As they sat and reminisced at a local tavern, the memories flowed and old differences dissolved. These old timers had learned one thing after decades of music and experience on opposite coasts: Life's too short to waste time on anything but the good memories.

They talked about old friends and departed family members and "Whatever happened to..." One subject came up, though, that sparked a special nerve. They talked about reuniting their old band, Crosstown Rhythm & Blues. Bill DiPlacido, trumpeter of the old band, had been phoning Lou over the years with the idea. He had casually mentioned it to Dick Buckel, guitarist with Crosstown, but this was the first time it had been discussed with any of the other members.

Horton and been a hard one to find during these long years. The whereabouts of other band members wasn't quite as mysterious. Some still lived in Erie. Lou had moved to LA, but Horton was the puzzle. Now, he was sitting across from Lou, sipping a drink as if he had never been gone. He had the ghostly appearance that old friends take on after a couple of decades of being apart. Lou had seen ghosts like this at class reunions. They were the same people he had gone to school with, some as far back as first grade. This time they'd have gray hair. Sometimes no hair at all. Sometimes the timid ones came back solid as oaks, while the once promising, "most likely to succeed" candidates reappeared as calm spectres, surprisingly average.

Horton's ghost looked remakably like the original man. He had a new gray beard and some snow for hair. He had the same voice, which seemed like proof that this was indeed the real person. He seemed genuinely excited about DiPlacido's idea to reunite the old band. We toasted and vowed to keep in touch, then we said good night.

I took the information to DiPlacido the next day. He was beside himself. How could he not have found Horton himself? Who knows? What was for sure was that now the reunion of Crosstown seemed more than ever a probability than a possibility. DiPlacido got on the phone and began the process of making it happen. As of this writing, the venue is yet unknown, but DiPlacido has indicated that there is interest in attaching a concert to a charitable cause. A local oldies radio station apparently has a PR department that specializes in benevolent events. The oldies station is one of three specialty stations, one being a Country station.

Breaking the Rules

Crosstown Rhythm & Blues got it's name when Erie musicians from Millcreek and the City of Erie combined to create a multi-cultural combo specializing in Soul and R&B. They drove from one side of the county to the other to rehearse in the basements and garages of tolerant parents. It was during the early '70s that trumpets and saxes were "in" and Top 40 radio mixed Black R&B alongside White horn groups like Chicago and Blood Sweat & Tears. Crosstown took advantage of those trends to keep horn players onstage despite pressure from the guitar-heavy competition of Hendrix, Led Zepelin and Cream on the radio. Crosstown just kept tooting their horns. It was they who stood for whoever was left unable to grow trendy Jesus-style Rock hair. They were also pioneers in their own form of integration, welcoming crowds across racial lines.

One of Crosstown's specialties was performing songs by R&B artists like Sly and the Family Stone and Wilson Pickett. Crowds of Black and White teens would fill Rainbow Gardens and the Hullabaloo, swaying to Crosstown's hypnotic beat. They performed exotic neo-pagan dances, one of which was known as the Funky Chicken. There was even a cadre of comely female followers who were such experts at the dance that the band named them, appropriately, "the Funky Chickens."