THE SMUGGLERS with DUOTANG, NEEDLES//PINS and THE NEW ENCHANTERS at the Horseshoe (370 Queen West), Friday (June 16), doors 9 pm. $20. rotate.com, soundscapesmusic.com, ticketfly.com.
During their 16 years as a band, Vancouver pop-punks the Smugglers took their high-flying show across the world. Frontman Grant Lawrence, now a popular CBC Radio host and author, kept a diary documenting everything that happened to them.
After posting them to the Mint Records website, Lawrence has collected these extremely colourful and droll ruminations for his third book, Dirty Windshields: The Best And The Worst Of The Smugglers Tour Diaries.
And because a book of this sort wouldn’t be any fun to launch without some reunion shows to promote it, the Smugglers are playing a few select gigs, including one at their usual Toronto haunt, the Horseshoe.
Lawrence spoke to NOW about his diaries and how much his ass now hurts after a Smugglers gig.
Where did the idea come from to keep tour diaries?
My dad. At the dinner table he said, “Look, if you insist on flushing your life down the toilet through the economic black hole that is rock music, then at least write it all down.”
When did you realize this was something that could work as a book?
In 1998, on the 10th anniversary of the band, fellow scribe Michael Barclay said to me, “Man, I’ve read your tour diaries. Have you ever considered putting out a book?” So he was the first person to plant the seed. There was so much archival crap that it took me 20 years to finally get off my ass and do it.
I love all the old photos and concert posters in the book. How obsessive were you about collecting that stuff?
Basically, I come from this family of… I wouldn’t say hoarders or pack rats, more like documenters. My mom has always kept detailed photo albums. When the Smugglers started way back in 1988, from day one I kept anything that our band’s name appeared on: newspaper clippings, gig posters, even the tiniest little concert listing in the classifieds. I credit my mom for the archivist in me and my dad for the writer in me.
Was there much from the diaries that you didn’t include in the book?
I read a lot of rock books, and I realized that they all sort of got boring when the band made it big. The interesting part was the struggle. The Smugglers never made it big – we always struggled! So I thought if we lived to tell the tale, let’s tell the tale. I wasn’t too worried about it, but my amazing editor did say, “Okay, this one story is over the top. You should not put it in.” I appreciate it, too. She may have saved my job by doing that.
The Smugglers were always full of life onstage. What’s changed now that you’re all middle-aged?
Since anyone has last seen us play, we’ve had between us nine children and one heart attack. So I worried about that. But we were able to get airborne again at our Vancouver show. The day after, though, Dave [Carswell] could not move his head, Beez thought he was concussed, and my ass hurt like hell. So it does hurt a lot more. The fear we have with the Ontario shows is that we’re doing two back to back, which could really kill us. Thankfully, Toronto is first. Ottawa is gonna get some hobbled, hoarse, cast-of-Cocoon version of the Smugglers.
Will you hold a kissing contest like you used to?
We quietly phased out our kissing contest while we were still a band, and no one at the Berkeley or Vancouver gigs complained. We were getting sick, and we would hear back from people who “won” that they got sick. It was getting too gross.
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