Wawa - wah, wah, wah, wah. waaaaaaaah…

Back in 1998 Toronto writer and Rheostatics rhythm guitarist Dave Bidini penned one of the best books on the Canadian rock scene ever written. Titled "On a Cold Road", Mr Dave paralled his band's rock and roll tour-of-duty with those of several well and lesser-known Can-rock artists. The beauty of the book was that whether you'd been there and done that, or just been there, anyone who'd ever done time in a cavernous arena or a seedy rawk bar could relate to Dave's honest yet respectfully endearing tales.

Having spent the better part of a year touring the northern Ontario bar circuit with a band (in a "non-performing" role, as they say in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame) more than a comfortable share of these stories rang true with yours truly. My first road trip with boys in "Viper" was to a desolate skid mark in the middle of a Northern Ontario logging community called Wawa. The pace for the following 2 weeks was set en route at a liquor store in Parry Sound, where we stocked up for the hundreds of miles of barren winter highway ahead of us. We reached the "armpit of the north" around midnight, staggering drunk and freezing, having spent 4 or 5 hours in a cube van with a broken heater. And I'd lost my glasses, which I use for seeing.

Fast forward (or perhaps "slow mo") to the following day. In the glaring northern Ontario sunshine this place looked like shit. Fortunately I found my glasses on the floor of the truck, right where I'm sure I'd left them the night before. We loaded the equipment into the bar, which was a surprisingly good room – big space, fairly high ceiling, ample stage. In the midst of our shlepping all manner of amps, drums and PA we were introduced to "the mayor of Wawa" who, as you've probably guessed, was not the real Mayor but whose imbecilic ways had earned him this dubious moniker. We took an immediate disliking to his honour until he started buying us beer, after which we exchanged mailing addresses as Christmas was mere weeks away and what kind of a shit-heel would ignore Christmas card duty anyway. Seriously though, the band should have been called "The Beer Whores" because alcohol became the crazy glue that bonded us to many a stranger.

That evening we hit the local "fine dining" restaurant, which meant that their chips came with a choice of gravy or no gravy. I should have opted for neither for despite my inebriation it was obvious that the chips were "off". Take note, food poisoning and alcohol equals a feeling of death, or at the very least the desire for a rapid departure from this mortal coil. Holy f***, I think I was vomiting up dinners from LAST Christmas.

At any rate the first week passed like a festering kidney stone, which is to say like the feeling that you want to rid your system of this poisonous thing but you know it won't leave until you've suffered sufficiently. The second week was College shenanigans week wherein every sad sack who'd had the good sense to leave this dog turd of a town inexplicably returned to celebrate the drunken event that was family Christmas in the bush. Truth be told it was a lot of fun having a packed house every night of the week, the collective student body rocking and rolling to the classic teen hits of the day. This was also the setting for my proudest moment as a roadie, for it was my rabbit to set up and execute the pyrotechnical portion of the show. My predecessor in this role, who is now a genius chemical engineering prof somewhere in the USA, crafted his own "flashpots" from two 6 inch rolled steel cylinders welded to a metal base. Inside each pot was a pair of 1 inch bolts which were attached to electrical terminals on the outside of the pot. From these crude connectors was strung common household lamp cord, which ran to a common electrical light switch located back at the homemade lighting board – well out of harm's way – well, my harm's way. Prior to showtime I would string a thin piece of copper wire between the bolts, and pour a single tablespoon of gun powder in a neat pile over the wire. At the appointed moment I would flick the switch which would short out the copper wire and ignite the gunpowder, inspiring a round of "oohs" and "awws" normally reserved for Canada Day fireworks. If this sounds crude and unsafe I can only reply "yes". So, to the point. Wednesday night mere moments before "the big bang" a patron accidently knocked over one of the pots, spilling the gunpowder. Fearing that the fiery climax would be little more than a sparking fart I seized my plastic container of explosive powder, ran to the stage, poured in what a pissed-up Graham Kerr would have called a tablespoon, and ran back to my post just in time to launch a fiery mushroom cloud that would have been more appropriate at the Nevada desert A-bomb tests of the 1950's. As the filthy gray cloud of dusty smoke filled the cavernous bar, fun seekers coughed and hacked their way to the exits, en route to some other watering hole where asphyxiation wasn't part of the deal.

In hindsight this precursor to the horribly tragic Great White "Station Nightclub" fire of 2003 (also due to flashpots) was ill-advised, and fortunately no one was hurt in the ensuing Wawa smoke out - but at the time it was funny as hell.

You can find Dave Bidini's "On a Cold Road" on Amazon, check it out, it's a truly entertaining and insightful (but in a fun kind of way) read.