Jurgen Peter’s music lives on in my heart and soul
True confession: I still cruise down the Laurentian autoroute with my stereo throbbing to the beat of the Haunted’s 1-2-5. Both versions of the song, though I prefer the first one.
“Walking down the street on a foggy night ...” Bob Burgess sings, after the nifty drum intro.
It was the first single from the band, penned by Burgess and Haunted co-founder Jurgen Peter, and I loved it from the moment I heard it way back in 1966. It was the first 45 I ever bought. It was so raw, with a wicked lead guitar solo that ripped through the soundscape of that era in Montreal, and it turned me on to hard rock. It would also be first song I would drum to a year or so later, and I bet I wasn’t the only one.
I thought of that song, and The Haunted, this week when I saw an obituary for Jurgen Peter in the pages of the Montreal Gazette. He was 74, and when a Gazette reporter tracked him down a couple of years ago, he had resettled in Vancouver.
The Haunted were a major soundtrack of my teenage years, and Peter was a key part of their sound. I wore out their first album, listening to it over and over in my bedroom. While their hard rock songs stirred the rocker — and the rebel — in me, gentler ballads like A Message to Pretty and Untie Me struck a lovelorn chord that perhaps only a high schooler can relate to.
The 1960s was the seminal, golden era of rock in Montreal, when local bands like The Haunted, The Rabble, Harmonium, Beau Dommage and others were “blowing our little minds to bits,” to rework a phrase from another Haunted song.
How popular were The Haunted? When their single 1-2-5 came out in 1966, it hit No. 2 on CFCF’s Top 40. The No. 1 song at the time was Monday, Monday by the Mamas and the Papas, and Paint It, Black by the Rolling Stones was No. 3.
The Haunted said they were influenced by bands like the Stones and the Kinks, and they did very competent versions of Out of Time and I’m a Man that would sound fresh on any true rock music station today. But they had acid-rock leanings, too, influenced by Jimi Hendrix, songs like Land of Make Believe and An Act of Leisure.
“Daydreaming all day along/I’ll never cut my hair ...” Johnny Monk sings in An Act of Leisure.
And that’s the image I have of The Haunted. They were “the scruffy bad boys of Montreal rock,” as Ralph Alfonso wrote in the 1983 liner notes for a CD release of the band’s recordings. They were heroes of my youth. I idolized them, as only a tweeny bopper could, and I would have been a Haunted groupie if I’d had the opportunity to follow them around.
I wonder if Jurgen Peter, Bob Burgess et al had any idea what effect their music had on my life, and the lives of others. I wonder if they knew that people are still grooving to their music all these years later, like they do to so many other great rock’n’roll songs of that era.
I still love The Haunted just as much as I love Paul McCartney and Robert Plant and Jimmy Page.
I love every member of the Haunted for what they contributed to music — and to my life, because, really, our musical tastes are so personal. We all have special feelings for the musicians and other artists who touch our souls and lift our spirits.
Like The Beatles and Zep, The Haunted are part of my personal fabric.
So, on this grey afternoon, I’m listening to their CD again, and I’m remembering how much Jurgen Peter has meant — and still means — to me, even if I never had the honour of meeting him and his bandmates.
And, yes, the tears are welling up as I listen to A Message to Pretty again.
Thank you, Jurgen, for what you gave the world.
Thank you for the difference you made in my life. You will always rock, man ... RIP.