CR Avery and the Special Interest GroupThe RivoliToronto ON2010-11-12

"Sister, tell your Brother, Brother tell your Auntie, Auntie, tell your Uncle,Uncle tell my Cousin, Cousin tell my friend
Goin' up the (Rivoli) Mama, don't you want to go?" BwMcT

Finally a home game in Toronto The Good, Hogtown, Hollywood North, or, my favourite, Dirty Little York.

CR is back in town, pushing his new book of poetry and the DVD he made with Toronto film maker, Michael Levesque.

38 Bar Blues is available online and the DVD, Subtitles For A Foreign Film, should be out in December.

This venue is the shooting location for the two concerts that make up that DVD, it's kinda like home to the krewe I drag around to these shows.

And a second to home to CR, so The Rivoli's packed to capacity. The 'other CR', Toronto's Troubadour Corin Raymond is here. Members of the Toronto Youth Slam are in attendance in the hopes of learning tricks from the Bard of East Van.  Ronna Blume a Toronto area poet who was featured at last weeks Words Aloud. got up to do a Neil Young (sorta) poem, the drummers family, CR's videographer and some old guy who keeps following him around with a pair of mics.

So after 4 attempts I finally get a board. Was hoping to have enough A+ material for a live record but there's time enough in the future to nail that project. What I did get will tide me over the winter.

So what about the show? Well, it was Toronto and the audience was in the mood, so you know the band delivered.


CR Avery vocals, harmonica, keys
Noah Walker guitar
Evan Bates bass
Adam Farnsworth  keys, backing vocals
Kevin Romain drums


Set 1
Track 01 Shirley Dragon
Track 02 Is This What You Wanted?
Track 03 Ice Rinks
Track 04 Neil Young'sSongs Are Really About Cars (reading by w/ Ronna Blume CR on keys)
Track 05 Blackbird
Track 06 Motel 50 Miles Out of Town

Set 2
Track 01 This Disclosure
Track 02 Promiscuous Women
Track 03 Very Sarah Palin/Commercial Drive
Track 04 Honeymoon Is Over
Track 05 talk - 38 Bar Blues plug
Track 06 Dungeon of Love/Love Song
Track 07 Make It Count On Election Day (off board)
Track 08 Dinner For One
Track 09 Pryor/Dylan Rap/ Folk Singer
Track 10 band intro
Track 11 On To Something/Piano Lessons
Track 12 encore break/talk
Track 13 Doll House and Pocket Knife
Track 14 Midnight Gold Mining
Track 15 talk - Subtitles for a Foreign Film plug
Track 16 My Own Road To Go


3 nights that finish at 2 am ...  gruelling
850 kilometers on the road...  time consuming
Hotels, Food and Gas      ...      $400

5 sets of CR Avery in a week ...  priceless