Buoyant blog of septuagenarian (78) Kanadian poet and haikuist Chris Faiers/cricket. People's Poetry in the tradition of Milton Acorn, haiku/haibun, progressive politikal rants, engaged Buddhism and meditation, revitalizing of Callaghan's Rapids Conservation Area, memories of ZenRiver Gardens and Purdy Country LitFests (PurdyFests), events literary and politikal, and pics, amid swirling currents of earth magick and shamanism. Read in 119 countries last week - 43,329 readers in September.
The morning dawned with a strange hue. The light was too intense and vivid. All of this seemed odd as the sky was grey and cloudy.
All day I kept looking out, fearing that some kind of storm was brewing.
At one point I saw an orange sun masked by wispy clouds. But those weren’t clouds; it was smoke from distant mega-fires.
In Toronto, the orange haze has been called apocalyptic.
We used to have summer. Now we have fire season.
Sky above Lake Ontario looking towards the United States - July 15, 2026
The news media are full of stories of record-breaking temperatures, heat domes, and thousands of deaths in Europe from heat stress. Scientists are warning of mass die-offs in the ocean due to ever-increasing ocean temperatures. What “Super” El Niño has in store remains to be seen, but people are worried, given the reports.
Eleven years ago, world leaders gathered in Paris to address the looming threat of catastrophic climate change. Scientists warned us we had a narrow window to dramatically lower emissions.
Canada made bold pronouncements about meeting our global Net Zero commitments. Yet in that same period, oil production jumped from 2.9 million barrels a day to 5.3 million.
Canadians were told that we could somehow massively increase oil production while still getting to Net Zero. It was a ridiculous premise, but it was rarely challenged in the media.
Now the issue of Net Zero has been thrown out altogether as the Canadian political class bets our common future on the promise of pipelines.
Mark Carney and Danielle Smith have inked an MOU for a million-barrel-a-day pipeline to the coast. Premier Doug Ford is claiming he can build a 3,200 kms pipeline to refineries in Ontario.
Who will pay for the projects?
Nobody in the oil industry is stepping up. They have other options for increasing production without the added cost of building “nation-building” mega projects.
The cost will fall to the public.
Canadian taxpayers paid $34 billion for the TMX expansion. The public was reassured that it would get the money back when it was sold to the private sector. That hasn’t happened.
To shift the huge problem of debt, the government established a shell corporation, TMX Finance. It has no employees, but this shell entity holds all the debt. This has allowed the government to claim that the pipeline is profitable.
And still no private company wants to touch it.
Imperial Oil has calculated that a new pipeline will cost $100 billion. No company is going to take on that cost. And so, like the shell company spin used to promote TMX, the government is telling us this new project will be a public-private partnership.
If you break down the numbers, the public is on the hook for 90% of the cost, and the pipeline company that has agreed to put their name forward is protecting themselves with all manner of prevaricating language.
The urgency of the pipeline stems from opening new markets to China. This, as global reports indicate, is because China is taking advantage of the closure of the Strait of Hormuz to drive forward its staggering increase in renewable energy.
We are building a pipeline to nowhere. Meanwhile, the planet burns.
Recently I spoke with Markham Hislop of Energi Media, who has been tracking the energy industry in Canada for years. We discussed the insanity of Canada doubling down on pipelines at this time and why that matters.
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the tender heartthrob under a tortoiseshell --Zoltan Pachnik (Kaposvar, Hungary)
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Don’t move, stay still now; there’s a caterpillar there resting in your hair --Ugur Olgar (Silifke, Turkey)
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intervals of the sound of sea-- dozing beneath the noon sun --Christina Chin (Kuching, Malaysia)
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the whisper of a bicycle squeak summer dusk --Glenn G. Coats (Carolina Shores, North Carolina)
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railyard conversation seed heads whisper to graffitied boxcars --Kim Goldberg (Nanaimo, British Columbia)
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a mockingbird desperate for a date-- endless string of calls --John Richard Stephens (Maui, Hawaii)
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press conference the loons are calling on the White House lawn --Mike Fainzilber (Tel Aviv, Israel)
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Harsh times even the best orchestra failed to sing --Junko Saeki (Tokyo)
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empty carriages pulled by an engine named Victory-- train tracks rattle --Robin Rich (Brighton, England)
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the last notes of a piano in the landfill --Howard Lee Kilby (Hot Springs National Park, Arkansas)
------------------------------ FROM THE NOTEBOOK ------------------------------
Long-hemmed kimono rustles on the temple floor green maple trees --Murasaki Sagano (Kyoto)
The haikuist found inner peace in the colorful sounds she perceived when a polished black floor reflected green (yuka-midori). So as not to destroy the tranquil atmosphere of Iwakura Jissoin temple, other floors are covered in tatami mats to silence noises such as shuffling feet and the flowing silk trains of ceremonial court dresses. Stania heard graceful tranquility.
close to silence--the silver wings of a dragonfly
Matsuo Basho (1644-1694) composed hokku for a courtesan who offered a piece of white silk to write on at a teashop named Butterfly: ran no ka ya choo no tsubasa ni takimono su
the incense breathed onto a butterfly’s wings a fragrant orchid
Handling silk requires a gentle touch, noted Margaret Ponting in Victoria, Australia, and Tom Bierovic in DeLand, Florida, who respectively wove their poems on a universal theme.
trust a silken thread is broken
* * *
cobwebs on the porch swing broken promise
In today’s column, haikuists record a crescendo of summer sounds: splashing, dripping, rattling, whirring, whispering, whooping, shrieking, howling, shouting and silence. In Joetsu, Niigata Prefecture, Yutaka Kitajima slurped sloshing liquid from a bottle listening to a “pocha-pocha” rhythmic sound.
Soda pops from the shopping bag... cooling sounds
Jack Kerouac referred to haiku as pops, including this one from his “Book of Haikus” (2003).
Missing a kick at the icebox door It closed anyway
Julia Guzman was surprised by a cold-blooded caiman reptile rolling off a riverbank in Cordoba, Argentina.
the sound of paddle strokes-- a yacare stretches in the sun
Melissa Dennison smiled contentedly at the noises coming from a government-financed community center in Bradford, England. Built 40 years ago, however, the well-used infrastructure needs replacing.
splashing pensioners in the council pool summer never ends
Witnessing a water accident in Tokyo, Junko Saeki knew enough “to throw a line and call for help.”
interpreter at the scene of an accident until doctors know what to do
Boryana Boteva penned this head-on collision in Sofia, Bulgaria.
your word against mine-- crashing trains
Shannon Wallace got a call in Mississauga, Ontario.
in the voice message a familiar breath sighs
In Berne, Switzerland, Linus Blessing wears a keepsake associated with flowing water--the symbol of the Japanese goddess of eloquence, good fortune and knowledge.
my beloved’s medal Benzaiten hangs on my chest
Listening to a bird in Kielce, Poland, Marek Printer invoked Matsuo Basho’s 1689 ode: muzan ya na kabuto no shita no kirigirisu
How piteous-- beneath the warrior’s helmet a crying cricket
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heat waves-- goldfinch sings from a pierced helmet
Joanna Ashwell cried for relief from the heat wave in Durham, England.
mopping my brow when will this whirr of AC end
Isabella Kramer had lullabies to sing in Nienhagen, Germany. Earl Livings drifted off listening to a lullaby in Melbourne, Australia. Raj K. Bose welcomed a new neighbor to Honolulu, Hawaii.
weeping willow all these fairytales I never told you unborn child
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frogs in the pond raindrops on glass… insomnia music
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summer evening breeze neighbor’s lullaby sounding just like my mom’s
Anthony Q. Rabang arranged percussion instruments in Santa Catalina, Philippines. In Beesenstedt, Germany, Ramona Linke moved her hands close to metal antennas that created an electromagnetic field controlling the pitch and volume of her musical composition.
convenience store raindrops filling empty soda cans
* * *
Theremin sound once upon a time in July
Mario Massimo Zontini returned to a dream in Parma, Italy. Timothy Daly pulled over to the side of the road, mesmerized by a graceful bird wading in tall reeds to perch on a log by the Misa river, Italy.
the first coffer before the doves begin to coo-- I go back to bed
* * *
just traffic until the heron pauses my commute
As soon as C. Jean Downer finds the coin that slipped between the upholstery, she’ll race ring-billed gulls to the beach at White Rock, British Columbia.
dad’s favorite chair-- searching for one more dime for the candy aisle
Carl Brennan licked his lips at a summer resort in New York state. Christina Chin put the top down.
Offkey ragtime the ice cream truck rolls in Finger Lakes fog
* * *
Beetle convertible singing scouts songs sunshine on my bonnet
Padraig O’Morain was sure he heard an animal sniffing around Dublin, Ireland. Florian Munteanu bought two dogs in Bucharest, Romania. P. Kimura replied to a knock at the door in Worthington, Massachusetts.
roses dip their heads the dog that died snuffles around the lawn
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at a park-- a lost puppy nears hot dog stand
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Hello! Who is it? Leaves unfurling on oak trees woodpeckers knocking
Kitajima has been listening to the sound of a keepsake since his junior high school days in Joetsu, Niigata Prefecture.
grandma’s gift ticking sound round ’n’ round windup watch
Matsuo Basho often received gifts, such as summer melons, from his disciples. In exchange, he instructed them on how to write poetry, sometimes imploring his disciples to resist copying: makuwa melon--do not be like me two halves of a melon (ware ni niru na futatsu ni wareshi makuwa uri). Elizabeth Moura described a hopeful moment in East Taunton, Massachusetts. Mona Bedi walked at high tide. Morgan Ophir meditated in Sydney, Australia.
mama’s day out scratching lotto tickets holding up the line
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beach combing finding hidden treasure in the wrack line
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stone garden raking the sound of straight lines
Traveling by locomotive, Subhash Roy Choudhury traversed the Mahanadi River on the way to Cuttack station, India. On a rainy trip to Ooty, India, Shalini Gupta sat in a “heritage steam locomotive with surreal views.”
train whistle-- the iron bridge thrums rain plinks in the river
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toy train chugs along painted gouache cabbage farms frosted window panes
Sandip Chauhan fished in Great Falls, Virginia.
rusted buoy bell between the swells a fisherman sings
Dennison sat down for a traditional fry-up breakfast. Patrick Sweeney tucked into some warm grub in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Mark Manalang packed breakfast into a haversack while running away from busy Shinjuku, Tokyo. Bose had breakfast on a haiku hike.
tight trousers... sitting down the sound of buttons popping
* * *
the whole neighborhood knows what the downy woodpecker’s knocking out for breakfast
* * *
Dawn rush to the park racks with warm onigiri “Just grab everything”
* * *
Morning hike crunching a cereal bar-- branch under fallen leaves
Vishal Prabhu hopes young birds will return as large ornamental peacocks with shiny blue-emerald feathers by next autumn in dusty Pune, India. Neena Singh unfurled an umbrella when she heard an echoing scream in Chandigarh, India. David Cox knelt at Battambang, Cambodia.
retreating pea-chicks scattered by a dog… summer day
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summer rain the peacock calls a lost queen
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observation-- two peacock feathers at the altar
Allen David Simon visited the hills in Kerala, India, to see a blue-purple flower that blooms once every 12 years, only to wither as soon as it spread its spores.
Neelakurinji bloom-- twelve years in the making a spiel, soft wilting
Marie Derley felt at home while visiting Doha.
visiting Qatar I think I hear the song of European swans
Japanese summers have lengthened by about three weeks over the 42 years from 1982 to 2023, according to researchers at Mie University who meticulously measured the start and ending dates of the four seasons. A.J. Johnson noted when a cicada went quiet in Stephens City, Virginia. Tejendra Sherchan traded blood for saliva in Kathmandu, Nepal. Stephen J. DeGuire didn’t need to slap a gnat in Los Angeles, California. Dorota Czerwinska had sticky fingers in Warsaw, Poland.
shrieking all summer long mirage jets
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a mosquito bite its venom drives me mad all day long
* * *
mosquito AHA! moment caught in amber
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on each side buzzing wasps sweet buns
Corine Timmer wrote from Faro, Portugal.
au naturel-- spring in our union
Protected from the fiery sun by a massive tree in Cuttack, India, Choudhury penned his impression of the moment a ceasefire agreement was broken. Soumya Mukherjee bartered at a wet bazaar in Kolkata, India. Christina Chin traded up in Sarawak, Borneo.
silence shatters-- a dolphin gasp chinar shades alone
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monsoon sale in five cents the Buddha
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down at the store for a pound of flour-- choc chip ice cream
Amid all the noise this summer, T.D. Ginting kicked back and plugged in earphones to listen to “Star Wars” scores in Medan, Indonesia.
rare quietive holiday, jukebox, pizza... I’m watching five co(s)mic wars
War sounds made John Daleiden’s temperature rise in the normally serene Sonoran Desert, near Phoenix, Arizona.
all that noise all that sound-- delusional rage
Brandon Favre knows “dark and stormy skies bring more thunder than rain in the Sonoran Desert,” near his home in Tempe, Arizona.
monsoon clouds come and go parched saguaros
Johnson listened to the wind whip up sand.
desert playa a dust devil twirls alkali salt
Originally shared by the spoken word, and then Japanese written on paper, haiku became international as it transcended the performative form with multi-languages including sign and gestures as well as digital representations. This poem by Stoianka Boianova in Sofia, Bulgaria, points the way toward the creation of universal haiku in three or more dimensions. Mona Bedi’s haiku pivots on whether the listener is with her in Delhi, India, or in the heavens above.
secret conversation between us-- the universe listens
* * *
scattered stars I drown in your galactic presence
Hinano Nagamine searched for answers in Kagoshima. Ponting felt deceived.
Summer night breeze questions drifting through my brain sleep slips away
* * *
lost in a maze of questions the lie
As if hearing nails on a chalkboard, Archie G. Carlos cringed in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Versailles deal signing the scratch of his sharpie in a hollow hall
Looking forward to the Fourth of July holiday, M.R. Pelletier celebrated the length and breadth of America.
Yuma thunderstorms eyeing the umbrella I brought from Portland
Martina Agata Matijevic puffed on a seed head in Vidovci, Croatia.
dandelion fluff... his voice softens
Ashwell counted myriad shades of yellow.
more dandelions than marigolds a rampant border
John Hawkhead tended a cemetery plot in Bradford on Avon, England.
grass borders filled with hymns of rain planting a stone
Reciting in Wiltshire, England, Alan Summers read aloud this haiku at an interval of three whole tones between C and F sharp musical notes, noting the sequence in the rock band Black Sabbath’s heavy metal music.
any last requests for the DJ in the sky an extra tritone riff
Richard Bailly cocked an ear in Fargo, North Dakota. Nature masked unwanted sounds for Stania. Tsanka Shishkova intermittently watched football and the world news in Sofia, Bulgaria.
difficulty hearing truth white noise
* * *
Sunday walk--frogs drown out the cellphone conversations
* * *
World Cup the roar of wars silences the joy
American expat Ian Willey awoke early to watch two televised events from Takamatsu, Kagawa Prefecture, noting “in those moments, to your ears, the birds stop chirping and start singing, and even the traffic takes on a triumphant hum.”
subdued sunrise our team settles for the tie
* * *
open window how the world sounds when your team wins
Choudhury will mark the July 14 anniversary of the 1789 Storming of the Bastille in France.
French revolution-- the domestic help changes an election poster
Christopher Calvin’s haiku expressed his “great concern about the political turmoil taking place” in Kota Mojokerto, Indonesia.
summer streets darken shouts thrown, gases fired, then crash tears roll heavy
Chen-ou Liu turned off summer in Ajax, Ontario.
war news on mute lily petals curl inward early July
Beata Czeszejko quietly closed the front door behind her in Warsaw, Poland.
Read what you hesitate to do at http://www.asahi.com/ajw/special/haiku/. The next issues of the Asahi Haikuist Network appear July 17 and 31. Readers are invited to respond to Matsuo Basho’s hokku: How piteous--beneath the warrior’s helmet a crying cricket, on a postcard to David McMurray at the International University of Kagoshima, Sakanoue 8-34-1, Kagoshima, 891-0197, Japan, or e-mail to mcmurray@fka.att.ne.jp.
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David McMurray
David McMurray has been writing the Asahi Haikuist Network column since April 1995, first for the Asahi Evening News. He is on the editorial board of the Red Moon Anthology of English-Language Haiku, columnist for the Haiku International Association, and is editor of Teaching Assistance, a column in The Language Teacher of the Japan Association for Language Teaching (JALT).
McMurray is professor of intercultural studies at The International University of Kagoshima where he lectures on international haiku. At the Graduate School he supervises students who research haiku. He is a correspondent school teacher of Haiku in English for the Asahi Culture Center in Tokyo.
McMurray judges haiku contests organized by The International University of Kagoshima, Ito En Oi Ocha, Asahi Culture Center, Matsuyama City, Polish Haiku Association, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Seinan Jo Gakuin University, and Only One Tree.
McMurray’s award-winning books include: “Teaching and Learning Haiku in English” (2022); “Only One Tree Haiku, Music & Metaphor” (2015); “Canada Project Collected Essays & Poems” Vols. 1-8 (2013); and “Haiku in English as a Japanese Language” (2003).
During my political career, there was a running joke in my office about dealing with the Library of Parliament. After every election, someone from the library would call to update my official parliamentary biography and ask about my educational background.
Jan (yes, the same Jan who helps run The Resistance) always had the same answer:
“Charlie’s a graduate of Punk Rock University.”
For some reason, they never updated my bio.
The fact was, I missed my high school graduation as I had a gig at the punk rock bar, the Cabana Room at the Spadina Hotel. While my classmates went off to university that fall, I climbed into an eco-line van and began touring the country with the political punk band L’étranger.
For this instalment of the Sunday Summer Reading Series, I want to share a few lessons I learned from Punk Rock University.
A Punk Rock Education
The Toronto punk scene grew up in the late 1970s-early 80s amidst the worst recession since the depression. Industrial Toronto was disappearing. The old factories and garment businesses along Spadina/Riverdale/Liberty Village were shutting down. It provided great practice spaces and cheap rent for artists looking to build their craft.
Getting a job wasn’t easy, but for artists who secured a part-time gig dishwashing or waitressing, it was possible to pay the rent and still have time to explore creative interests.
University students could dabble in art, politics, or music because, if they failed a course, the debt load was nothing to worry about. They could pay their university fees with a summer job.
Everything was political then — the fight against nukes, apartheid, justice for El Salvador.
Cheap rent created an explosion of art spaces. Clubs like The Edge, Larry’s Hideaway, the Turning Point, the Cameron, the Rivoli, and the Bamboo offered live music to increasingly varied audiences and subcultures.
Some of those clubs and art spaces flourished. Others, like the Queen City Tavern, the Club with No Name, and 100 Bond Street, were mere flashes in the pan. But all of them were made possible because people could afford to take a chance on doing something creative.
Andrew Cash and I went to the same parish in Toronto (Holy Spirit). We met at 14 over a shared desire to learn to play guitar. By 17, we had formed our punk band with the intention of leaving school and heading out to discover Canada.
Charlie Angus and Andrew Cash
I loved travelling with the band. I saw Canada as a vast and fascinating land. An adventure. That feeling about this country has never left me. Playing in various punk rock enclaves was an education that taught me my first lessons in building community.
The majority of time on the road was monotonous. The band filled the hours on long drives playing word games or debating the merits of the latest records, the state of hockey (the Maple Leafs under owner Harold Ballard), and politics.
One time, there were seven of us—four musicians and three roadies—driving home from a gig in a van supplied by a company called Rent-A-Wreck.
The vehicle lived up to the name. It only had two seats, so the driver and co-pilot focused on road conditions while the rest of us sat on sleeping bags amid the amps, drums, and guitars, with no seat belts.
When we hit the road, we found ourselves driving straight into a major winter storm. About one hour into the trip, the wiper-blade mechanism on the van died.
There was no money in the band’s kitty for a hotel. It was a Sunday, and there were no garages open anywhere along the highway. Necessity being the mother of invention, we pulled the laces out of our combat boots and tied them to the blades.
It took almost ten hours to cover the five-hundred-kilometre distance, each of us taking shifts kneeling between the driver and co-pilot while pulling the laces back and forth to clear the blinding snow. By the time we were a hundred kilometres from Toronto, we were down to our last pair of laces.
Suddenly, Pete, our driver, said, “Ah shit,” and pulled over to the side of the snowy highway.
“Why are we stopping?” I asked.
“We’ve been flagged down by a cop,” he said dejectedly.
But it turned out that the man with a flashlight and an official-looking peaked cap wasn’t a cop but an air force officer. His car had slid off the road in the storm. He had flagged us down in order to catch his flight to Germany.
We opened the side panel door, and our roadie Big Nick Baljak—who was wearing his leather jacket and a sleeping bag wrapped around him for warmth in the barely heated van—said, “If you’ve got laces, we’ll find room for you.”
Touring is perhaps the quickest way for a young musician to realize why it’s important to stay in school. Long drives, crappy food, bumping up against the same five or six guys for days on end; shows where no one turns up, or the management rips you off, and you’re left without a dime in your pocket.
But John Armstrong of the Vancouver band the Modernettes is quoted in Have Not Been the Same: The CanRock Renaissance of saying that it was the fans in small towns that made it all worth it:
“We were welcomed like long-lost relatives. In those days, the punk rock community in every town always seemed to be composed of the best and the brightest. The scenes were always filled with really smart and interesting people. There wasn’t a bunch of thuggishness and nihilism. It was just a bunch of really cool young people having a good time.”
Outside of Toronto’s downtown, the punk world of Central Canada was strung along the Highway 401 corridor from Windsor to Montreal. The punk communities were isolated outposts where small groups of fans found ways to put on shows in rented halls or dodgy bars. Many were in blue-collar towns heavily dependent on auto supply and manufacturing.
In 1980, these towns were getting the shit kicked out of them. Canada’s manufacturing sector was a branch plant of the American economy, and the shock of 1980 hit it like a piledriver. There were multiple plant closures and huge job losses.
Canadian banking policy followed the Americans and obediently jacked up interest rates. By 1982, there were officially 1.5 million unemployed Canadians, but this did not include nearly a million others who had given up looking for work.
One summer night in 1982, our band was booked to play a punk show at the Italian wedding hall in Welland, Ontario. Prior to 1980, Welland had the highest per capita income in the country from its plethora of unionized factory jobs, but those jobs were being wiped out by the recession. Our band arrived in town oblivious to the economic devastation hitting the region.
As soon as we began the first song, a group of local working-class guys rushed the dance floor and jumped the punk kids. They started slugging it out. We stopped playing and attempted to mediate.
The wedding hall’s manager screamed at us to start playing again and to play louder. He pointed to the disco ball above the dance floor and said, “When you see the disco ball turning, you play fast and loud.”
For the rest of the night, every time a fight broke out, the disco ball started spinning, and we played fast and loud. This was how Saturday nights in Welland went down in the Great Recession.
Hamilton was a mob and biker town, with both forces to be found at a restaurant/club called the Golden Garter. From the outside, it looked like a high-end steakhouse—a hangout for mobster Johnny “Pops” Papalia. But if you went in the back way, you found yourself in a barroom that was the domain of the local motorcycle gang.
They rented out a spare room in the back to punk kids, who called it the Golden Gutter. The rule was simple: stay off the bikers’ patch. No punk kid dared peek into the steakhouse side where Johnny Pops held court.
On our first trip to Hamilton, our manager advised, “You boys aren’t in Toronto anymore. You’re going to the big city. Keep your mouth shut onstage because Hamilton is a rough place.”
One day, on our way to the Golden Gutter, we learned that the manager had suddenly shut the establishment and hightailed it out of town. The Hammer was indeed a rough place.
In the late 1970s and early ’80s, the bars in blue-collar Southern Ontario were the focus of turf wars between biker gangs like the Outlaws, Banditos, Satan’s Choice, Para-Dice Riders, and Hells Angels. A gangland biker killing at a bar in Port Hope in 1978 was the basis for Steve Earle’s song “Justice in Ontario.” At stake was the trade in drugs, violence, and women being trafficked through the industrial belt of Ontario.
We were naive kids.
We regularly played the Kent Hotel in Waterloo without knowing it was a hangout for the Henchmen Motorcycle Club, who were on the losing end of a gang war with the Outlaws. The punk kids hung out upstairs while the main floor was reserved for the strippers.
Once again, the rules were simple—we kept our nose out of what was going on with the dancers, and the bikers made sure nobody bothered the punk and college kids who were going upstairs.
But this isn’t to say that trouble didn’t happen. The Kent was the first place where someone threw a bottle at my head.
In another quote from the book Have Not Been the Same, Kevin Kane, guitarist and vocalist for the Grapes of Wrath, states,
“I remember the whole naiveté of everything back then when we were doing our early tours. Half our shows were in peeler [striptease] bars, because they’re the only ones that would let a band who dared to play original songs get up on stage.”
“Slumming” at dive bars across the southern industrial belt spoke to a certain element of privilege, as none of us had a clue about the growing inequity faced by the dancers in the other room.
In these marginal spaces, our band had little interaction with the women who made their living doing burlesque or strip dancing to a jukebox soundtrack. But their world was quickly disappearing.
The changes began in the early 1980s, when Réal Simard, a hitman for the Montreal-based Cotroni crime family, moved into Southern Ontario.
According to author Stevie Cameron,
“Simard felt the Toronto clubs were run by rank amateurs who were missing the truly lucrative part of this business: the opportunity to run cocaine into the city through the network of dancers.”
Simard’s partner was Montreal businessman Frank Majeau, who supplied nude table dancers from Quebec through his company Prestige Entertainment.
Majeau’s day job was the chief political adviser to Conservative cabinet minister Roch LaSalle. When LaSalle was elevated to Minister of Public Works, first under Prime Minister Joe Clark and then Brian Mulroney, Majeau served as his political point man.
The Public Works portfolio was a plum gig in Ottawa. It was the government trading space for large public construction projects and real estate dealings.
Majeau had the day job of chairing the minister’s weekly meetings with key political advisers and cabinet ministers. His political connections to the Conservative government gave him serious cache with the mob.
Simard told the Montreal police anti-rackets squad that,
“Johnny Papalia was seeing a lot of Frank Majeau because organized crime is always interested in putting their money into legitimate things and investing in land. Majeau was a very good prospect because he was connected to LaSalle, so that he could always know what bids the government would accept for this land or this building.”
The import of Quebec table dancers was part of a deal brokered between the Controni mob, Ontario bike gangs, and Johnny Papalia’s mobsters. But this expansion into Southern Ontario and the heavy focus on sex and cocaine quickly drew criminal competition.
Simard was jailed for trying to kill a drug dealer who had attempted to muscle in on his turf.
I look back on the naivety of punk rock kids and art school students who had the privilege of slumming in this twilight world while being largely cocooned from the darker realities.
I think back to Larry’s Hideaway on Gerrard Street in Toronto. It was a total dive that was a notorious hive of sex work, drugs, and illegal activities. But the basement boasted a large bar with a huge sound system, and the bouncers rarely checked IDs.
I remember standing outside the club with our gear at the end of the night, waiting for the band to pull up. As I stood there, the bouncers would be tossing the johns down the stairs beside me.
My friend Nora Daisy Fannin worked the punk shows at Larry’s as a waitress even though she was in high school. She did her high school homework at the bar, watched over by the same bouncers who tossed the johns.
Larry's Hideaway in the 1980s
I value the education I received at Punk Rock University. It was a colourful and exciting time to grow up. The world of privatization and mercenary capitalism had not yet pushed the debt and risk onto young people.
This made it possible for young people to experiment and to risk failure because they weren’t burdened by high rent and massive student debt.
Gary Topp, who opened The Edge punk club, said this cultural revolution was driven by the privilege of being able to take chances without the fear of financial ruin:
“The whole gist of it was trying things, and it didn’t matter if we failed.”
The skills I brought to Parliament came from years on the road playing punk rock bars and honky-tonks across this vast land. I continue to value the lessons of punk rock resistance and DIY.
But perhaps the greatest lesson I learned was seeing this vast and magnificent land.
I will never forget the awe of seeing the fog-shrouded St. Lawrence past Quebec City for the first time, pulling over at 3 AM to watch the northern lights dance over the Yellowhead Highway, or driving the nose-bleed heights of the Kicking Horse Pass.
I feel that same awe when I travel today.
This is an interview with Andrew Cash and me when we were starting out.
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