091795 Dan Aykroyd with Bill Murray, Johnny Fay, and Gord Sinclair/Bloom, Kingston, ON

It was a random day in September.  The phone rang.

“Hello?” I said.  Sometimes I can be so predictable.

“Come to Kingston on Sunday,” was the only response.

“Okay,” I replied without hesitation, recognizing my friend’s voice.  Then the phone clicked dead and just like that I was committed to…well, I had no idea what I had committed to.

And so it was that on September 17th, 1995 I drove my Toyota minivan (the Big Red Tomato) to Kingston with nothing but a half tank of gas, a youthful sense of adventure and wonder in my heart.

I pulled into my friends parent’s driveway and was welcomed with open arms.  My buddy let me in on the secret: Dan Aykroyd had just opened up a bar in Kingston called the Ghetto House Cafe (this was before his association with the House Of Blues franchise) and as a promotion he was going to perform that night with a great local act called Bloom and members of The Tragically Hip.

Well, that was exciting!  And as a bonus my friend told me the $20 ticket was on him!

We went to the club almost immediately and were the first to arrive.  The bar was in a big old house somewhere downtown.  As we walked in we were each presented with a souvenir glass and three drink tickets.  Sweet!  Rounding a corner we entered the main room, a small nondescript venue with a bar on one side and a handful of booths surrounding the small dancefloor.  My buddy and I grabbed the first booth, just five feet or so from the band’s gear which was set up on the floor, no stage or riser to be seen.

We soon tore through our drink tickets and dug into the bar service as the music began.  Bloom was a band I had seen several times before on Kingston road trips, they were a great band and one of my fave’s on the Kingston scene.  This night they were joined by The Tragically Hip’s Gord Sinclair on bass and Johnny Fay on drums, both very solid players who ripped through a set of sweaty rock and roll.  

Just before the second set started two MIB security dudes came up to our booth and told my buddy and I we’d have to move.  I protested loudly but when presented with the choice of giving up the best table in the house or getting kicked out of the show itself I quickly relented, though we made a point of merely standing next to the booth and continued utilizing the table to hold our quickly-rotating drinks.  

And then the security dudes usher in none other than the great Bill Murray, who held court for the rest of the evening from what was until very recently our booth!  I could not believe it, the real-life Bill Murray standing right next to me, sharing my table (well, I guess I was now sharing his table, but whatever).  And just then Dan Aykroyd and his father walk in dressed as the Blues Brothers and step on stage with the band.

Now, this was before the Blues Brothers started retouring; as far as I know this was the first time Dan had been onstage as Elwood Blues since the passing of John Belushi.  This was BIG and it was happening just a few feet in front of me in a small bar with the incredible Bill Murray dancing right behind me.  Geez Louise!

I raptly watched the band lead the Blues Family through classic after classic while stealing glances at the dancing fool behind me, which cracked me up every time.  Bill Murray is a walking pile of comedy, and just seeing him standing on the bench dancing his butt off cracked me up every time I looked at him.  Eventually the band pulled him onstage, he did two numbers, I think King Bee and Money (That’s What I Want).  Bill sang terribly and was terribly entertaining at the same time, and his butchering of the two numbers stole a show that was already historic in proportion.

I can’t believe I was there.

I remember reading Rolling Stone and random guitar magazines back when I was a kid and occasionally seeing a blurb on this concert or that where some heavyweight sat in with some other heavyweight, like Les Paul playing a bar in NYC when Eddie Van Halen or somebody strolls in with a guitar.  And I remember always thinking, “How does a guy get to be at one of those shows?” and of course the answer is: serendipity, luck, and the willingness to always try to be in the right place at the right time.  

For me this was that night – it was the right place at the right time – and moreover it all arose from my willingness to immediately and unquestionably say “Okay” when that mysterious phone call came.  

And there, my friends, is our lesson for the day.