MONTREAL THIS SATURDAY FOR FEELINGS!
I am so eggcited for this special nite and my pal Otis Fodder will be my special guest deejaying as DJ Summertime Smile.
July 24th, Casa Del Popolo (4873 Boulevard Saint Laurent), 10 pm- 3 am
No cover but the cover of night...
Bask in them....
FEELINGS is a special night where we spin music that you probably won’t normally hear...
Midnight candlelight night recitation by Robert Dayton, Junior.
...
DJ Body Beautiful and special friend DJ Summertime Smile will spin a boutique mix of :
ELUSIVE DREAMINGS/PRIVATE PRESSINGS/BALD HEADED BALLADEERS/FREE FORMS/CAN CON CONCRETE/B SIDE EXCURSIONS/ELECTRONIC PRIMITIVA/EMOTIONS/EURO HORRORS/INTENSELY PERSONAL VISIONS/DEEP PSYCH/UN-EASY LISTENINGS AND BALLADS/PRISON SOUNDTRACKS/FANTASTIC JOURNEYS OF WONDER/ACTOR AS SINGER/
ORGAN-ISMS/NEO-BAROQUE/MORE
This will be ...special.
YOKO
The Turtles- Battle Of the Bands
The Turtles? Yes, they were under-rated especially with this album where they pretended to be about 10 different bands! I met Mark Volman once, I was in awe....
Lindsey Buckingham- Go Insane
This album can be found for 50 cents and it's GREAT!Uber-slick 80s production, some hits, yet-yet!-he truly sounds like he's Going Insane! By the BEST Fleetwood Mac member and has a suite for Dennis Wilson...
From same place as previous post. Dwight Twilley- Sincerely, a great power-pop album.
Done for an ish of Roctober for Gary Pig Gold(who put out the 1st Simply Saucer single wayyy back when)'s list of albums you need to own. And, yes, you do need to own this album....
A WAY OUT
PUSSY HORSE
HEAVY AIR
This humidity makes everything so heavy, even sleeping is a drudge task. Boss gave us the day off work on Friday. A day to just stay still if possible and say,"No more please" to the world. I stick close to home. Stepping outside, the air hangs with the stench of garbage as endless honking assaults me. So this is the outside world? I want peace. Apparently this honking is to celebrate a sporting event of some sort, is it? Really? The cars are all festooned with flags of disrespective countries. Are they foreign dignitaries? They act like assholes, these visiting dignitaries here for the G20 conference. Downtown is a ghost town, people are too scared to be downtown where armed police stand in packs. I tell my Mother my fear of working downtown, she thinks they will protect me. No. I need protection from them if I am in the wrong place at the wrong time. I work on the 16th floor.
Wednesday. Water moved in my glass. An ominous feeling of reality shifting. I believe that the military is trying out a sonic weapon on us! "Let's go!", I yell to my co-worker Karla. No elevator, take the stairs, 16 flights. She has to take her heels off, I attempt to undo one.
It was just an earthquake.
Tuesday. A great bookstore has its' locks changed due to back-rent, they've been around for thirty years, two generations.
The skies are overcast. I get a text message mere moments after writing a morbid joke. A great lady I know has died, I just visited her last week and was going to this week, too young. It saddens me, I think of the loss that her loved ones go through, and then the loss the community and the city will go through. She was that kind of gal.
Thinking on this for a while, then a friend calls and tells me that he is moving back to Vancouver, although he is uncertain of his choice, we hang out a lot, we talk of this and the oil spill and its' devastating environmental impact, rains of oil, how he read that Russian scientists stated how the chemical used to treat it will wreak utter destruction on the East Coast.
Thursday. Taking my mind off everything, the sadness of death and the mood of the city, this friend, another friend and I drive to Niagara Falls to see natural beauty in all its'glory, its' uncomprehending vastness, we get so close that we get wet, it surrounds us, it is surrounded by man-made monstrosities. These are behemoths akin to Reno. Yards away from rumbling splendour, one can pay to get a photo taken in front of a fake Niagara Falls backdrop. One can pay to see Niagara Falls in iMAX.In 3-D/4-D, what does that mean? Does one get to view four dimensions in three? Will it simplify and demystify things for us? We pay to enter a shoddy wax museum, one of several, this one is of crime and murder and slightly off the path. Flawed craftmanship,typos, succinct overviews of notorious figures who look somewhat off and not quite fully-formed.It is appreciated.
Wednesday. Water moved in my glass. An ominous feeling of reality shifting. I believe that the military is trying out a sonic weapon on us! "Let's go!", I yell to my co-worker Karla. No elevator, take the stairs, 16 flights. She has to take her heels off, I attempt to undo one.
It was just an earthquake.
Tuesday. A great bookstore has its' locks changed due to back-rent, they've been around for thirty years, two generations.
The skies are overcast. I get a text message mere moments after writing a morbid joke. A great lady I know has died, I just visited her last week and was going to this week, too young. It saddens me, I think of the loss that her loved ones go through, and then the loss the community and the city will go through. She was that kind of gal.
Thinking on this for a while, then a friend calls and tells me that he is moving back to Vancouver, although he is uncertain of his choice, we hang out a lot, we talk of this and the oil spill and its' devastating environmental impact, rains of oil, how he read that Russian scientists stated how the chemical used to treat it will wreak utter destruction on the East Coast.
Thursday. Taking my mind off everything, the sadness of death and the mood of the city, this friend, another friend and I drive to Niagara Falls to see natural beauty in all its'glory, its' uncomprehending vastness, we get so close that we get wet, it surrounds us, it is surrounded by man-made monstrosities. These are behemoths akin to Reno. Yards away from rumbling splendour, one can pay to get a photo taken in front of a fake Niagara Falls backdrop. One can pay to see Niagara Falls in iMAX.In 3-D/4-D, what does that mean? Does one get to view four dimensions in three? Will it simplify and demystify things for us? We pay to enter a shoddy wax museum, one of several, this one is of crime and murder and slightly off the path. Flawed craftmanship,typos, succinct overviews of notorious figures who look somewhat off and not quite fully-formed.It is appreciated.
TOO SENSITIVE
If I built me an Iron Man suit would it make me less sensitive?
I'm too sensitive! Wayyyy too sensitive!
Like an exposed wound.
I can feel emotional jabs in my heart.
Case in point, I left a show early the other week that I performed at, not wanting to face anyone. I thought that I had bombed. From the stage one cannot see the crowd, makes one feel insular, a disconnect. I get home and realise, "Oh! They were laughing!" I see some people a week later, "We were laughing!" And if they weren't? So? Just another night. An experience. I need me some thicker skin.I do good work, I've paid my dues (I even have a tag on my shoe that Balogh gave which says exactly that).
Another case in point, I put in my dayplanner that the old New Pornographers were coming to town on Tuesday. Tho I'd done plenty of stuff with them, I actually hadn't seen them perform live for eight years, maybe not since Canned Hamm hosted that one show they did where I wound up getting the most vile pair of panties thrown at me onstage. As The NPers played on, I paraded around with that pair on my head oblivious to the fact that the owner maybe should have gone to the doctor.
Day of their show, day turns to nite, I putter about my apartment, no response. My pal Paul calls me from backstage, hands the phone to Dan and they're about to go on and all I can do is whine, "I wanted to see you all! I put it in my dayplanner!" Then I go to bed feeling forgotten. Yesterday, I find out that they were all wondering where I was, why was I not hanging with them? Welllll, I was at home thinking that they didn't care about me, that I didn't matter to them no more, self-pity self-pity, etcetera, etcetera...Crossed wires, if only they thought to put my name at the door, hmmm, maybe it was.
I still wished I'd been there, hang out and catch up, apparently it was a great show.
I try my best to forge forward but I can get reflective, some folks I have known forever, too much has happened to ever let go, there's a bond. Do I miss Vancouver? I miss many of those people, many scattered; living in Toronto now, I do get to see quite a few folks.
A book was sent to me. Confessions Of A Local Celebrity by Mike Soret. Great title and a great looking book. Funny read, funny music book, first hand tales of reaching for the top and not getting there. Well, his band was called The Molestics. We were also in a band together called Zarathruster in 1991 and July Fourth Toilet played many shows with The Molestics. This book is ascerbic and honest and he just doesn't care who he may offend cuz he's done. Do I agree with everything he says about me in it? No. But it's not my book. it's his book. But reading these mentions of me felt like a weird time capsule, a sorta "Oh yeah, that was me in the 90s."
He writes, "Rob Dayton, who had a band called July Fourth Toilet and who was as legendary for being broke-ass as for his drinking..." and "He's made a career of being a caricature of himself..." Etc etc..
Caricature? No, it's called being iconic, darling. That's why my personal style is in perpetual mothballs. Ha!
He does have some truth to that. Those two quotes go hand-in-hand. Ahh, this book is simply a reminder of why I had to stop the booze! I certainly feel more nuanced today, even though back then there'd be soul baring- is soul baring a characteristic of caricature? I know what he means and it makes sense, many nights of stumbling shenanigans can make for some broad brush strokes! At one point I took to calling myself The Grand Wizzard of Debauchery which never caught on with anyone but me.
He also says some very nice things about me in his book but that's irrelevant to this blog post.
I was quite entertained by that lil tome and anyone who has any interest in the bottom rungs of show biz had best give it a read! Pure honesty! Worst thing about it? He keeps calling me Rob in it. Rob? I don't steal, I give.
I'm too sensitive! Wayyyy too sensitive!
Like an exposed wound.
I can feel emotional jabs in my heart.
Case in point, I left a show early the other week that I performed at, not wanting to face anyone. I thought that I had bombed. From the stage one cannot see the crowd, makes one feel insular, a disconnect. I get home and realise, "Oh! They were laughing!" I see some people a week later, "We were laughing!" And if they weren't? So? Just another night. An experience. I need me some thicker skin.I do good work, I've paid my dues (I even have a tag on my shoe that Balogh gave which says exactly that).
Another case in point, I put in my dayplanner that the old New Pornographers were coming to town on Tuesday. Tho I'd done plenty of stuff with them, I actually hadn't seen them perform live for eight years, maybe not since Canned Hamm hosted that one show they did where I wound up getting the most vile pair of panties thrown at me onstage. As The NPers played on, I paraded around with that pair on my head oblivious to the fact that the owner maybe should have gone to the doctor.
Day of their show, day turns to nite, I putter about my apartment, no response. My pal Paul calls me from backstage, hands the phone to Dan and they're about to go on and all I can do is whine, "I wanted to see you all! I put it in my dayplanner!" Then I go to bed feeling forgotten. Yesterday, I find out that they were all wondering where I was, why was I not hanging with them? Welllll, I was at home thinking that they didn't care about me, that I didn't matter to them no more, self-pity self-pity, etcetera, etcetera...Crossed wires, if only they thought to put my name at the door, hmmm, maybe it was.
I still wished I'd been there, hang out and catch up, apparently it was a great show.
I try my best to forge forward but I can get reflective, some folks I have known forever, too much has happened to ever let go, there's a bond. Do I miss Vancouver? I miss many of those people, many scattered; living in Toronto now, I do get to see quite a few folks.
A book was sent to me. Confessions Of A Local Celebrity by Mike Soret. Great title and a great looking book. Funny read, funny music book, first hand tales of reaching for the top and not getting there. Well, his band was called The Molestics. We were also in a band together called Zarathruster in 1991 and July Fourth Toilet played many shows with The Molestics. This book is ascerbic and honest and he just doesn't care who he may offend cuz he's done. Do I agree with everything he says about me in it? No. But it's not my book. it's his book. But reading these mentions of me felt like a weird time capsule, a sorta "Oh yeah, that was me in the 90s."
He writes, "Rob Dayton, who had a band called July Fourth Toilet and who was as legendary for being broke-ass as for his drinking..." and "He's made a career of being a caricature of himself..." Etc etc..
Caricature? No, it's called being iconic, darling. That's why my personal style is in perpetual mothballs. Ha!
He does have some truth to that. Those two quotes go hand-in-hand. Ahh, this book is simply a reminder of why I had to stop the booze! I certainly feel more nuanced today, even though back then there'd be soul baring- is soul baring a characteristic of caricature? I know what he means and it makes sense, many nights of stumbling shenanigans can make for some broad brush strokes! At one point I took to calling myself The Grand Wizzard of Debauchery which never caught on with anyone but me.
He also says some very nice things about me in his book but that's irrelevant to this blog post.
I was quite entertained by that lil tome and anyone who has any interest in the bottom rungs of show biz had best give it a read! Pure honesty! Worst thing about it? He keeps calling me Rob in it. Rob? I don't steal, I give.
Gordon Jump! How High?: A Very Special Episode
Upon the recent death of Gary Coleman, my pal Lou asked me to dig up an old column that I wrote about Gordon Jump. For several years I wrote a regular column entitled Robert Dayton's Going For It for a free Vancouver weekly. When my carte blanche left, I left (they refused to print my 3 column series about my cock, alas, only the first part saw print), they also didn't pay their contributors: a big no-no considering others (editors, ad reps, et al) were getting paid! My advice to you if you are a creative: get paid! By not getting paid you are under-valuing others in the industry and thus taking away work. I see big name blogs with advertising not paying for content. THIS IS WRONG! I blog here for free cuz no one else is making any coin off of me,just me...
Any ways, enjoy this classick column from a few years back...
The downtown Vancouver Eaton’s has really got the lead on free En’tainment. In the past they have had breakdancers, lingerie shows, living mannequins, and a French man playing an accordion. How did I know that he was French? Ohhh, the tell-tale signs were there: the beret, the striped shirt. But there was one special day that will be forever etched in my memory. April 12th, 2001. The day The Maytag Repairmen came to town. This special in-store featured Gordon Jump, who replaced the late Jessie White as Maytag Repairman in 1989 (before that he was portrayed by Tom Pedi), and his new buddy, the young and buff Mark Devine. Gordon Jump is best known for portraying Mr. Carlson, the station boss from the TV sitcom WKRP In Cincinnati. But it was his guest-starring role on Diff’rent Strokes that truly invaded my psyche.
Diff’rent Strokes was a sitcom that was inherently racist in its’ setup. An 80s materialistic escape fantasy where a rich, white man- Mr. Drummond- adopts two wise cracking black kids named Arnold and Willis as pets. Every episode would have some sort of forced moral. And then there were the “Very Special Episodes” such as The Bicycle Man, a two-parter written by two former WKRP writers with Gordon Jump as the title character, Mr.Horton. It’s been a while since I’ve seen it but I’ll rely on my memories, friends’ memories, and the glorious internet.
One day Arnold and his friend Dudley go over to Mr. Horton’s bicycle shop for a visit. These kinds of shops are very popular with the children. Mr. Horton gives the boys booze and then persuades them to bounce up and down on the bed with their shirts off. Before they leave, he gives them gum to cover up their breath. The next time they visit he shows them a dirty cartoon where a mouse drops his pants! “It’s not dirty. It’s adult. We’re all adults,” says Mr. Horton. Arnold gets upset and leaves. Mr. Drummond finds out what’s been happening. I distinctly remember him getting so upset that he swears! A close-up of his face going, “What the Hell is going on here?!?!” He calls the cops and Dudley’s parents. After giving him a pill, Mr. Horton decides to play a game called “Neptune, King Of The Sea” with Dudley in the tub. Before this game happens, the police arrive. Dudley says, “He tried to...he tried to touch me.” The show ends with The Drummonds discussing the issues of child molestation.
However, due to the nature of the medium, this serious issue became somewhat trivialized with the show’s cheap set and always prevalent laugh track. The effects of child sexual abuse don’t disappear after two weeks but off Arnold and Co. would go obliviously skipping onto more “very special episodes” involving cigarettes, height issues, and Nancy Reagan. But it was effective- child abuse just wasn’t talked about so much back then. And lots of people do remember this two-parter.
Back to Eaton’s. Unlike most people, I have a good rapport with celebrities. We see each other eye-to-eye, we’re equals, I knew that meeting Gordon Jump would be no problem. Both Maytag Repairmen were signing glossies for the crowd. I approached Mr.Jump and asked him about The Bicycle Man. He was very cordial and in a quiet, pleasant tone of voice said, “That was a real gamble. You never know whether you have done the right thing or not because people could look at us on television and think that’s really us.”
“Just the other day I went to a large store where they sell stuff to new mothers. This young girl came up to me with tears in her eyes. She said, ‘Are you Gordon Jump?’ I said, ’I sure am.’ She said,’Would you mind if I could give you a hug and thank you for what you did for me years ago?’ I said, ‘No. What had I done for you years ago?’ She said, ’You did an episode of Diff’rent Strokes. That episode changed my entire life.’ And al of a sudden I realized that this business is really far more special than we sometimes give it credit for.”
I told him, ”I was a kid when I saw it and I didn’t know anything about that stuff.”
He responded, “It gives you an open forum so everybody’s talking about it and that’s what it was designed for.”
Mark Devine, the young Maytag Repairman joined in and said, “It’s weird how it sticks in your mind, too .I remember seeing the episode. I didn’t understand it but now...”
Thanks to Ted Dave for interview documentation.
Any ways, enjoy this classick column from a few years back...
The downtown Vancouver Eaton’s has really got the lead on free En’tainment. In the past they have had breakdancers, lingerie shows, living mannequins, and a French man playing an accordion. How did I know that he was French? Ohhh, the tell-tale signs were there: the beret, the striped shirt. But there was one special day that will be forever etched in my memory. April 12th, 2001. The day The Maytag Repairmen came to town. This special in-store featured Gordon Jump, who replaced the late Jessie White as Maytag Repairman in 1989 (before that he was portrayed by Tom Pedi), and his new buddy, the young and buff Mark Devine. Gordon Jump is best known for portraying Mr. Carlson, the station boss from the TV sitcom WKRP In Cincinnati. But it was his guest-starring role on Diff’rent Strokes that truly invaded my psyche.
Diff’rent Strokes was a sitcom that was inherently racist in its’ setup. An 80s materialistic escape fantasy where a rich, white man- Mr. Drummond- adopts two wise cracking black kids named Arnold and Willis as pets. Every episode would have some sort of forced moral. And then there were the “Very Special Episodes” such as The Bicycle Man, a two-parter written by two former WKRP writers with Gordon Jump as the title character, Mr.Horton. It’s been a while since I’ve seen it but I’ll rely on my memories, friends’ memories, and the glorious internet.
One day Arnold and his friend Dudley go over to Mr. Horton’s bicycle shop for a visit. These kinds of shops are very popular with the children. Mr. Horton gives the boys booze and then persuades them to bounce up and down on the bed with their shirts off. Before they leave, he gives them gum to cover up their breath. The next time they visit he shows them a dirty cartoon where a mouse drops his pants! “It’s not dirty. It’s adult. We’re all adults,” says Mr. Horton. Arnold gets upset and leaves. Mr. Drummond finds out what’s been happening. I distinctly remember him getting so upset that he swears! A close-up of his face going, “What the Hell is going on here?!?!” He calls the cops and Dudley’s parents. After giving him a pill, Mr. Horton decides to play a game called “Neptune, King Of The Sea” with Dudley in the tub. Before this game happens, the police arrive. Dudley says, “He tried to...he tried to touch me.” The show ends with The Drummonds discussing the issues of child molestation.
However, due to the nature of the medium, this serious issue became somewhat trivialized with the show’s cheap set and always prevalent laugh track. The effects of child sexual abuse don’t disappear after two weeks but off Arnold and Co. would go obliviously skipping onto more “very special episodes” involving cigarettes, height issues, and Nancy Reagan. But it was effective- child abuse just wasn’t talked about so much back then. And lots of people do remember this two-parter.
Back to Eaton’s. Unlike most people, I have a good rapport with celebrities. We see each other eye-to-eye, we’re equals, I knew that meeting Gordon Jump would be no problem. Both Maytag Repairmen were signing glossies for the crowd. I approached Mr.Jump and asked him about The Bicycle Man. He was very cordial and in a quiet, pleasant tone of voice said, “That was a real gamble. You never know whether you have done the right thing or not because people could look at us on television and think that’s really us.”
“Just the other day I went to a large store where they sell stuff to new mothers. This young girl came up to me with tears in her eyes. She said, ‘Are you Gordon Jump?’ I said, ’I sure am.’ She said,’Would you mind if I could give you a hug and thank you for what you did for me years ago?’ I said, ‘No. What had I done for you years ago?’ She said, ’You did an episode of Diff’rent Strokes. That episode changed my entire life.’ And al of a sudden I realized that this business is really far more special than we sometimes give it credit for.”
I told him, ”I was a kid when I saw it and I didn’t know anything about that stuff.”
He responded, “It gives you an open forum so everybody’s talking about it and that’s what it was designed for.”
Mark Devine, the young Maytag Repairman joined in and said, “It’s weird how it sticks in your mind, too .I remember seeing the episode. I didn’t understand it but now...”
Thanks to Ted Dave for interview documentation.
OPENING FOR NEIL HAMBURGER THURSDAY...in waterlooo
Toronto can be a good city in many ways, there's some good people, some old friends, but there's also plenty (a tonne) of people that not only won't call you, they also won't return your calls: keep all expectations at rock bottom, it's not you (no, really, it's not, you pathetic, pathetic self-absorbed shell), they're flaky (and they don't even have the wacky tobacky of the West Coast to fall back on as an excuse)(and as much as you try to not take it personally, it burrrrrns because it seems to happen, oh, just about all the time to the point that you are thinking of writing off all new people entirely, all that time and energy wasted might be best spent working on projects alone, such as building a wall). Perhaps this is not a Toronto thing, perhaps it is a wide-spread modern malady of declining courtesies due to technological developments (text messaging, Facebook, cell phones, computers, blogs-uh ohhhhh) causing A.D.D. I will test this theory out by visiting Waterloo for just one night. Has the malady spread there? Is it a Toronto only thing, an Ontario thing, a world-wide thing or what?
Find out as I hit the stage opening for Neil Hamburger along with Daiquiri this Thursday, June 10th, 2010 at the Starlight (47A King Street North, Waterloo, ON).
I've never been to Waterloo. Could be...curious. An Ontario town named after the place of Napoleon's defeat. Could be a great show. Yet another opportunity to become a phoenix.
This is my only show with Neil.
I really miss performing with him. It's been a few years and we'd done lots and lots of tours together. I miss touring. I miss dodgy hotels with curiously unattractive women knocking at the door at 2 AM hoping to bottom-feed on the desperation of anonymous strangers. Does driving an hour to Waterloo count as touring?
Unfamiliar with the legendary Neil Hamburger?
Here:
http://neilhamburger.tvheaven.com/