Gary'sGlimpses: 2022

Dianne Lawrence

Dianne was a regular good looking and engaging. She moved to L.A. about the sametime I moved to the movie biz.

She Edits and Publishes an online magazine there

Dianne Heatherington

Dianne spent many nights at my bar and we had a close personal relationship that in another time and place could have gotten very serious.

Dianne Mae Heatherington (May 14, 1948 – October 22, 1996) was a Canadian singer of several genres, particularly rock, whose musical career spanned nearly two decades. In the latter part of her career, she became a successful businessperson in the film security industry, while at the same time enjoying modest success as a Canadian film and television actress.

She was nominated for a Juno Award in 1981 in the category of Most Promising Female Vocalist of the Year. She also hosted her own national CBC Television series, Dianne, in 1971.^[1]

In May 1993, she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer from which she died on October 22, 1996, aged 48, in Toronto.^{[2]
CLICK ON PHOTO FOR MUSIC}

Peter Gzowski

I met Peter when he was doing his TV Show. I guess it put him under a lot of pressure. He would come to my bar a couple of times a week to unwind. We spent many a night just the 2 of us in my backroom playing pinball for 20 bucks a game. We talked about a lot of things. One morning for some reason we ended up back at his place, some lady making breakfast or something. At eight o clock in the morning we were sitting at his kitchen table on Yorkville Ave. with a bottle of wine on the go. We were very very drunk.
Out of the blue he stops and says. "Want to know what is the most important thing I ever did in my life?" Of course I said "Sure." he proceeded to tell me about a hockey game he had played. Something about beating a really tough team from another town. I don't remember how old he was when he played this game or anything. I just thought of all the things he had accomplished and that is what he thought of. It was not long after this that Peter wrote "The Game Of Our Lives."
Peter sometimes brought some of guests to my place. through his show I met Jack Webster, Hunter S. Thompson and Tom Waites to name a few.
a lot of Peter's staff were regulars at the bar. And many the day I had to send a taxi to CBC with the master script of the next nights show that somebody left behind. I did many favours for Peter like lend him a room for card games with Michael MacClear, Bobby Miller etc.
After The TV show I didn't see him for some years.
Then I ran into him on the Esplanade one day.
"Peter " I said where the hell have you been."
"sorry, man he said but you just remind me of a very bad time in my life."

Reiner Swartz

I always had time for Reiner. Not long before he died he messaged me apologizing for not talking to me more and I would second that. We had a couple of little adventures together and a few great get-togethers. I was part of a conspiracy with MacLean & Maclean to say fuck on his show.

Burton Cummings

Burton Cummings is no longer talking to me.

I have had a troubled history with Burton

Gary MacLean was a friend of Burton's and he brought him to my after-hours bar and introduced him. I bought him a drink

e chatted for a while and i drifted off to tend to some bar business. Suddenly there is an awful racket screaming and yelling. It is Burton and he is attacking Peter Gzowski.

I can't believe it. At his time Peter was doing his TVshow and he and his crew were my best customers They were there every night the show was on (not always peter) They were the major source of my Income and there was no question. I escorted Burton out the door.

15 Minutes later Burton shows up and apologizes profusely saying he won't do it again. I buy him a drink. In 15 minutes he's yelling at Gzowski again. (I have no idea what the problem was. It was beside the point.I escort him out.

He came back and apologizes profusely says he won't do it again. I buy him a drink. In 15 minutes he's yelling at Gzowski again.

Once more and I gave up and wouldn't let him back in. Somehow I survived and Peter came as usual.

Now at that time Burton and I traveled in the same circles and often met up. Burton was dramatically contrite dropping to his knees he would hug my knees and beg forgiveness. He did this half a dozen times.

Soon we were friends and he often showed up for my private Sunday parties to jam with the Macleans and Murray McLauchlan and whoever else was in town. These were great times, great songs, great harmonies.

He was back in the Bar Gzowski was no longer on TV and was mostly a no-show so it didn't matter anymore.

Now Burton would often sing with Macleans

Burton was amazing with the MacLeans, Gary and Blair had good voices too, and harmonized wonderfully. One night the Knob Hill was so impressed they tipped a whole case of Dom Perigon. We had a party that night. Burton wrote a couple of the Macleans' songs including Their theme song'Fuck Ya"(I sang the lobster song with the Macleans when Burton wasn't singing with them)

Burton spent many nights in my kitchen singing with the Macleans and Murray Mclauchlan and whoever else was around. The funniest moment is Burton comes in one night trying to be cool and quiet. plugs a quarter in the Jukebox just as 'AMERICAN WOMAN" came on full blast. Everybody jeered and pointed as he cried I didn't play it! I didn't play it! It was a good laugh. Then Burton told me to get a date and he would take me backstage at the CNE for his show. He called and said he would pick me up. Then he called and said his manager would pick me up. The short story is, that he left me hanging and looked very foolish. When Burton and Randy got back together I got backstage passes to the show in Peterborough. they might have been from Donny MacDougall. anyway, after the show Burton hid on the bus so he did not have to meet me.

I never saw him again and a dozen years later I put these stories on Facebook. When Burton played here lately. Sydney)

I message him if we were still friends and told me to give my head a shake after all the bad stuff i said about him. So we are no longer talking but so far still friends on Facebook.

So we had some good times and bad times, water under the bridge to me.

Nick St. Nicholas,

My dear friend Lesley McDonell married Nick. One night at my club she mentioned that Nick was starting a new band and he needed a space to rehearse and could he rent my space during the day.

Anything for Lesley I agreed. I gave her a key and didn't give it another thought until Monday morning.

I wake up to loud solo Bass. I forgot I slept upstairs during the day. One week of Bass. Next week Bass and Drums next week would have been Bass, Drums, Rythem Guitar. ETC. By then I had moved out to a Hotel for the next 2 months.

Patrick Watson

Wow Patrick Watson died on my birthday. I was always a big admirer of Patrick from 'this hour has seven days" I met Patrick through Robert Markle. Patrick often showed up in the Toronto Art scene and we became casual friends. Then one day he called me to meet for drinks and he said his son had been going to my after-hours bar and had told Patrick how much he liked our late-night conversations with me. (I am not sure if I even knew he was Patrick's son) Anyway, Patrick just wanted to thank me for friending his son and hoped I would continue the friendship. I eventually lost contact with his son and I heard he died tragically.

I felt lucky to know Patrick he was an oner, one of those guys who was brilliant and creative. unquestionable integrity. he was a great guy to talk to. I will always regret not being able to have spent more time with him.

Henry Winkler

I was Henry Winkler's Bodyguard. (Would you believe minder?)

At the second Festival of Festivals Film Festival in Toronto. I was a friend of Bill Marshals and ended up with all sorts of odd jobs. Like I was the host of the Hospitality Suite. However, at one of the celebrity parties, Bill asked me to accompany Henry. My job was to distract over-attentive fans and stop photographers from taking pictures of him smoking. I regret to say I didn't get much time to talk to him. I was kept busy with fans. When Henry had enough of talking to one. He would give me the nod. and I would enter the conversation giving Henry time to slip away.

Fats Domino

Fats Domino was playing the El Macambo. I was sitting in Grossman's when out of the blue Cliff Bastien asked I I wanted to go up the street and see Fats so I agreed we went up and caught the first set. Fats did his shtick with lots of hits to play with and had the place jumping. When the set was over Cliff led me up to the dressing room and rapped on the door. Fats opened the door with a big smile and a hug for Cliff and invited us in. After the introduction, we sat down and cliff gave Fats the lowdown on a bunch of people in New Orleans. Fats smiled at me and said 'Damn he knows more about my family than I do." I learned that Cliff had lived in New Orleans for a while and Fats'uncle had taught Cliff how to play the banjo and Cliff was friends with quite a few of Fat's relatives. Fats dedicated a song to his friend 'Kid Bastien' in the second set. It was a night to remember. For the last number of the night, he thumps really hard and pushes the piano across the stage with his stomach as he plays.

Michael Ironside

Mike and my Mother

MICHAEL IRONSIDE(my crazy friendship with him.)

I used to be in the movie business but when I met Michael I was

Toronto's leading 'bootlegger' I owned an after-hours club that was basically for musicians but I expanded it to the famous. And I had been notorious in the 60s for my lavish parties and I slowly built up an illegal business it was a lot of fun and very profitable and I met everybody and their dog. Mike was at the Art College of Ontario and had made this acclaimed 8mm film that won an award and thought he was somebody.

Meanwhile, I was the King of Toronto in those days (lol) and we clashed often, it took a couple of years for us to become friends he kept after me. Finally, when we did become friends, we were good friends.

People have often asked me how mike got his scar.

Mike got his scar before I met him.

He told me he was sitting in his girlfriend's house having a beer and waiting while she changed as they were going out, suddenly there was a hammering at the door and when he opened it up this drunk guy attacked him screaming that he was stealing his girlfriend. in the course of the brawl the guy broke the bottle and gashed Mike's face Mike thought he had lost his eye and he freaked out he actually tore one of the guy's eye

out. After the police and the ambulance and everything was sorted out it seems the guy had the wrong house his girlfriend lived next door and Mike didn't even know her..

I got in the movie business after the after-hours business. I got into

the movie business by phoning a producer twice a week for 2 years.

I was an assistant producer on 'Double Negative. I got Mike a small role in it.

These stories about Michael seem rather wild and there is

lots to tell but there are even some I can't tell. Mike's ex-wife is a

policewoman named 'Ironside' 20

I went to Peterborough with Mike just after the release of 'Visiting

Hours". His father had a heart attack and I went with Mike to visit

him. It was quite an experience a lot of people in that hospital had

seen visiting hours and you should have seen the looks on their faces

when Mike walked by. In the movie, Mike had a Canon Sureshot 35 mill camera prototype.

He stole it from the movie and gave it to me for my birthday. it was a great camera.

One afternoon Mike and I tried to seduce two young ladies by smoking a lot of dope and building a huge bowl of sangria. It backfired Mike and I both passed out and some weeks later when I developed the film I discovered the girls had stripped us and taken photos. of us naked. I thought that was hilarious. I shoved the photo of mike into a book and forgot which book. I expect somebody got a surprise one day.

I was approached by a fan and I wrote some stories for them.

I really don't think about 'spilling the beans' I find it amusing that

Mike has such a big fan club. For me, it was just fun to remember what a wildman he used to be and write some of these things down. Anyway, I hope you enjoy these tales they are written just as I remember them.I had a stalker fan of his pump me for the information she had a good story and I passed it on to mike.

Then I get a phone call from Mike, his lawyer, and his agent accusing me of giving her information about mike. like phone number and address. Not only did I not give her any information I did not have his latest info.

Mike sort of brushed me off and wouldn't believe me.

Which was a little disappointing as we were such close friends and our list of adventures together read some like sort of weird underground action-adventure. I understand why. I was a part of his past that he doesn't particularly remember. He is and has been clean and sober for about 12 years and this is probably good as he would most likely be dead or in jail if he had kept on. I wouldn't say that I liked him better as a drunk but he certainly was interesting and we had a lot more in common than we do now.

By the way, it was Mike's sister who gave her the information.

A mike story: We used to drink at the Club 22 at the

Windsor Arms in Toronto. One night my friends Johnny Hart and Jack Caprio who draw the cartoon BC were in town and I joined them for a few drinks with Mike in tow. Michael got fairly hammered. I got up to meet another old friend Catherine O'Hara from SCTV she had her parents with me and introduced them to me as I shook hands with her mother, I gave a bit of a bow, and as I did Michael came up behind me and bit me on the ass and wouldn't let go. It was unbelievable I jumped and hollered and leaped around the room but he wouldn't let go. It took Jack and Johnny and a couple of waiters to get him off of me and I don't know why, he just thought it was funny, and when it stopped hurting I laughed too. Mike was barred for that but I managed to get him reinstated and the next afternoon we drank $400 of margaritas between us.

I remember the next morning after that we went for brunch at Joe Allens with lady friends Mike ordered a triple Bloody Caesar with a shot of Vodka on the side. This is Mike's favorite story at AA

Back in the mid-seventies, I used to own an after-hours club and Mike spent a couple of bad years drinking himself into the ground. As often as not he would pass out in the club and I would just put a blanket over him and leave him there. I lived over the bar and one night I woke up with this horrible thumping through the floor. I go downstairs to find Mike with his face stuck to the bar. He had managed to get a hold of a pool cue and thumped it on the ceiling. I had just put in a new bar and got this guy to put a plastic top on it. He made a mistake and the bar top didn't set properly. Michael in his stupor crawled up on the bar and fell asleep on it. His face was firmly stuck to the bar It was quite a job to pry him loose without any more damage to his face.

I had somehow become a movie producer and Michael and Winston Reckert were going to be in it.

We hung around together and Mike and Winston got really crazy sometimes they got banned from several restaurants and bars and I saved them from arrest a couple of times.

One day Winston had just finished a movie and was flush. So Winston and Michel Ironside and Alberta Watson and Winston's accountant Jerry and I are sitting around at Jerry's drinking beer smoking dope and snorting coke. We were getting pretty crazy and we thought we should order some food. the subject of ribs came up and Jerry said the best ribs in the world were from Fat Willy’s Rib Shack in Chicago. So Winston says can we get some?. Jerry got on the phone with plane tickets and taxis etc we had ribs from Fat willy's in 4 hours for about a thousand dollars or so.

Mike and I had several pretty good fights. One night Michael and Winston Rekert (Neon rider) went to see Willie Dixon at the El Mocambo. This is after both of them had made a couple of good movies and things were beginning to happen for them. We had met some interesting young ladies and wanted to party later. Well, I have this very fussy friend who had gone to Poland for a month or two and had left me the key to his apartment. So I invited everyone back to his place which was just down the street and Mike used the phone to phone his girlfriend. when he couldn't get her he threw the phone out the window right through the screen I bopped him one for that. it was a real hassle to get it all repaired.

When Mike got his big hollywood call He settled 50% what he owed me which was alright.He went to Hollywood and made a few pictures and was doing well.He never called or gave me his phone number.

Then I got befriend by a weird girl who claimed to be his daughter. She had a pretty good story and I emailed Mike he should check it out. he said it was bullshit and that was that. This girl was persistant she tried to pump me. I never told her anything pertainent including email.I never gave phone or address I didn't know them.

Then I get a phone call from Mike, his Agent and lawyer accusing me of giving her his phone number etc. because she was phoning him. I denied but was not believed and we left on bad terms with threats from his side. A few months later they found out it was Mike's sister that gave her all the info. I got no apology.

Ian Tyson

I had known Ian for a bunch of years and he was a good friend of Morgan Vice who lived in one of my upstairs rooms. (Only musicians could live above an after hours club) Ian was going through a rough time when his marriage was breaking up and spent a lot of time in the bar and Morgan's place. One night Gary MacLean comes by. The Macleans had started as the folk group the vicious circle and Gary was a big fan of Ian's. SoI told him Ian was there. He was very excited to meet him and when I couldn't find him I led Gary up to Morgans's room. The door was open and in the dimly lit room, Ian was passed out on the floor. what could I do? "Ian Tyson, meet "Gary MacLean, "Gary Maclean, meet Ian Tyson.'
Gary bent down, "Jesus he said That is Ian Tyson."
(sorry Ian it was a long time ago)

Some weeks later Ian came in with Christine Wookie. He was schmoozing and I got into a long talk with Christine. We hit it off pretty well in a friend like fashion and she asked me why I was running a place like this. And I said i wanted to buy a sailboat. "That's all you want" heck we got a 70 foot sailboat that nobody has used in a couple of years if that's all you want why not.......
At that moment Ian grabbed her and whisked her out the door. wait a minute I holler. we will be back sys Ian says and is gone. Of course, I never saw her again.
I wonder how that would have finished.

Al Cromwell

I knew Al from the early sixties. he was a talented folk singer. He got involved in Scientology and seemed to lose it. He was mostly driving Cab when he hung out at my place in the seventies. He talked about a comeback but it never happened.

Danny Marks

When I first opened there were a lot of nights when there would just be Danny, Mike MacDonald and Jim Jones and me listening to my fabulous juke box and drinking beer till dawn.

Rolling Stones

I get a phone call one night. It's Tom Hedley "Hey Mick Jagger wants to talk to you. "Allo Gary Mick Jagger here. "Tony Silverthorn says "we might get a drink at your club?' A little stunned I said 'sure.' "Can you guarantee my safety?' "No Problem!' I assure him. "We are in a limo outside your door Will you let us in." I went down and escorted them in. they stood at the end bar, not obvious but in plain site and a few whispers went through the bar but basically my very hip

clientele ignored them.
They kind of got antsy after a while and Mick had to do a little prance on the way back from the washroom to get a couple of young ladies to harass them for a while. Mick got very drunk and he had to go and pick up Bianca at the airport so he asked me to get him back to the limo. I got Jesse Frayne to do that for me and she thanked me for months after that.
Tony Silverthorn was the manager of the Windsor Arms at that time. he had trouble getting the Stones to leave the Courtyard Cafe. so he got Tom and Bary Callaghan to show them the way.
the aftermath was amazing this happened on a Thursday night, on Friday and Saturday night I had line ups around the block.

Cathy Smith

I liked Cathy from the first time I met her in 1965, she was Paul

Donnelly's girlfriend. We were social friends always glad to see each other

Jerry Reed , Myrna Lorrie, Roseanne Cash, Eagle

Myrna Lorrie frequented my after-hours in the seventies, She was a lot of fun and I caught a few of her shows and liked her music. One night she showed up on the arm of Jerry Reed. (I'm a lover, not a fighter) Roseanne Cash was with them and she was with one of the Eagles. (I can never remember which one) apparently, she had a fling with him They were there almost every night for a week or so.

Helen Shaver

Helen was a night person, She was intelligent and sexy.

She came to my bar often and we enjoyed each other's company. She invited me for dinner one night,
And in her sensuous sultry voice recited one of her poems about losing her virginity to a sailor in my ear.
I suffered instant arousal. Unfortunately, it was not to be her sister dropped in and the situation never rose again so to speak. After she went to LA. We got together at a TO film festival. I introduced her to the MacLean Brothers and we had a great party. Ahh. . .Helen sigh

Robert Markle

How I became an Artist and almost met Bob Dylan(I sat beside him)

In 1964 I had a job as Stainless steel tube mill operator having formerly worked as a shepherd And decided to become an Artist. i had always been artistic but I thought I would make it official. How does one become an Artist? I tried to enroll in the Art College of Ontario but they wouldn't take me because I failed Math so I thought the next best way to become an Artist was to hang out with Artists. So I did this

By now I had found out about 'The Pilot' A tavern at Yonge and Bloor.The pilot was reputed to be the Mecca of Artists this is where most of the famous ones hung out. Barry Hale was the Art Critic of the Telegram and wrote lots of stories about Artists at the pilot. (mostly because he hung out at the pilot)

At that time the pilot was a bit of a problem for me because of the shifts I was on at the factory.

So I show up at the pilot around noon. There are no artists and I didn't even notice the back room. I sat at the bar and had a sandwich and a beer. A guy who sat beside me looked like an ad man, very dapper in a gray flannel suit trimmed mustache gray hair, he ordered a martini. We chatted he was a really nice guy and seemed to know a lot about art. Over the next few weeks, I went a couple times a week and met the same guy often and we became very friendly but I never saw any of the artists Barry Hale wrote about in the Telegram.

One time I asked Jack if any artists hung out there and he said he thought so but they came later in the afternoon and hung out in the back room. I couldn't believe I hadn't noticed the back room, it was like a large dark cavern It had a continuous upholstered seat right around the room with an exit door at the back and a dozen or so table with chairs. One wall was mirrored and the other had a very strange mural. But it was almost in complete darkness. So I started coming at 5 pm and soon began to recognize the ones from the art articles (at that time Jerry Santbergen was the featured Artist) Robert Markle was an unlikely looking guru he looked like kind of a slob he was overweight, he only wore blue jeans and navy sweatshirt and often rubber boots with a motorcycle jacket and a scarf. But he was brilliant, wonderful, witty, and sort of a snob.

Markle sort of held court at the Pilot. At 5 he would appear and sit in these funny little corners at the Pilot Tavern on either side. The pilot had benches along each wall with tables for four and 2 chairs outside. But at the entrance, there was a sort of cul de sac on each side of the stairs that they made into a seat like a mini throne. Markle always sat there and woe be on them that took his seat. The inner circle sat up on that side on that day. The Pilot was always very dark at any time of day. The five o clock crowd was very much an In Crowd outsiders were made uncomfortable and soon moved on. I came in as an outsider and was strongly ignored. But I wanted to be in the art scene and persevered and sat off on the fringe trying my best to get any drift of the conversations. I vaguely remember words like ‘ramifications’ that sent me running for a dictionary. But I lingered on the fringe even though Santbergan was more or less on the fringe and managed to talk to him a few times, he was fairly new to Toronto and had just come from Saskatchewan. One thing I knew for certain if I was going to get into this Artist World I would have to be accepted by Markle. Markle was a bit of a celeb at that time too He was friends with Patrick Watson and was on CBC quite a bit and also wrote articles for the Telegram.

I hit the Pilot about once a week and met some other fringe artists and CBC people like Bill Mc Neil and Hans Pohl Larry Zolf etc but I was not accepted by the art crowd. I found out later some of them thought I was an undercover cop..

Then one night in February 1966 I drifted into the Pilot at ten o clock. The 5 o clock crowd is long gone. I sat and ordered a beer waiting for my eyes to get used to the gloom. It was not a busy night and not many around. then I saw Markle coming in with some guy. He walked by his usual throne and sat on the bench, a table away the other guy sat down across from him. Wow! he was sitting with Bob Dylan WOW! I dared not approach and merely nodded as our eyes met. I couldn't hear what they said but I could tell Dylan was engaged and enjoying the conversation

The next day I was at the Pilot at 5 o clock. Markle was soon in his seat bubbling with the news of bringing Bob Dylan there the previous night. There was a mood of disbelief. Markle saw me and invited me over and offered a chair. "Hey man, you saw me here last night with Bob Dylan - right?"

"Yes," I said and was accepted into the in-crowd.

I started going to Openings and soon was invited to parties and studios and smoking dope and all that that entails.

The factory job was a conflict I wasn't cut out for factory work and it was spring I quit my job and moved to a house on McAlpine near Yorkville (the same street Markle lived on) And somehow got unemployment insurance as an unemployed shepherd. it seemed my Artist life was starting. One of the things that impressed the Pilot Artists is that I was friends with Jack Bush who was the guy I had been talking to at the bar.

In 1965, Markle's paintings shown in the exhibition Eros ’65 at the Dorothy Cameron Gallery were seized on a charge of obscenity, drawing considerable media attention. In the mid-1960s Markle began to write for magazines such as the Toronto Telegram Showcase, Maclean’s, and Toronto Life, publishing widely on topics as diverse as striptease, hockey, childhood Christmases, and Gordon Lightfoot. Markle also worked extensively as an illustrator, contributing images to magazines and literary journals. His work as an educator included terms at The New School of Art (1966-1977) and Arts’ Sake (1977-1982) as well as OCA and the University of Guelph. From the early 1960s, Markle played tenor saxophone and piano in the Artists’ Jazz Band. In 1970 the Markles moved to a farmhouse outside of Holstein, Ontario, although Robert re-established a studio in Toronto from 1979 to 1982. In 1979, he won a commission to decorate a Toronto hamburger restaurant, which was named Markleangelo’s in his honour. His other large-scale commissions include wall sculptures for the Ellen Fairclough Building in Hamilton, Ontario, and the MetroToronto Convention Centre. He executed and painted outdoor murals in Owen Sound and Mount Forest, Ontario. Markle was killed in a traffic accident in 1990. Of Mohawk ancestry, Markle used his mother’s spelling of his surname, although it was spelled “Maracle” on his birth certificate. Markle worked primarily in painting and ink drawing, and also explored photography, collage, printmaking, wooden sculpture, and neon. He collected folk art, which inspired a number of whirligig works later in his career. His work is in numerous public and private collections, including the Art Gallery of Ontario and the National Gallery of

Canada.

Gary Kendall (writes_

Gary was an early patron of my after-hours club. I talked to him on many nights when he was the only guy left. He was married and worried about money and maybe give up playing.
Now he is a giant bass player on the Toronto scene. playing for Downchild and many other bands.
he wrote these comments

I`m a little foggy on the time frame but I think your bar`s era was around 76/77. Not the best time for my career as a blues musician. Disco had taken out a number of live music clubs, punk and new wave were gaining a foot hold. Looking back, I think I was floundering with not much direction or creativity. My music of choice was blues but I couldn`t get a good gig to save my life and I was burned out from being the band leader of Dollars through 74/75. Making money was a challenge and hanging out in an after-hours bar wasn`t a wise choice for a guy with a family. When I did get a gig, I`d spend a good chunk of my pay drinking at your place.

I guess that bar offered something more interesting than some of the places I`d play during regular bar hours. The cast of characters was a pretty interesting mix of rounders, actors, and musicians, some of whom had happening careers and others who like me were waiting for something good to fall out of the sky. I can remember seeing Murray McLaughlin and Ian Tyson there a few times. Donnie Walsh offered me the gig playing bass in Downchild at least twice while we got loaded at the bar. As much as I wanted and needed it, it was a job I couldn`t take at that time because his bass player, Jim Milne was one of my best friends. Fortunately, Donnie would never remember the next day. I had to wait until a couple of other bassists had gone through the band before taking the gig, that way my friendship with Jim stayed solid. I`m still part of that band today although I`ve been there twice, 79-83, 95 to present.

It was fantastic when Handsome Ned would take out his guitar, stand in the middle of the room and knock off a short set of country standards. Although I never got to know him I was always glad when he`d be there and couldn`t wait for him to bang off some tunes.

I was in the bar the night Mick Jagger and Ron Wood from the Stones came in. I remember thinking that it would be great if everyone left them alone so they would stay for a while. That didn`t happen. Billy Bryans and I were in the middle of a conversation and he made a beeline for Ronnie. A friend's girlfriend who was talking to me mentioned she`d always had a crush on Mick, she immediately disappeared in the direction of the bar that the Stones and entourage were hanging in. I stood at the end of the bar watching as everyone in the place started to gravitate to the corner of the room where they were. As soon as some asshole started screaming "MICK JAGGER, MICK JAGGER" at the top of his lungs they were gone, along with most of the women who were there that night. My friend`s girlfriend ended up with Ronnie Wood and the best line of the night was, when asked why they were in Toronto, they said for the skiing. On his way out Mick walked past me and shot me a look that said, please leave me alone. I kept my mouth shut and and gave him a friendly nod of my head. A week or so later they played their infamous gig at the El Mocambo.

The bar`s era ran parallel to a pretty reckless time in my life, it was probably a necessary diversion for me, somewhere to hang while I waited for things to fall in place with my music and my life. Eventually, things did come together for me. A life in Canadian blues isn`t the easiest choice for a way to make a living but it`s been interesting, creative and I`m happy. Shirley and I are still together, now grandparents, so as chaotic as the '70s were, part of our lives made it through intact.

Feel free to edit and correct spelling if necessary. Use whatever you want for photos. If you want to send a graphic and link I`ll put your blog on the links section of my website. http://www.garykendall.com Gk

Joni Mitchell

Bernie Fieldler brought her to my after-hours club one night and she couldn't have been nicer. We sat and talked for a while and then she asked if I would like to hear her new record She borrowed Roy's guitar and got up and sang a whole set to my patrons. what a treat,.

Lou Miles

Lou Miles was a famous Toronto Tailor and a man about town. We became great friends and went out on many parties dinners and the like with his girlfriend Wendy. They also spent many nights at my bar.

Michael Ironside