66 Wheels! (12 of them being Wheels of Steel) The Kid Koala Bicycle Tour!

Hey Everyone! 

I was asked to do a post recapping our 66 Wheels Bicycle Show. It was an event involving a whole load bikes, 12 turntables and six snacks!  So basically, 3 of my favorite universes colliding!  

The idea was to do bicycle tour of Montreal with six musical stops. "A culinary musical storytelling adventure on wheels."  The day before, we set up turntables in a few of my favorite snack bars (and one book store) in Montreal. At each stop, I would introduce the chef or proprietor of the establishment and they would talk a little bit about how they got started and perhaps highlight some of their menu specialties. They would serve an hors d'oeuvre of one or two of their specialties. I would then break into a couple turntable routines from one of my albums or affiliated projects. Then everyone would jump on their bikes and head to the next stop.

Here's a map of the event:

We started up near the Jean Talon Market at my friend's bicycle store Dumoulin Bicyclette and made our way down to the Old Port of Montreal. The Dumoulin Bicyclette staff were also our "bike-herders".  They led us to each of the destinations safely, taking the most scenic and traffic-free routes.  If ever our peloton got split up the group leaders from Dumoulin Bicyclettes were able to get us all back together. My friend Therèse brought some of her home baked Madeleines and got suited up with helmets, bike gloves as I cut up a couple of routines from the Carpal Tunnel Syndrome era.  

The whole group did a loop around Jarry Park and stopped at Papa Crème, a seasonal Gelato bar set up at 7381 St. Laurent. The chef at Papa Crème is actually the father of my friend Therèse. His dream since he was a kid was to open his own ice cream stand.  Finally, in his retirement years, he moved to Italy to study the art/craft of Gelato making. When he returned to Montreal he opened Papa Crème, creating traditional flavors as well as new flavors inspired from his Vietnamese roots. That day he served his Litchi and Mango Ice as I cut up tracks from Some of My Best Friends Are DJs album.

The next stop was at Drawn & Quarterly in Mile End. Okay, this isn't a restaurant or snack bar, but still one of my favorite destinations in the city.  We distributed wireless headphones to the audience (as not to disturb the other book shoppers) and I played a couple of tunes from the Space Cadet Graphic Novel Soundtrack. Also our friend Clare brought some handmade dumplings and our other friend Chef Kate Lepage brought some of her gourmet popcorn!  If your ever in Sturgeon Falls, Ontario, Kate and her partner Bruno have taken over the RIV Chip Stand. Besides the more standard Chip stand fare featured on the menu, they also do daily special menu items where they develop new recipes and delicious offerings!

Next stop was the plateau. We headed south toward Mont Royal street to Tourtière Australienne or TA pies. It's a little snack stand that specializes in savory pies and Australian and New Zealand specialties. I knew there wasn't enough space for all of us in the shop so we had organized to get the pies to go and chill at Mont Royal park where I played a couple of tracks from the Nufonia Must Fall soundtrack on a portable battery powered turntable set up. My daughter Maple, had also made a drawing that morning for all the attendees and distributed them.

The next stop was Big In Japan, a bar/eatery that serves noodles and snacks.  I set up some 1200s there and cut up some tracks from 12 bit Blues and The Slew.  The proprietors Andre and Julie have just opened a new cabaret called Vol de Nuit about a block away in the plateau area of Montreal. Hope to do a couple events there someday!

Then we headed down to S.A.T., (where we would eventually do the Music To Draw To: IO launch events indoors in their dome theatre in 2019) but that day, we stayed outside in the adjacent park, and met my friend Pascale from Pascale's Ice Cream. We got to try her famous ice cream sandwiches. I played a test pressing preview from the yet to be released Deltron 3030 Event II album as well as some demo tracks from The Storyville Mosquito soundtrack which would premiere 6 years later at Place des Arts! 

Here's the menu/set list:

It was a lovely day. The whole event which we at first thought would take maybe 2 hours, actually ended up taking 5 hours! But nobody seemed to mind as there was plenty of fresh air, music, views and places to visit. Plus, I guess there were enough calories from the snacks to keep everyone going throughout the day. We ended the tour at sunset at the Old Port and we all played a Space Cadet track together using portable turntables and pitched tone tubes. Check out the video link above to see a recap vid! 

Big shout outs to the Pop Montreal volunteers for riding with us and guarding everyone's bikes. We couldn't have done it with their help!

Since then, we've done the 66 Wheels event in Toronto at Luminato Festival which was also a wonderful time. There are plans to eventually set one up in Austin, Copenhagen, and other bike-friendly towns. 

It's indeed quite a bit of organization/preproduction for a pop up event but it was definitely fun time. I'm interested in doing this as a patron event in some cities as touring starts up again! Let's start making a list of local bike shops and snack bars (with sufficient bicycle parking) and see if we can make it happen!

E