Brett Thoms
Fort Coulonge March 5, 2022
JR and the Gator, a two-man band out of the Ottawa Valley, played a live show at the Café Downtown in Fort Coulonge on Saturday.
This was their first official show since restrictions began to lift in February.
The band, named after it’s two performers, JR and Gator, has been together for . . .
six years and have performanced all over the greater Ottawa valley area.
“We’re just two guys with guitars,’’ said Gator. “You know, there’s no fancy stuff to it, it’s just what we do.”
The band played music from the 60s and 70s and hit genres ranging from rock and roll, blues, folk, country and reggae at their show on Saturday.
Gator, whose real name is Gaetan Forgues, was born in Campbell’s Bay. He teaches guitar and is a freelance writer for the Pontiac Journal.
Before COVID shut him down, he recently started teaching music at École Secondaire Sieur de Coulonge. He has been playing guitar and bass his entire life.
JR, whose real name is John Richard Griffiths, is the lead vocalist and guitarist for the band. He has been performing live music for almost 50 years now.
Gator originally booked JR for various shows around the Ottawa valley; however the story of how the two formed the band is strangely tied to an important event in recent Pontiac history, with the band forming the night of the Esprit whitewater rafting lodge fire in 2016.
“I was supposed to play there that night, ‘’ said JR.” I was actually getting into the place when they were panicking and getting everyone out because it was burning right down to the ground.”
After the shock, JR called Gator to tell him the gig was canceled, and Gator invited him over to his house to jam.
After performing for one of Gator’s neighbors, the two realized they had something.
“We sounded like we’ve been playing together our entire lives, ‘’ said JR. “We just gelled, we played together really well.“
After that fateful night, the two have been playing together ever since, and stayed in sync.
“Although we’ve been playing almost six years, we’ve had like five practices together, ‘’ said Gator. “We just usually show up and play our shows.”
JR and Gator hope they’ll be able to continue to perform all over the Pontiac and beyond, and are big supporters of the local music scene.
“There’s a lot of talent in this town and a lot of people support local music,” said Gator about Fort Coulonge.
The two are both hopeful that the lifting of COVID restrictions will allow them to play as much as possible, and even might reform their five-piece-band, The Blast.
“I definitely see that if things keep going the way they are, the music scene is going to really kick up again for the summer,’’ said Gator.
