New Vintage Porn -
A charming four-piece combo hailing from our fair city, Crackpuppy, is set to appear at Folsom Fair North on July 17 at 5pm. Will there be pyrotechnics? “All the pyro may just be emotional,” said vocalist Drew Rowsome (who is also an Associate Editor at fab). This sounds awesome, considering the lead guitar player is legendary bartender Patricia Wilson, who, if you’ve ever bought a beer at Buddies in Bad Times, has probably served you. Crackpuppy hopes to release its first recording on August 4 at the Horseshoe. It’s a five-song CD on Spinerazor Records (also available online at www.spinerazor.com or www.crackpuppy.net) called – what else? – Vintage Porn.
It all started humbly three years ago with an offer to perform at Cheap Queers. They had the songs; they just needed a rhythm section. So they drafted Lorne Sokoloff on bass and Johnny Leroy on drums. Ultimately, Johnny’s gig running the Vatikan made him too busy to stick with it, and he has since been replaced by a cute drummer named Jay Shrubsall. Jay’s looks weren’t what landed him the gig, though. “My first question to him was, ‘Do you pound?’” said Patricia. To prove the point, Jay sheepishly showed me the tom he punctured by hitting it too hard, which he had covered over with a cymbal he’d cracked.
Am I exaggerating the volume bit? At the rehearsal I attended, I was handed a pair of heavy industry earplugs, the same type I had to wear when I was a summer student working amidst the high-decibel grind and blast at Kidd Creek Mines in Timmins.
Crackpuppy is louder than Kidd Creek Mines. Patricia’s girlfriend, a vocal coach and opera singer named Hélène Ducharme, told me about one gig that was so loud, her pant legs were fluttering. “The owner of the Vatikan told us that we were louder than [’80s hair band] Anvil,” beamed Patricia proudly.
Patricia’s been playing guitar since age 12. She describes her typical day as “get up, play guitar, drink a beer, play more guitar, drink more beer, fuck my girlfriend, play more guitar, then empty the cat’s litter box.” Playing seems to put her in a beatific trance, as though this were the reason she was born. Lorne’s story is the most unusual, though. He played bass as a youngster, then gave it up for 17 years. A few years ago, when a relationship ended, he found himself returning to such boyhood pleasures as playing hockey, riding a motorcycle and playing in a rock band, all at the age of 43.
Crackpuppy recorded its five-song CD with producer Steve Keil at Signal to Noise Recording Studios, in just four hours. It was amusing to watch Patricia play in front of a stack of Marshall amps that would make Ozzy dizzy. Their sound is so not gay. Patricia hates it when people call them a queer rock band, “because 50% of us aren’t.”
I adore Crackpuppy. They remind me of Iggy and the Stooges. One of their songs, “Litter” (about a lesbian who gets dumped, and all her lover leaves her with is the cat box), has a catchy sing-along chorus that goes, “Fuck you and your ’80s haircut.” Drew likes to torture Patricia by saying he wants to add a tambourine or a children’s choir to the mix, and further irritates her when he tells me that when he sings, he’s “channelling the pure baritone of Robert Goulet.”
“The best part of my day,” said Patricia, “is when I get up, turn on my amp to practise and hear that hum.” Yes, we know. We can hear it all the way down the street.
• paul bellini
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