WHEEL WATCH: When ‘Jacques Strapp & The Sweat Band’ took centerstage
Brian Robbins and his band became a Fourth of July staple in the 1980’s
The band may not have been “technically proficient” but was still “a force to be reckoned with.” Photo courtesy of Brian Robbins.
July 1, 2026
By Brian Robbins
The band had several impromptu names, sometimes dreamed up right before the parade. Photo courtesy of Brian Robbins.
There was a period in the 1980s when a group of us were regular participants in the Island’s 4th Of July parade (which alternated between Deer Isle and Stonington from year to year: one town would host the parade; the other celebrated the rockets’ red glare that evening).
We weren’t a walking group or antique car buffs. We didn’t have clever costumes or candy to hand out to children on the sidelines. We simply looked forward to getting together once a year to play music as hard as we could while rolling along the parade route on a flatbed trailer.
The lineup varied a little over the years, but there was a core group that had a natural connection. My brother Stevie would probably deny being the leader, but he just naturally was, simply because of who he was—big in stature, big in spirit.
Along with the two of us banging on guitars and bellowing, there was Steve “Snyder” Snowden on bass—a loyal crewmate from the offshore lobster days.
Burt Leach was the other half of the rhythm section; the Grateful Dead and the Allman Brothers both featured dual drummers: we had one Burt. That’s all that was needed.
Hank Whitsett joined us along the way, caulking keyboards into our sound.
And then there was Frank Gotwals, who probably had the most challenging role of all: besides being an immensely talented guitarist and vocalist, Frankie did his best to keep the rest of us reined in and focused—which basically meant not running all the amplifiers wide-open all the time. (Eventually, he’d usually get caught up in the madness, too.)
A side note, which I really didn’t think about at the time: my brother Stevie had a handsome M-36 Martin, which he owned right up to his passing in 2020. I remember us getting in off a lobster trip and driving up to Bangor, where Stevie bought himself that brand-new Martin at the old Viner’s Music Store. He always ran the heaviest gauge strings that were available and played the heaviest picks he could find. The thing is, the rest of us were all playing through amps, but Stevie’s Martin was purely acoustic. There might have been an attempt to put his guitar through a microphone, but I don’t think that ever worked out, between Stevie’s exuberant body English and foot-stomping—he’d either crash into the mic that was pointed at the soundhole of his Martin or knock it over—but he somehow managed to hold his own volume-wise.
As I said earlier: Big in stature, big in spirit.
For years, our appearance in the Island parade was the only time we’d all get together to play music. Our approach was a simple one: get together on the evening of July 3rd; stay up most of the night “working” on a set of songs for the parade; maybe crash for a few hours of rest; then up-and-at-‘em bright and early on the 4th, ready to roar our way through the day’s festivities.
To be honest, those late-night practices on the 3rd were basically just massive jam sessions. It wasn’t like we needed a long setlist for the parade, as we tended to stretch any given tune to its natural limit—and beyond—once we got chugging on it. Technically proficient? Maybe not so much now and then, but I’ll tell you what: when it came to spirit, heart, and soul we were a force to be reckoned with.
The band didn’t have a name back then—or, rather, we adopted a name each year to fit the theme of the parade.
There was one Fourth when the parade honored the Island’s seafood, for instance: I think we performed that year as “Clam Fritter & The Flats.”
I know 1989 was the year of the vote on instituting a five-cent deposit on bottles and cans—the referendum known as “the bottle bill.” We showed up for the parade as “Bottle Bill & The Returnables”—Snyder had a sign on his back identifying him as “Bill” for the day. (More on The Returnables in a bit.)
I’m pretty sure Stevie came up with both of those names, but his best work of all was in 1988, when the parade saluted the Summer Olympics.
It was well into the events on the evening of the 3rd when we realized we not only didn’t have a name for the band—we hadn’t put any thought into suitable decorations for that year’s flatbed.
I swear you could hear the lightbulb when it clicked on in my brother’s head.
“Brian, take me to the house,” he said, unwrapping a fresh cigar. “I know what to do.”
Off we went, with Stevie giving no hint of what he was thinking. I pulled into the driveway of his house, and he bailed out of the truck, telling me to “Stay put—this’ll only take a minute.” Sure enough, my brother was back out in no time, lugging a well-stuffed dark green garbage bag, some blank poster paper, a big ol’ Magic Marker, and a staple gun. “Go,” he said, slamming the passenger door shut.
When we got back to where the flatbed was sitting, the band was all ready to help however they could. My brother walked into the garage where the trailer sat and upended the garbage bag into the floor, depositing a massive pile of empty Crown Royal bags. For those not familiar, the folks who distill Crown Royal Canadian Whiskey are proud enough of their fine product to put each bottle in a lovely purple velvet bag with gold lettering, piping, and drawstring.
My brother handed Snyder the staple gun and told us to start tacking the Crown Royal bags around the wooden edges of the flatbed, letting them hang by the strings.
Somebody asked Stevie how long he’d been collecting them.
“Oh, these are just since last December,” he said. “I had a big bunch of them before that, but I gave ‘em all to the elementary school for the little kids to wear as elf hats in the Christmas pageant.”
That may be true; I can’t swear to it.
Anyway, while we were busy stapling bags to the float, Stevie was painstakingly lettering the posters with the marker. It wasn’t until the last bag had been hung that he shared his inspiration with us, holding a completed poster against one of the wooden lobster crates we’d be sitting on atop the flatbed.
“JACQUES STRAPP & THE SWEAT BAND.”
Brilliant. It fit the Summer Olympics theme perfectly and even managed to be multi-cultural while doing it.
It was almost classy.
We did our best to live up to the name during the parade the next day.
Before I let you go, I promised you the rest of the story of Bottle Bill & The Returnables. That particular year—1989—our momentum carried us beyond the parade. We played on the Stonington Town Pier the night of the 4th (going a couple of hours past the 9 PM fireworks). And that somehow led to a series of raucous gigs that summer and fall, including a visit to Swans Island and a string of multi-fuse-blowing (literally) Deer Isle Legion Hall dances.
By December of that year, life was getting busy and we decided to call it quits.
Little did we know it would be another 30 years before we played together again.
In 2019, The Returnables reunited to mark the 50th anniversary of Woodstock. In true Returnables fashion—we’d shortened the name—our one practice together after 30 years was the soundcheck on the afternoon of the gig.
My brother had every intention of being a part of it; he was undergoing chemo treatments for pancreatic cancer, but thought he could pull off the gig.
It wasn’t to be, however: Stevie just couldn’t make it for the reunion (“Give ‘em hell,” he ordered me), but I swear during some of the jams that night I could hear his Martin and him letting out a whoop.
Since then, we’ve kept things rolling—just as my brother told me we should.
Stevie passed on July 18, 2020. But he’s there every time we play.
The Returnables will kick off their 2026 World (Pretty Much) Tour with a 7PM performance at the Deer Isle Music Hall & BBQ. For more information, please visit https://www.facebook.com/ReturnablesBand
—Robbins, who grew up in Stonington and now lives in Nobleboro, writes his monthly column “Wheel Watch” for The Rising Tide.