Married, Not Dead

(lifted wholesale from my Myspace).

Married, Not Dead. Current mood: thankful

May 26th was my wedding day. It's fucking awesome to actually be happy, to be able to both say it and feel it genuinely - a year and a half ago I was miserable. I was living in a mouse- and wasp- infested basement apartment in Citadel that the landlord wouldn't do anything about, living with the deadbeat addict boyfriend I'd moved here from Cold Lake with, and working at a seniors community. Life had been pretty shitty up until then too. My parents moved from Ottawa when I was 19 and I'd stayed behind because I was tired of moving, having been a military brat. I dropped out of the English Literature program at Carleton University, broke and depressed, to busk the Byward Market and write unpublishable poetry about people who were gone from my life, meanwhile smoking and drinking as much as I could afford to, working shit waitressing jobs, and dating a sleezy dealer or a French con artist. I never would have thought I'd reconnect with this shy talented boy I'd once known, now a shy and talented and handsome man, get engaged, and be married - a mere year and a half after finally getting rid of mooching, jobless asshole Blake and escaping scam realtor Bertram Okeke's big yellow slum mansion. Gareth Williams, you've saved me. Finding myself able to love you after going through all that shit, I've also saved myself. More proof we make a good team.

It may be difficult to imagine, but being married doesn't mean I'm dead, or dormant, or that I'm going to stop playing music. In fact, I really can't, since I'm playing bass and singing backup vocs in my husband Gareth's band. Not to mention the birdheat EP I'm working on. I think it sounds like Reverie Sound Review influenced by an all-night LSD party with Emily Haines and Julie Doiron. What the hell does that mean? We'll see. I think it'll be a lot of fun. Anyway, that aside, the band Gareth and I have together along with our friends Ben Rayner and Tynan Groves is called lonely hunters. Our wee Myspace page is www.myspace.com/garethsband and shows off new tracks from our upcoming album.

For our stag/stagette, we asked Grandfather Fire and the Holy Morning, along with Fox Opera and Jagatha Christies, to play at Soda. Thanks to their talents and smiling faces, it was a great time. Markus Overland got on top of a speaker and began to radiate multicoloured riffs of psychedelia from his beard. Jzero pulled crepe paper streamers of notes from his keyboard and they got all over. Once they got on you, your pores turned into tiny stars, so you were practically made out of music after that. No kidding. Grandfather Fire has a CD coming out, and I got a copy of it that night. They went to a remote cabin, romantics that they are, and laid down some beautiful tracks! Then they handmade cardboard cases and art for it, which look a bit slicker than Lucid 44's handiwork but have retained all the soul. Beauty. Jagatha Christies are also working on a new EP in a certain musician's garage, and along with Fox Opera, all three bands are playing Sled Island. Gareth and I have passes and intend to enjoy the festival as much as possible, trying not to be bummed that our band wasn't asked to play. The festival is a great idea with tons of terrific bands playing, and we just couldn't resist Cat Power.

A few days later, our wedding reception saw our friends Jagatha Christies play for us again, along with best men Tyler Shipley and Matt McLennan from bands Consumer Goods and Mr. Pine (which I'll tell you about in a minute), Mr. Pine's Kevin Scott, and groomsman Ryan McVeigh. My cousins Sean and Nikki played a set, our friend Mat from Boats! made a chorus of himself out of pedals and wizardry, and to top it off, we headlined our own wedding. What a night! My mom's pretty traditional and wouldn't let me get away with the garden wedding idea, but at least we had our rock reception. Even Granny got into it. How 80 years worth of suffering the world and a husband that's left that world before you can still equal party animal, I don't know. The tiny woman is a marvel of the human spirit. It was wonderful to see her so geared up, smiling, dancing, staying up way past her bed time until one, and even leaping through the air for the bride's bouquet. She transformed into this little blue and gold bird and absolutely soared. Gareth's dad, visiting from Wales, got it on camera. You can see the moment when the feathers sprout, it's mindblowing.

Looking ahead, we're releasing our debut album July 7 at Marquee Room. A Vancouver band called Said the Whale will be supporting us. We're excited because tonight we're meeting with our friend Sandy, the industrious local graphic designer responsible for http://www.slamart.net/ and who's a Jagatha Christie too, to see the final coloured version of our album art. Then we're sending it off for manufacturing, sponsored in part by other members of our recently-formed record collective, Grumpy Cloud.

The label is awesome and can only get more awesome still, in part because of the lonesome distance that separates members. Everyone started out in Winnipeg, playing in bands together like The Poets and Cone Five and The Horribly Awfuls. Technically my first band was in Winnipeg too, actually, called Breaking Syntax, but that's another story. Now the collective members are based in Winnipeg, Calgary, Toronto, Ottawa, and soon Vancouver, in bands The Haste, lonely hunters, The Consumer Goods, and Mr. Pine respectively, which are all active and putting out debut or sophomore albums. I've heard the argument that every successful label is based somewhere in particular, but I can see this arrangement working even better. Each Grumpy Cloud member will know their city first-hand, and be able to hand-deliver Grumpy Cloud records to all the right independent record stores and media folks, as well as sell Grumpy titles at their shows. Also, while on tour, we'll all have a place to stay almost anywhere, either through labelmates or friends of friends.

Recently we had some news from Ryan McVeigh, our friend and the excellent audio engineer who has been recording these musicians from the beginning - first at Mid-Ocean School, where he teaches, and now from his home studio. He's moving to Vancouver, and taking his talent with him. Now we'll be even more scattered, so recording our next album might have to coincide with Vancouver tourdates next year. It's exciting - I've never been to Vancouver. I was born in Comox and haven't been back to B.C. since. So I look forward to visiting Ryan in his new digs next year and checking it out. We're playing a show with a Vancouver band called Said the Whale for our album release at Marquee Room on July 7, so maybe we'll be able to do some shows with them on their own turf to when the time comes. Consumer Goods' drummer who also plays with The Details played with them before and said their nice folks. We'll probably be playing a show with them soon too, will keep you posted.

In addition to booking and playing lonely hunters shows and working on my EP, I'll be continuing to get involved with the Calgary Housing Action Initiative when I can, plus planning & playing the Holy Beep! Benefit at Broken City on July 20th, putting together Calgary MultiArts, programming Broken Reels at Broken City, volunteering with Side Stage backline at Folk Fest, coordinating musicians for the Single Onion poetry series, and doing General Editor duties at filling Station Magazine, meanwhile working my regular dayjob at a not-for-profit association. Some friends think I'm silly to make myself so busy, but as a couple of others I know that are as busy as I am (both of who happen to be named Mark) would probably agree, I can tell you that it's a good feeling when you've got everything under control and you feel as though you're not wasting too much time being idle in your short life. You go to bed tired, and if you haven't abused your body overmuch, it feels good - you know you're going to have the best sleep.


Anyway, much to look forward to! New life, new album, another one in the works (Gareth's prolific like that), and new songs of my own surfacing unrestricted by the aforementioned, previous penchant towards romantic suffering, purposeful or subconscious. Fuck the ephemeral, goddamn the meaningless. Now I can get down to finding which words might matter after I'm dead, if any words ever do. But also fuck over-seriousness. Then, all of this having been fucked, find and pull from those wrecked bedsheets something in between meaning and decadent frowning - while avoiding outright insanity if possible. It's a dirty job but I'm ready for it, I'm strong, my breasts are perky, I'm smiling with too many teeth, I'm not quite foaming at the mouth.