Embassy Hotel
1932-2009

Back when it was still okay to smoke your face off in London bars, back when the London music scene was still relevant, striking and alive, back when I was too young to drive, but too old to sit still, back when cruising to a show in my best friend's mini-van and lying to our parents was a typical Friday night, there was the Embassy Hotel.

I proudly wore the black underage X's on the back of my hands; a nod to my youth, but also a symbol of rebellion and membership to the local rock community. Showing up at school with permanent marker-stained fists, showed my classmates I was serious about one thing; music! Ironically, I was absolutely clueless when it came to melody or composition, tone-deaf when it came to pitch or key and could rarely identify a band or even an instrument without help, but I was hooked on the ‘scene'.

Friday and Saturday nights were spent in smoky, dirty, probably dangerous Clubs; listening to aging grunge, emerging ‘indie' and punk rock. Supporting my peers in their musical endeavours, however misguide, was a favourite pastime. My amateur (at best) talent in photography and my passing interest in graphic design allowed me a temporary invitation to a new world; printing band stickers and t-shirts, running ‘merch' tables, finding my name on guest lists; I wasn't just growing up in these places, I was learning and changing and developing an appreciation for art and expression that would impact me for years to come. Blurring age restrictions and creating its own six-degrees-of-London conspiracy that still haunts me today, our city's music scene defined my adolescence.

The first show I ever attended was at the Embassy Hotel on Dundas Street. It's been a lot of years since that night and I won't mention how many. I remember being terrified and awestruck. Equal parts repelled and compelled; this place was dirty, scary and completely forbidden; what more could a 16 year-old ask for? Going to the Embassy was the first time I remember lying to my mother about where I was going. Located in an area of town that could be described as less-than desirable; the crowd was drunk, the music was deafening and I was dancing my heart out.

Over the years, the Embassy Hotel was a mainstay for my best friend and I. I saw bands there that went on to headline at the ACC and saw bands I never heard of again. My friends sang and played there hardest on that stage. The Embassy was the venue where a lot of local high school bands played their first show. It was a great start for local talent booking their first gig; Sifter, The New Grand, Scratching Post, Frizbee; all just local teens making rock and roll.

The Embassy introduced me to Henry Rollin's spoken-word, Juliana Hatfield's angst and Hayden's melancholy. I saw the father of my children perform for the first time at The Embassy and fell in love with a rock star. I remember a fantastic summer I spent with a guy named Aaron who I met at a show at The Embassy. He wrote his number on my hand and later broke my heart. I showed up with my fake ID that summer with my fingers crossed. My goal was never to get to the alcohol; I just wanted to get into the shows that weren't all ages!

I still went to a few shows once I hit 19, but by then the scene had passed. Eventually, I grew up, had a family and started attending shows at more ‘respectable' venues like the JLC or heading to Toronto to catch big arena productions in a crowd of tens of thousands of fans.

I hadn't thought about The Embassy in years, until I read the news about the fire that destroyed it. I watched the video of the hotel smoking and burning in the night and it stayed with me for the rest of the day. I knew that condo developers had purchased the building and that the owners had been offered enough money to simply walk away from the heritage property. I had read that the club had been emptied in March and that demolition was scheduled this summer. Since I hadn't been there in years though, I hadn't given it much thought.

Seeing The Embassy engulfed in flame, surrounded by smoke, reading reports about the fire that burned into the night, the eye-witness accounts that described an inferno that seemed to die and then would rage back to full strength, holding back firefighters from entering the building; it seemed fitting. Here's a building that's over 75 years-old, decorated by local art, with decades of music and memories stained on its walls, sitting there, scheduled for a clean, organized demolition to allow the construction of shiny new condos. Instead, the whole place goes down as a raging, hot, noisy, smoky mess. Sounds so much more like rock ‘n roll to me.

Rest in Peace Embassy.