I Got Hoofed Out Of Wal-Mart!!!!!!!
February 18th, 2003
Today, I got hoofed out of Wal-Mart for playing the NINTENDO GAMECUBE for almost 3 hours straight.
-chris
Am I that Scary?
February 7th, 2003
Trevor and I went postering last night since our show is this Saturday. Since we haven't organized any sort of "street team" we were forced to do the postering ourselves. Luckily it wasn't that cold.........
Anyways, we had covered a bit of the market and were now postering around Rideau Street. With all the bus stops and people wandering around we figured that this would be a key place for people to read our posters. To give some more background to this story, this was also the day when the new edition of the Xpress came out with the article on us in it. So as we were putting up a poster at one of the bus stops I realized that a man standing beside me, reading the Xpress, was looking at our poster. So I, being in a good mood, leaned over to him and told him to check out our article on page 9. The guy looked at me like I was from the moon and bolted off.
What did I do wrong? I don't think what I did deserved that reaction. Are we not in a friendly enough country that strangers cannot talk to each other? Crazy.
-Paul
Crazy Kid
February 4th, 2003
I saw a kid today outside my work smoking smokes. He claimed that he was 15 years old, but in reality, I would've guessed that he was maybe 9.
He was smoking cigarettes, and had this incredible medallion around his neck.
The medallion he claimed, was stolen from his mother. I noticed that he had a pair of glasses on that had no right frames, so he kind of looked like the boss man who financed AIRWOLF in the television show.
This kid told me and a few other workin' buddies that he was going to rob my work with a pistol that he had in his pocket. After we laughed, and one of my buddies gave him a piledriver, he ran into my work waving a small bright orange .38 caliber revolver.
He was hauled away by the police fifteen minutes later.
I felt bad because he had clef lip, and my friend George literally piledrivered him, but that's life.
-chris
What a day!
January 31st, 2003
Dear diary,
Today I woke up this morning, ate breakfast and had a shower. Usually I eat after my shower, but my roomate was in the shower when I woke up so I decided to eat first. After having a delicious meal of oatmeal and peach juice, I took the #3 bus from the stop near my house to work. I worked all morning and took a late lunch at 1:00pm. After lunch I decided to play video games instead of doing work and then I left early to watch a movie at the Bytowne. After the movie I came home and ate dinner and then went out to Zaphod's and Babylon to see some bands. What a day!
-steve
Diaries Not Personal Enough?
January 29th, 2003
We've been recently told by someone who was stopping by the website on occasion that our diary entries were not personal enough. That to the casual fan we were still mysteries wrapped in riddles. Of course our new 'Meet the Setbacks' section should help that a bit, but not much.
So I figured I'd start getting more personal. Not to the point that you'd be frightened of me, but just a little insight into everyday things that happen that aren't very interesting, but would show you something.
With that said I begin with the subject of nicknames. Recently people at my day job have been attempting to stick a nick name on me. Working with people named Diesel, Turkey, Hershey, and the G-Man really makes Trevor sound lame. So they searched their souls and came up with the most random thing they could come up with. Their big idea was to stick the name Corn Pipe to me. I feared it would not stick. I was correct. Within hours one of them called me Corn Cob by accident, then the whole thing fell apart.
It didn't help that I was claiming that nicknames never stick to me. Ever since I was a kid I've pretty much been called Trevor or Kealey. In high school people got nicknames, even me, but none stuck longer than a day or two. When I moved to Ontario from La Belle Province, someone thought a good name would be Gaetan, it stuck a bit, but not beyond 3 people.
In University Frosh week, almost everyone got nicknames. That's when we started calling Paul 'Chet', and that name has stuck so hard some people only know him by that name. During that week someone came up with the name Rasta Gator for me (don't ask, because I don't even know) but it didn't last more than a couple of days.
It could be that the nicknames people have attempted to stick on me were not good, and as a result fell off, but I maintain its because I'm covered in nickname Teflon. I'm thinking of scraping some off and selling it in an aerosol can for people who don't like their nickname, but I haven't worked out the physical logistics yet.
Anyway, that's all.
-trevor
Cock Rock is still alive
January 18th, 2003
Friday night was rehearsal night for the setbacks, but unfortunately Chris was delayed in getting there, and had to leave early. This combined with the low energy in the band, and the fact that we wrecked our bass amp at the show last week meant practice was a waste. The night however was not.
After "practice" Steve and I went to Babylon to see the Million Dollar Marxists and Jake Lovetart. We only saw the last song of the first band, but it was a two piece with one of the dudes from Bertha Does Moosejaw. Sounded good. M$M went on next, and rocked Babylon pretty hard. They played some new songs that aren't on their EP. Sounds like they are headed deeper into the good stuff. That album is great.
We were joined by Chris as the headliners hit the stage. That was Jake Lovetart, whom I've never seen but comprises two of the Double Pumpers and two members of Paperjack. If you've never seen these guys you should. The sound is frenetic shirtless Sabbath riffs, fronted by Jake Lovetart, a whorin' gamblin boozin' kind of guy. Carrying his bottle of "whuskey" on stage, and stumbling about through songs about balls and other enlightening things. It was amazing. It's hard to describe, but something everyone should see. Amazing music and very entertaining.
-trevor
Loose Ends
January 16th, 2003
I thought I'd ramble on for a couple of paragraphs about things we've recently done. First off is a house party we played at the start of January. We got an email request to play in a basement in Ottawa south. There would be a P.A. and another band, it'd be fun! The guy who invited us (Duane) had remembered us from other bands we played in back in University, and thought it'd be great to have us play again.
So we packed up our stuff and arrived to find they had not only rented a great P.A. system, but also two racks of lights, controlled by a large pedal rack, a laser which oscillated with the noise, and a fog machine. They also had a foosball table, and beer. We were in heaven. Three of us anyway.
The basement was small, so the first thing that happened was a blown fuse. When that got straightened out, an all girl band called Nice Rack played a set of covers, ranging from Johnny Cash to The White Stripes. Good times.
Then we played a set, starting with mostly our own tunes, which then disintegrated into some covers which we screw around with at practice sometimes. Songs by Weezer, Guns n Roses, ACDC, the Police, The Cars... etc. Our horrible, horrible attempt at Thunderstruck was met by a crowd surfer. Doesn't work so well in an 8 foot basement. Basically they pinned him up agains the ceiling. He claimed it was the highlight of the night.
In all, good times, awesome times. Hopefully other people enjoyed it. I know Duane did, as he expressed amazement that we were "actually playing in my basement!!!!!!!!".
ON a side note, Chris destroyed the drum set provided by Nice Rack, which wasn't accustomed to such intense pounding. He replaced the skins and sticks, so we're all still friends.
-tk
All Malevolent Forces Utterly Shattered
January 13th, 2003
For the few of you that weren't at Zaphod Beeblebrox on Saturay I have this to say to you: "You have missed The Setbacks climb up another rung in the Ottawa music scene." For those of you who experienced the show, you know what I am talking about. The 117+ patrons at Zaphods came to hear if all the rumours spreading about The Setbacks blistering live show were true. These now Setbacks fans had no idea that they were about to experience a sight and sound explosion that would change their lives forever.
Thankfully the growing crowd had come to rock. The opening band, The Double Pumpers, drew the crowd to the stage area with heavy riff drivin rock and a pounding rhythm and bass section. They left the stage, on what was only their second show together, with the crowd begging for more. Hopefully we will be seeing much more of this solid three piece in the future.
With the crowd ready, we cashed in the rest of our beer tickets. With hands full of Labatt 50 rock feul and blood pumping we hit the stage. From the first note hit to the last cymbal crash the head-bobbing crowd egged us on to push harder. Not to let the fans down we jumped, kicked, and just plain rocked ourselves to exaustion. Steve and Trevor barely gave the crowd a second to breath between wailing guitars and vocal harmonies. I think one of our fans described it best when he said, "Holy shit! That fuckin' rocked!"
This was, in my opinion, one of the best shows we have had. I want to personally thank everyone that came out to support us. The rock and roll machine called The Setbacks is just warming up so watch out for us in the future. Our next show is on February 8th at Bumpers Roadhouse. Hope to see you there.
-Paul
Last Minute Show Preparations
January 10th, 2003
Well last night Steve and I went around town to do another poster blitz. It was cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey. Which wasn't conducive to walking around slapping paper to metal. The tape wouldn't stick to the posts because of the low temperature, it would only stick to itself (and my mitts). So we were forced to employ a rarely used but amazing to behold technique. It basically looked like one of us was humping a post while the other looked on.
Then we got to out front of one of the dance clubs or Rideau Street, and while we started putting up a poster, the muscle out front informed us that he was just going to tear it down because the manager doesn't want them up there.
So Steve says to him (read this next part in an angry voice) "I got news for your manager, you tell him that being vigilant in taking down posters out front isn't going to ensure the financial future of your club. There are other reasons it has changed names 5 times in the last 5 years. I don't care if it is ladies night, you tell him that if he DARES to set foot in Zaphod's on Saturday, we will DESTROY him with rock music. The sheer girth of the roll and/or the rock will cause his heart to stop." We then booted outta there confident our message would be delivered, as the young steroid case at the door was reduced to a quivering mass of fear just from thinking about the consequences which would befall his manager if he dared step foot into Zaphod's on Saturday.
The moral of this story is if you cross The Setbacks, we will destroy you with rock music. So if you dare step foot in Zaphod's on Saturday, you can expect all negative attitudes to be defeated, all frowns obliterated, and all malevolent forces to be utterly shattered. But most of all expect all souls to be set afire with the spirit of the rock music.
Or something like that.
-trevor
Hitting the Media Scrum
January 3rd, 2003
I just finished our first real interview for The Setbacks. It will appear in next Thursday's Ottawa Citizen in Wes Smiderle's night life column. I tried not to sound to lame, and hope that in the process didn't sound too uptight. I have a history of saying silly things, so I held back tight on the reigns. I'll wait until our first cover story to start belching out bad jokes and other such nonsense.
But this interview did get me to thinking, even though it was the first Setbacks interview, the questions were a lot of the same ones you read in the big players' interviews (ie how did you guys meet? how does the songwriting process work?...). If I was in a situation (which I hope to someday be) where I'd need to answer these questions day in and day out I could see a lot of truths being stretched. Soon our history would become so convoluted that not even we would know how we met, or how we write songs.
I guess its part of the process, and believe me the idea of doing more interviews is very exciting. And fear not, it'll be a little while before I start making things up to keep interviews fun for me. But just to be safe you'd better find out all you can about us in the first bunch of press items, because who knows what you'll be hearing after our second cd comes out...
-trevor
Contact the band at band[at]thesetbacks.com