SUNNY DAYS: THE SKIP PROKOP STORY (PART 3) by Jaimie Vernon

Skip Prokop (drums), Bill Misener (guitar vocals), Chuck Beal (guitar), and Denny Gerrard (bass)  formed The Paupers on December 10, 1964. Skip picks up the story from here.

Bill moved to our house in Alderwood (south of the QEW near Browns Line) to stay with us, and he went home on the weekends. We would drive from Alderwood, New Toronto, over to Scarborough and we would practice in Chuck Beal’s basement because we could set up our equipment there. That’s where we really began to put the band together.

Doug Thompson: DON’T MESS WITH THE WRECKING CREW!

So, what project in your life has taken you the longest to complete?  Has anything you’ve really wanted to do ever taken you 18 years?  Most likely not, but that’s how long it took director Denny Tedesco to complete his documentary on a small group of musicians in Los Angeles who, from the late 1950’s through to the 1970’s, supplied the rhythm section (drums, bass, guitar, keyboards, percussion, saxophone) for hundreds, if not thousands of hit records.

Roxanne Tellier: Big City Love

I have lived on a beautiful, quiet, residential street in Scarborough for 15 years this month. Up the street, just a stagger away, is a busy local pub called the Black Dog, where I’ve seen many a friend play, and drank many a cold pint.

Doug Thompson: WHAT, IS IT NEW YEARS ALREADY?

John Lennon said it best in one of my all time favourite songs of his: “So this is Christmas and what have you done.  Another year over, a new one just begun.”  I do so wish that Lennon was still here to continue with his amazing talent.  But some self-centered asshole with a hand gun and a diseased brain (or a mind-controlled one, for all of you conspiracy buffs) silenced that legendary voice forever 33 years ago.

JAIMIE VERNON – How Do You Sleep?

I’m tired. I’m really effin’ tired. It’s the “I’m so tired that I can’t even roll off my lover and rudely fall asleep beside her because I’ve already rudely fallen asleep on TOP of her tired.” [admit it, you’ve done this…at least ONCE.]

I started a new job in February.  And it’s sapping the fiber of my very being. I’ve had jobs that have made me tired before. But they were office gigs where the exhaustion was mostly mental – from dealing with asshat employers and bigger asshatted customers. In my current job I work alone, but for the first time in 30 years of employment I’m actually working. Up at 4.30 AM and usually home by 5 or 6PM. Eight to nine hours of driving and walking. When I finally get home I eat dinner, stare blankly at photos of cute cats, idiotic diatribes about Monsanto, Rob Ford, hockey and Chemtrail conspiracy theorists on Facebook. It’s all I can do to keep Mr. Sandman at bay. By 9PM I’m done. I haven’t accomplished much except kiss the cat and pet the family good night.