A Brilliant night of pints and Newfie goodness...
Last night was a prime of example of why I love being out on the road. A week ago Eric (one of my cast mates) came in to report he’d found a good, honest pub with a Newfie band playing good, honest music.
Last night Eric, Ben, Annie & I we went.
Brilliant!!!
The band was The Streels. The food was hot, crispy, most excellent fish & chips. And the drink…? Guinness. Which is, they say, good for you. The room is banged up pub at it’s most sincere: The Atlantic Trap & Gill.
As Eric said, this is music that lives on 1 & 4. (Unless it’s a waltz, then fuck 4. I said that, not Eric.) The beats were heavy, tankard bangers. The woman at the crash and bang instruments (who looked like a younger version of my very staid voice teacher at university) was great. The fiddler, great. The bassist (who sometimes picked up the guitar) great. And the lead man - guitar and squeezebox and standing directly behind a post - great. Just great. And the crowd? Loud, friendly, sing-a-long, shout-a-long, mixed of age and hipness, and featuring - though he’s backed against a wall and you might not notice him unless he’s pointed out to you: Spoon Man. Old, dapper dude whacking away at the spoons and so into it - really lit up from the inside - that I felt ashamed of any moments of less-than-enthusiastic involvement in life that I may have experienced in the recent past. And there have been some.
Disney claims to be the Happiest Place on Earth®… Not last night. Last night it was the long table facing southeast to the band (and east to Newfoundland) at The Atlantic Trap & Grill, Vancouver, BC.