Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Marc Weisblott from 12:36: Toronto Mike'd #1176

Episode Date: December 27, 2022

In this 1176th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with Marc Weisblott from 12:36 about what you oughta know about the months that were November and December 2022. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Yes, We Are Open, The Advantaged Investor, Canna Cabana, StickerYou, Ridley Funeral Home and Electronic Products Recycling Association.

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At Sammy.Cone K-O-H-Nn at properlyhomes.ca joining me today better late than never is f-o-t-m hall of famer mark weisblot better late than never and yet here we are december 27th, 2022. This is not a clip show. It's not a best of. It's not some kind of year in review. It's also not fromage 2022. The last couple of years, in the depths of the pandemic,

we did a review, a recap of musical mediocrities. Not something I was feeling this time around, but it is always capable of being revived in the future. Instead, a regular episode, continuing the tradition of monthly recaps inspired by something which currently does not exist. The newsletter that was coming out every single day at 1236. A lot there for me to unpack.

Let's start with your feelings. So this was supposed to be, you know, it's a recurring event in our calendars for the first Thursday of the month, which would have been like literally December 1st. I pushed it to the limit here. I wondered how far could I go into the month until I could make good on my appearance here. To the left of the empty symbol in the gas tank. How far can you go? So this is so just so I'm clear.

OK, because you're in my calendar to return next week, as per usual, back to your normal schedule. Yeah, we'll talk about that. We've got something on the agenda for the beginning of 2023. So is this what I think it is, and I hope it is, is this the November and

December recap that we're used to, the monthly recap? Is this just a twofer? Well, something like that, because this managed to be the 12th time during 2022 that I made it into your basement. I think we hit the cycle here. And you and me, Mike, we went through a lot, including back in the spring when the masks finally came off. Me appearing on your show with what I felt might have been symptoms of COVID-19.

We did a horrifying episode where we wondered over the course of our three hours together whether or not I was going to infect you. And I think that despite the caution exercised by your brother, who was hypervigilant about not wanting to be in the same room with somebody whose podcast guest had spent three hours talking about how they might have infected them with COVID. Right. Finally, in the month of December 2022, COVID-19 came for you. Woo! I have an applause there. Absolutely. Yeah, I finally got it. And a bunch of us FOTMs got it at the lowest of the low show at,

where were we, Lee's Palace? And this was a full day of festivities that you had, right? I was nowhere to be found. No, it's off-brand. You did your TMLX. Which was a huge hit and wonderful. Paul Palmer's Kitchen. I listened to that episode.

TMLX 11. Unexpected cameo appearances. And joining me now in the TMDS Hall of Fame, Peter Gross inducted himself in a very moving ceremony that you had on the mic that morning. Long overdue. So now he joins you. He joins Ed Conroy from Retro Ontario. What did you think of Christmas Crackers Volume 5 we recorded last week?

Well, part of the reason I was motivated to get down here was you and Conroy lamenting the disappearance of the 1236 newsletter. Oh, let's talk about that. And we addressed that a lot on the prior episode. And you expressed subsequently when you were talking with Blair Packham when he was down here in the basement. Sure, people miss him. Other people. You said you got some expressions of concern.

There were listeners out there who were worried about me yeah which is a little weird because i didn't hear from any of them they decide to talk through through you an intermediary can you sum up what people were wondering about your last appearance which was now almost two months ago so i guess that was the first thursday of november you uh seemed a little sad like we we've been very uh open in our discussions about how you've parted ways of St. Joseph Media, and the 1236 newsletter is now, you're now the sole proprietor of this, and you're kind of pivoting,

but you're not looking to rush into anything. You want to make sure you're going to head in the right direction, so this is a time of planning, strategizing. I mean, I declared I wasn't going to rush into anything, and then I slowed it down even more. Partly because I have this other job to do. It's too slow for us. This job is with the Canadian Jewish News

where I am in charge of this editorial mission. It included making another magazine. You can find it at the cjn.ca. I think I managed to inject some personality in there that previously didn't exist, rethinking this for the future. But in the process then, I felt like I was moving things into a level. I was going to take it slow. And then I thought the best strategy for the moment was not to give it too much thought at all. We deliberated here about whether or not I should use this platform, Substack,

and invite people to download an app and plug in over there. You were skeptical, right, Mike? I mean, you didn't believe. But at the same time, we had this tremendously chaotic situation with Twitter.com and including my fellow Hall of Famer Cam Gordon, no longer with the firm. The day Elon Musk moved in, there was a deep and wide hit list, which included, as far as I can tell, pretty much the entire Canadian operation. It wasn't like they came for Cam in particular.

It was just getting rid of the communications role they held for all those years. And looking forward to what our buddy Cam comes up with in the future. He has also been AWOL from your podcast here, which is unprecedented because he's the most prolific Toronto Mike guest of all. This gives you an opportunity to catch him. Like he's, yeah, he's taking a break from toast. And I brought in Coy and Vance Duke. This was discussed.

And I think somebody, I don't know if it was Steve Leggett, but somebody pointed out there was more Coy and Vance talk on Toronto Mike last week than anywhere in the past 30 years. These were the younger Bucks who took over during the contract dispute on the Dukes of Hazzard. And you got me Googling through the history. They were on for almost an entire season. People thought, you know, flash in the pan,

maybe this was just a few weeks. No, it was only in the last month of that year, which from what I can tell, formative year for you. You wanted to see the Dukes and you got stuck with the Koi fans. I don't want these scab Dukes as we call them. And listeners of Toast are experiencing scabs too, all because of Cam and Stu on the road interviewing wrestlers. Stu would zoom in if Cam were game.

Stu would have zoomed in. He's on the road for a couple of months. But when Cam paused, Stu took that opportunity to not zoom in, and then I just refreshed it with the coin vans. What do you think? Now, no one can replace Stu and Cam, and Stu and Cam will return in 2023, I swear. But what do you think of the Bob Willett, Rob Pruce coin van support? Yeah, they're all right.

They deliver the goods. I enjoyed it. Fun facts. It was fun. Mind blows. Keep it going. But I feel, Mike, you're getting a sense that all your regulars are starting to abandon you. It was a tough month.

Because of transformations that are taking place in their own lives. So here's the newsletter. First of all, what's the song I'm listening to? Oh, I thought I would add this to the playlist just because if I was wondering if I had a favorite single of 2022. It would be Die Hard by Kendrick Lamar. Kendrick Lamar. Oh my god, of course, K-Dot.

I think his career leveled off this year. More of a man of the people, less dependent upon that critical acclaim. Kendrick, let's let him take us home here. And then as he fades out,

deliver the goods. We need to know what exactly is going on at 1236. We're all we got. You're waiting for the good part. All right, now, talk to me. Yeah, that's what it is. Shimmy, shimmy, Cocoa Puff.

Shimmy, shimmy, bop! You know, from the digital underground. Come on. Quoted there by Kendrick Lamar. Originally referencing Little Anthony and the Imperials. Okay. Yeah, I love it. Bring the heat.

Okay, talk to me. Okay, what is next with the news? People, let me set the table then. I already alluded to this like about 10 minutes ago, but there was a sense last episode you were a bit sad and not too sure where the pivot... It sounds you're busy with the canadian jewish news which is amazing confusion and despair but then you cancel on top of that for allies putting something out into the world wondering what do i do with the fact that i spent all these years building up this media asset, and when the opportunity was taken away from me,

given the license now to go independent, how was I going to make it happen? How was I going to make my effort get anywhere, not be in another situation where I'm a sole practitioner trying to make it in the media by myself. I have been there and done that. And we're not seeing on the horizon circumstances where the outcome is getting some kind of job, right?

Like no new corporate overlord is out there waiting to discover me i do what about zoomer people well i feel i'm not i'm not i'm not fishing i'm not looking for that validation at this point in time okay i feel mike my greatest asset is my relationship with you oh my god i'm honored and how can we turn how can we turn the fact that i've been on here every month on the Toronto Mike podcast? We've created the Toronto Mike Universe, TMU. Where do we go from here? What do we do with it all? Through the fall, we were sitting around talking with VP of Sales, Tyler Campbell,

sat in on a couple episodes. Why is he today, by the way? I ended up, I didn't ask. I figured he was still in holiday mode. I got together with him in early November, a week after my last appearance here. One of those last warm days when you could sort of sit on a patio. We met by the Yorkville Rock.

And I wasn't invited to the summit. a patio. We met by the Yorkville Rock. And we talked shop for a little while because while we were having that conversation, here you were in the basement with a returning guest after three years, Edward Keenan of the Toronto Star.

And I enjoyed your conversation so much that I thought, we gotta get me and Ed Keenan together here in the basement, not entirely to figure out what I can do. But I think there is a valuable Toronto Mike episode to be had where we're going to discuss theories of Generation X media, where we have come from, where we have been, and where this whole thing is going next. So I'm going to play it out on your podcast in real time. We're going to get Ed Keenan here, an actual Toronto Star columnist, one of my absolute favorites, and a personal longtime friend. And I think we're going to have a conversation down here

where we hash out how people of a certain age have maybe been left out of the corporate media conversation. A lot of these people have gravitated towards our podcast called Toronto Mike. What can, what can we do to connect with that community? What could, what could we learn from the experiences of the past 20 or 30 years? And where is it all headed from here?

We're going to talk in early January, 2023. You, me, Edward Keenan. Wow. Breaking news. Coming up next, that is what I cultivated as a result of the frustration that I was airing out here last time around.

Now, what the point is of me hanging out here for the rest of the afternoon? I'm not so sure. I guess we got the usual litany of topics to go over, including what has been happening with TMDS and Toronto Mike. And I think here is a forum for you to explain in great detail, because I've got all day, what has been happening with you and some of the clients of TMDS, what you've discussed over the last arc of episodes and a drama that involves a Hollywood household name whose intervention and interjection

actually put the kibosh on one of your most anticipated projects. Firstly, I just want to, you know, this is a great jam. This is Seeds by new FOTM Julian Taylor, who made his debut in March, not March, in December. What month is this? He was great, and I just want to say he's a welcome member of the community.

Loved my chat with him. And I think Julian Taylor, one of those episodes where you caught somebody who has been in the game for a long time, very determined to fulfill his passion of music making, the sacrifices that he was willing to make to get there. We spent a lot of time on this podcast dunking on those characters who feel that they're owned a level of attention, that just because they've done their time, that the universe owes them a living. And with Julian Taylor, I think we got the flip side of that.

Like, what did you get out of hearing him? A refreshing point of view that he just wants to be heard. And most recently got on the CBC Music Radio Top 20 chart with his song. Great jam. And it felt to me like I was talking with a man who had finally found his voice. He's kind of found out where he belongs. And you're right, after decades from Staggered Crossing to now, ups and downs, peaks and valleys, and he's found his voice,

and he sounds great, and he seems content with everything. And I wish him much luck. Julian Taylor, FOTM. Now, on the other end of that, let's talk about Tori Spelling. All right, well, look, firstly, yeah, I knew you were talking about the X's and O's. Well, I mean, I gave you her memoir, her storytelling biography, upon realizing that I had two copies of this book. I don't know what I was going to do

with the other one, but I had to express deliver it to Toronto Mike so that he could read up on what Tori Spelling had to say about herself in her relationship with someone named Dean McDermott. So, quick recap. I feel like, I don't even know if I've done it on

this show. I might have done it on, actually on X's and Uh-Oh's, and I might have done this on Humble and Fred. I don't even know, but I'm going to do it, I guess for the first time on my show. The quick recap is this. I worked very closely with Mary Jo Eustace and Dean McDermott since June. So for a few months, like three or four months,

we worked very closely together, strategizing this new podcast we were going to launch called x's and uh-ohs and it was going to be uh co-hosted by mary jo and dean who after a very bad bitter divorce that was you know fueled by uh a tabloid frenzy and then of course the tory spelling element there because dean left mary jo for tory spelling from 902 and oh and saved by the bell fame. So we all know that kind of like that's like a TMZ thing that we're all kind of aware of. So I produced this show because I met Mary Jo through Bob Ouellette and I met Dean McDermott through Helen

Tansey, who used to date the man before Mary Jo. It's all very interconnected, but Helen's a great client. She produces, she hosts The Feminine Warrior. So blah, blah, blah, Mike, what are you talking about? For months, we would meet, we would have meetings and Zooms, and I would often record them in lengthy, in-depth, heartfelt, authentic conversations. And by, I don't know, by the time we launched this show, I had 11 episodes recorded, I call it. I say I have 11 in the can. So I have 11 episodes of X's and uh-oh's.

Mary Jo and Dean are all in. Then there's this, so during this like happy period, we're gonna start promoting the show. I put them on three shows myself, okay, that I produce. Okay, I think this might be the only three shows they did together during this period between launch and their second divorce, I call it, when they break up again. So I put them on Toronto Mic'd.

Did you hear Mary Jo and Dean on Toronto Mic'd? Yeah, yeah. It was in November. It was, I think, shortly after I was last on here. And how was that? I know there's a lot of talk about Tony and Napo and Stew Stone's penis sizes. A lot of enthusiasm there. Good energy for what they were going to do in terms of putting this podcast out into the world.

And I thought we were seeing the emergence of a new character here, Hollywood Mike. Hollywood Mike, what's emerging? As your output would suddenly make the American tabloid media. Ray Dawn Chong. We'll get to that. Okay, we'll get to Ray Dawn, actually. So what happens is I do my show, and then I put them on Dana Levinson's show on the DL.

They have a pleasant little chat. And then I put them on Humble and Fred. Now, Humble and Fred record very early in the morning at 8.15 a.m. Toronto time. I need somebody to zoom in and chat with those guys. And our California friends, Mary Jo and Dean, said, we'll do it, we'll do it, even though it's 5.15 a.m. So on Dean McDermott's 56th birthday,

he zooms in at 5.15 a.m. to talk to Humble and Fred, who he knows from his back in the day when he used to pop on and stuff back in the 90s or whatever. So this is happening, this conversation that I'm producing, they're chatting, Fred's humble,

but particularly Fred starts asking questions about that day in Palm Springs when Dean McDermott is going to tell Mary Jo Eustace that he's been sleeping with his Lifetime movie co-host, Tori Spelling, and that she is his soulmate and that he is leaving his family to be with her. This moment in time, I guess at some point,

Dean McDermott says he utters the F word, and then he closes the lid on his laptop and leaves the Zoom. So the next day I pop on Humble and Fred to kind of chat just what happened with Dean Bailing. And I felt I dealt it with great kindness and respect for Dean. I don't know what you think, because I put this clip on YouTube and shared it via Twitter, but I felt I was very kind to Dean and empathetic,

and I felt for him, and I understood why he bailed. Do you think he connected with you, though? Because you're a dad who was divorced, and you have a different household than the one that you started out with before. Right. Did he connect, relate with you on that level in any way?

We were often meeting on Zoom for unrecorded one-on-one chats because we really hit it off. I considered him a buddy. We got along great. Until the very end, we got along great. So long story short here, I know, there's an American Thanksgiving on like a Thursday. So the Wednesday night, I'm literally about to drop episode three.

I mentioned I had 11 in the can, and we were still recording episodes because it was going very, very well. And then Dean zooms with me privately to say, I'm out. Don't drop episode three. I'm no longer going to record with my ex-wife, Mary Jo Eustace. And I was blindsided by this because it had been going so well. And I'm like, why? And he basically, he shared a bunch of reasons why, but he says, I'm out. Then I phoned Mary Jo Eustace and I said, Houston,

we have a problem. Dean McDermott just left the podcast and he says, don't drop episode three. I'm going to just tap out of whatever happens in the family dynamic. But at some point, you know, the son Jack puts an Instagram post that gets picked up by people.com and Us Weekly. And it references this unnamed producer. And it's, this is the part I think you're alluding to,

but it gets, there's this, I feel really bad for Mary Jo because it seems like these Tori Spelling articles and people.com are sort of, sort of leveraging Mary Jo because Mary Jo has two children seems like these Tori Spelling articles and People.com are sort of leveraging Mary Jo, because Mary Jo has two children. One is named Jack, who she had with Dean McDermott, and one is named Lola, who she adopted as a child.

And the way I read it anyways is that Tori kind of talks openly in these tabloids about how these two children are now living with her, not Mary Jo. I already referenced this Instagram post that Jack deleted. I've never met Jack. I've never met Tori Spelling. But there seems to be, you mentioned Hollywood Mike. Well, Hollywood Mike is never going to emerge because I have such a bad taste in my mouth from all this.

I'm going to stay Toronto Mike. And I'm still happily producing Mary Jo's podcast because she's continuing without Dean McDermott. Still happily producing Mary Jo's podcast because she's continuing without Dean McDermott. But that whole experience and seeing this like reference to this double, I don't know. I don't remember the words. You might know.

Backstabbing? What this unnamed producer who betrayed Dean McDermott's trust. It is such bullshit. I don't even know how to respond. But you might have heard me talk to Ray Don Chong because the day that people.com thing dropped was the day I was

scheduled to meet with Ray Don Chong for Toronto Mike, and we talked about it because Ray Don Chong is a good friend of Mary Jo and had appeared on the new episode 3 of X's and O's. So, what did you think of Ray Don Chong? What did you think of all this? And am I missing anything in this story? Well, does this mean you're gonna

give me my Tory spelling book back? I would happily give you that. Maybe we should have missing anything in this story? Does this mean you're going to give me my Tori Spelling book back? I would happily give you that. Maybe we should have a burning in the backyard? I don't know her. We've never talked. Amidst it all, she's putting out a selfie of herself in the hospital. Tori Spelling. Right around Christmas Day.

She says she's had a hard time breathing. Crazy dizziness. There was even a tweet where she was pronounced dead. Really? Something that made the rounds attributing it to the COVID-19 vaccine. Oh, that's ridiculous. And yet, in this new Twitter, I don't think there was

anyone to moderate this tweet out of existence there. Oh, died suddenly. The haters were saying that she's faking the whole thing. How much does this go back to the drama surrounding the podcast that Tori Spelling has been having a hard time? I guess this has been a teachable moment for Toronto Mike.

Well, really, it's really Dean who needs to be you know learning a lesson here because he committed to this project and he recorded 11 episodes and if he if it wasn't cool of his wife I feel like Dean should have sort of addressed that earlier and maybe not embarked on this project till his wife was okay with it. Like I don't think

it's fair to Mary Jo or I to commit to something and then pull the plug on a whim one day. Who knows what else was going on in his life. Somehow in the process, then, you get a new FOTM in the form of a Canadian cult icon. Right. Someone nearly as famous as Stu Stone,

Ray Dawn Chonk. Right. Now, what's that all about? Because you seem to hit it off as far as a Zoom guest goes. Right. Definitely a lively conversation here on Toronto Mike. It was great. But the premise of the whole thing would not have happened if Tori Spelling didn't bail.

Right? Like, this is now what's connected you to the... Dean McDermott bailed. Dean McDermott Bale. And now all of a sudden you're connected to Tommy Chong's entire family. Right, because Precious Chong is actually visiting tomorrow afternoon. So tomorrow afternoon, Precious Chong, who lives in Toronto, so she can visit. Ray Dawn Chong, who lives in L.A., zoomed in.

And the reason I think we hit it off because it was our second experience together because I had appeared on the new episode three of X's and Uh-Oh's with Mary Jo Eustace and Ray Dawn Chong. So I had appeared on that to kind of explain why we're resetting here. And then Ray Dawn was on that. And then we hit it off. She's Canadian.

And she's got a fascinating perspective on things. Like I love talking to this woman. So I think it was a fantastic debut for Rae Dawn Chong. What's your takeaway from everything that happened? Where does it go from here? What's your prediction for 2023 in the Dean McDermott-Torrey Spelling household? I was done dirty there.

They've got a lot of mouths to feed, right? And it seems to have been implied over the years that the Aaron Spelling family fortune that his daughter Tori, despite having that role of Beverly Hills 90210, that she has yet to be able to access those big bank accounts. Big chunk, right?

Yes, and that's the reason that she's doing a 90210 nostalgia podcast with Jenny Garth that explains all these tacky reality shows that they've done over the years. She seems to be selling these stories. I'm learning a lot about this Hollywood machine

because I was ignorant as Ray Donchon called me naive, but that might be true. A lot of these the reason People.com keeps getting these Tori Spelling exclusives is because she sold this package to People.com. Like, there's money in it for Tori to feed this beast with these stories of, you know, divorce being off the table

and the Christmas card and, you know, the whole family, the blended family story, including Jack and Lola being there. And I just feel for my friend and client, Mary Jo Eustace, who has to watch this airing in public. You think that maybe to some extent you were set up here, like you were playing for a patsy. 100%. Am I correct, though, in saying you were compensated for your services

as a podcast producer? And for this particular assignment, that included you providing psychological services to Dean McDermott himself. Right, right. And how did that go? I mean, he's ghosted you. He's not in your life anymore. No, he's gone. After what you say were heart-to-heart conversations that you had with him.

Not even for the show, right? Not recordings. And you heard. You were just bantering with him back and forth about what he's been going through. And as an astute listener, you would notice that when there was an episode of Toast with Stu Stone and Cam Gordon,

I would have a recording from Dean McDermott for Stu Stone. You know, Stu the Jew and all that Hollywood stuff that he remembers from Stu. And then when I had Tony Nappo on, there'd be a recording from Dean McDermott talking about playing hockey at George Bell Arena with Jeff Merrick and the gang, you know,

there's an old crew there. So yeah, I don't know on a dime. And I'm all choked up here. It's hitting me hard here, but on a dime, a friendship and a guy I trusted and I was happily working with to produce good content.

I guess I'm dead to him. And I, this whole Jack Instagram post is what really bugs me because Jack deletes that thing, but it really sticks a knife in his mom's back, Mary Jo Eustace. And I get a little, what I would call like shrapnel. I get hit with a little shrapnel on the way down. And it's not fair because I always treat a Dean with not only respect and kindness,

but as if he were a friend, not a client. And that's the kind of year it's been. Look at how far we've come. I mean, last time you had a Toronto Mike saga that deep. It involved fearless Fred and

Dean Blundell. As far as I'm concerned, you've trained it up here in the world. Yeah, that we've moved on to something that interfaces with Donna Martin from 90210. Donna Martin graduates from working with Toronto Mike. Was she on any of these recorded episodes? No, but that was dangled like a carrot because Dean, throughout the 11 episodes, Dean said Tory wants to come on. Tory's coming on.

And there'd be email exchanges. And I know a lot of this stuff, because even though he stabbed me in the back here, I'm like, the amount of the emails I have from Dean McDermott and the recordings I have from Dean McDermott, I think I'd be a wealthy man. People.com should hit me up. But I'm just like, no. I'm an honorable guy and I'm going to hold the water.

But the stuff I can share is there was a lot of email with Mary Jo, me and Dean. I'm on these lists and it goes back and forth for, you know, days and days about scheduling the Tori Spelling episode because it would be great for the awareness. You know, awareness is the battle with a new podcast. And Tori being on the show would have been great for that.

And Dean said, she's going to do it. She's going to do it. There was always a reason it needed to be delayed a week, delayed a week. And then it all came to a head with that, the Wednesday before Thanksgiving when Dean tapped out and said, I'm gone. And that's the last, no, that's the second last time I ever spoke to Dean. Because when Mary Jo went on Instagram to announce that X's and Uh-Oh's is continuing without Dean because Mary Jo wants to keep it going.

And I'm glad she is because I'm still producing the show and I like working with Mary Jo I really dig her Dean phoned me up and said I hear you can't drop the nine episodes you recorded and I said I'm not dropping those nine episodes and then he said

you can't use the music because my friend recorded it and he doesn't want it used if I'm not on the show and I said I won't use the music and my friend recorded it and he doesn't want it used if I'm not on the show. And I said, I won't use the music. And then I think the final thing was there might be a problem with the photo you're using because my friend took that photo. And at that point I'm like, I'll talk to MJ about that.

But now we've, it's a bridge too far. So anyway, MJ said, you know, the photographer gave her permission to use that photo, which does not include Dean. And here we are.

Next thing you know, Mary Jo is having a podcast conversation with George Strombolopoulos. Absolutely out of nowhere. Sounds like Strombo was suddenly making all the podcast rounds. Yeah, coincidence, I think. That was part of whatever self-promo campaign that Yeah, coincidence though, I think. He was on this fall, looking for attention out there, just like everyone else. We're just throwing these conversations

into the void and hoping something comes back. I know, unless you have any more, and please, if you do, because it's been a couple of months since I've seen you, do you have any more comments about Toronto Mic'd episodes for the past two months or about

the TMLX11, any TMDS stuff to empty that vault right now because there's so much ground I want to cover with Bell Media, for example. Lots and lots of Bell Media stuff. Five or six items on the table and include from PJ to George Lagaganis and Lisa Laflamme and Michael Mellon

and Stephanie Smythe. So much I want to ground to cover. Ground I want to cover there. So before we get to the Bell Media segment, any more TMDS, TMLX? Well, you had your annual Dave Hodge, Hodge 100. How did you feel about his picks

this time around? I love his picks. You know, he's got a genre he loves and he goes deep into that genre. He doesn't stray from the genre very much. You know how lots of us are like, I like this hip hop song and I like this country folk rock thing. And I like this alt rock thing. And I like this electronica thing.

No, Dave likes, I'll call it alt country. I think it's like an alt country thing. Alt country, Americana. Right, right. And he sticks to his lane and he's deep in that lane. And bless him. I love that he still comes on once a year to unveil his top 100 of the year. Blair Packham, who I have yet to sit down with for a long-form,

heart-to-heart, personal chat. He did a basement episode with his drummer. David Steinberg. David Quinton Steinberg. David Quinton Steinberg. personal chat. He did a basement episode with his drummer. David Steinberg. David Quinton Steinberg. David Quinton Steinberg. Who they both played TMLX11 as well. I want to shout him out.

Thanks for that. And always on point with his impersonations of me. Shout out to Blair Packham. He loves your episodes. Who I absolutely did not go to school with. Or work at CIUT.

Yeah, on the radio at the same time. We're going to do that regularly, the David Quinton Steinberg, Blair Packham episodes. And he's a guy, I got some great notes from him over this break we're on here. What kind of break? I recorded Thursday, and then Friday was supposed to be the generational storm, which I was able to bike through. That's how bad we got in here in Toronto. But Friday became an empty day

and this is my first recording since Thursday. But Blair Packham loves the 1236 episodes and I think it's fair to say he's listening right now. As is, I want to shout out Mike Epple. And he was also worried about how I was doing. I appreciate the concern. Yeah, you sounded sad. Did you listen back to those?

Well, okay, but here's what happened with this company, St. Joe's, SJC Media. There has been other developments over there, and in the process, in fact, the people that I was most closely aligned with who were overseeing the development of this 1236 newsletter, they are not working there anymore for one reason or another.

Either moving on to bigger or better things or just stepping aside from, at least at one point, what was seen as a big transformation for the Canadian magazine industry. And that's what I was tethered to. We're in this phase right now where maybe it's because I'm not doing the newsletter anymore. You don't find the industry articles, the speculation, the coverage, the media columnists writing about media. There's actually a lot going on there, which I think points to this direction of whether there is viability to be found in the future of these Canadian magazine brands.

That's something that I got to be connected to for a few years. It was pretty exciting there. a few years. It was pretty exciting there. I do sense now maybe there's some doubt, some skepticism. This has been a recurring topic here on our monthly 1236 episodes. What does the future hold for these forms of media? And I came down here as someone who was being subsidized by this magazine company. And, of course, here I was playing for the home team. I talked with some enthusiasm about these different magazine brands that I had the chance to sit in the stable with and be a part of it all. and be a part of it all. And I think the story is maybe turning out to be a bit different than people think it was going to and before.

Maybe this points to the fact that it's difficult, if not impossible now, to make a growth business out of making and producing print magazines. I've had the opportunity through the Canadian Jewish News. Now I'm overseeing, I'm supervising a printed quarterly. So that to me has been an exciting development, something I didn't expect. Trying to put a vision together and move this thing in the right direction. Maybe, just maybe, I will be in command, believe it or not, of the last fun magazine in the entirety of Canada.

Wow. And it will be part of this Jewish community publication. No, the thing is going to get a new name. It's going to get a brand of its own eventually. So to answer your question here 30 minutes later, that is a direction in which things are going just because of the niche involved, serving this particular demographic.

I now have the opportunity to focus on seeing this other thing through, and that's what has distracted me the most from doing the 1236 newsletter. Because it's fun. It's exciting. Things are going in the right direction. But that doesn't mean I want to sacrifice my

relationship here with Toronto Mike. It's just something else. It's something else that I've been up to over there. Okay. What about, well, brainiac Mike thinks, okay,

so you were doing this 1236 thing with St. Joseph media. Now you've got this, let's call it the CJN, the Canadian Jewish news that you're working on. It's a great, great, great work you're doing there.

Why not marry the CGN stuff? Whatever name it ends up getting, if you rebrand it, but why not marry that to 1236? Mike, I've only got so much bandwidth, and I think we need to put our heads together. Well, we have to find energy from other people out there. VP of sales.

VP of sales got a new gig. Oh, I'm looking for it. I'm looking forward to hearing all about that. We'll talk about it here with Ed Keenan, okay? At the beginning of 2023. What lies ahead for people with that particular disposition of a certain age, those who are now in their 40s and 50s who are maybe wondering,

what happened to the energy of the media that I grew up with? Where do you put it now? How do you reach these people in a way that was maybe more complicated to do before? Can we find a solution? Is there something that we can discover here? Can we spend the next year prospecting it and figuring out where it goes? spend the next year prospecting it, and figuring out where it goes.

And if we find the answer, I will use the fact that I have this robust 1236 email list, and we'll start doing the regular newsletter again. But you're in good spirits? Like, you're not sad, you're optimistic, you're working hard at Canadian Jewish News, and you're going to be back here next Thursday. Well, pessimism might be my personal brand. But I think as we do our usual romp here through a bunch of media

stories involving all these corporate shenanigans out there, I think we'll reflect on the fact that you and me, Toronto Mike, we might have made the right choice of unhinging ourselves from what has become of more corporate media in Canada here. You can throw on a jam that will be a transition from one conversation to the next. What about the United States of Pop? I think that'll get us in good spirits. I'm telling everybody I'm stupid, but crazy What you need?

I know that you wanna know me I can't help it Your feet You see What you need? It's me, it's me It's me Do you understand?

I wish I knew How you feeling? How you feel right now? I wish I knew. How you feeling? How you feel right now? I wish I knew. How you feeling? That's how I feel right now. There's a whole lot of people in the house. Is everybody back up in the building?

Let's exchange the experience. You know, Mike, you never shut up about how much you love that guy. Girl talk. Greg Ullis. Mash-ups over the years. Love his mash-ups. You know, one time he trashed me from the stage in Toronto for something I wrote about him. You should be honored.

Proudest moments. Love it, honestly. And here we have DJ Earworm, who comes up with this mash-up at the end of every year, based on the top 25 pop songs in America. Even Kate Bush, Running Up That Hill. There's Elton John in there. With Dua Lipa

representing the old school. And Steve Lacey, Bad Habit. Which I think of all the big toppers. Was a favorite of mine. I think I introduced you to that song sometime during 2022 here. It was everywhere all year long. Maybe that's the jam of the year.

But he's working with the material he's got. If you don't like the mix and the mashup, you can blame the American public for not hitting the hits hard enough. So here's what was down with DJ Earworm. Just showing off like I try to every month after all these years. No, you bring the heat. That's why we all care about you. Now listen. United States of pop. All right, I'll bring it down in the mix.

It's, you know, yeah, it is what it is. Okay, let's discuss the Bell Media stuff. And one big, well, a couple of big departures, and then we need an update on a third one. I know you wanted me to pull a clip, but I'm going to have to go to Instagram and see if it plays. But what can you tell us about the disappearance, if you will, of Stephanie

Smythe, who's an FOTM? Mike, what can you tell me about the disappearance of Stephanie Smythe? Because she put out a tweet of her sitting there by the fireplace, Christmas time, looking in supervillain mode, wishing everyone a

Merry Christmas, coinciding with the fact that it was announced that she is no longer with the company. You've heard a lot of rumors about this. Your inbox has been burning. Okay, I know, but I did correspond with her about her coming on with her husband, actually, Paul Cook from 680 News.

And so I'm going to give her a chance to speak to what happened but here's the facts we can say right now on this recording she hadn't been heard or seen on cp24 for a few months when when did was her like she had been gone since october right uh i i didn't keep track of the exact date but she was a high profile personality? Because they kept up that tradition, her as what? The assignment editor, editor-in-chief, some position like that where she was carrying on the tradition of being on camera at the same time, keeping tabs to the point where when she appeared previously on Toronto Mic, she did your show in full TV makeup. Right. Because she never knew when the bat phone would ring, right? And we have to take that photo.

And she'd be called, summoned into duty at any given time. It meant that even coming into your basement, she had to be camera ready. And after a few years of doing that high-stress, high-pressure kind of job over at Bell Media, CP24, which was considered one of the crown jewels of the company, big profit center, just to repeat the same news stories over and over again of their whole acquisition of City TV. I think that turned out to be the most lucrative thing of all, everything that they caught,

which was the whole idea of having this ubiquitous broadcast, right? Like you can't go out in public in Toronto without seeing CP24 on any given screen. And as the old school cable has faded away with all the cords being cut, how many channels out there are seen as regularly as you see what's happening on CP24? And Stephanie Smythe was a big part of that, right? A central figure. A main character. And then when she disappears for a certain number

of months, culminating in the news, the information, how exactly was this dispatched? How did they make it known that she wasn't going to be there anymore? But the news seemed to hit hard enough that it meant a whole bunch of Google hits for Toronto Mike. TorontoMike.com. But yeah, so obviously being Toronto Mike, when things go down in newsrooms or in media centers, I get notified what went down.

So Stephanie Smythe, again, she'll come on and we'll get her story first before we talk any further. But something happens where she's no longer on the air. This is months ago. I think it was October, but I have to check the dates. So she's no longer on the air, but it was only announced this past week that she had officially parted ways with Bell Media. So that's why we saw that, you know, her, her, that great photo of her with the glass of wine or whatever. And so notice I'm being very careful with the conjecture because I don't want to be

blamed for telling a story that turns out not to be true. We haven't said anything. Different scraps of information and innuendo about a situation that I think reflected the fact that allow me to speculate a little bit here she was just doing her job the best that she could,

and there was a difference of opinion about a message that she delivered. Right. Okay, that's fair. That's fair. So obviously you and I know the details, and when we stop recording, we'll discuss in great depth.

But at this point, I'm not going to put that out there. Like, a lot of things I'm fed, I'm very fair to people, especially talent here. So I'm going to get Stephanie down here in the basement, and we're going to talk about it, and then we put that out there. Like a lot of things I'm fed, I'm very fair to people, especially talent here. So I'm going to get Stephanie down here in the basement and we're going to talk about it and then we'll go from there. But needless to say, she's no longer at CP24, which then caused me to get notes from people

because, you know, they come to me like, where's this person now? There are a couple of other people that I've been getting notes about being absent. Now, sometimes, you know, I'm going to think of FOTM Kayla Williams, who I know she changed her name because she got married to a CFL player. So she's Kayla. I believe she's like Kayla Tracy. Now she's actually like at home with her child. Like she's a happily at home with her child. And that's why you don't see her on the air. But the two names I've been fed, people want to know, and I have no insight into this, but I'm just going to throw it at you, Mr. Wise, but Chris Potter and Jackie Crandalls. These are the two names that

lately have been recreating in my inbox. Where's Chris Potter and Jackie Crandalls? And I have to admit, I'm not keeping enough track. The only time I see this channel is when it's playing in the lobby of some building that I'm walking past. But I do know enough that they are both personalities that you would also see

on CP24. At the same time, though, they gave a proper press release exit to someone who is no longer going to be on the air there. It becomes increasingly conspicuous since we've gone through an entire era of what here on Toronto Mic'd we like to call the tap on the shoulder. And how sometimes these exits are announced, sometimes they are spun in a way that turns out not to be true. Right, like Kevin Franke. And many months or even years later after the severance has run out, we get the truth, what's exposed. And then we get the folks who you see on the air everywhere all the time who just sort of vanish and don't say anything at all.

And you check your LinkedIn years later, and it turns out that they've moved on to some kind of quiet low-key communications job in the case of george log janice who we remember as a videographer at 299 queen street west the co-host of electric circus who ended up doing double duty, working the camera at the same time that he was co-hosting the show himself with Monica Diehl back in the heyday of EC. Brought back by Bell Media when they took over the CP24 channel. I would imagine with some sentimentality, keep a heritage intact, keep some city TV people still hanging around so that you had that legacy there. George Log Janus having moved into this position as senior news anchorman. Right. There, after several years of not seeing him, noticing George Log Janus in the corner of my eye, wondering, what is George Log Janus' dad doing anchoring the news? But no, that was George himself in his advanced age, taking on this position of being the voice of God when it came to Toronto's breaking news on this CP24 local 24-7 news channel.

He got a dignified exit, which I guess is playing out here in the last week of 2022. George Lagajanis leaving broadcasting behind, which then leaves us the slightly younger Gen Xers wondering, did he or did he not make the decision to retire? Because it's sort of frightening, right? We're looking out here at people who are not yet 60. I don't know George's exact age, but somewhere in that range, somewhere in that realm. Is this guy really of an age where he's ready to just sit back in that rocking chair for the rest of his life? Or do you think when he makes his appearance on Toronto Mic'd, he's booked? You sit back in that rocking chair for the rest of his life? Or do you think when he makes his appearance at Toronto Mike, he's booked,

you got him in the calendar. George Lagagiannis. George Lagagiannis has written me and shared his personal email and said, he'd love to come on. And I don't have it actually, uh, like the specific day and time, uh,

I'm going to have to follow up and get that done, but he's said he will do it. So I believe he'll do it. Will he or will he not give you an honest appraisal of what happened to the company? I'm constantly throwing back to an episode of Toronto Mic'd where Michael

Landsberg promised you an exit interview. It was the morning after the weekend of his last day on TSN. Right. And there he gave a cheerful account how he decided it was time to walk away from this four-decade-long legacy in sports broadcasting. It was nothing but love on his part.

It was a voluntary departure. No tap on the shoulder was involved. And me listening to this, I was not buying it for one second. As far as I could tell, neither were you. And yet you let him give it a spin on your show without interjecting, without challenging him on the way that he was portraying it. Okay, imagine all I can do. Listen, when you have a guest on,

and I've done this 1,176 times or whatever, but if a guest is telling their story, you can only do so much if you think they're being disingenuous. This was particularly tough because it was on Zoom. He wasn't even here in the basement. Right. So I can, you know,

ask to clarify and suggest that maybe he got a tap on the shoulder, but if he's going to tell his story as he believes it, or his, he wants it consumed publicly. I'm not in a position to yell out, Mr. Landsberg, you're a liar.

You're a liar, sir. Get off my zoom. Like this is not how it works in a liar. You're a liar, sir. Get off my Zoom. Like, this is not how it works in a civil society. Okay, well then, let's see if we get a little more honesty out of young George. Rod Black was honest, right? Like, I liked Rod's. It was like a quick call.

He's like, you know how it's going. You know the way of the world right now. So, like, Rod wasn't going to sell some. He wasn't going to, you know, throw me some bullshit. He's like, yeah, I've been around a long time. I make a lot of money, and this is the way of the world right now. So Rod wasn't going to sell some, he wasn't going to throw me some bullshit. He's like, yeah, I've been around a long time, I make a lot of money, and this is the way of the world right now. Goodbye.

And he went on and did something else. So there's different models that you kind of deal with here. Amidst everything happening here, we got the news revealed that a guy named Michael Melling, who was completely anonymous outside of the Bell Media

boardroom. Outside of the Dana Levinsons of the world. That he has been reassigned after stepping down as the head of CTV News to spend time with his family.

And now he will be working for BCEce for bell canada uh he's got a new job away from the news division the vice president of shared services at this giant telecom company which as portrayed by brian lilly of the toronto sun is is a promotion, if you look at it from the perspective of the hierarchy of Bell. That is to say, how much money is he responsible for here? At the same time, a column from a financial analyst in the Globe and Mail suggesting outright that Bell should get out of the media business.

Did you see that story? I did read that, yeah. It was just an argument here that they don't out of the media business. Did you see that story? I did read that, yeah. It was just an argument here that they don't have any passion for it. They've shown that all they have been doing for the past few years is chopping away, letting people go, trying to find some sort of profit here in all the media that they own. And the fact is that the assets that they acquired from Astral Media, from Chum, this is worth a fraction of what it was even a decade ago.

And there is ultimately very little here that can positively contribute to BCE's bottom line. can positively contribute to BCE's bottom line. Well, Michael Melling is now safely ensconced within this telecom company, leaving the media division behind. And part of the critique of what's been going on in Bell Media relates to the fact that they, over the last few years, have put telecom people in charge of broadcasting content, right? Like, how is someone who made a fortune in selling cell phone plans,

you know, how do they have a mastery of what's going on in radio, right? The rhetorical question there, which is answered in listening to the product that they produce, right? More syndication, more nationalization, more limited live content. Just listen to these heritage stations like in Toronto News Talk 1010 CFRB, you know, the headcount, a fraction of what it used to be, producing their own original newscasts

at what used to be considered the most authoritative news radio station. They're not in that business anymore, just like low-key, low-overhead, low-maintenance talk radio. And maybe it's better in the end that these personalities like Michael Melling stay away from pretending that they know anything about the news.

And the only reason that Michael Melling's authority was challenged is because what happened with Lisa Laflamme. Lisa Laflamme, I know you love the Laflamme, except they always called her Lisa Laflamme in those intros to her CTV national news there. But we had that brief, you know, the queen died. I don't know if you heard that. Okay. Shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. But the queen, Liz II,

died in 2022. And Rogers made some noise by like hiring Lisa as like a freelancer to go to London. Maybe she was going anyway, but to basically anchor live from London.

Yeah, the way she tells it, she had already booked her ticket on the plane, not knowing who would, she would have just posted these videos to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram. But she found a customer for what she was doing.

Friends in high places over at Rogers. Right. We speculated aloud on this very program, the 1236 episodes of Toronto Mike, whether this was maybe Lisa, maybe the next shoot of fall-fall there would be that Lisa joins Rogers in some capacity. But here we are, I don't know how many months

later, and there's been no news on that front. Like, is Lisa just out doing the tour? She gets a lot of money for speaking at these events, etc. Like, maybe she's too busy cashing checks to go get a Joe job again. Well, yeah, I've seen her booked for a number of different talks over the next six months,

including, what is it, Canadian Journalism Foundation Awards night in June. There'll be a special tribute to her. I should be there. She's doing another event with reporter Robin Doolittle. I think something else, Montreal, the Holocaust Museum. It looks like her services are very much required to be to be that kind of personality and that you know she she will do okay in the end are you sure it's lisa laflamme did you do a fact check on well i went to the voiceover me who's

always been getting that wrong the voiceover because as you might know i don't actually watch ctv national news but i did then on youtube see here the voiceover because, as you might know, I don't actually watch CTV National News, but I did then on YouTube hear the voiceover, that big voice that says, you know, CTV National News, you're with Lisa Laflamme. Like, it's definitely Laflamme in that voiceover. And I'm sure she would have approved that.

And it's a recurring thing. It would have been corrected if they had it wrong. So I'm going to say she goes by Laflamme. Sorry about that. I regret the error. I butcher every other name. I mean, you've corrected me before. I know. But I didn going to say she goes by Leflam. Sorry about that. I regret the error. I butcher every other name. You've corrected me before. I know. But I didn't trust you. I didn't get the background to your fact check.

Do you have access to YouTube? Maybe you could also go and find these CTV National News voiceover introductions. You know, Lisa Leflam was on the cover of Post City magazines. You know, those free newspapers you get, Midtown Toronto? They seem to have defied

the newspaper recession of this century. Like my local Guardian. Packed with advertising, and there you've got you've got Lisa Laflamme celebrated as the number one most inspiring woman of the year.

And who wrote this?-up about her? This woman, Rosa Wang, who works with her, or worked with her at CTV. Do they disclose about how close those two are? Well, Rosa is still working there. So as part of that Brian Lilly reporting, he characterized this mean girls environment that the two of them cultivated within CTV,

but Rosa kept her job, and she wrote this tribute celebrating Lisa as the greatest woman to ever appear on TV. That's like me writing a piece for, I don't know, let's say for the Toronto Star

in which I talk about how great Mark Wiseblood is and how the 1236 newsletter is the future of journalism. Like, no bias at all, right? Okay. Okay, well, the ethics are a little bit slippery there.

One more name I want to talk about, but you did send me a clip, so I'm going to actually, in real time, I'm actually going to Instagram.com. Oh, there's a mute button. Stand by.

Expert based in Toronto and joins me now. Patricia, thank you so much for joining me, and I am loving the Christmassy backdrop. Just first of all, tell us about the dramatic change in weather, and what is the situation like where you are at the moment?

Well, happy holidays to you, Monica. Yes, I wanted to make sure I was festive because tis the season, right? And we all beg for a white Christmas every single year. Well, here in Toronto, Canada, it's not the case just yet. We're dealing with rainfall right now, extreme rain at that. Because why? Monica, the temperatures are still quite, if you will, comfortable. I don't want to say mild, but quite comfortable, especially for this time of the year. The transition, though, when the actual winter storm and all those warnings will become more so factual

and a true story for Ontarians, those in central Canada, will be overnight tonight into the morning hours. How long do I need to go? You just tell me when to fade down. The TSB, the Toronto District School Board, and the Greater Toronto Area, some students are getting an early start to the Christmas season. Yeah, that was bullshit, by the way. My kids could have gone to school Friday.

It's a snow day for tomorrow, Monica. Yes, it's a bit like a Christmas movie. How dare you step over the words of a Toronto weather expert, Patricia Jagernoth. We were lucky here in Toronto. We didn't quite get that. But okay. of Toronto weather expert Patricia Jagernoth. We were lucky here in Toronto. We didn't quite get that. But okay.

Behind the scenes of this podcast, one month of intense negotiations between Toronto Mike and the PJ team. Okay. I will just preface this by saying somebody tagged me on twitter and said you should have patricia jagernoth on your program and i replied to this tweet and said and it's true i've actually way before she left bell media i wanted her on this program uh and romer actually suggested i have her on and i tried to get her on then i i tweeted at patricia

and i said uh i'd love to have Patricia Juggernaut on Toronto Mic'd. And then the reply from that account, Patricia J, I can't remember the handle, but the reply from Patricia's account was, I'd love to come on Toronto Mic'd. Something to that effect. And we should add, the enthusiasm would have been stoked

by some developments over the course of this autumn, which included a complaint to the Canadian Human Rights Commission. So Patricia Jagernoth, PJ, who's a woman of color, she says she was passed over repeatedly for promotions,

full-time job with Bell Media, that she was treated as a token and a commodity within the corporation. So this is one of a number of legal battles that they're dealing with at Bell Media about their treatment of on-air personalities. We've got Jamil Jivani we've talked about here over the past year. He disappeared all of a sudden from the Bell Media News Talk 1010 airwaves. He wants back pay because he said he was treated as a token and a commodity

because they wanted a black guy on the radio, and the things that he had to say as a conservative turned out to be the opposite of what their diversity and inclusion committee was looking for. So he wants to be paid back. We've also got this host who used to be on E-Talk, Danielle Graham, also suing Bell Media because she says she was passed over by the hiring of Tyrone Edwards, T-Rex, the guy who they brought in to replace Ben Mulroney.

You'll notice that we don't hear from Ben Mulroney anymore. He's completely ghosted the people of Canada off to Hollywood to hang out with Meghan and Harry or whatever he's up to behind the scenes. But it seems like Ben Mulroney ducked out of this whole situation. He's laying low. It's that lawsuit from Danielle Graham. Danielle Graham's a white woman right a white woman claiming that their diversity push ultimately undermined her and all her years of service trying to make it in the in the e-talk daily cinematic universe uh that she was she was pushed aside so that could bring

in tyrone edwards. She's making the argument that he is incompetent, like that they promoted a guy, a diversity hire, who didn't deserve the job. So she's suggesting he got the job because he's a black man. That all seems somewhat subjective also.

He's not qualified to read off a teleprompter and do these celebrity puff pieces as well as she is. If I may, so that suit there is, I got over, I got looked, I got replaced by somebody because they're

a person of color where Patricia is I was passed over because I'm a person of color, right? So these are like opposite. And then you've got Jamil Jivani saying I was removed from the radio because they were expecting a black person doing a talk radio show to hold certain opinions. The allegations that he is making that he lost his job because, in fact, he did not agree with the Black Lives Matter movement.

He did not agree with these diversity and inclusion initiatives within the company. He just wants to get paid what he thinks he's worth, which was like a six-month contract that they cut him off from. A lot of legal battles here. It seems like the excitement that you're looking for on the TV and radio, it's all going on behind the scenes in the offices of BCE as they try to deal with these legal battles. But to clarify, with Patricia Jagernoth, PJ, her thing is a human rights complaint.

So she's not saying that she was entitled to any job that was taken away from her. She agreed to work there as a part-time freelancer. There's nothing she can do about that. She was putting in her hours, right? She was pounding the pavement on behalf of the company. She was bragging that she had some astronomical number of Instagram followers.

And maybe we can analyze where all those followers came from. But as far as we're concerned, looking from the outside in, she developed a lot of fans. And she says that for systemic reasons, she was not respected by her bosses at Bell. That there were these other weather presenters, forecasters, who were credited meteorologists. Chris Potter was one of them. Now he's disappeared. He's no longer on the air. You're getting emails.

The mystery of whatever happened to him and that PJ was cast aside. I mean, essentially, she walked away from a more casual job because the way she puts it, she wasn't getting anywhere within the company. A lot that you would have been able to talk about with her had you had her on Toronto Mike. So if you take the racism allegations

and you put it aside, which is a big, big ask here, but if you did that, this story sounds to me an awful lot like Megan Edwards' story when Megan Edwards, who worked for Bell Media on TV and radio, came on Toronto Mic and talked about why she left the industry. Okay, so Megan Edwards and the PJ story, the big difference, which is a significant

difference, I'm not minimizing this difference at all. Megan Edwards is actually a white woman who was a pay-as-you-go part-timer, couldn't get the health benefits and stuff of Bell Media, but was working like a dog, bad for mental health, etc., etc. And PJ, sorry, which is, you know, I happily gave Megan, I don't know, 90 minutes. Let's talk. Like, let's talk about this. And I would be so happy to give PJ as much time as she needs to tell her story in this very safe space. And I'm disappointed to say that in the discussions via email and Twitter DM and Twitter, I don't believe in my heart of hearts, and I hope, I don't know if I'm, I can't prove this,

but I can prove it for the email, but not for the Twitter. I don't believe I've ever corresponded directly with PJ, email but not for the twitter i don't believe i've ever corresponded directly with pj because all this correspondence by email is signed by the name johnny j-a-n-i and a little googling tells me this is actually pj's fiancee and on team pj or the pj team the pj team so uh is it a real estate firm on the side so where does the pj team come from so if pj can hear me i don't believe i've ever corresponded directly. I now believe in hindsight that that tweet I got from the account, which I thought was PJ saying I'd love to come on,

I now believe that was Johnny. So I don't think I've ever talked to PJ. Well, she's running a big business there. A lot of followers to appease. I would love to have PJ sit here in the basement and tell her story, share her story. I think it's an important story, and I'd like to shine a light on it.

What the hell is the point of Toronto Mike if not for somebody like PJ to tell her story? I'd love to have her on. Is that what you're doing down here? Is that the point of this entire exercise? Amber Giro came on, talked about and this is a good segue because I do want to reference

somebody who's disappeared from these airwaves but you'll remember early in the history of Toronto Mike Amber Giro came on to talk about the racism that she in her experience uh that she experienced in the 1010 newsroom and she came she was very uh honest about what she experienced at 1010 and she believes it's because she's a woman of color a black woman now on that note before we go too far from Bell Media, what has happened, please tell me now, for the record, what has happened to FOTM Scott MacArthur?

Well, that's a question I was hoping that you could answer, Toronto Mike. I mean, we've discussed Scotty Mac. He got a co-hosting gig on News Talk Radio alongside Reshmi Nair. Reshmi. You had down here for a memorable episode.

Another great episode, Tim. I love both those people. One of the great episodes of 2022. Right. But in the process, I don't know if it was at that point or shortly thereafter, her co-host of this afternoon drive show disappeared. And they were introduced with great fanfare because they had previously done an afternoon drive show, News Talk 1010.

That was J. Mad Dog Michaels. Sure. Ryan Doyle, a year ago at this time. Also both FOJs. A lot of speculation about how he disappeared. Now it seems to have been happening again. But we don't want to say the wrong thing because we don't know what's happening here. Well, here's what I can say.

You're right. I'm not going to speculate because I have no idea what's going on. I just hope, I hope Scott MacArthur's okay. Like, legit, I hope he's okay. I just hope he's okay. So I texted Scott, who in the past would text back, and he did not reply to my text. Now,

I'm not ranking, I'm just saying, the silence could be, this could be a health, a personal health matter, and it's none of, you know, they're not going to disclose things in public from an HR standpoint. So I hope he's okay. I don't have any insight. I don't know if he's still there. I hope he's, maybe he'll come back.

I hope so. So I don't know anything. So I would never come on and speculate about what happened to Scott MacArthur on 1010. I just know he hasn't been on the air in how many months? Oh, at least since September, as far as anybody could tell. Also very quiet on social media, right? Like not a peep,

not a reply. No, and not replying to TorontoXText. That's a serious sign. But I hope he's okay and I don't know anything further. But I do will say, like, Ryan Doyle, what happened to Ryan was my most frequently asked question via email and Twitter for a long time. And that has been replaced by, where is Scotty Mac on 1010?

In the process, we presume here that the audience is falling away. The podcasting has replaced habitual listening for a growing number of people out there. habitual listening for a growing number of people out there, and what's left behind at an operation like News Talk 1010, part of Bell Media. Well, look, I mean, it's like an argument in perpetual motion that things aren't what they used to be. But at the same time, we've heard the arguments that what broadcast radio has going for it is that ability to be live and local, right? Deliver content with immediacy that you can't get in any other fashion,

any other form. John Moore with The Morning Show, he seems to be a fan favorite to this day and his ability to deliver the goods over there. Evan Solomon walked away to work for this global vanity media operation. He's been replaced by Vassie. That's a big move. Vassie Capellos.

Right. Something Greek. If I'm pronouncing it correctly. She moved in from CBC to be that political anchor at the CTV network. Which was a big move which includes doing a daily show on the radio where evan solomon uh that was his perch before right got that job at bell after he was fired from the cbc for dealing art on the side with his guests right i thought that was a fantastic comeback but he's off to bigger things uh outside of working in this can corporate radiosphere.

The common denominator in all these stories that we tell here month after month after month is the way that things are run today is only going to break your heart, right? It's going to end with a tap on the shoulder if you're lucky enough to have put in those decades of service. older, if you're lucky enough to have put in those decades of service, maybe if you're like George Log Janus, you can exit a little more on your own terms. You can spin that tap on the shoulder to make it sound like a retirement, which gets people like me and Toronto Mike shaking our heads. We're not going to be able to retire when we're 57 years old. What are they trying to say about the lifespan of someone in the Canadian broadcast sphere? And it's very unlikely somebody with that position at that age would one day wake up and say, I would like to stop doing this now.

Like this is, with the exception of people like Lloyd Robertson, or you know who might be an exception as well. Peter Mansbridge, who says, no, he said, when I hit a certain age, I didn't want to be on the air. And he says, you know, it was his choice. And I believe Peter because that's what he told me. But these people I'm thinking now, like Kevin Frankish and then Roger Peterson. Remember, Roger, like these people clearly got the tap, you know, Rod Black got the tap. We can run down the list of people who got the tap. But this is simply time to go.

There's a guy in Calgary who just got the tap that I'm hoping we'll talk about. Well, here's the thing. I believe Tarzan Dan managed to spin his dismissal in the right direction that he got the public on his side. A lot of people rooting for him. The fact that Q107 in Calgary, different thing from Q107 in Toronto, was 2004, and they did something at a time that you didn't see happen a lot back then.

Now it would be more common today, which was they took this brand that was long established, of course, in Toronto as Rock Radio Station, Q107, and they imported the Q107 branding to Calgary on what was an entirely different radio outlet.

Maybe they shared some syndicated programming, but ultimately this was a classic hits radio station for Calgary and had as a morning man on that station Terry DeMonte, who was a legend in Montreal for all those years, and he got a gig in Calgary there. It was Chorus, I guess, trying to bulk up one of their assets, give it more of a big city branding than it had before,

a way to sell to advertisers. They've got, you know, Q107, such a legendary heritage brand that it could operate at the same time in two different cities. And since then, it was hobbling along. I mean, to the point where half the Q107 Calgary programming

wasn't even coming from Calgary at all. It was stuff they were sharing with the same station, Rock 101 in Vancouver. So another corporate radio situation where this is a shadow of its former self, and they've only got a couple local shows. One DJ who stayed with the corporation, they gave him another job at Chorus down the hall,

the country radio station, and a name that everybody knows from the Toronto airwaves, Tarzan Dan, out of a job because of a format change. And I think the way he relayed what was happening to him with posts on social media, there was a lot of compassion out there for what he was going through. This is a Canadian media veteran, legendary personality, a guy who was born to be on the radio,

thrown out of work by chorus because of a format change. And that hopefully Taurus and Dan will live to swing again somewhere on the airwaves, jamming in the jungle somewhere else, maybe back to where it all began in Toronto. But a lot more coverage than usual because I think it was well played by Tarzan Dan to get the message out there about what was happening to him. Am I right about this?

You heard, given that this is something in Calgary, you saw a lot of social media mentions about Tarzan Dan. The first was, oh my God, there's a Q107 in Calgary. I had no idea. Okay, I had no idea. I'm really, when it comes to radio,

I'm pretty hyper-focused on this market I live in, what I can get in my wife's automobile. Yeah, you're barely even listening to the stations after. No, but at least I'm aware. What's your favorite station? Is it still going? You can't on me. Today Radio. 93.5. Yeah, bless the heart. Yeah, I think

that was doomed from the start. So I'm aware of things. Not getting off the ground. I think they need Tarzan Dan over there to get people excited about listening to the radio again. So, wow, there's a Q107 Calgary? I had no idea. I'm only aware of a Q107 in Toronto. And then it's like, oh, Tarzan Dan's still on the radio there?

That's cool. But then I have memories of a very interesting exchange I had with Tarzan Dan about, I don't know, two years ago maybe, where maybe just before the pandemic, now that I think about it, in which he said, respectfully, he doesn't want to come on Toronto Mic'd because he, I'm trying to remember his words, but something to the

effect of, he doesn't think it's appropriate to talk about himself. Do you think that's maybe something he had heard in the past? I always want to go on Gmail and find out what that is. That people had told him he had a big ego, that things were out of control. Yeah.

But at the same time, maybe being a little cautious about employment. He's been something of a radio journeyman across the country over the years. But Tarzan would be best remembered from when he was on 680 CFTR. Yeah, in 640. The last incarnation of 680 as a music radio station right yeah 640 for a few years and then back of Rogers kiss kiss 92 5 right I saw he was bragging about the fact that he was I don't know windsurfing with the backstreet boys over the course of this summer and uh right weird Al Yankovic when he's in town always uh tries to find and we'll get

back to him in the uh ridley funeral the last of the last of the great uh top 40 djs out there uh playing these pre-programmed classic hits coming out of the central chorus computer uh i think tarzan dan deserved better and now he's got a lot of people out there rooting for him to bounce back. Sure, but DJ's losing their job because of format flips. I watch WKRP in Cincinnati. This is sort of nature of the beast. But in this case, there's a cliffhanger because losing his job for what?

The speculation that this might be the beginning, we'll find out in January, of Chorus taking its talk radio stations and putting them on FM, which would also then be a situation that would inevitably extend to Toronto. But Toronto's Q107 is still a money-making enterprise. Yeah, that's what they're finding out after the settlement with John Derringer, which had to have been one of your most discussed topics of conversation. Some might say that Toronto Mike is where it all began.

The downfall of John Derringer on the radio in Toronto. So that was 2022. What a year it's been. We should have done like a not, we don't have time today. In fact, this is going to be a very long episode. This is why you have to come every month. can't do this two two months in one show it's just too much but we should almost do a recap because of what's happened just from my perspective what's happened in 2022 because the derringer thing is what prompts the blundell thing that

drags in the fearless fred thing which makes the bullard thing fly out of left field like this is all connected man the assumption is that what they've learned at Q107 is you don't have to have some kind of cornball comedy on the classic rock radio in the morning. In fact, there might be a greater preference out there to just keep it low-key. Like, people are there for the Zeppelin. Yeah, well, Zeppelin. I mean, that would be like the most extreme edge of what they're playing these days. I don't know.

Like Fleetwood Mac and Elton John and the Guess Who. I mean, QN07 is really now like your grandmother's old AM radio station. Are they playing Journey over there? Whatever is safe and they can present in the form of being rock music, even though by any measure of what you and me consider to be rock isn't being played there at all. I mean, it's essentially just like the same role that a Wally Crowder would have played on CFRB, right?

They would play music back then, and he would chat the people up in between the songs. There wasn't any attempt at actually making any jokes. There wasn't this idea that they had to shock people or even say one memorable word, just like give them the time and the temperature, and here's something that we randomly found on the internet, some fun facts. You know, here is like a list of the most popular

gangster movies of all time. What do you think? Give me a call. You don't even know if the caller is real or not when they put them on the air. Does it even matter anymore? This is that, as I was calling it, a Soviet style of classic rock radio, where they found a capable player in Dan Chen to fill in for all these months for John Derringer. Also, the rest of the cast of characters over there at QN07, John Derringer had left the building. Speculation about these two guys who were on the air with him as sidekicks. From what I could tell, they expressed some relief that the internal investigation was over. I think, Toronto Mike, you commented on that on Twitter where they issued a statement, right?

We've completed our workplace research from a third-party firm here at Chorus, and we've calculated that our investigation is over, and we are now taking steps to rectify whatever was happening involving the enormous ego of John Derringer, and it will never happen again. It wasn't even that specific. It was complete corporate gobbledygook, just infuriating, to be honest.

Precisely what I can't stand about the corporate PR machine, talking loud ain't saying nothing. Right? That's Chuck D, right? That's a lot of words, nothing said. Does anyone really care what happens with Q107 in Toronto? Do they need to announce that they've got a new morning host who will be attempting to do some kind of comedy? Would it matter to the ratings, to the revenues?

I don't even... Does anybody care? It doesn't matter. It would just give us something else to yak about once a month. And same thing up the dial. 102.1 The Edge, CFNY. Topic of conversation year over the years. They barely even play new music anymore.

Right? It's very much a throwback. 1979? Yeah, throwback operation right now. More Smashing Pumpkins? The grunge hits. So can I ask you? Stuff from the early 2000s.

I mean, low energy. Minimal effort. That morning show. Nothing to see here. Nothing to listen to at all. That morning show, they were all FOTMs because they came over when they were on Y108 and then they were the morning show, the B team, and there were three of them.

And all three I liked. It was all right. Well, the only interesting... They're still there. But the only interesting angle about everything here was our pal Jay Brody. Because he was the one collecting piss bottles on a construction site,

and he had a dream. He calculated that one day he could be the morning show host on CFNY, and he took a number of calculated steps about how he could get that job, and I just heard his whole life story with amazing admiration uh when he when he launched on 102.1 it crashed right into the pandemic so i don't think that story was very well told uh it was something that you could uh draw a lot of attention to as far as saying look this is a guy who's fulfilled his dream it was something that people get on board with. It just fizzled away really fast. And that was the end of Jay Brody. De-camped to Vancouver, right? Right. He followed

a former Edge 102 personality. Do they live together? Is that what was happening here? Why can't you comment on this? I think this explains everything. I'm not TMZ, Mark. But this level of corporate radio, because maybe if you only have to pay one rent for a couple that's on the radio, I think that's the best deal of all for these corporations.

So we're referencing the fact that Carly Myers left 102.1 for the same station in Vancouver. And all I can say is I love this Jay Brody chap, and I wish him nothing but the best in Vancouver. Okay, so if they happen to be roommates, I think that works out. I think that's really great, right? You know, I'm not going to be paid a lot of money being on some rage-against-the-machine radio station out there in Vancouver. Why not be able to split the rent

and try and make some magic on the radio in the process? That whole thing just fell off my radar, too. I mean, wishing them the best. But we're standing by to see if 102.1 CFNY ends up flipping to a talk radio format, if that's what is happening here at Chorus. They will take the broadcast. It's right now on AM640.

And just sunset this radio station. There's so little effort being put into it. I don't think it would surprise anybody at all. And that's the point where we will have the CFNY closing ceremonies. Where else? With Scott Turner. Where else but on Toronto Mic'd. because you talked about cfny uh i need to just tell you that uh i i work for humble and fred you already know this but fred patterson excitedly uh phones me up and says mike i've got a box of

dat tapes and we can digitize it for uh like humble and fred best ofs in 2023 and all this stuff and he knew i would be interested in this because i'm a natural born archivist and i was excited and i phoned my friend bob blue light and i said i need a dat player because i don't own one i don't even know what one looks like to be honest and he's like let me get on it then i don't own one. I don't even know what one looks like, to be honest. And he's like, let me get on it. Then, I don't know, 25 minutes later, Fred Patterson calls me back. Mike, Mike, they're not dad tapes. They're cassette tapes. I'm like, I have a cassette player.

I'm touching it right now, Mr. Wiseblood. And I said, I can, you know, TRRS cable my cassette player to my board and record, digitize anything I can play on cassette. I can digitize it. So I get, in fact, it's on the seat beside you. I got a box of tapes. And just yesterday, I had a little time on my hands. And I started to go through these tapes. I'm like, I'm going to hear some old Humble and Fred shows. This pile here I'm pointing to, which might be approximately 20,

15 to 20 cassettes. Only one of those tapes has Humble and Fred on it. The other 19 or so tapes are actually a bunch of Scott Turner with Fred Patterson when Humble Howard was at 99.9 The Mix. There's May Potts filling in for Humble Howard. So there's a tape of May Potts with Fred Patterson. There's a tape of Humble and Dan Duran because Freddie P wasn't there. There's literally, and I don't think Fred knew what he had. He just knew he had old tapes and they're probably Humble and Fred episodes. But it's amazing to me as I go through them

how very, very little Humble and Fred I have on these tapes. So I'm a little bit bummed out about that. But there is one March 1st, 1990. I have a complete episode of Humble and Fred in which Howard leaves early to catch a flight to something like, I don't know where he's going, San Francisco or something. And he has a cellular phone where he calls in to finish the show, trying to catch this flight. And I will share it with the world, but it's kind of neat, kind of cool to hear that and hear what the music they're playing and

hear the sports and updates from Freddie P and everything and go back in time and hear Humble and Fred in 1990. So that is something I'm working on in my spare time here. Okay, so you can just live in the past, listening now to yesterday's radio, and it doesn't matter what's happening in the present tense anymore. The big sports news? Maybe Calgary will have to host the 1992 Winter Olympics

because Albertville in France might not be ready and they might ask, IOC might ask Calgary to do it a second time in a row. That was like the big sports news. Look, who am I to talk? I'm listening on the iHeartRadio app to old Casey Kasem

American Top 40 countdowns. That's my radio comfort food. But Mark, because I need to get to the Ridley Funeral Home segment, and I need to play a little Jan Arden so that we can thank some sponsors for making this possible. Are we going to burn off some other topics? Well, I wanted to address the Toronto Star, but when we're here with Ed Keenan,

talking about the history of Gen X Media, we'll get into it a little bit more. But you know what happened with the Toronto Star? The two buddies, BFFs, who said that they were going to... Bitov, and what's the other guy? Jordan Bitov and Paul Rivette. They were butting heads. They were at odds with each other and Jordan

Bitov prevailed, and we'll see what happened there, but included in this fall, the Toronto Star decamping from one young street, not the Toronto Star building anymore, to the point where they rapidly took down the letters at the top of that skyscraper.

I think they're all gone now. I'm actually going to Queen's Quay and Jarvis tomorrow morning, and I will make sure to look at all angles of that building at One Young Street. Okay, so that's obviously for Keenan next week. Toronto Star.

We'll talk more about that. Now Magazine, Glenn Sumi, who was like the last correspondent standing, which is to say that he voluntarily continued to post his theater reviews at nowtoronto.com, dramatically announced Christmas Eve. He could no longer log in. He was done.

His privileges were withdrawn. He no longer had access to the Now Magazine email, Now Magazine website. And this thing was zombified. They weren't producing daily, weekly content anymore. I guess he was just using it, doing his community service to the theater community, just keeping tabs on stuff. Maybe he figured he would get some back pay.

Things would turn around for him somehow. But the day after, announced he's just going to do his own newsletter. He's going to try and monetize on his own, try and find his own path. Coincidentally or not, his privileges were revoked, and that was the end of the line

for something that made a fade over the course of, I guess, the last two or three years, which is the concept of an alternative weekly or monthly or daily or whatever it was going to be, publication for Toronto.

This might be spelling the end for now. We'll see what happens there. We'll talk about that with Ed Keenan next week as well. And maybe we'll also get into talking about BuzzFeed and Vice. And we've got this whole catalog of episodes where we're discussing how media was being transformed by venture capitalists who made a big bet on these companies

that might have eventually gone public. That did end up happening in the case of BuzzFeed. Vice twisting in the wind, waiting for some kind of Saudi Arabian buyer to put it out of its current misery. And what that says about how far we've come. Stand by. Ed Keenan, Mark Weisblatt, together.

If Blair Packham thinks I recede into the backgrounds in a typical episode of Toronto Mic'd with Mark Weisblatt, wait till he hears next Thursday. You won't even know I'm here, I suspect. I'll turn on the mics and I'll let them go at it. That'll be great. Here's a woman who says she's going to come on Toronto Mike early in 2023. I look forward to it. Shout out to a future FOTM, Jan Arden star of bandits, the stew stone movie that is now available on a Hollywood suite.

Shout out to a, was it David Kynes FOTM, David Kynes from Hollywood suite. Shout out to, is it David Kynes? F-O-T-M, David Kynes from Hollywood Suite. All right. I want to thank the partners that have made

all this possible, particularly the most delicious craft beer in the province, Great Lakes Brewery. There you go. Mark Wiseblood

finished his coffee. He insisted I make them and now he's going into the Great Lakes. Thank you, Great Lakes, for your support. Another great year. We're going to have another TMLX event on their patio next summer. Palma Pasta hosted us at TMLX 11.

Wiseblood did not show up because it's not on brand for him, but it was a great time, and their food is delicious, and everybody knows if you want authentic Italian food. Hang on. Ho, ho, hold the payment. Ho, ho, hold the payment. Shout out to Leon's. I did make an appearance at one of your events this year. I know. I'm talking about TMLX 11.

Wonderful though. I was at TMLX 10. I saw you there at Great Lakes. I smoked my first ever cannabis cigarette. Shout out to Canna Cabana. And I actually want to announce a couple of things. One, that Andy Palalas is back later in January for the edibles episode, which will be indoors. I'm going to take an edible at the beginning.

We're going to talk about edibles, and then I'm going to report back how I'm doing. That's with Andy Palalas. And also, so thank you, Canna Cabana, who won't be undersold in cannabis or cannabis accessories. And breaking news. Okay, this is breaking. As we record, I popped in to see my DMs. I'm now announcing later in January, we're going to celebrate the anniversary of Sportsnet, in studio, two day-woners, Jamie Campbell and Brad Fay, coming back to Toronto Mic'd in person to talk about the ongoing history of Sportsnet.

How does that sound to you, Mr. Weisblatt? Sounds like something I'll be hearing a follow-up review about on Hebsey on sports. Shout out to Hebsey. We're back, by the way, Friday. Is he also hanging around there in the early days? Yeah, more or less. I think Scott... I assume Hebsey's opinion on everything might be

a little different from theirs. And that's part of what makes the Toronto Mike Universe fun. Absolutely. Couple of great podcasts you should be listening to. Yes, We Are Open, hosted by the cuddly Al Grego,

who's an award-winning podcaster with Moneris. Go to YesWeAreOpenPodcast.com Inspiring stories. Every time there's a new season, there's like a three-month sponsorship deal with Moneris, and that means we're actually one more episode, and

I just want to thank Moneris and thank Al Grego for letting me talk about them for the last few months. I love it. And I love the podcast. And I love Al, who's 11 for 11 at events. And Raymond James Canada, the advantaged investor. Subscribe to the advantaged investor from Raymond James Canada to get insights, valuable perspectives from analysts on what you should be doing with your money.

Get your money to work for you. Thank you, Raymond James. And of course, Ridley Funeral Home. And this begins our Ridley Funeral Home segment of Toronto Mic'd with Mark Weisblatt from 1236. at your feet I'm tingling right from my head to my toes

So help me, help me, help me make the feeling go Cause when the loving starts and the lights go down There's not another little soul around You'll be here till the sun comes up A Shirley Icard with a song originally recorded by Fleetwood Mac, Say You Love Me, which turned out to be a Toronto radio hit all across Canada. Don't forget CKOC in Hamilton where Rob Pruce was loving this song.

Rob Pruse was loving this song. It was a case of a Canadian record label capitalizing on what was at the time an album track, which sounded like it could have been a radio hit. Singer-songwriter Shirley Eichard was at the ready to do a cover version of this Christine McVie song and beat the Fleetwood Mac single to the punch

as far as getting on the Canadian airwaves because this song qualified as CanCod, Canadian content version cover of Fleetwood Mac. And on certain radio stations then you would not have heard the Fleetwood Mac version of the song. It would have been this one by Shirley Icard, which I think sounded more like one of those Canadian show bands. A lot more

horns in here. There seemed to be a certain ostentatious sound that you would have not received in the blues-based legacy of Fleetwood Mac. And yet, at the same time, it sounded indistinct enough that these stations could get the CanCon points by giving this airtime to Shirley Eichardt. Well, Shirley Eichardt died on December 15th, 2022, 67 years old. And her name was largely familiar

from this cover version hit. And then another song that she wrote for Anne Murray originally wanted to do a version of. Right, she named the album that, right? Something to Talk About. And it was on some songwriting tapes. Anne Murray's producers thought the song wasn't good enough for even an Anne Murray album track. Eventually landed in the hands of Bonnie Raitt.

Something to talk about became Shirley Eichardt's biggest hit of all. Here's the thing. She was suffering from a particular kind of stage fright, where even though she was fine in the recording studio, even though she didn't have a problem making appearances on TV, the whole idea of performing for a crowd turned out not to be Shirley Eichardt's thing. So we have a story that because of the royalties that came out of this version by Bonnie Raitt, Shirley Eichardt was able to fulfill her dream and just live a quiet life, writing music on her own,

where she died, Orangeville, Ontario, and that she goes down in history as a mythical figure in the history of Canadian music, because she did not seek the spotlight. Their name was known, mostly from this Fleetwood Mac cover song, but then, again, later on, hitting the jackpot, thanks to Bonnie Raitt, who adopted this Something to Talk About Her Signature song,

pretty much, after that Nick of Time album. Still at the point where Bonnie Raitt could have a big Top 40 Mass Appeal Pop Radio hit, and that too, Canadian content, which means that we've heard it over the years

more than we ever could have imagined. It's just like one of those songs that won't go away, but also like a legitimate big tune. Huge jam for Bonnie Wright and the song that everybody knows out there. In the past few weeks, covering here, November and December, shout out to Ridley Funeral Home.

Not only did we lose Shirley Eichardt, we lost Christine McVie, who wrote that song, and the man who ran the record label. And I remember his name, Michael Jackson. Made this Shirley Eichardt song happen. No, Michael Jackson was a producer, Michael James Jackson. Yeah, he also died this year. Yeah, Michael Jackson was a producer. Michael James Jackson. But he died. Yeah, he also died this year.

In October or something. Yeah, you're quoting one of my own tweets. Yeah, I remember. He was a producer with Tom Cochran and Red Ryder. And Kiss when they took the makeup off. But also a guy named Al Mayer. I've never had a lover like you. Never had a lover like you make me feel so good.

And I've never had arms to hold me I never heard the things you told me Nearly understood before What love is But every bit of love you give me Every bit of love you give me Makes me feel alright baby Every bit of love you give me Touches something in me Here we have the music of Ken Tobias.

Here we have the music of Ken Tobias. Shout out to Ken's nephew, Conan Tobias, journalist in Toronto. Ran his own magazine for 25 years called Tattle Creek, collaborator for a couple years on the 1236 Newsletter. He's the one that looked things over before I hit send. Believe it or not, we had somebody doing that job. So, Conan's uncle, Ken Tobias, was one of those recording artists for Attic Records,

a company that was co-founded by Alexander Mayer. F-O-T-M, Alexander Mayer. Al Mayer turned out to be the second guest of the Toronto Mike podcast to die. And I think he might have merited a deep dive episode of his own, but

you ended up having him on in a very particular context, which in the typical Toronto Mike style, I think you diverted the conversation away from what was supposed to be a deep dive in the history of heavy metal into talking about the evolution of Attic Records.

I definitely took advantage of the fact that my guests, in-person guests, were there to talk about the history of heavy metal in this country. And Al Mayer, we landed Al Mayer as our special remote guest. And that's awesome. But once I knew Al Mayer was coming in, I had questions because I had just literally,

just had Kevin Shea and Waxman, Steve Waxman, were literally just here like a week before telling me all these stories about Attic Records and Maestro Fresh West and Drop the Needle and of course Weird Al Yankovic and so many great Al Mayer Attic Records stories that I had to divert from talking about country music and triumph and stuff.

I'm country music. I meant heavy metal. Country music is a future episode. But yeah, I actually dropped my Al Mayer segment as a standalone episode in tribute to Al Mayer when he passed away. And that forced me to listen back. We covered a lot of ground, actually,

for a guy who was supposed to be talking about, I don't know, killer dwarves or whatever. Okay, Al Mayer. And Learren. Don't forget Learren. Al Mayer who died on November 25th 2022. He was 82 years old after a battle with cancer. They kept pretty quiet.

Now, I knew Al Mayer. He was a big supporter of mine over the years. And this went back to originally being an alt-weekly journalist with iWeekly, Attic Records. So with iWeekly, Attic Records, Al Mayer threw open the doors of this townhouse in which he ran Attic Records during the 90s in Liberty Village, back when most of Liberty Village was still like a pile of dust, right? Like he invested well in this building over there. And the evolution of Attic Records, it was a story where he started with a guy named Tom Williams. The two of them started their own record company. Before that, Al had worked in

Canadian music, including being the business manager for Gordon Lightfoot, but then struck out on his own initially doing these singer-songwriter records, saying that even though these songs, like ones by Ken Tobias and Shirley Eckhart, got that even though these songs, like ones by Ken Tobias and

Shirley Eckhart, got a lot of airplay, didn't do much for him in terms of sales. So they pivoted to different genres, including heavy metal. And that's the band Anvil, were originally discovered. Their original name was Lips. That's where the singer of Anvil,

the frontman, Steve Kudlow, his nickname, Lips, that was the name of the band. They changed singer of Anvil, the front man, Steve Kudlow, his nickname, Lips, that was the name of the band. They changed it to Anvil, and the whole evolution over there, that culminated in a documentary film. But through the 1980s, through Attic Records, Al discovered where the real opportunity was happening as far as a Canadian record label was concerned, was happening as far as a Canadian record label was concerned, which was to find independent labels

that did not have distribution in Canada, pick up those records, make deals with those smaller record companies that weren't being distributed by the bigger guys. And Hymn Through Addic Records took on that role of nurturing these albums, nurturing these acts, and making them hits in a very specific way within Canada. In the process, there were a number of hit records that Al Mayer was responsible for discovering out there in the marketplace.

One of them was Walking on Sunshine by Katrina and the Waves. So that originally was an indie record picked up by Attic Records that he had the instinct to find this stuff that was out there. Jennifer Warnes covering Leonard Cohen. First, we take Manhattan with Stevie Ray Vaughan. Another opportunity that was on a small American label. Jennifer Warnes had been, I guess, an Al Contemporary singer. A few hits in America through the 1970s, Right Time of the Night.

A bunch of stuff like that, but very much under the radar. And saw here and her doing a cover tribute album to Leonard Cohen. She was also one of Leonard Cohen's muses. He's also on this famous Blue Raincoat album himself, doing a vocal appearance that was very much authorized by him. And you remember, first we take Manhattan, a big Canadian radio hit, thanks to Attic Records. And it was just part of him developing this eclectic stable of these acts

that he picked up from other places. The Scotty Brothers record label was another one. And who turned out to be the biggest act on Scotty Brothers' records? Weird Al Yankovic. And that is how Attic Records became intertwined with the fortunes of Weird Al. And then we have the story of Maestro Fresh West. One direction, one name, and one destiny. Maestro Fresh West became a rap star in Canada thanks to Attic Records.

Where it all began was on a show called Electric Circus. P.O. 99 It's the Vazine, baby It's the Vazine Yo I'm filled with Israelites, Rastafarians, God bodies F.O.I. Sunni Muslims, T.O. to Brooklyn Many nights in Bed-Stuy, blazing trees out in Cali We're brothers from a frat, sippin' Henny, man-friendly

Got Toronto's rap title, Damaris idols McQuincy Jones in 89, that's my idol Chicks from every nationality, showin' hospitality Grabbin' me, showin' mad love in the club Now we heard on the Toronto Mike podcast, Al Mayer dropping a nugget about what happened with Maestro. There he was rapping on EC on the same episode as an American freestyle singer, a guy named Stevie B. Do you remember Stevie B? I got your letter from the postman just the other day. That was his big ballad.

And before that, some real great cheesy freestyle music. Of course I remember Stevie B. Well, Stevie B happened to be making the rounds on Electric Circus. And there he was sharing airtime with a rapper called Maestro. Maestro Fresh Wes. And Stevie B's managers, people from the record company, they liked the cut of his jib, and they signed Maestro Fresh West to something that was highly coveted here in Canada,

an American rap record deal. He might be the second guy to get one, right? Because Mishy Mee got one first, I think, if I remember correctly. But we discovered that because of this contract that Maestro Fresh West signed with LMR Records, he never saw a dime from those early records that he put out through Attic. Like, essentially, it was a case where

they were distributing these Maestro Fresh West records within Canada, and once everybody involved got their cut with the contracts that he signed, this is a typical enough story for a young musician trying to make it, that essentially Maestro Fresh West signed his fortune away. Do I got that story right? That was the indication that you got. Yep, absolutely.

So far, so good. And I'm sure you're getting to haywire well haywire was one of those corporate rock acts that uh were also signed to attic you know teenage head were on the record label too and i think it was al also talking about some of their misfortune along the way i mean it was all about trying to cultivate these acts within Canada and find American distribution for them. A lot of the times, it didn't quite happen.

Triumph was more of a success story as far as that American distribution was concerned. In the other direction, you had Attic Records picking up these foreign acts, and it seemed like the piece de resistance for the evolution of Addict Records was that they captured the rights to the debut album by a group called Creed. My Own Prison.

Just like this awful post-grunge track. Kind of an Eddie Vedder-esque delivery there. Yeah, Christian rock, over the top, yet uh sold a ton of copies within canada nickelback-esque in its popularity absolutely big we we got towards the end of the 1990s and uh thanks to all the money that was flowing through uh the capital markets alexander mayor was given an offer that at the time he couldn't refuse. He admitted himself that he was about to turn 60 years old, around the turn of the millennium. He didn't feel like he was with it anymore. Here was a chance for him to cash out that all these assets, the

deep catalog of Attic Records was worth something. I don't know if those old Lee Aaron records would have been selling in perpetuity, but definitely a lot of associations out there, all these independent record label deals he made. In fact, towards the end of the 1990s, Slipknot was also selling a whole bunch of records for Attic. Anyway, the money was in the air. A guy called Alan Gregg made a deal where he would create this music business consortium

within Canada called Song Corp. And within like a year or two, a matter of months, all the dreams that they had for Song Corp, the whole thing went bankrupt. It just wasn't working out at all. They just created this bloated infrastructure that was soon enough unsustainable.

FOTM, Molly Johnson was among the artists who got burned to the point where, as is chronicled in a Toronto Life article by David Hayes, Molly Johnson in the early 2000s would be on stage and beg people not to buy

her album because any proceeds any money that anybody spent was just going to help to pay off the bankruptcy but what went wrong with Song Corp now I think this situation created a lot of regret in the life of Al Mayer

he walked away with the money but a lot of hearts were broken as far as what he had built up with Attic. But that's the name of the game. That's where things fell into place in terms of trying to keep this business going in the face of Napster and file sharing. Something eventually was going to give,

and that turned out to be in the early 2000s, the end of Attic Records, including a bankruptcy auction that I attended. I was there in person watching all these gold and platinum records and, I don't know, pieces of furniture, whatever they could find being sold to the highest bidder. And I saw my friend Al Mayer walking through the room looking totally heartbroken. Like this was his life's work. This was everything he ever dreamed of happening here

just entirely falling apart here because a bunch of people bet on the wrong set of circumstances and Attic Records and Song Corp was all over in May of 2001. You sort of burned through that maestro story and I just want to, you know, I mentioned Haywire because it's the song Drop the Needle from Symphony in Effect.

Big hit we all remember from Much Music. Shout out to all the FOTMs that are involved in the Drop the Needle, from Jay Gold to Dwight Drummond, everybody who's in that Drop the Needle video. But okay, it starts off with Drop the Needle, which is a sample from a Haywire song. And Haywire, Attic had Haywire, and this sample was never cleared.

And if I remember correctly, my conversation with FOTM Al Mayer, he took sort of like, they found a way like, oh, you know, because you didn't clear the sample, they worked out some distribution deal for Maestro in Canada through Attic because of that, right? I got that right, right? Yeah, I think so. It all comes down to Haywire.

Thank you for saving me from what would have been an impossible digression. That story, who I had Almeer tell me the story again, but I first got that story from FOTM Steve Waxman when Kevin Shea dragged him into the basement here. And it's just wild to me how shortly before Almeer that happened.

So Almeer, and now you're about to do the final wrap up here, but the last thing I want to say about Almeer is that when his obituary ran in the Globe and Mail, it was written by, I consider him an FOTM even because he's a devout listener and fan of the program, and he was on Hebsey on Sports With Me, but he's never actually appeared on Toronto Mic'd,

which is a story for another day, and maybe one day we'll make that happen. But Brad Wheeler listened to Almer on Toronto Mic'd and wrote his obituary based on several things that he heard from Al on my show and Brad had the decency to actually shout out the source

which is a Toronto Mic'd episode so in the obituary for Al Mayer Brad Wheeler references Al's appearance on Toronto Mic'd and I think that's a solid thing to do and I want to say thank you Brad. Okay and let me add here then Alexander Mayer was always wonderful to me, okay? Like, who was I?

Nobody. Just some kid writing these scrappy articles for a free newspaper. And as I mentioned, always opened the door of his office. Let me hang out with Weird Al. I was at his office. I remember I met Luke, Luther Campbell of the Two Live crew. Wow.

Showed up at Attic Records one day. I had a little boardroom session with him. Type O negative, remember them? Of course. Like this goth heavy metal band. Right. Led by this guy. Shout out to Ridley Funeral Home.

Peter Steele, who died at a young age. Wow. He had posed for Playgirl magazine and Attic Records sent me a copy of Playgirl so that I could get a load of the unit on Peter Steele and write a story all about him. So just a tribute here to Al Mayer. He got what I was doing, okay?

Like right in 2022, he would constantly send me feedback and tips for the 1236 newsletter. So not only one of the greatest Canadian record guys, but also as far as I was concerned, somebody who understood the excitement that I had for the modern multimedia and everything that was going on there all the time. He had like thousands of friends on Facebook, right? He would be like posting all day, saying hi to everybody. And that's what people most remember about this personality. I just faded into the sunset, right? Like in his golden years as a retired record industry guy. But even

though he wasn't in the game anymore, even though the whole Attic Records story ended badly, he did a spectacular job of staying connected with everyone. And so when it gets to somebody who I sort of knew, I guess, I can be a little more emotional here, right? I'm going to miss Al Mayer. And shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. Al Mayer, dead at age 82, got his Order of Canada in the hospital, presented him during his last week alive. his last week alive.

And just a tribute here to somebody who was a real supporter of everything that I was always trying to do, even though a lot of times I wasn't making a whole lot of sense, that Al Mayer always found a place for me, always made me feel welcome, always made me feel like I belonged, and even helped ensure that I got access to this world that he created. I would be on the guest list for these attic record parties, and ultimately I felt for him that his life's work fell away the way that it did, how I saw him at the bankruptcy auction, how they were getting rid of everything that he had accumulated over the years there. And he's definitely someone worth remembering here as the second guest on Toronto Mic'd,

who we're remembering here in the Ridley Funeral Home Memorial segment. One night in November, 1986 A weighty mix of speed blades and sticks Leafs at Red Wings, Joe Lewis Arena There was a curse in the air, an anathema Laughing hyenas, banshees, octopi. Too focused to notice, the rivals were preoccupied. The king was on thin ice, cocaine the reason. He wasn't even supposed to be playing that season.

He came over from Sweden in war number 21. An unlucky number for some gamblers or anyone sometimes. You try to forget but you can't. That number haunts the dreams of Gerard Gallant. Dumbstruck the poet, horrified the Philistine. When sideways comes the cold blade of the guillotine. See a bright red, the time and place of the thing. And two hundred stitches across the face of the king.

Look away. Look away. We leave fans of a certain age will never, ever forget that gash, that cut on Boris Elming's face. Did you know there was a song written about what happened here? I did not. And I love it because, honestly, I mean, in that photo with the stitches, it's like it was everything in an era

when our Maple Leafs were awful. November 26, 1986, the Borya Salmi massacre, recalled here in a song by Rich Turfry, better known as Buck 65. Wow. Good job, Buck 65.

And yeah, it was a Gerard Gallant skate blade across the face of Borea-Salming. Okay, now, Buck 65 wrote this song for Hockey Day in Canada on the CBC. And Buck 65 has been a broadcaster on the CBC for a long time now. Yeah.

He's got the morning show, right? Coming up on 15 years. Afternoon Drive. Oh, Afternoon Drive. I meant that, yeah. Who's got the morning show on CBC Music? Can't keep track anymore. Shout out to Buck 65.

But Boreas Salming. keep track anymore. Shout out to Buck 65. But Borya Salming. Borya Salming, who died in November 2022. November 24th, 71 years old. And I think

his passing hit even harder because it was not even two weeks earlier that Borya Salming returned to Toronto. Toronto Mike, you're who I turn to when it comes to all things sports. I figure you would have been watching the tribute that they did. Absolutely.

I even made my wife, who doesn't know Borya from Adam, I made her watch because I gave her a little context. All she needed to know was the man had ALS and this was like the Hockey Hall of Fame weekend and he was making the appearance. because I gave her a little context. All she needed to know was the man had ALS. And this was like the Hockey Hall of Fame weekend. And he was making the appearance. Back-to-back nights, actually. So two nights in a row, we saw him on the ice.

And I'm thinking now about Daryl Sittler openly weeping. The photo with Dave Tiger Williams and Lanny McDonald and Daryl Sittler. These are the Leafs. For a certain age group, these are the Leafs of our youth. And it was so emotional. Not a dry eye in my living room. You know, I could cry just thinking about it right now. And it's difficult to believe that it was less than two weeks later we found out he had actually passed.

Some speculation as to whether this was a timing issue on his part, right? Whether it was a medically assisted death situation. I don't know if these things have to be disclosed, but that's how the timing was such that I think it became more poignant that he made that last appearance in Toronto. And my understanding is it was part of a documentary film that they were doing

as well on boris salming and his relationship with the city but that the als was a situation that had come his way only within 20 2022 right so a very dramatic situation for him to have been diagnosed, and he could no longer speak, no verbal communication, something he couldn't do anymore, needed a tablet in order to communicate with people, and being fed through a tube, you know, all quite horrifying for anyone to contemplate for themselves, and that we saw Boris Salming go through it. And yet, at the same time, you get to know that in the last days of his life, that he got that level of tribute, right?

The love from the Leaf fans within Toronto. 16 years! That's how long he was playing with the Leafs. 16 years! That's how long he was playing with the Leafs. And the Boreas-Salming massacre, as remembered there by Buck65, who said that seeing what went down there,

it put him off watching hockey forever. And he only revisited it in the form of the song that he wrote all those years later because he was in the stands. He saw the game. He was there, Joe Louis Arena. What was going on? Now, in that era, there was one hockey injury, to divert here for a moment, that haunted me far worse. It was the Clint Malarchek.

Clint Malarchek was a goaltender, I think, with the Sabres there, and he took a blade across whatever this vein is in your neck or whatever. And then the blood just starts spilling onto the ice. And that contrast of the, not to get too graphic, but the contrast of the red blood pouring onto the white ice. I'm haunted by that image. And Clint did survive that accident. Although, shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. He's no longer with us today. But yeah, these are a couple of the accidents

we witnessed on the ice in the 80s. I'm going to have to clarify here. Yeah, what do you want to clarify? That Richard Fry was not actually in the stands of the game. He was watching on TV. Yes.

In Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. There you go. And that wasn't even like high definition, right? No, no, no. Like this was horrifying enough even with the old rabbit ears.

Oh yeah, but what a photo on the cover of the sun the next day. Wow, that was the talk in the schoolyard. But what a warrior, what a great, great, you know, he was referenced on this program by people like Ann Romer when they talk about when they were allowed to visit the dressing room at Maple Leaf Gardens.

And I still remember Ann Romer's face when she talked about what he was packing. And there's a reason they called him the king. And that was sort of the legend in the schoolyard at Borea Salming. But wow, the king no longer with us, gone far too soon and just sad. And I'm glad he got that final moment here

in the spotlight where we could let him know how much we loved him. Speaking of Playgirl magazine, did you know that Borea Salming is the subject of a bunch of nude paintings, portraits that I did not know that I knew he made their way into the home of very obsessed fans of the Toronto. He made a mint though, selling underwear in Sweden. I know he was like a entrepreneur selling some kind of underwear

product in his home country of Sweden. Borya Salming, dead November 24th at age 71. school for you. There goes a little something like this. I always tried to be the flyest kid in the block. The popular one with the rising stock. So that's when I had this bright idea.

For all the parties of the month. Now the party of the year. All the fine girls couldn't turn it down. Now all I gotta do is get my parents out. Should I send them

to a movie? No, send them to a show. Let me think. It's gotta be long though. I said, Mom, Dad, yo, what do you say to home?

It's a Friday night. Have you seen Aunt June? And don't worry about staying out too long. Don't fuss over me, I'll be fine alone. Have a good time. The doorbell rings, cause the party's here. I'm cranking up the stereo like it's two years.

Walking around the house like who's the man? Ain't nobody do it like Harry can. First on the floor, you know that's me. Busting out the moves like it's MTV. I guess somewhere along I lost my head. Then I joke around the table, you know that's me. Busting at the moves like it's MTV. I guess I'm wearing long, I lost my head. Then I joke on the table, this is what I said. People all around, you got to. Everyone together, sing it loud.

Jump all around, come on. What? Say it again. People all around, you got to. Put no left to the right, make noise. Here we go now, come on. I think this song was as good as it got for Aaron Carter. Aaron's Party. Come on and get it.

Year 2000, the peak of the boy band exploitation era, riding on the coattails of his brother Nick Carter of the Backstreet Boys. The Backstreet Boys extended universe, which allowed one of their younger brothers to have a hit record of his own. Shout out to Lou Pearlman, the man who made all the magic happen, notorious enough figure in his own right.

And now we heard the tragic story, although perhaps not entirely a surprise. I mean, when you hear about the fact that someone like Aaron Carter has died, what runs through your mind, Toronto Mike? Oh, well, I knew he had substance abuse problems, and I had heard that he was not doing well. So it's one of those sad pieces of news that are not out of the blue,

not entirely unexpected. Something inevitable about it all, that he only made it to 34 years of age a month before what would have been his 35th birthday. And Aaron Carter, another child star tragedy out there. These are the stories that our friend Stu Stone has so far managed to avoid as an end for himself. Stu's doing well, right?

Directing a movie, Bandits, working on Dark Side of the Ring. Just checking in here on our closest child star friend. Can't wait to get him back on toast. Ten years older than Aaron Carter ever got to be, wishing the best out there for Stu. Stu Stone himself,

also a rap recording artist, perhaps with a little better flow than what we heard from Aaron Carter. Attic Records also, I remember, put out an early Aaron Carter record and probably made a lot of money at the time that he was signed to some obscure European indie label, but then signed to Jive Records, there we had Aaron's Party.

Now, the Carter family, a situation where everyone was feuding with one another, that a lot of this also played out in public, what they were going through with their parents, and originally from Jamestown, New York. Aaron Carter was informed that his parents were getting divorced right before he was about to shoot an episode of MTV Cribs. I think that would throw you for a loop. If,

if that's what your life was like, you were about to show an MTV camera crew around your palatial teenage estate. Then someone informs you that your parents no longer want to be married to each other. This was the kind of experience that he had, you know, continuing to be in the celebrity tabloid circuit. The inevitable reality show appearances he was on dancing with the stars in 2009 and then a year or two later there he has first time going into a rehab facility a graduate of the betty ford center but he was on stage in the fantastic soft broad. Maybe it looked like he was getting his life together in his early 20s, went on a tour,

playing the Nostalgia Circuit, kind of like an ironic kitsch. June 2014, he even specifically toured Canada. But you got to admit here, no one was looking for Aaron Carter to make some kind of deep musical statement that by that point in time, the thing was kind of a joke,

you know, like young women who might be interested in catching up with their preteen heartthrob, you know, having a laugh. I mean, he was reportedly dating Hillary Duff and Lindsay Lohan in 2017. He came out as bisexual, in case you were wondering out there. 2021, Aaron Carter had a son, and this was after he had turned to OnlyFans,

And this was after he had turned to OnlyFans, in which he was trying to make a buck selling naked pictures of himself. He was cast in the production of Naked Boys Singing in Las Vegas. Seems to be a recurring theme here on this Ridley Funeral Home Memorial segment, but they fired Aaron Carter from this production of singing naked on stage because he refused to be vaccinated for COVID-19. November 5th, 2022, Lancaster, California. A housekeeper found Aaron Carter dead in his bathtub. And here we are a couple months later standing by for a toxicology report. Aaron Carter was cremated.

His twin sister, Angel, hanging on to his ashes. hanging on to his ashes. And so Aaron Carter, remembered here as an unfortunately typical Hollywood child star life, dead at age 34, November 5th, 2022. So in love with you Whatever you want to do Is alright with me Cause you make me feel so brand new

I want to spend my life with you Say since Since we've been together, loving you forever is what I need. Let me be the one you come running to I'll never be untrue I'm true Oh Mimi Parker from a band called Low, which was primarily a duo with her husband, a guy named Alan Sparhawk. Mimi Parker passed away on November 5th, 2022,

age 55, from ovarian cancer. And deep discography, like 30 years of this act called Low, but figured there we'd play a more familiar song, cover version. A little insight into the style of slow core music from Duluth, Minnesota. We also had another cover version of the Rihanna song, Stay. But beyond that, like a deep discography of this kind of style. And there she was diagnosed

and having to, having to postpone certain tours. And then we hear that the life of Mimi Parker ended as one of the great indie rock cult figures died at age 55. Any thoughts on Low besides you hearing this song and insight

into what Low sounded like and how they stuck around for all these years and became a staple of a certain kind of critical acclaim to the point where Robert Plant covered a couple of low songs that was back in 2010 on his album. And Robert Plant there, one of their biggest champions as far as recognition was concerned.

as far as recognition was concerned. So ubiquity that was cut short, tragically, with the death of Mimi Parker at 55. When the times are good and bad Don't have me to say it Yeah. Life was so right, I was drowned in your light With the world so in tune, till you made me out for a fool That was nothing to do, can't forget about you With my heart in my hands, pack my bags, leave my memories with you Yeah, I remember when this album came out. It was Irene Cara.

It was going to be her solo album debut that she was previously known for. Flashdance, what a feeling. And before that, the movie Fame. But this was like her debut as a recording artist with producer Giorgio Moroder. Why Me and then another song, Breakdance. These were pretty reliable hit songs,

like Dance Euro style with rock edge to it. It got good quality control from Giorgio Moroder, but a career that ended up stalling very fast, partly because she said that she wasn't paid sufficient royalties for the success of the song for Flashdance, which was something that she co-wrote, won an Oscar for, and

Irene Cara, for pretty much the last 30 years, her career curtailed. Like, she did some backing vocalist work out there, including for Lou Reed, but that original promise that people knew. There's a great clip from the David Letterman morning show.

She's singing out here on my own from fame. I thought that was a moving thing to watch and really captured the promise that people had out there for her after starting on Broadway and and uh a movie called sparkle uh which was from 1976 set in harlem uh she did some tv roles and then fame and then and then flash dance like this flash dance song when irene cara died did you uh toronto mike crank that one up like everyone got nostalgic about the impact of that one

jam that people remember it as? It was like the center point for an entire movement, right? Like all that imagery, Jennifer Beals, Flashdance. I was having brunch in Montreal when I learned that Irene

Cara died. And, yeah, the two big touch points for me were fame and Flashdance. And Flashdance, a film, the story of which originated in Toronto. Bit of a local connection there. And then remade here as Heavenly Bodies. Yeah, well, I mean, everybody was trying to do Flashdance knockoffs and later a Broadway musical. But Irene Cara really in the shadows.

Not someone we heard very much about. Although she did some kind of podcast where she was talking nostalgically about herself. But then we heard she was no longer around. Dead at 63, November 25th, 2002. Why me? Irene Cara. I love you totally Why me? I love you totally Why me? I love you totally

Why me? Why me? Why me? Why me? Can you hear them Talking about us Telling lies Is that a surprise Can you see them

See right through them They have a shield Nothing must be revealed It doesn't matter what they say No one listens anyway Our lips are sealed There's a weapon That we can use in our defense. Silence.

Watch us look at them, look right through them. That's when they disappear. That's when we lose the fear. It doesn't matter what they say. Okay, Our Lips Are Sealed, which was co-written by Terry Hall of The Specials and Jane Weedlin of The Go-Go's about their secret romantic affair.

And everyone knows the song by The Go-Go's, but also Terry Hall got to have his own spin with Fun Boy 3. Fun Boy 3, which was spun off from the Specials. And the Specials very much fondly remembered from the two-tone ska revival that Terry Hall, when he died, that Terry Hall, when he died, a lot of recollections of this musical legacy in that specials discography that he had left behind

as a relatively young man. I mean, these were songs from over 40 years ago, and he died December 18th at age 63. Terry Hall co-writing Our Lips Are Sealed is a delicious fun fact. Here's a less fun fact. When he was 12 years old,

Terry Hall was abducted by a pedophile ring. That is a less fun fact, actually. In France. That's not fun at all. Fun Boy 3 had a song about that. It was called Well, Fancy That. And then he left school behind

and worked as a bricklayer and apprenticed a hairdresser. But, I mean, all the promise of the post-punk scene, I think he sees the day. Got Fun Boy 3,

Ghost Town, and Message to You, Rudy, and then Fun Boy 3, Ghost Town, and Message to You, Rudy, and then Fun Boy 3, which also spun off Bananarama and The Color Field, another group from Terry Hall. Eventually there was a specials reunion, but what had happened to him as a young teenager? I mean, 2004, attempted suicide, a rough ride of it, even though he eventually got back on the road.

Terry Hall died from pancreatic cancer. Much missed, big loss. Our lips are sealed from Funboy 3 and Terry Hall. Of the same vintage, another personality, Keith Levine, guitarist with Public Image Limited. After the Sex Pistols with John Lydon, Johnny Rotten. Hard to believe that people had a hard time working with that guy. Didn't seem like his personality at all,

but after the first few pill records, they had a breakup, and Keith Levine was on his own. 1984, there was one of those public image albums where John Lydon released his version of the album, and then Keith Levine released his separate version of the album. That's how bitter the breakup was. But through the late 70s, early 80s, Public Image, gotta love a band that had its own theme song,

declaring their intentions here. And Public Image Limited, most famously on American Bandstand. You know that clip with Dick Clark where they're subverting? No, this was Public Image subverting the circumstances, like refusing to lip sync

and just like, you know, roaming through the room and inviting all the kids onto the stage. Legendary clip there with Dick Clark. And he was rolling with everything that these punks from England were willing to do. So Keith Levine is the guy that we lost as John Lydon's guitarist after the Sex Pistols dead November 11th at age 65. a weapon of mass destruction. Whether you're Soroway's son or BBC One, this information is a weapon of mass destruction. You could have Caucasian or a poor Asian. Racism is

a weapon of mass destruction. Whether inflation or globalization, fear is a weapon of mass destruction. My dad came into my room holding his hat. I knew he was leaving. He sat on my bed, told me some facts. Son, I have a duty calling on me. You and your sister be brave, my little soldier. And don't forget all I told you. You're the mister of the house. Now remember this. And when you wake up in the morning, give your mama a kiss. Then I had to say goodbye. In the morning woke mama with the kiss on each eyelid. Even though I'm only a kid, certain things can't be hid.

A maxi jazz from Faithless. You know this one, Toronto Mike? Faithless, Mass Destruction. I think when I first got into listening to radio on the computer, this was like a big old radio hit out there. But Faithless also had Insomnia. God is a DJ. Familiar enough voice for Faithless

alongside a guy named Rollo, Rollo Armstrong. His sister, his sister, a singer named Dido. Yes. That's a connection. Eminem made her famous. In this country, anyway. Maxi Jazz, real name Maxwell Fraser from Faithless. Dead December 23rd, 2022.

65 years old. Shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. The other night, I saw somebody hold you tight. I said, I wondered who it could be. It was so dark I couldn't see, but I know what was in me. When I tell you it ain't right, I know you got to agree. Wilco Johnson is someone who we lost on November 21st. He was

in a British blues band Dr. Feelgood. The name of the song Roxette later adopted by a Swedish band of the same name. But later, Wilco Johnson got more famous in A New Generation

because he had a part in Game of Thrones as the mute executioner Sir Illyn Payne. Hope I'm pronouncing that correctly. I never was a Game of Thrones guy. Hope I'm pronouncing that correctly. I never was a Game of Thrones guy. Where do you stand on keeping track of the Game of Thrones characters? Not so good, Al.

I tried very, very hard. In fact, I gave it three seasons. It just never took, and everyone said I would love it, and I don't know why it didn't take. So maybe this is a conversation for another time, that I never loved Game of Thrones like everybody else did. You can tell with this song, Roxette, not only did it inspire songs like Joyride,

but also like a seminal influence in what became punk rock in the UK. And Wilco Johnson later joined Ian Dury and the Blockheads, which makes perfect sense. This is a familiar enough sound.

Dr. Feelgood Wilco Johnson dead at 75. Thank you. Você precisa saber da piscina Da margarina, da carolina, da gasolina. Você precisa saber de mim. Baby, baby, I'm like this Baby, baby, I know I'm like this Gal Costa, the singer, died November 7th, November 9th, at age 77. Baby, also covered by Os Mutantes

staple of Brazilian music which people who are hipper than you and me swear by as the greatest music ever recorded along with Caetano Veloso the guitarist who is still alive

80 years old but on Caetano Veloso. The guitarist who is still alive. 80 years old, but on November 19th. Sorry, getting that wrong for the third time. Too much GLB. 77 years old. Gal Costa, legendary Brazilian singer. Worth worthy of a shout-out here. I'm trying to think of all the ones I left off the list. I'm going to give you one more jam.

We've got, like, repeated deaths within the same band, right? So I didn't put on the playlist anything by Angelo Badalamente, the David Lynch musician, because we covered Julie Cruz earlier this year. He's a singer on those Twin Peaks songs. We had Nazareth, Dan McCafferty. I think we had another member of Nazareth who died recently. There was the Stranglers drummer. I think we had that also covered at one point.

Ridley Funeral Home and Primal Scream. Who was the guy who died from Primal Scream? Died in December. Martin Duffy. So we covered that before. And I also didn't include the rascals, young rascals, Dino Dinelli, who, you know, initially heard he died at age 78. I thought, you know, is this really a big deal? But the tributes him looking back like Dino Dinelli, the Rascals drummer.

This guy was like the original Tommy Lee. That is to say, like a drummer who is the central figure in a band. But one more here in the music portion of the Ridley Funeral Home memorial segment. I mean, this one is worth a big talk up here. What do you got? What do you got, Toronto Mike? Pay tribute without

paying a fortune. Ridley Funeral Home. Elton John on 680 CFTR. Delivering, baby, delivering your happiness. Darling, you're no different from the rest. Can't you see that it's love you really need? Take my hand and I'll show you why love could be.

Before it's too late. I don't know who you are, I don't love to be In Forestry Lane Mama don't want you Daddy don't want you Give it up baby, baby Mama can't buy you love Mama don't want you Daddy don't need you Give it up baby, baby

Mama can't hide your love Okay, look, Toronto Mike, you can get into name-dropping the Spinners and the Stylistics and the Delphonics. Those were all records produced by Tom Bell. Died on December 22nd, age 79, but here I'm going to admit, per my shout-out there to 680 CFTR, the first song that I would have known with the Tom Bell signature was Elton John, Mama Can't Buy You Love, and that was the result of a collaboration in 1977,

although they didn't work together very well in the studio, and it turned out that rather than show up on Elton John's album, it was only an EP, a 12-inch single with Mama Can't Buy Your Love, and another song, Are You Ready For Love, by Elton John, which ended up having a resurgence, ended up becoming a big British hit single in the early 2000s, digging through the crates of the work Tom Bell did with Elton John. But when it came to producing this song,

the record producer Tom Bell was recycling himself. I don't know if you want to look up Ronnie Dyson, R-O-N-N-I-E-D-Y-S-O-N, One Man Band. You can hear from Ronnie Dyson's One Man Band, a song that Tom Bell directly lifted from to inspire this jam from Elton. It's up to you. In the meantime, I will mention that from the sound of Philadelphia and producing all those great R&B records, one last number one hit for Tom Bell came in 1990. James Ingram, who we talked about on a previous Ridley Funeral Home Memorial segment, James Ingram, I Don't Have the Heart, which was the first,

sorry, the last chart topper for Tom Bell in 1990, but left solid discography behind, no matter what happened in the studio with Elton John. More than enough fodder for Quentin Tarantino and the soundtrack for Jackie Brown. So Tom Bell, fondly remembered for all this music.

December 22nd, dead at 79. I've spent enough time alone Up in my bedroom at home Been kinda bored lately I hate on all I see It's all mundane to me This box I've painted pains me But you could watch me You could help me down

The rabbit hole with you I could hole with you. I could go with you. You could lead the way. I'd go hand in hand with you. Today's the day I've been waiting for. Tomorrow won't come after all. Yesterday's so far away.

This today's the only day. Somebody please stop the clock. Oh, don't ever let this day stop. Oh, I never want to go home. No, no, no, no, no. Yeah, it makes me kind of sad that we're fixated upon celebrity deaths when you hear about someone like DJ Twitch suicide death on December 13th, 2022 at age 40. I mean, look, Toronto Mike, you got me into this business of keeping track of celebrities who died because you're the one who ran a website where you put up a memorial post whenever whenever there's a death of interest to you and it was on your website

but you posted about Twitch I think Twitch is hitting a lot of people very very hard and I think Twitch is a good example of how you never know what somebody's

you know struggling with and dealing with because if you were just like my wife and my daughter followed him on Instagram and they knew him from Ellen but they also knew him from uh so you think you can dance and those

are two black holes for me I don't watch either program so I think I saw the odd viral clip on YouTube of Ellen talking to somebody and I would see uh the DJ and I kind of recognized him and there's Twitch but this is a gentleman where like it where he just seemed to be full of love and joy. Loved his family and everything looked great on Instagram. But of course, you got to look out for your loved ones,

their mental health. And this is hitting a lot of people hard because Twitch took his own life and it's sad, man. It's tragic. This is the Ellen DeGeneres theme song from Pink.

I did not know that. You did not know that. No. Okay. Steven Boss Twitch Big Loss December 13th, 2022 at age 40. Making your way in the world today Takes everything you've got

Taking a break from all your worries Sure would help a lot Wouldn't you like to get away? Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name And they're always glad you came You want to be where you can see Our troubles are all the same You want to be where everybody knows your name If we're going to do the Ridley Fiedel Home Memorial segment,

then we have to acknowledge the big Hollywood deaths, like Kirstie Alley died age 71 on December 5th, 2022. How she took over the role of Shelley Long, not the same part. They didn't pretend it was the same character, but I would say that the show Cheers lasted as long as it did and became so legendary, largely because of her and the chemistry she had with Ted Danson. It was like a raunchier kind of attitude than in the original iteration of the show. She died of colon cancer.

And so in the process of learning more about the life of Christy Alley, how she moved to Hollywood. She was lured there by the Church of Scientology. Can't avoid the elephant in the room, including the fact that she was in the Look Who's Talking movies alongside another Scientology legend, John Travolta.

And remember, these are the movies that traumatized FOTM Hall of Famer Cam Gordon and turned him off comedies forever. His grandmother saw the sperm scene, the opening sequence with the sperm, and got the F out of Dodge with her grandson Cam. got the F out of Dodge with her grandson Cam. In the process then, I could not imagine Cam Gordon

rollicking along laughing at the sitcom Veronica's Closet. Right. I forgot about that. That's from the must-see TV lineup where you only watch

Seinfeld and people watch Friends and then ER would come on and they would stick things between these juggernauts that you were just supposed to be too lazy

to turn the channel and go somewhere else and do something else. So of course you'll watch, because you're here for the 9 o'clock Seinfeld. Also a show called Fat Actress, which was on the Showtime cable channel briefly, which was part of Christy Alley's self-awareness about body image and how it affected her career in Hollywood.

Oh, can I shout out a Christy Alley vehicle, if I may? That my six-year-old discovered Full House, a show I completely ignored. Shout out to Cam Gordon. And this is on Netflix, I think. And she watches Full House. And she loves this character, Michelle, played by the Olsen twins. Okay? And there is a film. I think it's on Netflix as well. Full House, and she loves this character, Michelle, played by the Olsen twins, okay? And there is a film, I think it's on Netflix as well,

like a film vehicle for the Olsen twins called It Takes Two. And the woman who stars in this program alongside Steve Guttenberg, shout out to Police Academy, filmed nearby, is Kirstie Alley. So It Takes Two, Kirstie Alley. So it takes two. Kirstie Alley vehicle. Her film debut in Star Trek II. Right? The Wrath of Khan. Is that two?

Yeah, that's two. Okay, what was three? I actually, like Cam Gordon traumatized when Grandma takes him out of the theater in the beginning of Look Who's Talking. I had a very big problem and needed to leave the theater when that slug crawls into the ear in the beginning of Look Who's Talking. I had a very big problem and needed to leave the theater when that slug

crawls into the ear in Wrath of Khan. I was at Runnymede Theater and this was so, I was just too young, I think, and I had to leave the theater. So,

true story. Kirstie Alley. And I never loved Star Trek again. Dead at 71. One of the great theme songs, and this guy, this composer, Mike Post, One of the great theme songs. And this guy, this composer, Mike Post, man, the stuff he put together, love it. And he did some Steely Dan stuff.

Am I getting my lines crossed here? Mike Post, Steely Dan? And Van Halen. Van Halen. He produced the Van Halen 3, the Gary Cherone Van Halen album. Oh, my favorite of the Van Halen 3, the Gary Cherone. Van Halen album. Oh, my favorite of the Van Halen albums. Okay, Stuart Margolin was the actor who died December 12th at age 82. Played Angel on the Rockford Files. But yes, Mike, you're with me.

Just an excuse to pull out this theme song by Mike Post. Nothing deeper going on here. Although, Stuart Margolin, you know, big journeyman, American primetime TV. Although, Stuart Margolin, you know, big journeyman, American primetime TV. And did you know that he lived in Salt Spring Island, B.C. for 22 years? I did not know that. Secret, secret Canadian. Believe it or not, believe it or not, I'm walking on air.

That's a Mike Post jam. And I know Mike Post didn't die here. We're talking about somebody else. But the A-Team, right? The A-Team theme is a Mike Post jam. And I know Mike Post didn't die here. We're talking about somebody else. But the A-Team, right? The A-Team theme is a Mike Post jam. Magnum P.I., that's, I mean, of course, Law & Order. Everybody knows Law & Order is a Mike Post jam. The NYPD Blue, I mean, we could run down Mike Post jams.

L.A. Law. Oh, okay, keep going. I could do this all night. This is unbelievable. Well, Stuart Margolin was on a CBC show called Mom P.I. Okay, close enough. Early 1990s. And we just mentioned Steve Guttenberg,

who filmed Police Academy nearby. We all know he co-starred with, cheers is Ted Danson, with the sexual chemistry with what's-a-wabba Rebecca Howe,irstie Alley and you know who the other guy was Tom fucking Stelic

from Magnum P.I. Is your mind blowing? Mine is. Alright my apologies are you finished with this particular sad death before I Yeah let's take it home. I'm so young and you're so old This, my darling, I've been told

I don't care just what they say Cause forever I will pray You and I will be as free As the birds up in the trees. Oh, please stay by me, Diana. December 2022, we learned about the death of the woman who inspired Paul Anka's song, Diana. This is a woman from Ottawa, where Paul Anka was from,

Diana Ayub, 83 years of age, which puts things in perspective because Paul Anka's singing, I'm so young and you're so old, and at the time, Diana was barely 18. 16-year-old Paul Anka, budding teen idol, wrote this song. And Diana commented decades later that she could never protect her privacy. Like she went through life with this song hanging over her head.

That she knew Paul Inka from the teenageings, Ottawa, the Lebanese community. And little did she know that this would then kick off a huge career for Paul Inka, which continues to this day, okay? Like, courtesy of FOTM, Gary Taup. I saw a video this summer where Paul Inka was performing in a, like a private backyard party in Forest Hill. And he was doing these, these high kicks, you know, coming out singing New York,

New York, my way. I guess if you're like a rich old guy and you know, you want a real stick it to you, the haters who stood in your way, you pay Paul Inka hundreds of thousands of dollars to come to your backyard and let everyone know I did it my way.

So, Diana, I, you, put that at 83. Isn't she lovely? Isn't she wonderful? Isn't she precious? Less than one minute old. I never thought through love we'd be making one as lovely as she. Isn't she lovely? Made from love. The whitest man on Sesame Street, Bob McGrath, who died December 4th at age 90.

Doing some Stevie Wonder songs on one of those Sesame Street albums that you might have had some time in childhood. And it seemed like Bob was a fish out of water, right? Like the Muppets that were surrounding him, they seemed to be drenched in sarcasm and irony. And Bob McGrath was the most sincere guy on all of Sesame Street. He maintained the earnestness that would let the

children know that there were rewards in just being a wholesome, virtuous kind of guy. Bob Johnson was the name of the character on Sesame Street, by the way. Not Bob McGrath. Yeah, they all kind of kept their, I guess they think they kept their first names

and then, I don't know, they changed the last names. But Bob was a big deal. He was for us OG. Well, I'm not an OG because I think it starts in the 60s, Sesame Street. But I wasn't there then. But raised by Sesame Street. This was a big deal to me. And Bob McGrath was a big deal on that program. Always there. Quick fun

fact, though, while we're talking about the late great Bob McGrath, the original Gordon, I learned this from the HBO documentary about Sesame Street, but the original Gordon who left the show and then they got a new Gordon,

the Gordon I remember, but the original Gordon is the father of the actress Holly Robinson. I did not know that. And he was, yeah, Gordon Robinson. You know, they let Bob go

like he was retired. He got the tap on the shoulder on Sesame Street. And he was, yeah, Gordon Robinson. You know, they let Bob go. Like, he was retired. He got the tap on the shoulder on Sesame Street. But HBO did that, right? I feel like HBO had a role in all that. But they said goodbye. At that point, he's like in his mid-80s. Right. And Bob McGrath, who was born in Ottawa, Illinois.

Oh, okay. Different city from Paul Inca. And every year he would go to Saskatchewan. Oh. For 38 years he would host Telethon, Telemerical in Saskatchewan. He got a Distinguished Service Award, like an Order of Saskatchewan, Distinguished Service Award, like an Order of Saskatchewan for all his decades hosting the Kinsman Telethon over there. There you go.

Bob, childhood fixture for everyone. Dead December 4th, 2002. 90 years old. both of your fists while a hurricane was blowing Freedom just around the corner for you But with truth so far off what good will it do Joke them and dance through the night

and get to the perfect high by the light of the moon George Lois, who died at 91 on November 18th, 2022. The man responsible for the slogan, I want my MTV. Wow. MTV. Wow. And before that, best known as the cover designer for Esquire magazine through the 60s, early 1970s. But ultimately remembered as one of the great creative directors. Admin.

Madman. George Lewis did not like the show Madman. He said it gave short shrift to the creativity that was actually going on back in his day. drift to the creativity that was actually going on back in his day. Like, you know, all this soap opera stuff surrounding the fact that, you know, him and his people were actually digging in, making the creative revolution happen. Did he not see Don's sales pitch for the carousel from Kodak? Come on. But by the way, I want my MTV because I did not get MTV.

You didn't get MTV either, right? No. I know some rich kids had it because of a satellite dish. I never had it. He had a satellite dish. I would say to this day, we missed out, I feel, on the original premise of MTV in the early 1980s because much music was a reasonable hand-drawn facsimile, but it was definitely MTV where the zeitgeist was happening.

I'll never know. I'll never know. So already, you know, George Lois is like into his 50s. And there you go. One of the greatest ad campaigns of all time. And a music video he made himself for Bob Dylan, Joker Man. And that video directed by George Lois. But I was going to say, even though I never had MTV,

people like me, maybe some of us Gen Xers from Toronto who couldn't get MTV, because Stu Stone went to California and got his MTV. I didn't get my MTV. I had my much music. But it lives forever in Money for Nothing by Dire Straits because Sting, another Gordon, Gordon Sumner, is letting us know that he wants his MTV in Money for Nothing.

So it sort of lives on embedded in that for all eternity. And so all those covers for Esquire, and then later he worked on a New York magazine, also an iconic logo, graphic design style, which continues to this day. George Lois, dead at 91, November 18th. ¶¶ Robert Clary, the Holocaust survivor who had the last word against the Nazis when he became one of the cast members on Hogan's Heroes.

1965 to 1971. Corporal Louis Lebeau. Then later became a soap opera star in Days of Our Lives and The Bold and The Beautiful. So, look, not many Holocaust survivors left around. I mean, Robert Clary was 96 years old. Not many left from the cast of Hogan's Heroes. Another excuse for a TV theme here for Ridley Funeral Home. One more to play out, I think,

because we bookended with Shirley Eichardt. Christine McVie. You got that? Last one. I'd rather go blind. A woman named Christine Perfect. Did you know that was her name before McVie, before she married John McVie from Fleetwood Mac? I learned that when she died, and I did all my reading, and I learned that.

What a perfect name. when she died and i did all my reading and i learned that what a perfect name and so uh christine mcveigh died at uh 79 november 30th 2022 and uh even though there we had the circumstances where her song that was covered by shirley icard on a record label owned by Al Mayer. Get all melancholy here with our end-of-year reflections, but a little tribute to Christine McVie on her own. And I'd rather go blind. Thanks, Toronto Mike.

How did that go? Did we do okay? Yeah, we blew past my hard three-hour cap for you. We blew by it because we missed a lot of time. It was great, and I'm excited that you're back next Thursday, so I don't have to wait another two months to see you. We're going to air it all out.

Figure out what I'm doing here. Maybe even chart a course for the future and leave behind all these tributes here in 2022. Should we continue the Ridley Funeral Home Memorial

segment in 2023? Because there's always the opportunity to leave this idea behind. Why would we stop doing something we so thoroughly enjoy? Do you enjoy doing it? It makes me a little sad sometimes to be rummaging through all these celebrity deaths. As I recently said to Mr. Cam Gordon when he said, I'm taking a break,

I said, I can't make you come to my basement and kick out the jams in an episode of Toast. And I'd say the same to you. I can't make you come here and talk about those we lost in the last month, but I'll tell you, I think it's important. I think you cover ground that's not covered by CBC and the mainstream media, and I would hope you continue. Okay, well, since no one talks to me, let Toronto Mike know. You're intimidating. You're an intimidating guy.

If you made it to the end of this episode, should we continue? I mean, you're a hardcore listener. If you get to the end of an episode of Toronto Mike, it's more than three hours long. You know, I don't care if you listen on double speed. That's the only way

I listen to anything, including myself. Well, we'll see what we can do. But I'd like to thank Brad Jones of Ridley Funeral Home for, I think, sparking it up. You told me he wanted to sponsor this segment. And my only reaction was, I guess we've got to follow through. And you've got a podcast with Brad Jones. Life's Undertaking. Life's Undertaking.

And everybody knows now about Ridley Funeral Home. got a podcast with Brad Jones, Life's Undertaking. And everybody knows now about Ridley Funeral Home. Thanks to Toronto Mike. I think among your partners, that's one that people will remember forever, and hopefully

we paid proper tribute to those who have left us in the year gone by. And I think that's about all I have to say. Toronto Mike, take it away. And that brings us to the end of our 1,176th show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike.

Mark is at 1236. Here's hoping in 2023, another issue of 1236's newsletter drops into my inbox. That's an order. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery are at Great Lakes Beer. Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. Sticker U is at Sticker U. Mineris is at Mineris.

Raymond James Canada are at Raymond James CDN. Recycle My Electronics are at EPRA underscore Canada. Ridley Funeral Home are at Ridley FH. Canna Cabana are at Canna Cabana underscore. And Sammy Cone Real Estate, if you have any real estate questions whatsoever, drop an email right now to sammy.cone at Properly Homes. Properly is L-Y, by the way, homes.ca. The man is in the top 1% of realtors in Toronto,

and he's a great drummer with the Watchmen. He's on Twitter at Sammy Cohn. See you all tomorrow when my special guest is Precious Chong. Well, you've been under my skin for more than eight years It's been eight years of laughter and eight years of tears And I don't know what the future can hold or do for me and you

But I'm a much better man for having known you Oh, you know that's true because Everything is coming up Rosy and gray Yeah, the wind is cold But the smell of snow Wants me today And your smile is fine And it's just like mine

And it won't go away Cause everything is rosy and green. 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 There's a thousand shades of grey Cause I know that's true Yes, I do

I know it's true, yeah I know it's true How about you? All that picking up trash And then putting down ropes And they're brokering stocks, the class struggle explodes And I'll play this guitar just the best that I can Maybe I'm not and maybe I am

But who gives a damn because Everything is coming up Rosy and gray Yeah, the wind is cold But the smell of snow Warms me today And your smile is fine And it's just like mine

And it won't go away Because everything is rosy and green. Well, I've kissed you in France and I've kissed you in Spain. And I've kissed you in places I better not name. And I've seen the sun go down on Chaclacour. And I've seen the sun go down on Chaclacour. But I like it much better going down on you. Yeah, you know that's true. Because everything is coming up rosy and green.

Yeah, the wind is cold, but the smell of snow warms us today. And your smile is fine, and it's just like mine And it won't go away Cause everything is rosy now Everything is rosy, yeah Everything is rosy and gray, yeah, yeah