Queen St West in Toronto is an odd mix of bars, chain stores and indie boutiques, mixed with the core businesses (drug stores, corner markets) that make a neighborhood livable. It's the street for tourists who don't like feeling like tourists. For tourists who want the mirage of residency.
I wandered up and down Queen, Dundas and College streets most of the morning, passing through several ethnic enclaves. Chinatown. Little Italy. Trinity-Bellwoods (home of a large Portugese population). The World Cup was everywhere. Every restaurant and bar, every store, every laundromat, was tuned to the Cup matches.
I settled in for a pint or two (I was on vacation, shut up) at the Cloak and Dagger, one of the many restaurants and bars that advertised back patio seating. I didn't make it back that far, hanging out inside with the bartenders (one of whom was in a band performing Friday night), drinking cask ales and being given a free t-shirt (too short in the arms - that's right, too short for me Scott! What do you say about that?!?)
(Shut up, Scott.)
France played Mexico, I drank, the bartenders smoked up on the patio. I like this town.
From there, more wandering, this time getting lost in Soundscapes, a great Toronto indie record store. It's not great in the Amoeba sense, but in the Championship Vinyl sense. You'll find everything you want at Soundscapes, as long as you have decent taste in music.
(They also have a pretty great little music blog at the above link.)
My trip to Toronto was undertaken because of a Broken Social Scene show on that Saturday, but it was also the middle of North by Northeast, which is a lot like I've heard South by Southwest is except without the poser "social media experts" and about 50 percent less people. Also, a $25 daily wristband gets access to everything.
The new Broken Social Scene movie was having its Canadian premiere that night at the Royal, and it was a NXNE event, so I figured I'd pick one up to try and improve my chances of getting in. Soundscapes sold them, so I went up to the counter and stood next to the cute girl buying wristbands for her and her friend.
- You should see Anais Mitchell.
- Who?
- Anais. She's at Czhoski tonight. We'll be there.
Now, I might be bad with women, but that sounded like an invitation.
We talked for a few minutes, then I left with wristband, pocket NXNE schedule and newly found interest in Vermont-based folk singers in tow.
More wandering (by the end of this trip, I needed new shoes), then I got to the Royal for the Canadian premiere of This Movie Is Broken.
Director Bruce McDonald and screenwriter Don McKellar interwove a love story with lots of footage from a free Broken Social Scene show at the Toronto Harbourfront. The concert footage was incredible, the narrative fell apart in the third act, but I got to meet McKellar, who wrote and starred in one of favorite movies ever, Last Night, after the film.
(Sad note: A week later, his wife Tracy Wright, who also appeared in Last Night, died of pancreatic cancer.)
Then, off to Czhoski for Anais Mitchell (and, since I got there a bit ahead of her time, Julia and Her Piano, a Vancouver-based singer/songwriter who writes pretty pop songs and sounds a little like Regina Spektor).
Mitchell plays an interesting set, including songs from her latest work, a folk opera recasting of the Orpheus myth. It's the type of music I miss living in LA; most local bands here are after nothing but major label "money," and certainly wouldn't be as daring as to trust an audience to appreciate the telling of an ancient myth through folk music.
After the set I walk to the back of the room and find the two girls from earlier. I invite myself to sit down with them, and we talk music (their music knowledge puts mine to shame, though I think I've got them on hip-hop), Toronto, America and other things that I'm sure were fascinating. Or I like to think were fascinating. I was pretty drunk. They're locals, of course, and therefore have work and responsibilities and the like the next day. I too, have one major responsibility: To find a television at 10 am (which, by this point, is about six hours away) to watch the US-Slovenia World Cup match.
As we prepare to part for the night, one of the duo, S., a very pretty graduate student at University of Toronto, asks for my phone number. My phone doesn't work, I explain. How about at the hotel? My hotel does not have phones in the rooms, I say.
This sounds like the worst weaseling out of this situation possible, but it's true. And that's how AT&T may or may not have cockblocked me.
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