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On September 27th, 2022 I woke up in Ottawa excited for an in-and-out to Kingston to see Ringo Starr. I was two days removed from my most recent gig at the National Arts Centre and had been couch-surfing at my friend Doug’s place. I killed the morning waiting for my noon-hour pickup courtesy of Jason, who drove the two of us to Huss’s place where, in a sudden development, Huss was waiting for the results of a covid self-test. Huss’s explanation that he had awoken feeling lousy was wholly unnecessary; he looked like hell.
As Huss retreated inside to check his results Jason and I huddled. The problem was Jojo’s lady had recently confirmed that she couldn’t make it to the show and as Jason and I had recently purchased our own pair of floor tickets (just days before the venue dropped the prices by 50%) we needed a fourth. Jason and I were rather convinced that Huss had the ‘vid regardless of what his test might claim but when he walked out of the house with a suitcase and bee-lined to Jason’s back seat we shrugged and got in. I wore my mask all the way to Kingston.
In K-town we rolled into Jojo’s place to find a loud solo rock and roll party in full swing. I had to wear earplugs. We visited, we laughed, we screamed; Jojo fed us half an excellent meal and off we went to the show, just a hair behind schedule. Our GPS kept going offline as we made the surprisingly long trek to the venue and we ended up missing the first song. It had been Matchbox, a song I knew solely through my old band The Gutterboys, who used to cover it. Jason and I made it to our rather good seats in time for the second number, Ringo’s own It Don’t Come Easy. Then came the first Beatles-penned song of the evening, What Goes On before Ringo started handing things over to his band.
You must know that Ringo Starr always tours with his All Starr Band, right? You know, a revolving band made up of other famous musicians, all of whom who have their own hit songs to offer up? In this iteration the band consisted of Edgar Winter on keys and sax, Steve Lukather on electric guitar, Colin Hay on acoustic guitar, Hamish Stuart on bass plus Ringo’s two mainstays: Gregg Bissonette on drums and Warren Hamm on, well, lots of things. And everyone gets their moment in the spotlight. As a matter of fact, the main sidemen each get three moments in the spotlight.
First up was Edgar Winter and I gotta say, his Free Ride might have been the highlight of the show, although his Frankenstein was pretty darn close to epic (it even included Bissonette’s super-fun drum solo that basically scrolled through the greatest drum riffs in rock history from Come Together to YYZ). I had expected Colin Hay’s Men At Work stuff to steal the show.
But then there was Steve Lukather’s guitar playing! My word, the dude is just so, so great. And so were his songs of course. All Toto: Rosanna, Africa, and Hold the Line. Like c’mon, pretty show steal-y, right?
But then there was Hamish Stuart. And just who is Hamish Stuart? Well, he was the bass player in Average White Band. And just who was Average White Band? Well, they were a British mostly-instrumental funk band from the ’70’s with songs like Pick Up the Pieces and Cut the Cake, both of which were played at this show, and both of which pretty much did steal the show.
Well, until Ringo Starr stepped up to the mic and sang Yellow Submarine, Octopus’s Garden, and I Wanna Be Your Man. I mean, once you get a real-live Beatle playing real-live Beatles songs with a crazy good band behind him things become permanently attached.
Unstealable is what I’m saying.
Then the guy goes and closes the show with that most epic of Ringo songs ever (not that he wrote it, ‘cuz he didn’t), With a Little Help From My Friends. Like, right there in front of everybody!
Holy.
(Okay, the show closed with the band quickly shifting into a snippet of Give Peace a Chance of course, Ringo being all peace-and-love-y as he is.)
And then he was gone. What a great show.
Jason and I found Huss outside – he had stepped out to get some air during the last song – and we eventually found Jojo too. As the two abstainers Jason and I arm-wrestled over who got to sit in the driver’s seat on the way back to Ottawa. He won, which proved beneficial, as I kept falling asleep. No wonder I was tired: it turned out that I had covid. I tested positive (for the first and only time) the next day when I got back home to Newfoundland.
It was a bit of an ironic twist that Huss didn’t have covid and didn’t catch it either, because it seems that I gave covid to Jason, who in turn shared it with his wife and their son. As it turns out Ringo got covid as well. Five days (and two concerts) later he postponed the rest of his Canadian tour. But I can’t blame myself for that; our seats weren’t that good.
Todd Man Out 