About Me
Ticket info:
Tattoo Rock Parlour w/Slave to the Square Wave, Nov 27, 2008
Blue Peter performs "Video Verite" live at the "March Hop Jump" recorded at the Concert Hall, March 1981
Blue Peter performs "I Walk Alone" live at the "March Hop Jump" recorded at the Concert Hall, March 1981
Blue Peter performs "A.W.O.L." live at the "March Hop Jump" recorded at The Concert Hall, March 1981
Sherry Kean, former lead singer of Toronto-based band The Sharks, talks about her solo career in this piece on The New Music, c. 1984. Includes clips from the video for I Want You Back.
SLIDESHOWS :: MOD CLUB
3 Photo Galleries from the Mod Club Show, October 5, 2007
:: view ::
SLIDESHOW :: Are You Ready Record Release Pilot Tavern
November 30, 2006
Watch "Don't Walk Past":
Quicktime
Led by key members Paul Humphrey (lead vocals) and Chris Wardman (guitar), and augmented by Jason Sniderman (keyboards) and the rhythm section Rick Joudrey on bass and Owen Tennyson on drums, Blue Peter were one of the most innovative and influential acts to emerge from the Toronto underground environment, and their brand of cutting edge pop, rhythm, and dance stands the test of time today.
The Blue Peter story started in the mid to late 70's when Chris Wardman and Paul Humphrey, who became the nucleus of the band, began practising and writing material. As the band developed, and began to secure gigs, Humphrey remembers that the era was one in which many new bands faced certain challenges that made the going difficult.
"In those early days, there were no places for a band who did original material to play. In a lot of bars, you had to play cover tunes, so we came up with our own treatments of the Stones, Iggy Pop, Led Zep, and the like, but we really wanted to have a way of exposing our songs. Besides," Paul continues, "we really couldn't play a lot of those covers 'cause we found it just didn't work that well with our energy."
Times did change, however, and the live venue scene in Toronto started to open up, providing more opportunities for young, up-and-coming bands to get a shot at playing gigs. "It was an exciting time," recalls Humphrey. "Clubs like The Edge and Larry's Hideaway opened up and a lot of good bands with original music got a chance. There's a certain musical historical element to those days, and we were part of it."
As Blue Peter released singles, albums and EP's .. Records, and toured Canada regularly, the bands' popularity grew dramatically. And with success, came the inevitable comparisons to other acts of the day. "Yeah, that's something that's just going to happen," says Humphrey philosophically. "I've heard them all... Bowie, Roxy Music... it's unavoidable, but with those bands, at least you can say we were in good company. I really think that the comparisons weren't based so much on a musical level, but rather a visual one... the way I dressed on stage, the somewhat flamboyant presentation... they were all contributing factors."
When the video for “Don’t Walk Past†was released it won two important awards in Canada in 1983: "Best Video of 1983" from the prestigious Canadian Film and Television Association; and "Most Popular Video" at Sony's Video Culture Festival. It also received airplay at various U.S. outlets including MTV.
Looking back on Blue Peter's career, Chris Wardman recalls several key shows with a great deal of fondness. "The Police Picnic in 1983 at the C.N.E. in Toronto was an experience we'll never forget. It was the largest show we'd ever done in terms of audience and venue size, and it was extremely flattering to be included on the bill. The show itself wasn't easy... we couldn't hear that well. But the thing I remember most," he continues, "was the whole backstage thing... hanging out with The Fixx, using James Brown's dressing room (and actually getting kicked out of it!), just being part of such an amazing line up... it was great."
Opening two shows for the Boomtown Rats at Toronto's El Mocambo was one of the first major breakthroughs for Blue Peter. "We really liked the band," remembers Wardman, "but the thing that really sticks in my memory is that one of the songs they did at soundcheck was a new one called ..I Don't Like Mondays'... this was before they had even recorded it. So considering that it turned out to be such a career song for them, in retrospect it kind of felt like we were privy to history in the making."
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Humphrey recalls opening for The Jam two nights in Toronto and one night in Ottawa. "Some of the guys in the audience starting spitting at me during our set. I really didn't know if this was sending a message that they liked us, or wanted us to get the hell outta there. But when the same thing happened to The Jam, I took it as more a show of approval."
Two other gigs that especially stand out in their collective memories were opening for Simple Minds in Toronto, Ottawa, and Montreal and headlining a sold out Ontario Place Forum show in 1984. Although the band split up in 1985, Humphrey says that to this day, he gets stopped in the street by Blue Peter fans, who tell him what a great band they were. "While we were fairly successful in our day, I'm admittedly a little baffled when this happens. It strikes me that there's this kind of ..mythology' about Blue Peter that still lives on. Maybe it's more like harkening back to those days, which in my mind was a time of hopefulness. So maybe it's an emotional rapport that lives on in people's imagination."
