HEADSTONES are spreading a little holiday madness

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Reunited Headstones performing Thursday night at The Venue

By KENNEDY GORDON, Examiner Staff Writer

Cobwebs? No cobwebs for this veteran Canadian rock band, back together after close to a decade apart. "It's the best we've ever been," says Tim White, bassist for the reunited Headstones, who play The Venue Thursday night. "The chemistry is there. The songs are there. It's very possible that this is the best we've ever sounded."

White, singer Hugh Dillon, guitarist Trent Carr and drummer Dale Harrison split in 2003 after more than a decade together, a time that involved numerous hit singles and albums and a powerful live presence that fused punk stage energy with solid songs and big fat guitars.

When the opportunity to reunite came last year, the connection was still there. "We felt it right away," White says of his bandmates, who formed the Headstones in 1989 in Kingston.

That first reunion saw the band play at The Venue in January; now they're back, with the Electric City one of six Ontario tour stops before a trip out west. The tour slogan is "Making bad lifestyle choices since 1989." But that's more about the group's rowdy, semi-metallic, quasi-punk images than it is about what's happened to them since those druggy, drinky early years.

During the band's hiatus, Dillon maintained the highest profile. After making his acting debut in the Bruce McDonald films Dance Me Outside and Hard Core Logo in the '90s, Dillon kept acting and currently stars in the TV series Flashpoint, which airs on CTV in Canada and, up until this season, on CBS in the U.S. White's in the film and television business, too, having made his name post-Headstones as a music writer for screen and a voice performer. With Carr and Harrison also busy with demanding new careers, the Headstones will likely not be a full-time pursuit again, White says.

"We do what we can, when we can," he said from his Toronto-area home during a conversation punctuated with his efforts to get his young son to go wash his hands. "We have our work, our families, and so that keeps us busy."

Which is how he likes it. "We have no record label, no radio commitments, nothing but the four of us doing what we love," he says. "At our pace. That we set."

Recording is different now, White adds. "We put out a new single, right?" he asks, mentioning Binthiswayforyears, the band's first reunited recording. "We recorded that, mixed it in one night and we had it up online within, I think, two hours. At 2:30 in the morning, a song we'd just created was being heard. That's how things work now and it works for us."

The song is available at www.headstonesband.com and features classic Carr guitar, tight rhythm and, as always, profanity-fuelled Dillon lyrics. "We'll do this when we can," White says. "No big plan. The only mandate is we have fun."

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