The Drinking Fountain was an out-of-the-way music venue located 85-miles East of Buffalo but we played there anyway because it was a good size club with a large stage. It was big enough for Parousia’s seven members to perform on and that was better than most of the clubs we were booked in.
85 miles one-way from Buffalo, NY to the Drinking Fountain in Avon NY
I remember setting up the North drum kit on my red-carpeted plywood drum platform held-up by ordinary aluminum garbage cans. (The cans were masked from the audience by large blue and black cloths hung around the perimeter of the platform).
Gerry’s red-carpeted drum platform (behind him) with garbage cans.
I finished setting-up my gear a bit earlier than usual. Eric and I relaxed at a small table in the middle of the club facing the stage.
He looked at me and said… “that is an awesome set up dude…” and it was… the drums looked like a space-ship departing a launch platform surrounded by a wall of amps and keyboards and on the far-ends of the stage sat our massive P.A. system with low-end bass-scoops (hand built by Danny Hairfield at the Music Mall), mid-range Perkins cabinets and high-end Altec horns.
One thing was guaranteed for this evening… we were going to be loud!
Behind Robert Lowden is a glimpse of Parousia’s massive P.A. system.
The crowd shuffled in between 10:00 -11:00 pm. We hit the stage around 10:30 and played all of our classic rock tunes like “Suffragette City” and “Rebel Rebel” by David Bowie, “Hold Your Head Up” by Argent, “Hocus Pocus” by Focus, “Heart Breaker” by Pat Benatar, “Sing Child Sing” by Heart, “Come Together” and “A Day in the Life” by the Beatles and “My Sharona” by the Knack.
PAROUSIA 1981: Barry Cannizzaro, Patt Connolly, Eric Scheda, Robert Lowden, Kim Watts, Garth Huels & Gerry Cannizzaro.
The club manager was also a drummer and I remember that during our long-jams on songs like “You Really Got Me” by the Kinks, he would like to stop what he was doing and walk to the front area below the stage and air-drum, (with twirling imaginary sticks and all).
Parousia was building momentum at this point in our career. A lot of it began when our New-Wave song, “Miss Ogyny” landed a track on “Buffalo Rocks” the first 97-Rock “Home Grown” album. “Miss Ogyny” was broadcast on WGRQ FM many times and people who knew the music scene began to recognize our name as a serious contender.
“BUFFALO ROCK’S” L.P. featuring “Miss Ogyny” by Parousia
Suddenly, it was spring-time in Buffalo and the music scene was picking up. We played big concerts at Buffalo State College and Daemen College. We were kicking ass at “battle of the band” type jams held at large clubs like, Fast Annie’s in Hamburg, NY and the Prince of Wales in Wales, NY. We were also playing many local small to mid-sized venues like the Starting Gate Café, Graffiti’s, Dad’s Café, the Old Harmony Bar, the Bachelor’s Den and the Plant-6.
PAROUSIA concert at Buffalo State College, 1981.
PAROUSIA at the Plant-6, Kenmore NY – 1981
As the weather continued to warm in Western NY, we were playing everywhere all the time and when we didn’t have a gig, we were rehearsing our music at the Music Mall or networking with our friends and fans. There was no sign of it slowing down anytime soon and that was fine with us as long as we didn’t collapse from exhaustion first.