Show Recap: Phog Lounge with Wax Mannequin

Phog Lounge

  • When: Nov. 27, 2010
  • Where: Phog Lounge, Windsor ON
  • Who with: Wax Mannequin, Alex Carruthers & The Rhythm Brothers
    Set List:

  • Dusty Bones
  • Alligator Song
  • Southern Ontario
  • Aren’t You Glad (Beach Boys cover)
  • Stan & Georgie
  • Tortoise
  • Young Enough
  • Raise Your Dead

Windsor gets a bad rap. I haven’t spent much time there, so I can only comment on the following: the steak joint we ate at before the show deserves it, the Phog Lounge definitely does not.

We’ve wanted to play there for a while, so the 4 hour drive was well worth the excitement—add Wax Mannequin to the bill and it’s like Christmas came early. That’s not to say it was a show without hiccups. There were definitely hiccups.

Our blinking sign (which Phog manager, Tom Lucier, seemed to really enjoy*) had a couple dead lights, my little amp proved slightly too small, my guitar strap fell off at one point and I was getting what I like to refer to as “electrical tickles” from the vocal mic. Of course, if it all went smoothly there’d be no stories, right? Conquer adversity and all that…blah, blah, blah.

It helps that Wax Mannequin put on the best set I’ve ever seen him play, consisting of emphatic between song sermons about the mysterious power of crystals (done in what I can only presume was a Christopher Walken impression while holding—and throwing—various shards of plastic valuable gemstones) all culminating in a half-naked, fiery rendition of the Canadian classic, “The Log Driver’s Waltz.”

As a band, we like to get out of Hogtown whenever possible. I’m itching to hit Phog Lounge again soon…

*He eagerly told the crowd that we were the only touring band in Canada with a sign that blinked to the music and that sold paintings with download codes. We were very flattered.
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