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Mullins, then Velvet

On Friday night, Paul and I took the guitar-and-accordion act to Mullins, a pub in the Bay-and-Wellesley area. For those of you not familiar with Accordion City, Bay and Wellesley’s kind of quiet mostly-condos area nestled between the financial district to the south, the University of Toronto’s main campus to the west and “Mink Mile” — a shopping district with the kind of stores you’d expect to register at for your wedding — to the north. Since this is good ol’ multicultural Toronto, Mullins is an Irish pub managed by an Asian guy named Ken.

Mullins has an open mike night every Friday night hosted by our friend Dave Ellul, one of the members of a fine drinking club known as the Thirsty People of Toronto. Word about the open mike night hasn’t gotten around yet, so while the pub is usually packed with patrons, Dave usually ends up being the only act for the evening. Paul and I thought we’d come and help lighten the load. We even brought our own groupie, Eldon. The rest of the Thirsty People were already there when we arrived and our buddy Rob — he who gave me the accordion almost four years ago — met us at the pub.

Pre-gig

Kate and Christina are the queens of pub decorum.

Kate and Eldon.

Christina tries on my Flaming Vegas Cowboy Hat. Best US$75 I ever spent (I rasied the money for the hat by busking at DefCon.)

The gig

We opened with Baby One More Time, with me doing the vocals.

“We’d like to dedicate this number to Fred Durst, whose relationship with Ms. Spears is the subject of much speculation…”

Then on to Cloven Metal, with great backup by Dave on the electric guitar.

Paul played the rhythm sticks and Collin Douma took harmonica duties when I played Duran Duran’s Rio.

“The grabbing hands, grab all they can, everything counts in large amounts…”

“Hit me with your rhythm stick…”

Post-gig

Diana: “Clubbing! Yippee!”

Give me a dance floor and some good tunes, and I’m all smiles.

Paul and Eldon: “If you’re not wasted, the night is!”

Ladies, please, there’s enough of me to go around.

Have I mentioned how much I love this instrument?

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