Record Store Tales

RST #1183/VHS Archives #154: 2 Minutes on a Wednesday at Work in the late-90s

RECORD STORE TALES #1183: 2 Minutes on a Wednesday at Work in the late-90s

 

In the 90s, the Beat Goes On were advised by the police to install a video security system.  Though it was rarely helpful, they suggested it could be used to catch CD thieves who came in to us to sell their stolen goods.  The one time I know it was used in court, the tape was too fuzzy to identify the thief.

Can you identify me?

We had seven security tapes:  One for each day of the week.  We’d rotate them.  Every few years they would wear out, and you’d have to replace them.  That’s how I got this tape.  It was a freebie that the boss didn’t need anymore.  Truth be told, half the time, we didn’t even bother to record.  Each tape was only good for eight hours, so we could not record the entire day anyway.  We’d usually insert the tape at around 1:00 PM so we could record the night shift.  This was supposedly done to record during the “most dangerous” hours.  I gave the camera the middle finger a few times, but nobody saw those tapes, I suppose.

One of our old employees told me he liked to take the security tapes home and get high watching them.  I ended up keeping only this one.  Unfortunately, I chose a very boring Wednesday tape with nothing interesting going on.  If you’d like to see for yourself, have a look at the quick video below for a day in the life at the Beat Goes On.  Glad I kept it for one reason only: this physical location no longer exists and is now part of a parking lot.  History!  This is the only existing video documentation of my old store of which I am aware.

#1182: The Legendarium of George

RECORD STORE TALES #1182:  The Legendarium of George

Every neighborhood has a legend.  While in my own mind, I’d like to think that Bob Schipper and I were the legends, we were far too normal.  Oh sure, we were quirky, but we were not unique enough to be legends.   In our neighborhood, there was only one kid that was an absolute legend, and of his own making.  He was the obligatory “older kid” that had all the records, all the pornography, and reigned as the ultimate outcast.  That neighbor was George.

We lived in a relatively new subdivision.  When my parents bought their house, it was practically new.  Only one family owned it before.  Next door to us, George’s family had been there the longest.  Though he would only have been four years old, George always said he could remember when I was the new baby next door.

George was a dick from when he was just a kid.  He was also the ultimate neighborhood geek.  He had the big glasses.  He had the center-part.  But he was an enigma.  Even though he was most definitely a geek, he was also a braggart.  This probably came from his age, being the oldest kid on our street.  He was also one of the first kids to acquire a record collection, which meant there was often a reason to have to spend time with him, besides the times he’d just invite himself over.

His family was what you’d call dysfunctional today.  He never really had a chance, but George couldn’t be trusted.  While he could be sweet, he started young as a bad apple.

In one of my earliest memories, I was in my basement playing with Lego.  I built a colourful airplane.  I brought it outside to show George, and his two friends Todd and Sean.  “Make it bigger!” they egged me on.  I raced back inside and added another layer of bricks and brought it back out to show them.  “Bigger!  Make it even bigger!”  Eager for approval, I ran back inside and added another layer of multicolour bricks.  I leaped up the stairs and out the back door to show them again.  “Add more!  Keep adding!” they advised, and so I went back inside and added more bricks.  This went on approximately five times total.  The final time, I showed them my massive and impractical airplane, and George smashed it.  Laughing, they stole my bricks as I ran inside in tears.

Indeed, George soon earned a reputation as a thief.  In grade school, he was caught stealing Play-doh.  It became a well-known neighbourhood fact.  “George is a stealer!” said Michelle across the street.  It was like this black mark upon his house.  After he was caught, we didn’t see him around for a while.  He laid low.

Eventually the status quo returned, and George resumed joining the rest of the kids on the street in various activities.

We had a school with a baseball diamond and a tennis court nearby.  Two baseball diamonds in fact.  One summer afternoon, we were playing catch, but not on the diamond.  We were just playing in the schoolyard.  Someone threw George the ball; he ducked, and it went through the school window.

“Oooh George that’s your fault!”

“No it isn’t, you threw it too hard!”

“You should have caught it!”

We were all eager to throw George under the bus for that one.  We all felt he had it coming.

George would always bring two cans of pop with him when we went to the baseball diamond.  If you were thirsty, though, you didn’t bother asking George for a sip.

“These are mine for my diabetes,” he would always answer.

One of our weekend activities was playing “Pop 500” on the baseball diamond.  I don’t remember the rules, but the idea was to hit the ball as far as you could.  There was a regular group of us that played.  They included Bob Schipper, his brother John, George and his friends Todd Meyer and Scott Peddle.  It was well established that Bob was the best athlete in that group.  That wasn’t in dispute.  He was the biggest, strongest and fastest.  But George had his own ideas on how we ranked.

“Bob is the best at Pop 500,” he told me one afternoon.  “Then me, John, Todd, and you and Scott are in last place.”

He sure did think a lot of himself.  It seemed like he always had to be the best (or second best) at something.

Back to the Lego, when we were younger, George discovered this cartoon called Force Five.  It was a North American version of a few Japanese anime series.  Bob and I had never seen it or heard of it, but George was raving about this cartoon.  He built a Lego robot based on the show, but it was really shitty.  The arms and legs were just skinny little twigs that didn’t move, and it had a gun where its…well, where its dick would be.  Bob and I critiqued it fairly, but negatively.  However, we did take inspiration from George, and built our own robots.

We re-convened on my back porch with our robots.  Ours were cooler, had some movement and most importantly, didn’t have a gun for a penis.  (Oh, don’t worry, we’ll be talking about a different kind of “Love Gun” soon enough.)

George’s critique back at us was also in the negative, but for unexpected reasons.

“You see, yours are based on the idea of ‘robot’.  Mine is based on Force Five.”

Always had to be the best at something, to the point of basing the contest upon a show that neither Bob or I had heard of.  Sometimes it was hard to like George.

He was not the giving type, though he was always happy to show his younger neighbours his Playboy magazines.  I can distinctly remember one afternoon, we were out on the sidewalk, burning stuff with a magnifying glass.  I had an awesome plastic magnifying glass that could really burn.  For George though, burning holes in leaves and newspapers wasn’t entertaining enough.  He brought out a Playboy and encouraged us to burn the nipples.  That might have been the first pair of boobs I ever saw.

His young obsession with pornography put my parents on alert.  I think they considered George the neighbourhood pervert.  Indeed, he was the one who would introduce, shall we say, new terminology to our vocabularies.  He was the first one who had porno videos.  He would often talk about girls and sex, and at my age, I would have rather talked about Star Wars or comic books.

Because George was older, he was often first on board with many fads.  He had a Commodore computer early on, as well as a great collection of Transformers and GI Joes, including their accompanying comic books.  He had his own VCR, and he would borrow a second one from Todd to record porn videos.  And, he had a pretty killer record collection early on.  His favourite band was Kiss, and there is no question that without George, Kiss would not have been my favourite band.  When I discovered music, I spent a lot of time learning about Kiss, and other bands, from George.  He would bring his VCR over, and let me tape his music videos.

George’s big weakness was money.  He was stupid with money.  He would come into some money, and go to the comic store and buy a whole bunch of comics.  Then, six months later, he would get into something new, and sell off all his old stuff dirt cheap to fund his new obsession.  And so, he sold to me the first 24 or so issues of GI Joe: A Real American Hero for something like 50 cents each (except the early issues, which were a couple bucks).  This included the super rare first printing of issue 2, which I still have.  Unlike George, I kept every single thing I bought from him.  I still have everything.  This included G1 Optimus Prime, and a ton of early GI Joe figures and vehicles.  I have the GI Joe “MANTA” sailboard, which was mail-order only.  These things are priceless today.  He sold them to us for a few bucks.  Every time we came into some money, from allowance or chores, we could go over to his basement and buy a GI Joe toy.  This went on for a few weeks until he eventually sold everything, to buy records.  Because records were his new big thing.  Until CDs.  But let’s not jump ahead.

When George got into music, Kiss were his favourite band followed by Iron Maiden.  He quickly became a know-it-all.  He would play a tape, and try to stump us.  “Who’s this playing?” he asked.  We’d never heard the song before.  “I don’t know, Black Sabbath?”  He’d smirk and go, “NO, it’s Uriah Heep!”  This went on and on, to an annoying degree.  Bob and I decided to get our revenge and stump him instead.  Bob had recently acquired a cassette called Masters of Metal Vol. 2.  This compilation included a cool song called “Balls to the Wall” by a band called Accept.  “Who does this sound like to you?” asked Bob of me when he got it.  “It sounds like AC/DC to me,” I answered, considering the similarity between Brian Johnson’s grit, and Udo’s.

A plan was hatched.  We were going to put George in his place.

And so, in my back yard, gathered around a boom box, Bob challenged George to “name that band.”  Masters of Metal Vol. 2 was cued up to track five on side one:  “Balls to the Wall”.

George was quiet for the first minute of the track.

Then, “Watch the damned!” screamed Udo Dirkschneider from the speakers of that boom box.

Immediately George answered, “AC/DC”.

“No!  It’s Accept!”  exclaimed Bob in victory.

“Sign of victorrrrryyyy!” sang Udo behind us.

Bob and I stood up and high-fived in our own sign of victory.  George immediately tried to justify his mistake, by saying my stereo wasn’t very good quality, and that was the reason he got it wrong.  He certainly knew AC/DC when he heard it, he claimed, but my boom box was too cheap and crappy to tell the difference between AC/DC and Accept.

Sure…

Though George was seriously into music, as were Bob and I, there was one guy on the street that was miles ahead because he was in a band.  Rob Szabo is talented singer/songwriter today, but I remember when his favourite bands were Motley Crue and Stryper.  Rob had started playing with Peter Coulliard down the street.  He had even written and recorded two songs.  The second one was called “The Stroll”, and I can still hum it today.  George desperately wanted to be in that band.  He wanted to be cool.  He wanted to play in front of girls.  And Rob’s band needed a bassist.  George would hang out with Rob, watching him play, and Rob was kind enough to show him a few things on guitar.

George sold more of his stuff, and saved some money.  Soon, he had enough to buy a brand new bass.  He decided to surprise Rob one day by showing him.

“Look what I have!” he grinned.  “Now I’m your bassist!”  Only, George couldn’t play.  Rob was horrified.  He didn’t want this.  He was serious about music.  He also felt terribly guilty, because George bought the bass specifically because Rob needed a bass player!  For two weeks, George was technically “in the band”.   Rob made a copy of his two-song tape for George.  I was there when George played that tape for the girl he liked.  We were outside on the sidewalk, and George had his ghetto blaster in hand.  He played the first tune.

“That’s us!” he said.  “That’s my band.”  He wasn’t on the recording at all.

Like a kid who didn’t know how to break up with his girlfriend, Rob took a while to tell George he was “out” of the band.  He was crushed, but to his credit, he didn’t give up.

George kept practising.  Gene Simmons was his favourite bassist, followed by Steve Harris.  George would often bring his bass and amp outside to play, so he could be seen and heard by the neighbours.  Desperate to look cool, George brought his bass over to my house and plugged in on the back porch.  Then, he’d be back to “Guess this song” again, trying to stump us.  “Guess this song from the bassline!”

Durm durm durm durm.  Durm durm durm durm.

“Uhh, I dunno, ‘Shout It Out Loud’?”

“No, it’s ‘Love Gun!’”

Bob and I hated that game.  We may have schooled him on Accept, but he was relentless with the basslines.

Most of them were Kiss anyway.  He had a growing Kiss collection.  He would frequently come home from Sam the Record Man with new Kiss albums.   There was a point when he only needed two:  Hotter Than Hell, and The Elder.  There are good stories about each, but the main thing is that I actually got Hotter Than Hell before he did.  I had acquired it and Kiss Alive!, my first two Kiss albums, in a trade with Ian Johnson.  I gave him my sister’s Atari 2600 cartridge of Superman and got the two Kiss albums in return.  She was angry with me, but today accepts the importance of that trade to me.  I still have that copy of Kiss Alive!  As for Hotter Than Hell, I immediately phoned George and leveraged it in another trade, for a Walksman, a Black Sabbath cassette of Paranoid, an Abbot & Costello record of Who’s On First, and some Iron Maiden 12″ singles.  I definitely came out the winner.  That copy of Hotter Than Hell was brutally scratched.  But, I was now well on my way to having a rock music collection.

I taped most of my Kiss off George as I began my collection.  The annoying thing there wasn’t so much that I had to hang out with George to tape his records.  The annoying thing was that he would sit there and play bass as we were taping.  So, I had to politely compliment his playing, as he played along to the records I was taping.  The bass would bleed through, and therefore my dubbed cassette of Kiss Unmasked had his bass all over it!  I wasn’t able to get a proper copy of Unmasked for about two years, so for a long time, all I had was the cassette with George’s damn bass on it!  I can still hear it in my head, especially on “Naked City”.

George finished highschool, but I was just beginning.  In grade nine, I saw my first Battle of the Bands.  Rob Szabo was playing the regionals, and it was a big deal.  The grand prize was recording time at an actual studio.   I sat with Bob Schipper and Scott Peddle.  We were there to support Rob Szabo’s band, Over 550, but also to heckle George.  He had joined a band called Zephyr.

George was really rocking out.  He leaned way, way back as he played his bass.

“Don’t fall over George!” I yelled.

“You suck George!” shouted Bob Schipper.  Scott had his own comments that he yelled at the stage.  We thought we were absolutely hilarious.  It was our revenge for all the stupid bass he made us listen to in the back yard.

George eventually got a job at Long John Silver, a nearby seafood restaurant.  He was memorably disciplined for “finding a faster way to cook the fish,” but that was his main gig.  He would leave early in the morning, walking down the street alone.  He was notorious for singing on his way to work, with a Walkman and earphones.  George was not a good singer.  Not in the least.  My sister and I took to watching him from the front window when we saw him leaving for work.  We’d laugh in hysterics at his horrendous, off-key caterwauling.

The best example of this had to be one time we heard him singing Kiss.

He started his walk silently.  He was already halfway down the street when he raised his fist in the air and shouted “Alright! Love Gun!”  Then he proceeded with the off-key chorus.  “Love guuuuuuun…looove guuuuuuuuuuun!” he bellowed.  Somewhere in the distance, a dog answered his howl.

It was absolutely hilarious.  If there was such a thing as cell phone cameras back then, you can be guaranteed that I would have recorded it.  It was a moment, for sure!

When he was old enough to get into bars, he acquired his very own beer belly, which he showed off with his short T-shirts.  He got a perm.  With his big glasses, it looked even more hilarious than it would have on its own.  He wore studded wristbands and assorted metal jewelry.  He looked like an actual parody.  He used to show off this one photo of him with a bunch of strippers at a strip club, as if it were a trophy.

He was always talking dirty.

“Hey guys.  Wanna hear something cool?  I was getting out of the shower the other day, and I had a boner.  I hung a towel on it.  Pretty impressive.”

“What, a tea towel?” chided Bob.

Unfortunately, George’s problem with money was genetic.  After two and a half decades in the same house, they had to sell it and move.  He moved around a lot, and then eventually we lost track of him completely.  There were rumours he was in Orillia, or Windsor.

One day in 1995, I came home from work to find a message on my answering machine.

“Hey Mike, this is George calling.  I just wanted to tell you, I just bought all the new Star Wars Power of the Force action figures.  Call me.”

I could hardly believe it.  We hadn’t seen this guy in years and he was still up to his old habits:  Going all-in on the latest thing.  I’m sure by 1997, he had sold them all at a tremendous loss.

I didn’t call him back, but kind of regretted it.  Over the years, curiosity got to Scott Peddle and I, as we Googled and searched.  There was no sign of George, anywhere.  It was as if he had vanished without a trace.  Scott and I made jokes about how George was probably plotting his revenge against us somewhere, but the truth is, we spent more time telling “George stories” than anything else.  Because he was a legend.  A total legend.

Eventually, Facebook reunited us.  It was as if none of the past ever happened.  Nothing need be said; we were friends.  Perhaps for the first time.  As for George, he was more into Star Wars than ever.  He started a fresh collection of Star Wars Black Series action figures.  He read this blog, and commented on it.  But the sad ending to the story is that George died young, before he could even see The Force Awakens in the theater.

George passed on Boxing Day, 2014.  He was 46 years old.  He went to a party the night before, came home, and never woke up.  It is strange to think that George was always older than us, but now he will always be younger.  He went far too soon.  We reconnected as friends, but we learned that we are only immortal for a limited time.

We may talk shit about him to this day, but Scott and I toasted George when we went to see The Force Awakens together.

“Cheers, George.”  It was a moment.  He would have loved to see Star Wars back on the big screen.

We talk trash about him, and we make fun of him, but I guess he really became our friend.  He did earn every bit of shit that we threw his way.  It was always deserved.  I mean, he stole Bob’s brother’s bike.  (We know, because he put it in his garage, and his garage didn’t have a door, so you could see the bike from the street.)  He stole Lego from me more than once.  (We know, because I had a rare 4×3 clear windshield slope that disappeared one day and re-appeared in his collection.)  He stole Lego from Bob.  But, he let us tape his records and videos.  He taught us about bands, albeit in the most annoying ways.  Maybe when we were kids, the better word would have been that we were “Frenemies”.  That word didn’t exist back then.  When we reunited as adults, we became friends for real, though so briefly.  I’m not sure if George had a happy life.  He always had a smile, but he lost his family fairly young, and never married or had kids.  He was a loner.

But he was a legend.

 

#1181: Ice Storm April! [with Dashcam Video]

RECORD STORE TALES #1181: Ice Storm April!

I think one of the greatest reasons that my seasonal affective disorder (S.A.D.) has been non-existent this year is the revelation that I can work from home, and when I do it’s not as bad as I feared it would be.  This means if I can avoid driving due to weather, I don’t have to drive.  My work has a good policy on working from home that would give me this flexibility.  After all, when it comes down to brass tacks, the worst part of winter isn’t the weather.  It’s driving in it.  Looking at it from inside is actually kind of fun.

Our spring has been warm/cold off and on, but spring is definitely here.  That means that a few drivers have prematurely taken off their snow tires.  Canadians seem to forget that April can get angry, just when you think it’s all over.  I don’t know why they forget this, year after year.  Perhaps it’s wishful thinking.  Regardless, when that last angry storm hit us on April 3 2025, the lack of snow tires on cars that should know better by now, created an actual perfect storm of traffic chaos.

I was at work that morning, and watched as a wet mix of snow and rain suddenly pelted my car from outside.  Although I should have gone home immediately, I ate my lunch and emailed my bosses that I’d be working from home that afternoon.  I wish I had left 30 minutes earlier, but if wishes were horses…I’d probably still got stuck in traffic.

I watched as a pickup truck in front of me, on only the slightest incline, began to skid backwards.  He veered off to the left, and made a U-turn, unable to go up the slightest hill.  Once I crested the hill, I was met with three transport trucks that were completely stuck in the snow and ice.  I had to carefully navigate the space between them in order to proceed.  The hill got steeper, but I had no problem with my snow tires.

It was nerve wracking and I had my dad on the phone the whole time, keeping him up to date with my progress home; he was so worried.

I saw cars pull over to the side of the road just to brush the accumulating snow off their rear and side windows.  I was luckier.  With my dad’s help the day before, we just finished installing new windshield wipers on my car.  They were more than up to the task.

Lessons learned in the winter of 2025:

  1. Working from home alleviates the anxiety aspect of Seasonal Affective Disorder.
  2. Don’t take your winter tires off until mid-April!

Songs:

Buffalo Crows – “Starlord” from Bovonic Empire

Sword – “Unleashing Hell” from Sword III

Stir of Echoes – “Wild Eye” from Stir of Echoes

Blotto – “Secret Agent Man” / “Metalhead” live at Toad’s Place

#1180: Games Without Frontiers

RECORD STORE TALES #1180: Games Without Frontiers

One glorious March break in the early 80s, Bob Schipper and I invented a game.  We were just kids, 10 and 12 years old.  We invented lots of games over the years, but this one was one of the most bizarre to outside observers.  If my mom happened to look out the window, she would have seen two kids running, jumping, leaping, dodging, climbing, tip-toeing and diving through the yard, seemingly around invisible objects and opponents.  I  can’t remember what this game was called (perhaps “The Maze”), but I do remember this:  we had fun.  We played it almost every day of that March break.

It started with Bob and I at the backyard picnic table, at which we brainstormed many an idea.  It was made of wood, painted brown, and starting to wear with use.  The picnic table only had a few years left, but it was like home base.  Across the picnic table were scattered sheets of paper.  On those sheets of paper were drawn detailed maps, all from our imagination.  On these maps, we depicted obstacles and enemies.  Starting at point A, one would navigate the map and its obstacles until reaching the exit, and escape.  Quicksand, poison darts, pits, fire, and water would have to be passed, each in turn, like levels of elaborate video games.  Only there were no video games, only Bob and I.  The back yard was our obstacle course, and our imaginations created the obstacles.

Once our maps had been drawn and agreed upon, we began our quest to escape…wherever it was we were pretending to be.

We climbed on top of the picnic table.

“Ready?” asked Bob.

“Ready!” I exclaimed.

“OK.  JUMP!”  We leaped off the picnic table with exaggerated movement and pretended to fall a great distance.

“You OK?” Bob asked as we got up.

“A-OK!” I confirmed.

“OK, according to the map, our next obstacle is a wall of fire dead ahead.  Let’s go!”  Off we ran until we reached whatever hedge or bush was to be our wall of fire.

“How do we get through this thing?” I asked in mock desperation.

“Well,” pondered Bob, “I think the only way through is to run!  Run as fast as we can.  Ready?”

“Ready!” I exclaimed once more.  With a start, Bob was off at a run in his track pants and jacket.  He leapt through whatever trees or bush we pretended to be our fire.  I followed suit once he was through.

On and on we went, for hours, or what seemed like hours.  We had storylines.  We made use of everything in the front and back yards, as well as garage, as we could.   And it was our own private game.  We didn’t want anyone else playing along with us.  We had ideas for future games in the coming days, and we didn’t need outside ideas or players.  It would ruin the good time we were having.  This we knew from experience.  We often made up our own games, and upon bringing in more people, found that they changed it, either by design or accident.  Bob and I were in sync, but the other kids were not.

“We can’t let George find out what we’re doing or he’ll want to join in,” I warned Bob, referring to the annoying next door neighbor.  “He can easily see us if he goes out the side door.”  Bob agreed, and so we planned a cover story if he inquired what were were up to.  It probably involved practising for track and field, and the words “fuck off”.

And so, for four days that March break, Bob and I navigated the most challenging imaginary obstacle course that nobody had ever seen.  We thought it would make a great idea for a movie or video game, if our amazing ideas could ever be properly captured.

They never were, and so we just have this story to remember it by.

#1179: Spring Dinner With Aaron

RECORD STORE TALES #1179: Spring Dinner With Aaron

The clocks have changed and we have beaten winter once again!  Though it was the harshest winter for weather since the 1990s, it was the easiest winter for my mental health in decades.  And I have you to thank for supporting me through it.  Though winter’s not completely over, the darkness that pervaded my evenings is.  We’re due for one or two more big storms, but nothing like what we endured in February.

Spring is so close I can taste it.

Coinciding with the clock change, another sign of spring has emerged:  that being Aaron of the KMA!  Aaron was in town on Sunday, so we met up with him and his lovely wife Cindy for a dinner at my favourite local establishment, Borealis.  Shop local, buy local!  So that is what we did.  Aaron was curious about the “local” aspect.  “Does Kitchener have a lot of wild boar?” he asked, only partly joking.  All the food comes from Ontario.  Aaron and Cindy had the wild trout, while I had mushroom rigatoni and Jen had prime rib.  All-Ontario menu!  They did serve some foreign spirits such as Absinthe, but we didn’t look too deep into the liquor menu.

Of course there were gifts!  I gave Aaron his own copy of Live In Ontario by Max the Axe, and he gifted me a Def Leppard tour shirt (with Journey), a Jacob Moon album I needed, and the new 40th Anniversary edition of Stay Hungry by Twisted Sister.

Dinner was incredible, and we received special service from “Cousin” Luigi, whom we have not seen since before the pandemic.  I have been wanting to take Aaron to Borealis for years, so it was a happy circumstance that we had Luigi.  We didn’t want to eat upstairs due to Jen’s health conditions, so they opened up the entire downstairs dining room just for us.  We had the whole room to ourselves.

And Luigi made sure Jen never ran out of drinks.

A delightful night, and two wonderful reunions in one.

#1178: Kitchener Blotto

RECORD STORE TALES #1178: Kitchener Blotto

There’s an old saying; I think it goes back to Aristotle.  It goes, “Never meet your heroes.”

I think we can prove that wrong, right here.

Quick recap:  I first heard Blotto’s song “Metal Head” as a young kid.  Not sure what to make of these guys, I filed it away as “interesting” but never had the opportunity to hear more through my younger life.  I even worked at a used CD store from 1994-2006.  You know how many used CDs by Blotto came in during that 12 year span?  Zero!  Not a one!  I started to wonder if they were a real band.  Fortunately, along came the internet, confirming that my memory wasn’t playing tricks on me.  Some of the core Blotto members first assembled in the early 1970s, as the Star Spangled Washboard Band.  They had albums and singles.  Yet, up here in Kitchener Ontario Canada, nobody I knew had the record, heard the record, or knew where to buy the record.  It was frustrating as hell, but I never forget the name “Blotto” nor the song “Metal Head”.  The music video was indelible.  The singer had charisma!  The band looked unique.  One guy was bald (a rarity in 80s rock bands) and one guy had glasses and wore a tie!?  What was with that?  In the 80s, we had Revenge of the Nerds and I couldn’t help but wonder what this band was about, because visually, that was what I was seeing!  A nerd with a guitar?  It made no sense to 13 year old me.

But I never forget.

Fast forward to 2018.  My pal Aaron and I had this summer ritual of hitting Toronto to go record shopping.  This trip almost never happened because Jen’s mom was dying of cancer and we only had so many weekends together left.  However, she ordered me:  “Mike, go with your friend.”  And so, first thing in the morning, we embarked.  The first store we hit was BMV and there it was:  Combo Akimbo by Blotto, featuring the song “Metal Head”.  Flip the record over.  There was the bald guy, and the guy with the glasses!  I snapped it up immediately.  It went under my arm and stayed there until checkout.  There was no question I was getting it.  The whole trip was documented on video, including this find.  In the video, I was delighted to find the guys all had “Blotto” names:  Sarge Blotto, Bowtie Blotto, Broadway Blotto, Cheese Blotto, and Lee Harvey Blotto too.  I got the gag, and all my hopes were confirmed when I dropped the needle on that record later that night.

Fast forward again.  We lost Jen’s mom, and I started writing again.  My Blotto reviews were spotted by drummer F. Lee Harvey Blotto himself, who contacted me in gratitude.  He even sent me a shirt, while defending their cover of “Stop! In the Name of Love” which I wrote slightly negatively about.  “What a cool guy,” I thought to myself.

I wore that Blotto shirt with pride until it pretty much wore out.  I also emailed F. Lee in 2019 when Sarge passed away from cancer.  What shitty disease it is.

I continued to listen to and love my Blotto albums over the years.  I purchased the Collected Works CD which has most of their studio material.  The rest of their discography eluded me, at least at prices that Jen won’t smite for me.  And finding Blotto, in the wild, in Ontario?  Not frequent, or I would have had an album sooner than 2018!

I’ve lost a lot of weight since then!

Fast forward again!  It is now 2025, and to my delight, I discovered that a Blotto documentary film was coming!  Hello! My Name Is Blotto – The Movie, directed by Rob “Bert Blotto” Lichter will premier April 12 at the Cohoes Music Hall.  I asked for any band member to come on my show Grab A Stack of Rock to talk about it.

A day or two later, F. Lee emailed.  “Why not!” he said, and offered the whole band and director Bert too.

And so we did the interview, and it was a lot of fun and hopefully gained the band a few new fans.  I know that among many of my regulars, particularly in Australia, it was their first time hearing and seeing Blotto.

What was really cool was the pre and post-show chat when we weren’t recording.  Bert was first to arrive in the virtual studio, and his passion for Blotto was only exceeded by his feelings of camaraderie with them.  We chatted a bit, and then Bowtie arrived.  He was curious about me, so I told him I was from about an hour west of Toronto in a place called Kitchener/Waterloo.

Without pause, Bowtie said “We played there as the Star Spangled Washboard Band in the early 1970s.  1975 or so.  We also played Guelph and Richmond Hill.”

My jaw must have dropped at that moment.  Guelph is pretty obscure even among Canadians.  And Bowtie pronounced it right, which most people don’t do on their first try.  He said that Broadway Blotto would remember.  I speculated that they might have played at the Coronet Club, not far down the street from me.  They were known for their regular-hours lunch menu, and strippers and rock bands at night.  That was the kind of place that Blotto would have played up here, as Bowtie and Broadway confirmed.

Also confirmed by F. Lee:  There are lots of Blotto live collections up on Spotify waiting to be streamed.  Lots more music for me to hear, right at my fingertips.

At the end of the show, the Blotto guys thanked me for my support over the years and said some very kind things about my writing.  I’ll tell you, there is nothing better than when someone whose art you admire, tells you that they also like what you do.

Broadway called us “kindred spirits” which I find very flattering, but this is where it gets really cool.

He asked me to choose my own “Blotto name”.

I thought about it, and I played with Hoser Blotto for a little bit.  I ultimately decided on “Kitchener Blotto”, because that really identifies me.  Maybe there are lots of fellow hosers who are Blotto fans, but I hope when Blotto hears the word Kitchener, they think of me.  And the strip club.

Thank you guys.

Don’t meet your heroes?  Pfft.  Choose your heroes wisely, I say.

Kitchener Blotto

 

 

#1177: Snowpocalypse Now!

RECORD STORE TALES #1177: Snowpocalypse Now!

I haven’t been writing much lately, which is a choice I made in order to avoid the burnouts of the past, and to focus on giving 100% to 50 Years of Iron Maiden.  Doing this series has been a healthy and rewarding experience.

In the last week, my town has been hit with roughly 70 centimetres of snow.  I had not seen snow like this since the 1990s.  It’s quite remarkable!  On Saturday morning, Jen and I went out on a junk food run to stock up for the holiday weekend.  (The junk food lasted about 36 hours.)  We noticed that a lot of the snowbanks were taller than the humans on the sidewalks.  That was before we got hit with another 40 cm.

But here I am, sitting indoors and just marvelling at the winter wonderland.  That is where we break this story down into a mental health detour.

I had to find a new counsellor again, which sucks.  I really like my counsellor now, but she has another maternity leave coming, and it is hard finding a good match.  I did however find a new counsellor earlier this month that I think is going to work out.  I am optimistic.

Perhaps because of that optimism, I had a revelation the other day.  It goes back five years, to when Covid began.

We were all forced to adapt.  We were all stuck indoors.  Some of us had to work from home.  Everyone bought webcams.  Anyone that could work from home during that time, probably did at least once.  Now, working from home policies are pretty standard.

And thus it occurred to me:  storms like this don’t have as big an impact on me anymore, because I can just stay home and work.  That is a game changer as far as my winter disorder goes.  I don’t have to go fight the roads just to get to work alive.  I can stay home, and eat pretty much anything I want to.  That’s thanks to Covid.  So there you go.  Perspective.  Five years ago I said I’d have loads of perspective.  There’s one angle.

Of course, for me, working from home recently meant a drop in creativity.  One of the cardinal rules of working from home is:  “Thou shalt not use your creative space as your work space.”  It’s just not good for mental health to mix the two, but I have no choice.  So, as a result, when I’m done sitting in this chair for eight or nine hours of work, I don’t choose to sit in it again for an hour or two more.  It’s not healthy.

I will say one thing, which is that I bought a disappointing Rod Stewart CD this past weekend that I should have spent more time reading the sticker.  You’re In My Heart:  Rod Stewart with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.  Cool, Rod with a symphony.  All my favourite songs like “Reason to Believe” and “You’re In My Heart”.  New versions, I assumed.  Unfortunately, I discovered it’s just another Drastic Symphony.  Except for two new recordings, it’s just old Rod classics with strings dubbed in, just like Def Leppard.  Disappointing!

So, writing hasn’t been a priority when I have this stuff going on, but not everybody watches YouTube so it’s nice to touch base like this once in a while.  Hope you’re doing well.

#1176: End of Isolation

RECORD STORE TALES #1176: End of Isolation

I’ve been in isolation nine days.  A positive Covid test and some weird symptoms have kept me house-bound, and of course Jen was only a few days behind me.  She tested positive with symptoms about four days later.  The true test of a marriage is if one can survive Covid isolation together, twice.  I am happy to announce we are still married!

On Thursday January 23rd, I started feeling an irritation in my throat.  I went home early.  I recorded a 50 Years of Iron Maiden episode with Harrison and Melissa Nee, feeling absolutely wiped out by the end of it.  I went straight to bed.  I woke up the next morning knowing I would not be going into work.  I felt stinky rotten, but without a cough or congestion.  Just my throat, a lot of body pain, a foggy head and fatigue.  I tested myself, and you know how that went down.

While it was longer and harder than my first fight with Covid, it never turned into anything serious.  Fighting the fatigue was the hardest part.  I started working from home on the Monday, putting in full days, but delaying my recovery by not resting enough.

My experience with Covid was not just different physically this time.  Mentally, the toll was different.

During my first round with Covid, I was dreading working from home, but gradually warmed up to it.  On my second round, I was looking forward to working from home, but tired of it quickly.  My lack of enthusiasm might be due to feeling worse this time, but I spent my time differently.  I didn’t listen to any music, at all, while I worked.  I didn’t do any easy chores like laundry while I worked.  All I did was cook the odd meal.  A lot of Spam.  I’m into Spam now.

I didn’t do anything creative for that whole time.  Physically, I didn’t want to continue sitting in that chair (as comfy as it is) any longer once my work day was done.  I did do a quick video with Dan Chartrand on both our YouTube channels – check it out.

It was just a bummer of a time otherwise, as Jen and I learned how to navigate her personal space clashing with mine!  The monotony of the food too; that was starting to wear.  We ordered in a lot.  I had a McBreakfast one day (I ordered so much that it did last the full day).  We tried ramen for the first time.  We got a pizza.  The days blur together.  After I wound up each work day at 4:30 PM, I hung out on the couch for a while, but was starting to feel tired by 5:30.  It was a struggle to stay awake, and I didn’t want to go straight from work to bed.  It is hard balancing what one wants to do, with what one needs to do.

Because I wasn’t able to do much creatively (and also because our next guest also has Covid), Harrison and I paused 50 Years of Maiden.  I think I’m ready to jump back in, but already the show schedule is daunting.

Today I’ve sat down and listened to music properly for the first time in nine days.  I chose the debut by Rose Tattoo, a band we’ll be talking about very soon on Grab A Stack of Rock.  But I’m nervous; nervous that I won’t be able to keep up or maintain my motivation.  I have the Contrarians, Grant’s Rock Warehaus, and Grab A Stack all in the coming week.

Feels good to be negative though.  I plan on going music and Lego shopping today.  Otherwise taking it easy.  Writing this is my creative endeavour for today.  Let’s enjoy the rest of it.  Allons-y!

 

 

#1175: Tie Dye

By request of Dan Chatrand from Off the Charts

RECORD STORE TALES #1175: Tie Dye

Bob Schipper was the instigator.  He was always the one with the creative ideas.  From making our own spiked wristbands from juice tins and black electrical tape, to sketching our own original video games, he was usually the one with the kernel for the idea.  I provided the energy, and was able to spin his ideas off and expand them into entire universes.  On this day in question though, Bob had the idea that we could make our own tie dye T-shirts.

I don’t know where he got the idea.  Probably someone from school.  There was one hippy kid in his grade that I would later work with at the grocery store.  Massive Grateful Dead fan.  The idea probably came from him.

In our world, tie dye wasn’t big.  Metal bands rarely wore the stuff, and we didn’t go back to Zeppelin.  Our horizons were much more recent.  In my world, wrestlers like Superstar Billy Graham were my inspiration.  He was known for his tie dye, and he looked incredibly cool.

We were not able to make tie dye as fancy as Superstar’s.  We were only able to mix a couple colours.  Our methods were simple.  We went to the local Zeller’s store, bought a few colours of fabric dye, and four of the cheapest, plain white T-shirts we could find.  Then, we would walk home and set up in my mom’s basement.  With no regard for other people’s clothes or the mess we were making, we dumped the dye into the big basement sink, and mixed it up. Then, we carefully twisted the shirts up, trying to create a spiral effect.  Once satisfied, we fastened everything with elastic bands, and dipped the shirts spiral-side down into the dye.  We repeated the process with another colour, and let everything dry.  Of our shirt experiments, maybe one out of every two attempts turned out.

The dye started to wash out after two washes.  The shirts wore thin and ripped easily.  One evening, Bob and I were wrestling in the park, when he grabbed and lifted me, and my favourite tie dye shirt ripped.  I had no choice but to finish the job.  “Rip it off like Hogan!” encouraged Bob.  With a roar, and a lot of effort, I ripped the shirt off my body and threw it to the ground.  “Raaaah!!”

Meanwhile at home, Mom was trying to get splashes of dye off of every surface in the basement.  She was absolutely furious with us.  No wonder Bob wasn’t allowed to do stuff like this at his house!

 

#1174: Big Feelings & Why I’m Upset With the Arkells

RECORD STORE TALES #1174:  Big Feelings & Why I’m Upset With the Arkells

I bought my first Arkells album High Noon back in 2017, but I really fell hard for the band in 2023.  The Canadian pop rock quintet hadn’t put out any songs I disliked, but in 2023 a combination of personal drama and a need for Canadian tunes led me to dive into the band all the way.  It was May, and in less than a year I had acquired all the albums.  That is a short period of time to absorb so much new music, but I did, and I loved virtually all of it.  There are actually few bands I love as much as the Arkells, and only a handful that I fell for so quickly.

I love their lyrics, from everyman tales of not being able to pay the rent, to social discourse and critique.  Singer Max Kerman was a Poli-Sci major, and also has his finger on the pulse of the youth.  This results in some pretty cool lyrics.  As for the band, their musicianship is top notch.  Drummer Tim Oxford is in my top Canadian drummers of all time, and you know that’s an elite list.  I’m also a big fan of bassist Nick Dika, who always has deep tones and fabulous bass melodies.

Shortly after I went all-in, the band released a new album called Laundry Pile, an acoustic affair with melancholy feelings.  A bit of a slow burner, but a brilliant album.  This was followed by the 2024 all-covers LP, Disco Loadout.  I enthusiastically went bonkers for it, and got it on CD and signed vinyl.  Their eclectic set of tunes, from Abba to Whitney interpreted by the rock band, satisfied deeply.  They threw in a couple rock tunes by Springsteen and Hall & Oates, and I just liked the whole album.  Could I fall in love any more with the Arkells?

Full stop to the summer of 2024.  So soon after the Disco Loadout album, Arkells announced the release of a new single called “Big Feelings”.   “It came together quickly,” said the band. “It started with a bold drum loop that Tim made, and was quickly arranged when the band assembled for a session in February.”

A few weeks after Aaron and I visited Sonic Boom records in Toronto, the Arkells announced an appearance at the store.  They brought with them 150 copies of “Big Feelings” on 180g clear vinyl, hand cut by Red Spade Records in Calgary, Alberta.

150 copies were all that were made.  And they sold out that day.  No copies have ever shown up on Discogs.

And this is why I’m upset with the Arkells.  I had just been to Sonic Boom a few weeks earlier, and there was no way I could make it down for that store release.  Trying to get there early enough to get one of the 150 copies…being in a crowd like that…no, no thanks.

I guess you could say, “Why are you upset, Mike?  It’s on you that you didn’t go.”

Sure, that’s true.  However, I think I’m on record for despising these kinds of releases that I’ll never get my hands on physically.  Maybe I’m not mad at the band; maybe I’m mad at the practice.  However it is the band that I have taken it out on.  “Big Feelings” remains the only Arkells song I don’t have, because I refused to buy it on iTunes.  I haven’t even put a “like” on the music video. Oh sure, I’ll probably give in eventually.  It just really bugs me that a band of Arkells’ stature, with thousands of fans who value physical media, would only release 150 copies in such an exclusive way.  Some might see that as indi-cool.  I don’t.  Arkells aren’t some garage band.  They have fans, and I feel a real disservice by this release.

Call me a curmudgeon, but that’s how I feel.