Rotate Fugazi

It had definitely been one hell of a summer. Not only was Lollapalooza one of the biggest concerts I had ever attended, but it gave me the chance to meet a few "rock stars" and I even made some new friends there. I'm not sure what was in the air that week, but mere days before Lollapalooza I went to the opera house with Derek to see Fugazi. Fugazi was a newer band that had acquired legendary Minor Threat front man Ian MacKaye as their vocalist. I was super excited to see Ian in the flesh as I felt he was a very important piece of punk rock history. When we got to the Opera house I was stunned to see Ian out front unloading some gear from the tour truck. We eagerly approached him and Derek blurted out "Hey Ian MacKaye what's up?" Ian turned and looked to us, paused a moment, then replied "it's going good but it's pronounced MacKaye" (mah-kai, Derek had pronounced it ma-kay) As if Henry Rollins hadn't disappointed me enough, now here I was thinking Ian was a douche for getting sensitive about the way someone pronounced his name. Regardless he was still aces in my books, after all he's Ian MacKaye damnit!

The Opera House was packed and Fugazi brought the house down as expected. The opening acts Scott B Sympathy and Pure left a lot to be desired in my opinion and they really didn't even fit the bill. During one of the opening acts we ran into a guy we called "Driftwood Chris" who worked at Driftwood Records, our most favourite used record store in Toronto. Chris was a really cool guy and was forever hooking us up with deals on vinyl. Chris introduced us to his friend Navie. Nav was of Indian descent, although I'm not sure if he was east or West Indian. Never the less he was a large dude, a few inches taller than me and probably 30-50 pounds heavier. Nav had long black hair that he wore tied back in a ponytail most times. We got to talking and there was an instant connection between him, Derek, and I. 

As the conversation unfolded, we discovered Nav was a bass player and he was also working at a new local record shop that had just opened called "Rotate This" When given first chance, we went to check out the shop and visit Nav. Rotate This was laid out nicely, it was clean and spacious, and there were even couches you could chill out on. The record selection was tremendous, although prices were a bit higher than I was used to from the used record stores in the area. We got to rapping with Nav and realized that the three of us all shared very similar musical tastes. Although we had a bass player in Sted, we never really connected with him, perhaps due to the large age gap between us. Now Derek and I were unanimously agreeing that we wanted Nav in our band.

I don't remember what we said or how we told Sted, but he took the news like a champ. It didn't really seem to phase him, but looking back at it, we were "Slow Poke" and the band was living up to its name as far as progress went. Sted was a seasoned veteran musician, he had no doubts or worries as to joining another band, which was a huge relief to us. We immediately offered Nav the spot and he accepted. The next night we jammed and it went very well. After rehearsal we sat around talking and eventually we stumbled upon the topic of us playing live. Derek and I voiced our disappointment about how hard it was to get a gig in this town. Nav had a simple solution. He proclaimed we needed a demo tape to give out to club owners so they could hear our sound, plus it would make us appear to have our shit together. We agreed that this was a good idea, now we just had to record a demo somehow...