"i've had enough of you man, i'm 'bout to fuck up your plan"

Just when you thought everything was cool, Guru dies.

One of the best rap MC's of all time, and probably my absolute favorite, has passed away from a long time battle with cancer. His flow was so fuckin' cool and never needed to raise his voice above the smooth cadence heard in his delivery.

I used to skateboard in my garage to Gangstarr records for hours during my teenage years, with Above The Clouds usually playing on repeat on some of my very first burned cd's. So many memories attached to this group.

shawty

Since when does Usher need autotuning?

I thought that was mainly used for those who can't produce notes in key?

Let's stick to the classics, because I'm with Jay-Z on this autotuning.

Raging Bull

Okay.
Everybody listen.
Scratch that.
Everyone in a band, or collective, listen.
Take the advice from ?uestlove (one of the greatest drummers/influences/aficionados/impacts on modern music today, from possibly one of the best hip hop groups of all time) and listen to him.
Sunday is Band Day.
Above any politics amongst your group, Sunday is Band Day.
Lately, Hue's has been Monday.
We drink tequila and freestyle.
I talk about cooking for the band, but the tequila is usually the deciding point.
Listen to ?uestlove.

works every time

Some days I just feel like giving Much Music a chance.

I sat down this morning with some peanut butter toast and decided:

"Shit. Since there's nothing but shows about boats on TV, I might as well head over to Much Music. Maybe there's something good on,"

I was greeted by THIS.

I strongly suggest that you watch the entire video before reading anything below, just to put it into context.

First, a strong slew of obscenities comes to mind. This comes as no real surprise. Secondly, and most importantly, you have to ask "WHY?".

For starters, this suburban white-boy honky has no right being on television. He's not even good looking! Usually the formula goes as follows:

A = current looks, with chance of insurmountably awkward puberty stage
B = current voice, with chance for digital tuning
C = personality and marketability
D = chance for product placement

A + B + C + D = $$$

The strange thing is, this kid barely falls into any of these categories. He's not good looking: Usually the big record labels will go for the image first, and then start from the ground up. He's not talented: auto-tuning has more prominence on that track than keyboards. On top of that, the kid can't dance worth dick. Last time I saw something that white I was staring into the sun. The director knew that, so they either put a black kid next to him, or put him on a skateboard. Watch me ollie!

I understand that what I'm saying has been said time and time again, and that it will never get any better. I know why music sucks and I know why it will never change. Lou Pearlman practically wrote the bible of the formula in the early 90's.

My biggest question remains: WHY THIS KID?

He's on DEF JAM for fuck sakes. You know Def Jam? The Roots, Nas, Method Man and Red Man, Ghostface Killah, and this cracker? Why is Usher hanging out with this loser?

How long was I asleep?

yes yes, from the northwest

I was planning on gushing about how much fun the golf trip was, but I think I'll celebrate my return to Toronto with something a little simpler..


I can easily say I recite different lines from that song at least once a week. They usually find their way into my diction, and sometimes really cool people pick up on it. Then we high-five.

I don't want to think about how much work I have to do, so I won't. Instead I'm going to hang with friends, sit on my ass, start a painting, buy expensive olives, go swimming, and sip beer on my roof in the afternoon. I'll get to those important life decisions later.

assault and pepper

Hey Friends!

I've not been a slack as of late. It was just old Ted Rogers holding our internet signal ransom for several days. Yet, a lot has happened.

I might as well start with last Thursdays show at Call The Office in London.

The night itself was an overall success. Seeing as I don't have Facebook, I never really know who's "attending" and who's not. I'd heard word that many old friends were confirmed guests, and nearly all of them showed! This made for some, well, I'll just say interesting events. Even great friend, past-bandmate, and wonderful human in general Nathan Albion made his appearance. Dan and I used to be in a band with Nathan called Gerald Pessy way back in the day. We also almost won our highschool Battle Of The Bands together after only two weeks of playing our instruments.


The show also went quite well. There's a young and shakey kid doing sound at CTO nowadays, which caused us a bit of sweat. Aparently the show sounded good from the croud. People seemed to respond well to the new material. Even the new-new material (a near remix of an untitled song that had been played at several shows) went off without a hitch. That new version is pretty awesome, and a lot more fun to play, even though I stole the beat from a Josh Ritter album.
I have to mention, the Call The Office stage has heat like no other club. I'd rather play in the desert than feel the lights of that place. I always bring a change of clothes to those shows because, combining the heat with the vigor I play with, always makes for a sweaty performance.

The next morning, after some delicious King's Inn Diner lunch, we made for the road. I drove. Upon arrival, we all split for a Triple S before the show. I got Chippy's, located directly across the steet. If you've never eaten there, and have an appreciation for fish & chips, boot your ass over there as soon as possible. We then showed up for sound check.


I'll be honest, and I've said before, Lee's Palace scares the shit out of me. It's a massive venue that has seen some of the best bands on the planet play since before you were born. The walls of the place just ache with history. Not only is it one of the most notorious, but the best sounding clubs in the city. So naturally it was a bit nerve-racking packing our gear in it's hollow state. All of the bands were cool, except the bill didn't have any flow whatsoever.

The order went as follows: college funk, hue, hip-hop, then metal. Goofy.

We were rushed going on, seeing as the previous band ran late. I was literally still tightening my stands while Darcy tinkered the opening chords of our set. A great amount of people showed up, except we didn't make any money because they were all on the guestlist haha. S'all good. We payed for our gas money the night before.

Afterward we all hit Dance Cave and danced uncontrollably. Kevin Black and I jammed so fucking hard to Arcade Fire. I'm pretty sure we created our own dance circle in the middle of the floor just because nobody wanted to be hit by our flailing limbs. Atta boy. Another story that deserves some attention is actually quite funny. Minutes before we left after packing our gear, a fight broke out only a few feet from us. The cops showed up, and one of the guys who sucker-punched another dude approached us and told him to take his wallet. We said no, so he kicked it under our van. All I did for the next ten minutes was stare at the guy while he was being questioned by the cops. But why would he do this? It's simple really. The oldest in the book.

See, when a cop questions you for something illegal, all you really need to do is chuck your wallet away. That way, upon questioning, you can make up any address you feel like and the cops would be none the wiser. You'll never recieve a ticket and never pay a fine.

The punchers girlfriend noticed me eyeing him up and pleeded with me to not rat him out. To be honest, the only reason I didn't was because Darcy was driving and didn't want to get involved. Lucky him, because I was drunk and wanted justice. The most funny part is, she was pleeding with me as I was sitting in a van full of people, and after I continued to shove everything she said to the ground, my only reply to her was:

"Na na na na na na na na, BATMAN!!!"

We all had a good laugh at her expense right then and there.

I went home after that and slept. Then! Just when life couldn't get any better! I awoke to tickets to that afternoons Jays game against the Kansas City Royals! My good friend Andrew Siu and his lovely girlfriend treated Blair and I to some free tickets behind the plate. That was fucking awesome. I don't really have any good stories about that, except that I would shout any obscenity Andrew asked me to, including telling Vernon Wells to "EARN THAT 20 MILL!!!" when he was up to bat. He then struck out.

A week later, Darcy and I attended the annual Alzheimer's Tournament at The Highland in London. This was our fourth year playing, and easily the most hilarious yet. I won't go into too much detail, because I have a tonne of pics and video from that day, which I will post hopefully as soon as my sister sends them. You're in for some hilarity.

That same night a whole whack of us went out to Raygun and party-hardy'd, until we eventually ended up at Caitlin's place, free-styling and putting back drinks until the sun came up. Those freestyle tapes exist somewhere and I'll see what I can do to retrieve them.


Nowadays I've just been working, doing laundry, rehearsing, recording, painting, photographing, working on a website, Luminato, watching playoff basketball with K, walking, organizing, and enjoying what has been one of the best summers in years. My life seems to be one hectic, fantastic moment after another.