to see them again. This time I came with John and we drank some beer which we sneaked in the back door of the Gardens. Regrettably, on beer, they sucked. It seemed that the LSD had gone a long way to enhance the actual quality of The Yardbirds’ performance the night before.
Sadly, they broke up after this tour, but I will always remember them as pioneers who led the world into a whole new wave of rock. In October, Jimmy Page would come out with his new band, Led Zeppelin.
Heroin had become the dominant topic of discussion in the band. Geoff was using regularly. Steve and Lindsay were talking openly about joining him. They wanted to go there with him, experience what he was experiencing. Instinctively, I knew this was dangerous. Gary Wanstall was afraid but The Rock realized that this was part of the danger that I had come searching for. I agreed to tag along.
The three of us met Geoff, Jocelyn and her brother, Jeff, at his little shack on Welch Street in North Vancouver one rainy night. Jeff's family was wealthy but he and Jocelyn chose to go their own way and lived in near squalor in this hovel in the bushes near an industrial area. John did not want anything to do with heroin and stayed home. Jim was critical. He tried in vain to dissuade us from this.
In total, there were sixteen first-timers there. I watched as a skinny man with long greasy hair hunched over a filthy little wooden table in the kitchen and proceed to carefully dump some white powder into a spoon. He applied the flame of a Zippo lighter to the spoon and cooked it into a liquid. He had a small syringe. With its short needle, plastic tube and flimsy plunger it appeared to be homemade. He sucked a small quantity up into the tube and tapped it. He handed a rubber surgical hose to Steve, who was sitting in a chair across the table, and showed him how to tie it tight around his bicep and how to flex his arm a certain way to make the vein pop up. He put his thumb on the bulging vein and stuck the needle in. He pulled the plunger up a little and sucked a small rivulet of blood into the tube to guard against an air bubble – which, we were told, could kill you. Holding the syringe between his thumb and middle finger, he pushed the plunger down firmly and expertly with his index finger. Then he barked at Steve to loosen the rubber hose and he leaned back to witness the results of his good work.
Almost instantly, Steve's shoulders sagged, his head nodded forward, his face drooped and his eyes rolled back in their sockets. He sat there for a long time before he forced himself to rise and give his seat to Lindsay.
The man repeated the process with Lindsay then with me; he used the same needle for everybody. My heart was pounding as he prepared the syringe and as I pulled the rubber hose tight around my arm trying hard to do it right, to make a good vein. I flinched as he stuck the needle in but that was just a reflex, it didn’t hurt. He shouted at me to release the rubber hose and he sat back, folded his arms and looked right through me.
A rush of absolute bliss engulfed me. It came on so fast and so strong that it nearly knocked me out. I fought to stay conscious in the chair. I was overwhelmed by waves of utter contentment. I loved it here in this chair, in this shack, with these good people. I didn’t want to move, I didn’t need to move. Life was as good as it gets right here, right now, in this position. Don’t move. Why move? It’s perfect.
“Next,” said Syringe Man.
Slowly, I turned my head and was aware of someone hovering over me. He was impatient, anxious for his turn, and pulled the chair out from under me. I had to give up my place here in this wonderful chair by this lovely table. Okay. I got up. Oh why? I floated into the living room area. Steve and Lindsay were crumpled on the floor in the corner on pillows. They were head to head murmuring quietly to each other. I flopped down across from them and did not move for the rest of the night.
I watched a tender scene as Geoff fixed Jocelyn in the back of her hand. He held her palm gently while searching for just the right vein and then kindly guided the needle in as she gazed lovingly into his face. Hardly Romeo & Juliet’s balcony scene but it had its own romance just the same.
Geoff and Jocelyn and some of the others were already veterans at this but the rest of us sixteen rookies got off on one single cap. I had never felt so pleasantly euphoric in my life but there was a little voice inside my head saying, 'Don’t you ever do this shit again.' I should have listened to that little voice but I turned it off instead. I wouldn't hear from Gary Wanstall again for twenty years.
We opened for a Toronto band called, 3’s A Crowd featuring Donna Warner and Brent Titcomb, at the Retinal Circus on March 1st. They were very slick and featured complex six-part vocal harmonies. Our set was, as usual, a raw and dirty mixture of rock, blues and R&B. With Steve and I as a rhythm section and Geoff’s limited vocal talent we relied on John’s musicianship and Lindsay’s virtuosity. We may not have been a proficient band but we could cook a groove. When we locked into a shuffle we rocked! And, on the right feel, we would create a grungy syncopation that some people likened to the sound of a washing machine (I believe that was a compliment). Additionally, Geoff made up for his lack of voice with emotion and his gift for improvisation.
And Steve and Geoff were starting to discover their flair for comedy. Their ad-libbed ribald humour could materialize at any time and, once they got going, could gross-out a tug boat captain.
The following weekend, The Circus featured a great bill with two incredible Vancouver bands, Papa Bear’s Medicine Show (with Robbie King on organ and Kat Hendrikse on drums) and My Indole Ring (featuring guitarist/vocalist John King and organist John Cluff) as well as a new band called The Yellow Brick Road.
Papa Bear’s applied exceptional musicianship to their blend of jazz and folk while The Ring, who formed from a band called Jabberwock, excelled at creating exquisitely long blues based psychedelic jams.
My dad lent me the Impala and John and I went to see them. While we were there Stephen of the Addled Chromish Light Show laid some acid on us which we quickly gobbled up. Then, I remembered that I had an early curfew on the car. Just as the drugs were kicking in we had to leave. I could feel a really wild ride coming on so I hurried up the street to where the Chevy was parked. I pulled out into the traffic flow and passed slowly in front of The Circus. We noticed Anne, Bob’s former skirt, and a girlfriend standing in front being hassled by a car full of guys. John called out to them. Anne looked relieved to see us and the two girls rushed over.
“Wanna ride? John asked.
“Oh yeah, thanks,” Anne gushed as the girls jumped in the back. “I wasn’t going to get in a car with those guys - I think they're drunk!”
I turned onto Burrard Street avoiding the purple and pink polka-dot elephants that were stampeding in the street and aimed the pointy end of the car towards the Burrard Bridge. This was not easy as the bridge was swinging back and forth.
“It’s pretty dangerous to drive while drunk,” I agreed.
When we arrived unscathed at my parent’s house it took me a long time to inch the car into the driveway because it kept jumping out of the way. It didn't help that the bushes along one side were attacking the car. Finally, I got it in and we escaped out the passenger side before the savage shrubs engulfed us.
The car had a curfew but I didn’t so the four of us started to walk up Fiftieth Avenue toward Anne’s place. I turned to check on the car. It was leaping about, doing somersaults in the driveway while the trees did the hula. “Yep,” I said to my friends, “you should never accept a ride from someone who’s been drinking.”
Marc Derek opened a coffee house on Fourth called The Village Bistro. It was across the street from The Afterthought and right next to the Psychedelic Shop. The Bistro served coffee and soft drinks; you had to bring your own high. Marc featured folk singers and bands.
One night The Seeds of Time played a set on the same bill as a singer named Trisha. Trisha had a strong voice. She sang songs by Joan Baez, Janice Joplin and a powerful a cappella version of Big Mama Thorton‘s bluesy In My Time Of Dyin‘.She was seventeen but mature beyond her years. Her parents were musicians and her older brother a guitarist. She was slim with long sandy-blonde hair that hung