TRUCKS LEAVING
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Here's the story (according to Todd).

Trucks Leaving formed after I enlisted guitarist/bassist/vocalist The Unseen Guest (otherwise known as Danny Monette) and Theresa's Sound-World drummer Will Culbert to help me perform Pink Floyd's 1977 album Animals at The Free Times Cafe in Toronto. While rehearsing, we discovered our shared fondness for extended jams, all forms of rock music and (thanks to Danny's and Will's generosity) recreational drugs, so we decided to continue to perform together under the temporary banner "Todd Harrison and The Unseen Guest."

I gave us our name after a gig on May 3, 2000. It probably had some mystical, cosmic relevance to me at the time, but due to a combination of the aforementioned fondnesses I have next to no recollection of even mentioning that we should call the band Trucks Leaving.

But, either way, the name stuck and our first official project as an official band with an official name was to retreat to Haliburton with Tony Coleman and a vanload of recording equipment for a Big Pink-style weekend of zen recording. The sessions yeilded hours of tape, and I assembled a 40-minute compilation (called Wilburforce) to be released along with a four-track recording of the Animals show as the first official Trucks Leaving album. Fortunately, Will and Danny had enough objective judgement to realize that the tapes should never be heard by anyone, ever, and they vetoed the project.

Recording Wilburforce in Haliburton.

After our show at Vern's Cafe on May 20, 2000 (one of the best Trucks Leaving gigs ever), we realized that continuing as a trio would limit our ability to play fluid shows; Danny and I spent the evening trading between guitar and bass. To the rescue came Steve Kado.

After a few shows as a four-piece and mounting arguments over artistic control and all that other pointless crap that bands always argue about, I left Trucks Leaving and relaunched my solo "career." Theresa's Sound-World guitarist/vocalist Dov Tiefenbach was hired to take my place, and the band played one show without me in August, 2000 (though they weren't completely without me, since I was the opening act and I also joined them on stage for a song at the end).

Soon after, I rejoined Trucks Leaving and we played a show at the El Mocambo with several of our friends' bands. We discovered that the chaos inherent in a band with five big egos could make for deliciously unpredictable live performances, and nowhere was that more apparent than at our Hallowe'en 2000 gig at the Oasis. We thought we were perhaps the worst band in the history of the universe, but we received more compliments after that show than after any other we'd done. Ah, beautiful cacophony.

The problem with chaos, though, is that it's kinda hard to control. And so, after a concert at the Tranzac in November -- in which we stripped down to the original trio and played a set of covers by everyone from Gloria Gaynor to Pavement -- the band went on what I believe is referred to in the industry as an "extended hiatus."

During our time off, Will turned his full attention to Oldmandog, and they became one of the tightest and most intricate rock bands in the city. Danny converted The Unseen Guest into a full band (often including members of Oldmandog), and recorded an EP with Dale Morningstar in the summer of 2001. I began playing regular gigs -- and, for a while, hosting the open stage -- at The Free Times Cafe. In June, I held informal rehearsals with Danny (on bass) and Dov (on drums) that lasted until the end of the summer. Though we never played a gig, it clued Dov and me into how much we liked making music together.

In August 2001, Dov began talking about forming a collective to take over the world with guitars. Danny, Will and I were all on board from the early planning stages, and by the end of the year Community Co-op was booking and promoting shows for its member bands (including The Unseen Guest, Oldmandog and Theresa's Sound-World). Around the same time, I released my fifth solo album, ghost, which featured performances by Danny and Will and a couple songs arranged by them and by Dov.

Meanwhile, back at the Free Times, Danny and I had a problem: we promised our friend Ryan that we'd perform an entire Beatles album at a Fab Four tribute gig he was organizing for March 2002. We immediately enlisted Will, and since it was the three of us (and we were playing a gig similar to our first show two years earlier) we agreed that might as well revive the old Trucks Leaving moniker. We decided to perform Abbey Road, we determined who should sing what songs, and then...we did nothing.

With the show a mere month away, Will backed out in favour of a gig with his much-more-organized cohorts in Oldmandog. Danny and I agreed that Abbey Road would sound like shit without a drummer, and that we didn't want to play the show with any other drummer than Will. So we made two decisions: first, that we would do the already-rough Let It Be instead; and second (and, as it turns out, more more importantly), that we would hire Adelphia singer/guitarist Betty Dimo to help with vocal harmonies and guitar.

The three of us got on better than any party could have hoped, and before long Betty and I began talking about future projects. It had been determined at a Co-op meeting that I was the only person with a sentimental attachment to the name Trucks Leaving, and that I could use it as the name for the group I planned to form as soon as I could. Danny offered his support in whatever context I needed him, Betty agreed to join on (I'd already hired her to accompany me for a Co-op show I was playing in April) and Dov offered his services on drums.

Betty and I played a show in April 2002 with The Unseen Guest and Theresa's Sound-World, and since Dov's band was already going to be there I asked him to play drums on a couple of songs. The three of us played a great show, and with Danny's confirmation the lineup for Trucks Leaving was sealed. Rumours of our death, apparently, were highly exaggerated.

We played shows throughout the summer and early fall, and entered Dov's T.S. Studio in October to record We turn you on you're a radio. It was finished by early December. In a rare show of festive spirit, we even lovingly wrapped the CDs in bright orange ribbon.

Dov, recording We turn you on you're a radio at his excellent T.S. Studio.

We hosted a we-released-this-record-ages-ago-but-never-had-a-release-party-until-now release party for the album on March 12, 2003 at Sneaky Dee's. This show also featured the debut of the Trucks Leaving power trio: me on bass, screaming and a bit of guitar, Dov on drums and Betty Dimo on guitars and singing.

We spent the rest of the spring working on new songs for what was then to be the next record, a song cycle called Women I've seen naked. Those plans were temporarily shelved, though, when we accidentally wrote The six flavours of quarks. We decided to record the latter before returning to the former, so we returned to T.S. Studio in the fall and -- with only three microphones -- laid down The six flavours of quarks in a weekend and change. It was released on November 27.

The new year started with a hiatus as Dov and I worked on the new Theresa's Sound-World album. But, in early spring, we again started practicing and gigging occasionally. Additionally, plans were made to have Women I've seen naked ready for a spring 2005 release. I also started cooking up a little experiment in aural and distributory subversion.

Dov and the band parted ways later that spring, and by the end of the summer we enlisted in the help of our good friend Jones. He debuted on drums with us on August 12 at the Cameron House, but when he told us he'd rather play keys, guitars, bass and other noises, we could hardly say no. Dov graciously agreed to return to the fold at the end of the summer, just in time to start work on Wipeoutpop -- our public-domain album.

By this time, Betty and I had fully integrated themselves into Theresa's Sound-World, and Jones was getting set to make a record with Shawn Hewitt and the National Strike! Still, four Wipeoutpop sessions took place that fall, with the band recording beds live to DAT in Betty's bedroom. But the year clicked over, and for the first time since 1996, I did not put out a record.

Early in the new year, we invited Virginia to join us at practices. We played a show with her at the Drake in March, and then hosted the second annual house concert in early April. Then we stopped practicing for many months. Once in a while, one or two of us would record bits for Wipeoutpop. Mostly, though, we focused on our other projects.

In the fall of 2005, I started to panic. If we didn't finish Wipeoupop soon, it would mean I'd gone two years without putting out a record. This would not stand!! We worked like demons on Wipeoutpop throughout October and November, and had it finished on December 1. By this time, Virginia and I were a month away from marrying each other, Dov was living in L.A., and Jones was touring on a regular basis with Shawn. I kinda thought maybe this was the big finish.

But the new year once again brought a fresh perspective, and we decided to take a breath and dive. Will agreed to take over on drums, and we invited Paul Kolinski from Silent Five to join us on bass and whatever. We even found a new rehearsal space. Once again, we were starting again. The new sextet played shows throughout 2006, and quickly gelled into the best TL lineup yet. We ran out of copies of Wipeoutpop at every show we played -- most likely because it was free, but also, we hope, partially due to the fact that some people were into it.

After our November show at The Boat, we decided to break from playing live to focus on making a record and, more immediately in Vir and Todd's case, making a person.

Last updated February 11, 2007.

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