The Gruff | Biogruffies | Recent Fun | Music | Come See Us!  | Contact Us | Pics
Links | Art and Stuff | Tour Journal | FAQ

Wednesday Sept 5, home at last.
48 days  14,760kms  $2965.09 to fuel a thirsty van...

a map of where we've been and the trouble that we got in...
Tuesday Sept 4 BC Ferry

The ferry lineup!!
After a nice BC Ferry cafeteria dinner we're sitting around on the ferry talking about our epic journey that is now coming to a close. The show in Penticton was the perfect way to end the tour. The Can Coffee Co is a great venue and everyone that came out was really great. For the second night in a row we got to relish in the feeling of sound tech trust, and everything went smoothly. We even had a surprise visit from Cousin Gerry who listened to our CD, really liked it, and then discovered that his Uncle is married to our good friend James' Aunt. Crazy. So he jumped on his motorbike and came up to say hi. After breakfast with our friends Paul and Julie we loaded up and headed out. The Goose showed her appreciation for the end of tour by suddenly fixing the stereo. Terri turned it on just as she has done every day since it broke and this time Genticorum came blaring out of the speakers in a joyous eruption of sound! We made good use of the return of the music on the drive to Tswwassen where we enjoyed one last game of frisbee as we waited for the ferry.
Tour wrap up will be tomorrow, complete with a van wash! Plans of our next tour have already begun....

Monday Sept 3 Penticton, BC
We're currently hanging out at Can Coffee Company in Penticton waiting for the last sound check of the tour. We're both excited that we're about to complete the biggest tour of our lives so far and also sad that it'll be over soon. The show at the Arts Station in Fernie was really great! The audience was another one for the list of favourite audiences (we've added a lot of those to the list on this tour so far). They even did the wave for our folkumentary! We were also pleasantly surprised by the arrival of a couple of rowdy treeplanting skids who happened to be on their way home from work in Alberta and stopped in to get gruffed up a bit.

Phaedra with skid 1 and skid 2 at the Royal after our show in Fernie
We got to have breakfast with our favourite Fernie friend Troy before hitting the road early this morning. On the way, we had a very exciting stop in Grand Forks where Adam consumed a Boston Milkshake for the first time. None of us had ever heard of it before and were quite amazed to learn that it's a milkshake with a sundae on top! Adam ate the whole thing and didn't even barf. While Adam consumed his bucket of ice cream we met Cousin Gerry from Midway who really wanted to see Terri's bass once he found out what we did. We got some good footage of him playing it in the parking lot before getting back on the road.
Sunday Sept 2 Fernie, BC

We're officially back in our home province. It seemed like we'd never get here and then all of a sudden, the mountains rose up on the horizon and then we were here. Our weekend in Nanton was very special. We lived and played at the Auditorium Hotel where it turns out that lots of our friends and idols have been before us. Corb Lund even brought a bull into that bar to film one of his music videos. The bar itself is right up our alley. There's a buffalo hide beside the stage, a cougar over the bar, ducks, foxes, even a jackaloup up on the wall as well as farm implements and all sorts of great signs and stickers. The whole thing is rounded off with a gun rack that runs almost the whole length of one wall, some gambling machines and a jukebox that our CD might be in one day if we're lucky. The shows were fun and not having to drive even a block on Saturday was just what we needed to give us enough energy to finish off the tour right. We left Nanton looking forward to the next time (and sad that we couldn't stay until Monday to help Dave with his cattle branding) and headed West along secondary highway 533 that we've never driven before. It was just perfect. The drive to Fernie was nice and short despite the extreme road rage inspiring Sunday drive traffic. Now we're hanging out at The Northern our usual haunt playing pool and waiting for sound check.

Friday Aug 31 Nanton, AB
The Castle Rock Pub in St Albert looks like a castle and is located in a giant strip mall. After our show, we lay in bed in our stale cigarette/pee scented cheap (but not cheap enough) motel room with the ring of upper frequency feedback in our ears and talked about our feelings. We came to the conclusion that although selling your soul for a pub show just aint no kind of life (and might just make you deaf), gas is expensive. We spent the drive to Nanton working on a way to turn all the discarded Tim Hortons coffee cups that populate the highway into fuel for The Goose.

Wednesday Aug 29 Saskatoon, SK
If you're ever looking for a motel in Dryden, visit the Trans Canada Motel on 3rd. It was just about perfect. Good rates, a good restaurant and a Laundromat. What more could you want? We had a great round of perogies for dinner (yay comfort food!) watched some CSI and slept like babies. Breakfast was also quite satisfying and our server was somehow able to guess that we were tree planters. Maybe it's cause Phaedra kept running over to check the dryer during breakfast...

Hooray for the TransCanada Motel!
We left Dryden filled with anticipation for our return to Manitoba where the road is straight and the speed limit is high. After one little stop near Kenora where the line up for the Tim Hortons drive through went all the way out into the street we hit that blissful prairie highway and arrived in Winnipeg just in time to meet our new friends from the Brandon Folk Festival, The Dusty Roads Band. They threw us a BBQ, put us up and even came to our show! The show was super fun. Not a large audience but a really fun one. There was dancing and cheering and rounds of shots for all. We ended up back home pretty late where we bingo daubed love for Gruffs on the arms of those who partook of the spirits a little too heavily before crashing out all over the basement.

Gruffians with Dusty and Jake and their friend Brent at Tryst
Once we finally dragged ourselves out of bed and got some breakfast into us, the day was almost half over. Tragedy struck as we were driving through Winnipeg on the way to the highway. We hit a bump, and the stereo stopped working. *insert screaming here* The stereo itself still works but there was not a sound coming out of any speaker. We pulled off the highway at a gas station once we got out of the city and pulled off the dash to have a look at what we could find. After fiddling around with it for a while with the help of a lovely gentleman from the gas station we thought we had it working again and set off for Saskatoon only to find that we were wrong and it wasn't fixed at all. It was a long quiet drive (during which it rained bugs on the windshield and we saw one of the most awe inspiring sunsets ever) to Saskatoon where we arrived late in the evening to eat pizza and watch more CSI. It feels good to be back on the prairies. Manitoba is just about the most beautiful thing there ever was. Tomorrow we'll hit Alberta. Only five shows left....

bug rain aka really big snot on the windshield - Yellow Head Highway, Manitoba
Monday Aug 27 Dryden, ON
Sault Ste Marie struck out on this tour... First of all we made the mistake of running out of time for dinner and ate at the hotel restaurant. Barf. Then hardly anyone came to the show. The audience that did come was very appreciative though which was really nice. Unfortunately, some of us Gruffs were suffering from road block and couldn't muster the energy required for one of those memorable shows. We sure had a good sleep though. After Sault Ste Marie it was back to Naturally Superior Adventures in Wawa on Lake Superior. We rolled in exhausted and cranky but it didn't take long for the amazing rejuvenating energy of the place to kick in. The show was wonderful. Lots of people came and there were even a few repeat audience members from last time. We even managed to stay up for a while singing Weezer and Regina Spektor with some of the Naturally Superior staff and our new Katimavik friends which was super fun. We left pretty early this morning feeling tired but somehow refreshed for our long drive to Dryden where we are now doing laundry (thank the lord!!) and watching TV!

breakfast - the most important meal of the day
Saturday Aug 25 Sudbury, ON
Last time we played at The Townehouse in Sudbury, not a lot of people came out. Last night was just about the polar opposite. Local band The Rubes opened up the show while us Gruffs worked on our terrible pool skills, and once we took to the stage the room was just packed with crazy drunk Sudbury-ers dancing and yelling and having a great time! Having completed our rite of passage last time by staying in the basement band room, we arrived back at our hotel courtesy of Jeremy the sound tech and one of the Townehouse Army and fell into bed to dream of breakfast at the Laughing Buddha.

pool sharks in Sudbury
Friday Aug 24 Laughing Buddha, ON
The more we visit Toronto (the city of late night pizza), the more it grows on us. We had a really awesome time jamming with Marc, Will and Rob of Crazy Strings fame at the Silver Dollar Room on Wednesday night. All of a sudden we're a bluegrass big band!! Our gracious hosts the Good Lovelies were both good and lovely to us (although we could have used more toilet paper...) We spent most of the day on Thursday walking around Kensington Market where we found some really good finds including real bonafide cowboy boots for Jenny and Phaedra! Thursday night at The Cameron House was a really fine experience. The venue is really cool, and despite the sound which was a hardship, we aim to play there again... And so many surprise and expected friends alike came out to say hello! We also learned a particularly suitable definition of Gruff:
Refers to an unpolished, unceremonious manner but usually implies hearty good nature...
We're back in the land of tiny trees and rocks now in Sudbury. We will spend all of our time here in three locations: our hotel room, The Townehouse Tavern and the fabulous Laughing Buddha where we will eat all the food that we can consume for the next 24 hours.

Gruff at The Cameron House in Toronto
Thursday Aug 23 Toronto, ON
36 days on the road, 9783 kms, $2062.25 spent on gas...

The Goose on Queen St W.
Wednesday Aug 22 Kingston, ON
Where the whole town of Peterborough smells like oatmeal cookies, our show in Kingston smelt like apple crisp. Mmmm. We got to be part of the new Apple Crisp Concert Series and it was fantastic. A local Kingston funky rock-ish band called The Tangible Ears opened for us which was really fun. (We also made note of the fact that there seems to be a trend of surprise opening rock bands on this tour...) Then we all ate peachy crisp and played one of our nicest shows on this tour so far. Our audience was wonderful (they're saying hi below) as were the Apple Crisp folk, the sound and basically the whole experience. Top it all off with breakfast at the Sleepless Goat and a nice thorough vacuuming of The Midnight Goose and we're good to go!

Tuesday Aug 21 Peterborough, ON
Peterborough smells like oatmeal cookies. We're told it's because the Quaker Oats factory is there. Our show at the Rusty Snail was really nice. A very intimate setting. Our friends David and Kelly opened for us and we played totally acoustic which is always nice. We also met Claude who told us all about his guitar Stella whom he rescued from a garage sale. We're going to write a song about her.

Terri at The Rusty Snail
Monday Aug 20 Ottawa, ON
The Ottawa Folk Festival is coming to a close and The Gruff are preparing to set out once again. The Midnight Goose has spent the weekend in the shop and we get to pick her up tomorrow with brand new front suspension springs and no more list to the right.  Our weekend has been great as well. It started out a little quiet... we started to call this festival an indoor voices only festival but Sunday's events changed that opinion quite a bit.

Ottawa Folk Fest audience... Hi Dad!
Our first workshop this morning was probably the most interesting (and awkward) workshop we've ever been part of. The stage was just packed with musicians from all over the world who had been jamming together all week leading up to the festival. We were unable to make any of these jams and showed up not knowing what to expect. It turned out to be quite fun despite the early morning chaos of handfuls of musicians and only a few microphones (not to mention the lack of sleep last night....).  Later in the afternoon we got to participate in what is probably the best (and rowdiest!) workshop we've been in yet with our new friends Hoots and Hellmouth from Philadelphia. An hour of good vibes and foot stomping fun later we finished it off with a joyful rendition of Leonard Cohen's Halleluiah and set out to prepare for the evening main stage show.

Gruff and Hoots and Hellmouth And Jenny with Old Man Luedecke and Dirk Powell
Tonight's mainstage show proved to be quite an exciting one for us Gruffs. Our very own Adam got invited on stage by the amazing Dirk Powell and Martha Scanlan for a beautiful and heart wrenching set before one of our other favourites, Eliza Gilkyson took to the stage. Loaded up with new CDs for the road we headed back to the hotel to play more music in the hotel bar and spend a few more hours with all of our new friends.

Adam on mainstage with Dirk Powell and Martha Scanlan
Friday Aug 17 Ottawa, ON
Ottawa Festival day one for Gruff has come to an end. Well... not quite but we're back in our hotel rooms watching the Simpsons in our pj's. So far the festival has been kind of cold and stormy... It rained sideways while we were at The Works having dinner with Phaedra's family but the rain didn't last too long. The wind and cold sure did though... we had a nice little moment, despite the cold, huddled together on a mildew-ey tarp watching Kris Kristofferson and drinking copious amounts of hot chocolate. Tomorrow morning The Midnight Goose has yet another appointment with a mechanic for some strange sort of creaky clunking noise that developed on the drive from New Brunswick, and The Gruff are looking forward to having their palms read and a workshop with The Doug and Jess Band.

Oh Susanna
Thursday Aug 16 Ottawa, ON
We're in Ottawa now after spending a fun filled night in Montreal. Le Divan Orange was really fun. Great food and fun friends. Dara Weis, Terry Joe and Heather from Yonder Hill ripped up some wicked bluegrass tunes and everyone had a great time.

Le Divan Orange
After the show we went for some late night poutine and then some well deserved sleeping.
We topped off our Montreal experience with some crazy driving and banana chocolate crepes (which we ordered in French!) for breakfast. Now we're holed up in Phaedra's brother's basement again resting up for a big weekend at the Ottawa Folk Festival.

Poutine!
Monday Aug 13 New Brunswick
We're headed West again! Here we are in a motel in Edmundston (we made sure to spend an hour on the phone reserving one before we left this time...) full of buffet dinner and all settled in with showers and TV contemplating another life changing week in Nova Scotia. After the power finally came back on in Sydney, we waited and waited for an audience to come and for the first time in seven years, we gave up and went home. In this case, home was an hour away through a rain storm so it made it even nicer to get there. The next day we were up bright and early to drive down to Lunenburg for the festival. Our set got moved to an earlier time slot so we ended up missing our sound check and running around like crazy for a while before we got to get up on stage in front of one of the nicest audiences ever.

Our friends and billets took great care of us (and our Wolfville kidnapp-ees The Hupman Brothers), we spent lots of time throwing the frisbee with new friends and old, had a wrestling match, saw a couple more sun rises and even had a fire side song share during the Perseid meteor shower. We checked our van into the doctor and two new tires and shocks, a tire alignment and headlight redirection and she purrs like a kitten again. (big thanks to Bill MacDonald!) The van fix-up delayed our departure from Nova Scotia by a day so we planned a nice relaxing, early to bed, quiet reflection kind of evening but ended up staying awake til the wee hours playing un jeu de poker en franglais with The McDades.
Montreal here we come!

Wednesday Aug 8 Sydney, NS
After a slow sort of morning we packed everything up and headed to Cape Breton for the first time ever! It seemed to take a while to get here and we're looking forward to dropping the Midnight Goose off at the van doctor when we get to Lunenburg tomorrow for some TLC (we're looking forward to some of that ourselves at this point....) Sydney is a neat little place. There's a giant fiddle here. We had some dinner, played frisbee in a vacant lot and hung out on the stair with the banjo while waiting for the venue to open and are inside now waiting patiently to play as soon as the power comes back on....
\
Waiting outside The Upstairs in Sydney
Tuesday Aug 7 Halifax, NS
Wolfville is rapidly turning into one of our most favourite stops on our Nova Scotia route. Paddy's Pub was just packed right full for the Monday night open mic which is always one of the best open mics we've ever been to. People were singing and clapping, and Matt Anderson showed up  to sing a few songs. There were even some people from Victoria there! After receiving the royal treatment at the pub, we were invited to a great party complete with blues jams and a fire pit at the house we stayed at where we witnessed our second Nova Scotia sunrise. After breakfast at the Irving Big Stop in New Minas and a dip in the swimming hole we packed up and headed back to Halifax for our show at Ginger's with Vancouver's Dyad and more good times had by all.

Dyad
Monday Aug 6, Wolfville, NS
The Gruff loves Nova Scotia! We've already started calling Lunenburg home again... It's a good thing we've got dates booked all the way home or we might just stay! When we woke up after some lengthy afternoon naps, we rounded up some friends and headed over to Mahone Bay to see the Klunkers play at the Mug and Anchor and arrived just in time to see some boats playing war in the harbour with smoke machines and flares and big cannon sounds and everything. After a pint of the local bitter we headed back home again for some more sleeping. After driving all the way from the West Coast, the drive up to Halifax was so short it was practically fun! We met up with our friend Dusty Keeler there and took him to our show in Dartmouth (after the compulsory stop at the comic book and coffee/internet shops.) The show was great and so were the Leprechaun burgers. Terri's friend from years ago came out to see us and took some great pictures too. One of them was a picture of her singing into a pepper shaker in front of the stage but she didn't send that one along....

Celtic Corner in Dartmouth
Saturday Aug 4th, Lunenburg NS
Well, we made it all the way from coast to coast! We left Ottawa yesterday at about 2PM planning to travel to somewhere in Quebec or New Brunswick to spend the night. When we got to Montreal, our Midnight Goose started to wobble a bit and then she started to wobble a lot, and then we got worried. We stopped just outside Montreal (after it took us 2 hours to get passed the city in rush hour) at a truck stop to eat and wait for the CAA guy to come along. He said it was probably nothing but we should take it down the road to Canadian Tire and have it looked at. We ended up driving 15 hours straight to Nova Scotia instead. We followed a storm all the way through Quebec and caught up to it just East of Quebec City. It was the biggest storm that most of us have ever been in. We ended up right in the middle, thunder and lighting, rain and hail so heavy it was almost impossible to see. Phaedra pulled over for a breather (don't worry, we didn't get out of the van) until a transformer nearby blew up filling the sky with bright blue light and everyone got too nervous to stay still so she started out driving again really slowly with four way flashers on. We were in and out of the storm all the way into New Brunswick where Terri took over the drive and tried to find a motel with vacancy for us to sleep in. There was no vacancy in all of New Brunswick and when we got to Fredericton and the sun started coming up we decided we were too close to Nova Scotia, and it was getting too close to morning to stop. We made it to Lunenburg around 11:30AM and are now holed up at our wonderful friends house recovering.

Thursday Aug 2nd, Ottawa ON
15 days on the road, 4885 kms, $1267 spent on gas.


Wednesday Aug 1st, near Sudbury ON
So, everyone told us it would feel like we were driving through the prairies for ever. And it was true that you could see forever while you were driving through them, but Northern Ontario sure feels like it's going a lot slower. We've also had a lot of trouble finding places to hook up to the internet. Tomorrow we'll be in Ottawa, and that's when you'll be able to see this. Here's where we've been:
The Brandon Folk Festival! Was great! We had lots of fun and made lots of new friends. We spent most of the weekend hanging out with newly adopted gruff, David Hein. He makes comics, has a great song about jet packs that we got to play along with at a workshop and likes apple pie (a la mode). The weather was super hot and we had to douse our heads under the tap a few times so as not to give in to heat comas. The campground was loud and the after party was super fun. Good times all around.


Jenny on stage and Phaedra with festival A.D. Matt Duboff

After our lovers lost and scorned workshop on Sunday afternoon we took David to Winnipeg on our way to Kenora which seemed like a pretty cute little place even though it was dark and we were hot, tired, hungry and cranky. We set up tent by lightening storm at Rushing River Provincial Park and slept in for the first time so far! We think it's cause it wasn't sunny and boiling hot. At least not until later in the day....


the graveyard that is our front grill...
When it comes to Thunder Bay, unfortunately all I can say at this point in time is: Thank goodness for the saving grace of The Apollo in that otherwise crappy waste of space that is Thunder Bay. Disagree? Please convince me otherwise (gruff@thegruff.com). Despite our dislike of the city, our time spent at the Apollo was super fun. The venue and sound are great and we were treated like royalty. We also got to meet a couple of great bands from Winnipeg who were also on the bill called The Details and The Paperbacks both of whom we really enjoyed.

And then it was off to paradise... but not before we had a seriously failed attempt at finding decent, quick breakfast in Thunder Bay. We ended up at Robbins Donuts. (Timmy Ho where are you!!).  As soon as we hit Lake Superior though, things started to lighten up. Our concert and stay at Naturally Superior Adventures was absolutely fantastic. We got to go swimming and eat a wonderful dinner with all the guests at the Lodge. Lots of people came out and it wasn't even That hot! In the words of Adam, Wawa is Wawawesome!
Right now we're on our way to another provincial park to camp near Sudbury.

Gruffin' it!

Friday July 27th, Winnipeg MB
Ok, ok... the prairies are flat. Turns out that maybe it was just a little bit too dark to see the flatness. (Or the bug paste that is covering the the windshield was just too thick to see through.) It wasn't too dark to find the Sweet Shoppe in Mortlach though! If you're ever passing through be sure to check it out. They're open late, and you can't miss em! Our show at Bushwakker's in Regina was super fun and they definitely have the best beer on this tour so far. Now we're in Winnipeg and it's hot. It seems we've just missed the heat wave though which is lucky cause we're basically heat wimps. It's unanimous, Times Change(d) is one of our favourite venues ever and we can't wait to play there again. All of our two friends in Winnipeg came and now we even have a couple more! Romi is recording a show tonight at the bar so we might hang out here and go to that tonight or head back to Brandon for the festival.

Wednesday July 25th, Regina SK
We are officially in uncharted territory for most of us Gruffs. Yesterday we drove the Midnight Goose (who is acutally an Autobot) from Calgary to Regina stopping in Medicine Hat for an oil change and a meal at a 50's diner (seems to be a trend so far in eating habits...) where we played Canadian trivia while we waited patiently in the blissful air conditioned restaurant. We picked up our friend Shayne from Victoria in Calgary and he will travel with us until Brandon as our substitute driver, merch salesman, and guest director/cinematographer for this portion of our documentary. Upon reaching Saskatchewan later in the evening we pulled over to push hay bales around (carefully so we wouldn't wreck them) and run around on the prairie. So far, Jenny and Phaedra are actually a little disappointed that the prairies aren't more... flat. But Shayne has reassured them there will be flatter parts ahead.

Monday July 23rd, Calgary AB
We made it over the mountains! We played our last show of the tour with Serena last night at the Ironwood in Calgary where we had great food, drinks, sound and friends. We picked up Adam there who will be with us for the rest of the tour. He's excited. Today we're not really sure what we're going to do... drift around until we find a suitable place to sleep somewhere between here and Regina perhaps... Or maybe we'll go to see Transformers with Phaedra's cousins!

Saturday July 21, BC
Ok... day three, first journal entry. We certainly hit the ground running... The day before we left Victoria, our beloved van, The Midnight Goose, spent most of the day on the operating table. With a new starter intact, we set off for the ferry on Thursday the 19th to play at the Railway Club in Vancouver with Jess Hill and her band the High Hopes. The trip to Vancouver was very smooth and everything was just peachy. We listened to some road mixes that our friends made for us and talked about how excited we were to finally be on our way. Serena called us later that evening to tell us that she missed the ferry from the Sunshine Coast and was probably going to arrive in Vancouver just in time for the show which she did. And the show was great. Jess Hill was fantastic. She charmed the audience with her unassuming stage banter (with herself) and sang like an angel.

Yesterday we got up at the crack of dawn to make it to a TV interview on the Larry Read show in Kamloops. Everything was going fine until we pulled into the parking lot at the TV station and the van stopped turning. One very stressful soundcheck later, we went back to the parking lot and found the power steering belt lying in the middle of the road... One TV interview later, we met the cheerful tow truck driver in the parking lot and headed over to the mechanic. It didn't take long for them to replace the belt and send us on our way to the lovely town of Ashcroft BC where we were welcomed with tea and open arms at the Ashcroft Opera House which quickly became one of our new favourite venues.

Wonder where we're at right now? Check out our tour journal.

The Gruff have been nominated for Best New/Emerging Act in the 2007 Canadian Folk Music Awards. Yay!!
www.canadianfolkmusicawards.ca/cfma

"The Gruff" is now available at CD Baby! (www.cdbaby.com)
Click here to order!

You can now collect your favourite tunes off of our latest albums from iTunes! Download and be merry.

Pick up the Spring 2007 issue of Penguin Eggs magazine to read our new article!

Yay us! We're happy to announce we were presented "Artist of the Year" at the 2007 Vancouver Island Music Awards.

Today we're on our way to Cranbrook which seems to be quite the distance away. We drove through the desert and beetle kill of Kamloops, past the lakes of Salmon Arm and are currently making our way through the beautiful green forests and mountains of Revelstoke. Jenny and Phaedra picked up a copy of Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows at the gas station in Revelstoke and are both too excited (and prone to motion sickness) to read it yet.