Rheostatics - “Monkey Bird”
The last time my brother and I were in the same town on his birthday was 2002 in Montreal (a few months before he went off to Edmonton and I left for Vancouver). Kevin Hearn was playing a small show at Café Campus with Sarah Slean opening up. We were both big fans of both, so I brought him and his now-wife as a birthday present.
It was a weird show—less than a month after Sarah’s “Night Bugs” album was released. When the show was booked, Hearn was the bigger name, but “Night Bugs” had just started crawling up the charts and ~90% of the crowd was there for Slean.
She put on an amazing performance, and I wandered backstage while they were setting up for Hearn’s set. Now, the day I’d bought “Night Bugs,” I sent Sarah an email telling her that I loved the new record and had developed a “spring time crush” on her. Amazingly, she wrote back a few days later. If only I kept the email (of course I kept the email):
Matthew,
well shucks i’m blushing. Glad you dig my record. always nice to hear that. thanks for the note. much obliged.
pardon me, i do believe spring has sprung, i’m going to ride a bike.
see ya
sarahslean
Anyway, I’m backstage and there she is—I go talk to her:
Me: Hi… I don’t know if you’d remember, but I’m that guy who emailed you a few weeks ago saying he had a huge crush on you…
Sarah: Oh! Of course I remember! Matthew, right?
Unreal, right? We ended up having a nice little chat. Then I saw Kevin over in the corner and went to talk to him. He looked terrified. After convincing him I wasn’t some nut, we had a very shy/nervous conversation. I told him that it was my brother’s birthday and asked if he could wish him a happy one (“of course!”) Then I made a comment about how my brother’s favourite song from the Rheostatics’ The Story of Harmelodia album was “Monkeybird” (Hearn wrote and sang it).
About halfway through the set, Kevin announces “it’s Josh’s birthday, so happy birthday Josh! Everyone go buy him a drink!” (no one bought him a drink) and launches into “Monkeybird.” There’s a line in the song that goes “my brother Bug is a turd,” but Kevin, being awesome, sang it as “my brother Josh is a turd.” Amazing.
Later on, we’re leaving the Café when we run into Sarah and she says something like “good to meet you Matthew! Have a great summer!” Josh had no idea what was going on, how she knew my name, why Kevin threw his name into the song—to this day I’ve never told him (and he doesn’t read this blog).
Anyway, to bring this convoluted story to a point, I’ve been reading the dubious Looking Glass Wars, sent an email to a friend whose wife just published a new children’s book, and read the first chapter of the forthcoming Looking for Calvin and Hobbes: The Unconventional Story of Bill Watterson and his Revolutionary Comic Strip (send an email to lookingforcalvinandhobbes@gmail.com and the author will send you that sample chapter) today. I’ve also been listening to the Barenaked Ladies’ Snacktime (Kevin is their keyboardist) a lot lately. So my post-family 4-6 weeks of children mania got a bit of an extension and I wanted to listen to/re-read Harmelodia, which always makes me think of that (equally wonderful) story.
