So our record was finished, and The Phantom Shifters had played 19 shows, 18 in and around Ottawa and one in Montreal, on a cold Tuesday night... The time seemed right to "Hit the Road" a little more properly. Our connections hooked us up with 3 shows in 3 nights in 3 towns. Not a tour, but it was sure to be a good time... Show number 1 was a Thursday night (March 8th, 2000) at Toronto's infamous Horseshoe Tavern. All 3 shows were to be played with Ohio's Cowslingers. (http://www.cowslingers.coml) Who are now called "The Whiskey Daredevils" from what I can figure...
Phantom Shifters, at the Horseshoe Tavern March 8th, 2000...
I can't recall too much about the night in Toronto, the Clowslingers were cool, and were up for hanging out with us, I recall getting kicked out of the band room downstairs because there was too much "Dope Smoke" drifting up into the Club above. And a few very old friends of mine who are now Torontonians came to the show... When it was time to load out Chris Lee, who happened to be the only driver in the band went from "kinda sober" to "very drunk" in about the time it took to open the van up and carry out the first load, it became very comical to watch him attempt to help the Load-Out. It was also one of the nights that Ryan worked harder at "Pretending to Load Out" than he would've worked had he actually helped Load out. A very comical and regular event in the first few year's of the Shifters.
Greg "Daniel" Cockburn on Rhythm Guitar...
Before heading back to the Hotel room Chris fronted for us Deadbeats, I have a very vague recollection of Cockburn and I talking to a guy who was a reporter. Turns out he was reviewing the show for Toronto's "NOW" weekly... Next Morning we were off to Montreal. I don't remember too much about Montreal that "tour"... I re-all the Cowslinger's Drummer Leon, jumping around with a Cow-Bell while we played a cover of Mountain's "Mississippi Queen". I recall I split my hand open really badly on my old Gibson SG and we walked right past Swartz's Smoked Meat Palace on our way to some idiotic restaurant with terrible, over priced food...
Lookit me, I saved the article...
Finally on Saturday March 10th, we made our way back to Ottawa for a show back at the Dominion Tavern, which has felt like "home" for all the members of the band since it opened... (except maybe Chris) There was a pretty small turnout in Toronto, Montreal was alot better, but the Dominion on a Saturday Night is always a good night for a show. We expected big night, but a triple bill of Ottawa's premiere Country Rocker's, us and The Cowslingers brought in a very packed house. Once we got to the Dom, I opened up my guitar case for sound check and discovered that my guitar was still covered in Blood from the night before. Not covered, coated was a better work. Mark Michaud of the Fiftymen saw the bloody mess and offered to lend me his '86 Gibson Les Paul Junior for the show instead. After playing the "Junior" for the show I pretty much refused to give it back to him and eventually ended up brokering a deal where I bought him an Epiphone Semi-Acoustic and I kept the Junior. The Epiphone was Mark's main guitar for several years, and the Junior was my main guitar for many years as well...
With the Gibson Les Paul Junior for the 1st time. That's Scott Fairchild making a fool of himself in the front...
