IN
DEFENSE OF Don Staley, the reviewer, we were coddled 20 to 23 year old punks
without the experience to perform at that level and deserved to get slapped
silly irrespective of the technical problems.
The
next morning we confidently ordered the Frank Sinatra breakfast - cigarettes,
coffee and the reviews. Meanwhile, several hundred thousand copies of a front-page
entertainment section picture of Butch strutting below the caption "Revival
Without A Cause" had already arrived on the doorstep of the citizens
of Vancouver who were enjoying good laugh at our expense.
It was in a hushed room at the Frasier
Arms Hotel, a lumberjack hangout across the river from a 24 hour a day
screeching saw mill, that Don Stanley's review was recited aloud to the gathered
troupe like the reading of the will of a miserly uncle, and each Glass Pack
laughing the laugh of the doomed as the other was lampooned, each handed his
own bag of coal - a "particularly lame sax player", "Julio
Lopez slightly fatter and grosser than Steady Eddie Sullivan who is paradoxically
in love with his one good looks" and on and on . . . . The words filling
the room were met with gallows laughter as the next of our members walked
the plank. When the sawdust settled, we agreed that Don Stanley was right,
we weren't good enough yet and vowed with swords to the sky that that would
never happen again, and it never did.
A year later, after many more nights at DE's, we had revamped the show, adding
new features such as Father Duffy the way ahead of his time lecherous, spendthrift
Irish priest blaspheming "Tell Laura I Love her", a Country &
Western sketch and an American Bandstand format for Bob Sarlatte to mug like
Dick Clark and tell jokes for 15 minutes each night.
The
Dick Clark show was and remains a forum for whatever weird act that came to
mind (e.g. in more recent years, Blocked Intestine the Heavy Metal Trio --
(featuring leather-clad hambones Craig, Laz and Danny from the original group
who stomped out to the Band Stand stage to the opening bars of Jimi Hendricks'
"Purple Haze" and then screamed as one "S'cuse Me While I Kiss
This Guy", whereupon in heavy Cockney accents the three metal heads argue
with each other and Dick Clark as to what the correct words are "Kiss
the Sky" or "Kiss this Guy").
But the one Bandstand act that has logged the most appearances was Bah-Doon
(Gary Murphy), pictured to your left. Bah Doon is the penultimate bass singer,
the unsung hero of all Doo Wop groups, who has fallen on hard times and is
constantly finding the bumps in the road back to the top more interesting
than the road itself. Bah Doon is finally coerced by Dick Clark after a near
death coughing fit into a wheezing, hacking, rendition of Blue Moon that would
make the Marcels proud, with a last gasping "Ba badaba, bada bah bah
bah, bada ba badaba di di dang di dang dang, di ding di dong ding . . . BLUE
MOON . . . as he collapses into a heap at Dick Clark's feet.
The
Bandstand sketch was climaxed with an appearance by Butch as a shy Ricky Nelson
doing "Poor Little Fool" enduring condescending glances from a self-absorbed
Dick Clark, until at the end Rick gets the last laugh when he makes the record
skip (that's right the sound and choreography of an actual broken record.
Go ahead folks, we'll wait, you try and sing, play and move like the sound
of a record skipping) and Dick has to shake the Bejezzus out of an entranced
Rick to knock him and the record back on the groove resolving into the gushing
awe shucks "I was a fool, oh Yeah" fade out.
The Country & Western Show survives today, now featuring Gary Murphy as
Conway Twit (see
video -- "Country Show"), but was made possible in 1974 by two
unrelated phenomena - the first being the guitar playing of new kid Rob Birsinger,
and the second being a placemat that we had seen in and borrowed from a roadside
diner in the middle of Nebraska the previous Fall. On this placemat was printed
a poem with pictures of various trucks, flags and Red Neck American slogans
and icons titled "Ode to The Little Woman Behind the Man Behind the Wheel".
From
that sonnet came the character of Hank Bunion-suspiciously dressed and sounding
like Johnny Cash -- the Truck Drivin' Man bigger than life itself, who to
this day kicks off "Truck Drivin Man" (a song we stole from Commander
Cody & His Lost Planet Airmen - an even trade for their heist of our "and
at the Marquis De Sade Hotel Chains Are Required" joke to lead into their
"Beat Me Daddy Eight to the Bar") with a dedication to the "Little
Woman Behind the Man behind the Wheel".
With a streamlined act and new guitarist, Rob Birsinger, and new drummer (Mike
Moore), we were ready to take on Canada once more.
This time Vancouver was a dream come true. We had worked our asses off for
a year on the road and we were ready for the reviewers. The huge stage and
lighting equipment at the Cave provided a laboratory environment for the development
of the show that we've been reprising now for 18 years. With the help of Disc
jockey, Rick Honey, who pumped us like KSFO's Terry McGovern had three years
before, we drew better in Vancouver than we did anywhere, and played The Cave
for two weeks at a time twice a year for several years. It is a tall order
to fill a club that big for that long. Maybe we did pick up a dose of that
Double Shot of My Baby's Love fever from Pioneer week and snuck it with us
past customs and infected those staid Canucks. One Saturday night, we played
every song we knew, and responded to several encore calls. Back in our dressing
room, we had already changed out of our costumes when the club manger came
back and told us we had to do one more, because "These people won't go
home". So, we pulled our guitars out of their cases and went back out
on the stage in our street clothes. After a little time killing stand up comedy
by future Laverne & Shirley writer and Night Court Producer, Piano Man
Larry Strawther, we tuned up and our drummer, Mike, gave us the stick count
into "Little
Deuce Coupe" and taught 800 people standing on tables how to clap
on the twos and fours.
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