The Last Pogo Jumps Again

B-Girl Cynthia Ross wrestles a guitar away from Sam Ferrara, 2008;  photo courtesy/copyright Kevin Lamb.

We interviewed former B-Girl and current member of New York Junk Cynthia Ross.   The charming Ms. Ross, former squeeze of Stiv Bators, delighted us with tales of decadence and derring-do whilst standing in front of what used to be Club David’s, yet another punk landmark in Toronto that’s been transformed into a condominium.   Did Cynthia spill the beans on what really happened at that party in New York when Nancy Spungeon was killed?   Does she reveal the secrets behind her ability to apparently not age a minute since 1977?  And will The B-Girls ever do another reunion gig?  Find out when The Last Pogo Jumps Again is released sometime in 2010.   And for more background on the illustrious B-Girls, check out their really great web-site at bgirls77.com.   And to find out what Cynthia’s new band New York Junk is all about, check ‘em out on MySpace/newyorkjunk.

The B-Girls in ’77;  photo courtesy/copyright Rodney Bowes.

Speaking of Club David’s, local photographer, former OCA student and current archivist at the Toronto Archives, Patrick Cummins dug deep into his vault of negatives and pulled out a shot of Club David’s just after it closed (amongst other gems), with boarded-up windows and graffitti from none other than Joey Shithead.   (Hey, Joey, really would love to talk to you about The Skulls brief spell in Toronto in 1977, so please get in touch.)

Our work-load on this never-ending project gets bigger and bigger — it seems that whenever we interview someone, we find out there’s someone else we really need to talk to — but things are going to go into a stall for the next month as a big chunk of the crew of The Last Pogo Jumps Again take on a paying gig, shooting a one-hour TV pilot called The Grim Sweepers.   Nope, it’s not a show about a long-forgotten punk band, but a “docu-soap” on a bunch of characters who clean up crime and trauma scenes for a living.   Good times!

Wow, was it really forty years ago that there was Woodstock and three days of peace, love and understanding in a muddy pig farm in Bethel, New York?  What’s so funny about that?   Nothing much really, but when you’re doing a blog on Punk Rock (and more specifically the feature-film in-the-making, The Last Pogo Jumps Again) you tend to search out threads and degrees of separation on any musical thingy that happens.   And that’s all we have to say about it.

Johnny Garbagecan;  photo copyright/courtesy of Norah Currie.

While co-director Brunton suffers a month in exile (Saskatchewan), co-director Paputts continues to add to the (so far) four hour rough cut of The Last Pogo Jumps Again. Earlier in the week, it was a couple of hours interviewing Zoltan “Johnny Garbagecan” Lugosi, best friend of the late Mike Nightmare, Prisoner’s Rights advocate and general scenester.  What did Johnny carry around in that briefcase all the time?  Is is true that he and Mike used to hop freight cars to build upper body strength so as to improve their B & E skills?  And what’s the story of the Russian typewriter? All shall be revealed.  When we finish the movie.

Punk drummer turned lawyer David Quinton-Steinberg; photo copyright/courtesy Kevin Lamb.

On Friday, Paputts and regular shooter Richard Fiander rode an elevator in the gold-flecked tower at Bay and Front and spent some time in an honest-to-goodness corporate boardroom with our favourite lawyer/drummer, David Quinton.  Did David reveal who he thought in the original scene may have been mentally ill?  What was the magic moment when he realized it might be smarter to go back to school than hang out and tour?   And who is the coolest Canadian lawyer:  David Quinton, or Raymond Burr? Find out when we finally complete The Last Pogo Jumps Again in 2010.

And we’ll end this blog by bringing us full circle back to Woodstock, because if there wasn’t a more hip and hippiesh store in Toronto back in the early seventies, it woulda been Tribe, the used clothing store that occupied the front of the building where Club Davids operated.

(And hey — if anyone can dig up any pix of the old Club Davids, a factory-sealed DVD of The Last Pogo awaits you.)

There’s still a few more people we need to talk to to complete our interviews for The Last Pogo Jumps Again.  There are a few interesting characters who are reluctant to chat (we’ll work on it!) but there are a few people and things we need to find in order to put this puzzle together.

1.  Dancing Drunk Dude.   If you’ve seen the short film The Last Pogo (available on DVD right here!), you’ll notice one guy who seems to be in every frame, dancing, fighting, and falling over.  Good times!

Here he is dancing away.  Was he a Blake Street Boy?  A 905-er?  A regular?  We dunno!   But here’s a closer look, as he took a few quiet moments during the show.   A couple of pogoers beside him take the opportunity to carefully stick safety pins and needles in him.  Hey-o! And if you can help us track him down, you’ll get a dvd of The Last Pogo and a t-shirt (if you’re the right size.)

2.  Photos or footage.   We’ve rounded up shots of the Roxy, New Yorker, Horseshoe and Crash ‘n’ Burn, but Club David’s, the gay bar/punk club on St. Nicholas Street in Toronto was pivotal and the scene of much rowdy and raunchy behavior.    Of course, we’re always hunting for any super-8 or video footage of any of the clubs or scenesters, but even footage of everyday Toronto circa 1976 – 1978 would help out.    Big thanks to Michael K for Super-8 footage of The Last Pogo, Alan Zweig for footage of Yonge Street in 1978, Ron Mann for a shot of Cinecity in the early seventies (the first movie theatre Gary Topp helped program, including most famously convincing them to show The Beatle’s Yellow Submarine as a — gasp — Midnight Show;  Suzanne Naughton for allowing us use of her awesome 16mm films Afternoon at New Rose and Mondo Punk, and Peter Vronski for footage from Dada’s Boys.

Canadian hero Terry Fox runs by the Roxy Theatre;  copyright/courtesy Jeremy Gilbert.

We’re still doing our best to convince Much Music and CBC to let us get our hands on some stuff they have.   Andrew Strehler gave us footage of  Keith Whittaker from The Demics signing New York City with Teenage Head;  and finally a big tip ‘o’ the hat to Wayne Brown who supplied us with a clip of Rick Moranis as Chet Brinkley reporting on The Viletones at CBGB’s in NYC.  Boners! And we can’t begin to list all the people who’ve offered up photos, so we’ll save that for another post.

The Police, circa 1978.

3.  Sting.  Sure, we’ll just look up his phone number and give him a shout.  But seriously, as part of The Police, Sting played the infamous show at the Horseshoe Tavern in 1978 when there were more people working the club than actual paying customers.  And since then, of course, thousands of people claimed they were there.  Which would beg the question:  “Mr. Sumners.  Many many people claim to have been at The Police show at the Horseshoe Tavern in 1978.  Were you there?”

Deal with the Devil;  copyright Kim Northrop.  Check out his art at kimnorthrop.com

A year after interviewing the Topp half of The Garys, we’ve now chatted with the other half, sexy man-beast Cormier.   Gary had tons of interesting stuff to say on the partnership with Gary Topp and their years at the New Yorker and Horseshoe Tavern and The Edge and punk and rock and roll.

Coming up this week is an interview with Johnny Garbagecan, the late Mike Nightmare’s right-hand man, confidante and partner-in-crime, as well as a boardroom chat with Mods‘ drummer (and The Last Pogo Jumps Again’s legal counsel) David Quinton.   Apart from yer basic rock ‘n’ roll smarts and amazing history, Davids been a huge help with some of the legals we’ve had to deal with (and with any luck, he won’t have to spring into action later this week on our behalf to deal with a certain you-know-who.  I mean, really dude, can’t we just get along?)

The B-Girls at the Beach;  photo copyright/courtesy of Rodney Bowes.

Later on this weekend we’re talking to Cynthia Ross of The B-Girls, and then we’re hoping to get all of  The Curse together in an estrogen explosion of atomic proportions, and then…we’ll see.  There’s always someone else we can talk to who can help fill in the blanks. So while co-director Kire Paputts interviews and cuts, co-director Aldo Erdic cuts some of the footage from The Last Pogo 30th Anniversary Bash, co-director Brunton is out in Indian Head, Saskatchewan coordinating archival footage and stuff, and looking forward to seeing Alan Zweig’s footage of Yonge Street circa 1978;  we can’t get enough of those mullets!  Let’s hope there’s a glimpse of The Gasworks.  Hey-o!

(Pogo H.Q. got a sneak listen to Sunshine World by The Scenics, their CD of remastered songs from 1977.  Along with what you might call their hits, there’s great covers of Tommy James’ Mony, Mony (which, until you actually hear them sing the words mony, mony, you wouldn’t know what song it was;  it made us laugh out loud — thats LOL for the digi-gen) and The Kinks’  Where Have All The Good Times Gone.   More on that later, gotta go to work!)

Kire Paputts and assistant editors on break

It’s hard to grasp how huge and — dare we say it? — important the whole Toronto/Southern Ontario punk scene circa 1976 – 1978 was until you’ve taken a couple of hundred hours of footage and tried to sum it all up in an hour and a half to two hours.  Hey-o!

With The Last Pogo Jumps Again co-director/editor Kire Paputts in Toronto filling in the blanks with a few more interviews, and co-director Aldo Erdic getting through his busy summer attending every single punk show in town and trying to hang on to his day job, co-director Colin Brunton was holed up in a hotel in Regina, and decided to forego the awesome night life there to kick back and look at Kire’s three and a half-hour rough cut of the film.  Boners!

We’ve a little biased here of course, but wow.   All this hard work over the past three years seems to be paying off  (NB:  paying off will probably never mean anything in the traditional “money” aspect.)  The film looks great.   The hard part now is to try and determine who should stay and who should go, da da da DA DA DA DA, da, whooo!

We don’t wanna give anything away here, but we’re pretty 101% certain that we’re gonna do everyone proud.   And when everyone gets their due, and The Garys get on Canada’s Walk of Fame, there’s a statue of Steve Leckie in downtown Toronto, the former home of Freddy Pompeii and Margarita Passion is open for tours;  when there’s a street in Hamilton named after the late great Frankie Venom, and a wing of a jail cell named for the later and greater Mike Nightmare;  when the assholes who run the Junos and whatnot finally swallow back their bile and fess up that, uh, yea, the scene was particularly fucking awesome and give lifetime achievement awards to a dozen or so musicians;  when some hotshot band does some cover versions of some of the many great tunes generated back then and make the artists a few bucks;  when that all happens, then everyone who was into the brave new world of 1976 can finally say “Fuck you, told ya so.”

And it sure goes against the general hot ‘n’ nasty punk vibe, but looking over all that footage, listening to all those people talk about the old days, watching all these bands fucking tear it up, the overwhelming feeling that overtook Brunton on Saturday night was… love.  So…uh…we love you, man!

R.I.P. William “Willy DeVille” Bursay, 1953 – 2009

Very sad news today to learn of the death of Willy DeVille.  This has nothing to do with our feature film in-the-making The Last Pogo Jumps Again, but props to a master musical stylist, sharp dresser and terrific performer.  Willy was being treated for Hepatitis C when pancreatic cancer was detected.

Gary Topp of The Garys brought Willy and his band Mink DeVille to Toronto more than a few times, first at The Edge (the club they started after the Last Pogo demise of the Horseshoe Tavern) and later to the El Mocambo and more.

So, does that song sound familiar?  Yup, the iconic Viletones tune “Possibilities” as performed by Nirvana (i.e. that 90′s band that sounded like any number of bands back in the late seventies.  But I guess we can’t diss Kurt too much if he had such good taste.)   The Diodes’ John Catto found this on his Internet machine, and turned us on to it via Facebook.   

Peter Noble chimed in from England and reminded us that it was co-written by Steven Davey and original Toronto punk Steven Leckie.  Davey, apart from starting The Dishes with Tony Malone, and later The Everglades, was a huge creative force in the late seventies Toronto scene, having penned not only that tune, but a bunch of others as well, including what was arguably the most popular Toronto-ish punk anthem, New York City for London, Ontario’s own Demics.

The Dent’s Michael Dent credits Steven with teaching him how to write a song, and the inimitable Lance Charles just couldn’t gush enough about Mr. Davey when we spoke a few weeks ago.   Steven currently writes about food for Now Magazine amongst other things, and has been on our interview hit-list for three years now, but stuff takes time, what can we say?

The Astor Theatre about 30 years before it became The New Yorker;  courtesy Toronto Archives.

Ticket to Talking Heads and The Scenics courtesy Gail Wetton.

Speaking of Steven Davey, one incident that sticks in our craw was his infamous heckling of The Scenics.  Ah, the poor misunderstood Scenics.  Having been discovered by Gary Topp (and later managed by The Garys) and looking for the perfect opening act for the Toronto debut of Talking Heads as a four-piece, Gary thought he’d do Toronto audiences a favour by surprising them with this awesomely creative and original new band.   But opening for the Heads was a primo gig that every band in Toronto wanted, and many thought they deserved.   One false move, much?   The resentment started to brew as soon as they were announced as the opening band.  Last Pogo Jumps Again co-director Colin Brunton recalls being so nervous for his friends that he became psychosomatically sick to his stomach and couldn’t bear to watch.  He crawled back home to St. Nicholas Street.   To a packed New Yorker house, The Scenics hit the stage and after maybe a song or two, Davey stood up in the crowd, cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled out “BORING!”   Funnily enough, thirty years later Gary Topp has conceded that in fact, The Dishes might actually have been a better opener, but that was then, this is now.

The Scenics stoically continued on for another five years before finally calling it quits.   To paraphrase Brunton’s liner-notes from their upcoming CD release Sunshine World (more very cool news on that later) “…they were outsiders in a group of outsiders.  The didn’t dress the part, or go to the right parties.  They were weirdos: one of them played barefoot, and the drummer sometimes sported a beard. Their fans were proud but few.”

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