In Toronto, Canada, to busk the PanAm games. By day my virtual office hums, or curses, as I continue to fill dates and detail the upcoming US Midwest and South leg of the Tour. By night, it's me and the hustlers, the dope dealers, pick pockets, ticket re-sellers, addicts, insane street people, tourists, fire eaters and accordian players. Loose change. Blues. Smokestack Lightnin' echoing in the underground tunnels. I could join any of those other groups. I've shared this space with them for years. I know their work well. They make more than I do. The guy with the sign that says "I Lost My Job," makes a few hundred bucks a day. His girlfriend, who works around the corner has a sign that says "Pregnant and Homeless." People are always stopping and handing them $20 bills. There's a sucker born every minute, PT Barnum used to say. And here we are. Me and the other hustlers. Together on these mean, but polite streets. The guy who pretends to live on the hot air grate above me stops by and gives me a couple of beer at the end of his shift. "I had a good day," he says, before jumping the gate and disappearing into the roar and grind of the trains below.
I'm way too smart to die down here. And it's actually been a number of years since I've been robbed, or had a gun pointed at me by some street punk trying to impress his drunken girlfriend. So it's like weightlifting. The playing, that is. Between Tours I put in time, and it helps keep the whole thing running. Strong hands, good tone. But also bone spurs on my wrists and elbows, arthritis in my feet, and God knows my bladder is not what it was when I started doing these three, four, five, six hour sets. This summer, I'm averaging $12 an hour. If you're not playing, you're not making money. That's a whole lotta hours. So I play. I write. I watch and witness. Upstairs, in Nathan Phillips Square, there's a festival going on. I can hear strains of "Caledonia" echoing down the tube. On a hot day, apparently that's a very interesting story. The same band will repeat that same story all summer at festival after festival. Barnum's ghost floats above it all.
Early into the games, the streets of Toronto are much quieter than expected, and there is no sign of any economic trickle down. With festivals and free music all over town, buskers are at a bit of a disadvantage. Last night I went to hear Rikki Lee Jones on a comp ticket. Really, I should of busked the show, I guess. Sometimes I'm simply not as ambitious as I once was. I ran into Rob Bowman there, and figured that his presence was probably more ambitious than my own. Soon enough, I'll be busking Memphis again, negotiating my spot with the guys from the Moss St. Mission. The blind ambition of filling a couple of nights between St. Louis, MO and Clarksdale, MS...
Plenty of Mississippi and Alabama dates still open. Maritimes starting to fill. Newfoundland nearly booked up...
