From here to there...from the day we're born to the day we die it seems that we spend an inordinate amount of time marking off milestones in our calendar of life. Our early birthdays when we knew not who came and what we got, we just wanted cake so our parents could take those pictures of us with frosting on our noses or if they were very lucky, our entire faces. On to our social forming later years when we would make a list of friends to attend, doling out loot bags with all the grace of Drumph trying to be genuinely empathetic. Skip forward to old age and again, people we may or may not know showing up to sing that song and wait for cake. Milestones. First drink, first smoke, first love, first having to explain to your parents why you were walking through the living room with your bedroom screen window coming in from the backyard...true story.
When I turned 16 it wasn't that big of a thing. Some close friends decorated my locker and some tried to embarrass me. I didn't rush out to get my drivers license or anything like that, I actually waited a year for some reason. When I turned 18 and was now of legal age to vote, again, not a big deal, although I have voted in every election I was able to since then...I figure you can't complain if you don't show up....so there.
Turning 19, the legal age to access all forms of liquor and beer, well...that was a hootenanny and a half. As they say here in the Maritimes....loooaaaaaddddeeeeedddddd!! It was a night to remember and I hope I can remember it all here.
My buddies decided that we needed to do this in bar with a band playing. At the time, Hooligans was probably one of the best cover bands around in the big smoke back in 1987. They played the best from The Who and were very good at it. I've seen a lot of cover bands and some have been good, like the Genesis cover band and some have been horrible, like the John Mellencamp cover band. Hooligans was easily the best. They were tight and one hundred percent engaged with us drunkards. But more on that later.
I may have just turned 19 but it wasn't the first time I had drank...nay, nay...I'd been buying beer and other libations for a few years with no trouble at all. I guess I looked older than I was as I was never carded. In fact the only time I was carded was a few weeks after my 19th birthday...I laughed as I let him in on the secret when I showed him my I.D. Now you want to I.D. me? Coming here for two years and now you want to verify my age....smooth man. Needless to say I was familiar with the ins and outs of consumption, actually I was a bit of a legend as Quebec had already happened...twice.
The boys had got me a bootleg Rush album, which I still have. A live recording that captured the rawness of the band before they polished things up in studio. The sound quality of the recording was garbage but it's a nice collectors piece to be sure. I believe I received some bottles of gin, which I couldn't drink as I was still recovering from my first and last experience with gin in Quebec City. I gladly shared with my buddies as we made our way down to Rock and Roll Heaven. Not a metaphor for the best place to see a live show, the actual name of the rats ass club that we went to that night. It was sort of the home club for Q-107, the home of rock and roll back in the day. Located at Young and Bloor 30 floors beneath the radio station with low ceilings and as much cachet of a Toledo Holiday Inn circa 1975. It was poo.
We couldn't care less. Drinks were cheap, not that I bought any, the girls had huge hair...as a matter of fact so did many guys, the band was awesome and I was 19. Fuck yeah mother fuckers. Did I mention loooaaaaaddddeeeeedddddd? Absolutely shit faced that night. My friends were buying round upon round and we were all pretty looped even before the band came on stage. Once they started up though we were burning off energy fuelled by 100% alcohol at staggering rates. Hooligans played the greatest hits of The Who....reminding everyone why they were bad ass in the late 60's and early 70's. Baba O'Reilly and Magic Bus as the finale certainly got our attention. It seemed we got the bands as well....we were right up front singing at the top of our lungs at the lead singer often would jam the microphone towards us to allow our soulful penetrating version to ring true and ring loud. He thought we were nuts and he was probably right. Same type of thing happened to Steve and I when we saw Marillion at Old Massey Hall, still the best place to see a show. We were literally hanging over the second floor balcony and Fish, the lead singer, pointed to us in awe of our stupidity and audacity. It was quite the night. But wait, back to heaven and all that jazz.
I might have mentioned something about drinking a shit load that night, even for me, and while there was never any issue of drinking and driving, we felt we should know our blood alcohol levels before leaving the club...with Magic Bus still ringing in our ears. To that end, there was a vending machine size Breathalyzer at the club. You took a straw and blew into the machine for a quarter. Supposedly to prevent drinking and driving, but we of course turned it into a game. Who could score the highest? I won of course and the international signal for touchdown went up. Boy my parents would be so proud...hahaha I suppose you could chalk this up to another one of those "why are you still alive" stories but because it marked that milestone, that coming of age chapter in my life, it holds a special place in my heart. The end of the line when it came to my partying days was really less than a year away. We graduated high school a few months later, enjoyed our last summer as a group and began going our own ways after that. There was, of course, copious amounts of drinking all through that time but there was something special about winning the night and turning 19 with my best friends.
Maybe when I turn 50 next year I can replicate that night....hmmmmmmmmmm
Ciao
D
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