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Blind Spot

Our first gig was at the Cabana Room. The room was at the top of the stairs on the second floor of the Spadina Hotel at King and Spadina. It was about as large as a toilet. But when you start out, a gig is a gig. In those days, everyone got to play at the Cabana Room, as long as you played the game.

It all began with your interview/audition with music booker, "Johnny". No instruments required. I could never figure out if he was the owner/proprietor or a bartender with a very inflated sense of self-worth. After he feigned excitement with your demo tape he would give you the folowing speech in a voice heavily tinged with a Greek accent:

"Now, I'm a gonna promote this event all over, but you gotta help too. I'm gonna to advertise in da Now Magazine." (The listings at that time were free.) "All you gotta do is bring in da people"

Now remember this is pre-internet, no lazy boy Facebook announcements.

So you would do your best. Calling all your friends, taping posters on telephone poles. If you were lucky and persistent -you'd get about fifty of them to show up - which in that room felt over crowded -and you'd feel like rock and roll gods. You'd make Johnny about five hundred dollars richer and and get two free beer tickets for your efforts.

Blind Spot were (and still are)

Doug Cawker, Glen McFadyen, James McGee and Billy White

Here's a poster from our first gig. It was designed by a former girlfriend and her husband, the current alderman for the Spadina riding. Ain't if funny how people's life paths change.

The reference to "get the dog" is from the Ned Beatty/Lily Tomlin family scene in Nashville. It was an inside joke between two people who had seen too many movies.

Art by Adam Vaughn, design by Yasmin Khan