Pat Blythe – Indie Week, Jack The Lads, Loving Vincent…and Music!

 Indie Week in Toronto officially started last night with the big launch party at The Hideout starting at 7pm. Ran into (quite literally) Bruce Bradley of Slammin’ Media, Roxanne Tellier, Peter Montreuil, the man himself, Bob Segarini, photographer Micheal Macisaac, Hartley Pickens, owner of See Rock Live Magazine (whose huge RV was parked out front of the venue), producer/singer/songwriter Chris Birkett, Nadia Elkharadly of Addicted Magazine….and the list goes on.

Pat Blythe – Openings, Bands and Music…Playing Catch-Up….

Openers…….

Today is a bright but chilly October day. (great opening line huh?) Then there’s Snoopy’s book opening….“It was a dark and stormy night.” Okay, how about “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” (Tales of Two Cities – Charles Dickens) Or, “It’s a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.” (Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen) THAT was a different time….most definitely. Then there’s, “It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday and I was in bed with my catamite when Ali announced that the archbishop had come to see me.” (Earthly Powers – Anthony Burgess). I can’t even begin to imagine explaining that one. How about, “I write this sitting at the kitchen sink”. (Capture the Castle – Dodie Smith). That’s sure to grab attention…..and apparently it did. “It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs and I don’t know what I was doing in New York.” (The Bell Jar – Sylvia Plath). Confused, frustrated, a chronic depressive, Plath committed suicide by sticking her head in a gas oven at the very young age of 30, leaving behind two young children. “You’ve no choice, look back.” (The Story of Hansel and Gretel – Louise Murphy) We must learn from the past. “It was a bright cold day in April and the clocks were striking thirteen.” (1984 – George Orwell) Canada’s pants would do well to pay attention. Apparently they’re not paying attention to Hansel or Gretel.

Pat Blythe – Jazz and Around Town

It’s so quiet in the house you can almost hear it…..the quiet I mean. The steady tick of the clock, the occasional gurgle of the hot water radiator and the hum of complete stillness. The outside world seems so far away, almost non-existent. As I sit typing this it’s like I’m on the inside looking out….a rather surreal feeling….like one of those movie scenes where the person is standing still  and everything else is whizzing and swirling by at record speed. Watching and waiting. A sense of calm yet anticipatory. Of what I don’t know.

The Stories Behind the Songs – Part Two

It’s snowing!!!! Not those big, fat, fluffy flakes where one can almost cover your face. But it’s snowing…. Sigh. The grey, dull days of January with just a mere hint that the sun actually exists…..which begs the question, why doesn’t Bell Canada hold their “Let’s Talk” campaign on Blue Monday? That makes infinitely more sense than say, Robbie Burns Day. Why in heaven’s name would you pick the 25th of January for mental health awareness??? According to a number of sources, the term “Blue Monday” was coined by holiday company Sky Travel in a 2005 press release. Cliff Arnall, at the time a tutor at Cardiff University, had come up with a light-hearted formula to determine the most depressing day of the year which commonly falls on the third Monday in January. It’s now a worldwide phenomena. Everyone has jumped on the bandwagon and the term is used repeatedly by companies and organizations (there’s even a BlueMonday.org) and stories in all sorts of media abound. Newspapers recommend taking the day off, there are various sites that will calculate, on a yearly basis, which Monday is going to be “blue” so you can prepare…..the power of suggestion. Although the entire idea is considered pseudoscience by the scientific community, Blue Monday is not going away anytime soon. Did you know mosquitoes are attracted to the colour blue twice as much as any other colour?

Pat Blythe Goes to a GIG and Other Stuff

 

I’m staring at a blank page….my mind is a million miles away. Not sure what today’s column will turn out like. Focusing is increasingly difficult with a plethora of things running through my mind. The synapses are firing off so fast I’m in a spin. So much happening recently at such a rapid fire pace. Externally I have two laptops on the go, Amy Winehouse (Wake Up Alone) playing in the background and a good friend who needs help from a system that is so totally broken and letting her down. Amy sure sets the mood. Internally, how quickly can someone go from elation to shear “pissoffedness“? Answer….about a nano second. How do you scream at a blank page on a screen?

Pat Blythe: Synchronicity….

Life happens (or maybe it occurs), either way my plans for today’s column were short circuited by a few happenstance events that tumbled into each other this past weekend. A visit, a text, a ticket, a song and two remarkable performances by two gifted artists. One who is just beginning on his journey and another who’s journey began over 50 years ago. This is the blues.