The Blue Shadows

Jeffrey, Billy, Elmar, and Jay

Billy, Barry, Jeffrey and Jay

After Billy Cowsill parted from Blue Northern, he led his own act, The Billy Cowsill Band, which was merely him and Elmar Spanier playing traditional country songs. Jay Johnson was added drums. It was at this time that Jeffrey Hatcher had migrated over to Vancouver from his home in Winnipeg

Larry Wanagas and Dave Chesney tell what happen next this way:

Larry: This chapter in Bill’s life came at a time when an old friend of mine, Jeffrey Hatcher, showed up in Vancouver. And I had worked with Jeffrey years ago when I was booking gigs and the University of Alberta in Edmonton. He came through with a band called The Fuse from Winnipeg, him and two of his brothers, they all sang like angels. And years later, many years later Jeffrey showed up after spending some time in New York. He showed up in Vancouver and we decided let’s introduce him to Billy and see what these two guys can do together and that became The Blue Shadows.


Dave: So Billy was in need of a guitar player, so Larry phoned up Jeffrey and said, “Listen, we have this artist Billy Cowsill who needs a guitar player and I know you just arrived in town and you’re looking for some work. Would you be interested in playing with him?” And Jeffrey started saying, “Well you know I’ve heard a little bit about Billy, kind of scares me a little bit because I don’t know if he’s the type of guy who’d hit it off but whatever. I’ll go out and gig with him. Give me his phone number and we’ll see what happens.” So he phones up Billy and I guess they went out and played. Darby Dawes I think was the first gig. Then a couple days later Jeffrey comes in and so he says to Larry and I, “You know Billy is asking me if I’d be interested in writing with him and I’d be interested in writing with him. Looks like I’m going to be playing with him again this weekend at the Fairview Pub, but again I got to tell you we’re kind of different, Billy and I. We’re like ‘Well that’s pretty obvious.’ So anyways, this is like a Tuesday or Wednesday so Jeffrey goes and plays Thursday night at the Fairview Pub with Billy and Elmar. And I don’t even know if they had a drummer in those days. I think maybe Jay was playing with them. Cut to the quick, Jeffrey comes into the office on Friday morning and – like he’s there at 9:05 and he goes, “Larry I can’t play with that Billy Cowsill anymore.” And Larry goes, “Why what happen, Jeffrey?” “Well we finished the gig last night and there was a guy heckling us most of the night and at the end of the night we’re standing up on the stage packing up our gear. This guy comes up to the front of the stage and starts giving us all a hard time. Billy sort of told the guy ‘Hey give it a rest. We’re just trying to make a living here.’ I guess the guy wouldn’t give it a rest and he jumped up on the stage and took a swing at Billy and Billy ducked and came up swinging with his guitar. Split the guy – his forehead wide open, busted the guitar, the guy went down in a hump on the dance floor and they threw him out of the club.” Larry goes, “Listen Jeffrey you could play with Billy for a hundred years and you’d never see that happen again in your life. This is isolated incident and believe me, don’t worry, it will never happen again. I can guarantee that.” Friday night, end of the gig, guy walks up to the front of the stage says, “Hey, you. Understand you plunked my buddy with your guitar last night.” And the guys in the band are thinking, “Oh no. This guy has come to avenge his buddy getting clocked last night,” and they’re all sort of standing there. Meanwhile Billy is just merrily going about packing his guitars up and this guy is enraged. He’s come and just stewed in the back of the bar all night ready to take Billy on. And finishes the set and comes up and starts in on Billy and Billy just turns and looks at the guy and goes, “I hear you’re a good dancer.” And that’s all it took for the guy’s whole demeanor to just die down for a split second. Soon as he gave up his overt actions, Billy clocked him with his guitar. Busted up another guitar. Layed another guy out on the dance floor. Two nights, two guitars, two guys on the dance floor. So that was the start of The Blue Shadows.

We now had the quartet that was known as The Blue Shadows. The Blue Shadows music was country rock at it’s best. Their music was described as “The group melts an edgy Mersey-like guitar sound with exacting vocal harmonies drawn of the early Everly and Louvin Brothers, creating new and original country/hillbilly music.” Billy and Jeffrey sang Everly Brothers harmonies with such ease that it was hard to pick the spot where they switched high and low voices. Billy and Jeffrey played an Everly Brothers Tribute show in Los Angeles and it is said that, “just brought the house down. It absolutely was one of those magical moment.”

The Blue Shadows got a record deal with Columbia/Sony Music and released 'On The Floor Of Heaven' in 1993. It was just prior to that release that Elmar Spanier left the band and was replaced by Barry Muir.

In 1994 The Blue Shadows were nominated for a Juno (Canada’s Grammy) in the category of Best County Group or Duo.

1995 saw the release of the band’s second album 'Lucky To Me' again to rave reviews. But the drugs and the alcohol had a hold of Billy and these were blamed for the break up of the band in the winter of 1996. Less than two years later, Billy got the help he needed and became sober. He took the blame for what happen to The Blue Shadows saying what did you expect from "three vegetarians and a junkie."

Jeffrey Hatcher spoke of Billy and his Blue Shadows days: "Life with Billy is a broad topic. It’s a big topic. Billy was a big character and we did a lot of things together for a good solid, very hard working four years. So, it’s hard to sum up the whole experience in a few words. It was pretty intense for all of us and it tends to be that way whether you have a colorful character like Billy or not because the work is so intense, so fast moving. You’re playing or you’re rehearsing or you’re writing or recording or driving or flying or whatever you do. So that kind of intensity you get on the road, we certainly had that with Billy. Plus we had his extra colorful, extra personality. And I think he wouldn’t mind me saying, you know, as wild and crazy as Bill could be, especially him. He wouldn’t mind me saying that either. I think he wouldn’t mind me saying that we drove each other a bit nuts sometimes, which is part of being on the road. But … Well, yes, he nails it. (in regards to Billy’s ‘three vegetarians and a junkie’ statement. ) He may have exaggerated a tiny bit, but actually not by much. He certainly had a self-destructive streak that I didn’t like to see, it wasn’t great to see. And you know what’s not great to see about that with somebody is that it comes a really low sense of self worth, which usually has it’s roots way, way, way back, you know. And it hurts to see that because – it hurt us to see that, it hurt me to see that because I could see that he was a very worthy guy. Well, making music with Billy was very easy. And right from the first day that I auditioned for the band, Vancouver listeners or people from ???? will know The Fairview Pub on Broadway in Vancouver. I auditioned for the band there. And right from the first note I felt like this is so easy. This was much more fun, workmanlike in a fun way, and really satisfying. We were coming to the center from two opposite sides of a lot of things. Really did help the creativity, it’s true and excitement and energy. The sheer intensity of that of working under different circumstances sometimes, took a predictable toll."

Members:

Billy – vocals rhythm guitar
Elmar Spanier - bass
J. B. “Jay” Johnson – drums
Jeffery Hatcher – vocal, guitar
Barry Muir – bass

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