Wide Mouth Mason Frontman Records Album On Holiday Train

Prairie rockers Wide Mouth Mason are touring around British Columbia on a vintage train this month, and singer/guitarist Shaun Verreault is recording a solo album during the trip.

The band have returned for a second year as performers on CP Rail's annual "Holiday Train," which helps raise money for local food banks in towns and cities across Canada and the U.S., and Verreault is taking advantage of the early 20th century train's natural rhythm to record an album inspired by 1920s blues, Harry Smith's Anthology Of Folk Music, Al Purdy's writing, Canadian history and life on the road. Verreault will record audio and video in the locomotive, vintage boxcars and sleepers, the engineer's cabins, on the side of the tracks and in some heritage hotel rooms along the way.

Melanie Doane and Mike Norman are also on the Canadian Holiday Train, while Colin Linden, Tracey Brown, Ennis, Mark Murphy and Ken Post have been entertaining folks on the American Holiday Train.

Verreault will hold a record release party, appropriately, at Vancouver's Railway Club on Feb. 12. Proceeds from the sale of each CD will be donated to the Food Bank Of Greater Vancouver.

Wide Mouth Mason will play Calgary's Chrome Showroom on Jan. 25 and Fat Teddy's Bar & Grill in Courtenay, B.C. the next night. But, before that, you can catch them riding the rails and stopping to play here:

Dec. 14 Radium, BC @ Foresters Road Crossing
Dec. 14 Golden, BC @ Track #7
Dec. 15 Revelstoke, BC @ House Track
Dec. 15 Sicamous, BC @ Silver Sand Road
Dec. 15 Notch Hill, BC @ Notch Hill Hall
Dec. 16 Chase, BC @ Chase RCMP Building
Dec. 16 Kamloops, BC @ Interior Savings Centre
Dec. 16 Ashcroft, BC @ TMS Building
Dec. 17 Lytton, BC @ TMS Building
Dec. 17 North Bend, BC @ TMS Building
Dec. 18 Agassiz, BC @ Agra Centre
Dec. 18 Maple Ridge, BC @ Billy Minor Pub
Dec. 18 Port Moody, BC @ Queen And Clark