Salute

Ross Angeles was the name Rachel Cambrin, then known as Ross Cambrin, put on Salute, a four-song 7-inch EP released by Mogul Records in 1982. Salute was also the band: Cambrin on vocals, guitar and bass synthesizer, Dave Domi on keyboards, synthesizer and vocals, and John Cody on drums, percussion and vocals.

Cambrin produced the EP at Studios West with engineer George Schmidt and wrote 'Empty Amour', 'She Knows' and 'Hip Hip', sharing the title track with Maurice Ross. Two additional Salute recordings from 1982 survive: 'Archipelago-A-Go-Go' and a medley of 'Crossroads', 'For You' and 'Kill The Night'.

Salute launched the record with a run of December dates. On December 10, 1982 the band headlined a sock hop at the Soft Rock Cafe sponsored by The Province and CiTR (UBC Radio), and ads for the newly released EP added the Rock Box on December 13 and Vancouver Tonite on December 14. Cody went on to a long freelance career that took him through dozens of Vancouver bands and onto stages with Trooper, Prism and Bachman-Turner Overdrive.

Cambrin spent the years that followed in bands playing ska, reggae, blues and rock, wrote songs for early children's computer games, and worked as a house musician at a Vancouver club. A two-week blues booking at a country bar turned Cambrin toward country and folk.

After the band Ordinary Lies broke up in 2017, Cambrin went solo as Rachel Cambrin and spent about three years busking at Granville Island Public Market until the pandemic shut the program down. The first release under the new name, 'Sad Eyed Stars', came out in early 2020, and 'Sisters of the Dark' found its way onto local independent radio. The EP Cover to Cover followed in 2021, then the album Sad Eyed Stars, cut with drummers Pat Steward and Matthew Atkins, bassist Rob Becker and guitarist Cory Hawthorne, released online in 2022 and on CD in 2023.

Perspectives, recorded in 2024 with only Becker on upright bass, captured the Granville Island set: seven songs from the 60s and 70s and one original, 'Searching For The Heart Of Love'. It was entered in the Canadian Folk Music Awards. Cambrin, who has spoken on CiTR's Queer FM and elsewhere about being an openly trans musician in Vancouver, opened 2026 with a reworked 'Turnaround' and plays clubs around the city, including Lana Lou's and the Fox Cabaret.

-Robert Williston