by erin thursby scopes1925@msn.com
What: Enter the Haggis
When: January 16th @ 8PM
Where: Café 11
The power of Celtic rock fusion drives the eclectic band, Enter the Haggis. Though most of their inspiration has been born of the traditional Scottish and Irish tunes, they borrow from many genres, even occasionally throwing in a touch of Latin flair for flavor.
EU caught up with band founder and bagpiper Craig Downie to ask him a few questions about what the band has been up to lately. His voice is very Toronto, particularly on the “abouts.” Downie was born in Scotland but has spent most of his life in Canada, where he learned to play the pipes. “The best place to learn the pipes is just to join up with a pipe band.” Downie recommends “It’s definitely the most economical way to learn because they need pipers for the band, so they’ll generally train you if you have talent and supply you with a uniform and pipes…I started off with the General Motors Pipe Band when I was about 12 years old.” Downie earned extra cash by playing his pipes on the street while trying to make it as an actor in the ‘90s, and formed Enter the Haggis in about ’96. Band members have shifted since the band first started, but their current line-up (Trevor Lewington on guitar, Brian Buchanan on fiddle, Downie on the highland bagpipes, Mark Abraham on bass and James Campbell on drums) hasn’t changed since about ’01. Much of the band joins in on vocals, and Downie and Buchanan have an impressive array of instruments they can play. Buchanan has been known to play the keyboard or the piano and pick up the acoustic guitar as well as his customary fiddle. Downie can throw in a little from a Jew’s harp, the tin whistles and a guitar, when he isn’t squeezing his pipes.
Although the band recorded their latest album, Soapbox Heroes in seclusion, much of the songwriting was done beforehand. “About three-quarters of it was written before we got…[in the studio] but there was definitely some re-arrangement…There’s always stuff that comes together at the last minute.” Recording in seclusion was something new for the band, but something that Downie says was a welcome change:
“It’s great to be able to touch base and say hello, but I think it was great that we had that isolation from people, because when we recorded Causalities of Retail, we had a lot of people…dropping by and that distracted us a little bit. Instead of going ahead and working on the next tune, you say ‘Hey look, you wanna hear this last track we recorded?’ and you end up wasting time. And the studio is a bad place to be wasting time.”
Downie fronts the vocals on ‘Marty’s Last Stand,’ from their 2006 Soapbox Heroes. The song deals with a pacifist who is required to fight, something that has resonance in today’s world, though Downie says that “it’s not meant to be any anti-war or anti-American statement…It’s just a universal story about somebody being pushed into something they didn’t want to do, with tragic consequences at the end.”
Recording and releasing an album wasn’t all the band had done in 2006, they also went on several major tours, including a European tour that went to Scotland and Ireland. “We did a lot of acoustic nights where we would just be at a hotel pub and they keep those things open for as long as the bartender feels like it. The rules are a bit different than they are in America and Canada.” Traveling with the band were 30 lucky fans, giving Enter the Haggis a built-in enthusiastic crowd wherever they played. Because Haggis pulls from so many different genres of music, it’s not surprising that their fans are all very different. Touring with the 30, according to Downie, made for “a lot of variety in conversation.”
If you’re searching for foot-stomping original Celtic rock complete with drinking tunes, mournful pipes and rousing choruses, check out Enter the Haggis at Café 11. Who knows, you too could become a Haggis Head.
|
