The gravel-voiced logger poet from Gibsons, Peter Trower, has taken up a new career.
The 73-year-old hearkens back to his younger days, in the early 1980s, when he once sang with a band. It's something he's always wanted to do again, he says, but he just needed the right musicians. Recently, two of his literary fans have turned to musical cohorts, Downland Music's Mark Fancher and Greg Potter from Vancouver. Trower first met Potter when he submitted an article to a lifestyle magazine that Potter edited. Formerly a guitarist for Lost Durangos, Potter is a writer who has since formed a creative production partnership with Mark Fancher. Singer/songwriter Fancher, who plays guitar, piano and blues harp, is also an award winning graphic artist. Hard on the heels of the release of Haunted Hills and Hanging Valleys, a collection of Trower's poems from Harbour Publishing, the poet has launched his own CD, Pete Trower, Kisses in the Whiskey, in collaboration with the guys from Downland.
It features his original poetry and a few mean blues numbers set to good, solid, beer hall music. The overall sound is helped along by Buck Cherry on guitar, slide and dobro and some poignant saxophone from Johnny Ferreira. Trower is obviously having a ball. The fact that this new CD is called Volume 1 suggests there will be more to follow. "Sure, I've got a lot of poems yet that are not too hard to turn into songs," he says.
He's always been musical, he maintains, often reading his poetry to the backdrop of jazz groups and performing with buddy, fellow author and poet, Jim Christy. A liner note explains that Trower was first encouraged to sing his poetry by none other than Leonard Cohen when the two met during a blissed-out evening in the 1960s. Trower swears it's true. But unfortunately, he's no Cohen. His singing style is closer to shouting or chanting, a sort of precursor to rap that reminds the listener of Bob Dylan - at least on some of the better numbers. "Deepcity Blues" works well in making the jump to lyrics.
Who could go wrong with "deepcity blues/nothing to lose/lonelynight women who seldom refuse?" Similarly, the "Blowpit Blues" really rocks while describing Trower's summer of labour among the mill machinery in Port Alice. The title song "Kisses in the Whiskey" employs strong imagery.
Trower talks of the tender boy faces shamming tough, cigarettes nailed to them. It's one of the best poems in his collection and probably didn't need to be forced into song. The CD closes with a gloomy offering, "The Destiny Tree," a true story about a car crash that took place on the "hangover highway," which turns out to be the road from Gibsons to Port Mellon: "Suicide blues on a bottle-dumb morning - we've got a date with the destiny tree."
Kisses in the Whiskey will get a Vancouver launch at the Railway Club in mid-August. Trower will launch at the Sunshine Coast Arts Centre in Sechelt some time in September. The CD is available for $10 from Coast Books in Gibsons.
