PHANTOM TIDE: THE MAKING OF A BAR BAND

PHANTOM TIDE               A FOLK TRIO WITH A PERVASIVE MARITIME SWAY OF ORIGINAL SONGS – MIXING THEMES OF LOST LOVES AND OPEN ROADS

This was the printed poster that GRANT FREW, bar manager of the BUSHWAKKER BREWPUB nailed on at least a couple of the BUSHWAKKER bar room walls. 

BUSHWAKKER BREWPUB is REGINA’S BEST BREWPUB (according to prairie dog magazine) … CANADA’S FINEST BREWPUB (according to VACAY. CA) … ONE OF CANADA’S FINEST BREWPUBS (according to THE GLOBE AND MAIL).  

CHERY’S BLOND ALE, LAST MOUNTAIN LAGER, PALLISER PORTER, and STUBBLEJUMPER PILSENER are just a few of the beers brewed at the BUSHWAKKER BREWPUB in the OLD WAREHOUSE DISTRICT of  Regina.

I am not yet that brutto tempo busker that I long to be, and so during my Canadian winter doldrums, I am always a bandmate to someone.  For the last dozen years, I’ve been a band member of the GRAND TRUNK TROUBADOURS, a community service band that enkindles itself and the lives of others performing mainly for shut-ins and people in retirement communities.  As well we oftentimes do charities.

This winter I decided to create another band, one free of mimesis, one that performed only original songs.  And I decided that the BUSHWAKKER BREWPUB would be the most perfect venue for such a bully-pulpit notion.

But first I had to audition. 

I sent Grant a youtube video (just click on the top right of my blog header … NEIL CHILD: BUSKOLOGIST … this is the link that I sent).  Performing in this video are my friends, Trent (from Trent’s Guitar Studio) and Ben, who resides everywhere except North America … He had just returned from eight years in India previous to this video).  The video was shot by Michele, Ben’s girlfriend at the time (now his bride).  Michele, too, is always elsewhere than North America.  A few years ago she sang for Hillary Clinton while on a professional performance contract in India.

Grant booked me for the gig.  Now I needed a band.  My plot needed inspissation.

And then along came Darren.  Darren is a guitar luthier who plays a mean guitar, both in adverb and adjective.  His guitar skills are orphic and the guitar he strums – he made!  Darren, too, is a singer/songwriter.

And then along came Whitney, a social work student from the university.  Whitney can sing high and she can sing low.  Whitney has that strange ability to sing everything just the right way.

And finally Ray came along, making our folk trio with a Maritime sway into a foursome.  Ray plays bass and had been a professional road musician for a number of years.  Ray is a very seasoned pro.

Thrumming together, Darren and I tossed original song after song onto our play table.  We needed 90 minutes of original material for our gig at the BUSHWAKKER BREWPUB, though a few obscure covers would be fine, according to Grant.

After a couple of practices I had an epiphany about our songs.  Darren’s songs are existentially broody and darkly, having ghostly themes of past loves; whereas, my songs are breezy and sunny, having sandy beach settings with sing-along melodies.

It is time right now to pay tribute to Greg Peppler, who aptly named our band, PHANTOM TIDE.  Darren is the PHANTOM -- I am the TIDE.

Whitney put together our 26 song playlist, of which seven were covers (quite obscure covers).

The night of our nidifugous debut, Dan, at BUSHWAKKER, did our sound check at 8:30.  Our first set began at exactly 9 o’clock and ended at 9:45.  Our second set started at 10:15 and ended at 11:00.

The night of our performance the place was packed with family, friends, colleagues, and regular patrons.

Readers, I am so very grateful for the opportunity to bloviate this cockalorum.  THANK YOU to patrons, family, and friends, who came to see us play.  THANK YOU to all the BUSHWAKKER STAFF, and an especial THANK-YOU to DAN, the GENIUS OF SOUND.

Since that debut, PHANTOM TIDE now has mettle.  We are booked back at the BUSHWAKKER BREWPUB, SEPTEMBER 24^TH 2014. And in the meantime, GRANITE BY WEDNESDAY, a new granite and marble installation business, has requested that we play at its official opener, on its rooftop, with the media to be present.   

A special thank-you to the bomb, ROBIN COOLIO, for this one!

For me, PHANTOM TIDE is certainly a sea change, a very phenomenological fitting, considering my first registered name for a buskspot was SEA HORSE.  (I still busk under this moniker.)

In this early Autumn of my life … this senescence so to speak … PHANTOM TIDE ... is what bestirs me … whatever it may betide.