Treasure Beach

Brian Blain, guitar & vocals; George Koller, bass;
Clayton Doley, organ; Michelle Josef, drums

1. Forgotten 6:24 feat. Alison Young & Colleen Allen, sax
2. The Day Coke Saved the Blues 5:04 feat. Drew Jurecka, violin
3. Treasure Beach 4:15 feat. Wayne Stoute, percussion
4. Another Song About Alice 3:44 feat. Drew Jurecka, violin & Tim Posgate, banjo
5. Ramene Moi Demain 4:56 feat. Harry Manx, slide guitar
6. Don’t Blame The Bass Player 5:03 feat. George Koller, bass & Patrick Godfrey, piano
7. The Old Whaler’s Confession 4:25 feat. Clayton Doley, organ
8. Ghost of Clinton’s Tavern 4:13 feat. Joel Blain, beats, loops & sound design
9. Last Time I Saw Lenny 4:18 feat. Colleen Allen, sax

Additional Vocals, Stacie Tabb, Quentin Meek. Recorded by Leonardo Valvassori at Reba’s Café, Toronto.
Mixed and Mastered by Quentin Meek at the Qzic Mix Room. Additional recording by Margaret Stowe (Ozworld), Jeremy Darby (Canterbury), Terry Gillespie (Heaven’s Radio), Drew Jurecka and Patrick Godfrey. Produced by Brian Blain

All songs by Brian Blain, except #5 - Brian Blain & Daniel Racine. © 2013 Blainco Music SOCAN Unauthorized reproduction, copying and rental of this recording in any form is strictly prohibited by law. All rights reserved. Made in Canada.

A Message from Brian:

I loved hosting my weekly “Blues Campfires,” getting to play with so many great musicians. Some tunes like “Forgotten” and “Don’t Blame the Bass Player” turned into extended jams trading solos and making up words on the fly. We always closed the night with “Last Time I Saw Lenny.” I had the pleasure of recording these nine tunes with renowned bass player George Koller in a small cafe with a small audience. Over the last couple of years, this “live” album became a “living“ album as I kept adding cameo appearances by musical friends as well as a collaboration with my son the DJ on “Ghost of Clinton’s Tavern”

BrianB, November 10, 2013

FORGOTTEN - A nod to all the wonderful musicians and musical styles that came out of New Orleans “...they invented Jazz / gave us all the Blues / and that Dixieland / Rockabilly too / they brought us Ragtime / and the Second Line / Cajun and Zydeco / even Rock ‘n’ Roll”


THE DAY COKE SAVED THE BLUES - This is the story of how one song got my former record label back on their feet when it was picked up for a Coca Cola commercial... “Let me tell you the story of Northern Blues / How a guy built a label and refused to lose”

TREASURE BEACH – I rediscovered this tune (written in Jamaica 30 years ago) when I recently came upon the scribbled lyrics in a bunch of old papers. It’s a true story, a tragic tale of a young girl who committed suicide when she was accused of stealing.

ANOTHER SONG ABOUT ALICE - If you ever wondered what happened to the Alice that Arlo Guthrie wrote about in Alice’s Restaurant... “Alice don’t spend too much time / cookin’ in the kitchen anymore”

RAMENE MOI DEMAIN - Daniel Racine’s lyrics (en francais) paint a beautiful picture of the hills and valleys of the Eastern Townships where I come from.

DON’T BLAME THE BASS PLAYER – This is a tour-de-force for bassist George Koller. We were totally making it up as we went along and I was throwing solos at him and making up words - this was as spontaneous as it gets.

THE OLD WHALER’S CONFESSION - starts off with a veritable “seascape” that George creates with his bow on the bass strings. When the pilgrims arrived in New England in the 1600s, they wrote that there were so many whales in the Bay of Cape Cod that “you could walk ‘cross their backs right to Boston”

THE GHOST OF CLINTON’S TAVERN - “He’ll come when you are feeling low / He’ll come and he’ll seduce your soul / You’ll give it up without a care / Musicians ‘specially must beware.” Occasionally I do a gig with my son Joel – we call it BlainBlain – two laptops running a program called Ableton Live. We captured a bit of that in this treatment of “Ghost”. All the notes were played on my guitar but sliced and diced by Joel. To keep the “living album” alive, the MIDI clips from the middle section will be available for download on my website as are the original live versions of all these tunes complete with my rambling introductions.

LAST TIME I SAW LENNY - I only met guitarist Lenny Breau one time but I got to jam with him in Winnipeg and it left an indelible impression on me. In recent years we would always end the Blues Campfire with this tune. And so we end this album. Hope you enjoyed the journey.