Wendell Ferguson is as funny as he is busy.
“I’m a musical prostitute,” he said when asked what projects he’s been involved in. He spends a lot of time recording on other people’s albums including Lethbridge musician Karen Romanchuk and bigger names like Sylvia Tyson.

“I do a lot of session work. The phone rings and I say yes, unless it’s the tax department, then I say no,” Ferguson laughed.
“ I’ve got a little studio in my basement. It’s not Abbey Road, but it’s good. People e-mail me MP3s, I’ll record my part and send it back to them and I can make money in my pyjamas,” he continued adding working at home allows him to incorporate his vast guitar collection.

“When I go out to do a session, I’ll only five or six guitars. But when i work at home I can hear what it needs, so if it needs a baritone guitar, then I have one,” he said.
 But a couple times a year he gets to break from the routine of “making money in my pyjamas,” and gets to hit the road with long tome collaborator Katherine Wheatley.

 The duo will be playing the Lethbridge Folk Club Wolf’s Den, Nov. 10. Their show combines Ferguson’s hot guitar playing and weird sense of humour with Wheatley’s more serious, stories and songs. They will be touring around Alberta and Saskatchewan with a few dates in Manitoba.

 Meanwhile Wheatley has been busy doing her own thing according to Ferguson noting she  was busy touring and playing around the Arctic Circle with scientists and researchers, multi-tasking playing music and driving heavy machinery. She also did a similar thing in the Antarctic.

“So I joked with her, I guess you’re truly bipolar,” Ferguson laughed adding she is also busy running songwriting workshops in schools.
 They alway enjoy getting back together for a tour.

“It’s fun because it’s so fresh. We haven’t seen each other for three months,” he said.

Things slow down ever so slightly this week, but there are still several great shows happening.

 Juno award winners Monkey Junk return to the Geomatic Attic, Nov. 7. The Ottawa based blues trio always  put on an excellent show.
the Lethbridge Folk Club also has a big show this weekend. Wendell Ferguson and Katherine Wheatley combine wicked guitar playing with wit, thoughts and stories.

They play the Wolf’s Den Saturday, Nov. 10. Delhi 2 Dublin also return to Lethbridge this week. The always popular Vancouver based band combine celtic music, world music and hop hop with pop and East Indian music. They always get a good turnout and a lot of support in Lethbridge. They will be playing Scores, Nov. 11.

 And take a trip back to the ’80s with DJ Jazzy Jeff who plays the fifth annual Throw Your Panties party at Studio 54. He will be sharing the stage with a lot of DJs including DJ Skratch Bastid, MC Skillz and DJ Fuze, Nov. 9 at Studio 54.

Ottawa based blues -rock trio MonkeyJunk have tapped into something special.
 They won a Juno Award this year for best blues album for their second CD “To Behold” and took home a guitar case full of Maple Blues awards (five this year), bringing their total up to an even dozen. Not bad for a group that started playing together just for fun in 2008.

MonkeyJunk plays the Geomatic Attic, Nov. 7

“We’re three people who have been playing together for years. We started the band because we are all friends who had been playing together in a lot of different bands. We’re all buddies,” said lead vocalist Steve Marriner, who also holds down the bottom end on baritone guitar in the bass-less band, which also included guitarist Tony D and drummer Matt Sobb.

“We‘re not ever going to have a bass player. It's part of what makes us unique. Tony D and I  have to work hard to fill out the lower end and show there is a lot more than just blazing guitar solos,” Marriner continued. He is a respected  record producer in the Toronto/ Ottawa area, but has been focusing on MonkeyJunk, a name which comes from an off the cuff remark made by blues icon Son House.
They are currently enjoying a very successful tour of Western Canada.

“It’s been going really well, especially in Alberta. We played Sherwood Park on a Sunday night  and we played a room that has a capacity of 400 people and we had over 300 people there, and the Blues Can (in Calgary) was pretty close to sold out,” he enthused,  over a cell phone from Sicamous en route to Penticton.

 The entire year has been going well for them.
“Winning the Juno was especially  nice, not that winning the Maple Blues Awards aren't. But it’s a nice validation of all of our work. And we do a lot of work, because there are a lot of sacrifices. We aren’t with our families,” he continued.
“And while there is more to a music career than just winning awards, it is great to be honoured,” he continued.
The band is excited to be retuning to the Geomatic Attic and  have changed up the show.

“The first half of the show is acoustic, which is nice for people who have seen us before and it keeps the music fresh for us,” he continued adding they are always looking for ways to keep their music fresh.

“The album has been out for a year and a half and we hope to begin working on music for the new one at the end of the year,” he said.
They took a few days off to hole up at the Banff Centre For The Arts.

 I arrived at the Owl just in time for the Void to kick off their tribute to the Ramones, which is more my kind of music. I was pleasantly surprised.

They had huge wooden letters spelling The Void set at the front of the stage and they looked the part of the Ramones wearing leather jackets, torn jeans and T-shirts, even trying to speak in New York accents.

Tall, lanky bassist Johnny Little dressed as Ramones lead singer Ramones complete with tight jeans and hippie sunglasses, writhed as he wound himself around the microphone stand.

Jon Vornbrock sported a short black haired wig and played the role of bassist Dee Dee, who he eerily resembled, and completely overkilled the “Did anybody order pizza,” joke from the Ramones movie Rock and Roll High School.

They even did a “Ramones” version of a Void song “North Side” which sounded more like a catchy pop/punk tinged Ramones song than anything else.

 Rob Cooper played the role of lead guitarist Johnny Ramone, crashing away at his power chords.

Drummer Dean Wilson sported a Ramones T-Shirt and played Marky Ramone, I guess. The other three joked about being dead and wanting pizza and played entertaining covers of Ramones classics including “Rock and Roll High School.,” which they revisited at the end as well as my favourite “Beat on the Brat,” plus “The KKK Took My Baby Away,”  “I Wanna Live,” I Wanna Be your Boyfriend,”  “I Just Want to Have Something to Do,” and much more including Blitzkrieg Bop and “Do You Remember Rock and Roll Radio.”

They played them quite well, winding things up around 2 a.m.