By Andrea Holbrook
A Gloucester wood worker has reunited with his former bandmates for two shows.
John Cameron, a wood worker and custom furniture maker living and working in Gloucester, played keyboards and saxophone as part of Boston ska band Bim Skala Bim from 1985 through 2000, playing to thousands of fans and recording on more than half a dozen records.
The band's music was used in the MTV series "Road Rules" and "Real World," and NASA played "Wise Up" as a part of its Pathfinder and Soujourner Rover Wake Up Song List.
Last night, Cameron and the band played the Hometown Throwdown with The Mighty Mighty Bosstones and The Pietasters at the House of Blues in Boston.
The band opened for the Bosstones at the sold-out show — which Cameron said was ironic, because, in Bim Skala Bim's heyday, the Bosstones opened for them.
On New Year's Eve, Bim Skala Bim will play an 18-plus show at the Middle East Downstairs, 480 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge. Doors open at 8 p.m.; tickets are $20 in advance at the Middle East or through Ticketmaster. Also performing are Brunt Of It, The Morgan Knockers and The Have Nots.
"I always played music, and I always built things," said Cameron. "One enabled the other."
He said he started working as a boatbuilding apprentice in Salem to pay the bills while pursuing his music career.
"I was doing more woodworking than music, and then the band took off," Cameron said. "Then the woodworking took off."
Thinking of the future, Cameron said he believed woodworking would be a more viable longtime career. "I decided to focus on woodworking."
But he still plays music; besides the reunion shows, he performs once a week in Brighton with the 5-piece Phil Pemberton Band.
"It's more low-key," he said of the soul band's performances.
Cameron is member of the New Hampshire Furniture Masters, a group of craftsmen from around New England. His work was included in the Furniture Master 2009 exhibition and annual auction at the Currier Museum of Art in Manchester, N.H., and one of his table was featured on the back cover of in Fine Woodworking Magazine.
He creates his furniture in a small workshop in East Gloucester.
Andrea Holbrook may reached at 978-283-7000 x3456 or aholbrook@gloucestertimes.com
