Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Christopher Ward: Toronto Mike'd #202

Episode Date: October 31, 2016

Mike chats with former MuchMusic Veejay Christopher Ward about his years on City Limits and MuchMusic, co-writing Black Velvet for Alannah Myles and his recent dive into the Much archives for Is This Live?.

Welcome to episode 202 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a local independent brewery producing fresh craft beer. And Chef's Plate, delivering delicious and locally sourced farm fresh ingredients in refrigerated kits directly to your door. ingredients and refrigerated kits directly to your door. I'm Mike from torontomike.com and joining me this week is former MuchMusic VJ, Christopher Ward. Hello, Mike. Welcome, Christopher. Thank you. I love your theme. Who did the theme? It's very cool. That is by Ill Vibe. He's a local rapper producer and yeah, it's an original composition for

this show. So thank you for liking it now you didn't you didn't actually hear it there right uh no but i heard it before right right i just want to tell everybody at home uh listening that uh this is episode 202 but for the first time ever i'm gonna do an episode via skype And that's great that you made the time for me via Skype. I know your schedule is a bit hairy right now as you promote your new Much Music book. But I want everybody to know that when I play audio elements, Christopher Ward will not hear them,

but you will kindly pretend like you heard them and they were great. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I have an armload of superlatives ready to hurl at a moment's notice, Mike. That's fantastic. By the way, it's interesting to me that you're LA-based normally, right? You live in Los Angeles? Yeah. But right now you're in Toronto.

I am. It amuses me that we could have Sky could have skyped anytime when you were in los angeles but we're skyping while you're actually in my uh my hometown so that's just a mild amusement for me uh we can we can just have a skype relationship from now on it's all there well now that you're added to my contact list every time i have like a much music memory you have to like endure my my messages. Like, hey, Christopher, man, what was happening that time when Steve Anthony was this, that? Yeah, you're going to have to put up with that. I hope that's okay. Yeah, as long as Steve's involved,

I'll have the goods for you. Speaking of Steve, real quick to tell everybody, this is the fourth MuchMusic VJ that's appeared on Toronto Mic'd. So the first four were Steve Anthony, George Strombolopoulos. Sorry, you are the fourth, actually. So Steve Anthony, George Strombolopoulos, and Ed the Sock. Well. And speaking of Ed,

you were Charles de Camembert on Ed's fromage specials. That was something that we started well pre-Sock. we just decided that we were so reverent about what we played that we needed at least one occasion where we would completely mock everything that was taken seriously for the rest of the year so i i developed this character charles de camembert and we scanned through the library and it usually wasn't too difficult finding just the most horrific stinky music videos that existed so we called through the library, and it usually wasn't too difficult finding just the most horrific, stinky music videos that existed.

So we called it the very best of the very worst. Fromage, the videos and the hideos. Ian on Twitter wanted to know how drunk you had to be when you filmed those fromage episodes. Was there any eggnog involved? No, no. I hate to disappoint him, but I was as sober as could be when I was doing that. It's kind of sad, isn't it? Actually, and I told this to Ed when he was here, you know, because it's weird, you know.

There's this, Ed, you talk to Ed and then you talk to Steve Kersner and then you go back and forth. It's quite interesting. But I told him that those fromage specials those were i loved them like they they were sometimes my favorite favorite piece of uh content from the the calendar year was those fromage specials they were great that's good to know they were fantastic a little bit of housekeeping before we do our deep dive into much music here is i want to just let you know that had you been here in Southwest Toronto, I would have given you a six-pack of Great Lakes beer right now.

So don't worry. I'll drink these on your behalf if that's okay. Would you? I will do that for you. Thank you. And not tonight because I've got to be, you know, I'm trick-or-treating tonight, so I've got to have my wits about me, but I'll try to spread it out a little bit. treating tonight so i gotta have my wits about me but i'll try to spread it out a little bit uh and also just uh chef's plate uh would be basically encouraging you to uh use the promo

code toronto mike at chefsplate.com they're like uh like if you want to eat healthy but you don't want to worry about meal planning chef's plate basically will send to your door a refrigerated kit with pre-portioned ingredients and easy-to-follow recipes so you can eat healthy. And it's so easy, even I could do it. So go to chefsplate.com, use the promo code TorontoMike, and you get your first two plates for free. You know, if you're trying to maintain yourself tonight, you could always give the beers away

to the kids that come to the door. You know what? If any kid looks way too old to be trick-or-treating, I might just do it. Yeah, if they've got a beard, I think, you know. There's a pumpkin ale, actually, from Great Lakes. You see? This was meant to be. It might work out.

Now, you can't hear this, but you know this song. I am playing right now for the people at home. I'm playing the single Maybe Your Heart. Oh, my goodness. Because I don't think people realize. In fact, I'm going to let it simmer a little bit, and I'll get back to you here. But let it percolate a bit.

let it percolate a bit. Like it's a catchy little ditty. I didn't know about it, to be honest. I discovered it recently when we scheduled your appearance. And I will inelegantly shut it down because if I... Actually, no, I don't have... I can do this.

Hold on. So people would be surprised I think to know that before you know before city limits before much music Christopher Ward was a yacht rocker what does that mean this is like the Christopher Cross sailing type music, right? This is like that 70s, like, you know. Okay. I think they, I know there was a station on Sirius XM called Yacht Rock where they brought back some of these Kenny Loggins tunes. You know what I'm talking about? These easy listening.

Yeah. I've never heard that term before, but all right. That's how I would describe maybe your heart. So I can, like, what I know is that it peaked at number 17 on the 1050 chum chart in the summer of 78. So, you know, that's a, that's not easy to do. Like you had, so before City TV, you had a, what I would call a, you had a singing career. you had a singing career. Yes.

Yes. A singing career. Wow. Yeah, I did. I made records, wrote songs, played the guitar, did all of those things, you know. It was fabulous. I think this would surprise some of maybe people my age,

I think, who know you as a VJ. I think it would surprise us to learn that you had great tunes like that being played on 1050 Chum. So we're here to educate people that there's much more than meets the eye here. Well, I mean, I did have a career as a songwriter after Mudge, of course. Of course, and we'll get to that. In fact, here, let me set the stage this way. So where are we now? Of course, and we'll get to that.

In fact, here, let me set the stage this way. So where are we now? You're a budding pop star, and you're a Second City touring company performer, and television calls. At this point, and we'll get to these people, but you're dating a young lass named Alana Miles, and you're buddies with some young chap named Mike Myers.

So tell me now, Christopher Ward, how do you end up at City TV? Well, I did have a career as a budding yacht rocker that came to, well, we had a bit of a boating accident with my band. We just ran out of steam, ran out of money, ran out of tour. Lawsuits were involved. And so I kind of licked my wounds and figured out what I was going to do next. And I joined Second City while I was in their class program. And they asked me to audition for the touring company, which I did. And then Mike Myers was the next member to be auditioned.

And so he and I were in the company together. an ex-member to be auditioned and so he and I were in the company together and meanwhile I'd met Alana and we were living together and working together and developing her career and actually she and Mike and I all lived in an apartment in the beach for a while and I was doing my last show at Second City intent on refocusing exclusively on music and uh an old friend of mine named john martin came down to the show and at the end of the show i got an elvis bust a pie on the face and an interesting little offer from john who said christopher come to my office on monday i got something for you which from john that was like a huge elabor. So I did go to his office and he said, well, we're doing this little thing.

It's an all night show, Friday and Saturday nights. And the idea is that if we get the license, that this will be sort of the, you know, the prototype for Much Music. And I thought, I don't want to do that. I mean, I've just, you know, I'm focused on music, John. And he was, he's going, okay, okay. And he said, well, you need the money, don't you?

And I said, well, yeah. He said, and you can do anything you want. Hmm. So that was kind of the kicker, the idea that you could just go on television and play. And that's what we did for eight or nine months. And then we got the license for Much, and it went from there. Now, this will take about 30 seconds i'm gonna give people a taste of what the city

limits intro sounded like so uh let's hear that here the following is a city limits encore presentation from toronto city tv presents city limits canada's first all-night video music extravaganza and now live from the city tv control center at 99 queen street east here's your all-night city limits vj christopher ward greetings limitoids and welcome to the final edition of city limits all night live from now until 6 o'clock in the morning. Christopher Ward with you. That was fantastic. Just last, by the way, you mentioned this is a dry run for much music.

So, and we'll get to that. Obviously it was successful. But I just want to say, last night I'm watching a pitiful Maple Leafs game. And it's in Brooklyn. It was awful. watching a pitiful Maple Leafs game and it's in Brooklyn. It was awful. But there is an interview with a Leafs fan in attendance, Mike Myers.

And you mentioned you were buddies with Mike Myers. Yeah, he was there. So I guess people probably know this and I'll play the clip in a minute. But Mike Myers, essentially, he debuts his Wayne character. At least his television debut is on City Limits. Is that right? Yeah, Mike, it is. He, well, I said he and I were in the touring company together and he was developing the Wayne character already. As he said, he used to do it at parties to get girls. And so it was just a shtick that he did and he would work it into various scenes when we were in the in the company and then when i got the all night show gig i just said hey you want to come

down and do some stuff and he's like sure i said why don't you come down as wayne as my cousin so he did and then we developed a whole shtick based on that and you know if city limits is a is a dry run for much music, you were essentially a dry run for Garth, right? You're essentially sort of the Garth to his Wayne. Hmm. The Garth prototype. Wow. Okay. Hey, you gotta check it out

somewhere. So another 30 seconds, if you will, I'm going to play a clip of Mike Myers as Wayne on City Limits. Alright. I'm Hub from Tonich. And I'm Wade from Bludgeon. Next week on City Limits on Much Music.

Carnage Night in Canada. It's a heavy metal showdown. Be there. Vote for your favorite video, man. That's us, Tonich. That's us, Bich. That's us, Bludgeon. Oh, man. You know who the wimps are. You know who the masters of metal are. These guys are bogus. We are excellent. You guys are losers. We're losers, man. Cool, actually. All right. Carney Schneider in Canada. Bludgeon. Man, don't push me. Come on, man. It's a change, pal. Oh, this is great. So was it surreal when you're witnessing Mike Myers from Scarborough

becoming an international icon with Wayne's World? Like, what was that like? Well, it was thrilling, honestly, because, you know, we stayed friends. And, you know, I got to hang out at Saturday Night Live a whole bunch. And, you know, when he was making movies, come and visit while he was on set and stuff. So it was great. It was sort of like, you know, a joke on the world. It was like he pulled it.

He just pulled it off. That's the feeling you have when you, you know, you work at something for a while and you get success. You think, oh, my gosh, they're fooled. But he he so richly deserves the success that he achieved. He's just one of the funniest people on the planet. And it's just natural. It's intrinsic to him. He's an extraordinary improviser. And I don't know if you've seen his new book called Canada, but it just has all these amazing details about his upbringing. I don't know how he remembers all that stuff, but I think that's part of his gift as a writer,

is that collecting of little odds and sods and the storing away of those things until you need them, whether it's on stage or you're writing a sketch or writing a treatment for a film or whatever. He's so good at it. Absolutely. Now, you're at Much Music. So maybe share with me a little bit. Before I play, I have a clip. It's like 50 seconds long of the Much Music launch on August 31st, 1984.

But just before we get there, so I guess tell me a little bit about how this dry run at City Limits kind of converts to this national music station, Much Music, and your role there, thanks to John Martin. Well, it was a little bit haphazard, Mike, because, I mean, if you've watched clips from City Limits, you'll see that it was just this tiny little space. There was no sense of, oh, we'll build a set or we'll do anything sort of grandiose and television-like. It was, no, we'll get a guy who introduces videos and we'll just plop him down in the studio and have a couple of cameras.

So, you know, what happened was that that worked. It worked enough that it was a prototype for Much, but it worked in spirit as well, the way that the crew were always being part of the scene. I would just talk to them all the time. It was like being at a party every Friday and Saturday night. I think we took the spirit of that into Much, and miraculously, when it became this national network, I don't think we lost it. Now let's play that clip here, so you can hear opening night of Much, and then I have questions about opening night, because I hear that, you know, it was a party broadcast,

and I hear there were some technical difficulties I want to hear about, so let's hear how it sounded that first minute anyways. Tonight, live from coast to coast, the launch of Canada's first 24-hour music channel, the nation's music station, Much Music, featuring the world video premiere of Rush, The Enemy Within, and The Spoon's Tell No Lies, The Enemy Within, and The Spoons Tell No Lies. Plus, the Canadian video premiere of Yes!

Elvis Costello, The Fix, Human League, Slaves, Culture Club, and A Few Surprises. Get on with it here. All right. All right. Heck of a way to start a rock and roll show. Yeah, that's a little bit of a snappy opening, isn't it? Yeah, I think so. I'm J.D. Roberts. I'm Christopher Ward. And what we have for you to kick the whole thing off is the first time that music and picture were ever synced. This is from 1922 and Yubi Blake. This is Snappy Song on Much Music. So that's J.D. Roberts and you, Christopher Ward, introducing the very first video that would ever play on Much Music, which was not The Rush is the Enemy Within, but was Yubi Blank's Snappy Songs.

Yeah, that was classic John Martin. He just had to do it in his own roguish way, and it was a very funny thing to do. I mean, the first contemporary video, which we refer to of course was the enemy within yeah it was it was you know standing behind a blue screen waiting for this moment i i think um i think jd had a pocket knife and and cut a little slit in it so that we wouldn't be trapped behind it when the cue came so but it was yeah i mean it was chaos that night. Dave Kines, who many years later ran Much Music, he said he committed the first technical error in Much history because he was rushing in with some tapes for playback on the show, and he banged into the master control machine

and completely stopped everything. It was just like, no. And he went, oh, I did this, and then boom, and they pushed like no and then boom then they push play and it all started up again but um yeah that was the kind of stuff that we dined out on no it's pretty it was a pretty funny night you know like to me the fact that you know they would get like artists before much started to do little you know spiels for us little station ids so that you know i have annie Lennox and people like that. But then they'd get Rodney Dangerfield,

who clearly didn't have a clue what he was referring to. And what I love, too, is that the line that they used in the promos was that it was all for the price of a burger and fries. I'm thinking, you really want to pitch it that way, huh? Well, they did. That's too funny. And I mean, we'll dive in further later about the book, but I should point out that this story,

so you're sharing these stories with us now, but I've had the advantage of reading these stories in great detail with fantastic pictures in your book, Is This Live? So Is This Live is sort of the, and by the way, Mike Myers wrote the foreword, speaking of the devil, but great photos, great memories of the heyday of much music. So that is the book I urge people to pick up. And it's got, you know, you mentioned those technical difficulties and those stories are shared in this book. And it's just, it's just

great. Like I thoroughly thoroughly thoroughly enjoyed is this thank you thank you mike it was it was a joy to write it really truly was it was not work uh yeah and it sounds like it it really it really reads like that and there's you know all these people we know and love from my you know michael williams to jd roberts and erica m and denise donlan and so on and just just their contributions to the book just make it that much better. So you mentioned UB Blake, which was a John Martin idea. Is there a funny story there about him editing UB Blake for the broadcast? If he did, I'm not aware of it. Okay.

I just thought, we used to have these things back on the Old Limits show. We called them scopatones, but I know they have different names. And they were sort of music videos from like the 30s on through until the 50s. And that's where I thought the Yubi Blake thing came from. Okay. And John Martin in general, what are your thoughts? I know he created the new music and then he worked on Much. What kind of guy was John Martin?

John was a unique person in everyone's life. He was kind of gruff, rumpled, forehead furrowed kind of a guy who, you know, at first you might feel like he was rejecting you because he would be, he could be very dismissive, but he, he loved his people. He was intensely loyal. And he, I mean, I think I, I dedicated the book to him. I said to John, who wound us up and let us go, because that was his way. It wasn't like you'd go to Vijay's school or he would sit you down and say, here are my expectations of you. It's no, if you were hired, it was like, you're great hired, go put a microphone on, do a show, talk to me later. And he might have a commentary after you did your first show. Um, but with me, if ever I asked him

for something, guidance on something, or, or, you something or can we do this, he'd look at me just, no, Christopher, you'll figure it out. And he'd sort of like wave me away like a mosquito. He was a real true embodiment of the rock and roll spirit. He loved when stuff went wrong. He loved happy accidents. And he stirred the pot. If there was conflict, he loved it. He just ate out on that.

And like a perfect example was he was in Jamaica with new music. And they were driving along a road. And they had the band The Waltons, who were actually they wanted Juno back in the 80s with him. And he just stopped the car and said, oh, perfect, perfect. And there was a fountain up a hill. He went, yeah, yeah, yeah, put the Waltons in the fountain. We'll shoot the fountain. Never thinking, you know, that there'd be cables and that we had to like, you know, do the audio for it and everything.

It was just like he saw it, he thought it through and it was like, boom, it was a reality. So that was the spirit of Much, I think, got handed down very much via John Martin. Excellent. And while we're talking about these people at the beginning, what are your thoughts on Moses and his role in the creation of Much music? Well, I mean, Moses is the antithesis of John in terms of personal style. Moses is the antithesis of John in terms of personal style. Moses is very organized, very buttoned down, very cerebral. But they shared one thing, and that is that a love of what Moses calls process.

He loves seeing how things are made. And it was Moses that was responsible for the look of the place. And that's no small accomplishment. And it rubbed off into the world of news. If you think about City Pulse News, when they first started, they really liberated the anchor and the people that did sports and weather and so on from that sort of rigid, you know, guy behind a desk with a phone type of image. And everything became very fluid. There was a lot of motion as people would go from space to space. And it was revolutionary. And you saw it pop up all over North America after that. But then the spirit of Much was similar. It was like the studio, such as it was, was in the same place as all of the gear, all the technicians, all the office people, all the phones, all the producers, editors, people screening things in the background. The VJs had their desks.

And it was all just one huge mishmash. And out of that came a television program. And if you saw MTV when they they launched back in 81 it was the antithesis of that it was shot in a little box little shot box all the intros were written i imagine they i didn't see it but i'm guessing they worked off of either cue cards or maybe a teleprompter and it was rehearsed they did all their intros until they got them right and then they went home and somebody else then inserted the videos and packaged it and so on um you know ours was a whole different animal as you as you know well i mean some of the stories you share

in the book like bon jovi right uh rummaging through the the renovated offices like looking for a copy of their video which no one had bothered to catalog properly, and just great stuff like that. It's like, basically, it's character, as far as I'm concerned, right? It had personality. Well, you had to be able to improvise. And for me, you know, having come

just from doing Second City and doing improvisation, it was very good training for working at Much. Absolutely. In those early days, and I mentioned already a few names that you worked with, but J.D. Roberts, Michael Williams, Erica M., Denise Donlan, these are all names, especially, you know, we all know and love these names, but I have to ask, what happened with Catherine McClanahan? Because that's a name, like, lost to the annals, like, my memory bank forgot about her. I guess she exited early, there's a an interesting story there with katherine well i know katherine she's a friend of mine she lives in los angeles

and um actually we had a party this past week and she came up from la for the party i was delighted um she's a wonderful person and she was uh the first uh female vj but it was a very brief time period. What I recollect is that she auditioned for, because she was an actor prior to Much, she auditioned for a play, I think it was called Yuppies, and they cast her and gave her the part. And so she went to John and said, okay, I've got this opportunity. Can we make this work? In other words, can I schedule my shifts around being able to do this play? And John was like, oh, yeah, no problem. Well, Moses didn't feel the same way.

Moses felt there was a problem. And so she got toasted after about five months or so. Yeah, it's a shame. Now, this was prior to 1980. This is early, right? Yeah, it's a shame. Now, this was prior to 1980. This is early, right? So early on. So from 84 to 1988, much music is basically pay TV. So like other than like free weekends, it was actually tough whatever tier it goes to, suddenly you're on all these televisions across the nation. So what was it like when basically everyone including me suddenly had you on their

televisions in 1988? Was it 88, Mike? Because I can't remember. I think it was 88. Okay. I thought it was, I didn't think it took us that long to get to basic cable. Well, you know what, yeah, maybe. But you know what, I'm going to go with you on this one because I don't honestly remember. Well, obviously, it was kind of an explosion of viewership.

And I know they reached a million viewers. This was a big sort of landmark. And it happened so much sooner than they thought that it would. And the first reflection that i got of it um i did a tour uh with mike campbell who was mike of mike and mike fame right and mike used to be like the cable representative he would go around from city to city and town to town and and you know sell much music to make sure they included it in their cable packages and so on but mike was a true rock and roll spirit we went across the the country. We did a tour called Criss Cross Canada,

and we covered all 10 provinces. We went to the Yukon. I think we took like 25 flights in 40 days, and it was just grueling. But we met so many people who had fallen in love with Much, for whom it became, you know, an essential part of their day. And it was not only heartwarming, it was informing, because unless you're out there, you just only have a notion based on, you know, letters you get or people talking to you on the street or whatever. But seeing it coast to coast, the impact that we had made, you know, it was thrilling. I just will never forget the feeling that I got, that sort of cumulative sense of how much we were, you know,

impacting people's lives. Yeah, absolutely. So would you remember when J.D. Roberts leaves MuchMusic, approximately? Yeah, I'm putting you on the spot here. The dates. nobody said there were going to be questions do you remember how it felt when jd roberts left much because he was that you know he was right there with you day one uh yeah uh so how did it feel when he left jd was the best sort of colleague you could ever have and i have no doubt that he is the same today. He was the most responsible person I've ever met. And part of that is just his makeup. But part of it is also a

function of his curiosity. He was one of those guys, he wanted to know how the editing machine worked. He wanted to know how master control worked. He wanted to know how to operate a camera. He was adamant about editing his own pieces at times. And this is a guy who just had to know everything about this animal called television. And he always had your back. So it was a loss when he went. But at the same time, he was so clearly on a different path. And people were very skeptical. He wanted to do news. He wanted to do that news anchor type thing. People said, oh, you can't do that.

You're a rock and roll guy. You're a new music much guy. You're not going to do that. And clearly he proved them all wrong and has had unbelievable success. Absolutely. Yeah, that's great that somebody could, you're right, be the rock guy and then kind of transform himself into the hard news integrity guy.

That's not an easy pivot to make, I don't think. Well, he had to get rid of the mullet first. That's right. That was the first sacrifice. And get rid of the JD, right? Because he's John Roberts now. John Roberts. That's right. John Roberts. That's right. Now, the breakout shows that we all knew and loved, Soul in the City and Rap City and Electric Circus and The Power Hour.

So, Electric Circus. I had a chat. I recently had Maestro Fresh West on the show. Right. And he talks about basically being discovered. Stevie B was in the audience at Electric Circus, and that sort of led to his first record contract and one of the people I talked to is Joel Goldberg because he yeah yeah he directed those early Maestro Fresh West

videos yeah and which is so Electric Circus how there's a great story about where that name came from the electric circus do you have that story well the electric circus was the name of a dance club that was um where the original city tv building at 99 queen street which is queen and jarvis area was and it closed as all clubs eventually do and um so when they were sitting around trying to dream up a name for the show somebody said well why don't we call it electric circus like the old club just i mean the history was an obvious choice and the name just seemed kind of perfect yes indeed so yeah i yeah it was really cool. Well, Joel, of course, was the producer of Electric Circus as well.

And super, super talented guy. Yeah, he has good stories. Ask Joel about the Electric Circus stories. Oh, I will, I will. And just to promote an upcoming episode, in that video for Let Your Backbone Slide, which Joel Goldberg produced, sort of directed by Maestro Fresh West,

there's a cameo in there by Dwight Drummond, who's now a news anchor at CBC Toronto. And Dwight, so Dwight Drummond's in that video. You can see him in the steps early on. And he will be, he was also at City TV, of course, forever. But he will be my guest in two weeks' time. Dwight Drummond will be on the show.

Cool. It all comes together. By the way, you mentioned 99. Doesn't it though? Yeah, all the pieces kind of fit at some point if you do this long enough. You mentioned 99 Queen Street East. So what was the atmosphere like at 99 Queen Street East, the original home of Much? It was kind of like being in an sctv sketch

i mean they actually i think parodied some of the city employees i know they did a parody of brian linehan they call uh they called him brock linehan i'm trying to think who martin short marty short yeah it's perfect yeah yeah absolutely. And he was ripe for parody. And by the way, sometimes when I'm, you know, if I come up with some obscure detail and I'm questioning somebody, I say, that's my Brian Linehan showing. Like, I'm just trying to, you know, emulate the guy. I've been accused of obscura myself, Mike,

so we are soulmates in that regard. There you go. I'm in good company then. So, again, everybody knows about 299 Queen, but at 99 Queen Street East, I guess if you were going to compare 99 Queen Street East's atmosphere to 299 Queen, what's the biggest change that happened when you moved to 299 Queen? We had shinier equipment but i i think really the the spirit of the place uh maintained because it was the same cast of characters and we were essentially doing the same thing i mean it felt pretty cool to have a real honest to goodness studio even if there were even if it was like full of desks and people doing things and answering phones but uh no it was it was the the same uh the same story just writ large right right what was the much

groove oh that was master t tony young uh and he used to work with, uh, Gord McWaters, who, um, is still, uh, one of the top guys, uh, at Bell, uh, in terms of, you know, doing, uh, on-air promotions and, and defining the look. Um, and they would go out, I guess they had these sort of free Fridays. There's a, they had some name for it and they would go out and shoot, you know, little promos and bumpers and like show opening ideas and just like odds and sods. That was the thing. I mean, if you had an idea, you didn't even have to ask anybody.

You could just go out and do it, put it on air. And then if it didn't work, somebody would come and go, you know, but otherwise it was just, yeah, I mean, fill your hat. And Tony took really good advantage of that because he's a super creative guy, very funny, very talented, bright, and he was a natural VJ, despite the fact that he didn't think he was cut out for it. In fact, when he was originally offered the job, he'd been doing a show, I think it was Extend-A-Mix.

Yes. And he was offered the full-time gig, and a show i think it was extend a mix yes and he was offered the full-time gig and he thought about it and thought about it went no i think i'm gonna stick with being a cameraman i don't know whether he thought there was more security in that or just that what but in the end of course he was persuaded that his future was on air and and if you see some of the big interviews that he did, like the Madonna interviews, classic case, he took, you know, a pretty tough subject and just made her a pussycat. She felt so at home and at ease with him. And that's a gift. You know, now that we're, so now I realize we're

entering what I call the next wave of DJs, which Master T is sort of that second wave. But just now I need to reverse a little bit and just ask you about a couple of those cats from the early days so what kind of guy was Michael Williams or is Michael Williams I guess I should say Mike was a lovely guy to work with he is exceptionally knowledgeable

about music that's the thing that so many of us had in common in the early days we were complete music freaks, just eat, sleep, the whole – every aspect of music. And Erica was the same as well. People don't know, but she was like a 17-year-old DJ in Montreal before she came to much. And it's really easy to relate to people that have that passion. And I think the viewers related to it as well.

And then when he finally got a shot to do the shows that he wanted to do, which was, you know, Rap City and Soul of the City, I thought he really, really shone then. And I see you touched on Erica M. there. So she was also part of that early day crew, as I call them. And, I mean, Erica Erica we see her today as a very popular sort of uh entrepreneur with her mommy blogger enterprise as I call it and yeah got lots going on there uh so Denise Donlan how about Denise what was it how was she uh to work

with Denise was great she was very self-effacing at first because she didn't come from a television background. As she will tell you, she had no desire to be on air. But she had been working for Sam Feldman, the booking agency in Vancouver. And whenever Much would come to town in whatever form, she would be hustling to try to get their acts some time on much music. And I guess on one of his visits there, John Martin met with her and said, I want you to come work for us. And she went, okay. And then she agreed to come. And then she got the gig hosting what we called called rock flash which was a little uh like a five minute hourly news segment well this and i mean given her you know like sort of cerebral

nature i mean she was a natural for that like in terms of pursuing stories and um you know organizing research and putting it all together and doing it you know with a ticking clock over your head the whole time i mean she was amazing at that and doing it, you know, with a ticking clock over your head the whole time. I mean, she was amazing at that. And then, of course, you know, we know the phenomenal career that Denise went on to have. And, you know, she has a new book, huh? I hear there's a, yeah, there's a new Denise Donald. I saw the cover. My buddy at 1236 was kind of put together like a montage of like all the much books you could buy if you wanted to read them all well hers hers of course does cover her years of much but hers is um more a career and perhaps life-spanning story it's an autobiography right i can't wait to read it very

good um oh what's gonna say um oh darn it's okay i had a thought there and it's gone now, but that's okay. It'll come back. So back to the next wave. You mentioned Master T. There was also, and we brought him up really early on, but Steve Anthony, who I had an amazing 90-minute chat with Steve, and he was just very open and honest about everything. But Steve, a lot of people love Steve Anthony,

and then he had his critics, if you will. But what was it like working with Steve? Well, I shared a desk with Steve, and it was kind of like having the human tsunami as your next-door neighbor. I mean, he was just chaos embodied, and he made it work. It terrified me. I mean, even though I had some improvisational background, I am way more buttoned down. So he and I developed sort of an Oscar and Felix relationship on that desk, and he remembers this.

But I created this piece of tape that went down the line between the two desks, referred to as the line of death. He maintains it was the only rule that he ever followed. That's like Les Nesman, right? Les Nesman would kind of put tape borders around the office, if you would.

Okay, I didn't know that. But, I mean, the thing was is that Steve took risks that were perfectly appropriate to Much Music, the spirit of Much in the early days that no one else would take. He just did stuff. I don't know how much thinking there was about it. I saw an interview that he did with, I'm going to forget her name. She's on the Big Bang Theory. Oh, the Blossom actress? Yes. did with um i'm gonna forget her name she's on um the big bang theory she's um oh the uh blossom actress uh yes maya bialik or something yeah terrific actress he was interviewing her and without as much as a how do you do he just got up in the middle of the interview and ran at the window you know the window out at the window, you know, the window out to the street. Yeah, yeah.

Bounced off the window, hit the ground, came back, and just picked up the interview right where he left home. That sounds like Steve Anthony. It's so Steve. Yeah. It's totally Steve. Like not too long ago, he was doing a live spot from the monster trucks you get at the Dome.

Oh, yeah. And so he did the similar thing where he just throws his body into the, I guess he thought there was some more give in the tire than there was, but it was like hitting a wall. He goes down. Yeah. And you know what happens? He shatters his hip.

So yeah, not for the, not for the faint of heart, that kind of stuff. Well, at one point he did an interview with the Ramones and he did, he didn't like the answers he was getting. So at one point he did an interview with the Ramones and he didn't like the answers he was getting. So at one point he said to Joey Ramone, he said, if I get one more monosyllabic answer from you, I'm going to cut your hair. And he had a pair of scissors.

of scissors and and joey i think grabbed the scissors or something i can't remember the details and said basically if you do that i will take these scissors and slit your throat live television i mean it was all not funny but it was still nice to have on your resume the joey ramone threatened your life i think i wish i had that well if it's gonna be any ramone you want it to be joey i think you want it to be Joey, I think. You want it to be Joey, exactly. Well, I don't know. Like, DeeDee. If DeeDee were to threaten my life, I'd be pretty happy. That's right, that's right. Master T, Steve Anthony.

What about Angela Dorman, who actually is pretty well-known for, like, she did a guest spot on Seinfeld, Angela Dorman. Chan, right? She was the woman with the Asian last name, but of course she was a white woman. So what was it like working with Angela Dorman? I never did work with Angela because she, if I have my details right,

I think she actually replaced me. Oh, is that right? Okay. Yeah. So when I left, Angela came in. But I've seen footage of her as part of my research, and she was terrific. There was a tartness about her, but she was also really sweet at the same time. And she had this kind of wide-eyed quality that would really encourage people to open up. that she didn't know anything about music and that she had this massive learning curve. But she has, she's very bright and she's super curious

and she's able to roll with it, again, because she had experience as an improvisational actor as well. So, I mean, I think she was perfectly suited to much. Sure. Did you work with Simon Evans? Oh, yeah. Well, Simon I worked with on The All Night Show.

He was a volunteer from Centennial College's broadcast program. He was answering phones. But, no, he and I hit it off very early. And actually, Simon, while he produced City Limits, the independent show, which was on much, and then he went on to host The Wed and as you know had a career as a vj right but simon was like so intensely helpful to me uh working on this book he just helped me make all the connections and we'd organize get togethers and you know we'd record these these gatherings of former employees and stuff and then that made up so much of the material, as you know, that I used in the book.

And Simon's a good friend. Love, Si. What about the late, great Dan Gallagher? Again, somebody that I met but never worked with. But you can tell what somebody's all about when you hear the way that they're talked about, I guess, sadly, after they're gone. People loved Dan Gallagher, viewers and fellow employees alike.

You never hear a bad word said about Dan. And again, he had that spirit on much. He just, you know, camera on. Okay, what do you want to do next? There was no, like, big premeditation or overthinking anything. It was just, yeah, let's do it. Let's rock and roll. Those were the people that succeeded that worked best at much.

You can't hear it due to my technical limitations, which one day I'll figure out, but I'm now playing a little ditty that, unless you are living under a rock, you know and love. One of the greatest Canadian songs of all time, I dare say. This is, well, let me give it a minute here because just a few seconds. I recognize that shuffle groove. She kills on it too, man. That vocal performance is fantastic. Yeah, she's an amazing singer.

So let's talk about Black Velvet, which was, I'm fair to say, the biggest hit of Atlanta Miles' career. She's had several hits, but this is the big one. Well, we hope for a big one. If you get it, you're lucky. But that's a big one.

I mean, I don't think I'm underselling it to say this was a monster global hit, right? Yeah, it was. So tell me your involvement in this song. Well, tell the people your involvement in this song and what it was like to be partly responsible for such a monster, monster global hit. Well, there's a much connection on this song. When Denise was running the new music, Lori Brown was on maternity leave.

And so I went to work for new music for a while. And she asked me to go and do an assignment in Memphis, Tennessee, on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of Elvis's death. And I went, yeah, that sounds great. You know, anything to kind of get out of the studio and do something different would be fun. So they put me on a Greyhound bus with a cameraman and 40 Elvis fanatics. And these are people that, you know, they take their one week of vacation

and they go to Memphis during Elvis week. Right. And we followed them around. And I mean, it was really, really fun. They were just the loveliest people. But I had a a lot of time a lot of free time on that trip like and i'm i'm a note taker i'm always always always making notes um now i guess it's in my phone more than anywhere else um thank heavens for the cloud and um so and oftentimes those notes sort of coalesce later into a lyric of some kind but definitely there was a theme that i was collecting as i was traveling towards the south

and just beginning to get the feeling of the south from the you know the climate it was in august you know from the the weather and the way that people spoke, the cadence of the speech, the, you know, the architecture of the cities, the just everything about it was different and foreign to me. And that's always a turn on as a writer. So I gathered all these notes. And then when I came back to Toronto, was in you know the apartment that I shared with Alana and you know if you're a guitar player or a writer you'll know you the tendency is to you get yourself in this kind of hypnotic state where you're just playing one thing over and over again and you know god help the

poor people that have to listen to this in the next apartment or down the hall but I was just playing that shuffle group that you know run to do to do to do to do do and you know you play something enough times and then you start to improvise melodies and ideas and so on anyway that's where the song came from and I had the verse and the chorus which you know is the bulk of the song and I and I was working developing songs for Atlanta's first record because she'd been signed by Atlantic and Dave her producer Dave Tyson said you know it would be great if we had a shuffle feel so he said I would love to record a shuffle because I said well I got this thing I've

been working on I hadn't I was you know planning to sort of take it further before I played it for them and I played it well she loved it she just ate it up and Dave was like yeah that's great have you got a bridge and I said no he said oh, do you mind if I take a crack at one? I said, no, not at all. So he wrote the music for the bridge. The bridge is the part that goes, every word of every song that he sang was for you. That part.

And then we finished off the song, and yeah, the rest is history. Well, it blows up. I mean, that was everywhere and it was a rare... Back then, I was telling my kids about this. So nowadays, this last summer anyways, it was commonplace for a Canadian artist

to be number one on the Billboard Hot, whatever the US Billboard... What a run! I mean, The Weeknd, Drake, Bieber, Shawn Mendes. It was nuts. And they're all from Toronto, most of them. Well, yeah, most of them from GTA or Stratford at least. Yeah, The Weeknd.

It's crazy. It was crazy. And it's sort of like one after another, they would kind of peg each other off. But we basically, we Canadians, dominated that chart all summer long. But back then, I'm old enough to remember, when it was a rare thing for a Canadian artist to hit number one on the Billboard charts.

But this Black Velvet, this is a number one hit single. This is as big as it gets in the world of music. It was big for me. It's funny because the Billboard magazine have a book, the Billboard book of number one hits. And every number one song has a full page where there's this guy he's been around forever he interviews the writer or writers of the song and you tell your story about how it was written and i'd used it for research for years and i i remember kim chan is interviewing me on air the day that black velvet went number one

i'm sure i was just like three feet off the ground they were probably going to anchor me in play and he said well you know what's what's the best part of this for you and i went i'm gonna get a page from the billboard book it was just i was i was absolutely thrilled by that by that fact so yeah it was pretty remarkable you know it's interesting you're talking about like you know when there's renaissance of canadian artists like has there has been very much so of late but i remember that it felt to me like in the late 80s and early 90s we had a great run of female artists when you think about Sarah McLachlan and Celine Dion and Alanis Morissette

Shania Twain Shania Twain Amanda Marshall, Jan Arden It was just an explosion of female artist talent in this country. It's funny how that happens. It's true.

It's true. You're dating Alana Miles at this time, and so you helped write this monster hit. And tell me, though, is this songwriting success, because your songwriting career is taking off here, is this why you leave MuchMusic? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I'd always wanted a crack at crack at you know trying to be like a professional

songwriter i want i wanted to get up in the morning and think about what i was going to write and it seemed like a far-off goal because as you know as many people i'm sure will tell you even if they're full-time artists or whatever they a lot of times have to do other things to keep body and soul together. And this was just such a huge door swinging open. And career-wise, I'm sure it'll happen to you. You'll have a moment where you'll go, well, I've loved this thing that I'm doing and it's great and it's great,

but I see that door opening and if I don't go through it now, it may close. So that was what precipitated me leaving Munch. But I see that door opening, and if I don't go through it now, it may close. So that was what precipitated me leaving Munch. Did it change your, like, I don't have any sense of what kind of an effect this would have on your bank account. And I don't need specifics here, but are you starting to light your cigars with $100 bills at this point? Well, no, but only because I don't smoke cigars mike otherwise for sure you would right right uh no i you know i mean for one thing i wasn't 18 if i if i had had big success as a songwriter when i was really young i mean maybe it would have gone to

my head or i would have done a bunch of stupid stuff but no i wanted to buy a house i mean i you know i'd never bought a house before and um i i wanted to to you know be a songwriter and work with really interesting other writers and artists and and all of that came to pass as a result there were there were no cigars involved. Do you still get like a, I don't know how it works, do you get like a check in the mail still from that song, like for some royalties or whatever? Yeah.

There's a danger of getting really boring here, but there's a number of sources. I love boring. Okay, good. Well, there are sources of royalties. I mean, some of them come to the writer and the publisher of the song, or the writers and publishers. And that's based on sales. And then there's some that come from airplay, like if you hear the song on the radio.

Right. And then there's what they call public performance. I mean, radio and TV are part of that, but also like, you know, concert performances. And I guess the final, the third arm of that are what they call synchronizations. And that's a very old music business term referring to the synchronization of music and picture. And that could be for a film,

it could be for a commercial or a television show or whatever. So, you know, when your song gets used any one of those ways, you do get paid eventually. I got you. It takes a while. But what about if I'm watching American Idol in its heyday and there's 25 million people tuned in

and the performer sings Black Velvet? Yeah. Is that in group number two there? This is a payday for Christopher Ward? Is that in group number two there? This is a payday for Christopher Ward? Yeah, that's considered a synchronization because it's a performance of the song with the picture. In other words, one of the contestants singing the song.

And they have to ask my permission to do that, which I don't unreasonably deny, as you can imagine. No, it's got to be. Yeah, let's introduce it to the kids, which I don't unreasonably deny, as you can imagine. No, it's got a key. Yeah, let's introduce it to the kids, right? It's a huge compliment, too, when somebody takes a song that's, you know, 20, 25 years old and wants to

take their shot singing your tune. I mean, that's amazing. Well done. I still, like, if I hear it on the radio or whatever, I have to chime in. I have to join in. Like I have to sing that, belt that out. Please continue to do so with my blessing.

Thank you. Thank you. Back to Much Music here. So you now leave Much Music to focus on songwriting, which is great because the door opened and you're going to jump in. But tell me, when does the decline for much music begin? Because in my, from my perspective, the first 20 years, you've got VJs who seem to be selected because they're interesting personalities who love the music. And then it seems like maybe as I, maybe it's because I got older, that's part of it. But also it seems the VJs now seem to be more about

having a certain look. I don't know if that's fair, but there seems to be a coinciding decline when this change occurs. What is your thoughts on this? Or am I way out to lunch here? Well, I wasn't around, first of all. I have to qualify that by saying I was living in California, and there wasn't a big online presence in those days. So I didn't really have there wasn't like a big online presence in those days. So I didn't really have that much awareness of much. I mean, I would come back and visit and watch it in a hotel room or something like everybody else. But I think part of that may be attributable to, you know,

what you've said, which is that you got older. It didn't have the same important place in your life that it once did. And it's like popular music. I mean, we all feel this incredible attachment to the music that we grew up with. I mean, I might think that, you know, She's Not There by the Zombies is one of the greatest songs ever written. You may listen to it and think, what a funny little artifact of the 60s that is. And perfect, by the way, for Halloween night. I just want to point that out, the zombies.

The zombies, yeah, well, of course. So I guess the analogy I'm trying to draw is just to say that when you're first watching much, and music is everything in your life, when you're that kid that rolls out of bed, throws on his favorite band t-shirt plugs in his headphones ignores his family at breakfast and goes to school man that's when it just it's everything to you because i remember when i was a kid listening to chum radio you know 10 50 chum and the djs they were it i mean they delivered my daily dose of pop music heroine. It was everything I wanted and wanted to know about and wanted to hear. And any little stories or anecdotes that they would tell

were so important. And I was the guy that, you know, read the liner notes and looked at the credits in brackets after the songs to figure out who wrote what. And when you have that time period, that's when stuff is so powerful, so meaningful for you. And, you know, then it changes. You get older, you move on to other things. And of course ways of having entertainment brought into your life. And inevitably, it has to fulfill a different role. How much can we attribute to the disappearance? Well, obviously, Moses is no longer involved at a certain point because his company no longer owns much music. So is there anything there that Moses leaving puts much music on a different track?

I don't think so. I mean, as I say, I wasn't around then, so it would be a little pretentious for me to have any big proclamations as to why it became what it became. I think, you know, like Denise would address that better because she was there during a transition period. And I think, not to put any words in her mouth, but I think what she would say is, you know, first of all, we had to grow up. We couldn't be that crazy her mind, more relevant. Like she had a mandate for, you know, having viewers engaged in, you know, political things and sort of ecological concerns and a whole raft of things there. to answer to. Back in the day, when much was the only game in town for a certain kind of sponsor who wanted to reach a certain demographic, we didn't have to kind of cotton to what they wanted,

and we didn't. But, you know, it changes. And then the sponsors carry a little more weight. And suddenly, you know, you start tightening things up around the edges in order to fit in better. I'm guessing here a little bit, Mike. That's fair. In Is This Live, we learned that you had access to the Much archives. There's these Much archives and you were granted access. I got some questions about these archives. First of all, how much of the much archives are still there? You know, it's surprised me, like greatly surprised me, how much is there. I genuinely was fearful because I'd heard, you know, tales of terror from people who were like, oh, no, there's nothing. It's all gone. It's been shipped out to some other location.

All the tapes are deteriorating. You know, just like disaster speak. It's been shipped out to some other location. All the tapes are deteriorating. Just like disaster speak. It wasn't true. They have a team of librarians there who, by the way, rock. They are unbelievable, these women. And they were just my best pals during this research period. We spent a lot of time together. They assigned me a machine and a set of headphones and said, just tell us what you want and we will find it. And they found, I would say, fully 95% or more of what I was looking for. Wow. That doesn't mean that stuff isn't missing. But the big stuff, the really key things that you that i knew that i needed to have it's like i needed to have you know erica interviewing nirvana um i needed

tea talking to tupac i needed tea and madonna it's like you know stuff like that sure that stuff is all completely intact and digitized and everything so it all it all exists but you need someone in this case the librarians who know how to find what you want but it was very heartening because i think part of my thinking going into writing the book was i was afraid that this this was just going to get away from us all that we were all going to get old and our memories were going to become rattier than they already are and that somehow this wonderful time period that meant a lot not only to the people that were involved in making it but also to a whole generation of Canadians was just going to slowly evaporate and so and I didn't want that to happen. But when I got in there, I found that, you know what?

The archives are richer, deeper and better preserved than I could have imagined, thankfully. What was the most insane thing you found when you were going through the Mudge archives? Well, there were a lot of insane things. One of them... Well, one

thing that I had never seen before, because it happened just after I left, was the Pepsi train. Do you know about that? No, I do not. Well, it actually was the prototype for the MMVAs. They were called the CMVAs. And this, again, this is a classic John Martin idea. He and a guy from Pepsi cooked up this idea that they would have a train.

I think originally it was going to be like the Pepsi taste test or something like that, but much of course immediately took over. What they did is they put, um, the editing suite in the bar car. There you go. And, um, and then they had a big, uh, room that was, you know, kitted out with gear and they got jeff healy to be the house band so you got healy and then you got all these musicians jumping on and jumping off from coast to coast and it went for three weeks i think wow now they did actually give away awards at the very end but by then you know the experience was etched in

people's minds in a different way and i mean in those days of course you couldn't just you know put the thing up to a satellite so they um what they would do is they would cut something each day and then courier it to toronto and then it would get up on air the next day right so um people saw it a little bit delayed but i watched the entire thing it took me a couple of days and it was just i i was just knocked out by the ballsiness of wanting to do something like this sending all these people on this train inducing all these artists to come on and just wing it i mean there's there's a thing of the northern pikes in a small town in saskatchewan now how they decided where they

were going to stop i have no idea anyway there was like a couple thousand people at the train station because people what happened is that it built its own momentum where people knew that they were coming because they'd seen it on tv right so you got you know you're in melville saskatchewan or wherever and a couple thousand people and there are the pikes and um you know they're already like hometown favorites and you got like um brian pot fan and he's he's doing a guitar solo leaning out of the train as it moves, as it rolls along. And I look at the footage and I'm thinking, how is he doing this? And then you see that somebody's on their knees beside the cameraman and their arm is sort of like up his back and they've clamped onto his belt. And they're holding his belt. So he's literally being suspended by his own belt,

hanging out the opening of a moving train, playing this rocking guitar solo. And I don't know. It's different things that hit different people. But that was one of those I just went, oh, my God. You can never do that today, right? Thank you for doing something that insane. God bless you.

Because it would be the lawyers and the insurance companies and everything. You that today, right? Thank you for doing something that insane. God bless you. Because it would be the lawyers and the insurance companies and everything. You couldn't do that. They've ruined all that fun. Couldn't do that today. They didn't give them time in those days, I guess. That was an example of something that I'd never seen before that just I was sort of laughing and crying at the same time. Yeah. Do you think, so is this live?

Do you think your book, do you think that will make Much Music more interested in exhibiting its past, like its past glories and historical footage? Like I should point out, there is a video hub on much.com, which is much.com slash is dash this dash live. And there is a lot there,

which so it's kind of interesting to see now much music kind of embracing their history and it seems to fold in perfectly with your book uh so is this going to be the new normal that much well i think you answered your own question and that is that clearly they they are uh prepared to embrace their past i I think, you know, just to be really candid, I think the issue that they had in the past, and I'm, this is just my supposition, was that they ran into so many people going, oh, I remember much when it was cool, man, you know, and how much of that can you hear when you go, well, you know what, I'm not going to pile on and remind people that it was cool and that they don't, you know, think it's as cool now now and i think also they were obsessed with being the youth network right right and they were afraid

that if they showed all this stuff from you know 20 years or however much earlier that somehow it would i don't know make them look old but it would yeah what the kids don't want anything their parents want to see. But you and I have a different take. Yeah, go ahead. You and I are never going to see it that way, clearly. I mean, you're a young guy, but I know that to you this stuff is meaningful and important and it's a legacy of sorts. And that's certainly how I looked upon it.

Absolutely. But if that were the case, if that supposition of mine is true and that was how they used to look at it, I have seen a serious sea change. And like one of the people that works there, this guy named Justin Stockman, he was super helpful in terms of me getting access and being able to continue on with this book and all of that stuff. and all of that stuff. And I hope I'm not exposing something private, but he wrote me the most touching letter after the book came out. And he said, you know, I'm so glad to be involved in this.

The stories that you put in that book are the reason why I wanted to work in Much in the First Place. And I thought, yeah, thank you. And this is, you know, this is a guy who's a really important guy at Bell Media. And people picture, you know, they picture when they talk about like a broadcast entity like that, whether it's Rogers or Bell, they think of this huge, you know, impersonal monolithic

thing. No, you have to deal with individuals. No matter what you're doing, you have to deal with people. Yes, they may have to answer to certain corporate overlords but ultimately if you come in with a good pitch and a good story and it's something that makes sense to them then i think they're going to embrace it and that's what's happened here and the hub is the perfect example and you know it's so cool because it's like there's this visual equivalent to the stories that are told in the book right there on the Much site for people to look at.

No, absolutely. And I was personally happy to see Much Music embracing their past glories and historical footage instead of sort of brushing it under some rug and leaving it for us old people to do it ourselves on YouTube or something. It was good to see them sort of embrace it. Totally. Not to put you on the spot here, but I'm sure you are. You have more details than I do on this. But I do want to tell people about what's happening Friday, November 4th. That's this coming Friday at the Royal because the title here, it's called Much Music Retro Mixtape with special guest VJs Christopher Ward

and others, I'm sure. And you're going to launch your book, Is This Live? at the Royal this Friday. And I want to tell people that it's 8 o'clock Friday, November 4th, and you can buy tickets at the door for 12 bucks and you can actually get them in advance for 10 bucks. Do you, do you, can you tell us a little bit about, you know, I plan to be there,

so I'm fully intending to finally meet you in person this Friday. Right. That'd be great. Um, you know what? I think it's going to be a really, really fun occasion. Um, Ed Conroy from Retroario and joel goldberg who we spoke of earlier approached me about the idea of doing this i guess they they want to do a series of events at the royal i went over there the other day i'd never been in there and it is a beautiful theater it's been gorgeously refurbished and it's a so a really nice venue so their idea was kind of to do like an interview because because Joel would do the interview on stage.

It would be like an actor's studio type of interview, interspersed with clips. Now, I don't know where they got this stuff, but they have clips of stuff that I have never seen. Christopher, I can speak to this, because I should point out, Ed Conroy, who we know best on this show as Retro Ontario, as you mentioned,

Retro Ontario has been on this show a few times. He's a friend of the show and uh he finds everything if you are looking for some kind of retro uh clip from the 80s he finds it on some he finds it he goes through crates of old vhs and he finds it so if you're looking for obscure stuff like from your from the 80s uh he's your man well he was determined that the stuff that he had would not be anything that's on the much music hub so know that if you've already seen all of that stuff that what he's got for this night is something completely different and there was stuff like i saw of myself that i had not seen since I did it, you know, live 25, 30 years ago.

And that was a little mind boggling. But I think that's going to be really fun. We're going to have some other VJs are going to come down and I'm going to drag them up on stage and we'll talk about, you know, what we used to do and we'll take questions from the audience and then I'll sign some books afterwards. It should be a lot of fun. I'll be there and I can't wait to meet you. I've got to thank you very much.

We had a little bit of scheduling hiccup here but I thought let's give it a go on Skype. You sounded great. I hope people enjoyed this. Buy your book, Is This Live? Thank you for doing this, Christopher. Mike, thank you so doing this christopher mike thank you so much it's been my pleasure and that brings us to the end of our 201st show you can follow me

on twitter at toronto mike and christopher is at ward works numeric one ward works one and our friends at great lakes brewery are at Great Lakes Beer. And Chef's Plate is at Chef's Plate CA. See you all next week. I wanna take a streetcar downtown Read Andrew Miller and wander around