PAGE 14 September 26, 1985 The Other Press

Playing with myself

The last time | saw a one man band
was on Granville street last spring.
He was wearing close to 80 pounds of
equipment which overflowed into a

 

fied several Simmons drum sensors so
that his right foot controls the bass
and snare while his left foot sets off
the cymbals. Since he’s a percussion-
ist he arranged four mini Simmons
drums on his chest for solos.

Although he uses modern elec-
tronics to perform the 120 plus songs
in his repetoire (including Satis-
faction, Bang a Gong, Stray Cat Strut
and his own modification of Cocaine,
which he says is his most popular
tune in Whistler) everything is live.
The guitar comes from his right side
synth, rhythm from the left. A
headset microphone completes the
equipment. He even ‘controls the
lighting board with some carefully
placed floor switches.

When onstage McRorie looks like
one of those gamblers who wire
themselves up with computers to beat
the system. Offstage he wolfs down
nine grain granola and gulps water.
To keep in shape he lifts weights and
runs five miles a day. ‘‘You have to
have endurance to do this every
night.’’

 

 

 

 

 

by Dave Watson

 

 

 

Supervalu cart. He was probably safe
trom any weapon with a calibre of less
than 105mm.

Now technology has made the life
of a solo entertainer much simpler, or
at least lightened his load. The
pioneer in this modern field is
McRorie, currently performing at a
variety ef bars and clubs throughout
this great province of ours.

Originally McRorie belonged to a
five piece band as drummer (he has
20 years of percussion experience),
but the recession resulted in a de-
crease to duo-ality. Around the be-
ginning of August McRorie got left on
his own.

Rather than get depressed about
the breakup of the popular duo he had
belonged to he strapped on two
Yamaha keyboard synths and modi-