Cheamer managed one artist, Reg Wood, who as a teenager emanated Lenny Breau or at least he could do The Claw the way Lenny Breau recorded it. I would be surprised if anyone else for a thousand miles could do that, and he was 16. Seemed a no brainer, with the right management, Reg should be a star. Cheamer’s skills at buying and selling cars, didn’t train him for the peculiarities of the music business, like swag, bullshitting and payola. It knocked him off his game and he lost everything after striking up a friendship with Jerry Weintraub, which was clever considering Weintraub was in a powerful position booking Elvis Presley during the previous decade and now grooming/ marketing John Denver to massive success. Weintraub understood the math behind advertising. Ultimately, you could sell anything if you could afford to have it repeated on radio, tv and print. Didn’t matter what the music sounds like, people just absorb advertising. Like those signs in the subway “a funny thing happens when you don’t advertise…nothing”. The formula still holds true 50 years later. If you spend at least 65 thousand dollars you make back a more than 3 times in units sold or concert seat admission. Thank God, he thought to himself, hardly anyone understands this principle; less competition.
But he didn’t have any reason to help Cheamer, so he gave him misdirections, sticking to his motto (less competition). It was a stock tip, encouraging the out-of-towner to believe it would provide the gains needed to make his future investments. Cheamer not only assumed Jerry Weintraub was sincere, he mortgaged his house and put everything into Steep Rock mines whose only steepness was how fast Cheamer’s net worth declined when it tanked 60% the following month and went even lower later. Cheamer’s music management career ended before it started and young Reg Wood moved to Vancouver where he got into heroin like his hero, died like him too,drowning. That was on Lasqueti island where he was a momentary star at a jazz festival where he backed up and fell in love with Anzuba Marseilles, a singer from Nigeria who’s claim to fame was singing on Fela Kuti’s classic Zombie, and her very original vocals. Her interpretations had that high delicate swirly Billie Holiday presence and an unexpected aggression in her delivery which was of course not like Billie Holiday at all, not like anyone. She found Cheamer in the water she saw it as a curse, as proof there was something wrong with leaving Nigeria and she left, nobody heard of her again.
There was a tv show in Winnipeg hosted by Ray St. Germaine and there are recordings there of pre-drug addicted Reg Wood accompanying some pretty boring country music except that he is simultaneously playing bass lines. As though his guitar is the future instrument known as The Stick. He was a novelty act. It was the only gig Cheamer successfully obtained. There is also some stuff from Channel 13, a cable access outlet, like a community centre tv station. Two older women, lovers who escaped Nazi Germany in their youth had a show called The Cosmopolitans. Usually they played organ and drums. They were sincere, they played old folks homes, they played to children, they were grateful to be alive in Canada and live a safe life since they knew so much more about death and torture than the average person walking down Corydon or Inkster. Teenagers would call in during their show and try to shock them by requesting Stairway To Heaven or Smoke On The Water while suppressing their laughter but the Cosmopolitans weren’t born yesterday, they survived Hitler, the joke was on the Winnipeg teens, they learned those songs next week and played them albeit a little wooden, next week Reg guested and turned up the surrealism. Two middle aged good natured polka lovers were now propelled into Hendrixian stratospheres. Such a shame no one pushed to rename the swanky Tuxedo neighbourhood into Cosmopolitan. A fitting tribute it would be to all these wicked intersections of dreams, talent and loss.