The Parachute Club

The Parachute Club was a Canadian band formed in Toronto in 1982 out of several members of the band Mama Quilla II. The band consisted of Lorraine Segato on vocals and guitar, Lauri Conger on keyboards and vocals, Billy Bryans on drums, Margo Davidson on saxophone and vocals, Julie Masi on percussion and vocals, Steve Webster on bass and Dave Gray on guitar. Their first album was produced by Daniel Lanois. The song "Rise Up" from that album won a Canadian Juno Award for Single of the Year. Steve Webster left to perform with Billy Idol and Keir Brownstone replaced Webster on their second album At the Feet of the Moon in 1985, produced by Michael Beinhorn. They received a Juno Award for Group of the Year the same year. In 1986, they released their third album, Small Victories. The album included the song "Love is Fire" featuring Segato singing a duet with John Oates of Hall & Oates. Oates produced the single, as well as several other Small Victories tracks; The Parachute Club and Mike Jones were credited as producers on the remainder of the album. In 1987, they composed and performed four songs for the Canadian and U.S. versions of the anime series, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. After a final non-album single in 1987 ("Big Big World"), the band members went their separate ways in 1989. In 2005, critic Greg Quill wrote in the Toronto Star that "No musical collective bespoke this city during a specific period as powerfully as Parachute Club did in the 1980s. Their infectious, inclusive, soca-soaked dance music carried important messages about the social changes Toronto was experiencing at the time, about sexual and personal politics, about the need for hope and courage in an age of confusing, impersonal rhetoric from local policymakers and world leaders." On May 14, 2005, the band performed a reunion show in Toronto, co-headlining with Martha and the Muffins. On September 3, 2005, a reconstituted Parachute Club, including Segato, Bryans, Gray and Brownstone, with new members Mystic Walsh and Miranda Walsh (daughters of Eric Walsh, lead singer of Toronto reggae band Messenjah) on vocals and Ashley Wey on keyboards, headlined the City Roots music festival. The band has made a number of appearances since then, usually at political or cultural events in Toronto. The summer of 2008 will see them playing at Toronto's Luminato arts festival, concerts at gay pride events in Toronto and Hamilton, and a possible tour of Eastern Canada. In 2006, The Parachute Club was inducted into the Canadian Indies Hall of Fame.