Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Bernie Finkelstein: Toronto Mike'd #552

Episode Date: December 4, 2019

Mike chats with True North Records founder Bernie Finkelstein about his career as a music executive and talent manager working with Rough Trade, Randy Bachman, The Rheostatics, Dan Hill, Lynn Miles, Cowboy Junkies, Colin Linden, Catherine MacLellan, Tom Wilson, Moxy Früvous, Lighthouse, Blackie and The Rodeo Kings, Murray McLauchlan, Stephen Fearing, Barney Bentall, and Bruce Cockburn.

Welcome to episode 552 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, StickerU.com, Brian Master from KW Realty, and Banjo Duncan from Whiskey Jack. and Banjo Duncan from Whiskey Jack. I'm Mike from torontomike.com, and joining me is a man who worked closely with Rough Trade, Randy Bachman, The Rio Statics, Lynn Miles, Cowboy Junkies, Colin Linden, Catherine McLennan, Tom Wilson, Moxie Fruvis,

Lighthouse, Blackie and the Rodeo Kings, Murray McLaughlin, Stephen Fearing, Barney Bentall, and of course, Bruce Colburn. Here's the founder of True North Records, Bernie Finkelstein. Welcome, Bernie. Well, thank you, Mike. Glad to be here. I never do an intro like that, but I listened to another podcast, and they do these really long, extravagant intros, and I thought, I think for Bernie, this is what I'm going to try.

Well, you know, it was good. You left out Dan Hill. Dan Hill. You know what? I have loaded up in the soundboard some Dan Hill. I did leave it. My apologies. It's all fine.

It's all fine. I just thought I'd mention it. Let's do it again. Just kidding. I did leave it. My apologies. It's all fine. It's all fine. I just thought I'd mention it. Let's do it again. Just kidding. No, never again. Although I noticed, I also called my new friend Banjo Duncan and I learned yesterday, he prefers I call him Banjo Dunk.

So my apologies to Duncan. That's Banjo Dunk from Whiskey Jack, but we'll hear a little bit more from him soon. You're a bit like Madonna and Cher in that in this this country at least, you're a one-name guy. Like, with apologies to Bernie Federico and Bernie Saunders, I think if you say Bernie in this country, it's you. Well, that's okay. And you're living in Prince Edward County now, is that right? Well, I live mostly in Prince Edward County.

We have a place there, but we have a condo in Toronto as well. So we get here, but I'm only here about 20% of my time. I was going to say, have you ever bumped into FOTM Steve Anthony, who is now... Absolutely. I see Steve every once in a while. And there's lots of trying listen the mayor of prince edward county is uh steve ferguson who worked for years and years at at universal and at warner video and uh so you know prince edward county is crawling with lots of lots of old music people and lots of Toronto people.

It sounds like the place to be. Like, I had Ann Romer here, and we called up Steve Anthony because it was the 30th anniversary of Breakfast Television, and Steve answered the phone. He was in line in Prince Edward County. He was buying frog legs or crab legs or something.

Could be. And I'm thinking, oh, that's the place to be. Yeah, well, no, it's a good place. You know, it gets a bit exaggerated. I saw today's paper. They had a full page on what to do for a day in Picton in the Globe and Mail. And it was actually good. It made me go, good goodness gracious, I better go back to Picton soon,

which is about 25 kilometers from my house. So I want to say a quick special thanks to Tyler, Tyler Campbell, who has helped put this together. He was instrumental in delivering Bernie. So I'll give him some more props at TMLX5 on Saturday. But thank you, Tyler. Also, I want to say thank you to Basement Dweller, who I think is coming to TMLX5 on Saturday.

He submitted some fantastic questions for you, Bernie, and it really helped me kind of shape where I want to take this. Right off the top, though, we have a mutual friend. So shout out to Jay Gold, as I call him, but Joel Goldberg. Oh, Joel, I just spoke to him this morning. Oh, wow. Did you tell him you were coming here? You know what? I didn't, but it's been online a bit, and he's a fairly alert guy. But, you know, I didn't think to tell him. He's a big...

I speak to him quite often. We co-produced a film on Bruce Coburn called Pacing the Cage, and we just sold it. It's already had its first window on Vision tv a couple of years ago okay but we made it a vision showed a 47 minute long version or 50 minute version and we now have an hour and 10 long version and it's going to be shown on um hollywood suite you know the movie channels starting sometime in February. They haven't given us a date yet.

Well, he does great work, Joel Goldberg. He does. I'm a big fan. I love him. I mean, he's even on a couple of times, and of course we always talk about Bruce because he'll... Well, he's close to us, and we love him. Joel's a good man.

And the guy co-created Electric Circus, okay? What more do you need in your resume? Yeah, Joel's a good man. And the guy co-created Electric Circus, okay? What more do you need in your resume? Yeah, well. Well, we can't all be Bernie with the resumes that are a mile long here. No, no, that's a good thing. Joel's done lots, though. He's done Down Child film, and he's now got a hit parade show on Vision that I think does more 40s music

with Marilyn Lightstone. It's really good. I've heard great things. And I'm looking over to my right now because I have my original 12-inch single of Let Your Backbone Slide by Maestro Fresh West. Yes. And of course, Joel Goldberg directed that video. Absolutely did.

And they just put that in the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame last week. Awesome. Yeah. Great, great, great jam, as we say here. Put that song in. Yeah. Now, you were born in Toronto, right? But you grew up in, you spent some of your formative youth in England?

Yeah. Well, my father was a career Air Force, Royal Canadian Air Force. And I actually went to, we moved all the time. And I went to 13 schools before I finally quit school. But to get directly to your question, for three years, we were living just outside of Nottingham. There was a Canadian Air Force base there. It's gone now in a place called Langar.

And that was very formative years because it was 55 to 57 is when I came back, or 58. And anybody that knows their rock and roll history knows that's the beginning of Elvis Presley. Right. And the beginning of the first real true rock revolution. Well, and again, I don't recall it firsthand, but I would think in 55 is when Bill Haley and the Comets releases a rock around the clock. That's right. And then you write it a couple years later,

you've got the Elvis. Well, not even a couple years later. I mean, Bill Haley, you know, I don't have the, you know, a guy like Rob Bowman could come in here and tell you the exact dates. Actually, his co-author, yes, he's great too, but his, The Flyer Vault. Have you ever seen it? Oh, I haven't seen the book, but I've heard a lot about it.

And I'm looking forward to seeing it. So the co-writer of The Flyer Vault with the gentleman, Rob Bowman? Is that the... Rob Bowman is the co-author. So I think the, Daniel Tate is his name, I believe. But he's actually going to be on here in like 10 days to talk about the Flyer Vault.

Well, going back to Bill Haley. Yeah. I mean, Bill Haley and Elvis come out around the same time. Bill Haley gets though a big international hit, whereas Elvis is getting these regional hits. Right.

The best things Elvis ever did, in my opinion. So is this like a Hey Mama and... Yeah, that's all right, Mama. All right, that's... And Blue Moon of Kentucky and, you know, I can't remember all the titles right now, but I could if it was a contest.

I could tell you all the titles. But anyway, so Bill Haleyaley so it was a very formative time to be in england because of course we all know what happened in england seven eight years later right was the second rock revolution which is really the beatles and the beatles were hearing all this stuff and uh and uh just absorbing and absorbing American music. Now, you mentioned, I guess you're kind of an army brat. Is that the term you might use?

Well, I'll use army brat with wings. Air Force brat. Right, because you went over... Well, Air Force. Air Force brat. Same thing. Right. Same thing.

Because it's funny, I tweeted about, I just tweeted that Bernie Finkelman was coming on Toronto, Finkelstein. Bernie Finkelman was coming on Toronto. Finkelstein. Bernie Finkelman's another episode. That'll be later. That'll be another one, yeah. But Bernie Finkelstein.

Danny Finkelman. Right. Bernie Finkelstein is coming on Toronto. Somebody wrote back and go, is that the same Bernie Finkelstein? I couldn't believe it. So this comes back and it goes, it's a guy named Ted Knoller, like K-N-O-W-L-E-R.

I think that's Knoller. And is that the same Bernie Finkelstein who went to Trenton High School in the late 50s? Yes, absolutely it is. That's where I went to grade nine, and I failed grade nine in Trenton. But the weird thing is about being back in Prince Edward County is that Prince Edward County and Belleville and Trenton are all part of an area called Quinty. And you only really hear in

Toronto a lot about Prince Edward County for obvious reasons. But Trenton was where the air base was. In fact, when we left England, we went back to Trenton. I went to grade nine, failed grade nine. But then my father, we went back to Trenton. I went to grade nine, failed grade nine. But then my father got transferred almost immediately to Toronto again, to Downsview. And I've been in Toronto ever since. But I was born here. In fact, you know where I was born? I was born right on Yorkville.

So of all kind of weird coincidences, uh, and, and the actual, it was in the old Mount Sinai hospital and the front of the old hospital is still standing on Yorkville. They built a, they built a condo of some kind behind it, but they kept the facade. They kept the facade, which is really great. I like it when they do that. Like they have a, what is it now? A shopper's drug mart and you're run a meet and bluer. And it's like, oh, there's, that's the facade is still the old run a meet theater. Yeah. Yeah.

No, I mean, listen, it's maybe, I mean, Toronto hasn't paid enough attention to its own architectural history and let a lot of it go, but it is paying more attention now. And a facade is better than nothing. And really, like Scotiabank Arena, previously known as the Air Canada Centre, you still see the old post office is still the guts of that place. Yeah, I guess you do. Yeah, I mean, yeah.

It depends which angle you're looking at here. Okay, so you mean rock and roll hits in the 50s and then there's the Beatlemania strikes in the 60s. And is it your love of this music that basically makes you realize you want to work in the music industry? Like, what is the catalyst there? Well, you know, I fell in love with the music even before Elvis. My parents played a lot of music. It was show tunes, you know, things like Oklahoma and all the various plays and Judy Garland and stuff. And I used to enjoy listening to it all.

But when Elvis hit, and you know, around the same time, Buddy Holly and Chuck Berry and around the same time Buddy Holly and Chuck Berry and really the Mount Rushmore of modern music, modern rock. I just fell in love with it. But there was no motivation on my part to want to get in the music industry because I didn't even know there was a music industry. And when I got back to Canada, had I gone looking for a music industry, I would have had a very hard time finding it. So I was never really looking for it.

I moved down to Yorkville in 63, something like that, or 64. And I was more interested in the beat world at that time, Bohemia. That interested me more, but i loved music and uh of course yorkville was a great place to fall in love with to further fall in love with music and one day i woke up and i was in the music business well it's funny i mean there's a little more to it i read your book by the way which is fantastic thank you very thank you very much and we'll talk more about the book soon but uh i so i was reading there and i the quote that jumped out at me is a something to the effect of that you said yeah as you just mentioned now there was basically at the time there was no music business in toronto or canada for that matter like it didn't exist

yeah well i don't i don't want to um i don't want to be uh i don't want to write off those people that were around doing things and there were were. There always are people around. But there was no true industry. There was no organizations. There was no Canadian content. There was just far-flung. Every once in a while, somebody like the Beaumarks would get a hit or Bobby Curtola.

So there were some people doing things, there's no question. But there was no industry per se. When I wanted to know what a publishing agreement looked like, I had to usually ask people in America. So what led you to Albert Grossman, meeting Albert Grossman in that? Well, there's the long and short story to that. But I was, you know, the first real big break I got was when Skip Prokop of the Poppers asked me to manage him. Sort of a cute story. What had happened is I was working as a janitor

and an espresso coffee maker at a club called the El Patio on Yorkville. And one of the bands that played there with regularity was the Poppers. And the owner of the club used to let the Poppers rehearse in the afternoons. But part of my job in the afternoon was to go in the club and get it ready for the evening, accept deliveries, put them in the fridge. The fridge actually had a lock with a key on it. And the only thing the owner told me is, don't feed the band when you're there in the afternoon, which of course I did.

And I ended up sitting around with the poppers during the daytime. And we're all the same age. And I'd hear them talking about their problems and i usually would chip in my thoughts you know should they have long hair short hair right just weird most of it well i was about to ask you that same question mundane you know uh stuff uh uh not really mundane but just ordinary now they weren't trying to decide which way the universe was going to go and um i guess in the end they liked my answers and things weren't going well for them they probably had a feeling they got nothing to lose and uh one evening uh skip

on behalf of the band asked me to manage him. And I said I would. And that started a process that led me to Albert Grossman's door. Well, okay, well, since we brought up Skip there, there was a question that came in, and I believe this was Basement Dweller, but he said he wanted to know if you were surprised by his enormous subsequent success with Lighthouse. Like, were you at all surprised by that enormous subsequent success with lighthouse like we

had all surprised by that no i wasn't at all um just so you understand i worked with the poppers and got them a certain amount of success they got themselves that success including they played at monterey and just you know there's a whole story to that you could we could spend an hour talking about the poppers but but um i decided to quit uh i was partners with albert had become partners albert by the way for those that don't know uh you know was the manager of bob dylan and then later janice joplin and paul butterfield and god knows who the band of course and and uh gordon lightfoot and um i skip skip had so much ambition and was so talented as were the other guys in his band but skip particularly had the ambition you know true ambition and uh so when he when the band finally broke up, the Poppers, I was no longer with them.

But a year later, Lighthouse started, and I was not surprised at all. In fact, I just went to see what's left of Lighthouse, and they were fabulous. I went to see them in Belleville at the Empire Theatre about three months ago, a 50th anniversary tour. Paul Hoffert's still in the band, one of the original founders. By the way, throughout the episode, you might

hear music creeping in the background, so I'll do that. You know, tap your head if it bothers you. Joe, I like that. I like it. You can hear the laughter through the tears you cry. Want and need are words that come and go.

Watch as they pass you by. Can you name that tune? Yes, I can. Well, it's Kensington Market. It's from the second album, Aardvark. And, uh, oh, why don't I, I can't remember the title. Half Closed Eyes.

Half Closed Eyes. Half Closed Eyes. And what's great about this for the listeners is that's one of the first uses of a Moog synthesizer in a recording studio ever. Ever. I did not know that. John Millscock, who later had a band called Syrinx. Those are the fun facts you must drop

any time one strikes you. Well, yeah, it's not like I can just fall out of there. Well, it might just fall out of there. In fact, I was just with Keith Mackay who wrote this song. I went to the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame show. I don't go to a lot of things anymore because if you're not really part of it, why go? Everybody had seen enough of me and gotten sick of me already. And they inducted a Kensington Market song into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame.

And that song was I Would Be the One. Wonderful song from the first album called avenue road this was the second band i ever worked right so just okay so i've got those numbers right so you uh you managed the poppers from 66 to 67 and then kensington market 67 69 i guess that's close enough yeah yeah i think there was another year with the poppers there earlier but uh but it sounds right the i was uh you know checking out your uh your book and uh there's that cover of uh saturday night in 1968 you were on the cover of saturday night that was fantastic too well you know the poppers success was so explosive now you know they never had a top 10 hit and it's nothing compared to what happened later with the guess who or happened with Gordon Lightfoot,

but it was so unexpected. It was so, and the poppers were so much a product of Toronto. Right. And it was like people just fell in love with the idea that a man from Toronto that was so original could be blowing everybody's mind in the U.S., particularly in New York, and could hook up with Albert and all of this.

And I got a lot of credit for it. And part of it was I ended up on the cover of Saturday Night Magazine when it was the biggest magazine really in Canada. And if you haven't seen this cover, you got to dig up this cover. It's pretty odd, isn't it? It's a pretty odd cover. It's pretty cool.

It reminds me of like, what's that cover? I've seen the future and his name is Bruce or whatever. But the other Bruce, that American Bruce. Oh, that guy. Yeah, not our Bruce. We only have one Bruce here. But okay, this is actually a good moment to pause here because I have gifts for you because you came all this way and here let me give you here courtesy of sticker

you.com this is where you get all your bruce colburn stickers made okay and decals and magnets and all these great things but terrific that's a toronto mike sticker a coveted toronto mike sticker so i'll make sure it goes in a really great place. Oh, I see. Okay, you're doubling up here. I see. I must have had one down there and you moved it on top of the beer. No, I didn't. Oh, okay.

So you can get here. You got a two-for-one deal because you came all this way. Okay. You got the stickers from Sticker U. Thank you, Sticker U, for being a partner of Toronto Mike. There's a six-pack of fresh craft beer

for you to take home with you courtesy of Great Lakes Brewery. Terrific. And you can find that Great Lakes Brewery. Terrific. And you can find that in LCBOs across this fine province and their retail store down the street from the Costco, not far from here, near Royal York and Queensway, where you can pick up some Octopus Wants to Fight, my favorite Great Lakes beer.

So fresh craft beer for you. And this is an empty box. It's a beautiful box. But in my freezer upstairs, I have a lasagna for you from Palma Pasta. Oh, okay. Would you prefer a meat lasagna or a vegetarian lasagna? Well, I guess I'll go with the meat lasagna. Consider it done.

See, I'm just right now relieved I have one of each up there. So I was covered either way. Now, because we're talking about Palma Pasta. I like vegetarians, but the problem is my wife is a vegetarian, but she's also a gluten-free person. Oh, yeah, you don't want to give them lasagna. So you can't, she's not going to be able to eat lasagna unless they made it gluten-free, which is unlikely.

Now, if you can hear my voice and you're listening within the first couple of days of release, it is not yet Saturday, December... What again? My day is all mixed up. 7th, right? Yes. So Saturday, December 7th, the Saturday coming up, we are having a live recording of Toronto Mic'd at Palmas Kitchen

near Burnhamthorpe and Mavis. And it's happening from noon to 3pm. I just heard back from Brian Master from KD. Brian Master is going to be there. Is that the Brian Master from Chilling FM? Say hello to him. Love Brian. I actually was chatting with him this morning

and I said you were coming on and he got all excited and he says, tell him I want, because he's got a show on Jewel. It's a station here. Yeah, I know it. And he said, tell him I want to chat with him about the book and this and that, uh,

on my show. So hello from Brian master. And since we're talking about Brian master, uh, if somebody wants to get on Brian masters, fantastic snail mail newsletter, it's a, about how to,

uh, best practices for your home or apartment or condo. And you can just send him an email right now. Brian Master, he's a salesperson with Keller Williams. In addition to his radio life, which he's a fantastic radio DJ, he's also a fantastic realty broker with KW. And if you write him at letsgetyouhome at kw.com,

he'll add you to the mailing list. So just to recap real quickly here, because this is happening Saturday, and I'm really excited about it. You're all invited to TMLX5 at Palma's Kitchen this Saturday from noon to five. I've got your lasagna in the freezer. Make sure I get it to you

before you leave. You've got your beer. You've got your stickers. I won't be able to carry all this stuff. Well, I don't know. I'll figure it out. I'll figure it out. Well, if you donate some to me, I'll give it a good home. That's for sure. And a little, did you ever meet Stomp and Tom Connors? Yes. Yes, I met them. I mean, we weren't

overly friendly one way or the other. We were friendly, but we didn't see each other that often. Just going to play a bit of Whiskey Jack really here while I talk about Banjo Dunk. But Whiskey Jack, they played with Stomp and Tom Connors. They've got an album out, actually. I have it here,

so I can show it to the Periscope, but it's called Rhymes and Good Times with Stomp and Tom, and he's got a fantastic book, Duncan Fremlin. It's called My Good Times with Stomp and Tom, and they have a really cool Christmas ornament giveaway going on, so

this Christmas ornament lights up and it plays the hockey song, which is very cool. It's a collector's item, and if you want a chance to win it, all you have to do is go to whiskeyjackmusic.com, click on Store, and at the top of the page there, and then you can buy either the copy of the book or the CD or any other Whiskey Jack Stompin' Tom CDs that are listed there, and you get an opportunity to win the ornament.

And they're going to make the draw on December 15, 2019. And then they're going to express post the ornament to you the next day. So Merry Christmas from Banjo Dunk from Whiskey Jack. This is TTC Skedaddler, a good Toronto jam that Tom Connors would play. And now I think that brings us to the founding, I believe, correct me if I'm wrong, Bernie, but the founding of True North Records. Are we about there?

Yeah, what happens is I managed the Poppers and then Kensington Market. Both had reasonable success. Not really financially, really, the way we'd like to see things be, but they were recognized. They made great records. And I decided to get out of the music business.

You did a terrible job of doing that. And I bought a farm up in Killaloo, and it was part of that whole back-to-the-land movement that was happening. And I went up there for about a year, 69, and towards the end of 69, I decided, well, you know what? I'm going to run out of money. This is all good. It's all fun.

I enjoyed it a lot. I've got lots to say about it. But I came up with the idea that if I wanted to be successful, I should have my own label. Because then I could make all my own mistakes instead of having to live with other people's mistakes. Right. And hopefully I would make less mistakes

than the people I thought I was working with were. So I came back to Toronto and I started True North Records. And the first artist I signed was Bruce Coburn. And Bruce is the only artist I still work with after all these years because I've sold everything, which I'm sure you'll get to, but I've sold everything that I owned or I departed from everything I owned. Yeah, that's Bruce Coburn. That's true. That's a good song, too.

Well, this song mentions you. Well, I remember the title of this one. How I spent my fall vacation. And the reason I'm... I mean, I'm going to play a little bit more, Bruce, but I play it because there's a line in this song. I wonder if I'll end up like Bernie in his dream. Yeah.

Well, then Bruce goes on to describe the dream in a couple of lines, too. It's a beautiful song. We'll listen to a few seconds of this before I ask you my Bruce questions. That's pretty fabulous, isn't it? No, he's a... I've been trying for...

Maybe you're my in. I've been trying to get Bruce on Toronto Mike for a while now. Oh, you never know. He doesn't live here, which means we're limited to when he's coming through town. Right. And when he's coming through town, it's usually a one-nighter. There's no time.

I'd come to him if he came through town. I would come to him. Yeah. Just throwing it into your cranium there. I'll be to him if he came through town. I would come to him. Yeah. Just throwing it into your cranium there. I'll be thinking about it for sure. You can noodle that next time he's coming to town there. Now, okay, I have so many questions.

So tell me about when you first met Bruce Colburn. Yeah, well, the lead guitar player for Kenzie and Marco was a gentleman named Eugene Martinick who produced Bruce's first ten albums, including the big hit single, Wondering Where the Lions Are. But I started a label, but I didn't have an artist.

Gene wanted to become a producer at Kensington Market where I'd broken up. And Bruce Colburn had just been in several bands he didn't enjoy well let me rephrase it he didn't think he was over with that experience he wanted to set out as a singer songwriter and gene called me one day and said i hear you're gonna start a label and i said i'm trying to he said well look i've got a guy named Bruce Coburn do you know him? I said oh I've heard of him although I don't know him much

and he's from Ottawa he was from Ottawa at that time living in Ottawa so he's playing in town next week at a place called the Pornographic Onion which was a coffee house at Ryerson.

So I went down to see him, and I thought he was really fantastic and invited him to this house I was living in in the north end of Toronto. I had yet to open an office. And we talked about what Bruce would like to do and what I would like to do and what Gene would like to do and I thought to myself, I'll do this. So I signed Bruce to a recording contract. And I love that he's the first artist you signed to True North

and he's the last artist you're still working with. Yeah, that's right. That's coincidental more than it is. Well, perhaps it's not. You know, perhaps it's written in the wind. Well, you've been through a lot together, right? You run the gamut. Well, we're 50 years now, you know.

So that's a long, long time. He just finished a fall tour, mostly in the U.S., although he played four dates in Canada, I think, or five, including one here in Toronto at Kerner Hall, but it sold out so quickly that nobody even knew he was here. Right. It's a fantastic little venue, too. I love it. Yeah, it's beautiful, especially for a solo-type show. Right. It's a fantastic little venue, too. I love it. Yeah, it's beautiful. Especially for a solo type show. Right.

Now it's December, so I feel like... Trying to keep the latent depression From crystallizing Now the sun is lurking just behind If you listen to that carefully, you'll notice that Bruce has a cold. Just listen. On the coldest night of the year Yes, I do hear it, yes. a cold. Just listen. Yes, I do hear it, yes. Yeah, okay.

I just love artists that reference streets and places I can bike to from here. That's why I like the lowest of the low so much. You know, I know where Bathurst Street is. Yeah, no, these are all good things. Now, what is your personal favorite Bruce Colburn song? You know, it's an almost impossible question to answer,

as it would be with several of the artists I work with. I mean, he's got over 35. He's got 35 albums out now. But, you know, today, this morning, maybe Pacing the Cage right now is one. I love that one you played, Fall Vacation. But there's so many. It's really hard.

I'm going to ask you about one of the bigger hits. I mean, you talked about wondering where the lions are, but I'm actually going to talk about this one here. Oh, yeah. Now, Bruce is obviously a politically-minded songwriter, but is there maybe a story about how this song may have been particularly touchy, trying to kind of, you know, get it to break in the States? Oh, we had tremendous trouble with this.

with this. This came out right at the time when they were starting to sticker albums with warnings about... Is that the

Tipper Gore thing? The Tipper stickers they were called. Tipper stickers. Tipper Gore. I guess it was Al Gore's wife I guess and Al Gore.

Was he place president then? I don't even think he was yet. No, I don't guess it was Al Gore's wife, I guess, and Al Gore, was he vice president then? I don't even think he was yet. No, I don't think he was, but he's an important congressperson. He was definitely a congressman. Yeah, yeah, and well, here it is there. You know, this has the line, you don't give a flying fuck

about people in misery. So, we got a call. The album's not out yet, of course. It's about to be manufactured. We got a call from our American record company saying they felt they had to sticker this because of the word flying. One F-bomb.

That's right. And we suspected that it might have been the whole content, really, because the song was sort of, strangely enough, people thought it was anti-American. It was just anti, it's really anti-corporatism, really. Right. But anyway, it's funny the way people take responsibility

for things they don't have to. But the story is so complicated. I'm just trying to think of a simple way to tell you. What happens is we said no first, but then finally I had a long talk with Bruce. And I said, you know, Bruce, let's let them sticker it. It's great. I mean, the stuff they're stickering is hip-hop.

Right. And it's so popular. It's like two-life crew. In a way, it's like two live crew in a way it's like saying this is cool you know that's it's like it's like it's just saying this is cool and he said yeah okay i get that so i called them back a few days later and said okay go ahead sticker it then they called me back and they said you know we have thought about it and there's no way we want to sticker a versus cover an album.

We just don't really want to do that. It's going to look really bad on us. But what we want you to do, would you mind writing the lyrics out on the back of the cover because that way it will have given people fair warning. So again, after some back and forth arguments, we agreed. Then what happened was they took a look at that and they went, well, it's fair warning, but the real thing we've got to do is underline

or yellow market the word flying fuck, the line with flying fuck. So we thought, well well this is fucking great i mean they might as well buy a billboard on sunset saying first cover and has an album that says flying fuck in it so we said yes to that and then what happened was they changed their minds entirely and went, you know what, we don't feel good about any of this, but they'd already pressed some of the album, some albums. Right. With the flying fuck on the back underlined. It was actually yellow lined.

And it's a real collector's item if you can find it and there's only a few thousand of those ever made i don't know where they are but can you could you get uh call it democracy played on american airways well we you know bruce was pretty hot he had just had wondering where the lions are five or six years earlier and those things lasted a long time. But then he had sort of a string of, you know, continuing airplay on different radio formats, some of which didn't exist in Canada, the formats. So, you know, Tokyo had become a pretty big hit. Not so much in America,

because this was all happening in America. Things in Canada were pretty straightforward. It got banned in a lot of places. It got banned and it left a kind of strange thing where there's still people in America that think Bruce

is entirely anti-American. No matter what. Which of course he isn't. Of course not. Yeah, he's not. Well, he lives there, right? Well, he lives in San Francisco now because he married an American girl who's a lawyer who can't come to Canada to practice

without going back to school, which would be two more years. And they have a young daughter, and he could move easily. Anyway, he didn't mind going to San Francisco. It's pretty cool. Worst places to be, right? Yeah, and he'd already spent, you know, 70 years here. So, you know, he moved. Yeah, he misses being here, but he's in San Francisco, yes.

Oh, so I'm playing my personal favorite. And I know it's always cheesy when a popular song is your favorite song by an artist. There's no problem with that. Is that no shame in that game? Not if it's a great song. This is a great song. It's a great song. And of course, it's got that line, kick at the darkness till it bleeds daylight.

Which seems like every day that goes by, it becomes more and more important. I bet you there's a lot of tattoos of that line. I think there's just all kinds of them. I see it all over the internet. I see people using it for just, you know, everybody from Bono to, you know, it's just, you know, everybody uses it. And of course, the Barenaked Ladies version

is fabulous as well. I was going to ask you about that. It brought a whole new audience to to the song and to bruce's work which you know i think both me and bruce are very grateful about uh i love their version right from the first day i heard it it took bruce a little while longer to to it was that right i was gonna ask uh well he ended up really liking it but it took him a little while but he's like that bruce is like that because he he's not really a music business person you know i mean he's not he's an artist he's well

he's an artist and he's i gotta meet this guy he's living in his own world you know it doesn't have well that's why he has you right it doesn't have very much to do with the world that you and me. He's sort of a spiritual guy, and he pays more attention to those things than he does to who's got a hit or who doesn't have a hit. Right. Yeah, including his own hits. Now, this, okay, so obviously you're here.

Well, this is from Stealing Fire, which I had forgotten about, which, of course, comes between Wondering Where the Lions Are and Call It Democracy so there's this, Lovers and then what was even bigger than Lovers in America can I guess, Rocket Launcher?

yes, that was bigger than Lovers in Canada, Lovers was bigger but in the US, where they had this huge format called AOR which was kind of like the way Q107 used to be if you go back. Album oriented rock? Yes, that's right.

And it's where Van Halen and all and Rocket Launcher just got added to some American stations and it exploded and went top ten. And in a way it's his second biggest American hit. Yeah, I definitely got it.

But time changes all kinds of things. So now, a song like Lovers, which wasn't a hit in America, now feels like it's a hit. The Barenaked Ladies did Lovers early in their career when they were like a Canadian phenomenon. So that song wouldn't have broken in the States. No, what happened is it didn't even come out in the U.S. until they put out a Greatest Hits album.

And when they put out their Greatest Hits album, which was probably their fifth or sixth, I don't really know, but it was later in their career, and it came out on Warner Brothers, and it was one of their biggest selling albums. I think it was well over a million copies. They added it. I remember them calling us and getting a license well good for that and we were thrilled because it had done so well in canada but it never got

released as a single no and a shout out i mean tyler stewart fotm tyler stewart's been on the show and we talked about this but that video is fantastic i watched a lot of much music back then and uh the the video of them on the the pickup or whatever in Scarborough going to A&A Records or whatever, it's just so... It's so Toronto. I mean, those guys were great. And it came from a tribute album. The original recording of Lovers in a Dangerous Time is from a tribute album to Bruce that was done

that the Baronega ladies said they would contribute a song and that's the song they picked. And from the minute that tribute album came out, which was on a small label. Was it called Borrowed Tunes? No, that's, I think, Aneal Young. Okay, that is Aneal Young. It was called, ooh, it's not around anymore.

Maybe Kick of the Darkness. Yes, thank you, exactly. Speaking of the line. Kick of the Darkness. And it got released as a single and it was a really big hit for them. Exactly. Speaking of the line. Kick, Kick of the Darkness. And it got released as a single, and it was a really big hit for them. Absolutely. I think it was really, in a way, their first hit single.

But they had bigger ones later with some of their own songs. Well, it depends how Yoko Ono, for example, was big. Because they had the yellow tape, and that had Yoko Ono on it. And on 102.1, they were playing everything on that yellow tape. So it all depends on which charts you look at exactly definitely an early smash on much music for sure and lovers in a dangerous time fantastic uh it's interesting you mentioned bruce has a young child like i always thought okay so i have a boy who's about to turn 18 he turns 18 in in a month meanwhile i also have a three-year-old so i i do this whole like adult conversation with james

and then i'm like talking about dollies or whatever with Morgan or whatever. But our man Bruce, okay, he has a 43-year-old and an 8-year-old. So that takes the cake right there. And he's got four grandchildren from his first daughter. In fact, they're all going on a holiday

together. I won't tell you where. Top secret location. Well, it's not that secret, but I think Bruce would rather talk about that. We won't tell you where. Top secret location. Well, it's not that secret, but I think Bruce would rather talk about that. We don't want to get the paparazzi after that. Well, I don't think we're worried about that. So, fantastic, though. It's interesting with Bruce Colburn, because

he's kind of run the gamut in terms of genres. I get the idea, though, he's not a genre guy. But, I mean, you could talk about folk, and you could talk about New Wave, and Christian rock, and you could talk about folk and you could talk about new wave and Christian rock and you could talk about adult alternative. He's all over the place. You know, he's not a bad guitar player either. His new album's

an instrumental album. But I like the way Bruce describes that whenever he gets told that he's a great guitar player. He says, well, for a lyricist, I'm not a bad guitar player. Right. But yeah, he's not genre-specific, although I don't think he minds being just thought of

as a folk or singer-songwriter, even though it's kind of weird if you listen to it. If I had a rocket launcher, and you go, that's not exactly acoustic folk music. We'll pick up Bruce again. Okay, an FOTM, finally here. FOTM, Murray McLaughlin Well, I love Murray

Because Murray was my second artist He's great too But here, a little Farmer song here Just cowboys, truck drivers and pain Well, this is my way to say thanks for the meal And I hope there's no shortage of rain. Straw hat and old dirty hankies mop in her face like a shoe.

Thanks for the meal, here's a song that is real from a kid from the city to you i think he told me like farmers are buying him beer to this day like buying him his beer and oh i'm sure yeah you know the interesting thing is he may have told you all this but uh a couple of things about this this is the last thing he recorded for his second album he'd more or less finished the album, and he was in a Smiler's. They were called Smiler's delis that were open 24 hours a day, and he was in there getting something

to take back to his hotel, and he started thinking about farmers, where the food came from. It was like 3 o'clock in the morning, and there was this fresh food coming in, and he went back to the studio the next day. came from right it was like three o'clock in the morning and there's this fresh food coming in and uh he went back to the studio the next day he was being produced by a guy named ed freeman ed uh had produced american pie for don mclean for those that don't know there's an epic epic song

we only deal with people that do epics one way or the other. Apparently. Anyway, Murray, it's so simple. And the reason it's so simple is they didn't really have a lot of session musicians around because the sessions were over. Right. And he recorded it. And then the second interesting story is it wasn't even the A side of the record that we put out. It was the B side. Now, it wasn't unintentional. It was the B side. Now, it wasn't unintentional that

it was the B side. It had to be selected, and it was selected with purpose. But it wasn't even the emphasis track. But a country DJ in Ottawa named Ted Daigle, who I think has passed away, God bless him though,

and he was the big country station in Ottawa, decided to play it and uh it took only a few days for the phones to light up and we were smart enough to know that the a side we'd chosen wasn't going anywhere so we we turned over the record and worked it a common people don't even know what i'm talking about what do you mean i turned it over but i will say this a common thread on this program with different guests is kind of a longing for a day when a DJ could do that, like play the other side.

Those days are so long gone. Well, he had a certain power because he was also a music director, so he could sort of do that, and not everybody could do it, but there were lots of people that could select their own music. Well, David Marsden's been on the show, and he talks about giving great power, empowering, I guess, his DJs at CFNY back in the 80s. Well, he was a very advanced guy.

I mean, he's one of the greatest radio people that Canada has ever produced, in my opinion, and a pretty fabulous person. produced, in my opinion, and a pretty fabulous person. So that's the story of Farmer's Song, and it became a gold single. It became our first ever gold single for True North. We didn't have a lot of gold singles, you know, only four or five. We had lots of hits and a lot of hit albums. Like by the time I sold the company, we had 50 golden platinum records which isn't bad but um yeah we weren't a big singles company one of the ones we had though was yeah okay blue jays okay because keith hampshire's been on the show yeah keith tell me tell me yeah tell me the

okay blue jay story and then i'll come back to find out how you met murray yeah i'd like to talk to you about murray um well first with the Blue Jays record was already recorded, so I can't claim any creativity in that project at all. It had already been done. I had signed two people, Tony Koznik, who is the co-author of OK Blue Jays and the co-producer, and Jack Lenz, by the way, is the other co-author. And also, Doug, help me here, Mona and the Children.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. In fact, here, let me. Jack Lenz is an artist. Starts with a C? Oh, absolutely. Doug Cameron. Sorry about that listen i'm 75 going on 100 and uh my brain only my brain only you're doing amazing time so so anyway what it happened is

i was having a meeting at the koznik lens offices offices, and I saw a box. I saw a box of the Blue Jays records. Now, what you've got to understand, backstory, I've had season's tickets for the Blue Jays since the day they started. 77. I still have the same seats. When Doug Ald hit the two home runs. That's right.

I don't go to every game, but... Where are your seats? I am behind the visitors dugout in the second row between first and home. And you were there, I'm assuming you were sitting in those seats when Joe Carter touched them all. I was. I was. And, but, so I said, what are you guys doing with this record? And they said, well, we wrote it. And I said, what are you guys doing with this record? And they said, well, we wrote it.

And I said, what do you do with it? And they said, well, we only sell it at the stadium. I said, well, the Jays are doing so well. It's 85. And that's the first year they won the title. Yeah, they won the AL East pennant. So I said, let me put this out. So as it turned out, because of various scheduling things,

I actually ended up putting it out through a and m instead of through uh cbs who were my then distributor and uh the jays just kept on doing better and we just kept on getting radio to play it and finally became a national phenomena and uh it sold like crazy that's still the blue jays record for most wins in the regular season of 99 we've never actually even when we won the two world series we never won more than 85 yeah 85 we won 99 games that year we've still never hit that 99 number is that right you know i i didn't know that but now that you say it absolutely got to be right and we won't talk about what happened in the...

How many did they win the years that they won? Like early 90s. I think they were in the early 90s, but they didn't reach 99. And of course, this team has never won 100 games. And of course, they should have gone on because they were up 3-1, right? When they lost to Kansas City. Of course, George Friggin' Brett and that bases loaded triple by... Can you remember who hit the braces loaded triple

for Kansas City in that game seven? I can if you've got a few hours. But I, I'm trying to wipe it out of my head, but I was,

I was a massive Jays fan and I still remember like Al Oliver was great in that playoff series and yeah, one to go. It was three,

three to one series lead and we won't talk about the rest. It was brutal because it was actually a home run by Jim Sundberg, wasn't it? No, he's the one who hit the base loaded triple.

Okay. So the base loaded, he's off the top of the fence. I can still see it. And that was the end and that was it. And it all of a sudden went from being a great place to be to being so cold and so quiet and just so awful. And then, as you know, there's a collapse in 87. So we don't actually make the playoffs again until 89

when Mookie Wilson comes in, and we make the change for Cito Gaston. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I could talk Jays if you all... I love the Jays. So, you know, I mean, they're obviously got a lot of stuff they got to do, and I'm not sure I'm seeing what I'd like to yet. It all depends whether you believe this administration

will spend money on free agent pitchers. I don't personally believe they will. A lot of people say they won't. I don't know if now's the time anyway. I think they need another year developing players instead of getting that core together. I hope they do a few things

this year to keep people happy. Now back to Murray. On the other hand, I hope they do a few things this year to keep people happy. Now back to Murray. Yeah. Now, basically, how did you get connected with Murray McLaughlin? Well, Murray I knew before Bruce, actually, because I was hanging out in Yorkville during the 60s,

and Murray was living on Hazelden Avenue. And I would run into him and he introduced himself to me. And we got to know each other. Not really well, but we got to know each other. And long story short, Murray came to see me just after I signed Bruce. Because Bruce and Murray had lived together in the same house. They were very friendly with their wives when they were both starting off. And I told Murray, Murray said, will you sign me now? I said, Murray, I'd love to because Murray was so good.

I mean, let me not even hesitate for one second. He had incredible songs. But I didn't have the money, and I just thought I had to concentrate on Bruce for a little bit. So I said to him, why don't you go to New York? I said, if you want to make a movie, you go to Hollywood. And, you know, that's advice I'm really glad that you don't have to say to people anymore,

although the way things are changing now, who knows? But a country artist still has to go to Nashville, right the way things are changing now who knows if things but a country artist still has to go to nashville right but well i guess i don't but listen you still have to go everywhere if you want to be an artist but um but what i was saying is if you want to get a shot you're gonna have to move uh so why don't you give yourself a break, Murray, and go to New York. And he did. And he, too, ran into Albert Grossman's publishing company, and they introduced him to Tom Rush,

and Tom Rush recorded two of Murray's songs on an album that did quite well for Tom. They got noticed. One of the songs was Child's Song. they got noticed one of the songs was child song you know though yeah and and and then murray called me about a year later maybe less and the bruce record was starting to do well and he said i'm coming back to toronto do you want to try to do something i said well i'd sure like to think about it really hard he said well what do you want and I said, book a gig at the riverboat, which was no problem. Right. And I'm going to come and see you again, and we can talk.

So he did, and he came back to Toronto. I went to the riverboat. I was blown away hearing Honky Red and Child Song and Old Man Song, all these great, great songs. And I signed Murray. And I had done – so Murray's album was TN4, his first album called Song from the Street. And in between, I had done Bruce's first record,

a Syrinx record, which we can talk about because it has a surprise hit single on it as well, and then Bruce's second album, High Winds, White Sky, and then Murray. So Murray was the second singer-songwriter I signed, and we had a great long relationship that went to the middle 80s. We had a great long relationship that went to the middle 80s. If I overlook anything you think is a great story you want to share, just spit it out there.

Well, if I can think of it, yeah. So what was the story there? Don't depend on me. No, I'm all set without you. But if I skip over something and you're like, oh, there's a great story there, just feel free to interject. What was the story there about the surprise single you mentioned oh yeah so uh so as i said earlier when you played half closed eyes by kensington market all ties together you know that john mills cockle synthesizer player uh had a group called syrinx and he had been a member of Kensington Market anyway long story short he

brought me an album that I loved and even though I was intending to have an a label that was singer songwriter it was this really advanced progressive electronic instrumental music but it had a song on it called Tillicum, Here Comes the 70s, the theme for a CTV series called Here Comes the 70s. And we put it out as a single because I always believed every record I put out could be a hit, which is insanity. Believe me, I was insane about these things. I probably put out more strange records and brought them to more radio stations who would look at me like...

Well, later I will play Mona with the children. I will play that later. That was a wonderful, wonderful record. And I remember that from the mid-80s. It was a very important record and a very, very important video, in my opinion. And anyway, coming back to Telecom, I actually went to number one right across the West,

Alberta, Saskatchewan, all the places the liberals couldn't get voted in this time. And so it was kind of a regional hit in lots of parts of the country, but it was the first time True North had had a hit, although it was Farmer's Song, which was TN4, was our first gold record of any kind.

So it was kind of exciting. Yeah, that's the song called Tilikum. Now, I might bounce around a little bit here, so we might not be completely chronological. That's okay. We don't need to be. Oh, yeah. Well, these guys are pretty good, too.

The song was legendary when I was growing up Yeah, it's pretty brilliant I was very lucky to be able to sign a band as great as this She's a cool, blonde, scheming bitch She make my body twitch Walking down the corridor So tell me everything. What can you tell me about Rough Trade? Well, I knew Rough Trade a little bit because they hung around Yorkville as well. And I had the label going, and every once in a while,

I'd bump into Kevin or to Carol or both, and they'd say, when are you going to sign us? And I said, well, I don't know, I don't know. I'm not ready for that yet. And not that they were waiting for me. They were trying to get a deal. And they were getting turned down, I think, by just about everybody. In the meantime, they were making quite an underground reputation for themselves.

I feel like Gary Cormier was telling me. I have my Gary's confused, maybe. I think it was Gary Cormier. No, please continue. I was just remembering a story Gary Cormier told me about Carol Pope and Rough Trades. Okay, well, I'd like to hear the story later. But, yeah, they would have been involved somehow promoting shows, I'm sure, the two Garys.

And anyway, what happened is I put out a bunch of singer-songwriters and I started thinking about, you know, I'd like to get a rock band again. So I started thinking about it very intensely. And I don't know how I got told, but Rough Trade were playing at the Danforth Music Hall, which then was called The Rocks. I don't know what it was called. And so I told Carol I was going to come down.

And I went down, and I couldn't believe it. The place was jammed. I don't know if it was 1,000 people maybe. 1,000 people for a band. Now, they did have that directed disc record, the one done at Nimbus on Hazleton by Jack Richardson. Maybe Bob Ezrin was involved as well. And I loved it. It was so unbelievable. And it was such a different scene. So I went backstage, I said, This is great. Come on over the office

tomorrow. So Kevin and Carol came over, I signed them right there. Now, the paperwork took another several weeks. But we agreed on a deal. We shook hands. And I asked my friend, Gene Martinick, who was producing Bruce, and he did this album for them. And of course, the album caused a sensation. Right. Just a sensation, you know. Well, even listening to the opening lyrics, you're like, it's even kind of shocking now. It's like, can you imagine at the time?

Can you imagine? Well, it's even kind of shocking now. It's like, can you imagine at the time? Can you imagine? Well, it was pretty great. It was 1980. And to give credit where credit is due, though, Bob Wood at the time was the, was it Bob Wood? I think it was Bob Wood, was the program director, music director at Chum AM. And these are in the days where FM was still important

and getting more important, but AM was still. That's where you got your hit singles. And if you're interested in hits at all, and I know a lot of people sit at this mic and say, I'm not interested, I'm not interested. I clearly was interested, let me tell you. Because that's where the money was, right? Not even that, not even that. I i just you know why why do this otherwise i mean sort of like saying well i play baseball to

watch the audience i don't really care if i hit a home run you know right i care you know now the artists i sign often don't care uh but uh you know it's just sort of what makes things interesting and uh so he called me and said you know this song high school confidential if you'll take out the word cream and cream my jeans edited in some way i think we're going to play it and i think it'll be a big hit for you and i said well yeah so, yeah. So I called Carol and Kevin. They had to be the ones to do it. And they fooled around with it and fooled around with it. I mean, again, nobody likes to edit their music.

I'm sort of making what sometimes took four days to sort out. It sounded like it happened instantly, and it didn't. But in the end, the only thing we could come up with was a beep. And I'll tell you, every time that beep got heard, and they played it on Chum and it went crazy. And that album, Double Platinum album. Wow. And it was the next album that had their one international hit that was all touch

from for those who think young which is a pretty tremendous song actually did you say touch well that's good yeah so it only took me 552 episodes to figure out how to do a segue like well that's very good i mean this this was the biggest record I was ever involved in. I didn't own this record, but I helped make it a hit. I'd rather hurt you honestly. Yeah, that's a good

selection of songs you've come up with. Whoever put these all together was pretty good. Who was that? Pick my favorites. Guilty as charged. Although I'm sorry I missed Dan Hill in the intro. I feel like I need to re-record that. Well, I wouldn't worry about it.

What if Dan hears that? Well, he might. I hope he does. Because I love this song. A lot of people hate it. People, sometimes people like to hate things that are omnipresent and popular. Yeah, it was a different kind of hit for Canada.

It's obviously such a great song. Yeah, so we signed Dan before we signed Rough Trade. But we only signed Dan to our management contract because he already, I hope I didn't move too far away from the mic. Oh, you're back on it, so it's all good. Dan had the beginnings of an agreement with GRT, and that was fine. I mean, you know, in other words, we didn't have to have everything. So it was a singles deal that he had with GRT.

The minute we got involved, it got converted to an album deal, and this is from his third album. So we put out two albums before we got this single, although he did get airplay, including some airplay in America. But this just went insane. This is a record that you only get once in a lifetime.

Well, some people get them a hundred times in a lifetime. I'm not one of them. So this is the biggest single you've ever had a part. Well, it just sold millions worldwide. yeah i mean i remember we'd get daily i'd fly to la our record our american record company was 20th century fox most people don't even know they had a record label anymore but they did right they had barry white uh and i they had they have andy. I can't remember. But anyway, I'd go in the office,

and of course they all love you when you have a hat. And I'd sit there, and you'd see the daily sales reports come in, and it was like selling $35,000 a day. Wow. A day. Wow. In the U.S.

So, you know, that's pretty awesome. It's pretty awesome. It's pretty awesome. It's fantastic. I have a question. I'm going to bring down Dan with all due respect to Dan because there's an important listener question regarding this jam. Whoo! this is lighthouse take it slow and the question from Eric Peebles,

he's got a few questions I'm going to pepper you with here, but one of them here is, is Lighthouse's Rockin' Take It Slow out in the country the best CanCon song ever? He's a big fan. He just wants you to tell him it's okay that he loves this song. Well, you know, I don't know. I like it.

You know, I wasn't involved in it, which doesn't mean I can't like it know, I wasn't involved in it, which doesn't mean I can't like it. Because I wasn't involved in Lighthouse. I was involved with the Poffers, who then become Lighthouse. But it is a great song. And it's funny, when I went to see them in Belleville a month or two ago, it was the song that the next day I found myself singing, as opposed to Sunny Days or the bigger hits.

Right. One Fine Morning, is that them? Yes, yes, One Fine Morning. Wow, that was everywhere. Pretty Lady. Right. Yeah. Yeah, they had quite a few hits.

So thank you, Eric. I mean, I can understand how somebody would think this is the best. I think it needs more cowbell. Maybe so. Now, what was it like working with Bernie Fielder? So here, another Bernie. But Bernie, you guys were a deck? Fielder, sorry.

Yeah. You guys, like Cecil Fielder. Well, Fielder, yeah. Bernie Fiedler. Fiedler. Fiedler. Fiedler. Fiedler.

See, my dyslexia is popping up. It was a lot of fun working with Bernie. We worked together for 10 years. He owned the Riverboat. We knew each other because I'd been in Yorkville in the 60s. And Bernie wanted to get involved in something other than owning a club. The Riverboat was a very important club. Tell me, because I hear all about Neil Young or Joni Mitchell.

Everybody played there. Joni, Neil, but people like James Taylor and Seals and Cross and Muddy Waters and Gordon Lightfoot. And, you know, I mean, the list is too long. John Prine, Chris Christopherson. And it was a very, very important club. And Bernie was already promoting Gordon Lightfoot concerts. And I thought it was time for Coburn to start playing theaters.

And I wasn't too sure, you know, the best way to approach it. So I sat down with Fiedler and I said, would you be interested in promoting Bruce? And that led us to deeper conversations about his interest in wanting to get involved in other parts of the music business. So we became partners. And then we did a tour, a national tour in 72, not everywhere. And we brought in a third guy who was really good. He didn't remain a partner, but for the tour, named Marty Onrott. Very important, still alive.

One of the original Toronto promoters. And working with Fiedler was a lot of fun. He was very good at what he did, and people loved him. And yes, it's true that Neilil young and joni mitchell played in this club uh when they weren't that well known wow they actually played in this club when they were better known as well but but and then we ended up we ended up bernie and me had a concert promotion business and that lasted for seven or eight years. And we promoted mostly singer-songwriters at Massey Hall.

So Harry Chapin, Jackson Browne, James Taylor, Neil Young, Leonard Cohen. I mean, the list is very long. And we did a lot of shows, hundreds of shows. It got big enough that we brought in a guy named Rob Bennett, who's still doing it, RBI. Do you know Rob at all? No, I don't. Well, he still promotes Bonnie Raitt shows here and stuff. And then what happened is we got a couple of international hits on the label right away.

Not right away, but during that same period. You know, one being Sometimes When We touch, one being wondering where the lions are, you know, the rough trade record. And the concert business was changing. And also CPI was coming in, which was Bill Ballard, whose father at that time owned Maple Leaf Gardens and partners with Michael Cole, yet to be such a powerful person, but very smart, very sharp. And Bernie and me just went, you know, this concert business, you don't really make as much.

It's really hard work. It's all changing. It's all catering now. You know, if the food's not the right temperature, people go crazy. Right. Who gives a shit when you got a hit record? Excuse my language. No, no, I swear as you wish.

And so we got out of the concert business. We let Rob take it on. But, you know, he just walked with the business, such as it was. And that was the end of our fling that way. Well, I think it's funny that, okay, so we mentioned briefly the Garys because I've had both Gary Topp and Gary Cormier and you guys are the Bernies.

Like you have to have somebody of the same first name. Well, that's the way it had to be. We started that. The Garys were smart. They said, we better become partners so we can compete. And from the Bernies to a Barney. Yeah, well, don't I love Barney Benton? And this was a big Canadian hit.

It's huge. It's a platinum record. Platinum round. Love it. Yeah, something to live for. His son's pretty damn good, too. Justin. Yeah.

My favorite song is Life Could Be Worse. Same album. But that was a big hit. I loved working with Barney. I was with him for four albums. All of them were gold. Two of them were platinum. He was a great, great guy to work with.

But one day he called me and said, I'm going to be stepping back a lot, and I don't think I need a manager anymore. I was his publisher as well. So we stopped, although we stayed in touch. I don't see him that often. He's a West Coast guy, right? Yeah, he lives out in the West Coast, and he's doing very well for himself.

He's still on my label on True North, because uh when i sold jeff kulevic bought it and he's kept it going and it's doing very well or at least it looks like it's doing very well i wouldn't know really but from the you know he's got buffy saint marie signed and colin james and lots of people now this is the video here. Because it's very difficult. I found it difficult to track down Mona with the children. But some audio from a YouTube video of Mona with the children. And like I said, I remember this from the mid-80s. And I'd love to hear. You mentioned the gentleman behind a Cameron, right?

Doug Cameron. Doug Cameron. Jack Lenz. So maybe I'll bring it up later as we get to the chorus there. Yeah, get more of the song. Yeah, we get a little preamble here. But tell me how... Because it's a very strange hit.

Jack came to me. At that point, I hope I got this right chronologically because I don't study my life that much. You don't read your biography every morning? No. I try to forget it every morning. It's too long. I wake up in the morning and I go, maybe I'm somebody else now.

No, I don't actually feel that way neither. Yeah, you know, we'd already had a few, I think, political type hits. And, you know, that was our reputation in a way. We were doing all kinds of things. But people realized that our company had an open mind to these things. So Jack, who I'd been working with on the Blue Jays record, because Jack co-wrote it and co-produced it. And Jack is now one of the head people in the Baha'i church. So this song is about the persecution of the Baha'is in Iran.

is about the persecution of the Baha'is in Iran. And he brought over this video that blew my mind. The video was unbelievably good. Very sad. I mean, good, it's a bit of a tragedy. But it was so good, I thought, yeah, you know, much music will play this if it's presented to them right. So I put out the single, and it actually did quite well.

And Doug was a lovely person to work with. I'm not sure what happened later. I don't think we did a follow-up, but, yeah, I mean, it's a a beautiful beautiful record that jack did just waiting for the end oh and you know we got we got a little heat by the way we got the oh yeah we got the odd phone call at the office saying we shouldn't be involved in this like geo to geopolitical? Yeah, well, too anti-Iranian. Oh my goodness, okay. Yeah, you didn't want to be too involved in all of that. But we didn't care all that much.

So I mentioned Banjo Dunk, and he's in Whiskey Jack here doing the Stompin' Tom songs. I'll read his note he sent over yesterday. He said, Douglas John Cameron was signed by Bernie many years ago. Douglas wrote and recorded a hit song with Mona, with the children and Bernie released it on true North records. And he says, what attract,

he says, what attracted him to that song? So I guess we, you've already answered that, but yeah. Well, first it's a, it's a great song without the video and,

and, and the video that you're playing is slightly different than the, the video soundtrack is slightly different than the video soundtrack is slightly different than the single. I was trying to find I mean it is the same components but you're right you can hear elements that are part of the video. Well the reason that it's not around so much like a lot of the True North records are

easy to find because they're still in print and they're still but I didn't own the record I just licensed it from Jack it was a one off or from Jack Lenz it was a one-off. Right. Or from Jack Lenz. It was a one-off kind of thing. So it reverted back to him. I'm sure if I would have said to Jack,

I'd like to keep this out, he would have said okay. But I'm not sure what happened there. A little taste. You gave your life. Gave your heart. All around the world. We'll go dancing. All around the world. We'll be free. Definitely an earworm.

Oh, I'm so glad that you found this. Good for you. I mean, because a lot of people forget about this, but I'm very proud of being involved in that record. Very proud. Excellent, excellent. So now tell us, is it December 2007? Why did you sell True North? Yeah.

Well, you know, I thought around, but, you know, I didn't just decide on one day and sell it the next day. But a year before that, so let's just say towards the end of 2006 or whatever, I just started thinking, you know, I've been doing this all my life. I've been doing it since I was 18. I started the record company when I was around 20. And Scott Fitzgerald had once said, you know, in America,

and I think we could say he could have said in North America, and I'm clear he can't, nobody gets a second act. Now, I don't know how true that is anymore, but it left an impression when I first read that. And I thought, there must be other things that I would like to do. So that was part of it. And I knew that as long as I was running a company that had 15 employees and 500 records out and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, all of that on this board, on that board, doing this, doing that. Because I like to be on boards. I like to contribute and give back.

And that I would never, ever, I didn't know what a second act was. I didn't have anything. I didn't have any particular ambition. I didn't think I was going to be the shortstop for the Toronto Blue Jays or anything like that. But I just thought I could trip over a great opportunity and not even know it was there. But that's one thing.

And then also, the business was changing. I didn't think the business was going to be over. I wasn't a fatalist, but I could see that it was changing. And I'd had a hard enough time understanding it the first time around. I didn't want to learn it again. Oh, the land of streaming. Well, all of that, the digital age. Let's call it the digital age.

I mean, streaming wasn't yet all that predominant, although it may have been talked about. And all of it interested me, but not that much. And I'd also had a really good run. And at the same time, I started getting offers. You know, word was out. And Jeff Kulvik gave me a pretty good offer. And we ironed it out.

It took us about six months to figure out the deal. And I sold. And the first thing I did is that's when I moved to Prince Edward County. I didn't move because I kept my house in trouble. I bought a place in Prince Edward County, and I loved it. You know, I'd always wanted to go back to the country ever since 1968, 69, when I'd been in Killaloo. Right.

And then I wrote my book. And I would have never written a book had I stayed in, you know, stayed with my company. I sometimes think I sold too soon because I have more energy than I thought I was going to, but I'm producing a film right now. So that's something, and I'm so excited by it. By the way, I don't think we've said the name of the book yet.

So I've read the book. It's fantastic. But it is called True North, Life in the Music Business. So that's the book you should be picking up and checking out here. If you can find it, it's out there. It's always good. Amazon's a good place to get it although you know if you can find it at a good book dealer great now something you've been involved in that people might not know i find this interesting is that you were uh chairman of the much fact for uh for 26 years i started it so were you is it you and m that? Yeah, we started it

before much music came on air. They knew they had to go to Ottawa, had to go to Ottawa to get a license. Right. And part of getting a license in Canada in those days, I think it's not quite that way

these days quite as much, is you had to make a contribution to various things. And I was sitting down. Moses was a good friend of mine. And I was sitting down with him one day, and he said, you know, we're going to try to get this license. To make a long story short, I said, I'll help.

And we came up with this idea called Video Fact. It later changed its name about 25 years later to much fact it's called video fact and they got the license a year later and went on air and we started it and during my tenure we gave out about 65 million dollars so can i ask like is it essentially somebody i'm gonna make it up in fotm like maybe moe berg and pursuit of, they want, is it like a grant to help them make a video? Yeah, we gave them, that's exactly what it was. They'd apply, we had a board, a board of independent members.

We had a couple from Quebec and blah, blah, blah. And we would give you up to $25,000, although probably the average award was around 15 000 and um although we started getting up closer to the 20 000 after a while um and uh in fact i think somebody like moberg did get his money well that's it was in my head that he told a story about that first video we uh gave We gave money out to everybody from when they were yet to be stars. Katie Lang, Celine Dion. Wow. You know, when she was only singing in French.

Lista's Endless Blue Rodeo, the Try video. Love that video. It was a video fact video. Now, we just gave them the money. now we just gave them the money sometimes our staff helped in certain ways because people ran into problems

and the most knowledgeable people about video were our staff people like Julie Thorburn and later Beverly McKee and Naz Estien and various people Tiffany

now this connection it's a small world as you know Just Naz, Estienne, and various people. Tiffany. Now this connection, it's a small world, as you know, in Canadian media here. But your relationship with Moses, and then this business relationship here, and then, of course, Murray McLaughlin goes and marries one of Moses' employees. There you go. It's all totally connected here, of course.

And, of course, you're working with Joel Goldberg now on various projects. Yeah, well, you're working with Joel Goldberg now and various projects. Yeah, well, yeah. Zoomerplex. Yeah, I'm not working currently with Joel, but we have an ongoing interest in exploiting the film we did. All right. Is it okay if I steal a couple more minutes

just to bang off some quick hits here? Yeah, absolutely. Because I know I said 90 minutes here. One of the acts that you haven't mentioned that I had a lot to do with, and they're actually getting bigger every day now, is Blackie and the Rodeo Kids. Well, okay, that's coming up here right now.

Which include Tom Wilson, Colin Linden, and Stephen Fearing, three pretty awesome people themselves. You can't see it because the font is tiny, but it is actually correct next, because of course tom wilson and stephen fearing at least they're fotms i always end up producing my own shows so what led to them uh being signed to to true north records in late 80s well i already had stephen fearing i was

managing stephen and uh recording him as well for True North, a wonderful, wonderful artist. And I was already working with Colin over the years, producing some Bruce records. And Tom I knew, but Tom I knew less. I got a call one day, make a long story short, we went out and had lunch. They said they wanted to do a tribute album to Willie P. Bennett. My first thought was, no, that's crazy. Nobody even knows who Willie is.

But by the end of the lunch, I was totally convinced it was going to be great. So I signed, I made a contract, and I made the first seven of their albums, I think. And we even got a couple of hit singles with them. One called Lean on Your Peers, which is fantastic, and Stoned, which is even more fantastic. And you said it, but I haven't had the pleasure of meeting Colin Linden yet,

but Stephen and Tom are just sweethearts. Oh, they're wonderful. And Colin is too. I believe it, yeah. Yeah, they're wonderful. You know, and Colin is too, you know. I believe it, yeah. Yeah, the three of them are. And they, I think, they got a new album coming out. They just signed to Warner Brothers, which will be good for them

because they'll get a pretty good push, I think, I hope. And they're a wonderful live act. And they're finally getting to the point where they can sell out theaters. And, uh, yeah, I love them.

And I, and, uh, you know, I'd spend a lot of time working with Stephen Faring solo and, uh, I love all three of them. They're all,

they're all brilliant. You know, here's some accolades for you that I'll, uh, shout out here. So you, uh, Bernie,

you were inducted into the Canadian Music Industry Hall of Fame in 2003. In 2006, the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences awarded you the Walt Grealis Special Achievement Award, and apparently only individuals who have contributed to the growth of the Canadian music industry get that award. But here's a big one here. Order of Canada in 2007. Yeah, that's right.

Pretty cool. Where is it? Aren't you supposed to... Right here. Okay, yes. I wore it for you because I knew you're a spy on behalf of the government

and you'd get upset if I didn't wear it. I got to make sure it's there. Yeah. So that's just a little pin. And Denise Donlan has this too? She does, yeah. She does.

Murray has that as well. Yes, of course. Murray, yeah, it's fantastic. So when we take our photo, Molly Johnson, I think? Bruce has it. I haven't met Bruce yet. I think Molly has it.

Yes, she does. Yes, she does. Yes, okay, because she did the Kumbaya Festival and all kinds of things. Right, right. Molly Johnson.

FOTM? I think so. I think so. Now, we're going to take a photo after this episode and i'm hoping it's not too cold we can get that uh that pin in there now uh quickly wrapping up here but in fact i see i had a question about syrinx actually funnily enough but you've addressed syrinx so thank you gear joyce fotm gear joyce he's a great writer. He says, ask him about the work my late roommate did for him.

So his late roommate is Julie Ann Thorburn. Yeah, Julie was the executive director when we started Video Fact. Well, actually, she succeeded a person named Errol Rosen, who did it on behalf of SERPA. But she was the first standalone working in-house on Video Fact and did an incredible, incredible job, helped build the various structure. That's why it lasted so long because of her work. And she unfortunately died far too young. But she was succeeded by a good person named Beverly McKee

who did a great job as well. And Basement Dweller wants to know if you know what became of Doug Cameron. I saw Doug a little, but it's over a couple of years ago, so the true answer is I don't. Okay, but at least there was a sighting a couple of years ago. There must be a question somebody can think of that I had no answer to. Birchie, are you aware that Taggart and Torrens do sketches that involve you and Gordon Lightfoot?

Yeah, it's very funny. When I first heard about it and I listened to some of the episodes, I liked them all. I thought it was clever. It was kind of funny as well, but I thought they had the wrong Bernie because really Gordon is close with Bernie Fiedler,

but I could tell they were talking about me, but I did ask. So maybe they conflated. I did ask. Yeah, I did ask. Maybe they meant Bruce and they went with Gordy instead or something. Yeah, I don't know whether they confused Gordy,

Bruce and Gordy, or me and Fiedler. I'll find out because they're both FOTMs. They've been on the show. So that's, of course, Jeremy Taggart is- Who is FOTM, Stan? Friend of Toronto Mike. Oh, okay. I was going to keep

dropping it to ask you what it meant. You know what you are now? You're now an FOTM. Well, I'm proud. So forget that order at Canada Pin. This is more important. Yeah, I'll just get rid of it. But Jeremy Taggart, drummer with Our Lady Peace. Do you have those pins? Do you have dinners at Rudolph? I give out stickers. So Jeremy Taggart, drummer

of Our Lady Peace, of course, and Jonathan Torrens, an actor, and he's in Halifax, actually. So yeah, I'm sure they'll be very interested to hear your feedback. I've heard it, and I like it. I like it. I don't know if they're still doing it or not, but I like it. Good. Thumbs up, thumbs up. And again, everybody should check out True North Life in the Music Business.

Oh, there is a question here, a real quick one, and you don't have to dwell on it, but Eric Peebles, again, wanted to know if... Was Gomeshi... Yeah. You know, I know it's a tough... What happened with Gomeshi and everything, everybody knows, but when he was in Moxie Fruvis, you guys were...

You worked with Moxie Fruvis. Well, I did one album with Moxie. I liked the album. It was called thornhill it was the last album the group made uh is that the one that's stuck in the 90s in it or is that the one no maybe not yeah um i don't think stuck in the 90s is on that uh it's quite a long time ago now sure and i'd like jim you know i like working with him i mean i'm sorry that he got so so you know i don't know what well i mean it's hard to comment on this yeah it's very difficult but in your experience

with gian gomez in your experience he wasn't insufferable or anything you had an okay working relationship absolutely i had no i wouldn't have guessed that any of this was going on i mean look at you know the idea that that men in the music business like women is it's not it's not exactly radical yeah i mean you know it was but it was obviously out of hand so i don't want somebody don't don't don't yell at me what i'm trying to say is i had no problems with gian in your experience sorry to see him end up in such a mess. And I know there's some people saying, well, don't be sorry, he deserves it.

I have no opinion other than he obviously did things that were wrong. Apparently, I wasn't a witness. I don't really know. Now, Mark Weisblatt was here yesterday for his monthly recap. He's at 12 36 it's fantastic and it came up a conversation that there's this right wing uh website called true north and i just wondered uh can you send a cease and desist over there or what who owns this i don't own it now that would be jeff but i don't think he can because it's in the national anthem that's right

it's not it's not if somebody started true north records right you could do a cease and desist right but there's so many true north things that you can't i know it's really unfortunate because it's really a right because he just mentioned i didn't hear about it till yesterday and he's talking about true north and i'm like spurning know about this but okay so nothing you could do you don't own it anyways but uh i have a gift for you here this is another gift now the electric city candle company these are special needs adults that make candles and then they sell these candles at electriccitycandles.com and all the money they make from selling these candles goes towards their hockey league this special needs hockey league

and they're actually trying to buy a used van so they can help with the traveling. So if you want to learn more about the hockey team, everybody should go to electriccityspecialneedshockey.com. But Bernie, this is a special gift they wanted to... Yeah, you're bringing a lot of stuff home with you here. Appreciate that. I don't know how I'm going to carry it. And every single episode of Toronto Mic

has closed with a song from Shakespeare, My Butt. That's an album I love from lowest to the low. Came out in the early 90seties and it always closes with, uh, Rosie and gray. In fact, this one will probably close with Rosie and gray as well, but there's another great song on that album.

Just going to bring it up when I talk about it. And I actually thought I should close with this song and a shout out to Andrew Stokely. Cause when he kicked out the jams, this was one of them, but this song is called So Long, Bernie. Not about you, though, I don't think, but So Long, Bernie. So thank you. By the way, if anybody wants to win tickets to Lowest of the Low,

they're playing at Lee's Palace on the 14th of December, and I have two tickets to give away. Just tweet at me your favorite lowest of the low song of all time and you might win. I think I'll pick the winner, I think like Monday or something. I can't remember what day,

but coming up, you have some time. So tweet at me your favorite lowest of the low song and you can win two tickets to Lee's Palace. Bernie, that was amazing. I really appreciate it. It was great.

Thank you, Mike. Thanks for making the trek that was awesome and that brings us to the end of our 550 second show you can follow me on Twitter I'm at Toronto Mike now Bernie

somebody did want me to ask you about your Twitter handle did you run out of characters because somebody says they wanted to know if you were trying to avoid trolls by not spelling out your full name

in the Twitter handle. No, I just, at the time that I got that name, first off, I didn't even know what I was doing. So I just started spelling out my name, and that was as far as I could get. So it's Bernie Finkelstein, but without the N at the end. Yeah, well, is that what it is? Yeah. But that's not on purpose. I just didn't have characters. Right, you ran out of space.

I don't know if they give you more characters now or not. I think you have to pay extra. I don't know. Great Lakes Brewery is at Great Lakes Beer. Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. Can't wait to see everybody on Saturday, noon to three at Palma's Kitchen. Who else we got? Sticker U is at Sticker U.

Brian Master, you write him at letsgetyouhome at kw.com. Banjo Dunk is at Banjo Dunk. that's D-U-N-C. And Ridley Funeral Home is at Ridley F-H. See you all next week. Well, you've been under my skin for more than eight years. It's been eight years of laughter and eight years of tears And I don't know what the future can hold or do For me and you

But I'm a much better man for having known you Oh, you know that's true because Everything is coming up