotic textures followed in the Nineties.
In 2000 I wrote: “The 2000s were a blank slate, a great unknown. But I do remember it was white, shiny, gleaming, green, hopeful.
“Now I’d like it to be vast, multicoloured, joyous, rooted, honest, bright, rich.”
We’ll see…

1: Walking across Nathan Phillips Square. Tall, bearded black man, snappily dressed, presumably leaving work at City Hall, passes by. Our eyes meet for a moment. “Hi, sexy,” he says as he passes by. I laugh, startled. He doesn’t look back.
2: A sign in the tile on the ground by the Peace Garden in the square reads: WARNING ETERNAL FLAME

Yamaha has released new 13-, 12- and 10-inch snares (soprano, sopranino and piccolo) for ‘effects’ - especially drum-&-bass type music. Electronic processing creates trends in acoustic instruments! I wonder where else this has happened.