Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Heather Bambrick: Toronto Mike'd #423

Episode Date: January 17, 2019

Mike chats with jazz musician, broadcaster and voiceover actress Heather Bambrick about Newfoundland, music, the fall of JAZZ.FM91, the rise of JAZZCAST, and more.

Welcome to episode 423 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Propertyinthe6.com, Paytm Canada, Palma Pasta, Fast Time Watch and Jewelry Repair. And our newest sponsor, Buckle. That's B-U-K-L. I'm Mike from TorontoMike.com and joining me is jazz singer and broadcaster and voiceover actress. And some other things we'll discover

over the next hour or so. Heather Bambrick. Hello, Mike. I'm excited. This is cool. I'm already dancing around to the music. I love the theme. This is so great.

I'm so honored to be here. I am excited that you're excited. That's exciting to have a guest who's excited. Oh, absolutely. See how that works? Are you kidding me? I show up and there's lasagna and beer right in front of me. What is there not to be excited about?

You have some really kick-ass sponsors, let me tell you. Yeah, don't take that for granted because lately I've been doing some other people's podcasts and no one's giving me nearly the great stuff that I'm getting. I came with stuff. I got stuff for you, my friend. I'm excited about this. I've got a CD even though no one has CD players anymore. Listen, Heather, lately, there's been a rash of guests,

bless their hearts, giving me vinyl lately. I got nothing to play vinyl either, but Tom Wilson, somebody we'll talk about soon, James B., and Tyler Stewart gave me this Barenaked Ladies album I'm pointing to here. That's three very recent guests who give me vinyl. And I put them up, but you're right. So thank you so much, Heather Bambrick.

You'll never know. Yes. And future guests, if you want to bring a turntable for Mike, I would suggest if you have an extra one, bring that around. And I also have, because I'm from Newfoundland, I have two gifts from my home. Some Screech and Newfoundland chocolate with various Newfoundland sayings that I can quiz you on.

This is interactive, my friend, this podcast. Yeah, I know, and this is amazing because I've heard about Screech because this is like rum from Jamaica or some story there. Yeah, well, Jamaicans, we're very close. The island mentality is very big, right?

So the Newfoundland-Jamaican thing, a strong connection and traditionally we would trade them fish for rum so they'd bring us the rum we'd give them our fish right and as the story goes uh at one point in time there was an american vessel that boarded the newfoundland vessel with the bringing back the rum and they tried it and one of the newfoundland sailors made a very big noise when he drank it, and another one came in and said, what was that god-awful screech? And the Newfoundlander said, that's the rum.

And so that was how it was named. I love it. It's good. It's really good in almost anything. Soda or rum or Coke or eggnog. I'm excited. Were you guys in Newfoundland? Were you pissed off when Saved by the Bell came out

and there was a character named Screech? You have no idea. Because I can imagine there'd be protests. So my dog years ago, she's since passed on, but she's a German Shepherd Poodle mix. And I wanted to call her Screech because she was like this dark brown color. And as soon as I said, I'm going to call her Screech, everybody said, oh, like the guy from Saved by the Bell. And I thought, screw you. Yeah, it's been ruined.

It's been ruined. Damn you, Saved by the Bell. Oh, like the guy from Saved by the Bell, and I thought, screw you. Yeah, it's been ruined. It's been ruined. Damn you, Saved by the Bell. Oh, man. Yeah, like I can see like Newfoundland, whoever was airing it in Newfoundland, there'd be protests at the station, like take it off the air. And everybody probably tuned in thinking it was a show about rum, and then got pissed off. It got record ratings that first episode, and then nobody...

So, oh, and this chocolate bar. Okay, Newfoundland sayings on this. I don't know if I'll do these justice or whatever, but oh me nerves. Oh me nerves. So, oh me nerves is like, well,

it's oh my nerves. Like, oh my Lord, oh me, if something gets frustrated, oh me nerves, or if something frightens you, oh me nerves.

You know, it's kind of a catch-all for us. You know, this is my, okay, I'm having a flashback. I had Ron James on the show. Yes.

And we'll talk about him later too, but I opened up the, he's from, no, he's from, no, he's from Nova Scotia. He's from Nova Scotia but his mom is from Newfoundland. Okay.

Or his grandmother's from Newfoundland. So I had Googled like maritime expressions or something and we were talking like fill your boots. Fill your boots means

it's like get your fill, like go for it. Yeah, we use it here but I had no idea it was like a maritime thing. Oh yeah, oh yes,

boy, fill your boots, go on. Oh, drinks like a fish, that's a Newfoundland thing. that's a common thing. Yeah, yeah. Oh, yes, boy. Fill your boots. Go on. Oh, drinks like a fish? That's a new thing. Well, that's a common thing. Yeah. Yes, maid.

She gone by? Yes, maid. Well, women are made. You know what I mean? Like, so yes, maid. And she's gone by means like, it's another way of saying, we also say the arse is out of her,

which means like there's no hope. It could be a good thing or a bad thing. You know, like if the party is really good, oh, boys, the arse is out of her now. Or if the economy is going really bad. Like the current U. good, oh, boss, the arse is out of her now. Or if the economy is going really bad. Like the current U.S. government system.

The arse is completely out of her. That's the way we do that. I love it when we talk politics. That's great. Now, I was educated. I didn't know this, but I was told that Newfoundlanders, they don't consider themselves

part of the Maritimes. No, we're not. Because a lot of Canadians think that you're all grouped together. Yeah, no, we're not. The Maritime provinces are Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island. And Newfoundland is considered an Atlantic province, not a maritime province. So whenever someone says maritime, I'll go with it.

Just like when people say Newfoundland, I go with it. But yeah, we're technically Atlantic. You should correct. I would correct everybody. If anybody said, oh, you're in the Maritimes. And I'd be like, no, actually, we're not a Maritime province. Yeah, I guess I should. You're right.

I probably should. I would. Like that would be my whole thing. I'd be the guy who corrects everybody. Like the pedantic guy. I'll just send them your way then. Do it.

I will stand up. You know, I've never been to Newfoundland, but I've been to all those Maritime provinces, but I haven't been to Newfoundland. But I want to go. Yeah.

When you go, tell me and I'll tell you some places to visit because it's pretty fantastic. When I go, I want to align it with Stephen Brunt's Author Songwriter Festival. Are you aware of this? Oh, yeah. That's beautiful. What's that place called? Something Point? Oh, God.

Yes. Don't let your province down. I know, right? Oh, man. Something Point. I've got to have a look it up. I'm going to have to find my phone. Okay, look. Yes. Don't let your province down. I know, right? Oh, man. Something point. I got to have a look it up. I'm going to have to find my phone. Okay, look it up.

I can... You want to look it up? I can always talk about a sponsor. Yeah, talk about a sponsor. Okay, you look it up. You look it up. Okay. All right.

Everybody listening in Newfoundland, across this nation, in Newfoundland and Atlantic province, I've learned. By the way, Heather, you don't have to respond because I know you're looking to sign up, but this is your theme song. Uh, bull in the Heather, uh,

is your song, right? This is your jam. This is big. Paytm will give everybody listening $10. And here's how you do it. Download the app from paytm.ca. It's a great app.

It's for, uh, managing all of your bills in one spot and they reward you for making bill payments. You've got to pay these bills anyways. They make it easy and they basically pay you for doing it. So I love it. I swear by it. When you make

your first bill payment, use the promo code Toronto Mike and they'll give you $10 in Paytm cash. Do we have an answer to the Stephen Brunt Festival? Writers at Woody Point. Woody Point. Yeah, that's it. Woody Point.

Woody's makes a good burger as you know. Yes, they do. Because you're from the West. You're not from, obviously, but you live now in like Tobacco, right? Yeah.

I went from the easternmost city in the easternmost province in the east end of that city, no doubt, no less. And then I moved to Tobacco. You know. But you're south, I would say, you're kind of

south Etobicoke, right? Yeah. Yeah. Well, right now I'm mid-Etobicoke. Central Etobicoke. Yeah, I'm kind of. I'm up the road, but I was like up until maybe four years ago. I was right around the corner from you. Well, Woody's is a long branch, and they make a good burger. They're not a sponsor, but I like their burgers anyway. There you go.

Woody's, become a sponsor. We're like their burgers anyway. There you go. Woody, he's become a sponsor. We're already talking about you. Woody's point. Yeah. So anyway, so I do want to go to Newfoundland. And I want to talk to you about Newfoundland. Yeah. But I'm going to let Brian introduce the Newfoundland topic since we're doing Newfoundland

sayings. So this is Brian Gerstein. He's a sales representative with PSR Brokerage. And I'll let him introduce our Newfoundland portion of the podcast. I'll let him introduce our Newfoundland portion of the podcast. Property in the 6.com Hi, Heather. Brian Gerstein here, sales representative with PSR Brokerage and proud sponsor of Toronto Mike.

Any first-time homebuyers out there in Toronto Mike land? Because if so, I'm teaming up with CIBC and one of their mortgage brokers Tuesday evening, January 29th from 6 to 8 p.m. at Young New York Mills and Wednesday, January 30th from 5.30 to 7.30 p.m. in Liberty Village. Space is limited, so call or text me at 416-873-0292 to reserve your spot. Heather, I saw an article on 12 signs that you were born and raised in Newfoundland, so I want to see if some of them apply to you. Firstly, do you refer to yourself as a Canadian or as a Newfoundlander?

Have you ever gotten drunk in a shed? Do you identify with townies or baymen? You don't get excited about icebergs. And you know the deliciousness that is chip wagons on George Street at 3 a.m. And you've also made Jiggs dinner. Oh, there's a lot there to and you've also made Jigs dinner. Oh! There's a lot there to unpack. That's a lot, man.

Those are great. Okay, so first question, do I identify as a Newfoundlander or Canadian? Put them both together. I'm a Newfoundlander-Canadian, but I'm a Newfoundlander first, without question. Like, where's my... I've got to show you my keychain.

My keychain has a little island silhouette right there, so it actually says home on it. Okay. In case you get lost. In case I get lost. Or if you're hammered and somebody finds your key. Oh, she belongs in Newfoundland. Wow.

Who's got the cab fare? So that's that. Two, have I ever gotten drunk in a shed? Yes. Damn right I have. Three, do I get excited by icebergs? I do, actually, even though I was raised there and we saw them a lot. Oh, yeah.

But I think he said that you don't get excited by icebergs. I do, actually, even though I was raised there and we saw a lot. I think he said that you don't get excited by icebergs, because we do. Yeah, I think the assumption is Newfoundlanders would get, you know, we're like, yes, there's another iceberg. Look at that. But we still do get very excited by them. Because they're shrinking, they're gone. Because of global warming, there's less of them. Is that right? Yeah, but apparently there's no such thing as

global warming, Mike. I don't know who you've been talking to. So yeah, I still get excited about them. Do I identify as townie or baiman? I identify as townie. Okay, can you explain that one to me? So a townie, I'm from St. John's. I'm from the capital city.

The Rock. Well, the Rock is the whole island. Okay, I should know these things. And then St. John's is the capital city. St. John's is about 130,000 people. Maybe 150, but I think about 130. Is that all? That's all.

The whole island is only about 500,000. It's a very, very small province. Is the whole island going to tune in to this episode? Damn well better. If you're not tuned in, I know y'all got the internet now. Because I know now the Texas pays for the internet outside of the city. But yeah, so the town is is from St. John's, and then there's an overpass that is the,

we call it the overpass just outside of two streets, Kenmount Road and Topsail Road, and the overpass is sort of where the Trans-Canada Highway crosses these roads. And they call that the overpass beyond which, that's the joke in St. John's, is if you live beyond the overpass, you're a bayman, and if you live before the overpass, you're a townie. And if you live before the overpass, you're a townie. And Bayman is anybody out around the bay kind of thing.

The Bayman, I think, I tend to apologize for being a townie sometimes because I think the Bayman are far more colorful. But our Bayman, you remember back, not too long ago, but when I was growing up, Newfie jokes were big. Oh, yeah. But we stopped them. At some point, we felt we were being too mean. And also because we told them better than you

Newfoundlanders tell better Newfoundland jokes because we can do the accent better right? I believe it no I think over the years

as Newfoundlanders traveled more probably and you had shows like this Hours 22 Minutes and CODCO and Rick Mercer and all these guys

I think they kind of they presented Newfoundlanders in a different light than maybe people before. And Rex Murphy. I mean, Rex Murphy is as smart as Einstein. The man is... And they have the same hair. He can turn a phrase. See, politically

though, I find him a little obnoxious. But I find his... He did Cross Canada Checkup. I would tune in. We rarely agreed on anything, but I liked the way he turned a phrase. Yeah. I enjoyed it. He used to do commentary during the evening news in St. John's.

And what was really funny is we'd have the news on during dinner and Rex would start doing... I mean, the man's... You know, his vocabulary is ridiculous. And my mother would sit there at the table going, I don't know why he's using big words like that. We don't care.

We don't really know what he means. We don't care. And that's just, he's just stupidly smart. I'm watching a show on Netflix right now called Dairy Girls about early 90s

Northern Ireland. I know. Garvia Bailey has told me to watch it so many times. How is my friend Garvia who I've never met but she has threatened

to come on the show. We just have to schedule. She was going on a trip or something and we had to reschedule. Well, she's probably going on a trip to Ireland truth be told. She's a on a trip or something. We had to reschedule. She's probably going on a trip to Ireland, truth be told.

She's a huge Irish fan. So yeah, she's told me about the show that I have to watch. Oh yeah, and first of all, it's hilarious. Yeah. It's really funny. I know. And if you watch an episode, you start talking like them.

Which is a problem. After this episode, I think I'll be doing the whole... In the Newfoundland accent is very Irish, right? There's a lot of Celtic crossover. There's a place just outside of St. John's called the Irish Loop. It's within an hour of St. John's. And down around that area,

when you really get down to the southern shore, it's all Irish. And they're literally talking to you like this. And you'd swear you're out in Cork or someplace like that because they're all talking that way down around the southern shard of the island. But I grew up, my grandmother would talk about Dublin. She just came from there. Is that where she's from?

Well, that's the thing. I thought that's where she's from. She was born in Ontario. It's just her family's from Dublin. But she talked. And then as I got older, I realized my grandmother's never been to Ireland. I've been to Dublin. My grandmother, she's passed now. But she never got to Dublin. But my grandmother's never been to Ireland. I've been to Dublin. My grandmother,

she's passed now, but she never got to Dublin. But there were Irish doors, posters up. It was like she was fresh off the boat or something. It was a big draw. I think it's that sense of if you know that's where

your roots are, there's that strong sense of home. Whether you've been there or not, you still feel, I've been in Ontario for 25 years, but Newfoundland is still home to me and probably always will be until the day I die.

Okay, let's talk a little more Newfoundland. Let me play a jam here. Ha, my boys! One, two, three, four! Because I must confess, I only know two Newfoundland bands. I think I only know two Newfoundland bands, I think I only know two Newfoundland bands. But this is one of them. Black and white.

Black, black and white. Run, run away. See a chameleon lying there in the sun. All thanks to everyone. Run, run away. So this is Great Big Sea. Yeah. Are you friendly with Great Big Sea?

I love the boys. Alan and I know each other. Actually, so Sean, I don't think is with the band anymore. I love the boys. Alan and I know each other. Actually, so Sean, Sean, I don't think is with the band anymore. Sean McCann.

Sean McCann and a friend of mine dated. And by dated, I mean had sex on a soccer field. Not in a shed. Not in a shed.

I don't think so. Who knows? They snuck out of butt. Alan Doyle and I know each other because, well, you know,

it's just the music community back in St. John's is very strong. So Alan's a lovely, lovely fella. I love him dearly. Bob Hallett, we've never met, although my dad and his mom dated many, many years ago. In fact, there was my mom and then my dad's second, you know, closest girlfriend to marriage was Bob's mom. Wow.

So, yeah, we kind of all know each other, but Alan and I know each other far better than the others. They're wonderful. They're great, great ambassadors to Newfoundland. They're great musicians. Bob can play, I think, any stringed instrument and accordion and piano and drums. I mean, he's just ridiculous.

All right, here's my loose connection. It's very weak here. Okay. So Splashin' Boots are a... Yeah. You know Splashin' Boots? Yeah. I was going to explain who Splashin' Boots was. I So Splashin' Boots are a... Yeah. You know Splashin' Boots? Yeah. I was going to explain

who Splashin' Boots was. I know Splashin' Boots. Okay, so they're friends of the show and they were going to play... They weren't going to play kid songs. They were going to cover 90s jams at the second Toronto Mike listener experience.

So we have these listener experiences at Great Lakes Brewery. You need to come to the third one in June. Okay. Okay, so I've given Heather a six pack of beer from Great Lakes Brewery. And some of these I haven't seen before. I try to mix it up.

I try to keep you on your toes. So what do you have in your hand right now? Right now I have the—this is the best time. Octopus Wants to Fight You IPA. This is ridiculous. I like that one so much I have a poster on my wall for Octopus Wants to Fight You. The craft beer thing is great these days, but these names are fabulous. Like, Shinny Pants Session Stout.

I'm looking forward to that one. That's for lackey. So you're going to crack one open. Let's hear it. All right, ready? Hang on. That's the best sound in the world. It really is.

So as you know, Great Lakes Brewery is a fiercely independent craft brewery, and they're located right here in Etobicoke. Yeah. So thank you, Great Lakes. Fridays, I got to get the right time. Again, I was telling Tyler about this, and they're located right here in Etobicoke. So thank you. Great lakes Fridays. I got to get the right time. Again, I was telling Tyler about this and I didn't have the time then either. They have this new,

uh, I guess singers, singers come and perform these like acoustic jams on Friday evenings at the brewery. Like, and it's a really cool thing they're promoting and I got to get more detail on that, but go to the great lakes,

uh, beer.com or go to great lakes on, facebook and find out these details i should have but that'll be cool but that's uh what do you think i like it there's a lot of i'm tasting a lot of grapefruit in here which is real i'm yeah citrus yeah yeah i'm usually not an ipa fan but i will say this and i'm not just blowing smoke up you know the Great Lakes bum here but I really The octopus's ass. It's the next beer.

The octopus's ass. You know what? That's how they name things. Somebody says something and they're like okay. You're welcome. See Mike just named

a new beer. But this is actually really tasty. I like the citrus in it so it's good. Thank you Great Lakes Brewery. Thanks for sponsoring Toronto Mike

and for providing Oh and thank you Heather for tweeting at them because that's what... That's what I know. I always give guests these wonderful things and then I hope that maybe

when they enjoy the product, they'll tweet at the thing and say, oh, great lasagna, Palmas pasta or whatever. I can't wait. Yeah. Okay.

So let me give you some more stuff since you gave me some stuff. By the way, this chocolate, I'm going to feel guilty when I eat it because it's like I like the... Maybe I'll take the cover off and keep that as a memento.

Because, you know, at some point, I like chocolate a lot and I like a little milk with my chocolate, like a glass of milk and some chocolate. I enjoy that very much. And you know what you could do? Keep the label and then throw it into random conversations. Throw in a phrase, just like, you know, you get to something where you're talking

about... Let me read a few more here. Okay. What odds me, buddy? I almost didn't say it. Or am I missing a word? Oh, wait. What odds me, buddy, crooked? No, that's crooked as sin.

Yeah, okay. So what odds is like who cares? What odds, you know, is like. Oh, so that's a standalone. That's a standalone. The design is such. I think it's all in white. It's very random.

What odds is one thing. Yeah, so what odds is like, who cares? It doesn't matter. You know, like, do you want to go out Friday night or Saturday night? Ah, boy, what odds?

You know, it's like, it doesn't matter. Who cares? No difference. Me buddy is just a turn of, it means pal. Okay. How you doing there, me buddy?

What are you getting on with, me buddy? That kind of thing. And crooked as sin means somebody's crooked as sin, I bet. Crooked as sin means you're in a bad mood. Oh.

Yeah, crooked you think of like being... I love it when somebody's going to scam you out of some money. Yeah, no. In Newfoundland, crooked as sin means

you're in a bad mood. Oh, I like that. So if you get up and you're... My God, what's wrong with you? I've had some guests that were crooked as sin. I know.

You're not one of them. You're not one of them. I heard. And all I was thinking the whole time was, my God, she's crooked as sin. Listen to her. Right.

I was thinking the same thing. Okay. Proper ting. That sounds Jamaican. Yeah. There's a Caribbean thing there. See, that's what I'm saying. It's the island thing.

Proper ting. Proper ting means proper thing. Yes. It should be so. Because I used to listen to a lot of shabba ranks. Shabba! And you'd use ting instead of thing. And then there's that

grapefruit soda that's called something ting, right? I think you can get it at the Newfoundland. Oh, okay. I bike to the one on rural York all the time. They have a lot of Newfoundland stuff there. That's Mario and Selena's. Yes, that's right. That's exactly right. Right beside the arena there.

Do you think there's a lot... Maybe this explains a lot. Is there a lot of Newfies in my hood here? Is this like a collective place? Because it's near the lake. I would think they'd be comfortable near water or am I thinking too much?

I don't know. I think the way Newfoundlanders are, I think it's like any almost ethnicity. You know how you have certain areas in town where a lot of Italians will live, a lot of Portuguese will live, that sort of thing.

I think a lot of Newfoundlanders when we move away somewhere we try to be close to each other. So I know that there was, remember there was a place on Lakeshore, not too far from here,

a little, there was like something like the Newfie Corner or something. So there was a club here for Newfoundlanders. There was a little taste of home,

a Newfoundland store here. You know who I like? I like Bob Cole. Love Bob Cole. Yeah, he's the pride of. He's one of my favorite Newfoundlanders. There's a little taste of home, a Newfoundland store here. You know who I like? I like Bob Cole. Love Bob Cole. Yeah, he's the pride of... He's one of my favorite Newfoundlanders. Yeah, we're very proud of the guys like that. Bob Cole and Scott Oak is also from Newfoundland.

Is he? Yeah. I don't know about you. That's great. Yeah. He's good too. Yep, we know the hockey. Yeah.

Now, I play great big C. Oh, yeah. Did I finish my story? No, I don't think I did. So Splashin' Boots. I can't believe I forgot to come back to that. So Splashin' Boots. I can't believe I forgot to come back to that. So Splashin' Boots are going to perform at Great Lakes Brewery and they're flying

in from Newfoundland because they went to Newfoundland to record their latest album. They did it on The Rock. No way. Yes indeed. And by the way, did you know Splashin' Boots are managed by Jake Gold from Canadian Idol and Tragically Hip. Who's the other guy? Because remember Jake Gold was on, when he was on Canadian Idol. Zachragically Hip Thing. Who's the other guy?

Remember Jake Gold when he was on Canadian Idol? Zach Werner. Zach Werner has just moved to St. John's. Is that right? Yeah, he lives in St. John's now. Because Farley Flex

was working with Maestro Fresh West who was just here for episode 416. But you're saying Zach Werner is now in Newfoundland. He is in St. John's.

All year round or just in the summer? All year round. He's moved there. Some of us are not... We only come for the summer. Yeah. Well, Michael Enright from CBC.

Of course. He also... He bought a place in Newfoundland. He's fantastic. And then once I invited him on, like pretty recently to come on here because he's a great storyteller. And he was too busy. Like he was too busy.

Yeah. He's a busy guy. You make time for this though, right? Come on. Yeah. Curve it out of your sleeping hour. Michael. Buddy.

Michael and me, buddy. I like Michael. He's great. Weekend mornings on CBC Radio 1. He's great. You're right. Look at us. We like the same things.

I know. So Splashin' Boots are supposed to perform. I'm promoting that they're going to be there along with the Royal Pains, a great band that does some great 90s covers themselves. And then I get an email from Boots. Yep. Boots Tess, from Boots. Yep. Boots Tess, her name is.

Yep. And it was like a really like, I'm so, so, so, so, so sorry. But Alan Doyle asked them to stay one more day because they were recording at his home in Newfoundland. So they weren't going to get on the flight

that would get them to this event in time. And it was really like, and I, of course, it's not like I was pain splashing boots. You know what I mean? No, it's okay like I was paying Splashin' Boots. You know what I mean? No, it's okay. So I always think Alan Doyle is the reason that

Splashin' Boots did not perform 90s covers at the TMLX 2. Okay, so we've got to arrange this for the next one. Alan Doyle or Splashin' Boots? Both. I have something I'm going to tell you right as soon as we finish recording what I have cooking for this next one in June, TMLX 2. It's monster. I want to go in June, so I'm going to tell you right as soon as we finish recording what I have cooking for this next one in June. Tia Melk's name.

It's monster. I want to go in June, so I'm going to come. And Splashin' Boots stood next to me in line. We were both nominated for Junos last year. Right. And we were interviewed on Juno TV, and that's how I met them, because they were in front of me in line, and we were joking and having a good time. And then we found out that Tia Brasda, who was another jazz singer,

her now husband was either the recording engineer or worked with Splashin' Boots, and all things came together. And if they were recording at Alan's studio in his home, Alan lives right next door to my dear friend Katie Sullivan. So when I go home, I'm going over and I'm visiting Katie, and I'm knocking on Alan's door, and I'm saying,

listen, Great Lakes Brewery, buddy, you and me. Come on, we go. Oh my god. Yes, make it all happen. Oh yeah, so Great Lakes, Great Lakes Brewery, buddy. You and me. Come on, we go. Oh, my God. Yes, make it all happen. Oh, yeah. So Great Lakes, Great Lakes, Great Big Sea. Look at that. Two great things. See?

Great Big Sea, great Newfoundland band, but not my favorite Newfoundland band of all time. So I want to play a jam from my favorite. In fact, I'll tell you a little story once I start playing it. It's a long intro. We can talk over it, I suppose. But... I don't even want to talk over it. I love it so much.

Is this Hey Rosetta? Yep. Yeah. I love these guys. It's your spring. We'll bring it back up, but you ever met these guys? I haven't. I mean, we have mutual friends, but you ever met these guys? I haven't. I mean, we have mutual friends, but I've never met them.

But I love their musicianship. That's the one thing I'm very proud of of Newfoundland artists is there's not a lot of arson around when it comes to the musicianship. They get it done, and these guys are great. They're on hiatus, though. I know that they, I think there were several of them. Maybe that's tough to go, I think, as several of you. You all need a cut of the action or whatever, but they're on hiatus though. I know that they, I think there were several of them. Maybe that's tough to go. I think as several of you, you all need like a cut of the action or whatever,

but they're, they're on hiatus. So hopefully they come back and do something, but amazing. Like this album, I think it's called seeds and everything I've heard from here, Rosetta, I think is amazing.

And then I found out they're from Newfoundland. And then I thought, well, that's a, I've got to play that for Heather. Yeah. Songwriting is really strong with these guys. Yeah, check this out.

Anyway, they can play them all day. We're going to play a lot of tunes in this episode because I've got... I've even got something from You'll Never Know, which is in my hand right now. Wow. That we'll play. But here, so...

Have we given Newfoundland enough love, do you think? Never, but you're trying, and I love that, so we're good. So Great Big Sea and Hey Rosetta, two of my favorite Newfoundland bands have you heard Shani Ganok no

good friend Chris Andrews who actually owns a pub well he might have sold it but he did own a pub with Bob Hallett

from Great Big Sea one of the older Irish pubs in St. John's called Aaron's Pub and he's in a band called Shani Ganok very traditional

so I'll have to get you some of their stuff because it's kind of happening. I'm in. There you go. Get me some of that stuff. Alright. Come on in. And well, you gave me gifts and I gave you the beer from Great Lakes Brewery and you're enjoying Octopus Wants to Fight. There is actually

a large meat lasagna in front of you. Frozen, of course, but from Palma Pasta. Where is Pal Palma's... Palma Pasta. Where is Palma Pasta? Palma Pasta has four locations. Three are in Mississauga, and one is in Oakville. Go to palmapasta.com to find out exactly where. But I can tell you that...

See, that's one of their fancy new boxes for Palma's Kitchen. They just opened up Palma's Kitchen. It's pretty close to Mavis and Burnhamthorpe. That's where I would put Palma's Kitchen. And that's close to Mavis and Burnhamthorpe. That's where I would put Palmer's Kitchen. And that's like a brand new facility. Like I was at the grand opening. It's a brand new facility. They got a hot table.

It's like a retail store. It's got, you know, great pizza. And it's got cappuccino and espresso and coffee. And it's just there's a lot of seating there. So you can go there, eat there. You can pick up your stuff, take it home. Fantastic. So they're Mississauga's best fresh pasta in Italian food.

So enjoy the lasagna. Thank you. Thank you, Palma's pasta. This is so generous. This is great. And that'll, like, I mean, that's a lot of food. I don't know if you tried to lift it yet. I just tried to swivel it for some social media action here,

a little photo, man. Did you take the social media action here. A little photo, man. Did you take the social media naturally? Like, is that something that... I don't know. I mean, I did. At first, it was really just because it allows you to creep your friends. I mean, let's face it. Oh, you mean like Facebook?

Yeah, that's what Facebook is. I was just down in New York at Jazz Congress, which is this two-day hang for jazz artists and record labels and promoters and this, that, and the other thing. And I met with someone from Motema Records, which is the new, you know, smaller jazz label that's really growing

and people are really talking about it. So I met with someone there, and that was her first question. Wasn't like, what kind of an artist are you? How do you describe your sound? What do you do? It was, what are your social numbers like? And the first thing they checked wasn't even Facebook or Twitter.

The first thing they checked was Instagram. That seems to be the big one with the young people who have abandoned Facebook anyway. Yeah, and it is how the industry is measured now. That's one of the metrics is social media. So as much as, you know, when my mother said, will you get off your phone? I'm still like, mom, it's work.

I have to. So smile. I've got to post a picture of you. But does that, I don't know, do you feel dismayed by that? Like, because, you know, it used to be about the music. You know what I mean? Now it's not just the artistry of the music. It's the packaging and the social presence

and all this like I don't know it seems a little Well I guess remember Behind the Music? Of course Remember that show and that was really

VH1 right? Yeah that was one of those really popular shows that allowed you to see you know oh so that's what they thought when they made Rio

you know and all that kind of stuff so there is something really intriguing about finding out the back story behind artists or projects or whatever

so I guess in some regard when you're in this industry that's what social media does it allows people to see what you're doing when you're not actually out actively promoting and working and i would think now with and we're like we're gonna get into all this because you're you're part of a new enterprise like a new uh jazzcast yeah dot ca and i would think think it's more important than ever now to have that grassroots kind of a marketing machine that you power yourself. Yeah, totally. And we're all over social media right now and that's what we

had a meeting about that last night. How do we engage people? How do we get people excited? Who was at this meeting? Who was at this meeting and where was this meeting? I'm so curious about this whole thing. All right. So, Dani Elwell, who was on here a few weeks ago. Would you say that she was on here recently?

Recently? My friend thinks I'm misusing the word recently. Yeah. November, right? Yeah. So, I call that a few weeks ago. I think that's recently. I call that the other day, but that's just the way my brain is.

So, Dani Elwell, Garvia Bailey, who, you know, you gotta get on here, because she keeps threatening, so, you know, you'll get her on. I've invited her. I think the ball is firmly in her court, and we'd love to have her on. Especially now that I know we can talk about Dairy Girls, which I think is very, very funny. Absolutely. So, yeah, so, Dani Elwell, Garvia Bailey, Walter Van Afro,

and yours truly, and we met at the JazzCast studio. Where is the JazzCast studio? It's central, kind of downtown, west end, centrally area. So it's kind of Ossington and Queen area. And we have a little space that we're growing and developing.

So when I came down here and saw your setup, and we use you quite, we reference you quite a bit, by the way. In your meetings? Yeah. In what way? I must know. Let's leverage the Toronto Mic brand. Well, in the way

you've grown, you know, in the popularity, the way you've marketed this, the way people have really supported you, the way your sponsors have come on board, the type of show that, as you say, is grassroots and it comes from a genuine interest. Yeah, it's very organic. Okay, well, first of all,

I'm honored to be referenced. I was worried it was a negative way. I'm glad it's a positive way. Yeah, absolutely. I like to think maybe I'm becoming a bit of a case study. You know what I mean? In a good way. A little bit of a blueprint or something.

That's exciting to me. One of the things, when I was down at this conference in New York, they were talking about radio. And it was a panel of radio, you know, general managers, station managers, and that sort of thing, from U.S. stations that are jazz-related and jazz-focused.

And one of the guys from KUVO in Colorado said, you know, if you're modeling radio on the way it was in the 80s or 90s, you're going to die. Your model is going to die because radio is evolving. So things like this. Podcasts are huge now.

You know, almost the idea of pirate radio is kind of, you know, the way things are going now. You know, I just, on Twitter, I just had a I won't call it, it wasn't a fight at all, but a fun little disagreement with Gene Valaitis. So how long have you been in Ontario?

25 years. Okay, so do you remember Jesse and Gene? That's kind of borderline, though. Yeah, 25 years. Okay, so Gene is from Jesse and Gene, and he's in Vancouver now. And he was, I was not even bragging, because I never press record.

I want to put this on there. I don't know if this should be obvious. But see, when I press record with a guest, I never think I'm going to make this two and a half hours. There's no. No. If it's an hour and 20 minutes, that's great. And if it's two and a half hours, okay. Like it's only two and a half hours if it's great content that continues.

Like why would I want to stop this, right? Yes. So Tyler Stewart came on. You might have heard of him because he was at the Junos too last year. Yeah, his name sounds familiar. That's right. So last year,

Barenaked Ladies were put into the Canadian Hall of Fame and then they performed at the Junos. And I learned, just recently learned, Tyler Stewart listens to my podcast. I just learned yesterday that another person who listens to Toronto Mic is going into

the Canadian Music Hall of Fame this next one coming up in March. Corey Hart. Corey Hart. I used to do... One of my first concerts ever in Newfoundland

was Corey Hart. Awesome. Yeah, yeah. Your Asian eyes are calling me. Oh, yeah, man. Boy in the Box? Sure. Boy in the Box? Sure.

Boy in the Box is Steve Anthony. Do you know that? Do you know Steve Anthony is the Boy in the Box? Yeah, Steve is the Boy in the Box. He is the Boy in the Box. Oh, he's who's modeled that. Because he was at CHOM in Montreal. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I hope I said it right. CHOM. CHOM. And he was in a box of sorts, I guess some kind of a glass box where he was recording. And Corey came in and referred to him as the Boy in kind of a glass box where he was recording and Corey came in and referred to him as the boy in the box. And yes, he's also in the video.

So there's a whole bunch of interesting Steve Anthony, Corey Hart connections. I mean, I grew up watching Much Music in Newfoundland and Steve Anthony was, you know, he's one of the VJs and I loved him.

And then years later when I started doing voice work, he and I did a commercial together. And I got a little starstruck. What was the commercial for? It was for an organization that helped take care of elderly parents. And so the concept was watching a game and then the halftime horn goes

or the horn at the end of the quarter goes or whatever. And we both had to say, okay, you know, it's halftime. Do you know that you know that this is what's going on in the game, but do you know what's happening with your mom? It was this kind of thing. Right. And so he did his thing and I was going, oh my God, that's Steve Anthony. I want, he's talked to Duran Duran. Did you snort Coke with Steve Anthony? I did not. I have never snorted Coke. I ask tough questions here. Have you seen Coke? Like, has Coke... Have you been in rooms with Coke?

No. No. I mean, I know people that have done it regularly. Oh, sure. I've never, ever seen it. I haven't seen it either. And I feel like I'm the only one who hasn't seen Coke. No, I know.

One time, I remember when I was singing with the Beehive Singers, and we were singing at the Gemini Awards. Speaking of James B. Speaking of James B. And we, and my friend Kylie Martin, the other female singer in Singers and we were singing at the Gemini Awards. Speaking of James B. Speaking of James B. And we, and my friend Kylie Martin, the other female singer in the group,

we were singing, like this is, we're so not showbiz. Like we're not doing anything showbiz. So because we had to get dressed in the bathroom and everything, we had, you know,

baby powder or something in our cosmetic bags. I was like, should we put that on the end of our nose or something? So we actually, we were like,

we toyed with it and then came out and thought, no, we can't, we can't. But yeah, no, i know a lot of people that have done it i've never i've never done it although i did my cousin's ex-husband once said to me if you wouldn't have a good source it would be a good thing to try because it's one of the better highs okay that's i'm glad you guys didn't have kids that's good oh yeah like oh yeah so um so yeah cory hart uh yeah Corey Hart where was I Tyler Stewart you were talking about Gene

oh yeah so Tyler Stewart's episode was two and a half hours and that's a very long episode and I think I said something on Twitter like that's the longest episode ever two and a half hours until today then someone corrected me and said that oh Dan O'Toole from Jay and Dan on TSN you ever heard of these guys

so Dan O'Toole did two hours and 37 minutes or something so somebody pointed out that uh basement dweller that's his handle he says uh it's not your longest episode dan o'toole did longer so i'm now tweeting like a correction like just just to correct this tyler's got the second longest and dan o'toole has the longest and i don't know if gene saw that and thought i was aiming for two and a half hours as like the optimal length of a podcast because i don't I don't have an optimal length of the podcast in my brain. But then he was and something about how he said that studies show that the perfect length of a podcast is 22 minutes long. I think that was it.

Twenty two or is it? No, thirty five. Actually, I'm going to change that to thirty five minutes. All right. Yeah. So and then I was saying, well, the whole point of a podcast, to me, this is a radio person because he's a long

time radio veteran. And in radio, things are regimented and they put into these buckets, as you know. Podcasting is not radio. The whole point of podcasting is there is no, you don't have to edit it down to 35 minutes or it is what it is. This is what I like about podcasts.

I listen to a lot of podcasts. Joe Rogan's podcast, which is very, very, very popular, even more popular than Toronto Mike, sometimes goes three plus hours. It depends on what's going on. Well, it's like saying the perfect date length is three hours long. If you're having the perfect date, hopefully the perfect date means breakfast the next morning.

Right. Traditional radio, yes, is very form there's there's a formula for everything and that's the way you operate and i think that's what we were just talking about a minute ago the evolution of radio means there are no rules you just you operate by what feels right and what seems right and it's like a con if the conversation's going well you don't want to go anyway that was great take your stay tuned well we're out of time. Heather, thank you. Yeah, like,

Tyler Stewart, for example, was I supposed to, at the, I don't know, let's say I gun for 35 minutes. At the 35 minute mark, kick him out, send him home. Like, I know there's,

you're leaving two hours of compelling, interesting stuff on the table. But hey, you know, we're, and what's the point? Like, I don't understand the point.

So, and then I call, I didn't call him out, but I him out but i'm like well i don't like i don't adhere to these like rules because it's a podcast and he said something about how okay you be you or something but mash uh was mash was the most popular show of all time it was only 22 minutes and i have i'm thinking mash like a 19 a sitcom on network television in the 70s which was fantastic yeah like how are you mapping that 22 minute length to podcasts in 2019 like well yeah well and again years ago the worst thing you could do is go to someone's house and say let me show you pictures of our vacation in fort myers this year and now what do we do on facebook we put on every freaking picture we've ever taken here's my dog from 1986.

Look at that. That's when he first pooped. You know, so that's what we do. I have a question. Has anybody, without giving anything away, has anyone ever gone through all of the beer? No. Okay. What's the most... Well, first of all, I will say that if I saw somebody going into a third can, I would ask them if they're

driving home. Good for you. For sure. So there are... I'll tell you what. I've had guests who take public third can, I would ask them if they're driving home. Good for you. For sure. Like, for sure. So there are, I've come, I'll tell you what, I've had guests who take public transit here. Like, they take the go to Mimico. And they've got close, like, to be honest. There's a regular customer, as we say,

who gets close to the six-pack. Maybe four or five, I'd say. Well, I heard James B's thing when he was saying, he was going from cracking one to another, and I went, James B, there he goes. Right, and then that's the thing. I have some guests where they know, everyone knows their tolerance.

I can tell you, and I'm not embarrassed to say this, that I stop myself at two units of alcohol. Forget driving, I bike everywhere, but two units of alcohol, because after the third unit, I feel a little tipsy like you know what i mean so it's like everyone i know people uh someone's laughing right now like lightweight or whatever but i don't feel like investing uh the time and energy to up my

tolerance like i don't i'm happy with two yeah i had lunch with a couple of girlfriends the other day because we have birthdays around the same time and three of them were doing the whole I'm not drinking for January thing. I've heard of this dry January nonsense. Yeah, I'm going for February. I'm not doing January. I'm going for February. But you're going to do it? I'm going to try it, yeah.

No screech? No, no. Yeah, no, no. But it was interesting hearing them talk about how much clearer they feel. I'm thinking more clearly. I feel better. I'm going, what's the fun of that?

I don't want to. But no, it's funny how it it hits everybody differently you know newfoundland is i mean again going back to newfoundland it's such a it's it's a pub culture it's that irish thing right and the and the oh yeah so for us it's very it's it's it's i remember when my dad was on a particular type of medication like you know was he had a had to take an antibiotic and he couldn't drink and his his big concern was, I got a hockey social now on Friday night. How am I going to pass myself? It was that idea where you had to fake it. So dad would pour ginger ale into a glass and try to say it was rye

and soda or something and try to fake it. To be socially accepted. So it's a cultural thing, I think, sometimes, too. Yeah, for sure. For sure. And the whole dry January, because, and like the whole,

the whole dry January, cause I know people doing it. To me, it's sort of like, like either you do a lifestyle change cause you want to change your lifestyle or you don't like this whole like one month thing. Like, I'm not sure what that's about.

Like, unless it lights a spark, like let's say someone does the dry January thing. Is this somebody who has a drinking problem? Like it's interfering with their family life or is it cause, uh dry jam. Is this somebody who has a drinking problem? Like, it's interfering with their family life? Is it, because,

you know, everything in moderation, I say. Sure. The lasagna, okay? Right. You can't eat that every day.

No. Like, you just can't. No. But, if you eat it in moderation, it's fantastic. Sure.

So, I think that you can apply that to everything. And I think, I mean, I have friends who, you know, probably should go dry for a month or so,

but they're not gonna, you know? And I don't think it's gonna be, yeah, you're not gonna get them for a whole month. But I will give, listen, if you want to try anything, cold turkey completely, and it draws you into a healthier choice, then, you know, I say go for it. But yeah, the whole dry January thing, I haven't...

Plus, my birthday's in January. So I don't want to go dry for my birthday. No, that's no fun. And then I was in New York for Jazz Congress. Yes, and weren't you in Newfoundland recently? I was in Newfoundland over the holidays, too. So, I mean, you know, right now my liver should be flying a white flag.

And she takes another sip and her octopus wants to fight. It really is good. That's funny. See, it is. Great Lakes Brewery. You guys rock. I gotta tell you. The Chamber Brothers

are interrupting you, Heather. I hope they apologize. If anybody's going to, I'll take it from them. That's right. On this day, 30 years ago, 30 years ago today,

the number one song on the Billboard Hot 100 was this. Bobby Brown. That's right. Were you a big New Edition fan or Bobby Brown? I love New Edition and Bobby Brown. I had this record.

This was a big one. Don't Be Cruel was on this? All of those, yeah. Bobby Brown, Sheila E., Morris Day and The Time. I was an enigma, I think, going into record stores in Newfoundland looking for R&B and stuff. But man, I love this stuff.

30 years ago. 30 years ago this week? This was number one. Mike, we're getting old, brother. Good, because the alternative is worse. Every time somebody tells me I'm old, I'm saying, good, because I could die or I could get older. I'll do this

for a while. Remember the time is brought to you by Fast Time Watch and Jewelry Repair. They've been doing quality watch and jewelry repairs for over 30 years you might remember in sears you would go to sears to get your watch repair your battery swapped out that was actually these guys at fast time but then sears left the country and fast time we're like okay we gotta open our own places because they have 30 years experience doing this so they've been opening up their own locations. Their newest location is now open in Richmond Hill.

And if you go to fasttimewatchrepair.com, you can find out a location near you. And here's the promo that no, they don't do this for anybody. I talked to Milan there. He's like, we only do it for you. If you go to a Fast Time location and say that you heard about them on Toronto Mic'd, they'll give you 15% off any regular priced watch battery installation. Wow.

That's crazy. I have a bracelet I'm going to bring into them. Do it. Yeah. They're fantastic. It's a family run. They're fiercely independent too. Everyone I think on my list except Paytm are fiercely independent.

And that includes you and I. We're fiercely independent. Amen. I just realized we're like 45 minutes in. I'm like, we haven't talked about music or radio. And I'm listening to you in the headphones. And I'm sort of like just now adapting to the fact that the mom. Oh, yeah.

The mom from Daniel Tiger is in my headset. So I'm hearing you now as the mom in Daniel Tiger. Well, especially if my tone turns to this. Because there's a way of talking, the mom tiger. It's a gentle way. And then I get excited again. But the Rogers family is very, very, very much involved in Daniel Tiger's neighborhood. And they're so respectful.

Fred Rogers. Fred Rogers. People are going to think you're talking about Ted Rogers. Oh, yeah, no, not Ted Rogers. Fred Rogers. Mr. Rogers, back in the day. Right. I mean, he was around when I was growing up.

Oh, me too. We used to watch him. And they're so respectful of kids and of parenting and of the struggles that go on, but really of how they deal with kids. I don't have any kids. I've never raised children. I've babysat.

That's the closest. I don't even have nieces or nephews from my family. But you do know Splashin' Boots. But I know Splashin' Boots, so that qualifies me. But our director, Natalie Turiel, is brilliant, and she's a mother of two. And so whenever we have to do an episode where there's something that is very closely related to parenting,

Natalie comes in. She says, okay, let me tell you about what happened with my kids the other day. And she really gets the point across so that when we're there, we have a specific way of talking to the kids as the parent figures in it. And I love this show. It's one of the...

Let me tell you, because I don't need to blow smoke up your butt about this. I will tell you straight up because I have two toddlers. So I've had a lot of time. In fact, my third born's first birthday party was Daniel Tiger themed. Nice. This was a big, we watched a lot.

We still do because I got a two-year-old. It's still a big hit in this house. Daniel Tiger, I watch it because I think it's really well done. Like how to deal with your emotions and your anger and all that stuff. Like you could tell that something like the Mr that the the mr rogers neighborhood uh people are behind this yeah but okay so i went out of order because i only couldn't stand hearing you any longer without pointing out that i'm hearing the mom from daniel tiger in my head i was actually going to close with the voice acting stuff but we'll do it right now sure which is uh let me play a little bit of daniel tiger uh so we

can hear you on that show here it it is. I'm so frustrated. Remember what we talked about? When you're feeling frustrated, take a step back and ask for help. Okay. When you're feeling frustrated, take a step back and ask for help. Mom, can you help me get Tigey to stay up? I can try. Whoops. Let me try that again.

Come on, Tigey. We can do this. The castle! You knocked over Tigey. We can do this. The castle! You knocked over Tigey's castle. I'm sorry, Daniel. Mom, we know what to do. When you're feeling frustrated, take a step back and ask for help.

Daniel, will you help me? See, I learned a lot just in that two minutes. I learned a lot. It's so funny. I have friends that have kids, and that's the one thing they say to me time and time again is those songs. They call them strategy songs. There's a song for brushing your teeth. There's a song for when you have to go to the bathroom. There's a song for asking

for help, trying something new, calming yourself down when you're angry. All of these songs, even, you know, the first one that I remember was the idea of,

because it's something I remember as a kid when my parents went out at night and I would freak out going, why are they home? When are they getting home?

And there was always that song that we would sing on the show. Wednesday was like baby, is it Wednesday or Tuesday? What's the name of the prince?

Prince Wednesday. Prince Wednesday was babysitting. I remember this episode. And there was the grown-ups come back. Right, a catchy little ditty. Yeah, and the kids remember this, and they sing it to themselves,

and they calm themselves down. And I hear it from so many of my friends who say, are you kidding me? That show was helping me raise my kids. So it's really, you're at an age where you're trying to say to people, don't watch too much TV, don't get on too much social media and all that. Yet when there's a show like this with so much integrity, it's something that I'm, I will

encourage time and time again. If you are a young parent and you're trying, you're struggling with something with kids, or you want to have your kids watch something that's going to be educational and heartful and is going to really help both the children and you deal with emotional struggles or anything like this. It is an amazing show. Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood. I'm so proud of it. It really is. And it's on CBC Kids. We watch it there. And yeah, it's really good.

No joke. It's an excellent show because there's a lot of crappy kid shows out there. And this is not one of them. And yeah, the Mr. Rogers brand is like you said, integrity. Yeah, big time. How come? So i need to know how you got this gig like did you just try out yeah yeah that's cool it was just an audition thing so many of these things it's so funny i actually because i emailed you just before i got here because i was auditioning for something this morning um they could be you know last minute guest things where there's a character that's

that's built in and they just want you to come in and audition for it. For something like this, for this and a show like Wild Kratts or something where I'm doing more of a major role, there's a bigger process. So sometimes there may be two or three auditions. Sometimes you may audition. Like Wild Kratts, I auditioned and then a year and a half later. But do you sing in that one?

In Wild Kratts, very, very little. There's little singing. Just for more of the specials, like the Christmas special and the Halloween special. But Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood is singing all the time. Right. Every single episode. Yeah, we heard you singing there, and I guess that was a prerequisite.

Oh, for sure. So you would be ideal, because I don't even know if I've mentioned it yet, that you're actually a singer, but yeah, we're going to play some of your stuff soon. Yeah, that's why I moved here. Yeah, so do you want to drop a few more credits? Oh, God.

Wildcrats, I love. Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood, I love. One of the most recent things I've done is a recurring character on Hotel Transylvania, the series, which is a hilarious, hilarious show. Dee Shipley is the director there and some incredibly talented actors

that I get a chance to work with. It's so much fun. I'm blessed. I mean, I'm really, really, really blessed to be able to do this and have fun and giggle and enjoy my colleagues. It's great. I know Dani Elwell does a lot of voiceover work too.

So this is good work if you can get it. No one's offering me any voiceover spots. Well, let's talk. You might have to join the union, but other than that. But yeah, no, it's for me, it started because my agent actually was a friend of mine and I met her through an

ex and she said, I need someone to do a Newfoundland accent for a Pickles commercial. Oh, that's you. Right? So I came in and I did my Newfoundland accent and they ended up going with a guy. And so but she said, I really like the way you did that. She said, have you ever considered doing this kind of work? And I said, I considered it. I just didn't know how I'd get into it. And so she said, well, come in and read a couple of things. And I did. And she liked what I did. And she said, OK, you should join the union and,

you know, we will get you to do a couple of things, take a couple of classes and train a little bit. And so that was like, God, 18 years ago or 15 years ago that I started doing it. With apologies to the Godfather, it's like, leave the ex, take the agent. That's funny. I'm going to use that. Once in a while. I think I did. Get that on a t-shirt.

You can borrow that one. Okay. So yeah, that's great. Now let's get you back to use that. Once in a while. I think I did. Get that on a t-shirt. You can borrow that one. Okay. So yeah, that's great. Now let's get you back to singing here. Yeah. And you mentioned the beehive singers. Yeah. So is this like where it all begins for you in terms of singing?

When did you realize that A, you were good at singing and B, that you wanted to try to make a career out of it? Well, I realized I wanted to entertain when I was in, I don't know, middle school or something, or junior high, and there was a talent show, and I did a performance of Billie Jean, a lip sync performance of Billie Jean,

but instead of putting the record at 33 RPMs, we increased it to 78. So it was like, do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do, you know, we're doing this, and I did the whole dance and the video and the whole bit.

It was ridiculous, and the place went nuts, and I thought, okay, I want to do this for a living. I want to entertain people because this was fun. And then I started singing in Newfoundland. I was doing dinner theater.

I was singing in choirs and all that, and with the dinner theater, that was probably my first solo singing, but it was always in character. And I sang in a jazz choir, and i got a chance to scat and our conductor said come on hitter get up and scat a bit and i was all right dude and i did that and it went well and then i started applying to schools and i moved to toronto in in 93 so i don't know it was probably the late 80s early 90s when i started thinking like, okay, yeah, I guess I can do this. I mean, I've been singing from the time I was like six, seven years old.

I was singing in harmony from the time I was eight years old in choirs and stuff. Well, so much, I mean, maybe all of it. I don't know. It's innate. Like this is like, you can't teach good singing, right? You can't harness an innate talent. Well, you can teach singing. I mean, if you can speak, you can sing.

Because it's the same muscle, really, that's making the sound. Speaking is just singing in shorter tones. But singing with control and with, you know, being able to sing different styles of music and having different tones in your voice. And it's the same thing with voice acting. Like, if I go in and they say, we need you to sound a little more wry.

Or we need you to get down into the lower part of your voice so you place the voice down here but we need you to sound light lighter and and and you know try to sound younger so you bring it up here or a little more nasal so bring it into your nose a little or whatever you know it's having control of yeah you have to have control for sure for sure so uh i would like to i think i could do a bit of a Tom Waits maybe. Do it. Do it. Don't make people hear that. Okay, the Beehive Singers and Broadway. Yeah. Don't forget the S in Broadway.

It's key. I learned it's very key. So these are vocal ensembles that you were founding members of. That's early 90s stuff? Broadway is still working now. Beehive Singers started, actually, we were all at U of T together.

We were in the vocal jazz ensemble at U of T. One day we stayed late and started working on a piece of music for a little longer. And we realized we sounded okay together.

And then we started working as a group 401. Four of one voice. Oh, I like that. I know. Because that's the highway. Right? It was the reference to Toronto.

Exactly. But then James B. came along. Excuse me. Never heard of him. I know. And he needed some backup singers for a record he was doing. And one of our members, Sean Lavery, his ex-girlfriend's father was working with this engineer. And the ex-girlfriend's father said, oh, yeah, my daughter's boyfriend is in this group.

We got in to sing backup vocals. James B. came in like we were singing on the record before we even met him and he walked in wearing i'll never forget it cowboy and indian flannel pajamas and white vinyl sneakers and came hey how you doing i'm james b all right this is very exciting and then he walked out and we thought who in the hell was that and then um we recorded i think three records together we did three canadian tours we this is uh james b and the royal jelly orchestra yes and we were the b-hype singers so we were hired to be the backup singers and then we ended up releasing our own record um with four part kind of it was like manhattan transfer yeah it's kind of manhattan transfer meets new york voices meets the beach boys at It was like Manhattan Transfer meets New York Voices,

meets the Beach Boys at times, meets Steely Dan kind of vocals, those really great harmonies that Michael McDonald and Fagan were singing in that group. So it's a little bit of everything. But man, we really had fun. And then Keith Power, who was our music director, did all of our arranging,

he now lives in LA and is doing the television music doing music for television shows like Starsky and Hatch. What year is this? I know. Oh no, Hawaii Five-0. Because yeah, they're all being rebooted, right?

I know, isn't that weird? No one's got an original idea anymore. And he's doing all the music for them. So he's doing Hawaii Five-0 and I think he's doing Heartland on CBC and a bunch of others. I know, Mike, what are you CBC and a bunch of others. I know.

Mike, what are you playing here? I was listening to what this is. Because I get distracted. I know. That's the whole idea. I want to distract you. So let's see if you can tell me who this is. Only because I took a note on this guy So I thought An excuse to play him

And then read his quote About you Oh dear And is this Is this the trumpet player I'm trying to identify? Yeah Oh god

The trumpet player From this I'm putting you on the spot here You really are Not fair I don't So obviously this is a cover of It's Not Unusual

It's Not Unusual And someone with... They're using like a plungery kind of mute almost it sounds like. Guido Basso. I was... Oh my God, I was going to say Guido. I gave you enough time, Heather. I gave you enough time.

Well, because I'm used to Guido doing flugel. So that I totally didn't recognize him. Guido. I was emailing him this morning. I love that. Is that right? Yeah. He's gone on the record.

He's on the record as saying that you, Heather Bambrick, are his favorite singer. I love that man. That's high praise. It is. And he's an incredible musician. And I've been working with Guido for a few years. And I think the reason that Guido likes me is because he doesn't have to think. So if I show up, I'll just go, okay, guys, let's play this song in this key.

Here's the intro, go. And it takes some of the heat off of Guido from having to be the band leader for a few minutes when I'm around. But he's such an incredible, and he's also, he's a wonderful entertainer. Guido is just, you know, he's so warm and giving and charismatic.

And I just, I love that guy. He comes up a lot when I have Retro Ontario on and we go back and we talk about like old jingles and stuff. Oh yeah. Right?

Because he's such a big player there and we'll play, we'll be playing something, some old beer jingle or something and he'll be like, oh yeah, that's Guido Basso

and you get this education. It's so funny. I've never heard this before. There you go. I think I'm pretty sure I have this loaded up because of Ed Conroy from Retro Ontario, actually. I love it.

Love it. So, James B., it's interesting that you had that experience so early in your career with James, and then you would cross paths again. Years later on the radio. Yeah, but we'll get to that. We'll get to that. Yeah. So, tell me a bit after the B... What are these names again? The Beehives?

Yeah. When does the Heather Bambrick Quartet come into play? Well, we kind of, I went on a little bit of a hiatus. I mean, I started playing when I was still at U of T, and then I kind of took some time off to devote time with the Beehives, and then when we stopped working together in maybe 2000, 2001, when Keith decided to go in a different direction, that was when I started focusing more on solo stuff. So I made my first record in 2002,

released it in 2003, did another one in 2005, 2006. And I started focusing a little bit more on that. So your solo, let me just play something here. And we'll get to the new album last. But first... This is you, right? Well, not playing the saxophone.

But yes, this is me. That's Mike Murley playing that beautiful saxophone. Clearly I'd be unable to hit the post of this one. I have more deal when you come in here, so... We'll be patient. That intro is a little hint of the verse, if you will. I keep your picture beside my bed. And I still remember everything you said

I always thought our love was so right I guess I was wrong I thought you'd be by my side But now you're gone. All I want to know is, baby, what we had was good. Then how come you don't call me anymore? great in the headphones. I'm digging it. Thank you. I haven't heard this in such a long time. But yeah, that arrangement is courtesy of another Etobicoke boy, Michael McLennan and Mike Murley on saxophone. They're all mics, apparently.

They're all mics. I like to work with mics only. Yeah, yeah. It's a Prince song, right? It's a Prince song, yeah. Gary Topp was my manager at the time. And Gary said, you know, you got to try to bring in some different stuff. Like, what about this Prince tune?

And we did an arrangement of it. And yeah. Yeah. Really? Like, yeah. Excellent. Excellent. Thank you.

I mean, you're East Coast Music Award nominee. Like, tell me about Tell me about your awards. I have a list here. I see you have Juno nominations. I'm a Juno losing artist, which I'd prefer to focus on that. Yeah, well, all three records that I've done as a solo artist have been nominated

for East Coast Music Awards, which is really great. I'm always up against instrumentalists because there's not a lot of jazz being made on the East Coast, so they can't really have their own. If there was a vocal category, I would ace it. Actually, no, I shouldn't say that. Me and

Mary Berry would be after each other all the time. But, yeah, so I'm really, really fortunate to still be embraced by the East Coast that way. And the latest record was nominated for a Juno, which was a huge shock and thrill and, you know, exciting thing. And it was made in honor of my aunt.

I'd lost my aunt just before we recorded him. Oh, this is You'll Never Know? You'll Never Know, yeah. So my aunt, who's like a second mom to me, was sick, and I had been doing a lot of stuff with Broadway, which is Julie Michaels, Diane Leah, and me in this group that were kind of three middle-aged cantankerous women who want to have our way with theater music. We don't want to sing it the way it's always been done.

So we bring in a little bit of the spontaneity of jazz to the theater world. So we're three broads doing theater our own way, hence Broadway. So I'd focus so much on that. And then when I was visiting my aunt in the hospital one time, one of the nurses said, oh, well, your aunt was saying you're doing a new record. I said, no, I'm not actually. I just finished one because we had just recorded a Christmas record. And oh, no, she said you are. And I said, well, but I'm not. Oh, but she said you are. And if you knew my Aunt Mary, she was very, very headstrong and did not like to be, you know, she didn't like to be argued with.

So when she passed away, my mom said, you know, Mary's left you a little something. And it was just a little bit of cash. And I said, okay, there's a sign. She's the first investor in the new record.

So I made the record very much for her. She and I paid for it. And even the title, you'll never know. She was a big Vera Lynn fan. She used to always say to me, now, Heather, I don't know why you're doing all that foolish boopy-doopy-doop stuff,

because, you know, I mean, my darling, people don't always want to hear that. They just want you to hear you sing a nice song. So just sing the song for the love of God. Shut up with all the other stuff. So I wanted to do a song for her, and I chose the Vera Lynn song, You'll Never Know. And there's a lot of Newfoundland reference there there's a lot of you know my ship which is that

nautical theme far from the home i love which is from fiddler on the roof but it talks about the idea of leaving your home to for for the character and the show it's leaving your home for love for me it was leaving my home for to study music here at u of t um i always do a newfoundland folk song so i did a version of petty har Harbor Bates' GIF on that. The song for Mary, you know, You'll Never Know is very much for her. So there's a lot of connection at home on that. So when we got the Juno nomination,

that was the first time I called my mother and I told her, and she's, that's Mary. Mary did that. So yeah, so it's kind of... For Aunt Mary. For Aunt Mary, with the whole idea of, you know, if you make something out of love, it will bring love back to you.

I'm going to play a song from that album. Cool. You just handed to me. I have it in my hand right now. And this cut, it's a cover of one of my favorite songs of all time, which you do a great version. I was listening to it. I'm going to play it now. But also, coincidentally, the aforementioned Tyler Stewart's Barenaked Ladies do a pretty

darn nice cover as well. But let's hear this. So can I talk over the intro? Oh, of course. Yeah, it's your song, of course. So that's Davide DiRenzo on drums, who is a brilliant, brilliant drummer and tours with all kinds of artists.

Guitar is Rob Pilch, who is, again, brilliant. Ross McIntyre on bass. And coming up on piano, Mark Kieswetter and on alto saxophone, Johnny Johnson. And this was an arrangement that I started years ago and then gave it to Mark and he kind of blew it up. And the result was something that I think is, it's kind of a cool take on this tune. So I'm going to start singing any minute now. Coming up. Right now, just in a second. Once we set the mood with this intro. And here we go.

Don't the hours grow shorter as the days go by? You never get to stop and open your eyes. Never get to stop and open your eyes One day you're waiting for the sky to fall The next you're dazzled by the beauty of it all Lovers in a dangerous time lovers in a dangerous time lovers These fragile bodies of touch Beautiful.

Thank you. There's always a fear, you know, when you take a pop tune like that that is so iconic and try to do it in any other style, there's always that fear that you're going to be Bill Murray in Saturday Night Live

doing, you know, Star Wars at the Cocktail. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know? Nothing but Star Wars. I remember when we went to the Junos, my sister came with me. She lives in Washington, D.C. She's killing

it as a catering manager. She's trained as a chef. Killing it as a catering manager at a hotel down there, a boutique hotel. So I said, you know, do you want to come? Of course I'm coming to the Junos with you. And she wore her funkiest stuff. And she was, you should have seen you want to come? Of course I'm coming to the Junos with you. And she wore her, like, her funkiest stuff, and she was, you should have seen her work the room. If you ever need someone

to do PR for you, Mike, I'm telling you. She took me, she's like, take your money, come on, let's go. Will she work for beer and lasagna? Yes, she will. And she, so she went over, she saw Bruce Coburn, and he was there with his manager at the time, and she went over, she's like, Mr. Coburn, I want to introduce you to Heather Bambrick, and she, you know, has recorded your song uh and she went over she's like mr coburn i want to introduce you to heather bambrick and she you know has recovered recorded your song and she's nominated for jenna

was so funny and he was just kind of going hi heather i said i'm really sorry it's just an honor to meet you and blah blah blah he said yeah i really like what you do with the song i said okay thanks very much and then he said oh and i enjoy your show on the radio so it was kind of funny because he knows who you are he's aware of heather bambrick he should be very strange for me because i still think of myself as that little girl from newfoundland who is you. He kind of knew. He's aware of Heather Bambrick. He should be. Very strange for me because I still think of myself as that little girl from Newfoundland who is, you know, way out of her league up here.

Well, let's talk about radio. Yeah. Let's. Actually, we're not going to talk about radio quite yet. No? Because I want to play, I want to ask you about a song.

Okay, cool. I want to leave. This is a song. I found it on YouTube. Okay. Okay. I found it on YouTube Okay Any Canadian

knows this song and if you don't you should be ashamed of yourself I wonder if the kids know it though I don't know I don't know

Yeah, you're right People our age Of course Right That National Film Board short or whatever Yeah though. I don't know. Yeah, you're right. People our age horse. Right. That National Film Board short or whatever. I saw it all the time. All the time. Yeah. And even if you didn't know the words

to the whole thing, you at least knew the chorus. Right. And this is the Toronto Symphony Orchestra killing it on an orchestration by Becca Pellett. If you ask any girl from the parish around what pleases her most Killing It on an orchestration by Becca Pellett. Amazing. The McGarigal sisters. Right.

Yeah. So how did this come to be? How did this happen? Lucas Waldron was the conductor. And I got a call. I was actually performing with Broadway at the time. We were about to do the Waterloo Jazz Festival. And I got a call

from Lucas. And he said, we're doing, it was Canada 150 year. He said, we're doing a show with the TSO Canada 150 and we need a vocalist. And would you be available to do maybe three songs? And they would be something like, you know, the Wild Drivers. Well, they probably only had two decided at the time. And then I ended up doing, I think, five or six.

And it just happened. So, you know, I got the call. I said, yeah, do I want to sing with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra? Let me think. Yes. So we did two shows for Canada 150. And we did that. We did My Way, Paul Anka.

I did Big Yellow Taxi. I'm trying to think of the other songs that I did. Oh, Hallelujah, of course. Leonard Cohen. Leonard Cohen, yeah. Yeah, so it was a real thrill to sing with the TSO. But this was so fun. Because you could watch everybody in the audience just bouncing along with it because we all grew up with this, right?

It really is. For Canadians of a certain age, and it's probably a pretty good range, I'm sure, because it was already old when I was introduced to it. So this is an iconic song. Sure. This is right up there with the hockey sweater or whatever. Remember? These are the ones that we they were force fed

they were it's funny because you were talking about losing that Juno and then I was thinking oh you were splashing boots and they keep losing the Juno and I

when they were on I was like well you keep losing the Juno and they get well they keep losing to the same guy they keep losing to Fred Penner

and Fred Penner did that the cat came back and that's another one like that one's still bouncing around the cat came back. Some of them are just, they are.

They're the songs of our childhood. And they're the songs of, you can't even say a generation because it's multi-generational. I mean, when you think about it, it's just so funny. It's like, listen to the crowd, right? They love the song. Everybody went nuts for this because it's just such a part of our

history. Look at how thankful you are. Well, nuts for this because it's just such a part of our history. Thank you. Look at how thankful you are. Well, you know, because it is. I'm grateful, you know, to get a call from Lucas to do it and to do it with the TSO. And they were so wonderful. The audience was great. It was a thrill, I have to say.

Okay, we're going to dive into Jazz FM and then back to JazzCast. Yeah. But first, anyone listening who owns an automobile, if you own a car, I want to tell you about Buckle, proud new sponsors of this program. So Buckle is B-U-K-L dot C-O. You go to Buckle dot C-O and you enter like your make and model

and your year of your car and then what service you need. So if your car needs any servicing at all. And then you get instant quotes from shops in your area and you can book the appointment right away on the web. And then you just bring in your car, it gets serviced and then you drive away and you're, you don't have to, you're automatically charged through this service. It's all completely seamless and convenient. Like you have to try this, right? It's amazing. You got to try this. I know it's absolutely amazing. So buckle.co that's B-U-K-L.co and give it a go. All right, Heather, tell me about, I was thinking when I

was looking at like previous other jazz FM hosts and stuff that I'm kind of collecting morning show hosts. Like I'm kind of collecting them because I'm trying, I'm Ralph Ben-Murigy. Is he the first one? The first one? No, the first one was Terry McElligot back years ago. Okay, okay. So, oh, yeah, yeah. Okay, so, but since Ralph Ben-Murray, he's a morning show guy.

Was it John Donabee? John Donabee came in. So John Donabee's been here. Yep. And who's after John Donabee? Me. Correct. I was wondering if you would get that right. So tell me how that came to be at Jazz FM.

Well, I was doing a show at the Reverb years ago, and Brian Snelson, who was doing the market report on Jazz FM, was there. Again, that same ex of mine that I probably owe a lot of money to by now. Don't say that. I'm recording. Never mind. Never mind.

I'm coming after you. So, yeah, Brian was there, and he said, hey, do you have a demo that I can bring into Jazz FM? And I gave him a little EP that I had. And then I started coming on when Terry McElligot was the morning show host. I came on and helped him fundraise. And then they would call me for fundraising drives. They had about four drives at the time a year.

And I would come in, and I would do a couple of shifts fundraising. And once that, they seemed to think that went well, Chuck Camry, who was the station manager at the time a year and i would come in and i would do a couple of shifts fundraising and once that they seemed to think that went well chuck camry who was the station manager at the time asked me to pitch a show he said i want you to do a show about singers so i pitched a show and then the station pitched chuck so um when when uh he was gone and there was new management i was then asked by brad barker uh to yeah the pursuit of happiness yeah my buddy from coal harbor nova scotia even though he spent very little time there but still just like sydney crosby and uh who's the other guy nate mckinnon there you go yeah so brad asked me you know do you want to pitch a show i said i actually pitched a show a couple years ago so um i came on board

then as a so first it was a volunteer for a couple years then it was a part-time host for a couple years ago. So I came on board then as a, so first it was a volunteer for a couple years, then it was a part-time host for a few years, and then I moved from Sing Sing Sing to Sunday Afternoon Jazz, then to the morning show for- And this is Wake Up? Is that what this is called? It was called Wake Up with Heather Bambrick.

Yeah. Get your name in the title. Well, you know, it was a way of kind of peeing on the show, I suppose. It's mine! You don't just wake up with anyone, you wake up with me. That's right.

Good morning. So, yeah. So, I did that for going into my fourth year. And then I left. And then I went back to Sunday Afternoon Jazz. And that's where I was until I left just last month. Yeah, just last month. So, for those who don't know, Jazz FM, it's a unique kind of broad station because it's

a public broadcaster. But when you say to people it's a public broadcaster, they think CBC. This is where people's heads go. They think CBC. They think NPR or, you know. Well, sure, down there. Yeah, depending on where you're listening. Sure. Right. So, but, okay, because you mentioned fundraisers. CHFI isn't going to do a fundraiser.

They really don't need to. They really, really don't. I think they have Maureen Holloway just shakes her mug and hopes people drop a toonie in there or something like that. So, yeah, it runs, 50% of the budget came from advertisers and 50% came from donors.

So they would have fundraising campaigns. And that's how the station ran. And okay, so what are the unique stipulations? Like what makes it a public broadcaster? Well, no one owns it. That's the thing. There's no owner. So you can't say, okay yeah it's owned by the chorus network it's owned by standard broadcasting it's only it is not owned by anyone it is owned by the public um and there

are because it operates as a as a corporation so there are you know for lack of a better term they're shareholders and those shareholders are donors so if you donate, I think it's $20 or more a month, $240 a year, you become a voting member of the station. So you have a vote on how things operate, how things are done, how things, you know, how it's managed or whatever the case may be. You have a voting say in that. And so that's why it's public because it is publicly owned as opposed to being owned by a corporation and being one of several stations across the country. It's standalone. Right.

By the way, I did see an old interview of you where you talked about at 5 a.m. every weekday before you went to host the morning show that you had watched, The Golden Girls. I love The Golden Girls. Yeah, they would wake me up. That's how I would get up. I'd get up at 4 o'clock in the morning. I would walk

my dog, who really hated me walking her at 4.15. And then I'd come home and I'd get a coffee and I'd turn on the Golden Girls and then I'd go in and I'd shower and I'd get ready and then I'd leave the house at about 20 after 5. So I'd always miss the end of the Golden Girls. But inevitably

there would be something, some poignant lesson learned by end of the Golden Girls. But inevitably, there would be something, some poignant lesson learned by Sophia and the gals. So who's your favorite Golden Girl? I think, ah, God. I think probably Blanche, not Blanche, Dorothy, because she's so damn sarcastic. That just made, her phrases, her sarcasm, they killed me.

But Betty White again. You know, Betty White's birthday is today. It is not. Coincidentally. She's a Capricorn? I couldn't. You know, Betty White's birthday is today. It is not. Coincidentally. She's a Capricorn? I couldn't make that up. Yeah. She's 97 today.

Bless her heart. Betty White. A Capricorn gal. I love it. And Bea Arthur, of course, fantastic. She used to do

Shopper's Drug Mart commercials. Oh my God, that's right. Oh my God, that's right. You are a very But I used to watch

Golden Girls too. I quite liked Golden Girls. And oddly enough, that's right. You are a very good potpourri of stuff. But I used to watch Golden Girls too. I quite liked it. And oddly enough, Sophia, Estelle Geddes, who played Sophia, was the youngest one of the cast. I know, and then she died first too, which is too bad. She played the oldest character and died first. Yeah, she's sort of like, remember Mama's Family? Like Vicky Lawrence playing the mama?

Yeah. Younger than you'd expect. And she was in that Stallone movie, was it? Oh my God. Stop or My Mom Will Shoot. That's right. I almost said Throw Mama From The Train.

Different. I think she's in Goonies, that one. She's the Where's The Beef? No, that's not. That's a different old lady. There's so many of these. They're all gone except for Betty White. She's the Where's the Beef? No, that's not. That's a different old lady. There's so many of these. That's too funny. Okay. Yeah. They're all gone. They're all gone except for Betty White. She's still with us.

God bless her. 97. At the time of this recording, though, I should timestamp it. At 2 o'clock, Betty White, as far as we know, is still kicking. As far as we know. Please stay with us, Betty. For the love of God, stay with us. Oh, that's right.

At least get to 100. I remember that was a big thing of Bob Hope. Remember? Yeah. Get to 100. That's a nice milestone. Yeah. Wow.

Look at these people. So, okay okay that's cool cool fun fact so let's talk oh and also one of the differentiators I think are one of the things that made Jazz FM unique

I think is that the BBC News happened yeah every hour in the morning so one minute after the hour the BBC News would come through like a train coming through the tunnel and if you were in the way

you got hit by the train so you had to time it out and there was a promo spot that came on before the BBC like a train coming through the tunnel. And if you were in the way, you got hit by the train. So you had to time it out. And there was a promo spot that came on before the BBC that I had to make sure I had enough time. So I'd be watching the clock because I operated the board.

I was really, when I was doing the morning show, I was the only one there. So I would come in, I would turn off the alarm. I once had another, it's funny, I crapped on Gene Valaitis earlier,

but there was another Toronto Morning Show host who once told me like, people don't care about the details. They justpped on Jean Valaitis earlier, but there was another Toronto Morning Show host who once told me, people don't care about the details. They just want the story. Where I actually really like the details. I love the details. And that's how I would describe it to people.

When I walk into the building, I would turn off the alarm. I would turn on the lights in the kitchen. I would turn on the kettle to start my coffee going. And I'd grind my coffee beans, and I'd get my coffee going. And I'd go in, and I'd turn on the lights in the studio. I'd turn on the computer.

Like, it was a ritual, right? It was a ritual, but it was also a one-person show. So for people who thought it, like, you know, how many people are in there with you? No one. It's just me and you listening. So how did you be specific? How did you put the BBC news on? Like, what was that? So

there was a fader for the BBC and you have to make sure that the fader, you know sure that the light was on, the channel was open, and that the fader was down. And I would keep talking, and I'd be doing my thing. And in the next hour, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and I'd do it. But right now, it's time for the BBC World News. So while I was doing this,

I've got my left hand on my mic fader. I've got my right hand on the BBC News fader. But before I'd hit my right hand on the news fader, I'd click the start button for the promo for the BBC News while watching the clock and watching it tick down to 12 minutes to the top of the, you know, one minute after the hour kind of thing. And then I'd fade down mine and I'd listen to the promo

and then I'd fade up the BBC News and I'd turn it on. It was just this whole dance. It's like doing a tango where you have to make sure you're leading with one foot and swiveling and pivoting and all that. So you do all of that. I remember the first time I filled in for Ralph Ben-Murgy. And the panic. And Ralph, you know, I walked in to watch him do it. And he

turned around. And Ralph was so funny. He turned around and he looked at me. There's no like, hey, Heather, how you doing? Welcome. It was like, sit down. I'm about to do the news. It was just like that. Oh, hi, Ralph. Nice to see you. So I sat down and I watched him do it. So I got in there early enough to watch him do it a couple of times. So first time I had to fill in for him,

I was sitting there and I timed everything and I practiced everything. Oh, Mike, you have no idea the panic. So I sat there and I listened. And it was perfect. It was freaking perfect. So I left to go pee.

I walked down the hallway to the bathroom where the station was piped in to the ladies room. And I was in the stall and I suddenly thought, why don't I hear it? Why don't I hear it? And I realized, I forgot to turn it on. I immediately down the hallway again.

I ran into the studio. I saw the light wasn't red so I went in and I hit the button to turn it on just in time to hear the world's foremost pedophile. That was the very first phrase. So every 30 or a minute and 30 seconds of silence. Exactly. And the,

but the first thing people hear is world's full most pedophile. And I thought, Oh great. So that's the thing when you're doing it on your own, like it's, it's gotta happen. You'd think there'd be a better way only. I got a story fed to me from back in the day where like maybe possibly jazz

FM was literally holding like a shortwave radio to the microphone to get the BBC news. Have you ever heard any legends like that? I don't know. I mean, we, yeah, it's very, it was very skeletal. It was very grassroots, hands-on kind of stuff. And it started to grow. But, you know, I remember when Terry was doing the morning show and I was coming in helping him fundraise. And one of the things that we would get people excited about,

like, call now and donate and you'll get this wind-up radio and we were literally winding up this radio to play it. I had a wind-up radio

at some point. Right? But people lost their minds over it. The phones went nuts and now people are like, well, I'm not calling

unless they're giving away a trip to Cuba. It's just so funny how people operate now. All right, so how long were you at Jazz FM again? Remind me, from day one to this last month? From day one, 17 plus years.

I've got a lot of questions here. Maybe start with why did you leave your position at Jazz FM after so long? I personally had issues with some of the things that were happening there in terms of how it was being managed, some of the decisions that were being made.

I felt there was a lack of communication. And again, none of this is fact. A lot of it is just what I felt based on my own experience. Sure, and your experience. Yeah. You're allowed to have experience. So sometimes there's that idea of giving tacit approval to something by not leaving. And I felt by

staying there, when I was seeing things happen that I didn't agree with, I felt, listeners trust me, and if I'm staying, I'm sure listeners go, well, it can't be that bad. Heather's still there. And I felt like that was misleading listeners and misguiding them. And I morally,

and with my own sense of integrity intact, I couldn't remain and say, yeah, everything's great here. Because to me, it wasn't. So I had to leave. So in previous episodes, I think we did this first with Danny Elwell, actually. And then I tried to get James B. to talk about it. But he was too afraid that the lawyers

would be outside my front door. Well, there is a fear of that. I don't want anyone to get in trouble. That's for sure. But the collective. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

And I always, I sound like Joe Graham when I talk about this. It does seem like there's a movie. We're going to have to make a movie about this. There might be a... The collective. Yeah. Are there more members of the collective than we see on that list of four people behind JazzCast?

Yes. Yeah. The four people behind JazzCast all signed the letter from the collective. So for those, for people who don't know. Tell us what the heck. Yeah, you're right.

Some people don't know what the collective is. It just sounds cool. It does sound cool. About, so it was actually, I can tell you when it was. It was March 17th of 20. St. Patrick's Day, you know.

It was St. Patrick's Day. March 17th of 2018. Okay. We sent a letter, 13 of us. But that's well after Danny leaves. Yes. Okay. Yeah.

Because Danny leaves in like fall of 2017. But she's, just to frame it before we get there, Danny's the first sign that something is amiss, I feel, for us people in the public here. Yeah. Because Danny left, and I remember, because I quite like Danny, I go back to the 102.1 years

and her resigning on air and all this stuff. And so she just sort of disappears mysteriously. And she's super... And she disappeared mysteriously to us too, who was working there. Those of us who were us working there i got a call from someone saying just so you know and i got a call and to put it in context at the time when i got the call from this person my first thought was oh god i'm getting fired so i remember i was driving you know that the on-ramp to the 427 north just there by sureway of course right off of the queensway so i will never forget it i was getting on the 427 north and i got the callway? Of course I do. Right off of the Queensway. So I will never forget it.

I was getting on the 427 North and I got the call and I thought, oh God, I'm getting fired now. This is where I get fired. Because there was that sense of unease there

that we didn't really know what was happening. And I was told Danny Elwell is no longer on the air because we had already gotten a note saying Danny is not going to be

the programming director anymore but she's still going to host her show. And then all of a sudden Danny is not going to be hosting her show anymore. She will not still going to host her show. And then all of a sudden, Danny is not going to be hosting her show anymore. She will not be on the air. And we're getting rid of all the promos that mention Danny at all. So that was, yeah, that was the first sign, I think, for us where we went. So you were blindsided by that happening.

Okay. Yeah. And there wasn't a lot of opportunity to say, why? What's going on? Because I think even the people passing on this information didn't know. And so we just kind of all went forward. Okay, all right, there's that sense of blind trust. I guess you know what you're doing.

All right, well, then we'll keep going. On social media, there was just this very sudden, like, Night Lab, what was that? I'm trying to remember the name of the show. Airing last episode of Night Lab. It was just like here's the last one and then like no no sense no sharing of like like why are you leaving like were you pushed are you jumping uh what's going on well i will be honest with you um up until very recently i didn't even know that and danny and i are friends and work together and so i think there was just, you know, it was,

you know, when you get to that point where your relationship ends and it's mutual, um, I, I kind of sense that was maybe part of it, but so, so in, you know, you talk to people and,

and, and, um, I mean, I left the morning show for, for a number of reasons. Um, but,

but one of them was just the sense of not really enjoying the experience anymore. I love listening. Did they take Golden Girls off the air? They did and then they put in Mad Men which caused me to want to have scotch at five o'clock in the morning which also was not a good thing. But yeah, there was just that sense of

yeah, the vibe isn't cool here anymore and when you're disrupting your life to that degree, you know, getting up at four o'clock in the morning and your sleep is interrupted and your health is interrupted and all that. I thought, unless I'm really enjoying the experience, I loved getting up and doing the show. I loved listening to, to, you know, talking to the listeners. I love talking to the musicians. I loved supporting the community. That was all important to me and still good. But my interaction with I think some of management wasn't as as as pleasant as it could have been. And so I just thought, OK, it's time for other things. So anyway, in talking to other people, you realize that people

had some shared experiences. And when those those shared experiences came to this sort of pattern of behavior, we all decided to come forward. And so 13 of us gave a letter to the board of directors. And we brought those forth. An investigation ensued. And the result of the investigation was that, well, we don't really know. To this day, I still don't fully know what the results were. We've never seen the results of the investigation was that, well, we don't really know. To this day, I still don't fully know what the results were. We've never seen the results of the investigation.

We've never seen a report or anything like that. But what I can tell you has transpired is that every single member of the collective, no one is working at the station anymore. I was the last one. You were the last one, right? Several, a couple of people were fired. I was the last one to hold on.

And I left last month and um uh yeah so the former president and ceo of the station has become president emeritus of the station but still on the air still on the air yeah yeah every saturday morning um okay just so i i don't want to get in trouble. We're purposely not saying his name? Is that like by design? I don't know. He's a great broadcaster. He is. He taught me a lot of stuff when I was hosting there. I mean, I really learned a lot from him.

He gave me some excellent tidbits, and he put a lot of faith in me as a broadcaster, and I consider that very important. And he made me the broadcaster that I am today in a lot of faith in me as a broadcaster, and I consider that very important. And he made me the broadcaster that I am today in a lot of ways. But, you know, and the thing that I have learned over time is, you know, some people are excellent managers and mentors, and other people aren't. And, yeah, as a mentor, he was wonderful.

And as a mentor... Okay, so you referred to it as a toxic work environment. Yeah. And how many people are in this collective again? 13. So let me just... So this is a public broadcaster with 13 people. So all 13, are they all on-air personalities? Or is it a mix?

No, there was a mix. Some of the people were support staff, people who did things in terms of outreach community outreach and education and that sort of thing but a lot of us were um were broadcasters it just seems strange that like maybe there's there's been some like uh nominal changes but nothing like substantial that shows they take this like seriously so i this seriously. I just wonder how that works when there's no owner. It's so confusing to me,

considering it's a public broadcaster. That's, I think, where the shareholders need to be informed. I think that's why when the story went public, and to this day, I still don't know how it officially went public. There was a Globe article, right globe article right there was absolutely but in terms of how the people at the globe found out i still don't know um and but but in having it go public people learned about it the

the the voting members learned about it um they and i think they needed to know about it because they were supporting an organization that as a as an employee there, I didn't feel supported in terms of I didn't feel safe to be able to go say I have been bullied or I have been mistreated or I've been harassed in one way or another. When I still came forward and wrote to management or board members and voiced concerns, I didn't feel I was taken seriously. And I actually felt threatened. And that was ultimately why I felt, okay, it's time for me to go because life is too short. And I think I could be doing better things and feel a lot better about what I'm doing. So what specifically was the collective asking for? Like what were the ask? We asked for an investigation. We asked for a proper HR consideration. So a human resources resource

where we could go to be able to voice concerns without fear of retribution. And we asked for, we named four people specifically in the letter as being people of concern and I think what we hoped was that, you know, there would be something done about those four individuals and about the situation and that maybe there would be some sort of HR recourse, you know, that would be available to us. And you were,

is it fair to say you guys were not satisfied with the resolutions? Yeah, I think that's fair to us. And you were, is it fair to say you guys were not satisfied with the resolutions? Yeah, I think that's fair to say. And I mean, a number of you were, again, didn't have to quit because you were asked to leave. Oh, there was no asking. Would you like to leave your

job? Do I have a choice? Yeah, no, they were, yeah. Yeah, people were fired. Yeah. And there's still some stuff ongoing. There are a couple of lawsuits that are still ongoing. Well, I read in the paper about Garvia Bailey

has a lawsuit. I don't know how that works. Is it a civil lawsuit? Or I don't know the legalities of it. I don't, yeah. I'm not sure. There's something before the courts or whatever instigated by Garvia Bailey. I saw there's a dollar figure attached to that. Yep.

And out of, I guess, what, and this kind of ties into your new endeavor. So when did the idea for JazzCast present itself? When did that? I don't know exactly. I know that it had been

discussed before. Um, when, when Garvia and, uh, and Danny, they, they first started talking about it and I'm not sure when they first began talking about it. Um, but when, when I was leaving and, uh, said to them, yeah, I'm going to be, I'm leaving in a couple of weeks. Um, and they told me about it and asked if I would like to be involved. And I said, absolutely. And then, you know, we talked about it with Walter. So I would say the discussion's probably, oh, God, the end of last year. So it's come about, is it that Danny and Garvey have this up their sleeve for a while?

I have no idea. You don't know, AC? No. You don't ask that when you're having these meetings about social media accounts. It doesn't come up. There's a certain thing. You know when you don't want to know? Oh, I don't ask, don't tell?

Is that what I'm hearing? Yeah, that story where the person puts their fingers in their ears so that if they're ever asked later, they won't be able to say anything. They don't have to lie when they say they don't know. Right, exactly. So I, you know, at the time, because it was. First of all, there's nothing. Danny and Garvia, who no longer work for Jazz FM, it's completely well within their rights

to start meeting and planning to launch another jazz channel, if you will, an internet channel. So I was just naturally curious whether you left for JazzCast or whether you learned about JazzCast after you left. No, I didn you left for JazzCast or whether you learned about JazzCast after you left. No, I didn't leave for JazzCast. I left for my own reasons.

Would you have left for JazzCast if you knew about it before you resigned? If I was happy. In that alternate universe? Yeah. If I was happy, no. I mean, if I was content with what I was doing, because as a jazz musician, I believe in what Jazz FM was hoping to do and was meant to do. I believe in the goal of the station. I believe in what Jazz FM was was hoping to do and was meant

to do right I believe in the goal of the station I believe in the mandate of what the station had you know the mandate that was in place so and as a broadcaster I love the connection I had with listeners so if I had been happy and contented with how it was being managed and felt secure in my job there and happy in my job there no I, I would have stayed. But that wasn't the case. I felt neither happy nor contented nor unthreatened. And so because of that feeling, I thought, okay, I can stay here and be miserable and feel like I'm condoning something that I really vehemently oppose, or I can move forward to something that is positive and whatever that may be. And so when JazzCast was there, I thought, okay, there's something I can start. There's something I can get involved with.

Who's behind this group Save Jazz FM? Did I get the name right? Yeah. A gentleman named Brian Hemming, who is a huge supporter of the music scene. He is involved, as is someone named Joseph Manzoli, who was a former board member at Jazz FM. And several other people, it's a group of people,

but Brian is really at the head of it. And they are working to try to restore, I guess, a sense of order and a sense of rightness. It's this board that needs to be overturned, right? Like, it sounds like... I think it's a combination, Mike. Honestly. I think, you know, I think some changes need...

If something isn't working, you need to shift it. You need to move it around. And I think when listenership is down, when donorship is down, when advertising is down, at any station, when something's not working, you've got to reevaluate it and say, okay, what do we do? On that note, though, all of this, which you said

this meeting, you had it on St. Patrick's Day 2018. Well, that was when the letter was sent. That's when the letter was sent. Whenever this broke in the Globe, shortly thereafter, I want to say. I think, yeah. So that's when the idiots like me learn what's going on. Oh, the Globe just wrote about this.

It's not like someone's underground obscure blog, right? The Globe and Mail. So, where was I going with that? So, it's been going on a long time and I guess it saved Jazz FM.

There is something, just change the channel a bit, but there's some court decision where uh jazz fm has to hand over the uh email addresses of donors to this group so so when you sign on as a donor to jazz fm you give your you know you give whether whether it's credit card information if you donate by credit card or checking account information whatever the case may be and you fill out personal information. And of course, you have to protect that information. However, according to, you know, there's a Corporations Act that dictates that any member, assuming they're conducting business surrounding that organization, they should be able to contact

the other members, right? If you're a shareholder of a company, and you have concerns with the company, you should be able to contact other shareholders to say is everybody else comfortable with this right um which makes sense to me which makes total sense and brian hemming as a shareholder was uncomfortable and so he said i would like to contact the other shareholders and be able to see if there's if there are other options available to us jazz fm had the membership list and according to the bylaws, you know, was supposed to give it to them and they would give names and they gave mailing addresses. And this is what makes me laugh a little bit. I find this amusing because, yes, it ended up going to the court

where the Save Jazz FM group was requesting email addresses because their argument was, well, this is how Jazz FM is communicating with members, mainly via email. So if that's their method of communication, it should also be our method of communication. And Jazz FM was saying, well, no, we're protecting our donor list. We're not giving out email addresses because we want to protect their privacy. But they still gave out names and addresses. So that's what made me laugh. I thought, we're protecting your privacy. We're going to tell everybody where you live, but we're going to protect your privacy. So it got into a court battle and ultimately the Save Jazz FM group won access to the emails. So now they can communicate purely... Do you know if they got them yet? They did receive them. My understanding is yes, they did receive them.

And I think they've actually been already active communicating with the donors. In order to receive the emails though, Heming had to sign an affidavit saying, I will only communicate with station business. This is not going to be given to any other resource. It is to be protected. Otherwise, he is legally liable. So it's all, as far as I know, it's all on the up and up. So that's where we're at now.

I mean, it's a, you know, those of us who are involved in the community are watching this unfold. Oh, I remember where I was going there before. So much here, you see. I'm over here trying to do so many things. We're writing a movie here. I know.

It's like this Palma's lasagna. It's meaty. You asked for meat. I know. So I now ask all guests if they're veggie or meat. But it's good. Because you'd be surprised how many are veggie. As far as I'm concerned, it doesn't qualify.

Yeah. See, I like a meat lasagna. It's just tastier. Yeah. Yeah. Vegetarians everywhere now will stop buying my records. No, because we also have veggies. I think I have a veggie one for Biff naked.

Yeah, I can imagine. I would say Biff would want veggie. Right, right. By the way, you can't have that tonight. I don't want you to have any false hopes because it's frozen. I know. You need to put it in that fridge for 24 hours. I know.

I told a previous guest this and she suggested I was mansplaining how to make the lasagna, but I was just trying to, yeah, she's sorry. Ashley Dawkins. And I was thinking,

I would think of you as being, you have connection with these people. You are now an expert to me. And I say it to guys too. It's not like I only, first of all, and also to me, it was weird like to be mansplaining

something about cooking because the old stereotype was that a woman knew how to cook and men just wanted to be served. And yet when you look at all the quote-unquote professional celebrity chefs. They're men, right? A lot of them. Except for Julia Child, who's long gone, right? I know, bless her heart. And Giada and a few others.

But we digress. We need to lighten the mood. It's getting very heavy here. Oh, my goodness gracious. In fact, while we're in this lighter mood here, I just want to ask you about it. Play a little jazz here and ask you about someone else. One of the first people I asked about...

Is this Molly? This is Molly Johnson. Yeah. I thought I recognized that intro. So you must cross her paths... I love Molly Johnson....regularly thought I recognized that intro. So you must cross her paths regularly. I love Molly Johnson. Because you're both fantastic jazz singers. A conversation with Molly Johnson,

you will suddenly begin dropping F-bombs like never before. She's fascinating. I love that woman. We can't because I'm talking to Daniel Tiger's mom here. Although one of these episodes, I want Daniel Tiger's mom to lose her mind. Well, she lost it in that clip almost. She did.

Didn't she wreck his house or something? She did, yeah. But that was as upset as she got. Grr. Grr. One of these days,

I want her to just absolutely start going in on the gin and then losing her mind. Oh, that's funny. She's got the order of Canada, you know. She did. It's a big deal. Molly is a huge supporter of the community, of artists.

Molly is, when I started working on the new record that I'm still working on, Molly called me one day and had me on the phone for an hour and a half saying, you need to write more. You have a story to tell. You got to use your voice. You got to write more. Oh, she loves writing.

She loves writing. Well, that's one of the ones that she wrote. She wrote that, I think, with Stephen McKinnon. I believe. It left my heart. Yeah. And Stephen McKinnon, of course, is Colleen Allen's partner. Everyone's connected.

Everyone's connected. And that's Colleen playing sax on that track, I think. So I just asked her what she thought of some changes. Because at the time, I guess Garvia had just left and then there was no host. Is there a host of the morning show right now? No. Why would you want someone to give you information in the morning?

But somebody's getting that BBC News in there, right? Apparently there's a computer doing it. I have no idea. Since you've left, have you listened to your old station? No. Since I left the station, no, I haven't. After I left the morning show, I listened to Garvia as the host, and I listened to other shows, and some of my favorite shows

were shows like Danny's and Walter's. Do we know why Garvia was let go? Is it strictly because she was part of the collective? I haven't had enough beer yet to answer that question, Mike. It depends on who you ask. So I'll leave it at that. But I have my opinion on it.

You're doing a much better job than James B. Just because James B. was really frightened and was very careful and would say a tiny bit of like nothing and then would be

legitimately concerned he said too much. And then I'm trying to like... Oh, I mean, i know i know my partner is going to be listening to this going why did you say that you're not allowed to drink a beer when you're having an interview ever again um and and i mean all i can say i can qualify everything i'm saying with it's based on my opinion and it's based on my experience and i you know i i'm certainly not collecting uh paperwork to present a case or anything. I'm just saying this is my experience

and this is what I've been through. And I do have my opinion as to why Garvia was let go. I think... So Mark Wigmore? Mark Wigmore is gone too. Yeah, and he was part of the collective as well. He was not part of the collective. However, he did speak to the investigator.

I think he spoke to the... See, that's the thing. Some people spoke to the investigator, and some people were part of the collective. But were you ticked at people who did not become part of the collective? Like, why aren't you part of the collective if you're... I don't think I was ticked,

but I think I understand... You know what? He's coming on soon. I'll rough him up. Like, why the heck weren't you part of the collective? I like Mark a lot, and I think people have different... People have different things that they need to worry about in their lives. And you know what? He's coming on soon. I'll rough him up. I like Mark a lot. And I think people have different things that they need to worry about in their lives.

Some people hold on to their jobs because of various reasons. They have financial concerns. They have families to worry about. They have kids to raise. I'm never going to say to someone, you need to choose the same cause as me and you need to stand up as firmly for it. I can only be responsible for myself and say I didn't need to leave Jazz FM for anybody else. I left for myself. And I think anybody who came forward, any members of the collective, I appreciate it.

Everyone, Mike, has their own story with regard to this group of employees as well. Everyone has their own story. There are varying degrees of... There are some people that were very, very serious and there were some people that were fairly innocuous. But when you put it together, it paints a certain picture. And so, those people that were very, very serious, and there were some people that were fairly innocuous. But when you put it together, it paints a certain picture.

And so those people who came forward, I applaud their bravery, and it was brave in this day and age to come forward and tell their tales and their stories and talk to an investigator and go public with their stories. But go public, I mean talk to someone other than a husband, wife, or a mother or father or someone. So I'm not going to get other than a husband, wife, or a mother, or father or someone. So, I'm not going to get mad at anybody for not stepping forward,

but I certainly appreciate the people that did. Okay, how about this then? Yeah. So, following, because that was a bunch of people got let go in that wave. Correct. So, Danny's happened. He's like the first thing that, I don't know what happened with Danny, but that was earlier, and then we have this wave bunch of people.

First it was Danny. James B., for example. Yeah, it was Garvia first. Garvia after Danny. So Danny was let go. Garvia was let go while the investigation was happening. And when we found that out, we kind of went, whoa, wait a minute.

There's an investigation going on. Why is Garvia gone? And then there was a fundraising campaign, and after the campaign, James B., Walter Vanafro, Mark Wigmore, David Baskin, David Wall, Ralph Carter,

Billy Heaton, I'm sure I'm going to leave someone else, I said Walter, yeah, so there were probably seven or eight people that were fired right after the fundraising campaign. And they were let go in a mass crunch. Do you think, as the months progressed after that, that there was, you know, why is Heather still there?

Like, because she's part of the collective and she sees what's going on here. And here, she's still there. Yeah. Do you think there was some, even if they didn't say it to your face, that they were, you had a voodoo doll maybe? I don't know.

The other members of the collective, you mean? Sure. Do you think they wished that you would make a stand by maybe doing what you eventually did? Like they were hoping you'd do that? Yeah, some people probably did. No one ever said anything directly to me and said, you know, if you really were with us, you'd leave.

Other people said, well, you know what? You can fight from the inside and keep fighting the cause. And then some people, you know, I'm sure fight from the inside and keep fighting the cause. And then some people, I'm sure, didn't care one way or the other. But ultimately, I had a little bit of survivor's guilt, sure. You know, it was like the day that all the firings... That's a good word for it. Yeah, the day that all the firings happened,

I was in a session. I'll never forget it. I was recording a commercial for Ikea. And all of a sudden, I found out my phone went nuts and everybody was texting me like, oh my God, so-and-so's been fired. Everybody's been fired. And I walked into the station.

I barged into the station actually and just kind of said, what the hell is going on here, you know? And when the dust settled, I did have a little bit of survivor's guilt of like, oh my God, I'm still here. So is that when the wheels in your head, the wheels went in motion about like your exit strategy?

Because it wasn't, I mean, you exited. Was it December you exited? December 17th was my final day there. Yeah, I guess, I guess. No, no, because you know what? I did stay longer. I stayed, I wasn't thinking about when I was going to leave at that point in time.

I stayed as long as I could. And then when I felt that my work there was being affected by management decisions, in my opinion, that when I felt that was happening, that was when I thought, I got to go because I'm now getting angry and I'm feeling pushed out and I'm feeling threatened and I'm not feeling like I can contribute the best way that I think I can. So it's time for me to leave. That was how I felt. All right. Now let's move on to some nicer things.

Yay. You survived. So then on my second trip to Disneyland. How do you feel? It's not as bad as you thought it was going to be. You know what? I wasn't really worried. I knew people wanted to know because people do want to know what's going on. I still want to know more.

I know. And there's some things that I can say on the air and there's certain things I can say off the air, you know, because a lot of this is my opinion. It's anecdotal evidence too. It's stuff that I've been hearing from other people who work there, who worked there. And when you put the whole thing together, there are a lot of times I think like,

oh my God, I want to get a job with W5 now. Because I want to delve into things and I want to find out information. That's where Avery Haynes is there. I know. I had dinner with Avery the other night. Did you? I'm a big Avery fan.

She's been on the show. She is one of my favorite people, I have to say. I love her. She's got a genuine interest in people. She's got a genuine concern for people. She's got a way of asking questions of people. Excuse me, I've been wanting to do that for a while um and and and she's also ridiculously silly and fun and great she's one of my favorite

people i have to say see you never know i just dropped the name because you said w5 and i was thinking that's where avery is now and i talked to avery you know as a friend about everything that happened and you know and and it's funny like that. When I, as I was talking to her about all this, I said, now I know what you go through when you want to find out about a story.

When you want to find the information. You find a loose thread and you start pulling. Start pulling. And then, I mean, I'm kind of doing it myself. Slowly but surely,

we're building something here. We're building it from scratch. So, yes. And you've been very informative and helpful. And then I'm thinking as time goes on, people will say more and more. So I just have to have you on every couple of months.

You know what? Truly, I think one day the full story is going to come out. Yeah, but I want the story. I want the story. I know. I don't want to. I mean, I'll be happy to, but I'm going to read the whole story in the Globe and Mail.

That's what's going to happen. You want to break the story. It's fun to discover it yourself. That's what's going to happen. You want to break the story. I want to discover it. It's fun to discover it yourself. That's a lot of fun here. I know. But out of the ashes of the cluster F that is Jazz FM, there is this jazz-focused music service, an internet jazz-focused music service called JazzCast.

Yeah. Put JazzCast in all capitals, I noticed. This is an important style decision. Well... No? Yeah, I like it in all caps. Okay. I do.

Okay, I thought it had to be in all caps. That was in the style guide. I prefer it in all caps, and I think that's the branding of it is yes, all caps. Okay, because you need a style guide, you know that? You've got to be a big business here. So, you, Danny Elwell, Garvia Bailey, and Walter Vinafro have started JazzCast. Here's a listener. I don't know.

A listener, a tweeter tweeted at me. This is PhotoBlair. He says, we saw the mics being... I'm going to use his words and you correct them. We saw the mics being donated by Longman McQuaid. What's the status on the toilet? So tell us a bit about what photo blares referring to there. Well, Danny and I went to Longham Equate the other day.

They were not donated, no, but Longham Equate has been very helpful with regard to getting our equipment and whatnot. So we bought a bunch of mics. Can you tell me what kind of mics you bought? We bought, sure, the SM7Bs. Okay, yes. You know, they're kind of often referred to as podcast mics.

I looked at these, yes, when I made the decision to go with the Rode Procasters. Yeah. Yes, well, Shure makes good mics. Shure makes great, I mean, a lot of, as vocalists, the 58, the SM58 is the workhorse. It's the Bob Ganey of mics. The Bob Ganey, look at this reference.

Right? Because you're from Newfoundland, you got to root for the Habs. Is that how it works? No, I'm a Leafs fan. But Bob Ganey, he's a good Peterborough boy too. And he grew up across the street from my best friend's mom. So that's why I got to reference Bob Ganey. And my father always used to...

He was a great player. And dad always says, dude, he's a workhorse. Bob Ganey's a workhorse. That's what you need on your team is a workhorse. That's right. So yeah, the Shure mic is great. I use it at home when I have to do voice auditions and things like that. So what's going on with the toilet?

So the space where we are recording right now, or we will be recording, or broadcasting from, I should say, is a better way of putting it. Because it's live, right? Well, we'll get to that in a second. We'll get to that in a second. So the space doesn't have a bathroom. putting it um because it's live right well we'll get to the details we'll get to that so the the space doesn't have a bathroom and so one of the things we talked about in our if you go to our patreon page uh we talk about how we need practical things including a toilet so that was what blair

was referring referring to so the toilet is currently being uh installed blair but suffice it to say when we have long meetings as we did last night where you know four hour meetings suddenly everybody's going guys i gotta go i gotta leave so where do you go is there a communal toilet nearby go we all dispersed to various coffee houses okay yeah you need a toilet yeah uh it's funny because i now have uh i want to say externals but you're an external right so i have i always had guests but now i record other people's podcasts here so one of the when i started doing this was in september i invested in a new toilet. So that's a brand new toilet.

Nice. Very good. We can compare notes. I can see the model that you're using. Oh yeah, it's a beautiful toilet. But yeah,

so we did not, while Long & McQuaid has been very, very helpful to us, no, they did not donate, so don't go to Long & McQuaid and say,

well, you gave them free mics. No. No, it's funny. I actually approached Long & McQuaid when I started building my own studio six years ago.

I actually approached them to see if they wanted to do something where they gave a fantastic discount or free equipment in exchange for mentions on the show and a partnership with the show or whatever, and they politely declined or whatever. Well, who knows? I mean, I'm sure they get asked for that a lot, and I know that Long & McQuaid is a very big music organization.

They care very deeply about education and music. And Jack Long is a huge supporter of the jazz scene and of music education as well. So they may not want to focus their stuff. I'm spitballing. Oh, yeah. Well, I'm saying no one has to. Yeah, they were helpful to you, though, and that's important.

Yeah, so that's what's happening. So we have our mics, and we've got our space around Ossington and Queen. We expect to have full broadcasting going in March. Right now, there's a stream that's up, and that gives you an idea of the kinds of programs. That's recording, though. That's not live. It's not live. No, we've curated a bunch of tunes that are in the stream right now.

So if you go to jazzcast.ca and click on the listen button, that will take you to the player screen. On the top left-hand corner, you just click on that, and then you click on podcasts. And that will take you to the music stream. So there are various IDs from a bunch of artists. When I was down in New York last week, Wynton Marsalis and Steve Turay and Ben Patterson and a whole bunch of artists did IDs. Kurt Elling did a bunch of IDs. You should get an ID from Molly Johnson. We will get an ID from Molly Johnson.

Molly will. Hi, this is Molly Johnson. I love you, Molly. Did you ever perform at the Kensington Market Jazz Festival? Oh, yeah. Absolutely, a few times. And probably we'll be doing it again this year.

It's fun. Have you been down there? You know what? I only learned it existed in August when Molly told me and then I didn't get down there and I do love the spirit of this event. Yeah.

You got to come down because it's a good hang. And the beautiful thing about it is everybody's playing at all these venues. So, you know, you'll be walking up the street and you'll run into Lornell Lewis.

Hey, where are you playing? And you're all chasing each other at various gigs. Okay, I got to go to this set and then I'm going to come see you. You know, so it's... It at various gigs. And okay, I gotta go to this set and then I'm gonna come see you. And you know, so it's- It sounds very cool. It's very cool.

And I applaud Molly for what she's doing with it. And also for her desire to continuously improve it. Like she'll, the first thing they do when it's, and there's a team, there's Molly and Celine Peterson and Geneviève Marentette and Ori Dagan and some other volunteers. And the first thing they do when the festival is over

is they reach out to everybody and say, okay, tell us what worked and tell us what didn't work. And they will try their best to improve it. Did you ever listen to Molly Johnson's appearance on Toronto Mike? I did. Yes, I did. Do you have any feedback or reaction

that you'd like to share before we move on to the the return to the jazz cast? You know, Molly is honest. You can never, ever say that Molly doesn't wear her heart on her sleeve. She's refreshingly honest in this world of curated PR

spiel and polish. Yeah, and I know she was a little crunchy. Is there a Newfoundland expression for that crooked as sin crooked as crooked as sin i know she was crooked as sin when she showed up and you wanted to smack the face off her i uh did consider it but i would never i would never but no i mean the one thing i will say about mo like yeah i did i listened to that show and she she had a lot to say about a lot of stuff and that's molly she's got a lot to say about a lot of stuff she's got an opinion a lot of stuff. And that's Molly. She's got a lot to say about a lot of stuff. She's got an opinion on a lot of things.

And I think, you know, she's also worked in a lot of areas and has done a lot for the community and for musicians as a whole. And, you know, whether you like her style or not, you've got to respect what she does. Well, they just had that Gary Lowe tribute at the Danforth Music Hall. And, Excuse me. Is that Molly calling? It's Molly.

She wants a redo. I'm considering it. Tell Bambrick to stop calling me cruckus. Do you think she's veggie or meat? Would you guess? Oh, God. I'd say Molly's meat for sure. She's a carnivore.

I think Molly clamps down on a leg. I think she took a bite out of me on that infamous afternoon. Okay. I just was curious if you heard that Molly, because I know, you know, Molly. Yeah.

Molly. And I mean, I did. And I, and I also listened to it as, you know, through the ears of, of,

of someone who knows Molly, you know, and I'm kind of going, oh yeah, yeah. She's a little crusty there. Okay. And then,

and then you hear her, you hear her warming up throughout the episode. I, okay. I thought I had her warmed up and then it went far worse than it had gone at the beginning. It was bad start.

It was rocky start and it was tough. And then it warmed up and I thought, okay, we're back. Especially because speaking of Gary Lowe, we were talking about, what's the, I'm getting used to it. What's the band I'm thinking of? Aldo?

Aldomoto? No, no, no. Oh, you weren't talking about Marty Johnson. Oh, Big Sugar. Big Sugar. What the hell is a band I'm thinking of?

So the Big Sugar part, I said, oh, I got her back. I had this like, oh, she's back now. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. I felt she was back. And then she snapped at me for something else.

And then I told her, I tried to reset it like, okay, you don't want to be here. Like, we can just call it, or whatever, and then, then I think I made the reference, I know I made the reference,

that I was getting a diva-like vibe from her, and then that was it, like, it triggered something, and then I was like, oh, no, but then it did warm up,

and she gave me a hug, and, oh, yeah, you know what, it's funny, having done interviews on the morning show, when I was doing it,

you can always tell when you've got someone who doesn't want to be there, you know, and you're like, oh, man, And you're like, oh man, what do I do? How do I do it? You could probably do like two to seven minutes or something. That was all we could do. We could do max ten. I mean, I was horrible because being from Newfoundland,

I wanted to talk to everybody for ages. I can imagine. So 20 minutes you'd have, Danny would be going, wrap it up. And I'm going, listen, and another thing now. So yeah, ours were never that long. So if you had a Molly Johnson

on your show there at the Jazz FM, and if all she wanted to do was talk about Kensington Jazz Festival, that's fine because that's all we had time for.

Let's talk about that and you can do two to seven minutes on that. She got what she wanted. She's happy. You got what you wanted. You're happy. Everyone's happy. The problem is I wanted. You're happy. Everyone's happy. The problem

is I wanted more from her and I don't think she was in the mood. You remember that famous interview with the guy who isn't often named on radio anymore. Gian Gomeschi. There you go. There he is. For Tyler Stewart. Yeah, for Tyler Stewart.

Super Dave Osborne was on the queue when Gian was there and uh he he talked about how tyler was driving him around when he was doing the super dave osborne show so i actually played gian gomeshi on this show a couple of episodes ago but yeah billy bob thornton you're talking about that's the one right and when you have to deal with someone like that i i god bless a mark murphy jazz singer who passed away a few years ago i interviewed him just before he passed and he uh you know there was some i, I don't know if it's dementia or if it was an Alzheimer's situation, but there was some obvious confusion. Now, again, it's easy. It's eight minutes, right? And you can get it down to

five if you have to. But I asked him every, Mike, I swear to God, every question I asked him, he answered a completely different question. Oh, that's kind of sad. Right? And then you're kind of going, all right, what do I do here? Yeah, how do you save this person? Right? So then you kind of, my thing was like, I'm going to go along the ride with you because obviously you're not on the same train that I'm on,

so I'm going to try to hop on your train. Right. But it's, again, like you say, it's a shorter interview. So when you have someone who, yeah, you got to do a longer thing with them. It's a little bit different. But I think that's the, Molly, you get Molly whether, you know, whether you want her this way or not, you get her.

And that's the way she is. With regards to JazzCast. Yeah. What role is Marie Slate playing? She's a fan of what we're doing. Just a fan? Like, is she at all, I mean, is she helping to finance these costs at all? Well, we've got a bunch of people

who are helping to do that through Patreon. So, yeah. I mean, Marie has come on board through Patreon as well. And I don't want to give any other names out because people are doing this out of the goodness of their hearts. But the only reason I felt I could talk about Marie is because she's mentioned on our site. She's mentioned on your site.

She is. So she was, yes. I think it's safe to her is because she's mentioned on our site. She's mentioned on your site. She is. So she was, yes. I think it's safe to say that she is a supporter of the station. And I say station because we are like an internet radio station. We want to have 24-7 broadcasting. We're going to have podcasts. We're going to have streaming. We're going to have live broadcasts.

We're going to have interview segments. We're going to have it all. So she has, yeah, she's helped out a little bit at the beginning and is a supporter and believes in what we're doing and is very, very much a big cheerleader for us. Can you introduce her to Toronto Mike to the podcast? You know what? Marie and Molly Johnson are very, very similar.

You get what you get. There's 100% honesty there. She can come on the show if she becomes a patron. If you got your bleep button there. You can say what you want. I was going to say clusterfuck. I didn't know because you're on a kid's show. I didn't know if you wanted it.

Honestly, normally with you, I'd be, yeah. I would have called it a clusterfuck. But then I was like, I don't know because there's a whole... Not that the kids are listening to this, that watch Tiger, Daniel Tiger, but I didn't know. Yeah, there's that thing.

I don't swear on the Splashin' Boots. I try not to swear on the Splashin' Boots, because I think maybe... Whereas they're a foul mouth. Right. They probably are. They probably are, but I'm thinking, like, someone's gonna have a kid in the car listening or something, because that kid loves Splashy Boots. I didn't want to mess it up that way.

That's really respectful of you, though. That's really nice. I'm a father. I'm always thinking of these. Make it easier for the parents. That's why I said Cluster F instead of Cluster Fuck. You are the S. I'm glad you're sitting down, Heather, because I'm going to run this scenario by you.

All right. Work with me here. I'm glad you're sitting down, Heather, because I'm going to run this scenario by you. All right. Okay. Now work with me here. Okay. I'm with you. So Marie Slate, clearly she's a lover of jazz and was a proud, happy, she helped, well, she was a donor, I guess, for Jazz FM.

And through this situation, she's no longer a donor of Jazz FM, maybe? I don't know what her arrangement is with Jazz FM. I'm not really sure. Do you think maybe this JazzCast could be, the idea could be to add people, build up JazzCast, which you're doing now, which is fantastic,

and then at some point, until basically the board of directors at 91.1 just turn JazzCast into Jazz FM? Oh, will they try to buy us out kind of thing? until basically the board of directors at 91.1 just turned JazzCast into JazzFM. Oh, will they try to buy us out kind of thing? Yeah, like JazzCast is the new JazzFM, but you build it as JazzCast because you don't have control over JazzFM. And then at some point,

Marie Slate gets the board of directors to just make JazzCast JazzFM. And now JazzFM is back to where it should be. Oh God, wouldn't that be hilarious? What do you think of that one? Well, I don't know, man. I don't know. I think JazzCast has to live it should be. Oh, God. Wouldn't that be hilarious? What do you think of that one? Well, I don't know, man. I don't know. I think JazzCast has to live on its own.

The beauty of JazzCast is that we don't have to, we're not regulated by the CRTC. As you know, right? Operating a podcast. There are no rules and regulations other than those you set on yourself. So the nice thing about JazzCast

is that we are centered in Toronto, but we are international. We have a show coming from New Orleans. We have shows based in New York. We are a show based in New York. We have a show based in Toronto, a show based in Montreal, a show based in Vancouver.

Um, we're going to have shows from all over and I'm probably saying too much because they haven't been announced yet, but, but we did. Well, you're teasing. I'm teasing.

I said, we said in our press release, we said from, you know, from, from Toronto to, to Ethiopia. And that's what we want to truly be international.

And I was talking to someone about this the other day. Like, because of technology, the community, like the jazz community in Toronto is what it is, and Community Montreal is, Vancouver is. Whereas technology allows each of these communities to be a little closer. So we want to make our global community a little more accessible so while we are based in toronto and we want a big push on the toronto community we also want to share with toronto audiences what is happening in vancouver what's happening in montreal what's happening in chicago what's happening in berlin but i have like so when it comes to things like the kensington market jazz festival or the beaches one that uh yeah bill king was telling me all about. There's so many jazz festivals. But can you keep it local and still appeal?

Yes. So that's the goal, find a balance there. It is. That's the goal, and that happens with the programming, and that happens with how you do a show. So if someone wants to hear a show that is based in Toronto, my show will be based in Toronto, but I will get international artists in and that sort of thing.

So if someone wants to hear Heather talking about singers with other singers while they're all sipping something, you know, they're going to listen to Sip Happens. Well, yeah, let's be specific. What specifically is your contribution going to be on air? I know you're a founder and you're doing a lot of work behind the scenes, but in terms of on air, what are you going to do? Do you watch the Graham Norton show?

No. Okay, so the Graham Norton show is on BBC, and Graham Norton is an Irish comedian, and he does a talk show with celebrities, and they all literally drink on the air and because of that, the inhibitions go away and it's goofy and silly and fun. What I want to do is...

Does Graham have a toilet? Because you're going to need a toilet if you're going to do this, for sure. Exactly. FYI. My show will not happen until the toilet is in place, that's for sure. But I want to invite other... We're going to start with singers. We're eventually going to open up to musicians

and you know when you sit around in your basement as a kid and you say hey man listen to this and everybody would play tunes and you talk about them that's what I want my show to be and that's what it will be so it's called Sip Happens we're going to enjoy a couple of cocktails we're going to listen to music and I'm going to talk to other singers about singers

and then I'll talk to other musicians about musicians, like instrumentalists about instrumentalists. So that's what I'll talk to other musicians about musicians, like instrumentalists about instrumentalists. So that's what I'm going to do. No, I'm all in. Like this is right up my alley. In fact, this almost reminds me of Kick Out the Jams episodes of Toronto Mic'd

where like Biff Naked's coming over Monday. Yep. Biff Naked comes over Monday and we're going to play her 10 favorite songs of all time and she's going to tell us why she loves those songs.

Yeah. This sounds fantastic. Yeah. So that's the kind of show that I want to do and I'm also, because I moved to Toronto. Sip happens.

Sip happens. I moved to Toronto to go to school. All of my music education comes from a classroom and I'm all about quality music education so I will be doing and I'm all about quality music education. So I will be doing an educationally-based show as well.

Right, because you've served as a faculty member at both the University of Toronto and Humber College. Yeah. Did you know that, Heather? I did know that, Mike. I was right around the corner from you again. So, yeah, so I want to do something to focus on the, not only, but we're not only going to do about the students. We're going to focus on some of the teachers and the programs as well

and talk about what the schools are doing because jazz as an art form now is institutionalized. So there's a different way of learning it. You're not learning it by listening to that crazy trumpet player on the bandstand. Let me tell you a little bit about what I was doing. You're learning it from whatever, Air Training 101. So we're going to do an educationally based show as well.

So I'm looking forward to doing that as well. It'll be fun to be back on the air again. Yeah, no, this is amazing. And you said March for launch? We're looking at March. We were talking about February, but there are practicalities. We're really doing this from the ground up. We're starting the infrastructure ourselves completely

and getting the programming together ourselves. It's really interesting to watch it organically grow. Well, it's like you. This is what we talked about before we got on the air. It's kind of what you're doing. Growing something organically. And now this is what? Episode 423 or something? Yeah.

So you build it and hope that people will come. And as I said, you have been a bit of a model for us to look at. Anytime you want me to come to one of your meetings as a guest speaker, invite me. I'll bike over. Done. Happy to do it.

Perfect. So yeah, it's fun growing it. And we do have the ability to dream. The sky's the limit, and we do have a lot of big dreams for it. So we're really hoping people will jump on board. If you go to jazzcast.ca right now that's where you can find it so that's the teaser the teaser podcast stuff is there now to get a feel for it but the live streams it will be the same like

what's i guess you don't get too geeky here but what's the tech behind the live stream in march is that is that all uh i'm a singer'm a singer. I regret asking that question. I mean, people we're working on all of that now to make it as accessible as possible. So for people who are if you're used to podcasting, you're used to streaming stuff, it's a no-brainer. But for people who are used to terrestrial radio, they have

to get their heads around it a different way of listening. Of course. If you're used to just turning the knob on your terrestrial radio and there it is, well, then you have a little tiny, slight learning curve, I would say, but far less than it was even two years ago.

Like I've been watching this too. Most people know how to stream or podcast. Exactly. And it's also different, even if you're just used to listening to a particular podcast. You know, I listen to the weekly podcast of, insert name here.

It's even going to be different from that because it's not just podcast. It's going to be, there will be episodes, there will be podcasts, but there will be full-on radio broadcasting. So your hope, I suppose, is that all these jazz fans that are used to tuning into Jazz FM will find that there's a better

alternative in jazz cast and will simply change their allegiance to jazz cast. This is the goal. Our hope is that people everywhere you know we do want to make it international we do want to get people from all over the world and um and our hope is that people are going to see that there yeah there are alternatives but that people things can live mutually exclusive of one another as well but this is key the personalities that those people loved on Jazz FM can now be found

on JazzCast. Like, it's not just jazz music, it's your personalities that are the differentiators. for sure. I mean, there are still,

you know, I still love my guys who are still on the air at Jazz FM. I give shouts and love out to, you know, Brad Barker

and Terry McElligot and John Devenish and Glenn Woodcock and, you know, I mean, I love the guys that are still there and people listen to them still to Woodcock. And, you know, I mean, I love the guys that are still there

and people listen to them still to this day. But at the same time, people who miss me or Garvia or Danny or Walter and who also want to discover other voices, like Rich Brown or Chris Butcher or some other names that are going to be coming up very, very... Or Brendan Canning from Broken Social Scene, you know, and other names that we're going to be announcing soon, that people are going to be coming up very, very, or Brendan Canning from Broken Social Scene, you know, and other names that we're going to be announcing soon, that people are going to discover their

concepts and their perspectives as well. So the goal is, yes, we will get lots of listeners and that everybody will donate to our Patreon page, which is available on our website as well. Okay, so give us the website again. It's jazzcast.ca jazzcast.ca

Yeah. Amazing. I'm going to be tuning in, and I'll be watching you guys progress. I follow you on all the social channels, and I see the growth. I see the microphones being purchased. I can't wait to hear that you have a toilet, because I don't know your... We are going to post so many pictures of that damn toilet not being used. We'll post it just on its own. Do you have the plumbing infrastructure or is it just

the toilet you need? Do we need plumbing? Do we need that? I think so. Really, you just need a tube or something, right? It's connected to the bar. Why don't you just invest in diapers? Cheaper. Jazzcast, brought to you by Pampers. Yes, we have

I don't want to, because he's very shy, but we have someone who is excellent at helping with that side of things, and he is building us a bathroom, and he knows who he is, and we love him, and he is our savior when it comes to that stuff. Amazing. Heather, this was

a great thrill. I can't believe I got chocolate out of it, and rum, and I got screech, and I got a out of it. And rum. And I got screech. Yeah. And I got a CD. And you got pasta. And you got beer. And like we're so happy. And I'm so glad I finally got to meet you. And I'll see you again. That's for sure. I will say this from the bottom of my heart. I'm so

honored to be a part of this because I look at who you've had on the past, who you have coming up. It is a true thrill and an honor to be here. And I appreciate you inviting me. And kudos to you, sir, because Mike, this is such an amazing thing you're doing, and we, as part of the community, are grateful to you for doing it. So thank you.

Aw, shucks. And that brings us to the end of our 423rd show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at TorontoMike. Heather, give yours, and then give the JazzCast one for Twitter. And you can do Instagram, too, whatever you like. Absolutely. Well, I'm at heatherbanbrick.ca. And you can do Instagram too, whatever you like. Absolutely.

Well, I'm at heatherbambrick.ca. All of my social is there, heatherbambrick.ca. Proud Canadian with the.ca. Right. And jazzcast.ca is how you can find us. All of our social is on JazzCast, and all of my social is on my website. So please come on board, follow me, follow us, and join the family. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery are at Great Lakes Beer.

Propertyinthe6.com is at Raptors Devotee. That was a tough game last night. Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. Fast Time Watch and Jewelry Repair is... I've lost my spot. This is terribly tragic.

They're somewhere. What is their handle? Fast Time WJR and PayTM is at PayTM Canada. See you all next week when Biff Naked kicks out the jams. Well, I've been told that there's a sucker born every day. But I wonder who?

Yeah, I wonder who? Maybe the one who doesn't realize But I wonder who, yeah, I wonder who Maybe the one who doesn't realize There's a thousand shades of gray Cause I know that's true, yes I do I know it's true, yeah