As you read this I’m either on or about to go on stage for what is most certainly my 1,000th live musical appearance as the final act on the final night of David Bash’s long-running Toronto International Pop Overthrow Festival (this is year #10). I’ve been humiliating myself and faking musical talent in public since September 1980. Thirty-six years of looking for affirmation in all the wrong places.
They say that memories are built on intense emotional events – happy, sad or frightening. I have very few in the latter category which might be why the few I have are so vivid. Of course, these incidents are always the ones involving acts of, not bravery or heroism, but good old fashioned idiocy. Unlike the current crop of social media Jackass rejects there is no visual proof of my actions…thankfully.
During the pant-wetting tumultuous anticipation of the imminent birth of the Royal Sperm Tumour this week I was informed via Twitter that the child would be named Spencer (in homage to Princess Diana Spencer). I posted on Facebook that that was okay by me as my grandfather was named Spencer (after his mother’s family). My Dad and my son’s middle names? Spencer. My Dad’s sister married a James Spencer.
As you read this I suspect that I am recovering from what would have been a rather eventful 17th anniversary with my wife. As an anniversary gift, we were invited out to see Lighthouse in Oshawa by the very charitable 
Skip Prokop who has led the band since 1969 and is currently the subject of a biography I’m co-writing. As it turns out the current singer, Dan Clancy, has been an acquaintance of Sharon and I as well. He did double duty as a music teacher at Durham College and a judge at the school’s annual songwriting competition for which I volunteered as co-judge for half-a-dozen years as well. He’s also been on a number of recording sessions with artists that once graced my record label.
Bullseye Records of Canada
Segarini: Don't Believe a Word I Say 