Learning and Living with Greg MacDonald

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The Young Lions Head Out (Part 1)

March 31st. 3:22 PM Despite my throat screaming in pain, a big English presentation looming in the immediate future, and having the caffeine jitters, I’m in a good mood. All my worries are forgotten, because tonight I’ll be seeing the Constantines. I’d seen them open for the Weakerthans in November, but tonight they were headlining. That means longer than a 45 minute set. That means some hardcore rocking will be done by me. This article isn’t going to be very funny, I’m too excited to be funny. It’s OK though, because no one reads it anyway and you could always just go look at that naked drawing of me in the first article for a good laugh. I’ve had SHINE A LIGHT and the S/T album in the stereo all day. I’ve bounced around my room. I’m looking forward to it so much. KAJKAFHKAFSJKALFJAKLF March 31st. 3:30 PM Jake is looking forward to it. This is how the Organ Donors function. Time is moving slowly. I tell Jake about my Star Wars dream, but that conversation peters out pretty quickly. This article is going to end up being pretty long, because I’m using it to eat up time. March 31st. 3:32 PM I tried to stop writing this but instead I just started again. A page in one minute. This is going to be a beast. I might as well tell you my history with the Cons. It all started back in 2001, I think, when I heard a bit of buzz about the band. I had been fired from my job at the Main Ingredient Bulk Food Store (that’s a whole other article), and was liberally spending every penny I had saved from my four month tenure. This meant albums, many albums. I downloaded the song St. You after seeing that the Cons had opened for the Flashing Lights a couple of times. This was in the height of my fabled “Matt Murphy” Days. I thought the song was pretty good, and that’s all I knew about the band. Now, St. You is pretty much the only acoustic ballad in the Cons’ arsenal, so it was pretty odd that out of all the work that’s the one that Kazaa came up with. I headed down to Music World (where Jake worked, and I could get a discount) the next day and picked up the album, figuring I’d get a nice, acoustic C.D. I popped it in the old portable stereo which had served me well over the years, put the volume close to max, and pressed play. I almost blew my speakers. What I had bought was a gritty, loud, rock album. I listened through, and was kind of taken aback. I left the album alone for a week or so, then I though “Well, I bought it, I might as well listen to it.” The second listen was the clincher. I had no expectations this time and it slew me. It became my most-listened album that summer. I had trouble not playing the whole album every week on my radio show, Invalid Litter (the first Cons song we did play was Seven A.M.). I saw the Cons for the first time at Hillside 2002. I was blown away by rock. They played a hard, sweaty set in the warm summer air. It was great. Some guy looked at me and said “This is so rock-roll.” My hard-on for the Cons stiffened even more. Nothing big happened with my Cons love over the next year. They played in Peterborough a couple of times, but I couldn’t get in. Then I left Peterborough to go to Ryerson University in Toronto. (If you’ve read the read the history of the Organ Donors, ignore this.) The first album I bought in Toronto was the recently released SHINE A LIGHT. I listened to it instead of going to Frosh activities, I listened to it instead of sleeping. I ate and drank while listening to it. Then, in November I caught the Cons again. It was good enough to quell my desire to see them for a little while, but tonight, tonight I will see them in their full glory for the second time. Yay. I'll give a full report on the night tomorrow or Friday. Until them, Greg MacDonald is really fucking excited. Back