What’s in Your Fridge is where the Straight asks interesting Vancouverites about their life-changing concerts, favourite albums, and, most importantly, what’s sitting beside the Heinz Ketchup in their custom-made Big Chill Retropolitan 20.6-cubic-foot refrigerators.

On the grill

wendythirteen

Who are you

wendythirteen. Purveyor of hardcore, all punk or metal, every weekend, for 15 years, wherever I landed outside of the authorities or slumlords quashing attempts. These days mostly at Funky Winker Bean's.

First concert

April Wine—no parents involved. It was the mid to late '70s, I was a tween, went by myself—I like solo excursions. Still do—zero obligatory repercussions. Yikes, that was over 35 years ago. They did drop me off and pick me up though—it was the ’70s, parental glue supervision was minimal.

Life-changing concert

I saw a few in 1982 that were stellar. Iron Maiden's Number of the Beast tour with the giant Eddie blew my mind—and that was in support of the Scorpions for Blackout. Also saw Judas Priest, Def Leppard, and Girlschool. I already had the rocker look going and the spiky blonde hairdo rolling at that point, and my goal was to be a rock star. I live vicariously through rock stars is how it turned out life-wise. I still have these albums and bands on my iPod playlist.

Top three records

The Exploited  Any bloody record they put out. Most have redos of former albums anyhow. I think I love every song the Exploited have ever recorded. My absolute favourite Exploited song is actually a Vibrators’ cover they did called "Troops of Tomorrow". I had the great pleasure of putting on an Exploited show at the Cobes for my birthday in 2003—if that was the last show I ever booked, I would have died happy. I’m not really a rabid fan of meeting musicians but Wattie was a blast—quite the hyper character. I really love their newer releases like Beat the Bastards and Fuck the System as they’ve really sped it up to a more metal-ish tempo...

Bathory Nordland I  A metal symphony—I could listen to this on repeat. I think Chi Pig knows it by heart too—from the time he spent with me cleaning up the Cobes and I would always play this CD. A little metal embedded in the punk Pig’s soul—hahaha. Too bad Quorthon is dead because I really like the direction he was taking musically—he really is the father of many new genre offshoots in metal.
 
Various Artists A Cole Porter Songbook  His songs done by all the blues/jazz greats like Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, et cetera. I get quite the looks when I’m cruising around on my scoot with this blaring. Wonderful music—I must be reincarnated from living in the ’20s as I really like the Big Band era. I play it a lot at home.
(and)

Loreena McKennitt  Any of them—her voice gives me shivers. I took my daughter to see her a couple of years ago, just to infuse some culture in her 20-something psyche. If you ever get a chance to see her in concert, DO IT!!

All-time favourite video

Toxic Holocaust "Acid Fuzz"  Wasn’t really a MTVer—I watched MuchMusic Loud, and that’s about it. Coolest video put to music I saw was something posted online by Toxic Holocaust last year. Hang on... Gotta Google what the title was... It was this really cool animation, sort of protest corporation call-out piece, set to a song... Toxic Holocaust: "Acid Fuzz".

What’s in your fridge

Assorted cocktail mixes. Grenadine, margarita mix, other flavoured syrups—I have an abundance of these to spice up my soda water when I feel a booze craving coming on. Sober over a year already. I often fire up one of these concoctions to relieve stress and pretend I’m drinking when I’m watching the Canucks play out the third period of the hockey game.
 
Booze. Because I’m sober I have an excess of booze chilling in my fridge: beer, cider, Jägermeister. I don’t have an abundance of drinkers over anymore because the after-hours carryover has subsided, and so it just sits there. Might have to add that to my get-rid-of to-do list soon. The only people to indulge from this booze collection are my daughter when she’s over for dinner and a game, and the sweet punk librarian that sifted through my seven years of taxes I finally filed recently.
 
Cocktail sauce. I love this stuff—from normal to spicy, I have various kinds. On prawns, thin-sliced pepper steak, french fries, mmmmm. Odd, since I’m not really a ketchup person and I’m allergic to tomatoes. I still indulge in tomato-based products though—what’s a few hives when they are that delicious?