Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Lost Canadian Country: Toronto Mike'd #1417

Episode Date: January 25, 2024

In this 1417th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with Sean Burns about obscure and lost Canadian country musicians and songs that are underappreciated. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, The Advantaged Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada and Electronic Products Recycling Association.

Welcome to episode 1417 of Toronto Miked,ly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery. A fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. Palma Pasta Enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. RecycleMyElectronics.ca Committing to our planet's future means properly recycling our electronics of the past. The Advantage'd Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada, valuable perspective for Canadian investors who want to remain knowledgeable,

informed and focused on long-term success, and Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. Today, to help me dive deep into the history of country music in Canada, it's Sean Burns. Welcome, Sean. Thank you. It's good to be here. Where do we find you in the country today, Sean? Where are you? Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. On my list of great Canadian cities I've yet to visit, but will absolutely get there at some point. What's the weather like there today? It's unseasonably warm.

It's like minus five or something and should be minus 35. Truly, truly. Yeah, it's punishing. Punishing. They call it a winter peg for a reason, right? Absolutely. Yeah, it's a gritty city, but it's like, you know, it's a good city. We've got all the amenities that all the other, you know, biggest cities have, but it still feels kind of small. I think maybe a lot of people, there's the only city in the province,

so everyone kind of congregates here. So it still has like a rural thing. People are truly a lot friendlier than they are where you are. Okay, well, look, you're selling me on my visit. I think Winnipeg, big enough to have an NHL team, exactly, but small enough to feel, you don't feel that big city indifference and chill pun intended. Yeah, and I think that you know we're the butt butt of so many jokes here that you know, the people kind of wear that as a badge and And they do their thing and maybe it's like, you know, they don't want people to know how great it is here I mean, I'm not I grew up in Oshawa like in Southern Ontario dirty schwa. Okay, you're a local boy almost. Okay I didn't know that.

Yeah. So what brought you to Winnipeg? Yeah, I was on the road and I met the gal that became my wife. Okay, that'll do it. Okay. So actually, yeah, there's a handful of us here that found ourselves in that exact position.

Okay, so love brought you to Winnipeg and a shout out to the weaker thans. Absolutely, yeah. And their love for the city. And also while I'm shouting out people and then I'll set up this episode for everybody, but I want to shout out the Watchmen, dear friends of this program, the Watchmen, proud Winnipeggers. Yeah. Yeah. It's a thriving scene here truly and it has been for many years.

Amazing. Amazing. I'm glad you're here. I'm glad you carved out some time for me so you could make your Toronto mic debut. Let me set up this episode like this, Sean. Okay, so let me disclose to you and the listenership my country music history. It's not going to take very long. Okay, so in the early 80s, my mother had Kenny Rogers' Greatest Hits. It's the one that had Lady on it from Lionel Richie there And my mom just played that album over and over again. So I have like Kenny Rogers. This is greatest hits Embedded on in my cranium. And then of course as a teenager

I loved the simpsons and I Loved the lyrlene lumpkin episode, you know this episode of the simpsons. Of course, of course. Yeah. Yeah Uh and Beverly D'Angelo I I think, does the voice of Lurleen. But I like the music in there. Like, I know it's, they're doing a little bit of a parody of like, like the Colonel and Elvis and everything. But I legit will tell you now, I love the music in that Lurleen Lumpkin episode.

She finally bagged herself a Homer. And I love it when like she's being all subtle and then Homer of course doesn't get it. He's like, yeah bunk with me tonight. I'm asking you and bunk with me bunk with me tonight and then he clues in. Okay. So yeah. And then I'm going to throw in the mix here. I'm going to throw in. I was a huge Dukes of Hazard fan and I love the theme song for Dukes of Hazard and I think that was Wayland Jennings, but that's it. So, okay, so you're here. A little more background here. I'm gonna hear more of your voice in a moment here, but I'm just gonna set it up also to say that just, I don't know when this was a couple of years ago, I had this sub-series of Toronto Mike called

Progressive Past of Modern Melodies, and Cam Gordon and Brother Bill would join me and we'd dive deep into a topic with a subject matter expert. And just before we shuttered PPMM episodes, I had this itch to learn more about the origin in history of country music in this country. And that kind of brings us up to speed.

Mr. Burns, can I call you Mr. Burns? Oh yeah, absolutely. Whatever you want, whatever you want. Okay, so let's start by establishing you, let's establish you as an expert, even though that might make you uncomfortable. You're my subject matter expert. We're gonna dive into the history of country music

in this country. But tell me, I've learned so much about you. You host a radio show, you have a podcast, Lost Country. I've been on my YouTube music. I've been streaming the songs from Lost Country. The mic is yours. Tell us a bit more about Sean Burns. My sort of interest and knowledge stems from my father, who was a musician from, you know, he started making a living playing music in 1976 and he did that until he passed away, like until the last few years of his life he died in 2017. And he was a passionate country music fan and in Toronto through the 60s and 70s and into the 80s still there was really booming infrastructure for country music. Six-nighters, it was Monday to Saturday,

and then sometimes the bands would have an after hours gig, like at the Matador on Friday and Saturday night. You'd be doing Saturday matinees, you get a lot of stage time and there was a lot of opportunity to play. So there was great musicians playing all the time and there was subpar musicians playing all the time. It was really a scale of like an A, B, C room.

The pay would be reflected, the quality of the musicianship would be reflected. So he was in his 10, 12 years old when he started really playing guitar. In those days, the Sundays, a lot of the time in Southern Ontario from a lot of the fellows that I interviewed on the podcast of mine, they would do these Sunday jamborees, which would be, you know, family shows. And sometimes it'd be

aired on the radio, sometimes television. So like, trying to paint the picture of great infrastructure for country music, country music was, you know, widely popular in North America in this era. So there's a lot of people playing. So my dad got on stage when he was 11 years old to play with a band that, you know, 10 10 years later he was on stage with the same same bass player you know. So he had records he had a lot of information and when I you know began being interested in country music at about 14 years old he was he was thrilled and he had a lot of you know things to tell me and kind of guided me and then as you know I got older I kind of kind of guided me. And then as I got older,

I kind of found my own things that I liked. But it all started with a guy named Roy Payne for me. And two names that come up a lot in my podcast, The Northern Report and On the Record and in all of my conversations are Roy Payne and Mickey McGivern. And Roy Payne came from Newfoundland to Toronto in the 60s and he was like a well-documented wild man and he was a fantastic songwriter. But a bit of a wild card, like could never really catch on in the mainstream or with a bigger label because it was also, you know, acceptable to be a bad alcoholic, you know, or really leaning into that sort of lifestyle.

It was not uncommon, you know. You're playing in bars six nights a week. There's people there on a Monday night. There's nothing to do. There's no VCRs. There's no TV, right? It's music and it's the clubs. So Roy Payne was a great songwriter and his second record called Roy Payne number two came out in 1970 and Mickey McGivern was the guitar player. Mickey McGivern played on over 350 records, mostly for ARC records out of Toronto, but also with Paragon and Marathon. And Mickey McGivern was my dad's guitar hero when he was 12 years old, and he had that record. And then by 1977, my dad was playing with Roy Payne for the better part of that year. But it was Mickey, so my

dad was real hot on this record, and a friend of his who became a good friend of mine, uh, his father from Nova Scotia, he moved to Toronto and, uh, Roy Payne and Dick Nolan were good pals, Newfoundlanders. So they were playing around. So the, you know, my, my buddy's dad was friends with Dick Nolan. So there's all these little connections, right? But Mickey played guitar on that Roy Payne record, which is a fantastic record. And in those days on those, I'm just rambling by the way Mike you know that you can cut me off if you

need to but I can go for a while. I will I see I'm taking little notes on questions I have but I'll let you you know when you take your breath I'll chime in but keep keep rocking. Okay all those records by these regional local acts some of them would have songs that they've written themselves but also that the hits of the day you're selling these records at drug stores and department stores, right? And sometimes offstage, but Roy Payne would always have cuts of his own on his records. So he was a great writer. Mickey played guitar and that record is really what what got me real into digging around into who else was around in those days. And some of those records, most of them don't list the

musicians, they don't list the songwriters. So it's a real archaeological dig that I spent a lot of time on. And that's what turned into this record. But it all starts with Roy Payne and Mickey Mcgibber. Roy Payne. And Newfoundland's Roy Payne. Now, so I have been listening to Lost Country. So I'm going to need a little spiel on exactly what lost country is for the listeners. But before you dive into lost country, I know you covered a song by Roy Payne. Like I look at the credits in YouTube and I see written by Roy Payne. So I Google Roy Payne. Okay. There's like a few different Roy Paynes on Wikipedia, none of which are a Canadian country musician named Roy Payne. So I did find an interesting bio on

Roy Payne on some Canadian country website, which I'm glad I found that. But Roy Payne doesn't even have a Wikipedia page. It's just interesting how these are truly lost country stars in this country. So maybe give us a little idea what lost country is, and then I'm going to kind of bring you back to some names I know and then then again I'm gonna learn more about people like Mickey McGivern and Roy Payne. I'm ready to be educated. Lost Country was the name of a band that my dad started in the late 70s with a friend of his, harmonica player named Lance Bennett and they toured Canada for about 50 weeks and never got rebooked in any venue

that they played. They were there to play music, they weren't really there to entertain and they were working on parts and working on music and they were young, rowdy men causing trouble. So the name of the band was Lost Country. So when I sort of landed on the group that I've got now of musicians in Winnipeg, like really great players, I called the band Lost Country as a little nod. And so we've been operating as Sean Burns and Lost Country for six, seven years now. And I wanted to make this record of these sort of fringe, local legends, regional stars of Canada's honky tonk past.

And it's true, they're lost. There's a couple of names that would be familiar with Canadian country music fans like Harold McIntyre or Dick Dameron. But for the most part, you know, these are lost. And so it really made sense to me to call the record Lost Country because that's just what it is. And the cover of Lost Country is a great photo of Yonge Street in the 60s. Yeah, like I think 1965-ish, and I got it on the website, the Toronto Archives, but I'm pretty sure a fella named Larry Delaney

took that photo, and Larry started a magazine called Country Music News, I think in the 80s, and he's very active on Facebook, posting old photos every day, and I mean, like, he's got a deep well. But that's just a great photo of the Edison Hotel, which was Canada's home of country music through the 60s. And Mickey McGivern and the Mustangs, his band, were the house band there.

And they backed up, you know, Waylon Jennings and Johnny Paycheck, all the big stars from Nashville and Waylon, or sorry, Johnny Paycheck and Mickey formed a deep friendship and wrote a song together that was a hit for paycheck and so you know, and paycheck was a maniac and him and Mickey were good friends so if that tells you anything about what was going on in those days. Well like Sean, seriously, hook this to my veins because I know nothing about this and I'm coming in cold and you know so much about this and I'm just like a sponge right now so I had no idea about you know Toronto's country music past. I will just ask you a couple specific questions as I'm I'm still establishing you as the subject matter expert here

but yeah Lost Country, your dad, this is all great but tell me what Boots and Saddle, this is a radio show dedicated to classic Canadian country that you hosted. Boots and Saddle started, jeez, probably 15 years ago. An older fella started it and he passed away and then he moved it on to another host, a guy named Tim Brandt who did the show for a couple years and then there was a guy named Sheldon Burney who hosted for a few years. He's an author and he's a musician and I was a guest on the show a couple times just roll in with some records and chat about country music and then when he was leaving, I was

ripe to take over. And I had fancied myself to be, you know, Mr. Country Music at that point, which is comical now because the change in these last six or seven years has been drastic due to the research, to digging around and the interest in the Canadian stuff especially. So I hosted Boots and Saddle from December 2016 to May 2022. And yeah, 2022. And it was on every Tuesday at a highly coveted time slot of 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. on campus and community radio. Okay. CKUW.

Yeah. Yeah. CKUW 95.9 FM downtown Winnipeg University of Winnipeg. Great station. And man, it was it, you know know it established me more in the community and I met a lot of folks like a ton of people in the United States and Canada making country music and my ear was to the ground like heavily and and I had to step away you know we had a my daughter was born that year and I got the job with Cor Blund and that's a full-time job. So tell us about the job of Corb Lund.

There's a name listeners will know. Corby had the same bass player for over 20 years and it was time to go. He didn't want to be on the road. It's a very demanding schedule. And my good friend Grant Siemens, who plays guitar on all my records since 2018, he's been in Corb's band for 21 years.

And Corby was looking for a bass player and he asked around some friends and Grant suggested me and Corb laughed because we know each other I've opened for him and we hung out he didn't know that I was originally a bass player he's like you just want your friend to be in the band and Grant's like no no no he's the guy he's the guy so a few of us tried out for the gig and I think I just did the most homework and then I got the job and it's been it's been great he's fantastic to work for and it's what I've always wanted. You're held accountable for every note, for every move.

It's serious business and that's why he is where he is. He's all in on the career. It's great to work for him. And when you're not playing bass for Korb, you're still hosting the Northern Report podcast. Yeah, as much as I can. And I got to get to it here in the next month or so before we hit the road. But the Northern Report was a vehicle for me to find Roy Payne and interview him, which I've been unsuccessful in. But I've interviewed some Canadian country music hall of famers and some people that were real legends

like Joyce Smith and Marie Battrell and Brent Williams, Al Hooper, Paul Weber. And then I've also interviewed some folks that are outside of country music that I'm interested in, like Jerry LeGere from Toronto, songwriters were my faves. Okay, we have that in common because he's an FOTM. We are now an FOTM, friend of Toronto Mike,

and Jerry was here like a month ago. Yeah, he's he's one of my favorites and slow leaves Grant Davidson from here in Winnipeg and Paul Langlois from the Tragically Hip interviewed him recently. OK, he's also been here in the last couple of months. So that's two now. Two now. Yeah.

So it's it means for me, it was like I was trying to find people that knew Roy Payne and Mickey McGivern. And then and then it was, I've tried to interview everyone that I covered on the record too, like Barry Smith and Scotty Campbell. And so it's been fun. And there's some people that I wanna do again.

There's some people here in Winnipeg that I need to interview. It's just, you know, it's like, man, it's prepping for these is not, if you wanna do it right, it takes time. And also, your experience, what I've experienced is you have a conversation with somebody and then they tell you about somebody you're kind of, you learn about somebody else and then you realize, oh, I need to talk to that person now. Like it's this web that

just sort of grows. And then next thing you know what, you're a subject matter expert. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I can accept that. Okay. So let me, let me, okay. So we've established now, I've got the right guy for this very important responsibility, which is tell Mike there was a something before Stomp and Tom. Okay, so I'm going to drop you a name, even a casual, like I mentioned my history with country music, but even I know this name from just from the history books, or maybe even from the Elvis biopic or whatever, but can you please tell me about Hank Snow and maybe Wilf Carter and just what can you tell me about like the early popular,

because I know you're big on the obscure country artists, but let's start with some of the popular Canadian country musicians kind of there at the origin. Honestly, not a lot. I know you know of course familiar with Hank Snow and you can find Hank Snow records Everywhere in thrift stores now by the dozen you know and of course I got a few and I got some Wolf Carter records but you know Hank Snow was charming and talented and smart enough to move to the United States to really build a career. And yeah, honestly, not a ton of stuff on those cats, other than of course respect. But yeah, that stuff never

moved me as much as the real kind of biting sort of gritty honky tonk bar room stuff, you know? Right. The Lurleen Lumpkins of Canada. Yeah, like, you know, Buck Owens was my first country music hero when I was 14 years old and those guys were playing in loud bars in Bakersfield with drunk oil rigors and people fighting and they had to get loud over top of the chaos. So you got a loud telecaster and a loud vocal and that's reflected in those Buckaroo's records from the mid-60s. It's the finest honky tonk music ever for me and the greatest band.

And Buck was a bit of a tyrant in the studio and you had to perform and the band was great. So that's kind of where it comes from for me. And then to find out that, you know, you could be in Toronto any night of the week for this 25 year spell and see bands in that vein. Some of them, honestly, almost equally as good, like Mickey McGivern and the Mustangs were as hot a country band as there was,

and they were just playing at the Edison Hotel six nights a week for years, you know? And now live from the Edison Hotel six nights a week for years, you know? And now live from the Edison Hotel in the heart of downtown Toronto, Arc Records presents Mickey McGivern and the Mustangs. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Canada's home of country music right here in the middle of Toronto. The famous Edison Hotel, Mickey McGivern and all the Mustangs featuring Billy Adams and Loretta Dew and special guest stars from Nashville, Tennessee,

King of the Global Guitar, Chuck Jackson, along with Darlin' Darlene and Warren Robb. What a swinging way to go. Hey, that's a good idea. ["Hangin' Round"] What I love don't want me hangin' round All she does is put me up and put me down Tonight she's with a stranger at a party in her home And I'm here in the Edison getting stoned And I'm gonna go, I'll go down swinging

Where there's lights and laughter, fools and bums, lots of sad, sad singing. I'll sober up tomorrow and cry all day, I know. At least I'll go down swinging the girls and buy them wine Lay the jukebox, kill em down, my last dime. She thinks she made a fool of me, by loving someone else. She should see me make a fool out of myself. How do I gotta go? I'll go? I'll go down swinging

Where there's lights and laughter, Boobs and bums, Lots of sad, sad singing I'll sober up tomorrow And cry all day, I know At least I'll go down swinging For the swinging way to go So why, why so obscure for these tremendous country music artists in our early in this country's country music history?

Why are they so obscure, these names? I think it's because you could just make a living playing music. And it was not even about the glory of, on the Opry or being on the Wheeling West Virginia Jamboree, even though a lot of guys in Ontario did that. You could go to work six nights a week and make a middle class living. You could go home and you could have a family. If you were not drinking all night long, you could be present in the daytime and then go to work at night.

And sure, there would be some accolades and you would be Making records like Mickey I said over 350 records like he left his mark on a lot of on a lot of people's art And and that's and that's great. And it's I mean for some people You know, what more do you want and that doesn't exist anymore outside of Nashville or a little bit? But outside of Austin, Texas, it's like, you know, it's not like that anymore. No, no. Now, it's my theory.

Okay. Now there's another name I'm going to throw at you. So I, you know, I did some cursory research, but you're here to tell us about the obscure lost country legends. So some of these names are bigger. So Hank Snow and Wilf Carter, what about Bob Nolan of the Sons of the Pioneers? He was Canadian. Yeah and he's got a Winnipeg connection too and I want to say that he also might have left

Canada. I did some Bob Nolan research and some Bob Nolan stuff on boots and saddle early on when I was on the radio and yeah yeah you're you're proving that I'm maybe not quite the expert. Well Sean, you gotta you gotta fake it till you make it. Okay, buddy. So we're you know work with me Yeah, Wikipedia regardless look Nolan. I'll go first of all, you're very young. I should just 40. I'm 40 Okay, cuz I was thinking, you know, oh country music expert I'm gonna get like a grizzled like, you know 80 year old guy who you know from the honky tonk bars or whatever. And then I see a guy who, you know, you look, you look good for your age. They're 40.

And so like, we're going to basically focus on your areas of expertise and what you know. And if I need to go find somebody to, you know, give me the real talk on Hank Snow and Will Carter, I'll, I'll dig up another person for that. So I'm happy to kind of stick to your comfort zones on this one because you only know what you know, right? Yeah, and that stuff is great, but it's still a little slick, right? It's still a little right very yeah Very that sort of being slick being slick and again, I'm with you. I want to hear I personally

Hank snow I can you can hear but anywhere I'd rather hear about Roy Payne than Hank snow Because I feel like there's not enough people talking about Roy Payne, a name I literally just discovered when I was listening to your Lost Country album. So let's just establish the fact that yes, we know Hank Snow and we know Will Carter, and now we're talking about Bob Nolan, who is credited with writing Tumbling tumbleweeds and cool water. Yeah, heavy duty songs that were, and again that's like that, that I love that stuff, but that's you get a little bit of that like polished Los Angeles cowboy, you know, it's not, it's great. It's not the, it's not the honky tonk music.

No, no, it's, it was, was it was for everyone let me read a question so when i said that uh we were going to do a an episode about uh country music in canada i got a nice note from somebody i think uh shares some of your uh sensibilities here it was from john r and he wrote really looking forward to this episode there's a rich history and not just with the originals like Hank Snow and Wilf Carter. Johnny Burke and East Wind were Toronto's premier country band and were the house band on CFGM's Opry North. Johnny Burke was unbelievable and East Wind was like a supergroup, right? Like Brian Barron played fiddle, Bob Lucia played steel, and Johnny Burke was the bass player and the front man. And I've always

had soft spot for a singing bass player. And Johnny, I think Johnny landed in Toronto in the 50s or 60s. There's some great early 60s with a great record called On Stage at the Drake Hotel, which was like not hip. It was gritty. It was honky tonk and Johnny Burke was there. And I think Roy Penny was the guitar player. He was another fantastic picker in the scene. A little like maybe classier, less dangerous than Mickey McGivern.

But those were your top pickers in the scene for sure in those days. And someone, who was telling me, this is actually a great story, that Johnny Burke was just a singer playing guitar and then someone needed a bass player. Oh man, I forget, I think I was talking to Paul Weber. He never played bass, he just showed up, he said you want the gig, he said okay, and then he showed up and said you're the bass player, so I don't play bass, well you do now, you want the job, you're playing bass. And that's how he started playing bass and then he showed up and said you're the bass player So I don't play bass. Well, you do now you want the job you're playing bass And that's how he started playing bass and then he was fronting the band and yeah that east wind I think it's like 74 that their first record that is like it's yeah, those are great players and they were They were also on on tv with uh, harry hibbs. I think was his name

It was like kind of a kind of he's a real character, you know, and it was one of those like hokey tv shows. But like, yeah, but more of a like a east coast kind of Canadian thing, right? Love it. And yeah, they were they were they were the band and those but those guys were, they were serious business, right? They were they were not just content, you know, making money six nights a week. I talked to Bob Luscher on my podcast, The Steel Player, and he played on all the Anne Murray records in those days and Tommy Hunter stuff. And he was on TV. He was making a really good living on television all the time.

And those guys were serious about it and about being classy and good musicians. And they very much were. Johnny Burke kept at it until his late years. Yeah, that Eastwind stuff, I can send you some stuff. You can find it on YouTube. But man. So I should let the listenership know because I like to talk about how the cake is baked. If you were, you know, normally I do the music in real time, but for this episode, I'm literally just recording our chat. And then afterwards, I'll go add in some choice music. So anytime we kind of talk about an artist You can shout out a specific song that you can send me and we'll slide it in

So what what song should we hear from Johnny Burke? Well, I think wild honey was his hit as I recall, but I'll dig through this East wind record There's a really really cool and funny version of walk through this world with me Which is you know most famous by George Jones? They're saying like a lot of these records were mostly cover tunes, right? But their version's pretty special. They were truly the best players in their field all together at once. There's great videos too, great live videos of them on TV. Johnny Burke, Tall playing a bass, singing the songs. That stuff has been inspiring

to me since I started playing bass when I was a teenager. I'm up with your momma so soon in the morning Here's a half hour of down-east fun and music with Newfie's favorite son, Harry Hips Ask a baby for a smoke, he will say it's light but smoke Ask a baby for a two, he will bite it off for you Featuring catalyst queen of country music, Miss Dianne Lee All the people at the Lyle, they don't get a bullet That's why I like the fires and cars in Iowa, that air and fire Now here's that man that turns me on, they're known as the East Wind They're in the Irish waves, coasts, babes, and their little boats

Swimming in their petticoats, melting many hearts My name is Johnny Burke and here we go with the Harry Hemp Show! Applause And here's the Mistletoe Boy Music The Mistletoe Boy to the war has gone, And ranks of death you will find him. His father's sword he had guarded on, His wild heart longed behind him. The land of war was a warrior bar, And ranks of youth you'll find him, the land of love left far behind

His wild arms hung behind him And darts of lore would soon be o'er For the battle they far bravely But on the field lay a youthful lad His wild arms hung beside him The land of war was a warrior barred, Friends of death could find him. The men still avoid from the war, As comely men are right beside him.

The norms of war were soon lured, But the battle they they fall gravely, When on the field lay a youthful lad, With his wild heart right beside him. The land of war was a warrior barn, And ranks of death you'll find him. The men's little boy from the war has come With his fenn heart right beside him Men's gold boy from the war has come With his fenn heart right beside him Yeah! I'm gonna be a good boy. I love it. Now I'm going to read another note because I think sometimes these name drops spark interesting conversations.

And this name, I want you to focus on this surname because I'm going to ask you a question about that. But this is from a gentleman named Richard Crawley and Richard Crawley wrote, don't forget Carol Baker, Anne Murray, Hank Snow, and of course my father. So like firstly, who's, I'm sorry to say this, I feel shame, but I am here to be educated. I don't know the name Carol Baker.

Carol Baker is Canada's queen of country music. I'm so shameful, please educate me. No, so I interviewed Carol Baker on my podcast too and that was that I was nervous nervous because care like that's why I get I get a little sour to these days when people say oh Shania Twain's a Canada's Canadian country music queen. No no. Carol Baker was Canada's queen of country music. She didn't even want to be a singer. She was in a bar with her husband and she sang and got up on stage. Actually, honestly, the interview I did with her was really great.

She remembered everything and told her a whole story of how she kind of got pushed into doing it, but it was like it was what she was meant to do. And again, she was, all those artists you just mentioned were more contemporary, if you will, like a little slicker and they were palatable for, for mom and dad and maybe not for the, for the kids. But she had some great records, did some really, really big stuff and, and still was singing, you know, recently. And I think she's passionate about country music. Yeah, that's one too many and 1000 is not enough as is the Carol Baker song you're gonna want to play. Well, it's interesting. 100% true story. By the way he listened to our band I knew he played guitar

So when the show was over I just had to talk to him Shook his hand I buy you something? I said, no thanks, I don't drink. Then the strangest look came across his face, And he looked at me and winked. He said, I joined AA just last year, It sure been mighty rough One drink is one too many And a thousand's not enough

I said why come to a place like this? You must be living in pure hell. He said I played guitar some years ago and they say I played it well. Music was my only love but I just had to give it up One drink is one too many And a thousand's not enough So I gave him my guitar Said, won't you please play me a song Shook his head, said, I just couldn't. I haven't played one for so long. So I coached him just a little more and he finally gave up. Sang a song of once too many And a thousand's not enough

So now I understand it As He plays and sings His song And I know it's through the grace of God He's found where He belongs I know that He was drowning once, but for the last time He's come up He said one is one too many, and a thousand's not enough But when he dropped his trifecta of names, Carol Baker, Anne Murray and Hank Snow, I think we all know Anne Murray, although I will tell you I'm a little older than you and I know, of course Snowbirds everywhere, know Anne-Marie best as like for her children's recording there's a hippo in

my bathtub which I owned on vinyl as a very young boy so shout out to Anne-Marie but Hank Snow I mentioned this is a name we all know had a success in the United States but do you know by any chance who Richard Crawley's father is? I don't. So is there a Crawley in your in your cranium there a Crawley? No I don't. So is there a Crawley in your cranium there? A Crawley? No? I don't think so. And I don't know if he was a singer or if he was a picker.

I'm sorry. Well, Richard's going to have to let us know. So Richard, send me a note. Mike at torontomike.com. Tell me about your dad and then I'll share that on a future episode. I'd like to hear that too. And Anne-Murray, I mean, of course, you know, you know my Anne-Marie But Anne-Marie's first record was released on the Ark Records label Which is you know where I go for it for a lot of a lot of this stuff was like

You know and that my whole record and the whole idea of it It's it is a bit of a love letter to to Ark Records and Paragon Marathon boot records all these labels But Ark was the tops and there's some Fantastic releases on there anytime. I see theK symbol on a record, I buy it. Okay, and you know, founded by Phil G. Anderson. Okay, I'm looking at this through ARK Sound. I'm learning, I slipped over to Wikipedia, don't tell the listeners, okay. But I'm reading about ARK Records, because I did not know about ARK Records, but you're telling me that this is sort of like the good housekeeping seal of approval? Like if you see Arc Records?

Yeah, Arc is the tops for the regional releases out of Toronto and I think that they own the plant where they could press their own records and I spoke to Phil Son before, I think his name might also be Phil, but because I was like where are the masters? And there's a little, there's a group of Facebook group, some guys from Toronto that these arc records nerds. There's there's they're out there and Yeah, it was it was it was big time like they were releasing a lot of music mostly by local artists Yeah, I'm reading now like so you draw you talked about early and Murray in the 60s Stitch in Time, Catherine McKinnon, Fred McKenna, Harry Hibbs, a name you dropped earlier, Ronnie Hawkins, of course, romp and ronnie, not lowest

of the lowest Ronnie, The Travelers and the Ugly Ducklings, like wow. Yeah, it's honestly take a dive into like, I like to go to Discogs.com if I can control myself from making purchases. But that's a great spot. And Mickey McGivern's band, the Mustangs, backed up a lot of folks. And there's great Dusty King record and June Pascher. June and George Pascher were honky tonk, King Queen kind of vibes in Toronto. I met George at a, I have these events, these Toronto Mike listener experiences.

I met him at Great Lakes Brewery in Southern Etobicoke here pretty recently, maybe a couple of summers ago. He came out, just he happened to be going there for a beer and then I bumped into him and chatted him up. I know this guy. Yeah, his wife June, I mean, there's a record of hers. It's like, although some of those records have great titles like, you know, so and so sings the country hits of the day or all time favorite country songs. It's one of those I have it over here but June Pasher it's like it's raw honky-tonk and she sang until her very very late years too and yeah that's that's probably sadly she's no longer with us I take it

June I know I met George I had the pew to heaven when we married And for a while I brought you happiness And now your love for me stood and carried me And every night you share another's kiss And I'd rather be the one you slip around with Than be the one whose trouble is gone Yes, I'd rather be the one you spend your time with Than be the one at home all alone Deep down inside I know that I could repeat

And yet I'm always here when you return And I'd rather be the one you flip around with Than be the one who of love is gone. Yes, I'd rather be the one you spend your time with than be the one at home all alone. I'm loving the fact you dropped a name of a guy I met. Like this is exciting me very much. Okay, here's another name.

I don't know, but there's a listener named Jeff who simply writes, he says, I hope Fred Eaglesmith is discussed. Who's Fred Eaglesmith? You don't know Fred? No. Wow. Okay. Well, Fred, Fred, I think Fred, Fred's first record is very early 80s, like

81. And it might have been those days. I think he was Fred J. Eaglesmith, but Fred was, uh, was like pounded the pavement, maybe harder than anyone, like 300 shows a year kind of thing. Even like 10 years ago, he was still doing that. And Willie P. Bennett, that was Willie's last gig was with Fred. He was playing mandolin and singing with Fred. And Fred owned the bus and drove the bus and ran the band hard and made great records and had some shining moments. Like he was on David Letterman's show once.

And he's most recently been doing a duo with his latest wife, Tiff Jinn. But Fred in the band and Fred with Willie and Fred through the 90s, he gave a lot of people their start. Like Corb used to open for Fred solo a lot. Gordy Tentri is a songwriter from lives up in the in Yukon. He got his start with Fred. Fred was, you know, Mike Bloom got his start opening up for Fred. Like he was a really, really well-respected songwriter and performer.

And yeah, man, Fred's great. And then big stars recorded his songs like Todd Snyder did a song, Alan Jackson did a song, I think. Maybe Miranda Lambert or one of the female stars. So he's got some songwriting credits. And I saw actually last week that he's doing a show in July. He hasn't done a show in a long time, I think out in Carlton Place. But yeah, I mean, he's grizzled veteran and I mean, talk about it wasn't Six Nighters, you know, Fred was doing it. It was like, it was Six Nighters in six rooms and he toured a lot in Europe and the United States and Canada. And, you know, we're down in Texas with Corb and we do a Fred Eaglesmith song and the people in the, you know, we're down in Texas with Corbin. We do a fred eaglesmith song and and the people in the you know, Texas listening rooms

They all know fred's music man. So yeah, no, he's uh, he's a Not quite lost but uh, definitely certainly a legend not lost enough to be covered on lost country Yeah, I mean fred's still alive. He's not he's like 67 66 he's yeah. Yeah, you know I just went to his wiki so I did not know he's from guelph, ontario uh not too far from here and He he's been playing guitar since he was 12 and he's one of nine children in a farming family. So yeah He's got some great great great stuff and he used to do the Freddy Smith picnic and then he did a thing on The train they'd like ride across Canada on the train and they'd be playing and the yeah

The stories of Fred are legendary and he's respected for a reason. Okay now the miserable curmudgeon makes a good point. I think this is a standalone episode I need to produce on its own but the miserable curmudgeon writes in the unlikely collision of punk and country on Queen Street would likely consume an entire episode. So this and I'm thinking this needs this is almost an episode unto itself, but there, and it's funny because Buffalo Boy also wrote in to ask if we would be talking about Blue Rodeo, but it's all like Blue Rodeo, you know, I've had Jim Cuddy on the program and he talks about Big Rude Jake. And I should point out, I do have a Big Rude Jake deep dive schedule that's coming very,

very soon for people who want to learn everything there is to know about Big Rude Jake deep dive schedule that's coming very, very soon for people who want to learn everything there is to know about Big Rude Jake. But what are your thoughts on this punk country collision that happened on Queen Street? Well, I guess like Handsome Ned and the Cameron House and stuff would be something to dig into as far as that goes. So the old guys that I was around when I was a kid and the old guys that influenced my father, they didn't really care for that kind of thing, right? They're like hardcore traditionalists.

So like, there was like strict, like even Graham Parsons would be offensive to some of these cats, right? It's like they wanted it done right, you know, in their mind. And so and that stuff never really grabbed me as much though, you know, I do, I do. I mean, I grew up in the 90s and I love the California skate punk stuff. I still listen to bad religion records every week, but you know Junior Gone Wild as cow punk band from Alberta that had it going on the 80s and up until recently. I dig the energy, I dig the attitude, even the Hanson Ned stuff.

But I've interviewed guys that were around in those days that just had no time for that stuff. It's found it disrespectful to the traditions of country music. And I don't go that far. I just, you know, it just doesn't really do it for me in the same way. Well, thank you for bringing up Handsome Ned, because I actually realized as I said it, so there is a Big Rude Jake episode of Toronto Mike to Coming, but I conflated the names just the way they have these monikers with the name. Like I conflated Big Rude Jake with Handsome Ned. It is actually Handsome Ned, of course, that Jim Cuddy was telling me about being that huge influence.

So I meant Handsome Ned, but just real quickly, just some of the acts that we won't be diving into in this episode, but get enough love on this podcast as it is. But so you got, you know, Blue Rodeo, Prairie Oyster, Sky Diggers, Cowboy Junkies, these are the acts that kind of come out of that aforementioned Handsome Ned inspired punk country explosion on Queen Street. Yeah, Prairie Oyster was definitely the more traditional and they were the last actual country music group in Canada to be played on commercial radio. Russell Decarlo was my hero. He was the front man, he was the bass player.

I interviewed him on my podcast. I was, again, super nervous. And yeah, just like a great singer and a great writer. And they were a traditional band. But they were also, you know, those bands were all friends and they were all like, sort of, you know, like pot smoking hippies, which was again, looked down on by some of these hardcore country guys, but they were all like sort of turned to what it's turned into. What about that on that note?

Where would one, I realize we all have the internet on our fingertips, but where exactly would one turn to, to hear classic country, this traditional country music? Is it simply finding a podcast like yours that still seems to give a shit about this great genre? Like where do you hear this now? Like as far as the regional stuff is concerned, yeah. I mean I think you'd have to go to people like us that are trying to find out what's going on. And as far as finding the music goes, because like some of these labels were not paying royalties

and paying songwriting stuff, they're just, and who knows where the master tapes are. It's for the most part, I found all this stuff on YouTube from people, excuse me, people like ripping their records down to their computer and putting it on YouTube. Like that's where I had to find a lot of this stuff and then buy the records myself, you know. And some of it's available, especially the bands you mentioned, like you can find all the Prairie Oyster stuff

on the streaming platforms and all that. But if you want to find June Pasher and Mickey McGivern and Roy Payne, like you're going to YouTube and you're hoping that it's decent quality and it's labeled correctly. Right. No, absolutely. Before we get too far removed from, you know, because I want to get back to Lost Country. And then when I say Lost Country, it gets confusing because the band's Lost Country. But I mean the album Lost Country I want to get back to actually, which is available now.

But can you tell me what is a honky documentary film? During the pandemic, everything, especially out here, I don't really remember what it's like. I don't want to remember, but we were opening and closing so much, right? It was open and then we're booking shows. We're closed, we're booking shows. It's like, so we have a really great relationship with a venue downtown Winnipeg called the Times Changed High and Lonesome Club.

It's at 234 Main Street in the heart of downtown Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. And it's, you know, it was a blues club for many years. And then about 20 years ago, sort of kind of branched out into more touring bands and sort of bluegrass and country bands. Now it's just good, it's good. Whatever it is, rock band, country band, blues band,

you know it's gonna be good. And so, we've all worked there, I've in the kitchen or behind the bar or doing sound or working the door. So we've got a great relationship with the owner, John Scholes. It's a great pillar of our community and has kept the place going. I mean the only comparable place to the Times Change that I've seen in Canada would be the Cameron House where it's a musician working behind the bar and like everyone you know it's a little

insular and there's an expectation of quality on stage. And so- What about the Horseshoe Tavern? Would that make the cut or not? Yeah, for sure. But the Horseshoe again is a bigger room and you're gonna get more national acts. And these are, you know, what kind of local spots. Right. So we made four records there, two live things,

and then two during non-operational hours. We made a record of truckin' songs called We Got A Lot Of Truckin' To Do. I've always thought that as an artist that it's important to have these theme records. All my heroes had theme records, gospel records, prison records, you know, cheatin' records, whatever it is. Truckin' has all been infatuated with this truckin' country music, right? So, excuse me, so we made this truckin' record there and we donated all the money from the sales. It was one of those Bandcamp Friday things and did all the money we donated to the Times Change.

We were closed down, it was the pandemic. There was a brief window that we opened up for about three weeks and we did our show. We did a show of the trucking stuff and I suspected that we weren't gonna be open for long. So I got someone to come in and film the whole thing and someone to record the whole thing. And it was a way to shine a light on the club and on the band as it was at that time. And there's a few live songs, full songs, and then

a lot of sort of backstory on the players and backstory on the club. And it was a honky-tonky documentary film about 19 and a half minutes and Grant Siemens did all the music at his house and I narrated and wrote it all here in the basement and yeah it turned out really well. Had a lot of views and then I had to fix my YouTube page and now it's got far fewer but very proud of it, very proud of that. Amazing. Amazing and you recorded Lost Country here in Toronto, right? Yeah. So Grant and I, all the records we made, uh, have all started with us sort of

spit bowling while we've been on tour. And he was touring with Corb so often that I would book tours for him and I around his schedule, and then we would talk about when he's available, when we can do another project and we were in Leth he's available, when we can do another project. And we were in Lethbridge, Alberta, it was September 2021. And I was like, I got this idea, like, we got to do this. We got to do these old songs by these old acts. And then kind of kept jazzing around.

And then I said, what we have to do is hire these players. But these guys that played in those taverns and bars in the 70s and the 80s, that played six nights a week week 50 weeks a year They have the the knowledge about the way things were they no one plays like that anymore because they simply don't have the hours Or the experience in the background. They've got all these modern influences. These guys started playing in bars in 1974 So we got to hire these guys The only thing is they're all in Ontario and then we can't fly them here. The grant said we got to go to Toronto.

My friend Chris Stringer owns, operates Union Sound Company in Toronto. It's a great studio. Stringer is an amazing guy. He's made records with like David Wilcox and like he and like all of the sort of CBC darlings and Toronto people that are really hip and have nice shoes and stuff. He does all that stuff. But he's a great musician and best of all, he's got this like insane arsenal of vintage gear like real period piece stuff that's perfect for the music.

So he phoned up Stringer and he had a little break in his schedule and two months later we flew to Toronto with no gear and I had never met Chris and he said you're gonna play this guitar. It was like this old Gibson from the 1940s and Grant was playing these old early 60s amps and guitars and then the boys came in from southern Ontario and we made the record. All right, who are these boys? Who are these boys that came in? Can you name check these players? Yep, drummer named Sean O'Grady from Hamilton, Ontario. Sean is a specialist of like all the great American roots forms. He can play R&B and blues as good as anyone you'll hear and he's done a ton of country music. Sean

played on a Gordon Lightfoot record. He did years and years with Tommy Hunter on tour. All the up-and-comers and the legends of Canadian country music are familiar with Sean. He's a fantastic drummer and he's got a great personality. So you know you keep it light Sean, he's a fantastic drummer. And he's got a great personality. So you know, you keep it light too, right? So he was the guy. And my dad played in a band called Joe Firth and the Promised Land from 1981 to 84. And Joe was on the road.

But he started playing in Toronto in the 60s, Rockabilly, and then he kind of did this country thing from the early 70s to the early 90s. They did 50 weeks a year, six nights a week every year. And if the gig didn't pay enough, Joe would stay home and the band would do it. thing from the early 70s to the early 90s. They did 50 weeks a year, six nights a week every year. And if the gig didn't pay enough, Joe would stay home and the band would do it. So my dad became his best friend and his roommate on the road and that band was a guy named Mike Weber. And there's a photo of Mike Weber and my dad and I when I'm like four days old. And Mike was the pedal steel player. He was in Joe's band from 74 to 86, quit, moved back home,

bought a bar, lived his life, left this pedal steel guitar in the rear view. He would play from time to time. His brother Paul, who played bass on the record, he owned a bar that's still for sale right now near Guelph in Maryhill, Ontario, called the Commercial Tavern. And so Mike would go pick every Friday when Paul would play, you know, casually. And then he sold his bar and he had a lot of time on his hands and he just dove right back into playing steel guitar. And he's playing better than ever. He's the star of the record. So he was my dad's best pal, like my dad's best friend. And Paul was in Joe Furt's band from I think 76 to 81 or 75 to 81. And then he went on to be his own solo artist and had a great career.

And it is a disgrace that he's continually overlooked by the Canadian country music hall of fame for whatever that's worth, but he really should be recognized. He had a great career. And so I, he, I had to get Paul to play bass. No one play again, no one plays like those guys played. They have these weird habits and these weird ideas and it worked and they knew the language of the, of the bars. So that was the core band, Grant and Sean and Paul and Mike, and then I did a duet with

Paul on a Joe Firth song, which made perfect sense and that's like a that'll be a feather in my cap in my career that I got to sing a duet with Paul Weber, who is one of the most beautiful country music singers we've ever made. Okay, what about artists who you know came in for maybe a couple of tracks or a few tracks or maybe one track shout out these artists and then I'm actually going to just before we say goodbye, I want to walk through the track listing on lost country so you can tell me like, like who's the original artist and what like a little bit more about these obscure artists,

the singers and the ringers to my friends, and rena to rent. She's from Winnipeg here and my friend Jessica lines in Chicago, they sang on one track. They just emailed their stuff in on the last track of the record called Souvenir. And then Teddy Hawkins, do you know Ted? He plays around Toronto all the time. I'm embarrassing myself left, right and center here. No, Ted's been playing in clubs since 1973. He played in the roughest and the most hardcore. He was in not very good bands and he toured out here out west and in the worst places imaginable. And he's got hours and hours and then he had his own band called Jack Diamond Band. He had some, he charted some singles in the 80s and he's a great singer, great harmony singer.

So and he's a friend of my old man as well. So I had to get Ted into singing harmonies. He sang on five or six tunes. And then the ringers, Red Volkart, who's from Surrey, British Columbia originally, and then he moved to Alberta in the 70s or 80s and kind of made his name. He played with all the best people out there. Played with Joyce Smith for years. And then he moved to Los Angeles and then he moved to Nashville. And then in the 90s, he got the gig with Merle Haggard and he did that job for a while and moved to Texas and he's still down there and he's I mean he's a renowned world-renowned guitar player so I got him to play on a Dick Dameron song because Dick Dameron's an Alberta guy figured there was a connection and then I got him to play on the Harold McIntyre

song before she made me crawl because Red did his own version of that song about 15 years ago on a record. And then Roley Platt played harmonica. He's heavily in demand harmonica player, session player. He lives out, I think he's out near Peterborough somewhere and Dennis Kahn to play lead guitar. And I'm going to go on and this is because this is really a big part of it. In the 70s, Roley Platt and Dennis Kahn were in a band together called the Cement City Stompers. And the Cement City Stompers, their home base was the Horseshoe. So they would go, they would do at least six-nighters. They would sometimes do more.

They'd play around. They didn't have to leave Toronto. There was enough jobs, they didn't have to leave, but there was a few of them from like Sudbury I think. So every now and then they'd go, they'd go do a couple weeks in Sudbury or they'd go to Sarnia or they'd go to Ottawa. But they were a Toronto band, kind of in the vein of a sleep at the wheel kind of like a Western swing country band Phil Lloyd was the singer and the bass player

And Mike Holder played pedal steel guitar Mike. Dasty was a drummer Dennis was the guitar player really played harmonica It's like they were such a good band and they were my dad's favorite band when he was 19 20 years old He'd go to the horseshoe Dennis Kahn dad's favorite band. When he was 19, 20 years old, he'd go to the horseshoe. Dennis Kahn was his favorite guitar player. When I was 19, I was jobbing around trying to be a musician. I was in a Dixie Chicks tribute band. Dennis Kahn was the guitar player. I got to room with Dennis, my dad's hero.

And Dennis is like, I think he's about 70. And like I keep saying, I was like, no one plays like that anymore. Grant Siemens is an exceptional guitar player, but he doesn't have that same vocabulary as these guys that were playing every night in a different sort of style of country music. So very important for me to have those guys on the record.

And Dennis is playing as some of the highlights as far as the lead playing goes on the record. And so yeah, they came in and they Dennis came into the union sound and tracked his stuff. And I just we just asked him questions. And it was great. Amazing. Okay, so I'm going to just tell the listenership you can go to Sean burns.bandcamp.com right now, that the new album we're talking about is called Lost Country, Sean, of course, S E A N in case you're confused there. I see 10 tracks and I'm going to literally like, I'm going to give you the title and I just want a little bit about like who's the original artist

even if we've mentioned them before. And then at the end of this all, I just want to know what's your favorite song on Lost Country. So maybe you can tell me when you get to it. But the first track is The Final Word. Danny Eddy was a country singer. He was like a poor man's Dick Dameron and Dick, he helped him out a lot and he think he was from Sault Ste. Marie originally, ended up out west. He made one record, as far as I know, proper record called Just As I Am in the mid 70s and The Final Word was Danny's song. That was his tune, you know? That he played every night from the time he wrote it to the time he passed away. And he was really supportive.

I met him at a music festival in central Alberta called Wayne Stock in Wayne, Alberta. And he took a shine to Grant and I because we were singing a Porter Wagner song. He said, I've only ever heard three people sing that song, Porter Wagner, me and you. And from then on, he came and saw us. We were out in BC and he was a great man. He passed away right before I was supposed

to interview him. And so there was no way I could leave Denny Eddie off of the record. Okay. You got to lead with that. Okay. Now the second track is called Destroy Me. Destroy Me is by a guy named Chef Adams. Chef Adams was a producer, an agent, a promoter, a singer, a songwriter from a small, small town in Saskatchewan, moved to Toronto in the 50s, working in a kitchen, got the nickname Chef. He made a bunch of records on ARC and on Paragon and Marathon, 1969 record called Singer-Songwriter. That's where I found Destroy Me.

And it was down to a few songs by Chef, but it had to be Destroy Me. And it was down to a few songs by Sheff, but it had to be Destroy Me. It's like such a unique, weird chord changes and really sort of a great vehicle for that steel guitar. All right, the third track is called Me and the Old Promised Land. Joe Firth and the Promised Land was the band. That's the signature song. It was written by one of the fellows in Joe's band, title track to his record, I think 1981. And it was like, you know, they were playing in the bars every night and they'd only play a few originals. Joe had enough traction.

He was on the radio. He was on Tommy Hunter Show. He had a name, you know? So that was their signature song. And there's a few to choose from, but yeah, come on, like that was the one, right? For me. Yeah, for sure.

The fourth track is called, Before She Made Me Crawl. Canadian country music fans are definitely going to know that song. That was a hit, like a medium hit on the radio, early 80s. Harold McIntyre and the Area Code 705 band, a guy named Larry Code, C-O-A-D, he wrote that song. Larry Code wrote a ton of songs that were hits. He produced records, He played in Harold's band He was Harold's manager There's a great video live video of Harold singing that song on the tummy hunter show in the early 80s

So that would be the most well known of the tracks that we covered in but again, it's like that's as far as this sort of Area of the music is concerned. That's sort of a staple All the guys in the band had played that song in bands before. Okay, I'm learning so much today. Thanks for all of this. But the fifth track is called Hard Times. Hard Times is the title track to Mickey McGivern and the Mustangs record from, I think, 1967. At that time, he had a young guy named Billy Adams singing. Mickey didn't sing. He played guitar and he ran the band. He'd hire singers, usually younger guys, right?

So he could probably pay them less. But Billy Adams was like, cut of the same cloth of Johnny Paycheck and who they became friends with, as I mentioned. And Hard Times is like a, it's a depressing song and it stands alone as far as the mood goes on my record. But again, we needed something with a little bit of a mood. And there was another Mickey song that was a real bitch and like barn burner, but we had enough of that. So hard times is the one that's a great record too. Okay. The sixth track is called

drinking me six foot under. Drinking me six foot under you're not going to find that anywhere because Roy Payne wrote it. Roy Payne would do shit like write songs on a cocktail napkin on the set break and then go and sing it. And usually from what I've heard, they were often good songs. Roy wrote a ton of tunes. I got a hold of this really poor live recording from a bar, I think in Sarnia, Ontario, early 80s

from the Cement City Stompers. And I'm listening to it, they're doing all these songs and I'm, what's this? Drinking me six foot under, like I just loved it. So I sent Dennis Kahn a, and I'm, what's this? Drinking Me Six Foot Under, like, I just loved it. So I sent Dennis Kahn a message and he told me that's a Roy Payne song. And then there's a few other guys that were, you know, Disciples of Roy, a guy named Derek Pilgrim from out there in Ontario. He recorded it at some point, but you can't find it anywhere.

So we modeled our version over the Cement City Stompers version, cut a verse, the solo's long, everyone gets a pass. It's my favorite song, it's a song about a song, it's a song I love song, it's a drinking song, and that's my favorite one on the record. And sometimes I find it hard when I remember All my old friends in dreams are gone now There's just me and this old bartender Who keeps watching me while I am drinking me six feet under That old five-piece country band, they're late again as usual I guess they feel a little out of place around all those losers But outside on the street the night is filled with rain and thunder Lord it's a good night for me to be drinking me six feet under

Oh, someone please sing me Whiskey River Well I just gotta hear that story one more time I just love that line about a guy who's drowning in Whiskey River I'm on the whiskey river while I sit near Slowly drinking me six feet under So I'm a little bit of a I'm a little bit of a I'm a little bit of a I'm a little bit of a I'm a little bit of a I'm a little bit of a I'm a little bit of a I'm a little bit of a

I'm a little bit of a I'm a little bit of a I'm a little bit of a I'm a little bit of a I'm a little bit of a I'm a little bit of a Lord, I sure do pick me up some wild ones when I get plastered. That's all right odds are made, it's their bodies that I'm after She's got a bottle in her pocket, she knows the words to Whiskey River So she can sing to me when I am drinking me six feet under.

Won't someone please save me, Whiskey River? Yeah, I just gotta hear that story one more time. I just love that line about a guy who's drowning in a whiskey river While I just sit here slowly drinking me six feet under Yeah, tomorrow's just another day No time, no rhyme, no reason Just another day for me to be drinking Six feet under Oh Lord, I sure love that old song

They call Whiskey Grivney Track number seven, The Same Old Thing Again Dick Dameron's from Bentley, Alberta. He went to Nashville for two sessions, 1961 and 63. You can find the Starday sessions on streaming platform and the same old thing again is on there. Pete Drake, legendary steel player, played on those. Dick, of course, went on to be Canadian Country Music Hall of Famer, won all the awards.

He's in the International Country Music Hall of Fame, he's the biggest name that we covered. He had hits like Countryfied and Homegrown and he recorded for American labels. Charlie Pride and George Hamilton the fourth recorded Dick Dameron songs, so did Jimmy Arthur Orge and Carole Baker. Yeah, Dick Dameron is the tops as far as like that to me is the best Canadian country music like honky-tonk stuff. Of course he didn't make it here but that's this that's you know that's the that's the one and I wish we did that one a little faster than we did but but yeah no that's Dick Dameron is it was a must a must. Love it okay eighth track is NB to TO. Al Hooper his nickname was the East Coast

Ambassador. Al moved to Toronto from New Brunswick. He formed a band called the Blue Diamonds. Everyone in the Blue Diamonds had their own record on Ark Records. They all were players. They were all singers. They were a show band. It was like it was a real show. It was kind of more of a family thing, less of a honky tonk thing.

I interviewed Al before he passed away. He was great chat. And then they sort of the introduction of the dance floor changed everything and they had to sort of get a little bit more honky-tonk and that was his signature song. He would fill the bar with Maritimers and Al had the job at the Horseshoe Tavern and when he left, it was this house gig, you know, they would back up all the stars wet Pierce and Jean Shepherd And and then he told the owner of the horseshoe You should give this job to this Tom guy and the guy said I don't think so He said you got to give him the job and that's how stomp it

Tom Connors got the job at the horseshoe from Al Hooper Wow, that's a fun fact right there Wow. Yeah. Yeah I was waiting for that one. I'll smoke that one for you. That's amazing. It's like Wally Pip, right? You know that do you know the name Wally Pip? Yeah. I don't know that name. I do. He came out of a game and then Lou Gehrig took a spot and then Lou set the Ironman record

for the New York Yankees. He basically, yeah, once Lou took the spot in the outfield, that was it for Wally Pip. So, okay. All right. I love it. Bring the heat here. Okay. Number nine, it is Alone Again.

Alone Again is by a fellow named Barry Smith, who I'm not sure Barry ever played in a bar that fit more than 100 people. He was and is like a roofer. He's always had a manual labor gig. He just was a country music fan. He got on stage for the first time. Dick Nolan pulled him up on stage in the 80s. He worshiped those Dick Nolan, Roy Payne. He was from the hockey talk cloth. His dad was friends with those guys, go to the bars. Excuse me.

Barry wrote really great songs and never really pursued the thing as a real career. His drummer was Randy Adams, Chef's son, and Dennis Kahn played in the Inner City Outlaws, which was Barry's band, and my dad would play with him sometimes because Barry was in his late 20s and my dad was probably 40, and he said, I like this young guy. He's playing old school country music.

The jobs didn't pay more than 50 bucks each, but it was great music. And so I've kept in touch with Barry over the years. I've recorded two of his songs and it was another, you know, honky tonk bar room shuffle. And I've always loved that song. This is the perfect excuse to do it. And we close the album with Souvenir. It's a beautiful song by Hamilton Tavern singer Scotty Campbell.

I'm not sure if you know Scotty. Scotty sort of really made a mark in the Toronto area in the 90s and he would be the go-to guy if someone hip was coming to the horseshoe as local support it would be Scotty Campbell and the Wardenaires. Teddy Hawkins who sang all the harmonies on the record, he was Scotty's right-hand man, drummer, harmony singer, Scotty wrote great songs and he was not a he was a very and remains very opinionated about country music and about music and he was not afraid to and he did ruffle a lot of feathers with his attitude towards that stuff which you

know he stands by to this day and and there's a couple Scotty songs that I was looking at but this is a great song and we kind of gave it this is the only one that we purposefully sort of changed the feel on. Sean, I mean, good on you for breathing like new life into these, you know, maybe some of them are forgotten, maybe some were lost, but these honky tonk classics of the past, like good on you for bringing them new life and bringing them to a new audience, a younger audience. That's amazing, man.

Thanks very much. And I should mention on my website at SeanBurns.ca, in the news blog section, I've written a piece about each of the 10 artists that we've covered. Really got into detail about it. And then earlier this week, I wrote one about all the core band, Sean and Grant and Mike and Paul. And then there's one more coming with the ringers and the singers that helped us out so so for a little bit more deep deep dive if you're interested you can go to seanburne's.ca and uh and check out all

those blogs and I got like uh 1970s style hockey cards uh cartoon hockey cards drawing some of them all by my friend Boots Graham in Alberta so uh yeah, so there's, you know, then there's a lot more intel in there because, you know, the stuff that I do know about, I'm passionate about and I'm, and I'm willing to chat endlessly. I learned a bunch from you today, man. Thanks for carving out some time. I'm glad you're enjoying the heat. Are you wearing shorts on a minus five day in Winnipeg? There's someone out there wearing shorts, I'll tell you for sure. There's some hero out there. Thanks for having me, man. Thanks for doing this. And that brings us to the end of our 1,417th show. You can follow me on

Twitter and Blue Sky. I'm at Toronto Mike. Sean, what is your handle on social media? Where can we follow you on social media? Where can we follow you on social media? On all of them at Sean Burns Music. Sean Burns, again, Sean, S-E-A-N. Much love to all who made this possible. That's Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Recycle My Electronics, Raymond James Canada, and Ridley Funeral Home. See you all tomorrow and my special guest is filmmaker Susan Fleming. I want you to be And your smile is fine And it's just like wine And it won't go away

Cause everything is Rose and green