Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Al Mair, Derek Emerson and Chris Turner: Toronto Mike'd #1086

Episode Date: July 26, 2022

In this 1086th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike is joined by Attic Records co-founder Alexander Mair and two authors of Eve of Darkness – Heavy Metal in Toronto in the 1980s, Derek Emerson and Chris Turner. Topics include Gordon Lightfoot, Triumph, Anvil, Killer Dwarfs, Lee Aaron, Razor, Maestro Fresh-Wes, Weird Al Yankovic and more. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Canna Cabana, StickerYou, Ridley Funeral Home and Duer Pants and Shorts.

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and Canna Cabana the lowest prices on cannabis guaranteed over 100 stores across the country learn more at cannacabana.com. Tonight, making their Toronto podcast debuts are the authors of Eve of Darkness, Heavy Metal in Toronto in the 1980s, Derek Emerson, and Chris Turner,

and joining us via Zoom, Mr. Attic Records himself, Al Mayer. Welcome to all three of you. Hello. Hello there. Al, how you doing there? I'm good. I'm good, Mike.

Whereabouts do we find you geographically today? Young and St. Clair. Okay. Not too far away. Okay. But thanks for joining us today. We're going to cover a lot of ground.

So this is going to be like twofold here. We're going to cover a lot of ground when it comes to heavy metal and Derek Emerson and Chris Turner and their book. And you'll fold into that, but then, of course, because I have you on the show, I have some Attic Records question for you. Because it's kind of a coincidence, but just last Monday night, sitting here with me were Steve Waxman and Kevin Shade. You know those two fellows?

Vaguely, vaguely. And it's funny, because at the time, I don't think I knew you were going to be our special guest. And I was asking so many you know attic questions and I'll be peppering you of some of these later but uh here you are co-founder and we're going to get the attic story but here let me start by congratulating you congratulations Alex on the appointment your appointment to the order of Canada. That's pretty impressive. Thank you. When you got the call, what was your reaction? Like, do you just get a phone call and it's like... I got an email asking when they could call and what number.

It was quite a surprise. I knew I had been nominated some time ago. And, you know, I've been retired for 20 years. So for this to come when it did was quite a surprise, and I'm pleased. Well, I'm pleased for you as well. Now, we're going to get back to you, Al, very, very shortly, but I want to just find out a little more about the two gentlemen in my basement here right now. So Derek, Chris, give me a little overview of the two gentlemen in my basement here right now. So Derek, Chris,

give me a little overview of how the book came to be and who the hell are you and who let you in here? Well, the book stemmed from a project that we started about five or six years ago. We started down the road of documenting some of the music that was important in our youth. So my background, I started a fanzine when I was in my teens. It was called Metallic Assault, and it was the first sort of thrash metal fanzine in Toronto. That was circa 1984, I guess. And so having gone to all the shows since about 82, 83, we started to document them and put them out, and just that's how we did, you know, that's how we communicated. We didn't have podcasts.

We had fanzines. Pre-internet fanzines were the internet. Yeah, that was the way we communicated the information. So we did that and then I sort of became a little bit more interested in hardcore and punk scene. So as the 80s sort of progressed, I

ended up starting a band and taking part in that scene. So as the 80s sort of progressed, I ended up starting a band and taking part in that scene. So both the metal and the both underground scenes, the metal and the punk scene in Toronto were important to me. And so as the years went by, you know, people would always say, why isn't there a book about this stuff? Why, you know, we have all this ephemera and knowledge and it's going to kind of be lost to time. Okay. So before we get to you, Chris, let's let people know that you, Derek, you helped me with episode 1051. That was the episode where I chatted with Al Nolan, who's the front man for the almighty

Trigger Happy, Brian McAuliffe, who's the drummer for Youth, Youth, Youth, and Sean Cherry, who like yourself, you know, he was on the scene with the zines. That's right. And the book we talked about that day was Tomorrow is Too Late, right? Is that the right? So that's the Toronto punk book.

Yeah, and that's the one about the hardcore scene in Toronto. So what we attempted to do was we were going to do sort of an aggressive music compendium of metal and punk all in one book, but it quickly became apparent that there's way too much information, so we broke it out into a punk book and a heavy metal book. And so we decided to go down that road of the hardcore scene first, and that came out in 2018.

Okay, Chris, tell me how you got involved in this very cool project that Derek Emerson worked on. I actually didn't start out here in Toronto. I'm actually from Newfoundland. Okay. Born and raised in St. John's. Somewhere here I have. Heather Bambrick brought me this.

Heather Bambrick dropped by, and she said, look, she's from Newfoundland as well, and she said, here's some screech for you. When things are going tough, you got some screech. Might need some of that tonight. Yeah. Hopefully we won't have to break it open. So yeah, I grew up in the 80s.

I actually grew up in St. John's, not here in Toronto at all. Okay. But of course, being from St. John's, being from Canada, all your knowledge of metal was coming out of Toronto or the major cities. We had our own scene. Of course, I played in metal bands at the time, feverishly watched TV to see what was going on or listen to radio, whatever we could sneak into our province.

And Chris is probably one of Canada's most dedicated collectors of heavy metal cassettes and vinyl and that. So he's got a very deep knowledge base and a lot of it to do with the Toronto South. That's kind of how me and Derek met, actually, because someone hooked us up. He was selling some, I think it was tapes at the time. So I met him that way. And we started talking about it. He was working on the hardcore book at that time. Right. And so he was tapes at the time. So I met him that way. And we started talking about it. He was working on the metal,

at the hardcore book at that time. Right. And so he was telling me about that. And so we became friends at that point. And it was quickly after that. Yeah. And then when we launched the beginning of the process of researching the metal book, I thought who better to join our team?

Like Chris is not only a great guy, but he's got all this knowledge and the resources so he can help do the research. And for me, it wasn't so much about, you know, I got involved in this because I'm a collector. I was really into the more obscure bands. I like the demos. I like the bands that never got attention.

So I wanted to bring attention to those bands. It was a deep dive into not just the Razors or the Anvils, but the Kraken's, the Minotaurs, the Banshees, the bands that no one, even here in Toronto, probably remember, quite honestly. Okay, so I'm so glad you two are here. And again, what an honor it is that we have Al on the line, all the way from Yonge and St. Clair there.

So I want the Attic Records origin story next, but I'm going to pop open a Great Lakes beer. And I'm sorry, Al, that I don't have one for you, my friend, but next time I see you, I owe you a Great Lakes beer. And I'm sorry, Al, that I don't have one for you, my friend, but next time I see you, I owe you a Great Lakes. I've got to say to the guys that this book is phenomenal. Thank you. I'm blown away by it.

It's obviously a labor of love. For sure. Where did you get it printed? I actually work at a print company. Thank you for the sponsorship opportunity here to put that plug in. I work at a company called Flash Reproductions. And so we print art books, we print, we work with a lot of design agencies and ad agencies and that kind of thing. And so one of the companies that we work with,

they helped us design the book. And that's a company called Goods and Services. So they, their design team heard about what we were doing and said, hey, can we lend our aesthetic, our design muscle to the project? So they designed the book. And then my company, Flash Reproductions, which is owned by a couple of friends of mine, Rich and David, said, hey, we'll help you out with support on the cost of printing it. So that allowed us to do this sort of oversized production with all the bonus pieces and stuff that we sent you with the kit,

you know, and be able to sell it at a relatively reasonable price. So I'm glad you mentioned the book again, Al, so much because one, I opened up on Twitter, I said, does anyone have any questions for Derek and Chris? And I said, these are the guys behind Eve of Darkness, heavy metal in Toronto in the 1980s.

And right away, Cambrio wrote in and said, this book is so incredible. How did they compile so much good stuff? How did they decide on this huge trim size and page design? Well, that's partly what I was just mentioning, is that because we're in the business, we wanted to make something that wowed us, you know? And when you make a book of this sort of proportion,

it's nine and a half by twelve and three quarters size um it just sort of dwarfs everything on the else on your shelf you know and we thought that the scenes that we were documenting were very important to us and we feel that they didn't really get the representation at the time and we'll talk about this with alex too about how uh you know it was difficult to sort of break some of these bands outside of canada we feel that these bands deserved it. And a lot of the bands that Al's label signed, we feel are representatives of that. They needed to have more exposure.

So this was our chance to do it, and we were going to do it right. And we wanted the book to make a big thud when you dropped it. So you two gentlemen in the basement here with me, you'll be my co-hosts, okay? So any questions for Al as we proceed, or any bands you want to name check i love it when you name check chris when you drop these names i've never heard of like i'm like now i've heard of them and i'll retain that for next time i hear them but do you mind al giving us the attic

records origin story how did they come i know we're going back to 1974 here but how did uh you come to start an independent record label? Well, got to go back a long way further to 1960. Well, to 1954, I was a high school student and I skipped school to see a movie called Blackboard Jungle. Right. And I went to Matinee Theater at Young and Queen. And if you saw the movie, particularly in a theater, the beginning is all the lights go down, the screen is black,

and this voice comes on, 1 o'clock, 2 o'clock, 3 o'clock rock. Right. 4 o'clock, 5 o'clock, 6 o'clock two o'clock three o'clock rock right four o'clock five o'clock six o'clock rock and it goes through it's songs rock around the clock by bill haley and i had been a music fan already and was getting into a variety of music but that just blew me away uh and i said i would i was working in a record store after school and I said I want to be in the music business. 1962, I went to the New York World's Fair

in New York City for a week with a friend from Toronto and it was phenomenal. It was great. Loved it. I'd never seen anything like it before. 1967, Expo in Montreal. I went with a gentleman by the name of Paul Ski, who's now retired, but he, at that time, was a teenage announcer at a radio station, St. Thomas. radio station, St. Thomas.

He ended up being president of Rogers Radio and went into the Music Industry Hall of Fame on the broadcasting side the same night I went in on the music side. Expo was much better than the New York World's Fair, and it convinced me that Canadians could do anything that foreigners can and can do it better. So I got a job at Capitol Records in the accounting department. I had had one two-hour accounting lesson, but that at the time was the only degree you could get at night school. I didn't want to go to day school.

So I got hired at Capital, not because of my accounting skills, obviously, but having worked at retail, I knew all the catalog, I knew how to pronounce the names of the classical composers, et cetera. At Capital, they decided to have an internal training program to try to promote people within instead of hiring from without. I took it, and because of my retail experience, I aced it. So I got promoted out of accounting into indoor sales, which meant retailers called in. I took their orders and told them what was new and tried to talk them into stocking it. From inside sales, I got promoted to outside sales and got a territory of Western Ontario

where I would go to the accounts and take orders. But as a salesman, out of town, the salesmen were expected to call on the radio stations and hype singles. Well, most of the salesmen didn't know anything about broadcasting, didn't have any interest, never did it. I was just the opposite. I loved it. So I started concentrating on promotion to the exclusion of sales. I left Capitol and went to what is now Universal Music and started as Ontario Promotion Man. And within a year, I was national promotion, and I was at Universal from 64 to 68, during which I won the three general awards. One is top regional promotion, one a tie for national promotion, and the third national promotion on my own.

national promotion on my own. During that period, I promoted The Who, Jimi Hendrix, all sorts of acts. And one of the acts I was promoting was a guy from Toronto by the name Gordon Lightfoot. Gordon was working at a bar on Yonge Street upstairs called Steel's Tavern. street upstairs called steel's tavern it was between sam's and a and a steel's tavern was the building in between okay jordan was working upstairs for 200 a week and food to take home for his family he was married with one child at the time uh i promoted his records five albums that he had done for a label called united artists and worked very closely with him and broke him. And all those albums sold platinum in Canada, 100,000 plus. So he asked me to manage him. So in 68, I started managing Gordon Lightfoot.

And the first record we put out was an album called Sit Down, Young Stranger, which had a song called If You Could Read My Mind on it. Right. I went to the president of Warners, his new label, Warners here in Canada, and they had just opened up their own company here. And I said, you don't have a good promotion department. And the president said, I know, but I don't know anybody in Toronto. I just moved here from Montreal. If you know anybody that you want me to hire,

I'll hire them. So I called a friend of mine, Tom Williams, who at that time, he, what they call, brokered the all night show in CKFH and played R&B music. John Donabee, who went on to a lot of success in other stations was the all night man. Wow. Tom paid for the six or eight hours.

Then he went out and sold the time. And it was the only R&B show in Toronto. Anyway, I approached Tom and said, do you want to work at Warner's? So he said, sure. So he became the head of promotion at Warner's Canada. So we worked closely together on the Lightfoot stuff.

And over time, for a variety of reasons, I realized that personal management wasn't what I wanted to do. It was to be back in the record business. So in 74, Tom and I did a business plan. We went out looking to raise investment capital. We did the business plan in the weekend, and by Tuesday, we had raised $300,000. Wow. So we launched Attic in May of 1964. Wait, 1974.

1974. I continued to manage Lightfoot until 1978. Wow. But we launched Attic in 1974 and never looked back. Oh, that's amazing. Okay, so Attic, we're going to have so many questions about Attic artists and I'm so glad you're here to answer them,

but I'm just going to turn the mic over to Derek. Did you want to start with any particular, like I'm just trying to think of how we structure this. I know we're having a meeting on the fly here, but yeah, well, I mean, from our point of view and for the purpose of the

book we're talking about heavy metal and i think that addict started out with um more easy listening sort of artists and and and stuff and we could go into lots of depth with that but i think one of the harder acts that uh that they've started to break was triumph and i think maybe that's a maybe that's a good place to start so that was since r the set. Since Rick Emmett is an FOTM, that means friend of Toronto Mike, and Al, you're now an FOTM yourself, so welcome to the club. It's almost as prestigious as getting the Order of Canada, almost.

But it doesn't come with a lapel pin, so you'll... Okay. I get a T-shirt. You know what? I probably could get you a T-shirt, but let's talk Triumph. I actually just saw the documentary on Triumph.

I think it's on Crave TV here in Canada. But what can you tell me about breaking this Toronto trio? Well, Mike and Gil came to us, and I think it was Mike knew Tom previously from his Warners days. I'm not sure why, because they didn't record. His bands didn't record for Warn's, but they had some relationship. And they came and said, look, we want to form a power trio. And this guitar player, he's in a band. The leader has a record contract with Capitol Records.

But the guitar player, Rick Emmett, is not part of the contract. He's just a side man and if we can get a record contract that he will be part of he'll come join us we think so uh how about signing us we have a single we recorded two tracks uh and all we want you to do is sign us, let us get Rick and send out the single. Don't worry about promoting it, but we'll go out on the road and we'll hone our craft and we'll write the songs. And when we're ready to make an album, we'll come back.

So we signed them no advance. The single that they recorded at rca studios it's not on any album it's i guess a collector's item because not very many copies were made but at that time you have to remember that the bars there was a lot of work available for rock bands in the bars, you know, all over Eastern Canada. So they went out in the road for months touring in Northern Ontario and Quebec, and then they came back and said, okay, we're ready. So we made the first album. Now, I think Derek has a comment. I was going to say that at that point in time, there was a pretty strong circuit in Ontario and Quebec

for bands to tour, hard rock bands and burgeoning sort of heavy metal bands. But there was an appetite, from what I understand from when we were doing the research, there was an appetite for the club owners. They wanted to have cover bands. And so did Triumph run into that a little bit at the beginning of their... I remember Rush even said that.

Rush had to do covers at the beginning too. Al, you got quiet again. Sorry, Mike. There you go. Okay. Let me hear a bit of you, Al. Yes. They started writing And as they played

They started introducing original material into their sets They came back and said, we're ready to make an album So we made an album at Phase One Studios in Scarborough And launched it here in Toronto With a three-prong approach. They played, I'm trying to remember the name of the club on Western Road, Queensbury Arms. Right. In West, I think it was the Piccadilly Tube downtown, or it might have been the Gasworks, and a bar in Scarborough, I'm trying to remember the name of it.

Long gone. Anyways, that was their launch and we had commercials on the radio to support it. And the album took off and there was one track on it that was a cover of Rocky Mountain Way, which we released. Excuse me.

We released a single and that got them a lot of airplay because it was CanCon and it was a known song. That was the only cover they did on that album. What year approximately? I'm just trying to, I'm curious what radio stations you would have been promoting Triumph on. I guess 78, 80.

Okay, so Q107 launches. I know because I just did a Q107 Mike Umentary 45 years ago this year. So they were around in 77. Yeah, Q is a big supporter of Triumph. And Triumph were a big supporter of Q. And John Donabee was there. I don't

recall if John was there. Day one, I think, if I remember correctly. Dave Charles, I think, hired him for a day one, but yes. Yeah. Mike Levine, in particular, got very tight with the announcers of Q, and they got a lot of support.

And we did the usual promo things with displays and contests and what have you. They were able to spray it out of just Toronto and become a national band. And we sold the first album in platinum, which was $100,000. And then we made the second album. And it also went platinum. And I couldn't get a deal for the first album in the U.S., but there was a radio announcer in San Antonio,

excuse me, by the name of Joe Anthony, and I had sent him a copy and he started playing it and called me and he had a partner with a guy who ran some pizza store chain uh and they were selling records through his pizza chain so I started shipping them records to sell and they kept playing the records uh i don't think they ever paid me for any of the copies i sent them so i don't know if that constitutes bail or not anyways we're not talking a lot of copies but we got the buzz happening in san antonio and the guys in san antonio were presenting a concert and i don't remember who was the headliner, but the headliner canceled and they had already had the show on sale and

sold the tickets. So they called and asked if Triumph could headline. Wow. So of course Triumph were more than glad to headline. So off they went to Texas for their first headlining gig. I think there was something similar to that happened with Killer Dwarves, didn't it? Not when they were with us.

Oh, okay. The guys in San Antonio, they supported Moxie and a number of other Canadian bands. I don't know if they helped them get deals. Anyways, I was continually shopping Triumph in the U.S. and had the head of A&R. Sorry, let me step back. They played Toronto.

They were going to play Massey Hall as a showcase. And then Massey Hall heard about the pyro and said, no way. So they moved to Maple Leaf Gardens and what was called the Concert Bowl, which was about 9,000 seats. And we wanted it to be full, so they hired April Wine as the opening act. We had eight or ten A&R people from the states up here, and we went out for dinner, and we came at intermission, so they didn't know who the

opening act was whether and we don't know whether or not april wine how many additional tickets they sold but the point was the show was sold out so we had the anr people all sitting in a row with somebody from attic in between each of them uh the anR people at that time tended to want to be hip, and hard rock metal was not hip in their minds. They were into English bands and what have you. Anyways, they all left at the end of the concert. On the plane on the way back to New York the next morning, they were all in business class, and the Globe and Mail wrote a scathing review of Triumph, which was to be expected.

Again, the writer at the Globe and Mail considered himself too hip. The guy from RCA was in economy. He didn't get the free newspaper. He was interested. RCA was not a hot label at the time. They were living on Elvis, and they had Jefferson Airplane and some other acts, but they weren't a major player by any means. So I said to Warren, that was his name,

look, we'll make a deal. Take the tracks you want from the first two Canadian albums and put them together for the first American album. And the deal will be an easy deal for you. I'm not looking to beat you up financially. But you have to commit to a second album as well. It's a minimum of two albums. So Warren agreed and put out the first album. And

with the RCA and the band, they were able to get things rolling pretty well in the U.S. And then the second album broke them through with RCA. And they were on their way in the U.S. Love it, Al. And I'm going to be asking you about another heavy metal band from Canada. But first, just really quickly, when I opened up on Twitter that you were going to be making your Toronto Mike debut, Michael Barclay chimed in. And Michael Barclay, and this is unrelated to the heavy metal book for a moment, but ask him about the A&W Root Beer song, the rare pop hit led by Tuba. What's this about? Well, A&W at the time had a bear, not an animated character,

like a sports mascot. Yeah. And he was in the commercials, and he walked and the song was called Badum Badum. Okay. So it was a very popular song. Oh, Al, you got quiet again. So he seems to be flipping, but flip it back.

Anyway, we put out the song. It wasn't a hit, but it was fun. And actually, A&W sponsored a maritime tour by Flood the first time they had ever sponsored a band. That's wild. So Michael Barkley, yeah, he mentions that was an early Attic hit. So I wanted to say that. And I also wanted to shout out another FOTM

who chimed in when he heard you were coming on. His name is Gare Joyce. And Gare wants to know, Al, do you remember him writing a profile about you for Report on Business magazine? And it's okay if you don't, but his feelings will be okay, I think. But do you remember this at all, Gare Joyce, writing about you for Report on Business magazine? This might have been it.

Oh, here. I've got to flip screens here. Okay. Yes, okay. So he also says, Gare Joyce also says, that's great. He's going to be happy you remember. He says, and bagpipe and marching band albums. The secret of survival for any record company is a flow, a steady flow of product.

You always have to have new releases to ship out because you're always getting returns. And that's been the death of many, many independent labels around the world. You know, you put out one record and you get some action on it, but then next month you don't, you're not shipping anything new. So you're not bringing in any money.

So we did all sorts of things, including bagpipes and marching bands. And I, you know, we took shots at things that we thought would be fun. Awesome. Now, Chris, Derek, Michael Barker, I got to say his book is the best book on the Canadian music industry I've ever read. His recent book, just marvelous. Okay, so his most recent is actually 2000 to 2005, but the one before that's also very good, which covers like 1995 to 2000, I think. Yeah, I read that one, but it was the recent one

that I thought was phenomenal. Hearts on Fire? Yep. Yeah, I agree. I read it as well. 600 pages. It's a long read, but... You know, he's a great FOTM.

Now, Derek, Chris, is now a good time for us to talk about Anvil? There's never a bad time, really. I'd like to know what was the transition from Triumph to a band like anvil how did you become aware of heavy metal was that something that was even on your radar or just kind of stumbled into it through anvil because at that point anvil was one of the heavier bands around and so for attic who had a history in

some lighter sounding the rovers yeah things like this The Rovers. Yeah, things like this, right? Hey Good Hardy and things like this. It seemed to be a leap for any label, really, to tackle a band like Anvil. How did that come about? Well, first off, Tom and I had both promoted a variety of artists for the labels we worked for. So it wasn't anything alien to us.

Our personal tastes at the time were singers, songwriters. And we signed a few, Shirley Eichardt, Ron Negrini, Ken Tobias. And we got a lot of airplay on the artists, but we didn't sell very many records. And as I said earlier, even though we had raised 300 grand, we had to be generating revenue on a daily basis. So we weren't closed to anything. And we said when Mikey Gill came with the concept of triumph, we did it.

Why not? We had flood. And unfortunately, Brian Pilling had cancer, and we put out the first record and had some success with it. We actually bought the masters from another independent label that couldn't afford to finish the album and release it. Daffodil Records at the time. And Tom had promoted Flood when he was at Warner Brothers. So that was a friendship thing. Anvil, I don't know how Tom was, I think friends with their then manager, Bruce somebody.

Anyways, we got this record by lips and it was just a white cover with lips in lipstick color on it and we listened to it and said hey this is pretty good uh it's a finnish master you know it's different with the finnish master you can say yes or no. When you're considering signing an act and putting him in the studio and you don't know what the final cost is going to be and you don't know what the final outcome is going to be. It's a much different decision, a harder decision to make. With Anvil, it was an easy decision. So we signed them and we introduced them.

We put out a Q107 homegrown album, which if you remember them, they sold for $2.99 or something like that. And as we were the label, we could put on who we wanted on it. So we put Anvil on and that helped with promotion at Q. And it was a good record and we sold almost gold in Canada with it

I had shopped it unsuccessfully in the US again it wasn't considered hip by the ANR people so I hooked them up with a guy named David Krebs considered hip by the A&R people. So I hooked them up with a guy named David Krebs, who was managing Aerosmith at the time. He was a heavyweight manager, a friend. So he took them on for management and he put them on as opening act for an Aerosmith tour in the U.S.

I went and saw them in Albany, New York, and Anvil did their set, and then it was intermission, and Aerosmith, one of the members, I don't remember which one, was too stoned to go on stage, so Anvil went out and did the set all over again, and at which point they got the guy in Aerosmith unable to stand up and then they went out and did their show anyway David was shopping it and he came back to us and said I can't get a deal for the U.S. without Canada and that really you know was against what we were trying to do, was to retain Canada. But we thought, what's best for the band,

we'll let you out of your contract with Attic. And so I think this was the time of the second album, if I remember right. Sure. Forged in Fire. Anyways, we let them out of their contract. David never got them an American deal. David never got them an American deal and years ago

I think it was when their movie had its premiere at a theater on Yonge Street I was invited and I went and Rob said that the worst day of our life was when Attic let us out of the contract

anyways we let them out of the contract. Anyways, we let them out of the contract. They never really made it big, unfortunately, but they're still working at it. They just announced some dates and that's great. I love Rob. I love Lips. I'm glad

that they're able to keep making music. What say you two gentlemen about Anvil on the tail there. You, Chris. Well, I was just wondering, at one point for Metal on Metal, the trailblazing record, how did Chris Sangres get brought into it? I knew Chris.

I used to spend every quarter, I would spend a week in London and another week on the continent. So for a lot of our acts, we had a lot of European activity. And one of those trips, I think it might've been the trip where I picked up David Coverdale,

the Whitesnake album, which was, Whitesnake was the name of the album, not the name of the band. I think that's when I met Chris. Anyways, he seemed an appropriate producer for Anvil. So we hired Chris to produce them. Yeah, they did great work together. I mean, that's a milestone kind of album.

And so I guess it begs the question, too, and Forged in Fire was an amazing record, too. so like what was your strategy to try and break them i know that you guys got really uh you know good exposure for them on festivals in europe they were on monsters of rock and redding festival and that and i think at one point you guys opened an office in uh in the did. Trying to sort of spearhead, was that spearheading Anvil and Lee Aaron, I guess? Got it. Anvil. Oh, Al, your volume dropped again. Sorry.

That's okay. I'm coming closer. It sounds like it's beyond your control that periodically it just sort of drops, but you got, whatever you do to bring it back, it worked the last couple of times. Any better? No, not yet. Okay. As close as i can get oh see there it just snapped back in so when you listen back you'll see it's some technical gremlin going on

there but you're back now okay uh yeah we hooked them up with neil warnick at the agency in england in England. He was the biggest agent in Europe and he had all the big rock bands. Anvil were just one of the actors we hooked up with Neil. And he got them on all the festivals. They didn't have, they never had good management, unfortunately. And that worked against them. It's now an appropriate time to talk killer dwarfs. I know we teased him earlier, but what can you tell us about killer dwarfs? Well, Tom, my partner was single and lived downtown.

So he was the guy who went out to the bars every night. And he saw the killer dwarf somewhere. to the bars every night. And he saw the Killer Dwarfs somewhere. I don't remember where. And he liked them. And we were doing quite well with the hard rock acts, with Anvil and God, Owen, Triumph.

So he signed the Killer Dwarfs. We made the first album. And as I recall, they demoed some songs for the possible second album. First album didn't do very well. And it was option time. As I said before, as a record company, when you send an act into the studio, you don't know what it's going to cost, how it's going to sound, et cetera, et cetera. And we just weren't blown away by the demos, so we didn't exercise our options.

So we just put out one album by the Killer Dwarfs. And again, I don't recall them having strong management. I don't recall them having management at all, unfortunately, which is really tough for a lot of Canadian acts when they don't have decent management who has clout, not just a friend of the band, but somebody who can make things happen. Alex, do you remember a band called Kraken?

Because they were quite good friends of Anvil and a phenomenal band at the time. They actually recorded with Chris as well, a demo. I'm aware of the name, but I'm not familiar with the band, no. All right. I just wondered, because there was a lot of bands going around at the time, other than Anvil, of course, there was Craig, and there was another band called Rapid Tears.

I don't know if you remember them. No. Not at all. So did you look around for any other heavy metal bands, particularly? Were you looking for metal bands, or has whatever just kind of crossed your path you took? We're interested in metal and hard rock because the fans are the most loyal.

Oh Al, you dropped in volume again. Is it any better? Now you're back. Okay, it might be my mic. We're always on the lookout for new acts, period, of any kind but as i said the metal and hard rock fans were the most loyal uh so we were always looking for acts in that genre uh somebody approached us with lee aaron i don't remember who it was i think it was robert connelly

who was managing lee at the time yeah uh he approached us with the album metal queen which again was a finished album right uh so all you do is say yes or no you know negotiate a deal so we did and we picked up the metal queen album and put that out this actually is a great segue i'm glad you mentioned lee aaron i was going to bring up our metal queen in a moment here but since we're talking killer dwarfs and we're talking Lee Aaron, what role did Much Music play in the promotion of these acts? Because Much Music is where I learned about Lee Aaron and it's where I learned about killer dwarfs.

Yeah. Well, Much Music was really important. And at that time, and going back to what I said earlier, when we went out and raised money, we knew it was important that we had to make world quality records and videos. Initially, when we started, there was no videos,

but actually in the early days, we did with Patsy Glant, we did some of the earliest Canadian videos from New York to LA and a couple of other Patsy Glant tracks. Do you know where they'd air? I'm always curious. I know Toronto Rocks and I know Video Hits and there was a show on CFMT called Something Else, I think it was called, with Jay Gold and Shirley McQueen. But where would you air a video in this country

pre-Munch Music? Well, there was international opportunities. And of course there's already MTV in the U.S. So again, in the case of Lee Aaron, Conley came to us, and he had already done the video on Metal Queen in Los Angeles. Somehow he connived to get on a set at Universal City and produce the Lee Aaron video. So it was an easy deal for us to pick up,

and Much had to play Canadian videos, and there wasn't a lot of quality Canadian videos being made in the early days of much. So we were producing, uh, quality videos. So we got support on basically all the videos we did. For sure. I'm thinking you're right. There was a small, uh, a limited universe of Canadian hard rock, heavy metal videos. I think I saw that Helix video every single day on Toronto Rocks. So shout out to Helix,

also FOTMs, but glad you mentioned Lee Aaron. I'm actually going to read a question and I know that he's watching live on our live stream, which is live.torontomike.com. Hello to Midtown Gord. Midtown Gord has a question for the Eve of Darkness guys. He says, I saw an artist called Villevant.

I hope I'm saying it right. Villevant opened for Leigh Aron on Friday. She is young and super talented from Brampton. By the way, Leigh Aron's also from Brampton, but we're talking about Villevant here. And Leigh Aron's a Karen. That's a fun fact. Okay.

I was unaware of her before that evening. Where currently, I love this question, where currently can one find out about new and upcoming metal artists in this country? That's a good question. Chris, Chris, this one's on you, buddy. Midtown Ward wants to, where do you get that? I'm an expert in the old things, not the new things.

Yeah, well, there's a lot. I know where to see Annville and Learon, but what about this century? I honestly couldn't answer that. I don't know where people go. Because, you know, much music is gone. I don't know if you caught that memo. And the radio today is not playing new metal.

There's no new metal playing on the radio in Toronto. No, you're right. I mean, I guess you've got to go down the rabbit hole that is YouTube. Or hope you see them open for a band like Learon. Or go live, yeah. I don't know where you'd see any of that what do you say derrick uh i'm no further ahead than chris to be honest okay al what about you i don't know if you're keeping your ear to the ground anymore but where would somebody discover a new metal artist in this country in 2022 well it's interesting you mentioned the person who opened for Lee. I didn't go.

I'm not prepared to go inside a bar yet. I've had COVID and I'm old, so I won't go inside a bar. So I didn't see Lee on Friday. But the act that opened, I saw a post today on Facebook about them. And it sounds like it came from a management company, and it was produced a little bit on Facebook, so obviously they recorded at Elmo, and they did a quick edit on something,

and put it up on the internet. I'm not aware of today's marketing things and how things get started with influencers and all the other stuff that goes on. Band camp is a big thing right now as well. It has been for us several years. So there is a comment. Audio only. Yeah.

And, you know, you know, going back to what Mike asked earlier about the impact when he saw Lee Aaron's video on Much. Much and MTV and the various European equivalents, once they played a video, they gave you a national and or international platform. It's different from getting a radio station in Toronto to play your record and then trying to get it played in Winnipeg. Much, MTV, etc. were all national or international,

and they had immediate impact, and they set the visual image of the act, like it or not, they set it. Yeah, and there's somebody like Lee Aaron in The Metal Queen that makes an impact, right? You get that connection with the artist, and you get what they're trying to put across. And on in the in the earlier part of the 80s there was only a limited amount of videos so to point to al's point like you're getting that uh you know that international or national um exposure and you're getting it over and over and over again

because there's not a lot of things but you're also getting it to a broad audience at once you are but like mike pointed out he saw helix every other day right because there was only so many videos to play you think about like it's an odd time for bands right now because they have the world at their fingertips with the computers they can reach anybody individually right but you can't do anything broad to capture people that are not looking for it you can only capture the people that are seeking it now dj dream doctor is on the live stream at live.torontomic.com and he's listening and he says banger tv so this is dj dream doctor speaking uh banger tv is a good source for new metal and when he says new metal he doesn't mean new metal he means new metal and

i mean there are websites too like brave words was another, you know, supporter of the book and they cover, you know, things that are vintage like our topic and they cover new shows too. So local bands. Thank you, Midtown Gord. That was a great question. And there's another question. This is for you, Al. It's from Adam and Adam writes, I had this attic records compilation called Metal for Lunch. Yeah.

Please ask for any, so I'm going to read the whole thing and we'll figure out where to focus, but please ask for any stories about kick acts who appeared on the compilation, as well as attic artists like Lee Aaron and John Albany appearing on their welcome to the club album, doing a cover of with a little help from my friends. Al,

what can you tell adam about his metal for lunch uh album he loved well the first record there was two records involved the first one was called metal for breakfast and it was a compilation and not just attic artists we had i think we had judas priest and as i recall, our then distributor was CBS, Columbia. And they gave us access to some of their stars. So we put out metal for breakfast. And the cover was an announcer from Q. I forget his name, but long hair, black T-shirt.

And he had a cereal bowl in front of him full of... Oh, your volume dipped again. So whatever you did to bring it back. I sound like a broken record, but that's okay. The content is great. Say something again. Okay. Not yet. These faulty microphones, right, Al? No, usually it snaps right back, but I'll let you know the moment I hear you.

Okay. Why don't you talk to the other guys? You're back. Okay. We put out metal for breakfast, and we used that to introduce some of the attic artists, and it was TV marketed on much music.

So it was a gold album. And then we did a subsequent one called metal for lunch. We also did one with Robert Connolly, Lee's manager at the time. I'm trying to remember the name of it. It had a cartoon cover and it had a number of, I think it was all Canadian bands and included

the band that Sebastian Bach was in, his first band. Kid Wicked. Yeah. That was Maple Metal, wasn't it? Or was that the one with the girl on the front of it? Maple Metal, I believe it was called? Yeah. Cool. Yeah.

Cool. Any kick-axe stories for Adam? Nope. Alright, moving along. There's just a track on the album. As the 80s sort of wore on, by the mid-80s the

earlier part of the decade, the heavy metal that started at the 80s seemed to be a little bit passe and thrash metal and and more extreme forms of metal started to happen by the mid 80s and at that point uh attic launched a sub-label viper and uh i think the first signing was razor um or was it right Or it may have been Blind Vengeance, because I know that they were kind of around the same time period. Yeah, they're both about the same time. I don't remember which was which. Well, Razor were sort of upping the ante locally for thrash metal,

and they were sort of, you know, Metallica was doing it in the States, and Slayer and other bands were starting to do it in Canada. We had a few bands, Exciter and a few others, that were in that sort of extreme realm, Anvil sort of touching on it as well. But Razor started to take it to another level in terms of speed and the thrash genre. So they put out an independent EP first

and then I guess they were signed to Attic. And then the decision was made to release the first album, which was sort of part of the EP and part newly recorded material. So what was the logic behind that, rather than just going with a whole new, a brand new recording? Well, what was on the EP, very few people had heard it. So why waste the tracks? And I don't recall whether Dave had uh somehow funded the entire album or attic

funded completion i don't recall the details on it uh but we did use i remember we used the ep uh because that had given them the image they had right very underground image uh so we released the first album unfortunately again we're talking lack of management uh and if i remember right one or more of the band members had day jobs and responsibilities jobs and responsibilities. So they were never able to tour at the time. It was very frustrating because touring, as we talked about earlier with the bar scene was very important for acts and Razor were not able to do that.

So did Attic never get involved with the management side of it? They didn't want to manage the bands or why not get involved with that that with management and a record company you have a conflict right so we did what we could for the bands and in many cases we were quasi managing them you know back to the anvil situation right uh you know we got the booking agents in Europe. We worked with the booking agents here in Canada. We got the things rolling and we did a lot more than a record company would be expected to do. But we didn't have the time or inclination to manage because management is a full time business. You know, my my success with Lightfoot proved it. You had to know what you were doing.

You had to have contacts. You had to be able to work with a record company. You had to be able to work with a booking agency. You had to have a vision for the band that you could convince the band to follow. So we're talking about that. For the Evil Invaders video, how involved was Attic with that? Did you spur that on? Who paid for that? We funded it, how involved was adequate that did you spur that on who paid for that?

We funded it. Yeah. And how did that work out? Which is really one of the first sort of thrash kind of a band videos come out of Canada. I think, right. It didn't get a lot of exposure. Really?

I think I probably got on the power hour on much and a few things like that, but I never got into regular rotation. But it was an important part of marketing the band, so we did the video, and we didn't get the results we had hoped for because of lack of support from the band itself. And there seemed to be a rapid succession of Razor records too. Once they got

signed to Viper, I think there was three albums that came out within a span of about a year, year and a half? Something like that? I don't remember the details. It just seemed to be a really rapid it seemed like the label was supporting the band and the band was able to create enough

output like you were mentioning about getting a new product out there it seemed like that was it was a good pattern that that was happening where there was a lot of releases there was excitement there was a video and yet like you said it was they weren't able to maybe tour yeah the touring might have been the the hindrance okay now i'm going to take like a very brief pause here because i want to get my gifts i want to get some gifts for my guests here so you have your great lakes beer i have a lasagna a frozen palma pasta lasagna for you two gentlemen in my freezer upstairs that's right you're going home to burlington you're taking an old frozen it's gonna break your teeth it's gonna break your teeth how's alex gonna have

it share it with us i don't understand i have I have to figure out how to make Al happy later. But you guys are getting the lasagnas before you leave here today. I love lasagna. Thank you, Palma Pasta. They're going to feed us at TMLX, too, which is September 1st from 6 to 9 p.m. It might not be the patio. It actually might be the lawns, but it's going to be at Great Lakes Brewery, which is in southern Etobicoke here.

Here's a stickeru.com sticker. It's Toronto Mike's sticker, one for each of you. Great stickers from stickeru.com. Thank you for the support. There is a, believe it or not, a measuring tape here. Look at the great gifts you get, Al, when you make an appearance here. But this is a measuring

tape from Ridley Funeral Home. You've got one over there. I'm actually a cabinetmaker carpenter, so I can use that. Okay. Don't leave home without it, Chris. Don't leave home without it. And I'm not sure, do any of you enjoy cannabis? Personally, me, no.

It's okay if you don't. I don't touch it. Not against it, I just never have. No pressure. So if you have someone in your life who enjoys smoking cannabis, there is a ashtray you can pass on. You've each got a, that's from Canna Cabana. They won't be undersold on cannabis or cannabis accessories.

And last but not least, Dewar makes the world's most comfortable pants and shorts. They have a retail store on Queen Street West, and you can go to Dewar.ca, D-U-E duer.ca and you can save 15% right now of the promo code Toronto Mike. So use the promo code, save your 15%. It's so comfy, so rugged. You'll love it. Comfortable you say?

Comfortable. Comfortable. I hear good things about them. I love comfortable. These guys are getting into it now. Love it. Okay, so now back to business here. I actually have a few questions for al i was so excited when i found out mr attic was going to be on the program i had brought out one of my 12-inch singles but we'll get to that in a minute al can you tell us the story of a teenage head at the ontario place forum yeah uh again i've said couple of times, when you're offered a Finnish master by a band, it's easy to say yes or no.

And if you say yes, then it's a matter of working out the contractual details. Teenage Head with Frantic City was a Finnish master. They came to us and they shopped it to everybody including our then distributor cbs so we were starting to get into a bidding war with cbs and i spoke to the president and i think he instructed his people to withdraw from the bidding war. Anyways, Teenage Head signed with Attic. So we were very happy. And the first album, Frantic City, went well past Platinum. And they had a manager, Jack Morrow.

Jack was his alias. He had an Eastern European real name. I forget what it was, but he was very creative, and every teenage head date he tried to make into something unique, whether it was going into a club and decorating it, making it, I guess if it was in October, it would be a Halloween party, or in Christmas, or December, it would be a Halloween party, or in December, it would be a Christmas party, all the dates in December.

Anyway, he was very creative in that. Unfortunately, he was a thief, but we didn't know that at the time. So we put out the first album, and we subsequently recorded a second album uh i forget the title of it but it also went gold plus and we had had a number of acts play ontario place my then wife was involved in programming of the forum of ontario place so she might have had something to do with the number of our acts. I don't know that for sure, but teenage had headlined.

And we had, I had hired the Rolling Stones publicist. He had come up from New York. I had a friend at MTV in the States. He came up with a couple of other MTV people. We had a couple of other people from the States, not came up with a couple other MTV people. We had a couple other people from the States, not A&R people. I shopped Teenage Head in the States, and the name, most of the labels in the U.S. were afraid of it.

And the name came from, I think it was a Ramones song about being a teenage attitude in your mind, not of oral sex. But anyway, they did Ontario Place and it was sold out. It was magical. Some people couldn't get in.

A lot of people couldn't get in because the forum didn't have reserved seats. It was first come, first served. And some people might have been there at three o'clock in the afternoon uh at ontario place and then they went to the forum so it was a problem at the forum with a number of our acts triumphant gato as well and uh some people tried to swim across to get past the security, past the front gate. So it was reported in the paper as a riot, which to the best of my knowledge, it wasn't. But it was a wonderful night. And Frankie, to me, Frankie was the best front man I've ever seen. Wow.

And if you were ever at Ontario Place at the Forum, there was a circular stage and it had a barrier between the stage and the seats. And Frankie got up walking in that barrier all the way around and the fans were touching him and Frankie was just magical that night. So we had everything going for us. We had a commitment in New York from a radio station and a club. The club they were going to play in the radio station was going to broadcast the concert live. We had interest from MTV. And if we hadn't been able to get on MTV, that would have eliminated any problems with the name from the record companies. from the record companies.

Anyways, as we know, shortly thereafter, Gord, their teenage head band went off the road. Gord broke his back. The band hired David Bendis to fill in, but they didn't want to do New York without Gord. So all the momentum we had went down the tubes. Wow. Wow, what a story. I'm going to ask you this question. momentum we had went down the tubes. Wow. Wow.

What a, what a story. I'm going to ask you this question. So I told you last Monday, Steve Waxman and Kevin Shea were here and they didn't work at the same, they each worked at Attica different times. And one of them replaced Steve. Right,

right, right. So Steve had great detail about one of my favorite artists, Maestro Fresh West. Yeah. He's been on the program a few times. So I brought out my 12-inch attic, put out this Maestro Fresh West, let your backbone slide. I've got drop the needle over here. But go ahead. Something's happening.

Can you see and hear me? I can hear you. Yeah, absolutely. Something's happened here. Oh, it's all good on my end, though. I can see you. I can hear you. Yeah, absolutely. Something's happened here. Oh, it's all good on my end, though. I can see you. I can hear you. We're all good here.

Okay, I can't see you. I can hear you, but I can't see you. Okay, okay. Well, I'm holding up the 12-inch for Let Your Backbone Slide. And it's kind of interesting. Oh, he's gone now. So, gentlemen, you two take over for a bit while we see. Because I'm getting into my maestro quite.

Now we're getting serious, okay, you two take over for a bit while we see, because I'm getting into my maestro quite, just now we're getting serious, okay, guys? But why don't you guys tell us about some, if there's any heavy metal bands that had nothing to do with Attic. I have a note from Hamilton Mike who wanted to talk about Coney Hatch, Anvil, Killer Dwarves, Svengali, Slick Toxic. So we did talk a lot of Anvil and Killer Dwarves, but what about Coney Hatch, Svengali, or Slick Toxic. So we did talk a lot of Anvil and Killer Dwarfs, but what about Coney Hatch, Svengali, or Slick Toxic? Yeah, well, Coney Hatch is another one

that we were going to get to on this list of Attic signings. So Coney Hatch is an Attic. The first album, I believe, was on Attic. But they had some unfortunate... We cover this in the book, actually. There's a couple of unfortunate incidents where they were put on shows to give them a leg up locally. So they opened for Judas Priest on the Screaming for Vengeance tour.

They opened for Iron Maiden for the Peace of Mind tour at Kingswood. But in both cases, they kind of got heckled off the stage. The audience, although, I mean, I think the first album is really entertaining. Is that the one with monkey bars on it? Monkey bars, yeah. Yeah, I love it. Yeah, and there's some good material on the first record for sure,

and it seemed like it would be a good fit for some reason, and they cover it in the book, and they kind of laugh about it these days, but they got heckled off the stage. Well, he's a sweetheart. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. But, okay, what about Svengali or Slick Toxic?

Those are a couple of, when you're talking... They were like later 80s. Yeah, they were agali or Slick Toxic? Those are a couple of... They were a little bit later on in the game. Slick Toxic always felt a little like a Skid Row era. I think at any point when a genre becomes popular like a glam metal or a grunge or whatever, labels are looking

to sign similar kind of bands and I think Slick Toxic was our equivalent to a Skid Row. Sure. And they did have a couple of pretty catchy songs, to be honest. And they would be playing Gasworks and stuff. Yeah, for sure. They did some national tours.

Slick Toxic did go out as far as Newfoundland, actually. I do recall. Did you see them out there? I didn't see them, but I know they played there. When you get to The Rock, you know you made it. You're a loss, Chris. And we mentioned them earlier because I saw them on but I know they played. When you get to The Rock, you know you made it. You're a loss, Chris. And we mentioned them earlier because I saw them on Toronto Rocks every week,

but JR would love it if we talked a bit about Helix. Anything to say about Helix? Well, I can talk about how they got booed off the stage when they opened for Motorhead. That's also in the book. It was pretty funny. And Lemmy came out. So the crowd, you know, again, just whatever.

For some reason, they weren't feeling it. Again, Helix has some really good songs, but, uh, the audience wasn't feeling that night at that night. They opened for them, I think in 83 at the concert hall. And, uh, you know, Lemmy wasn't having it. He came out on stage. He's like, if you don't like them, fuck you. They're a good band. Fuck off. And he gave the audience shit. And, uh, so the, uh, the members of Helix were telling us that during the interview. They were pretty proud of that. Lemmy came out and stood up for them.

Oh, sure. There's some great Lemmy stories by Steve Waxman, actually, last Monday. So we were kind of buried in some great stories. Actually, when you get back to Helix,

there were actually the first metal band to come to Newfoundland. Helix and the Headpins toured together and they played Newfoundland and I did go see that. I think there's actually

a photo in the book of Helix playing in Newfoundland that one of our see that. I think there's actually a photo in the book of Helix playing in Newfoundland that one of our contributors submitted. That's what you should do right now while we try to reconnect with Al is if someone listening right now has said I gotta read this Eve of Darkness because everybody who's read it is raving about it

and even if you don't think, I've been hearing from people who don't consider themselves heavy metal heads, you know what I mean? They're just casual fans of the genre because maybe they prefer other genres or whatever who are in love with this Eve of Darkness. So where should someone go right now to buy a copy? If you're in Toronto,

there are local stores that have copies of it. I think Sonic Boom stocks it. Rotate This. There's a number of other stores. Type had copies. I don't know if they have any copies. Rotate this. There's a number of other stores. Type had copies. I don't know if they have any copies. In Oakville, yeah. There's a copy. I know in Burlington, there's a copy

at Looney Tunes. Yeah, so there are copies remaining. So the first print run has basically sold out, except for any copies that you might find. The odd copy here in a bookstore, but now the second edition has been released. And basically, the only copy here in a bookstore, but now the second edition has been released.

And basically the only difference in that is that the first edition had a silver reflective cover and the next one is just sort of a, more of a stripped down version of it, but the book itself remains the same. So I might have to assign a task to you, Derek. Can you text our, see, this is a great guest you lined up.

Thank you so much. He's been great. I mean, we had Can you text our, see, this is a great guest you lined up. Thank you so much. He's been great. I mean, we had a few mic issues, but not, you know, nothing you could do. Technology is going to do that. But other than the mic issues, like Al has been fantastic.

And I have to ask him, so you text him to find out if he's coming back, like if he can click that link again, because we have lost him on the Zoom. He seemed to have a premonition something was going wrong because he lost us before we lost him.

But we're going to get Al back. You know why we're going to get Al back, Chris? This is what we're going to do because I know that Derek sent me in that text. But Chris, here are the three big topics I need to address with Al while we have him here. Maestro Fresh West,

Weird Al Yankovic, those two for sure. And then I need to find out, you know, why did he sell Attic Records? Because Attic Records, he starts it up in 1974 and he sells it in 2000. And let's see, okay, I've rebooted the computer. It may be back in a minute or two. Okay, that's fine.

We can, so you guys, anything on your hit list that you want to address before we reconnect with Al? And then I'll wrap up with those three items for Al when he gets here. Well, I guess just to finish up on where you can get the book, we also have a Big Cartel website. So it's uxbpresscanada.bigcartel.com. And so there are two versions of the book.

There's the standard version, which is the oversized piece that we mentioned earlier in the broadcast. And then there's also a diehard edition. There's very few copies of that left, but it does come with all the bells and whistles, a seven inch by Hateful Snake, which was another Toronto Rocks hit.

I don't know if you remember that song. I'm trying to remember. Are You Ready? And it was a video that they filmed up and down Yonge Street and an exhibition place and so it's really a good snapshot of... What's the book called again?

You shared a book? The song or the... Oh, okay. DJ Dream and there could be a delay here, but DJ Dream Doctor is on the live stream. What's the book called? What's the question mark? The Toronto metal book is called Eve of Darkness. Eve of Darkness is the book that these two gentlemen helped write. And just since I'm mentioning DJ Dream Doctor,

waiting for Al to reconnect, he says one of his favorite Canadian metal bands was Exciter from Ottawa. Yeah. What say you, Chris, about Exciter? Are you excited about Exciter? I mean, they were a phenomenal thrash band, a very early thrash band that started. I guess the first, I mean, they influenced Metallica,

they influenced Slayer, they influenced so many bands to be heavy like that. And there was no one like them at the time, I don't think. So, Chris, you're a collector, you know, you've been around the genre since it was born, I suppose. But what's your favorite Canadian heavy metal act of all time? That's a tough one. It keeps changing.

As years go on. I mean, when I was young, Razor. I was all about Razor. Who couldn't love Razor at the time in the 80s? But there were other greats like Sacrifice, Slaughter. Slaughter were amazing. Slaughter were amazing. Okay.

Yeah. You mentioned Kraken earlier kraken now you know that's kind of putting on your vision as glasses when you go back to bands like kraken or banshee because that's what we know at the time i never heard in the 80s i never heard of those at all it wasn't until much later decades later especially with kraken they didn't really get known known until a bootlegger in Europe in the 90s bootlegged their demo and put it on vinyl. And they got big in Europe, oddly enough. And that's how I heard of it through the internet. Interesting.

And the band had an interesting quote in that. They said, you know, we feel like we got a record deal from the people. That's how they looked at being bootlegged, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a good way to look at it. If a label's not signing them and a fan puts it out. The masses have spoken. They want your product. That's right. Okay, yeah, yeah. That's a good way to look at it. If a label's not signing them and a fan puts it out. The masses have spoken. Exactly. Somebody wanted it. They want your product. That's right.

Okay, I love it. And you two heavy metal guys are going to be okay with a little Weird Al and Maestro Fresh West chatter? Not exactly heavy metal Al. I love Maestro, actually. I'm interested. Who didn't dig Weird Al? So the story was... Well, do you know where the sample comes from, right? The drop the needle

sample? So, I did know, but the story was told in great detail by Steve Waxman last week because he was there. You didn't know it before that? I did know it. Haywire. I did know it. I did know it. But you know why? Because I've had Maestro on three times.

I've asked him about it. And Joel Goldberg, does this name mean anything to you? We talked about where would you see a music video before much music? He was hosting a show on CFMT called something else. I believe it was called as Jay Gold spinning like early videos, you know, before much music. So,

but he also directed the first bunch of maestro videos. So he directed the, let your backbone slide, the drop the needle. And there we're back on maestro, and we're reconnecting. I'm going to give play-by-play to all the FOTMs listening. Alexander, he wants to be called Al. He's like Paul Simon said, call me Al.

He seems to be reconnecting. It's joining. Another show. Well, we're waiting for him to join. Another show that deserves an honorable mention for both the punk and the metal side of things is the new music. Yes. Right? Janie Becker of things is the new music. Yes.

Right? And so that was started. Jeannie Becker and J.D. Roberts. Exactly. It started in the late 70s and very important to be playing really obscure music on mainstream TV. And that's how I, as being not from Toronto, that's how I learned about a lot of Toronto metal. And while we're at it, talk about community radio, right? Like CKLN was a great resource for all of us.

A guy named Brian Taylor was playing. Know the name well. Yeah, he was playing a lot of this music as it was breaking on ARG Rock. And that's great because let's shout out, not heavy metal, but for hip hop, let's shout out DJ Ron Nelson. Yeah, that's right. Because this is going to bring us back to Al. How are you doing, buddy? Welcome back.

Am I back? You're back. Sorry, that's right. Because this is going to bring us back to Al. How you doing, buddy? Welcome back. Am I back? You're back. Sorry. My computer crashed first. That's okay. I kicked out a... I'm just glad you came back. You could have been like, forget these guys.

But as I tease the audience, I need to talk Maestro Fresh West and Weirdo Yankovic, and then I need to find out why you sold Attic Records. But let's start with Maestro. What can you tell us about Maestro Fresh West and Weirdo Yankovic. And then I need to find out why you sold Attic Records, but let's start with Maestro. What can you tell us about Maestro Fresh West? Well, as Steve told you, he approached West when he was in another act.

Vision? Yeah, I think that was the name of the band. Steve wasn't A&R. He was promotion. Right. So anyways, he saw them at something and gave Wes his card, but Wes never followed up.

Anyway, again, it was a finished album that was done, and Joel Goldberg had produced a video on Backbone. And I don't recall, probably came through Steve, going to Much Music and finding, you know, every week and finding out what's happening. Anyways, they had sampled Haywire, a song called, just a line called Drop the Needle. Dance Desire was the song, right?

Yeah, the Haywire song. Yeah, they start with, drop the needle! Yep. And Wes had sampled it. So I said, okay. They didn't clear the sample. So I got the contact information for LMR Records in New York, which is a label Wes was signed to. And I called and the head of the label was a guy by the name of Larry Molas.

Larry's father is a big real estate tycoon in New York. And I don't know why he started the record company, but he did and signed Wes. So I talked to Larry and I said, you know, you've got this sample. It's unclear. You've released the record in the U.S. You know, you can't take it off now. It's too late. So let's do a deal. so let's do a deal so I told him how much I wanted for the sample and then I said well but I'll pay you that amount to license the record for Canada and Larry said fine so the money didn't pass hands at the time but we got the Canadian rights to maestro and literally the rest is history it took off um just a magic video you know wes was a is a great guy uh we had a great relationship and then

when his contract with lmr ended we signed him Attic. And I don't know if you remember, he did a hip-hop version of the Guess Who, These Eyes. Of course. Using the original masters. Stick to your vision. To make them clear. Stick to your vision. Yeah. Love it.

I just love the whole story. And yeah, he was discovered on Electric Circus, which was co-created by the aforementioned Joel Goldberg so he's on that and Stevie B R&B artist Stevie B sees him and then hooks him up with

LMR in the US and the rest is history the bad side unfortunately we paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in royalties to LMR, and Wes didn't see any of it. That is tragic. It is.

And now he's living in New Brunswick because he says it's too expensive here. If that money had gone to the artist, he'd be here today. Possibly. All right, let me talk about an American now. That's a great Canadian success story, Maestro Fresh West. But how do you end up representing Weird Al Yankovic here in Canada? As I said earlier, I traveled a lot and I went to Europe every quarter for two weeks and over a period of time made relationships, friendships.

I knew what pub people went to after work and I was invited out with them. So I would meet not just the person I was dealing with, but the staff. And, you know, we ended up licensing a lot of foreign masters. We had Motorheads, Ace of Spades. We had Peter Green, founder of Fleetwood Mac. We had his first two albums. We had David Coverdale. A lot of that.

We were in the licensing business. And I had licensed the Nylons to an American label called Wyndham Hill, which was distributed by A&M. And they had done quite well. We sold over a million albums in the U.S. for the Nylons. Wow.

But they had an option. And one of the two leads with the nylons wow uh but they had an option and and one of the two lead singers of the nylons unfortunately was dying of aids so we did a live album at ontario place uh and it was kind of a best of with some original material and wyndham hill didn't want to pick it up for whatever reason I never really understood because it wasn't an expensive deal and the album was going to sell probably at least 100,000 in the U.S. and for Wyndham Hill an indie label that was good business you know that's a million dollars in business so I was in L.A. shopping the nylons and probably other things at the time and it was friday i had lunch with somebody uh and he mentioned that uh a guy by the name i'm trying to remember chuck's last name oh his name's escaping me anyways Anyways, he was running Scotty Brothers Records.

And he was a fan of the Nylons. So my friend said, you should call Chuck. So my friend called Chuck and said, yeah, I'd like to talk. So my plane was later in the day, so I had a couple of hours. So I went over to Chuck's office and met with him and played him the Nylons album. And he said, yeah, we definitely want it. And I said, well, what are you doing in Canada? And he said, nothing.

Our deal with CBS ran out some time ago and they had no representation in Canada. So I gave them the Nylons live album with no advance and they gave me the Scotons live album with no advance, and they gave me the Scotty Brothers catalog with no advance, and that included Weird Al. A number of others, Survivor, which had Eye of the Tiger. It was a wonderful catalog, but Weird Al was the biggest selling act in it. And all his back catalog, no artist sells like Weird Al.

And then when we got our first new release, we brought Al up to Toronto and he worked with Steve and he worked with the people at Much Music. Again, I listened to your interview with Steve and Kevin. They said Al could catnap for 20 minutes. He did it in our office. We were having a meeting and we looked and Al was lying in the floor sound asleep. He'd work all night, which is what he did at Much Music and did regular promotion during the day. And he had just a great relationship with Much and he also had a great relationship

with Tarzan Dan, who had a video show on another network ytv yep uh and we worked closely with alan and al's manager and uh it was just a wonderful relationship uh until scotty brothers sold the label and that was the end of our relationship with them well as you know there's no one nicer than on the planet than Kevin Shea and Kevin Shea tells me that Weird Al is an absolute sweetheart so that's one sweetheart talking about another so I love it and I want to shout out Brian Dunn it was Brian Dunn who really wanted to make sure that I asked you for any Weird Al stories and as if I was going to forget to ask you about Weird Al,

but sounds like the man could catnap like a champion. Yeah, it was great. Again, as I said, he graduated as an architect, and music was initially just a hobby with Dr. Demento. Right. I'm looking for a particular picture on my phone if I can find it. I used to listen to Dr. Demento on Chum FM on, I think Sunday nights at eight o'clock or so.

Okay. Don't know if you can see that. Pull it back a little bit. Cause sometimes you get to, okay. I kind of can, it's hard to make up the detail, but I see see was that weird

Al and is that weird and you okay I'm going to change the lighting oh amazing okay I love it I love these photos let me see this here no but I can see the mustache I'm sure that's Al

and then I see that makes you the other guy. And I can see his shirt. It's always very loud. But you yourself today, Al, you're wearing, there's two Al's I just realized, but you're wearing a shirt that could be in tribute to Weird Al Yankovic. It could be, but I always in the summer wear Hawaiian shirts. You know what?

I'm going to start doing that. You guys, we should be wearing more Hawaiian shirts. So here, before I find it. I do have a question for him if you don't mind. Yeah, that's? I'm going to start doing that. You guys, we should be wearing more Hawaiian shirts. So here, before I find it. I do have a question for him. Yeah, that's what I'm going to say. Chris, if you have any question for Al, now is the time. Al, you mentioned Attic did a lot of licensing, and you licensed Motorhead Records.

And one of the ones that always fascinated me was you re-released the What's Word Worth, but you released it as The Watcher with a completely different cover. And it was one of my favorite record covers the watchers you know the man in the brass diving helmet just floating you remember that nope no oh what label was it on for you attic was that attic not roadrunner Okay, no, I don't remember that particular record, sorry. It was just a license deal you did. I just always wondered where that image came from, but I guess you can't answer that if you don't remember it, sorry.

No, sorry. I've been very impressed with Al's recall, but there's just evidence he can't remember every detail there. This was 40 years ago, guys. All right, before we say goodbye to you because you've been amazing al uh why sell why sell attic records in uh 2000 uh i sold it i was 60 years old uh i wasn't particularly fond of the music that was popular then, hip hop. You know, back to Wes.

Wes never made sexist records. We always talked about it. I would say to him, because he did make one. Your volume dipped again, Al. It's okay okay just hold on there because we're missing this I'll let you know the moment it's back and I'm sure that because we're wrapping up here

this will be the last time we have to flip it back here but you've been again outstanding and thank you two, you two made this happen you guys are great so thank you derek and thank you chris thanks for having us just waiting for al's mic to pop back on chris you want to sing us a song what is the shout out what's the name of your band like you were in a band oh the punk thing yeah it was msi msi more stupid initials Oh, the punk thing? Yeah.

It was MSI. MSI. More Stupid Initials. I like that. Okay, More Stupid Initials. Okay. Did my mic come back? Oh, now you're back.

Yeah, please continue. Yeah, I said I was 60. I wasn't relating to the music that was popular. I'm sure the artists that we were talking to weren't relating to me either. You know, we weren't a large corporation. So I started thinking, you know, what do I do with the record company? And in my mind, I was going to go with not invest in new Canadian artists

because that's where the risk was in the expense. Probably downsized strictly to licensing foreign product and maximizing the bottom line for me and my family. Unfortunately, both Scotty Brothers and Roadrunner were both sold, and they were the backbone of our licensed product. But at the same time, fortunately, Alan Gregg, who at that time managed the Tragically Hip, he came knocking on my door and said, I'm starting a record company. It's going to be a public record company with access to the stock market. We'd like you to be an addict, to be the core.

And we'd like to buy you if you're interested. And I was interested. I didn't let on how much I was interested, but I made a proposal that the offer I was quite honest that we were losing Roadrunner and Scotty Brothers, but we went ahead with the sale

and launched Songcorp, which unfortunately, a year later, went bankrupt. But then you ended up with the Order of Canada. 20 years later. Congrats again on that. Honestly, this has been outstanding. I love the stories.

Thank you, Al, for making the time for me on a Monday night. And thank you, Derek and Chris, for making the trek to the TMDS studio here. This is awesome. And you're not leaving without your lasagnas. Wouldn't dream of it. That's an order. And that brings us to the end of our 1,086th show.

You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike. I'm curious, Derek, we'll start with you. Yes. Anywhere on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike. I'm curious, Derek, we'll start with you. Yes. Anywhere on social media, somebody could follow you. Facebook page is our main thing. We have an Instagram. Look for UXB Press. UXB Press. Chris, what about you? You got an Instagram or something? No, I prefer to be left alone. Don't leave, Chris. Everybody. Take your lasagna and get out.

Leave Chris alone. And Al, how about you? You just enjoying retirement and staring at your Order of Canada? Or can we follow you anywhere? No, I'm not on. Outside of being on Facebook, I don't have a website or anything. And yes, my son who lives in Japan, he arrived on Friday with his wife and my granddaughter. And they're here for the next month. So I'm spending a lot of time with them.

They were here today in the pool and having a great time. Amazing. Amazing. I'm going to African Lion Safari Wednesday. I think Chris wants to come visit. He's lonely. Amazing, Amazing. Find the African Lion Safari Wednesday. I think Chris wants to come visit. He's lonely. Amazing, Al. That sounds like you're going to have a great rest of the summer. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery,

they're at Great Lakes Beer. Palma Pasta's at Palma Pasta. Sticker U is at Sticker U. Dewar are at Dewar Performance. Ridley Funeral Home are at Ridley FH. And Canna Cabana are at Canna Cabana underscore. See you all tomorrow. And my guest is Hal Johnson from Body Break, the participation duo.

That'll be fun. See you all then. Thank you.