Old School Erieau Hip-Op

Shout out to the Gs and 'hos!

Everyone knows that music and locale have been intrinsic associates since even before Fred Flintstone rocked the "Bedrock Twist" in the Paleolithic Days of yore. In fact, so strong is the relationship between town and sound that some modern-day 'burgs have few other claims to notoriety beyond being the birthplace or epicenter of some sort of music. What's Detroit without Motown, Nashville without the "opry", Seattle without the Grunge or Cape Breton without its fiddlers? It could even be argued that all of the world's most fabulous cities have their own soundtrack. Paris has its Chanteuses and a jazz scene, New York's all Gershwin and Rio's down with that Samba.

So where does that leave Erieau? Sure, we all have soul (but we're not all soul-diers) as many of us play a little piano, guitar, squeezebox or washboard. But, is our musical legacy destined to be Murray singing "I'm my own Grandpa", Margie Bliss "dominica-nica-nica-ing" to her cabin kitties and a bunch of wranglers bootscottin' at the "joint who's name we dare not speak"? Hell no. On Saturday night, two musical worlds hooked up at the Sandbar and now we can say, Erieau is the original home of the Hip-Op. That's right, hip-hop and Opera all mixed together and it's a combination as unexpectedly intoxicating as gin and vermouth. You get a Doug E Fresh style Beat box dude from London to smooth the baseline and then a Placido Domingo style tenor from McGill to style the libretto. If you weren't hanging on the patio, it's totally "Amadeus" meets "Hustle and Flow" and you should stay out and drink more on Saturday nights. The shit was bananas. Mad "big ups" to singin' Dave and bassman Wes. Yeah, they're not villagers but Erieau is where the sound came together. Too bad for us, the next show tenatively won't happen until '07. Those cats are too cool to rock anything but one night only.

PS. We all knew Rich and Princess shared clothes but when did they start to dress alike? It's soo Olsen Twins (circa 1999) I can't stand it.