Why Spencer Burton Rules by Nick Ferrio (2015)
Spencer Burton
I first met Spencer Burton in 2009. He was playing guitar in Attack in Black and I was playing bass in the Burning Hell. We were sharing a bill at a venue in Peterborough called the Montreal House. It was summer time and the air was sticky with humidity. The dog days of summer. It seemed like most people had left the city for a cottage or a lake and no one was interested in seeing a sweaty, rock and roll show. While we eagerly waiting for an audience to show up, Spencer introduced himself and asked if I wanted to play some pool. I agreed. I loved playing pool. Little did he know, I thought of myself as a pool shark. My uncles had trained me, spending many summers of my wasted youth in smoky rooms around the billiards table instead of doing my homework or my chores.
Right from the moment he chalked up his cue, I knew Spencer was truly a pool shark. He was like the Great white shark of the pool table. From the first break he put in three balls. Bang. Two stripes and a solid. Spencer chose solids, giving me the advantage of a free two stripes. A gift. After all, this is a gentleman’s game. From that point on, it was as if he had the ball in hand. He moved around the table effortlessly, like a shark in shallow waters. He prowled around the pool table, grinning through that red beard, barely letting me see a dorsal fin and run for shore before he pocketed the eight ball and started racking ‘em for another game. Fatal. I barely got a shot in. That shark.
Since that first game of pool, Spencer and I have played pool at many clubs and bars in Canada. We started playing music together and toured around playing a lot of places with a lot of pool tables. We’ve played pool together in Newfoundland. We’ve played pool together in Regina. We’ve played pool together in Sackville. We’ve played a lot of pool. And Spencer, well, he just kept getting better. He got so good at pool; he even started bringing his own cue on tour with him.
Spencer Burton has this easy way of making you laugh while he slowly rips your heart out with every stroke of the cue. Same goes for his songs.
Nick Ferrio will perform at Kazoo! Fest 2015 and is also a member of The Burning Hell.
