FFWD Weekly
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Music by Aubrey McInnis DANKO JONES with Tricky Woo October 17 Night Gallery The first time I went to a Danko Jones show, I was calmly sitting at the side on the Night Gallery's cushy couchasaurus. Before Danko and his two bandmates took the stage, I thought, man, if this guy is one iota as good live as he is canned, then he may blow the boundaries of rock music in Canada into non-existence. When he took the stage in a sleek suit and felt fedora and peeled into his first song, I instantly waded through a thick crowd and rushed to stand front and centre beside a gal pal. It was incredible. Like the rest of the audience, our eyes were glued to his – in between checking out the poised ferocity of the other members playing their instruments. We wondered who the devil woman was who made such an indelible mark on this fierce guitarist's heart. He licked his lips with a snarl, steamrolled through songs about heartache and heartbreak and we remembered everyone who'd ever done us wrong. But it was the hungry, charging rhythm of the trio's fearless rock 'n' roll that reeled in almost everyone in the room. The second the band finished, we knew that we had the best gig to lord over our friends until the next time he came back. Surprisingly enough, Danko comes off as a quiet, intense guy. Press has complained that he's not loquacious during interviews, but all that needs to be said is in the music – you just have to hear it. Today, Danko is sitting somewhere in the middle of the 2,000 records in his collection, where Bad Brains, ZZ Top, Led Zeppelin, the Stones, the Makers, Allman Brothers, D'Angelo and GodSpeedYouBlackEmperor always seem to rise to the top of the pile. Over the phone from his Toronto home – which he lovingly refers to as a box – he admits that he has different mindsets on and off stage, but he doesn't concede that there's any blatant change in his personality. "I can be really quiet. Sometimes I can't help it, but I think that when you are put on stage, something is expected of you. When you are playing the kind of music we play, it's even more expected of you. "There are certain expectations that an audience comes to our shows with, and it's those expectations that challenge me and scare the shit out of me. Every night you have to live up to those expectations that you've built. "When we were building them, there weren't any expectations, so it's always been this thing where we have to prove ourselves and that's a challenge. And it's fun as hell if you're confident enough to know that you can do it. If you're not, I'm pretty sure it must be a hellride. "Everybody reacts differently when they're put on stage. A lot of people would just close up and implode, but I do the opposite. So what you are watching is a reaction from someone who's looking at hundreds of people. You're very vulnerable in that position and that's how I react to it. When you have maybe a thousand eyes staring at you, it's really intense. I like to put myself in intense situations. I like extremes." I think I heard a sigh when he uttered that last sentence, as though he's just come to grips with his own personality. Still, a show led by Danko Jones – also known as the Mango Kid and the Brown Panther – is unmistakably and extremely intense. The squeamish may mess their pants, but if you can allow yourself to surrender to the music, you may have a spiritual experience. "It's better than drugs and it's better than sex. It's the most intense feeling I have ever had in my life, so to be able to do that every night is great, it's a fun feeling." Hold your breath, Danko Jones will be releasing his first full-length album this spring.

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