Well, it’s certainly been a while since you last saw a blog post from me. It’s not that Steve and I haven’t been wandering near and far these past three years, it seems I’ve just become a bit lazy.

This morning, I typed out a very lengthy email for family and friends and, by the time I was finished, realized I probably had a blog post; so here we are.

For those who already know, and care, and for those who don’t know, and care, here’s an explanation of the link I’ve provided below.  (If you don’t care, stop reading – no offence taken.)

Steve was invited to participate in a band to celebrate the 50th anniversary of his high school graduating year and, because they were short on singers (as in they didn’t have any), and in true Steve style, he volunteered moi! We were to perform three sets, in a pub, over a number of hours, in front of many, many strangers (to me – it wasn’t my high school) — YIKES!!! I decided that was just too much excitement and pressure for me, and I’d likely lose my voice at the end of the first set, so we asked our friend, Tim, if he would help out and he said yes (phew).  From then on, we became known as the 69ers!

Five of the band members live around Toronto; three of them live in Montreal. We held several practice sessions here with stand-in members, then the Montreal boys showed up here for a weekend and we did a marathon together.  

Our “gig” (that’s so much fun to say) was in Beaconsfield, a Montreal West Island suburb, on Sunday, May 19th (the long weekend and, coincidentally, our 40th wedding anniversary — don’t say Steve doesn’t know how to show a girl a good time).  If audience participation, in the form of dancing and singing along, is any indication, WE ROCKED! Not too shabby for a group of mostly amateur enthusiasts — apologies to those who actually get paid to do this on a fairly regular basis — and this was a first time public performance for a few of us (if you don’t count Tim’s backyard the last few summers).  

Let’s talk about the quality of the video recording, which I’m not complaining about. If Tim hadn’t brought his GoPro, and if Julie, Tim’s wife, hadn’t operated it, we wouldn’t have any recorded memories of this momentous occasion so many thanks to both of them! But it does leave a little to the imagination for a few reasons:

• It was very noisy and the camera was not close to us
• Julie thought she had to stop recording after each song to save battery power and, in many cases, she missed the beginnings of songs ( no big deal)
• Julie also wanted to dance so she danced with the camera 😀 which explains any motion sickness you might feel

There are lots of songs in this link.  To save you from having to listen to all of them (you certainly can if you want to — Tim is way more the rock star than I’ll ever be), the following is a list of the ones I’m featured in.  It is my blog, after all. Unfortunately, there was an issue with the channel my mic was plugged into so you’ll see Tim and I switching mics back and forth.  Regardless, the drums were so loud, we had a very hard time hearing ourselves which is our excuse for occasionally going off key 😉 and why you’ll see me with my finger pressed into my right ear so often. Also, and I can’t emphasize how important this is, ALL the guitar lead lines are played by Steve, who learned all of them over a 5-week period (so proud). If you do nothing else, find Evil Ways and hold out for the middle and end instrumentals where Steve is excellently channeling Carlos Santana.

Recordings are in alphabetical order, not the order we sang them in, which will also explain the varying and random degrees of lightness or darkness behind us.  Enjoy, or not:

• California Dreaming
• Dead Flowers (Steve singing)
• Different Drum
• Gimme Some Lovin’ / Mony Mony
• I Feel Fine
• Light My Fire / The Letter
• Moondance (only the end was recorded and very hard to hear)
• Runaway
• Summer of 69
• These Boots Were Made for Walking
• Those Were the Days
• Whiter Shade of Pale (again only the end was recorded)

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Link to Rock Star Videos