Summer of love has ended
But the memories linger on
Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee at the New Penelope, Montreal February 1967
Amazon.com’s computer must be tired because it’s getting dumber not brighter. One of my CD purchases was “Live At The New Penelope Cafe” by Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee. Amazon.com has a computer trick that remembers what you look at or purchase. Then it decides to send you mail about new books, music or DVD’s based on what it remembers. That 1967 Montreal Quebec blues recording made the computer think I would like a dubious CD of Scottish blues singers “British Blues Quintet Live In Glasgow.” I’m having trouble with the blues in a brogue.
Their computer suggestion is dumb – live and blues. However, I’m going to find the Terry and McGhee disk and listen to it today. I was there when it was recorded, which is why I got it. 1967 Montreal, the Summer of Love-In’s at Fletcher’s Field at the foot of Mount Royal, Expo 67, partying and playing folk songs all night, watching the sun come up sitting underneath the cross on Mount Royal. Zipping my Honda scooter in and out of Montreal traffic. It was my first year away from home at 18 years old. What a life.
The winter, coffee house nights at The New Penelope were a prelude of the spring and summer to come. We had Haight Ashbury North in Montreal. It was the place to be. Tim Hardin was there for a gig. The folk scene was buzzing and we went several times a week. You could only get coffee out front. The musicians back stage had a variety of other intoxicants right up to smack. Hardin was at his peak with “If I were a Carpenter.” He showed signs of the H addiction that eventually killed him.
Montreal winters are so cold, minus 40 F windchill all through February. We stayed warm and when spring came out, the summer of love began. There never was another year like that one. We discovered life along The Main – Verdi Theatre, Fairmont Bagel, Schwatz’s Delicatessen and I can get it for you wholesale.
Sometimes I wish I’d have done more, gone to more parties, played more places, watched the dawn more but at least I survived. My bike blew up on Decarie Boulevard at 50 miles an hour. My brother crashed his on the elevated Metropolitan Boulevard, almost died and spent the next year in rehab.
At my warehouse job at Prelco Electronics, I learned the fine art of sleeping standing up against a wall or slumped over the can. There was no time for sleeping at night. I met Steve from Steve’s Music that year and wasted Saturdays sampling his guitar selection. Lost the Gibson J-45 from Steve’s to the first wife but kept the 1979 Martin D-35.
Rummaging in the basement two nights ago, I found the birth certificate of my first son two years later and a letter of reference from my boss Joe Schacter of Prelco. Amazingly he remembered me warmly over 10 years later when my brother made his first sales call on Prelco. Guess he knew I was just a kid back then.
Better go find that Sonny Terry CD. This is going to be a long day.
I really enjoyed that wander down memory lane. Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee were also fairly regular at the Yellow Door/Back Door coffeehouses. Did you ever hang out there? There was also good fun to be had at the Cafe Campus of the UdM and what was the blues club that used to bring in Chicago acts like Willie Dixon and Mighty Joe Young? I remember you always tipped the doorman a five in the hope he’d keep you alive if something went amiss…Dankoff’s Steak House, Ben’s…and of course Expo 67…
Memory Lane
February 11, 2009 at 11:30 AM
Thanks. It just sprang out but I always remember Montreal fondly. Didn’t go to the UofM but was at the Yellow Door and all the clubs in La Rue Montaigne. Yes Bens. We had two bibles back then – the liquor store book of wines which we worked through and rated the ones we could afford and the restaurant guide from the Star, was it Helen’s ?. Another great haunt on Friday after work, before the bars, was Pepe’s Pizza on Dominion Square, Peel St. I think. They did a double cheese pizza that I’ve never gotten over yet. The Maitre d’ was a charming Italian lady who kissed all the men and hugged the women. Do you remember Club de Moustachio – that was later – somewhere off Montaigne. They wrote your order on the mill paper table cloth and poured wine from a yard away. What was the club on Montaigne that was like an ice cave?
I’ll have to go back after this!
Stephen Pate
February 11, 2009 at 1:13 PM
Blues was the thing – Junior Wells, all the Chicago greats, and some guy named Woody Wood who played “Knock on Wood”, Buffy Ste. Marie, Ian and Sylvia, Tom Rush, everyone came to Montreal. We were so lucky to be young when all the world was green and golden at least for us. We argued politics, films, art and freedom and marched for ourselves and others. Claude Jutra was an icon. We had ideals of making the world better and having a great time while we were at it.
Stephen Pate
February 11, 2009 at 1:19 PM
Well, The Manse on Mansfield was our regular watering hole. Yep, blues were definitely the thing, tho Hendrix came though – the next year I think – and was certainly worth seeing. Nope, don’t remember that club but there was My Uncle’s Mustache somewhere around and also that great pancake place – was that Mountain or Crescent?
People keep saying they are selling real Montreal smoked meat on the Island and I haven’t come across anything close yet…but Montreal Steak Spice from ClubHouse (at ASS) is a real find.
Memory Lane
February 11, 2009 at 2:34 PM
La Crepe Breton, was on Crescent I think. Steve at the Farmer’s Market does a good facsimile of their crepe with strawberries and other goodies. Of course he’s from Montreal.
Crepes were all the rage then – you could get leather crepes at La Ronde. I preferred Canadian in a glass.
I know, the smoked meat here is nothing. I think Schwatz’s closed. One time when up on Mtl on business I ran into an old friend who was VP Sales at Merisel. He took most the afternoon off picked me up at the airport. We went to Schwatz’s and whiled away the time like he wasn’t busy. Stopped at Fairmont for a dozen bagels – “Take these home for your family. They’re the best.”
When he dropped me at Dorval he said, “Whatever you want, for you a special price” and named a discount that was unbelievable. Can’t repeat it but he was true to his word.
There is a place in Toronto on Bathurst and 401, Katz’s – near Yorkdale. The smoked meat is just so good – the atmosphere is early cafeteria. Great lox, sauerkraut and pickles. Very popular with the Jewish neighborhood including orthodox. An orthodox investment banker took me there and said -”Here you eat smoke meat, no where else.” He was from Montreal so I took his word. The best heartburn in Toronto.
Thanks for the steak spice tip.
Stephen Pate
February 11, 2009 at 3:21 PM
And thanks for the comments. What a special treat to share our Montreal memories.
Stephen Pate
February 11, 2009 at 3:23 PM
Easy, Stephen, easy. Farmers’ Market Steve is from Greenfield Park. But despite that their crepes, waffles and cooked brekkies are great. I believe Ben’s also shut its doors. Sad indeed. A few years back I got to see the modern Main and St Urbain over a few days – different indeed from our day. But still the ultra orthodox and great bagels and “for you a special, so soon, my life already, oy vay.” I must get back to spend a week or so poking around – so much has changed, yet so much remain the same. The only real city in North America.
Memory Lane
February 11, 2009 at 4:49 PM
Easy easy, I lived in Greenfield Park at the end, after the bombs and troops on the corner with machine guns…Steve ran a book store in Westmount…he’ll have to tell you the details on that…I don’t tell everything
I remember one of our weekly outings was new restaurant of the week – based on a review in the Gazette – sadly the Star was gone by then.
Stephen Pate
February 11, 2009 at 6:17 PM
Ah, you can take the boy out of GFP…etc. Yes, I remember the machine guns and worrying whether a post box would explode or not. I would have been just a mile or two away from you then…
Memory Lane
February 11, 2009 at 6:57 PM
[...] Both were artists with serious disabilities. Sonny Terry (1911 -1986), the harmonica player, was blind. Brownie McGhee (1915 – 1996) was disabled with polio, like I was. An operation funded by the March of Dimes gave him his walking back. I am re-discovering them after yesterday’s accidental story, Summer of Love has ended [...]
Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee, they got a groove « NJN Network
February 12, 2009 at 10:32 AM