Saturday, March 22, 1980, our second time performing for the gifted students of Calasanctius high. This time we were playing “off-campus” at a school sponsored Junior Achievement event, held at the coastal Holiday Inn, Grand Island.
The band looked forward to this gig, ‘cause we knew we were performing for an audience who appreciated our music and the presentation of it. The band needed that right now, coming off the heels of Parousia’s March 19th gig at the Cambria Fire Hall, an event sponsored by St. Mary’s School for the Deaf.
The St. Mary’s crowd expected a “dance band” (like Junction West or the Vincent Michael’s band) instead; they got the eclectic rock band Parousia …oops! Unless you enjoy dancing to songs like “Cross Eyed-Mary” by Jethro Tull, “Hocus Pocus” by Focus and “Toronto Tontos” by Max Webster, you won’t be having a great time.
The quiet of the ballroom soon to be shattered by the sonic madness of PAROUSIA
Fortunately, the like-minded students of Calisanctius high-school liked those songs and they liked our original stuff too, like “Cotton Holiday”, “Lucifer’s Lament”, “Myron” and our infamous track from the 97 Rock album, “Miss Ogyny”.
Two notable pieces of history marked this gig: It was the last show with Parousia’s head-roadie and lighting tech, Len Krucenski (1978-1980), aka: “RMS Labs” and it was our first gig with Dave Styn, who stuck with the band through thick and thin over the next two-years, quickly ascending to over-glorified positions such as “head roadie” and “occasional sound-man”.
Len Krucenski: a man of many talents.
On this March night in Grand Island, it was snowy and cold. It was warm and friendly inside the Hotel. We were playing in a side ballroom that was semi-acoustic friendly. We had Gregg Filippone running sound, meaning we knew we’d sound pretty-good for our friends and fans tonight. We didn’t disappoint our audience, we gave them everything we had and at the end of the evening, Gregg was anxious to wrap-up as soon as possible to get to an after-party at Laura’s house.
Bob Lowden and his industrial-strength Ovation Bass guitar
I was getting a ride with Gregg and Bob Lowden. We had just departed the Hilton and the security guard locked the door behind us. We were walking to Gregg’s truck when Bob suddenly announced (as he often did) that he left something behind and quickly ran back into the Hotel to get it.
Gregg was annoyed at the delay. He got into his truck and started it up. He decided to drive closer to the door and when he pulled forward, he ran over something… I heard a loud ‘CRUCNH’ when the tires rolled over it. Gregg stepped out of the truck and saw that it was Bob’s bass. He left it standing-up, leaning against Gregg’s truck. I remember Gregg getting pretty upset about Bob leaving it there… “What kind of a f*n idiot leaves his guitar leaning up against an idling truck?” he asked out loud.
Fortunately, Bob’s bass was in a good quality hard-case. Bob never noticed a difference and I don’t think Gregg ever told Bob that he ran it over. Oops, I guess I just let that cat out of the bag. MEOW!
