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The Grass Company
Once a Days / Once a Child - 7"
Sound - 1968
Michael Panontin
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In May 1967 The Windsor Star featured a story in its Saturday entertainment section with the hyperbolic headline "Sarnia's Answer to the Beatles". The fact that it was about a group that were barely into their teens and had not even released a record didn't seem to matter much. In the piece, Blair McKinnon writes, without even a hint of irony, that "the swinging Sarnia combo the Grass Company could go 'big time' almost anytime, but school studies must come first".
Of course, from here in the future we know that the Grass Company went nowhere but did in fact release one single the following year. And were it not for the fact the group contained a young prodigy on guitar named Kim Mitchell, few people these days would even care.
The Grass Company formed in the Imperial City out of the remnants of two bands, the Quotations (the 14-year-old Mitchell and drummer Brian McLellan) and Unit Four (keyboardist and British-born Phil Goodwin along with two 15-year-olds, guitarist Jim Chevalier and bassist David Myles). In lieu of a garage, the budding rock stars were fortunate enough to have Mitchell's rec room as a practice space. And, I suppose, Mitchell's supportive mother, who we are told gladly suffered the boys' house-rattling ruckus even though she "has to straighten out pictures in the living room upstairs or china in the china cabinet".
But like all bands, the Grass Company got better. They found gigs wherever they could, locally at first at area high schools and at the iconic Rose Gardens roller rink, whose weekly record hops would often host bigger names like Ronnie Hawkins, the Guess Who, David Clayton Thomas and Bobby Curtola. They even got to headline the 1967 Centennial celebrations in Sarnia that year. By '68, the group were venturing farther afield, with tours across southern Ontario and into southeastern Michigan, with at least one documented show in support of the MC5 at Battle Creek, Michigan's Kellogg Community College.
So it is probably no surprise that when the Grass Company finally did get the chance to make a record, it was for a Detroit-area label across the border, in this case the New Haven-based Sound imprint, which had issued the cool 'Sympathize' single by fellow Sarnians the Volcanoes the year before. Like the Volcanoes single, 'Once a Days' was produced by the erstwhile Detroit-area rocker Johnny Powers (of 'Long Blond Hair, Red Rose Lips' fame). The brooding 'Once a Days' was the group's stab at psychedelia, but it's mostly forgettable and of interest only for its creative use of sax and bells towards the end of the song. Much better is the ace 'Once a Child over on the underside. Though the vocals underwhelm a tad, the tune is carried by Chevalier's languorous groove and then later seared to perfection by the young Mitchell's scorching hot guitar solo.
But what about that grammatically challenged title, which surely must have had the radio jocks flummoxed back in the day? Cal Wallis, a friend who at the age of 19 lent the band his bongos for the recording session, was kind enough to email us with the scoop. "As I recall," he told CM, "this was actually supposed to be called 'Days' but there was a bit of a mix-up and the 'Once a' part was added mistakenly due to Jim's song being 'Once a Child' - a printing error, I guess you could say."
The Grass Company would go through some name changes and a move to the big smoke - Toronto, that is - but ultimately met with little success. The guys returned to Sarnia leaving a near-starving Mitchell to fend for himself back in T.O. Undaunted, he found work playing in hotels and airport bars and even spent some time in Greece backing up a Greek Tom Jones. Mitchell eventually hooked up with his childhood friend Pye Dubois, chopped off his bangs and finally went big time with the hugely successful Max Webster in 1973.
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