Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Simon Head and Andrew Stoakley: Toronto Mike'd #1289

Episode Date: July 10, 2023

In this 1289th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with the director of the new Lowest of the Low documentary Simon Head while Andrew Stoakley kicks out his 10 favourite Lowest of the Low songs. It's a Lowest of the Low love-in! Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, The Moment Lab, Ridley Funeral Home and Electronic Products Recycling Association.

Welcome to episode 1289 of Toronto Mic'd, proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times, and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. Home delivery in the GTA. Palma Pasta. Enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. RecycleMyElectronics.ca. Committing to our planet's future means properly recycling our electronics of the past.

Getting hip to the hip. An evening for the Downey Wenjack Fund. The Moment Lab. Brand marketing and strategy. PR, advertising, and production. You need The Moment Lab. And Ridley Funeral Home. Pillars of the community since 1921.

Today, making his Toronto mic debut is Simon Head. And joining us to kick out his 10 favourite lowest of the lows songs of all time is FOTM Andrew Stokely. Welcome, Simon. Welcome, Andrew. Thanks for having me. Thank you. Stokely, loyal FOTMs know well who you are and we'll catch up with you,

particularly when you start kicking out your lowest of the low gems. But let's join me, Mr. Stokely, as we get to know Simon Head. This is like fresh meat in the studio. So welcome, Simon. You're making your debut. Yeah, first time. I've been listening to your show for a few years now and it's an honor to be here sir so you know what to expect uh there's not going to be any surprises here no no and you don't know me very well because you just called me sir and now i'm getting all nervous oh sorry who calls me sir oh my goodness so as we find out like who

the hell you are and then of course you directed a a new lowest of the low documentary which is why this is like a lowest of the low theme show with the audio guru andrew stokely here kicking out his low jams but i have a few songs that'll help us get to know you and then hopefully we'll hear a lot from you and why am i playing these songs but let's start with this Ha ha. This is my theme song. Simon, tell us what we're listening to here. This is SN theme song. Simon, tell us what we're listening to here. This is SNFU. I started as their front of house sound guy in the early 90s, well, mid-90s, like 1995.

I toured with them. I was their sound guy throughout different parts of their iteration. Actually played keyboards on Bobbit, which is on Fulaba, which is the next record after. Just as a guest, I moved to Vancouver to be in this crew of people for a brief period of time. Just a fantastic group of people

who taught me how to tour and taught me how to be a person and how to live in close confinements with other people in a van. Cool punk band. I don't know, Stokely, do you have your 10 favorite SNFU jams loaded up? Not right now, no.

It took me a second. I recognize the intro, but it's been a long time since I've heard this track. And this is my theme song. This is Drunk on a Bike. That's sort of how I roll. Enjoy some Great Lakes beer and then leave the car keys at home

and jump on your bike. Yeah, this is the epitaph years of SNFU. This is sort of the quintessential unit of the band. There was the early part of the band, which is the early 80s up until like the late 80s. They broke up, they did a reunion tour, then they got a deal with Epitaph Records and then put like three or four more records out on Epitaph.

Briefly got dropped and then just different versions of the band. And now I think, well, unfortunately, Chai passed away a year and a bit ago. So the band is done. They're not going to carry on. Chai Pig was the life and blood of that band. Without a doubt. Shout out to FOTM Biff Naked.

We talked about his passing. And yeah, that's a great loss for the community. Yeah, he was my roommate. Chai was my roommate on tour. So I'd have to live with this lunatic. Where back in the day, there was a TV system called SpectraVision. And if you're in a hotel, you'd hit a button. It would go beep.

And every time he'd be, he's nocturnal. He was nocturnal. So he'd just stay up all night and sleep all day. And I'd be trying to sleep and you hear beep, beep. Until one day I'm like, you know, can you stop changing channels? And I roll over and he goes, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep. I'm like, okay, I'm going to go sleep in the van. Seminal punk band.

Okay. But I have another jam as we, as we talk about other stuff you've done before this low documentary. But here is a. One, two, one, two, three, four! She loves me I'm lucky Guys like me Don't get laid By girls like her By girls like her

So I'm playing Empty Cell because when I saw, where was I? Sneaky D's, I saw Rusty, like, I don't know, within the last year. And during Empty Cell, Ken shouted me out, like in the middle of the song, he shouted out Toronto Mike, and it was like a great thrill. But what have you done for FOTM's Rusty? The early 2000s, late 90s, I was also their tour manager slash sound person. Did a bunch of Canadian tours with them. I kind of actually, when I left SNFU and started doing less shows with them,

I got picked up by Rusty. I don't even know how that happened. I really don't know how the meeting happened, but I know that Scott McCullough used to be in the original versions of the Doughboys. Of course. And I'm kind of friends with John Kastner, who is the Doughboys.

Who married Don Draper's wife? yeah jessica paray paray yeah yeah the fun fact i need to that is very fun fact and she is the nicest human being you've ever met you know sometimes you meet people i don't know this person's gonna be okay i want to meet her the sweetest nicest nicest person uh yeah rusty great band um they had troubles in that time of their life, and they got through it, and here they are now. And their bass player, John Sutton, used to be in the Wicca band. He is a dear, lifelong friend of mine. I've known him.

I was his roommate in Winnipeg when I moved to Winnipeg to join a band. Wow. Okay, this is so many things here. Okay, and Stokely, anytime you have any questions, you just chime in. You're my co-host. I was just going to say, I worked with John a band. Wow. Okay, this is so many things here. Okay, and Stokely, anytime you have any questions, you just chime in. You're my co-host. I was just going to say,

I worked with John a few months ago. He came out and did some stuff with me. Oh, yeah, yeah. He does, he A2s. Oh, are you IA? No, no, but he does stuff for IA. He did stuff for Dome Productions, just some sports stuff.

I've seen him more and more every day because I work at Exhibition Place now, and I see him at Coke Coliseum and BMO Field sometimes, and he's the same guy. He's never changed. He'll always be John Sutton to me, just this lovable weirdo and just a fantastic character

in this group of this community we've built. Love it. It's all connected here. Now, much like you two, he's an FOTM. He's been in this basement, so to speak, when Rusty came by. And, yeah, he was a sweetheart. Absolutely. Absolutely a sweetheart.

So just to name check a few other bands. So it's funny because Stokely does audio for often when you're watching Blue Jays games on Sportsnet. Just at the Dome Dome, not just the Dome. I was just in Chicago. I'm going to Seattle. The life he's living. But you're the audio guru for what we hear on Sportsnet, Blue Jay telecasts. 16 years now.

Yeah. Okay. So Blue Jay is a lot of people listening, big Blue Jays fans, and then Stokely's responsible for that audio. Meanwhile, you're working with bands like Rusty. Name check a few others. Treble Charger? Yeah, I was their guy for a while.

I think I left Rusty to go to Treble Charger and from Treble Charger, I went to Sum 41. But did you skip, because I know that... Oh, wait, maybe I did. Yeah, Voivod. Oh, Voivod. Yeah, Voivod was a weird, just one kind of long tour

with a different singer at the time and it was through a guy named Mark DiPietro sort of hooked me up through James... Oh, God, I'm going to forget his last name now. I can't even help you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. McLean, James McLean, who managed the Doughboys,

who also managed Voivod. This is how it's all fitting together. And I went out on one tour with Voivod and it was a one tour. It's a Quebec connection there. That's like a Montreal thing. Yeah, yeah. And at the time,

James still is based in Toronto. That's where they sort of, and James actually, James McLean is this sort of staple point in the Toronto punk rock history of from the 80s, mid 80s all the way up until, you know,

he played in bands and he books bands and I haven't talked to him in a while, but he's a sweetheart. Good guy. I love the weaker bands. I just want to shout that out. So it's cool.

Oh, who doesn't? I've been trying to see if, I was trying to get John K. Samson to be a part of this, to maybe go and interview him. But he said he wasn't doing interviews and that was like two years ago. So it'd be a tough, tough pull to get him on your show, Mike. I'm sorry.

Yeah, but there's a couple, I just want to shout this out because I know he listens, but you did have on your show. So tell us about your podcast. Oh yeah, I have a podcast called the Apolog podcast. It's been eight years in the running, going on nine, actually come November, um, 300 plus episodes. I've interviewed people from musicians, Canadian, all over the world. I interviewed a few like high points. I interviewed the guy who invented the Raspberry Pi, which is a little tiny computer based out of UK.

And it's like a little Linux machine that people love. And it's like a sandbox of a computer. Also interviewed the guy, if your people are familiar with theater stuff, is the guy who invented QLab, which is software for theater based out of Baltimore. And yeah, so, you know, I've had all sorts of people. I started off with friends and now I'm sort of getting into getting like people like publicists to sort of help me find people.

I'm in that stage now where I've talked to all the people I know and now I need to, I need help. I worked with Melanie Kay who used to work for fat records, uh, Canada. Um, she, she's sent me a bunch of interviews who Who is now doing the Punk Rock Museum.

There's another... I went and saw that. Actually, I'm digressing, but I went and saw the Punk Rock Museum. No, digress. This is Toronto Mike. We digress like mofos on this show. Yeah, I went and saw the Punk Rock Museum in Las Vegas two or three weeks ago, and it's not enough Canadian content, I must... Where is it? It's in Vegas.

It's sort of a... It's a sketchy part of town. yeah yeah yeah we thought oh we'll walk there and we get halfway there and realize wait there's guys missing shoes and shirts and teeth i'm sure hot dog stands so we my wife and i we like let's take a cab and the only place you can get cabs in vegas is out in front of a hotel or strip bar so here we are in front of this gentleman's club and we called a cab and the guy's like you guys raging today i'm like no no no we're just using this to get a cab and the guy was like, are you guys raging today? I'm like, no, no, no. We're just using this to get a cab to go the other two kilometers to where we were going.

All right. To bring this back to lowest of the low, because the bulk of the remainder of this episode is pretty focused on the lowest of the low. We're going to kick out at least 10. Well, 10 plus one, right? Because this episode will end with the lowest of the low song because every episode ends with the lowest of the low song. this episode will end with the lowest of the low song because every episode ends with the lowest of the low song. But it's just a quick, you know, we talk about everything being connected and it blows my mind all the time when I talk to interesting people like you, Simon, and not that you're not interesting, Stokely, but we talk quite a bit. I've been here enough. It's okay. You're also a very

interesting man, I want you to know. But like John K. Sampson, of course, did play in Propagandhi. Say it for me. Propagandhi. Gandhi. Propagandhi. Gandhi, for me. Propagandhi. Gandhi. Propagandhi. Gandhi, yes. I always butcher that. Okay. But that when Ron Hawkins,

who's been here several times, Ron Hawkins, not the romp and late great, but the lowest of the low front man, he has that sticker on his guitar. Like that's one of his favorite bands of all time. Yeah.

There is actually a nice communication between Propagandhi and the lowest of the low because Propagandhi covered Pistol and put it on an EP that came out like 15 years later. But they used to cover it. And the story is they recorded it and then Chris redid the vocals

and it just came out like maybe three years ago, four years ago. I got to get the timing on that. No, I feel like it was during the pandemic. This is how I feel. But everything is pre and post pandemic. Areemic now can i say that well my wife might have she's not feeling well today so i'm uh yeah it's like we'll never be post you know it could be the flu right so it's like it's gonna just evolve and stick around forever and ever and ever and hopefully your wife recovers

quickly yeah and i tested so i'm good so good. Now Stokely's coming back. He left and he's now back. He's like, I don't want to get this thing again. Okay, so let us get to the jams. I'll just let you both know. You both came a long way to be here, different directions, but long drive to get here, and I appreciate you being here, and I don't want you to leave.

Simon, it's going to be exciting for you that you're going to leave with a large lasagna from Palma Pasta. It's in my freezer right now. Sweet. So Palma Pasta sent that over. They're good people. They're in Mississauga and Oakville, four locations. Support Palma Pasta. They're going to feed us at TMLX 13.

More on that in a moment. But I also have fresh craft beer for you from Great Lakes. Thank you. If this was an afternoon recording, I might ask you to join me with one. But here we are recording in the morning. And shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. Stokely, you always need to see things in the dark when you're working in the guts of the dome, okay?

Where are you? Is there a basement in that dome? Is that how it works? Yeah, I spend a lot of time by the dumpsters. Ridley Funeral Home sent over flashlights for you guys. They look like EpiPens. They're not EpiPens. Don't use them as an EpiPen. I was something like, is there something I'm missing that you've added?

There's a new sponsor or something? It's an adrenaline shot, so you don't need to go to the funeral home. Well, it's not an EpiPen, but I got to declare that just in case you're like, I thought it was an EpiPen. And then I get like a lawsuit on my hands. It's like, Mike, we could have saved a life with that.

So more later. Well, actually, because I'm about to kick out the first jam from Stokely here. I want to get to the music quicker and faster than usual. But too late for that, I guess. But I mentioned TMLX 13. That's at Great Lakes Brewery on, what is it, August 31st from 6 to 9 p.m. But the very next day, this is important because you guys are fans of Canadian rock bands. We know that

because we're going to be talking about The Low. There's another Canadian rock band you might have heard of called The Tragically Hip. Are you guys familiar with that band? Yeah, they've been around.

Good guys. Paul Langlois is on the show next Monday. Nice. Shout that out. Finally in studio, a member of The Tragically Hip. Okay.

Getting hip to the hip. An evening for the Downey Wenjack Fund. This is the day after TMLX 13. So this is September 1st, 7.30pm at the Rec Room. Everybody should go to gettinghiptothehip.com and use the promo code FOTM10. You save 10% on your tickets. There's a good hip cover band. There's a live recording of Getting Hip to the Hip. I'm going gonna be there that's that's not a selling feature but it's just a fact but people really should go to uh again getting hip to the hip.com pick up your ticket save 10 with fotm 10 and good luck to fotm jamie do in the crew at getting hip to the hip uh that's again september 1st 7 30 at the Rec Room. Andrew Stokely. Yes. Does your middle name start with J? No.

Because I feel like naturally, like I want to say Andrew J. Stokely. Like that just seems like Michael J. Fox. Andrew J. Stokely. It's like an author's name. Yeah. Andrew J. Stokely. I'm not that interesting. I do have a question though for you. Sure.

Your first consoles that you used to use when you were mixing front of house, do you remember what they were? Oh, they were usually like Mackie consoles, Allen and Heath consoles, those early Allen and Heath consoles. And they had a flaw to them because they had a special type of fader and people were using contact cleaner and buggering them completely up. So that and nothing digital, obviously. The very first digital console I ever worked on was the Whiskey,

mixing us in a few, and it was, I forgot even, but it had total recall. So you could look on the screen. Great movie. And you could see where the knobs were going on a computer screen. Right. Similar to like SSL stuff. Sorry, we're nerding out, Mike. Sorry.

You know, I was about to say, did Andrew forget that this is not Idle Hands? Oh, no. Okay, well, I'll nerd out about it. My first, I actually owned a Mackie 1604 idle hands? Oh, no. Okay. Well, I'll learn that about audio. My first, I actually owned a Mackie 1604. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I had it for a number of years before it finally popped out. You know, you're stealing all my questions, Doug.

My first question was about those boards. Oh, crap. Oh, I'm sorry. Okay. No, just kidding. Just kidding. All right, Andrew, big question for you here before we get to the music. Yes.

Are you ready to kick out the lowest of the low jams? Yeah, I'm going to transport myself back a few years. And I should preface this. Oh, go ahead. Yeah, okay. Love a good preface. I'm ready. As you know, and I think I've mentioned this,

Shakespeare in My Butt is my deserted island album. So I could have easily just said, play the album from start to finish, and I would have walked away very happy but i didn't want to there are other tracks that i like on other albums of course so i sprinkled that throughout these 10 tracks so are they my 10 favorite tracks yes and no but yes if you know what i mean i know exactly what you mean and i will tell you uh because we're going to be talking to you about the songs you chose. We'll be talking to Simon about the new documentary.

And there's another streamable piece of video that we'll be talking about, which will be right in your wheelhouse, Andrew Stokely, because you love Shakespeare My Butt so much. So we have a lot to get to, but let's get to this first jam. I was the drunken people's commissar. Oh, the best laid plans held together with rubber bands. The sacrificial barricade, well, we dismantled every single day.

With a pair of glass from a toolbox of saints and liars. We'll see you next time. Tell me, Andrew Stokely, why you love Bottle Rockets, a more recent low jam. Well, I think when we get to another track off this album in a few, you're going to understand why I liked this album so much as opposed to maybe ones previous. I'm a sucker for any type of organ. B3, whatever. And it's very subtle in this mix.

You can hear it, but in a track coming up, you can really, I wish in the mix that they had actually pushed the organ in the mix more than the guitar. But anyway, it's just a really good track.

I love the harmonies in the chorus. It's got a nice bridge here. Good timing. Yeah, it's just a fun track. I mean, I think it was the first track off of this album. Gadget Pop. Yes. I believe it was the first release, right this album. Gadget Pop. Yes. I believe it was the first release, right?

This is the story of Lo Salo. You're hearing them go through his career and his life with Lo Salo. It's a fantastic journey. There's a line there you can hear bleed a little while. It's just subtle. And if you've been a fan of the band for so long, it is. I mean, Bottle Rocket. It basically describes exactly

what they went through you know yeah pressure pressure pressure explosion and then fade out so for a few years yeah six god was that long yeah between the breakup and then the reunion reunion and then they broke up again for like three years. Yes. But yeah. And then Steven left and yeah, I mean, it's... Steven left in like 2012. I can't wait to see the documentary. Okay, let's talk. Let's do this. 101 on this because we're going to...

We have 10 jams that we're going to talk a lot about a bunch of low stuff. But what is the name of your documentary about The Lowest of the Low, Simon? It's called Subversives, The History of Lowest of the Low. It's an hour and 54-minute romp of the band from the early days, from social and security days to Popular Front.

That keeps getting shorter and shorter. But all the way up from the low, how they recorded, when they broke up, and then they got back together, when they broke up again. Talking with various people along the way. It's been a three-year journey. It's been a long three-year journey. What did you record it on? I used...

I love it. I ended up going right into the camera. Most of it. Single camera. I just went right into a Blackmagic cinema camera. When I was doing multiple cameras, multiple people, I would take a little Zoom H6 portable recorder. And that came into the mix very late in the game

where I had two cameras, but I'm like, I can't do two cameras now. You know when you start something and you're like, oh man, I got two cameras now. But it would just make the whole thing look weird. So I got one camera right into the camera, and then I use Pro Tools to sort of process. I use Final Cut as my software. And the smartest thing I ever did is got Andy Koyama,

who recorded the first album to mix it in Los Angeles. Wow. So that was like the final form of, I guess, not validation, but this sort of like, what the hell is going on right now? How is this art becoming something kind of neat? Well, the big question that everyone's screaming at their iPhones and their Androids right now is, like,

how does a fan of the lowest of the low get their eyeballs on this documentary? Like, how do we see this thing? Well, there is a premiere in Toronto at the Rivoli on September 20th, which is at this point about 80% sold. It'll probably get sold out by the next week or so and we're like 40 days away from the show um there will be a streamable downloadable

link um to to as sometime after maybe a week after because then i got a few other screenings other parts of ontario um taking it out to like different cities buffalo included which is going to be kind of fun oh when's that one because i'm sadly 27th or 28th uh london and 28th alora on the 29th um i'm going by memory uh london ninth it's in there it'll i'm sadly out of town working the week that it's at the Rivoli. I was. Yeah. No, it's just, it definitely be,

I, I did do a pre-release, I guess we'll talk about it, but there was a pre-release of it where I went through Shakespeare, my butt with Steve and Ron and Andy Koyama. And we did like sort of a classic albums version of Shakespeare, my butt. And that,

that came out on a, on a website called gum road. So that'll be... And by the way, I've seen this. It's excellent. But during the Rosie and Gray discussion, I kept thinking, why didn't Lawrence mention that podcast

that closes every episode of Rosie and Gray? So then I was like, I got sad. Yeah. Well, I'll throw that in there. You know, Star Wars was never closed. Like a pop-up. Like a pop-up video. Boing, boing.

Yeah, yeah. Fun fact, Toronto Mike closes every episode of Rosie and Gray. We're dating ourselves. It becomes a pop-up video, yeah video yeah yeah then now in fact toronto mike closes we're dating ourselves it becomes pop-up video yeah 20 20 years from now you can do the special edition yeah reopen get new anakin in there yeah okay so i have so many questions but i actually want to get to the next jam because i realize that i do all my questions during the first song come on so and this will get us to that album and we can talk more about that that that that non-documentary release you just referenced because this is from Shakespeare My Butt.

This is my wife's favorite song. To see your young and pretty face I am far too young to feel so old And far too tired to care That I took down twenty bastards Before they left me lying there I gotta add that I have the multi-tracks of this From when we went and digitized the 2-inch masters. So I have the master tape of this whole record. I don't have subversives, because that was done in a different situation,

but I have an idea that when I do these screenings, I'm actually going to have a karaoke version of every song, and people will put their hand up, or they can pre-do the thing and they can sing their favorite song of Lois and Lo. That would be like the fun live aspect to the thing. Lo-Yoki I guess we're calling it. Oh man. Karaoke Lo-

Karaoke Yoki Loki Yoki. Yours is better. We gotta workshop that but it almost rolls off the tongue. That's amazing. But Stokely why this song? We're counting down so number nine i i i think the song speaks for itself it's just all songs speak for themselves technically i think for this one it's the lyrics it's just such a interesting topic i love i love some of the

lines you know i won't be back to see you're young and pretty fit yeah know, it takes me back. I mean, I think this album, and specifically, if you want to talk about this, sir, I'm going off mic. And also, don't forget to give the title, just so if somebody's new to the low and they're listening and they might not know the title of the song.

It's the letter to Bill Bell, you know. I think anybody who knows the band knows. Anyway, it doesn't matter. Oh, if you know the band, you know every song on Shakespeare, my boy. Yeah. It's Bill Bow. Bill Bow. The funny thing is that um during this thing andy mentions his wife andy koyama his wife is spanish goes yeah he says it wrong now i don't feel so bad okay um

like this whole album i'm 51 now and i started i grew up inampton, which in the 70s and the 80s was still pretty isolated from Toronto and so forth. It took effort to go downtown. You had to get a bus or a parent to drive you to Kipling Station, and then you took the subway in downtown. So if you wanted to go downtown, it was a lot of work. I went to Raihai, or TM tmu now for the radio and television arts program and i was 19 and i was so you know john had you had you and um they were they were part of that ryerson situation um what years john 91 92 93 oh for sure yeah i mean john jim hair i think jim hair too is part of random killing guys the band from oh two guys from random killing ran that department they were oh so they were yes so

they were um lab assistants before when i was going because they were a few years old and me um but yeah no like so this album came out basically at the time that I was starting school or part of it. I have a long history of the band. I mean, as many people on this notion know, I started working at CFNY. I lived five minutes from the radio station when I was a kid. And so I started working there in the music department in 89, I believe, and went right through to 94. And so I did a number of gigs with these as part of CFNY. But when I was at Raihai, as I still affectionately call it.

It's your university now. Yes. I was on the board of directors for entertainment. So I booked all the bands that came in and played at the university for almost two, three years. And I booked these guys a lot. And I used to emcee their shows to the students and stuff like that. So I have a really long history. And this album, I think because, as we all know,

music takes you back to a certain time, a certain place, to certain memories. And so I associate this album with being on my own, finding out who I was as a young adult, and a city that I'd moved to that the album talks about. It talks about places in the album and it just, it just connected. And, you know, it's funny you say that because Ron and everybody talks about how naive they were and how, how new at what being musicians were and how fresh it was. And that was a relation to, it just went outward to everybody.

Everybody went, I'm with you. I'm along for the ride. They spoke to a generation of people. Yeah. And they were really good dudes, you know? Yeah, they had that too. Yeah. Still are.

Yeah. I keep in touch with Steven, you know, on Facebook and stuff like that. And we've chatted and, you know, I talked to Lawrence and stuff like that on Twitter and things. And I've seen them at shows. They've just been really good people. Can we name check the members of Lowest of the Low when Shakespeare My Butt is recorded?

It was John Arnott playing bass, David Alexander on drums, Stephen Stanley on guitar, Ron Hawkins, and that was the band. And three of those are like Popular Front members. Yeah, that was, yes. Ron was playing bass for Popular Front and then Steve came in, played guitar

and it was a three piece. And then they had different iterations of Popular Front. Like they had like a world band version of it, like this huge big band. And actually the funny thing about Reason Well, Popular Front turned to Lowest to Lowest because they just sidestepped everything. Like we don't want to,

we don't want to have this big production because they were talking about things in world views that they didn't know about and they were pretending like they were saying well you too is a pretty big band at the time so we're trying to just follow that and um that's where that's where the new low the version of the low kind of came to itself because he's like i'm not going to sing about songs i don't know about and that that's how The Low became The Low. Okay, I want to talk a lot more about Shakespeare, My Butt. And I'm going to start this third jam from Andrew because it's also from Shakespeare, My Butt.

But it's like a big, I'd call it a big radio jam. You know, I was introduced to Shakespeare, My Butt because I was listening to the station Andrew was working with, CFNY 102.1 The Edge, and they played the mess out of Shakespeare, My Butt. Here's a song that, to this day, when I hear it, yeah, I'm back in 1991 and loving, just love this song. guitar solo

I don't know where I'm going I don't know where you are tonight I don't know what I'm blowing And I ain't feeling all too right But I'm hanging around I'm hanging around You're hanging up the phone again I'm hanging up this town

Cause I want you in I need you in I need you in I'm bleeding And I'll bleed a little while tonight There are parts of this song that I'll need to bring back up later. I'll bring it down for now, but we might be back up. Because this is just, what a epic jam this is. Bleed a little while tonight.

I wish I had been able to ask you, maybe you know, was this song when Ryan wrote this, did he have the sing-along portion in his head? Because this song at live shows is the sing-along song.

I know he had a purpose in the new version of what The Low would become to sort of write music for people. Kind of emulate kind of Pogues kind of stuff, kind of like Weddings, Parties, Anything. They reference that. In fact, Mick and... And they cover Rosie and Gray. They do, and that's what Weddings, Parties, Anything.

They came to Toronto. There's a nice little communication in this doc where they have this part, or the weddings, parties, everything, at Mick and Squeezebox Wally. They talk about how they brought the music back to Australia and how people thought it was an Australian folk music, right? Right.

Anyways, digression, I'm sorry. No, we do that on Toronto. Ron was writing music at this time where he knew what he wanted he mentions the thing in this Shakespeare um note for note song for song thing where he's like we how did we know these things how did we know like it's like they're like mongrels they called himself a mongrel like we're a mongrel of music and then um talking about how they took stuff and made it theirs. And that's how, when you can reinvent music and make music fresh by using old techniques,

it's magic. Like, who knows how to do that? And he did. And a lot of it was probably like, he was going through a breakup and there was this thing about, not necessarily an affair, but there was this one person

that he really drew himself to because she was like this crazy Leninist type, you know, socialist. Sure. He's a Marxist, and it turns out that type of socialism, they don't get along. So he basically, that's, he didn't know.

Who would know? You know what I mean? Yeah. I just find like anytime this song is played, especially even back years, but even- Well, this part here I know I don't mean that but like

like just a little bit here on the damn damn the circumstance and my room is spinning yeah damn damn the circumstance it's great without you in it it's so bloody catchy

right this is a well it's sing along pop song and the show when they played the song it was it was an extended sing alongalong at the end.

That's how they finished it. You know, like, you play the chorus out because you want people to continue singing the song when they've stopped listening. And that's what any show I've ever been to with this song, that's what happens. Yeah. And he stops for the Alex always good, never good.

Yeah. There's a part where he brought it up where there's these little plinky plinky guitar part. In the track listing it's called Damn Damn Shit My Pants. And they're listening to it and go, yeah I can hear it. Mike, can I ask a question?

Oh my god, yeah. Where did you pick, is this the 25th anniversary that you brought these from, or is this the original? Can't remember. Okay. I'm going to guess that from hearing it in the cans that this is the re-release, because the bass is a little more forward in the mix. I remember messaging Lawrence when this came out and said, the bass, did you guys take it into the studio and remaster or remix everything?

He goes, no, we took the masters in that we had and they just did some trickery and helped to boost it. They didn't do a full remix. That record in the 90s wasn't even mastered. No. They just brought it and put it, made cd out of it and then and a cassette as well um and that's how and the fun fact if i'm correct here i believe i am but the the yellow tape from bernie ladies was from page productions right publications publicator thank you and so

was shakespeare my butt yeah yeah and actually shakespeare held that record of most canadian independent records sold until the yellow tape kind of kicked them off of it. And I'm not sure how the timing is because I know they were recording in June of 1990. No, sorry, 1991. And now Yellow Tape came out in June 1991. So when Shakespeare came out in December, they were selling. But I guess that Yellow Tape took a while to sort of catch up. Right.

I don't know. And then we all saw on Speaker's Corner, we all saw Yoko Ono that was it but it's funny that andrew's at cf and y at this time because those are kind of the two albums like if i look back now at like 1991 a year where i like that was the only station i really listened to that here in toronto here are those two albums massive like yellow tape and shakespeare my Yeah, 1991 is still probably, for me, probably the greatest year in music. Because of 10 from Pearl Jam? 10. Yeah, I mean, it's a fantastic...

Never mind. It's also... Never mind. No, wasn't Woodface by Crowder House put out in 1991? You know what? That's a fantastic... I worked at Music World, at Shopper's World in Brampton,

and that track, I could probably... Chocolate Cake? Chocolate Cake. I was just going to say, I can hear the... That might have been say, I can hear the snare drum. Just the, yeah, it was such tight compression on it. I once did an episode of Toronto Mic'd

with several FOTMs going to bat for what calendar year had the best album releases, okay? Which is obviously very subjective and really an impossible task. But I went to bat for 1991 and I brought my list of albums released in 1991.

And I just ran down the 1991 and I brought my list of albums released in 1991. And I'm like, and I just ran down the list and it is something else. The seminal albums that came out in 1991. What you should say is the ones that didn't come out like the, you know, the, the harem scarums, the,

you know, the honeymoon suites, those ones didn't come out. Right. So that's, there was, there was definitely like through the, the release of nevermind and this whole push of the indie world

and how it sort of became the record industry. It's an amazing story about how the majors got out of the way. Yeah, and I mean, that era was the true, I think, 19, maybe 89, I think 19, maybe 89, we really started to see a true Canadian band and music system. 89 through to, say, 94, 95. I mean, that was the glory years. Well, shout out to Michael Barclay. He wrote the book on it, right?

Yeah, yeah, I am on my podcast. He's a fantastic guy. Yeah, he's great. He's been over a few years. Anyway, I just, I mean, that whole era. Never was the same. I want to get the name right. Maybe I'll Google it. He also did a book on Slow, the's great. He's been over a few years. Anyway, I just, I mean, that whole era. Never was the same. I want to get the name right. Maybe I'll Google it.

He also did a book on Slow, the band Slow. That's what I picked up on. I forgot what it was called, too. Sorry, Michael. No, that's okay. Well, he also did a book on the Tragically Hip, right? That's right, yeah. The Never Ending Present.

But I think nothing was the same. It'll come to me. Jason Schneider, also a good FOTM, helped him out with that book, too. And it was just, it'll come to me uh jason schneider also good fotm uh helped him out with that book too and it was just it's all about this era in canadian rock and uh yeah amazing it's kind of where can con sort of didn't need to be as important as it as it was before you know it seemed like the 80s were sort of like the wood shedding years for bands to sort of get on their feet 1990s hit and it was it seemed like CanCon was like, we don't need it anymore.

I mean, we got it. But obviously to keep our culture and our musical culture specifically solid, we do need that type of support. Oh, and because I don't want to let this go too long of me butchering that name of that book, which is excellent, Have Not Been the Same.

That's right. The Can Rock Renaissance, 1985 to 1995. Oh, that's great. Wow rock renaissance 1985 to 1995 oh that's wow there you go right well i guess i guess they had brian adams and i guess i guess it depends on what they would classify as i mean brian adams the big now i'm the wiki to steal this but it's blue rodeo the tragically hip sloan daniel lanois and it goes on about you know network records and it's yeah and it's it's fantastic but yeah you mentioned slow not never be have not been the same i always forget that title but that is a that is a single by slow slow not sloan slow slow yeah yeah the vancouver and then who eventually turned into copyright right Right. And somebody, somebody passed away from there too recently.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Which we, uh, not Tom. Yeah. Well,

we'll revisit that. I'll get to another jam and we'll revisit that. Cause we don't want to get that wrong. Shout out to Ridley funeral home. Okay. Let's get to the, uh, the fourth lowest of the low song.

Again, I got lots more to talk about lowest to the low, but I got to spread it out over ten great songs. Here we go. Oh, it's a live version. Oh, this is from the early 2000s. Nothing short of a bullet live.

Live at the 12thth Ziggy passed away shout out to Ziggy he was also in what was he he was in that Connelly and Crush was he yeah

Trevor Hurst from Connelly and Crush was just on my program talking about the loss of Ziggy and it's a very sad episode but shout out to Trevor.

Let's kick it. And I might want you Yeah, but I don't need you And you won't sleep in my bed No, you won't sleep in my bed No, you won't sleep in my bed No sleep in my bed anymore It seemed like a dead end Yeah, even when I was seven

To sing for this country With your hands up to heaven Cause God is dead then Yeah, and he's never been back again And I don't think about it. No, I don't think about it. No, I don't

think about it anymore. Shout out to Peter Gross. This song is called Gamble. Also to John Arnott for mixing this. He mixed this. Before he left. Before he was, yeah, before he left. Yeah, sure, let's go with that.

We'll go with that. Yeah, no, he mixed this record. And it's like, I was listening to the headphones. I'm like, my God, that room tone is fantastic on this record. Yeah, I, you know, I think I wanted a live track in here because I think one of the great strengths of the band is them performing live. And, you know, through all their iterations from when it was just a four piece to when lawrence came in and

then obviously the current lineup now they're just when does lawrence come in he came in officially uh he came in in 2000 and just before um sort of Just before that. So that would have been 2001-ish, 2-ish? Because he was with them with the Rusty Nails and Do Good Assassins. He's a sweet, I just want to say, Lawrence, I know you're listening, a sweetheart, always accommodating whenever I want. Because we played Bleed a Little Wild tonight last,

which I was going to point out, also references Bathurst Street. And I remember as a teenager loving the fact that I'm listening to a song, I love this song, and there's Bathurst Street. I know Bathurst Street and I remember as a teenager loving the fact that I'm listening to a song I love this song and there's Bathurst Street I know Bathurst Street like this is exciting right can you

imagine Australian band singing that like talking about streetcars and Bathurst Street and like yeah of course there's an Australian folk song of course it is and we're not kicking out the only

spoiler alert but you know like the only I can go to the only tonight I know where the only is you know it's our CBGB's that's what Ron calls it okay but where was I going oh yeah so I just want to bring up Bleed of the only tonight i know where the only is you know it's our cbgbs that's what ron calls it okay okay but where was i going oh yeah so i just want to bring up bleed a while tonight before we get back to this great uh song but bleed a little while tonight lawrence and ron hawkins

played it at tmlx3 on the patio of great lakes brewery on my birthday and it's like a it was just amazing so thank you to sweetheart lawrence for helping make that happen and thank you to ron hawkins for doing that that was amazing i think i've seen that on the youtubes yeah it's out there somewhere for sure everything's out there now on the youtubes well if you record it you will find it i think i got a comment that the speed of this song is the right speed because usually they do play everything a little faster a little jacked up and a little like it seems this was way more realized than, you know, because, you know,

the band is frantic at the same time. Like anything could go wrong. This seems very calculated. I'm curious. I don't know if this was maybe right at the start of, they did a walk on and just kind of, because the bass leads them on to the stage.

I'm just wondering if that's how it was. But yes, because it does. If you listen to a lot of the other tracks on this live album, they're pretty up-tempo, shall we say. Yeah. Which always amazed me watching Stephen playing, going, he should be about 20 BPMs lower, and he's, you know. Yeah.

Gossip Talking Blues is a tough one to do guitar solos on when it's like, you can't. Yeah. Oh, listen to that crowd. Do I hear Andrew stokely in that crowd i i'd have to look at that i probably not i thought i heard your voice in the mix there there's a video out on that too there's somewhere like i have some video i have the video and i have the recording uh from lawrence gave me all this wow and it's like one camera off the side and

there's a little bit in the dock but it doesn't you know when things look kind of crappy back in the day it's sort of like, yeah, it's, it looks adorable, but it just looks really bad. Like, yeah,

really bad. That was the charm though. Yeah. Two, two, two 40. Woo pee. Yeah.

All right, Campbell. So I need to, so every Tuesday night, no Wednesday night, my daughter's case. So every Wednesday night I'm at high park. I'm also at high park Tuesday nights,

but for my son's soccer, I'm at high Park and Hayden's Hayden Desert. Hayden's son is on my son's soccer team and we hang out for like an hour every Wednesday and it's very cool. But, you know, there's this story that gets told on Toronto Mike quite a bit about the song Take, which was submitted for the

Discovery to Disc contest in 1991. This was the CFNY contest where you get $100,000 for winning this thing, which is real money in 1991 for like a bag. Anyway and hayden didn't want to sing take and he got no amends to do it and there's this whole great little story there but gamble was up gamble was submitted yep gamble which we just listened to and the producer and he's in the toronto mike calendar meaning he's going to make his toronto mike debut very month, just like you, Simon. Hey. Bob Wiseman. Oh, yeah.

Produced Gamble for that Discovery to Disc. I've already had him on my podcast. You know what? I'm going to just point you out. So I feel now like we're rival podcasts. We've got to go at it. But you did have a guest on who told me no. And it actually, it's like right now, it's irking me.

I'm going to bring down your mic. You want your lasagna back? My passive aggressive response is to just lower your uh you in the mix here but elliot lefkoe whose brother is an fotm yeah also good friend of peter gross who i just shouted out because it was called gamble which is an inside joke for all the fotms listening but elliot lefkoe who was who was very nice in his he said he loves the show and he gave it five stars on apple podcast but he didn't want to come on and talk but he came on and talked to you that's right so just just uh you know if't want to come on and talk, but he came on and talked to you. That's right.

So just, you know, if you want to bug me, you can just remind me of that. Elliot will talk to you, but not me. He's also in the doc, actually. He's not in my doc. He's responsible for getting the, basically putting the band back together for that show.

Trust me. At Massey Hall? No, no. This is like the reunion of the amphitheater, Lee's Palace, which actually this gamble is tying back into gamble. The recordings are from the reunion shows. Yeah. And then I think they did Kerosene and a new song at the same time.

They did a Bad Religion song and then they did a new song, Taxi, what's it called? New Westminster Taxi Squad is on that record, isn't it? And if people want that live record. Yeah, because it's a two-disc banger. Because Gamble, that live record is called Shot of a Bullet, right? Nothing Short. Nothing Short.

I got to get my glasses on over here. Okay, let's get to the next jam because it's a more recent jam. I actually have the magnet on the side of my fridge for this. That's how recent it was because it's in the era when the guys would drop by my home. So it tells you you're in the modern days here. But let's kick out another one. because it's in the era when the guys would drop by my home. So it tells you you're in the modern days here. But let's kick out another one. It's a long day Before you sleep

Scattered and strange Like the hours you keep There's no time To look before you leave It's a great single, man. to live before you leave. It's a great single, man. Yeah. Yeah.

Let the spotlight deceive you. The darkness can't reach you. The power lines crackle above you. The city that loves you has come alive. And the streets and the bars and the pavement Power lines. This is when I came into the fold, actually, 2017. I think it was 2017. I was going to ask you what brought came into the fold, actually, 2017. I think it was 2017.

I was going to ask you what brought you into the fold. This is actually going to be funny because this has a Rusty tie-in. Jeff Rogers was their manager, who also managed Rusty back in the day. FOTM, too. Yeah, he contacted me and said, hey, this band, Lois and Lois. I'm like, this band, Lois and Lois? Yeah, they're looking for a guy to do a broadcast on Global. It was like the Global television morning show. But they don't guy to do a broadcast on global. It was like the global television morning show.

But they don't want to do it just on themselves. Can you go in and set it up? And I completely set them up with in-ear monitors. And we rehearsed it. And then I did a virtual. It was like a real. And then we did the thing that went live. And it turned out really good.

And they had a guy, Mark, who ends up. He works for the Sheep sheepdogs and he was just really busy so i just kind of came in and started mixing the band wow yeah so i but yeah this power lines was the first song that i heard and uh this had derrick brady playing bass on this record um who also was in skydivers something i'm trying to remember that. He was in a bunch of bands, but he was in the Dugan Assassins with Ron, and then there was, yeah,

there's a part of, in the documentary, I keep bringing it back. How professional. Well, really, it's why you're here, because a lot of people listening are excited to see this documentary.

There's a part in this where you learn something about this record, and I'm going to tease it. You learn something about this record you'd never know or expect. So I'm going to say that. You learn something about this record you'd never know or expect. So I'm going to say that.

I'll tell you off, Scott. I'll tell you off the camera. Well, what I liked... And then I'll tweet it in real time. What I liked about this album, because the first three, I consider the first three, you know, up to Sorted Fiction,

and then this one, there's a real difference in the production quality and the... It's a real difference in the production quality yeah and the it's joe jump joe dumpy yeah it just it just seems to not pop and what i love about it too and i know lawrence has made fun of me in the past but as an audio guy i hate heavy heavy heavy heavy compression i don't want to see a sound file or a wave file that looks like this and it's just a block of noise koyama called her the sausage yeah i i want to see i want to see valleys i want to see peaks i want to see that that there's dynamic range yeah there's a debate going on it's called the loudness uh whatever the loudness

the loudness yeah yeah how loud can you make something and the answer is you can make it real loud but you're you gave up a answer is you can make it real loud, but you give up a lot of audio. I'm with you. I'm with you. Also with live shows too. I'm in the same, making a super stinking loud. Like I worked for a band called The Descendants and I did their sound and we're at Rockfest Montebello

and we played right before Lamb of God, right? Which is a Wallace sound. Which is like, and like, we're doing these great, they sounded great. And he goes, well, they were way louder than us, said the drummer, Bill Stevenson. I said, yeah, but it sounded great. This is not about loud. Yeah, no, we, PA people like that as a, as a broadcast operator, my biggest enemy in the world are PA operators.

Because for whatever reason, in-house producers feel that loud equals excitement and it i it kills me i've seen shows where i've just sit there and i get dizzy because it's so stupidly loud and maybe that's the old this is an old guy get off my front yard comment where it's too loud we're all old guys like what is going on right now i don't even know if there's a band like my head hurts um i'm standing all night my hips hurt yeah from dancing yeah no there definitely is a debate about how loud things should go and there's a lot of conversation about um for me inner conversation about i can make it loud it's really easy to make it loud just make it sound good that's that's the tricky part it's it's it's incredible i want to have young up-and-coming audio people who come to me i mean

music we use the same tools but we are different and so forth sure um and i just decided 30 years ago that i didn't want to when i was going to school i thought i was going to go do music but all the big studios were closing yeah in the early 90s and so I realized that it wasn't going to be at that time, a viable career option. So I went, I went the TV side, you know, and I don't regret my decision.

I've traveled the world, you know, amazing. I've done, worked on so many amazing shows over the years. You've seen curling rinks across this planet. It's taken me around the world. And it's immediate.

Whatever you're doing is your broadcast, right? So it's immediate. Like what's happening is like, this might not not be this is our cue sheet of things but it could change somebody could hurt themselves and then you have to do this everything's a pivot i love that i love it being like that i mean personally i i wouldn't want to be in there in your shoes but i love to practice things but no it's definitely something i can appreciate and i've seen live and it's i like when it's when it's done, it's over. I just, I can go home and not worry about it

because I do have a little obsessive about that. Did I make the EQ right? Did I make the, did I use too much compression? Did I not have? So yeah, I think just with that track, it just, it was a new sound for them. It sounded great in the, it sounded great the first time I heard it,

that's a catchy pop. Again, this is a poppy, catchy, light, likable song. We didn't shut out the name of that album, by the way,

which is do the right now. That record took the longest on any lowest, a low record to record, believe it or not. I know. No, I love these fun facts. That's,

that's funny. But when they were in the studio day after day, after day, after day, like Shakespeare took six months, but, but do the right now took months and with multiple mixes and with multiple scenarios and multiple groups and uh of people in like it was a lot of moving around a lot of tracks um and stuff you which gives it a magic

because there's so many tracks in there you don't really hear yeah but it's all texturized it's something i i i'm like kind of like keeping it under a certain amount of tracks whatever i'm recording but this thing is just this it's it's an opus you know so we've we've finished five of hoakley hoakley i'm still i'm not even drinking my great legs right now five of stokely's jams are complete there are five more to go this is literally the midpoint but as i review the albums from from which Andrew Stokely has plucked his first five low jams, okay, Agitpop, two from Shakespeare, My Butt, which we understand is Andrew's favorite album of all time,

then one from Short of a Bullet, which is the live version of Gamble, and then we have a song now from Do The Right Now. But noticeably absent thus far is any songs from, we say it wrong too, Hallucigenia. The live version. No, because I haven't played it yet. Gamble technically is from. Technically, but you did choose.

Yes, that is absolutely from the, so this is the, because Shakespeare in My Butt was so big, you know, CFNY, there's like, I don't know, six or, I don't know how many songs from that album got like heavy rotation on our local alt-rock station, right? I there's like, I don't know, six or, I don't know how many songs from that album got like heavy rotation on our local alt rock station. Right. I almost want to name check them in order,

but from like Henry needs a new pair of shoes. So many. Started with, um, uh, salesman cheats and liars. Yes. That was a massive radio.

Yeah. Uh, I don't know what came, was that the first single? And then eternal fatalist. Then it went, I, I don't know the rest of it,

but I know that salesman cheats and liars. I don't know the order, but we could name check them all because absolutely on high rotation for a while was Henry Needs a New Pair of Shoes. Yes. There was a period of time with that. Of course, Bleed a Little Wild Tonight. Rosie and Gray was the second single, I believe.

Because there was a conversation about how long the intro went. And then Skinny was their manager at the time and said, hey, can you cut that in half? No, we're not doing that. We're going to have a minute-long intro. Because that's how they became the closing theme for Toronto Mike. There you go. Because if they didn't have that long intro,

because the idea was at the beginning anyways was, yeah, I would try to hit that post. A long time ago, I gave up on even trying to do that. But I mentioned Hallucigenia. I'm glad we're going to talk about it because we're going to listen to a song from it right now and then we're going to get into that the follow up to Shakespeare My Butt There are synaptic gaps inside my brain

One more shot and my liver starts calling me Shane I'm in things and you're in stars Broken knuckles and dear graffiti walls And if I trashed all my beliefs and plans That you could be my woman and I could be your man Combat boots and overalls Anarchy, love and fear, graffiti walls Hands and walls and bathroom stalls.

A potent combination. The beer is cheap. The talk is too. A dead-end situation. Hanging out, talking, talking, stopping and traveling streets. Great Lakes Beer, Graffiti Walls. There's some, this song is based on Sneaky D's basement. This is the story I heard is that they go down,

you look on the basement bathroom walls of Sneaky D's and that's what you see is all, whatever he's telling you about is what's happening. One thing I got to comment about, the time signature play in this song is pretty amazing. Like, cause it's like, we're getting there. You know what I mean? So like, I love groups cause that can kind of alter their music around.

Time Signature doesn't matter. Elvis Costello did it on his last record where you're listening to it and he goes, I'm going to get there. But he adds beats and he takes away beats. And this is what this does until you get the message out. Where the message is there is that it's vocal driven and we're going to make the music fold around the vocals. And that's my observation.

Well, I love that it's about sneaky Ds. I have more fun facts, but I'm going to pass the mic to Andrew Stokely. And obviously it's not called Great Lakes Beer Graffiti Walls. It's called Beer Graffiti Walls. Why this jam? Basically, it's the history of the city's greatest nachos and tomato sauce, whatever. What is it called?

The El Matador. That steak they have is... Yeah. I can't even really call it salsa. I mean, it was just basically, I think, ketchup with some onion in it. But, you know... Secret recipe reveal. Anybody who's ever lived in the...

Who hasn't been to Sneaky D's? Yeah. And this is the original location to Sneaky yeah and this is original location Sneaky D's yes which is named Sneaky D's

because Honest Ed's was there so Honest Ed Sneaky D well I mean you'd be sitting on the bottom floor and there'd be

something going on upstairs and you could watch the floor move thinking is this the night where it's gonna collapse

you know I have a story a very quick story about SNFU's story where we just did the Warped Tour first time Warped Tour came through Toronto and we went to Sneaky D's. But we can I swear you get rid of it.

So we all took mushrooms at one side of Toronto and walked all the way over to Sneaky D's and we're upstairs at Sneaky D's. And we started throwing pictures, empty pictures at each other. And we were up where the stage was and we're up there and we're all like everything starts getting out of control and i'm leaving this guy's got me by the lapels he's gonna kick the shit out of me and i'm like super high on mushrooms and we got out of there and it's in their book in their biography there's a book written by chris walter where that that night is is explained um almost minute by minute and the the funny observation, we all had knee injuries and scrapes on our legs from wiping out. Because it was a crazy night. But that was my Sneaky D's experience.

But played there many, many times. It's such a fantastic, amazing place. Is it still open? I don't know. I don't know. I just saw Rusty there. I think I mentioned it earlier in the show. It's moved.

Oh, okay. Where's Queen? I can't remember where. just saw rusty there like i think i mentioned it early upstairs uh it's moved oh okay where's queen i can't remember where but but uh quick art art bergman shout out because art bergman also an fotm and art and again the guys have told the story many times they were art was kicked off a tour bus and then lois the lower driving by and they saw art uh hitchhiking and they wrote uh life imitates art yep also in the dock is art Bergman for a minute, for a hot minute, talking about art. And also, I mentioned earlier, I can never get that name right, the book by Michael Barclay, which was Jason Schneider helped write it. And Jason Schneider just wrote a great biography on Art Bergman, which I highly recommend.

There's a documentary being financed, trying to be financed right now about art. Okay. Can we talk about that quick? So you've got the Lowe documentary, which I'm excited to see. Yep. Meanwhile, Michael Williams is coming over

to hype a Much Music documentary. Oh, sweet. That's coming out. And of course, much documented on this program, and Stokely's been probably following this progress but from alan cross and robbie j etc is that there's a cfny documentary like being edited as we speak like this thing's been yeah he told me about that two and a half years ago he's also in in the lowest low documentaries alan cross so uh yeah we talked yeah so he had a health

scare yesterday and he i can share it because it was on he published published this on the web so this is not me telling you stories that's cool but he had like a it was that dog died when he was in like singapore and he came home to mourn the loss of his beloved pet and meanwhile he's got this great pain this is alan cross i'm talking about and he's got some great pains he thinks it's a sporting injury but it turns out he was very close to like full and complete uh fully completely uh uh kidney failure. Like, you know, he's fine now, Alan Cross. But it was like, you know, if he hadn't come back home because his dog passed away, he might have missed that window to make this okay.

Yeah, he's definitely a huge asset to this, the community to the community. We call the music scene in Toronto, Alan cross, and, uh, just a wealth of knowledge about the stuff he knows and the things he does and, and his commitment to that type of thing. He's a,

and he's a sweetheart too. He's a good dude. He's a good dude. And, uh, yeah. So Art Bergman, uh,

makes a cameo in beer, graffiti wall. He does. He says the words. And that was, there was actually Dave again, who also was in our Bergman's band, who was in Matt Good's band for a while, who is now in 5440,

who is also in the documentary. You made a documentary? Yeah, did I mention that? I'll mention it five more times. Basically, he came in and read the thing and what they were doing, they went and played a live show and Art came out to do it. He was reading it off the album cover and

realized he couldn't read the words and just made up his own thing. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, it sounds like a Bergman move there. Just because this is

the last jam we're going to play from this album, I just want to have a few words, talk a little bit about Hallucigenia. It's funny you tell the shroom stories, right?

Because that's like a Hallucigenia. Yeah, absolutely. Hallucigenia. Nice tie-in. Thank you. You're a professional. 11, what is this now?

Episode 128080 you got this i just figured it out and you know i don't know do you edit your show no no okay just checking because some people edit their podcasts and i have clients who there's heavily edited podcasts so i'm you know i'll do the editing but on my show it's like no that's not how we roll we get there eventually is that's my model of my mission statement you know if you go ahead uh who did i tell you i did that i was telling you earlier vernon reed i zoomed with him and he had a package delivery and i'm like i still didn't edit the damn thing i just shouted out some sponsors while he went to the door okay i had one that was 13 minutes long because the band's like hey we got a load in happening i'm like really so it was a 13 minute long episode hey

that's all right they can't all be 90 minutes. You're welcome. Okay. So this album, I feel like because Shakespeare, My Butt was so big and so popular that there was sort of a, like, I won't know. I mean, the guys are listening, but there was a bit of a letdown like amongst some of us with hallucinogenia that it didn't quite sound like Shakespeare, My Butt. Like it just wasn't as like crowd pleasing. There was a lot of pushback for people from people for them to re-record shakespeare right and they said we're not doing that because we've been playing this record for two and a half years in fact some of the songs are almost four

years old we're gonna make a new record and they they basically they pushed theirself through this is this is why i love this band so much is because they told everybody, no, we're not doing that. We're going to do this and we're going to stick to our guns and we're going to give you a record. They had a little issue with their producer, Don Smith.

Yeah, they were very, they came clean about it. He also did the Tragically Hip album, right? He did. He did a few. Yes. And he's also Cracker, Kerosene Hat and he worked on a Tom Waits record. You he worked on a tom so he's they have they tell the story pretty pretty yeah they hated his mix they hated him

and they hated the mix and they hated him as you know the whole idea of the thing and they were in vancouver yeah and there was a lot of stuff going on personally and privately and sort of professionally with their band um it just didn't gel. And they know, and Ron doesn't even want to hear the record anymore. But they do play a number of songs regularly. He gives credit to the live album that they just released, Towers and Palaces,

saying that version of which song? Black Monday. Yeah, which is, by the way, my favorite song on the album. Yeah. Oh, no, City Full of Cowards. City Full of Cowards is like, this is a much stronger version of this than the actual release of the album.

Right. So that says a lot. But yeah, Hallucigenia didn't get picked up well. They had a lot of politics in their band that they were fighting against a major record label at the time. They were just really kind of self-destructing and using the power of Shakespeare in my butt to sort of push their way through stuff. But you mentioned that mentioned that it was like you know we're going to do it our way because they have this punk like ethos like it's very commendable but it is also commercially

disastrous. Absolutely yeah. And one of the things I'll just say because I talk about this many times but I in addition to listening to CFNY I watched a lot of Much Music okay. You know you go to Much Music and you a lot of these bands like uh contemporaries if you will like b i don't know name it but moist whatever whatever big canadian alt-rock bands were going on in the 90s you'd see them all the time on much music but you didn't see lois little low in much music no they didn't do videos for hallucinogenia they did and then they did one video but it was like a college like um for uh one on shakespeare my butt but it was like a college like whatever was uh one on shakespeare my butt but it was like a college

like whatever was a project or something yeah i think that was through ryerson i think it was actually through ryerson yeah and that's uh they just didn't want to do that they thought no it's our live show this is the way it is and and you know it really it did sort of affect them as a band polit like as you know but i say, they probably wouldn't be around today had they not sort of held that type of, that line of like, this is our, this is our comfort level. We're not going to compromise. There is a story where-

They play the long game. Yeah, they, absolutely. They ran the marathon. And, you know, there's a story where they talk about like, they were doing a showcase and they all wrote, brought shirts out that says, Corporate sucks cock. Yes, right. I mean, like- Like they just shoot themselves in the foot.

That's a famous one, yeah. And Steve Cain speaks about it, because he's in the doc and he speaks about it. He goes, yeah, I was there. It was funny. You know what I mean? Like, where was he? Had Brooks left by then?

Brooks, I think he was still with them at that point. John Brooks, yeah. He was still... I think he worked for them up until like 90... Yeah, up just before they broke up, I think. Okay. Yeah, he was always wonderful to they broke up, I think. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

He was always wonderful to work with. He's a good dude. I worked with him down at the amphitheater. He was the crew chief down there when I was down there 20 years ago, 20 something years ago. Yeah. I used to see him. I used to direct some of the video screens there for some of the shows

way back in the day. And you know what, Mike? John Brooks, he's in the doc. Did you know that? I'm going to watch your doc. I would hope. I'm going to give it a thorough review on Toronto Mic'd when I see it. I can't wait to see it.

Stokely teased earlier that he was going to kick out another song from Agitpop. And what were we listening for here just before I came in? You're listening for the organ. The organ. Okay. In the mix. Alright, here we go. There it is. There it is. Well, it's your life So find your own solutions I would bump it up

Because I'm a sucker for Strength or strife Oh, what's it gonna take The queen of the game So crown this world a new one I thought you said Kevin Kane with the Northern Pikes. He's in the Northern Pikes. Really? Yeah. He actually used to live in the apartment below Brent Belkey from SNFU. So when I'd go stay

in Brent Belkey's apartment, Kevin Kane was in the basement. It's such a small... It's a very small world. I should just record you guys chatting because I do love how connected it all is.

It's kind of the joy of doing this is connecting the dots. It's two degrees of separation in canada i have told the story before but i was when the grapes of wrath played their last show in toronto before they broke up no one knew because they were going back to vancouver to play the commodore ballroom and cf and y was presenting that and i had like winners that were doing a meet and greet after the show at the temple. And so they did their last song and they walked off stage to do an encore. And I went, I said to the security guy, like, hey, I'm going to go downstairs and make sure we're all set up. And he opened the door and I walked into the back of the temple.

Remember, if you're looking at the stage, the stage left or the door on the left is what took you right down to the green room. And so I went there. Looking at the stage, the stage left or the door on the left is what took you right down to the green room. And so I went there. And as I opened up the door, the four of them are on the stage level screaming at each other. And I mean screaming. And if you've ever been in the wrong place at the wrong time, that was it. And I slowly grabbed. You're like Homer Simpson going back into the bush. And I grabbed and I walk out.

And I'm like, don't let anybody down these stairs until like the show is technically over. That's rock and roll, man. Hey, quickly, just to put a bow on this. So we talked Sneaky D's. Obviously it was Bathurst and Bloor because it's Sneaky D's as opposed to Honest Ed's. Get it? Very clever. But their current location where I saw Rusty recently was it's 431 College.

So they still have the spirit still there. Like, they still have the... That's West, right? Yeah. College West? Is that how that works? Yeah, the... I guess that's College. I don't think they have the word West in the title, but... Everything's Westy Young, though, isn't it? Yeah.

That was definitely Westy Young. 100%. Anyway, this song, it wasn't, you know, not many singles are released off an album that's track 12. Yeah. It's a great chorus. The lyrics on it, I just love how Ron just delivers his message. But for me, like I said, I'm a sucker for, I would have probably, if I was mixing it,

I probably would have changed it, brought the guitars down and in certain areas brought that organ up into the mix. This whole record is a direct message to the people, our brothers and sisters to the south of us and the political situation that was happening at the time. Ron actually talks a little bit about like, hey, you know, my next vote's with a brick. Love love that line a lot of people like in the band were like don't say that you can't say that that's mean and horrible and might incite some danger

and ron's like how important do you think we are in all of this you know that's ron typical answer but yeah definitely very i don't want to talk about the orange faced monster that was down there but but i think a lot of that is speaking against, and Botrell, David Botrell, who produced it, one of the greatest, I mean, producers, and he kind of gets out of the way and lets the band do the thing, but he also, he directs that band, he directed that band in a fashion that was like, it's just such a great record.

Where did they record that? I know I've read the liner notes. Union, I think it was. Was it Union Sound? Yeah, Union Sound. Yeah, yeah. And then I think they, was it Union? All the studios are on the East End, but I think, yeah. Was it on Logan?

I'm not sure exactly where it was. I was like invited to a listening party. I think I thought it was Logan, like near Lakeshore and like Logan. Yeah, yeah. And was that the one with all the record executives show up? I don't know, but they gave me like pizza and beer. Yeah, it was the pizza and beer. Were you at that?

I was at that, yeah. They talk about that in the movie. Okay, so I was there for the. Steve Cain was there and like these 12 record executives and they're kind of. Boundless. Yeah. Tim Thompson.

Coming up with all these like schemes and David was like putting his hand up going, well, what's that going to do? How's that going to work? You know, a very, very cool moment where, you you know the band gets to sort of ask and question because a lot of bands and work with labels they come up with these great ideas but none of it actually comes to fruition you know and even in that band like even that record it didn't really come to fruition in a way they had it all great they had these videos that were working with a guy and had these amazing tim thompson yeah who used to do those uh before hockey night in canada uh yeah you would see these montages to

create music and that was his work and it was such it was such a like this band how it seems to get the timing a little off and a little askew it seemed like everything was like lining up perfectly but the it wasn't you know same thing wasn't in the stars you know what i mean like but really honestly if they became bon jovi big is that going to be you know what i mean is that important to us i don't know if they'd like it no well they didn't they were getting that way with you know hallucinogenia and with into going in from out of shakespeare that's a definitely we'll get back to hallucinogenia but that was sort of a definitely revolt to the people that were at their shows backwards baseball cat wearing jocks drinking beer and the mosh pit well that's the tragically

hip crowd right yeah yeah and it's not the fans i know it's not the band that's a slow yeah it pokes me yeah that there's definitely like a thing with them where they but then they mentioned this thing in this this hour-long thing i did about well had we not had these people we we need to know there's our our limit in our guideline of where we want to put ourselves as artists and musicians you know they're in a good i think in a sweet spot where they can you know they sell out uh lee's palace or horseshoe tavern or uh maybe even danforth music hall but like that's that's sort of your october 6th okay they're gonna're going to play there October 6th. It is. All right, let's get back to Shakespeare, My Butt.

I feel like we've been away from Shakespeare, My Butt for too long here. This is a jam that Lawrence and Ron played in this very basement. They played this song, and there's an episode of Toronto Mic where you can hear it, but let three, four. You couldn't believe when they told you That you'd never been around here before Thought she hung out in the Kelowna Hotel

Or with the Cubans in the Puerto Del Sol And when she smiled all you thought about Was running up a suicide hill And nothing short of a bullet could have broken your will And off with a Hand of Magdalena. It's just a kick-ass track. I love Dave's drums. I like how they were mixed.

The double kick, or I guess not the double kick, but the double beat on the downbeat. I don't know. I just, again, songs take you back to times. I remember hearing this song and just, you know, being in residence, just listening to other people blaring it in my room. Of course, this line.

Yep. You know. Saucy. Very saucy for back then. It just, oh, come on, Rosie and Gray has a kind of like this reference.

Oh, yeah, yeah, it's true. Yeah. Yeah. This is the precursor to It's a dirty song, Andy. It's a dirty song. Well, I was 19. Come on. Right, there you go. It's a whole new to... It's a dirty song, Andy. It's a dirty song. I was 19. Come on.

There you go. It's a whole new era. It was, you know, just the way the song is structured, the lyrics, I mean, that, you know, I don't... Songs just hit you

and they stick with you. Yep. This is one of them. And like I said, any of the 17 tracks in the album, you could make number one as far as I'm concerned. But just the way

that the mix is, I don't know. It's just... Yeah. There's a fun fact about the recording of this album is that the drums

were recorded in one day. All of them. But not only just... Some of them were recorded twice because there was a problem in the recording session where one of the mics

stopped working. So six songs they had to re-record so they ended up recording 22 songs in one day for this one this record everything else went to uh andy koyama's studio where he worked called film house and he finished it there in the foley booth basically the drumming on this was done in this warehouse in the back where they stored like all the triumphs like big set pieces oh wow it's now called studio four like because they've made they built a studio in that place okay but i was there a week before this album was recorded i was there with another band called yet another posse and we recorded like a heavy metal drum kit in that room and it's you hear those that's a warehouse those room tones are from this warehouse

and there's not just two room mics but there's three and because I've been there I know where the third one is because it's like you look at the track sheet it's like I can't make sense of this right but I know because I was there like a week before how the guy is same engineer that recorded this record so yeah big warehouse so a kick far and then like a really far. They have for their room mics. There's one behind the kit and then one at like 20 feet on each side of the drum kit catching the room. And then their overheads were actually quite far away as well. But the drum, the Tom sounds because he was playing with a five.

We're getting really super nerdy now. The drum kit was a five piece at the time. So there's like there's there's more drums than he has now. But the same drum kit he still plays on today really exact same drum kit just short one one drum yeah so he takes one tom off he just goes just a four piece four piece yeah yeah i just it just sounds it sounds live it doesn't sound yeah tight because i mean that was the idea they weren't going to try to make they they they try to make that record like it's a live show. So it starts and it finishes at the end

like you'd go see a live show. Yeah, because, I mean, drum sounds was pretty bad in the mid-80s to the late 80s. You know, that really tight, tight, tight electronic sound. It just... Everything was just a closed fist. It was like... And some of them

were electronic sounding yeah it just yeah he's probably listening to like a lot of pixies at the time which was like steve albini and kind of that kind of sound where big black all these other bands that sort of were around that were just these huge big room tones i'm a big fan of that like i actually did a mix of um a letter from belbao belbao with a kick a snare and two rooms and i called it the bottom mixed and it's just this fantastic because it's like super nice big rooms yeah that that and i should say like my type of music that i really enjoy as friends who are in bands and who've become friends with bands is i want to hear like a polished piece of music anybody can put together put it through pro tools and make it

sound good but i love hearing bands do their music live to what they actually really want because a lot of times when you're writing and recording the finished piece sometimes might not be exactly what you want because the producer the record label they'll be like no we need to make a little more polished i want to hear that dirty noise i want an album to sound like yeah we got into the studio and recorded and then just sent it off yep yeah and you know the low kind of started that idea with the bare naked ladies and sort of said this is what it is this is our music you know and you know listen to some beatles albums if the record wasn't so and sort of said, this is what it is. This is our music. You know, listen to some Beatles albums.

If the record wasn't so well written, you'd think this sounds like a hunk of crap because a lot of the times, and they're recording in Abbey Road, you know, so you think it's all about the song, the structure and the intention of where you're going to try to deliver this. And it all transfers right across

wherever you're listening to it into your ears and you go, yeah, I can associate myself with this. Yep all right let's get to andrew's penultimate lowest of the low jam spoiler alert it's also from shakespeare my butt You felt someone else upon your lips You've blown another relationship You say that God had a hand in this I say you should have stayed away from that other girl now i look at you and you look at me our life's a fix for the eternal fatalist you gotta lost your job again cannot borrow 10 till tuesday friend you say a lack of dividend We'll be right back. Ah, life's a mix with the eternal fatalist.

You say it's all lined up like shot glasses on the bar of life. Love it, Andrew. Eternal fatalist. For all the other songs on the album, when I used to DJ, when I DJed at Ryerson and DJed stuff, this was probably the only track I really played because it got people up dancing. It was fast-paced. It was energy.

It was a bit moshy. And it did also, because it had a cold out, it also really worked well to mixing to other songs that you could go into, whether you wanted to finish this one, use it as like a showcase piece that was like a crescendo, and then you can bring it down afterwards. Did you have a DJ name?

Yeah, DJ Andy O. Yeah, that's so cool. I've never asked you that before. I feel like that's breaking news. That's because my brother gave it to me. Andy O. Yandy O. Yandy O.

Yeah, because I don't like Andy. Say it really slow. Yandy O. Yandy. DJ Yandy O. Yandy O. Yandy O, not Andy Yo. A lot of Public Enemy played in your...

Yeah, well, from about 80, I did everything from about 85 right through till about 94, 95. So your type of Andrew doesn't want to be called Andy. I don't. Yeah, you know what? I totally agree with you. My brother, his name is Andrew. And friends call him Andy. I'm like, it's not good.

People call me Cy. I'm like, can't you do two syllables? You know what I mean? Simon. Don't call me Cy. Don't call me Cy, Mike. Are you a Michael? You're the second.

I'm a Michael, yeah. Yeah, see, are you okay? Obviously, you're okay with Mike. Yeah, I'm okay with Mike. But you're the second Simon in the last few weeks. Simon Law from Soul to Soul came over. Oh, sweet. Two Simons.

There we go. Maybe we should get together and make our... Oh, wait, that was already done. Wasn't there a show called Simon and Simon? Yeah, it was a great, great track. Right. But yeah, sorry, sorry. No, no, yeah.

No, I mean, it was... So this song really was kind of one that could really get people up. Oh, it's great. It's a great fucking song from a great album. Yeah. Yeah. And this is The Closer, right? Was this The Closer? Usually it was The Closer before.

They did an encore afterwards. This is on my wedding album. I'm mixed. Isn't Rosie and Gray The Closer? The last song you hear it a lot. Because I'd say seven of the last eight times. That's their encore Closer, right? That's their encore.

The final song is Rosie and Gray. They would probably get dragged from everybody's car if Heddy didn't play that. You know what I mean? Some places they play i mean in some places i do know like if the guys you know i think lawrence is in charge of the set list because uh it is he is and he's actually it's funny because they don't do the same set list every night god no you know and it's challenging you know what i mean for them to pull together and it's fun because it's fun to watch them try to pull a show out of like something that is we did three shows in a row and it's like every song was just a little bit whoa whoa whoa

here we go you know what i mean they got a pretty good catalog now especially because these these recent albums be it uh like we talked about a couple of them agit pop these recent albums are really strong like these are not just like throwaway albums so they can tour on it or whatever get some free press or whatever like there's great songs that sound fantastic alongside the Shakespeare, my butt and the Lusiginia stuff. This band says every record they make is the best record they've ever made. And they believe it. And I believe them too,

because what they do is they, they take an idea, they just build on it and they make their songs and their records. And Steve Kane said it kind of brilliantly saying every record is a little bit different it's not like hey we're just gonna we're gonna call this in because people like shakespeare yeah yeah you know i mean we're not gonna write a whole record that sounds like that you know i would think the band would die if he did that yeah i think you would just talking to other guys you'd be like uh yeah no yeah when you have a close relationship to your fans in your community

and you start pandering to them they're gonna go away they're gonna be all over 5440 before you know it they'll just be like you know what we're fine we're gonna go to 5440 also good neo-loss born at least okay so we have one jam to go but i want to like clarify something because i think it can get confused so there's two things we've talked about that simon head has helped uh curate and deliver to the universe so we talked about the documentary okay so the documentary on lowest of the low which i have not seen and i'm looking forward to seeing it and you have that rivoli show but if you want tickets like you literally have to get them right now because it's going to sell out it's at like 80 yeah it's been on sale for five days and we're at 80 sold okay so like literally like if you're on the live stream go right now and i'll

drop it right away as you know i don't edit so it's this will be in the wild you know shortly after we take our photo outside subversives is the name of the doc on lowest of the low simon head directed and uh that's again rivoli and then at some point we can stream it somewhere but the other thing that we've talked about, and it's fun that we're going to close with a song from Shakespeare, my butt, one of Andrew Stoke is his favorite song, I guess,

because it's number one, but Shakespeare, my butt, you did another, this is a standalone separate project where members of the band, primarily, I guess, Stephen Stanley and Ron Hawkins talk about every track in great detail.

They talk about every track on Shakespeare, My Butt. Yeah, it's called Song for Song. It's basically a classic albums. Love that. Yeah, so I took that model and made it. And one thing I got from the band was, hey, this doesn't really speak to the fans. And because my idea with the documentary was talk about the story of the band and the,

and the sort of how the, that band doesn't need to be that band. And their music isn't to me is like, is it's about the story of the band. And if you like the band, you're going to like their music. That's always been my philosophy. This is all this song for song is all about for the fans.

You know, the fans can, for the Stokely's, the Stokely's and the Toronto, and the Mike Shannon's. Hey, Mike. Yes.

Who I met at a Brown Hawkins did a thing Mikes. And the Mike Shennons. Hey, Mike Shennons. Yes, who I met at, Ron Hawkins did a thing at the Elmo when I saw him. For those people who love the band so much and can really get nerdy on it. And they talk about the idea of where this record came from. And it's one of the first times you'd see Ron and Stephen in an interview together for many, many years. And it was going to happen in the documentary.

It just didn't happen timing-wise. But guys on stage off stage as they're they're they're it's magic watching those two people speak with each other because they have this shorthand that we all get you know i usually have inside jokes these guys have jokes that we all we're all going to get so there's like this type of like communication between them and i shot it at a place called sauce on Danforth. So it's just. Oh, shout out to Blair Pack. Yeah.

Players are all the time. This is beautiful. A little like old. Looks like almost like a like a Bordeaux kind of like, you know, kind of place. But it's. Yeah. So we have this amazing little setup and just did it. And it's just these guys talking about their love for each other and their music that they played.

Right. And a lot of water has gone under the bridge with these guys. And it's such a fun romp for them to talk about what it was and sort of listen. I mean, yeah. In Andy Koyama, I was in LA mixing the actual documentary proper.

So he was mixing it. So I ended up going to his studio and talked to him for a couple hours. And then they're in the studio, Revolution Recording Studios, listening to the tracks, like listening back and getting into ideas. It happens in the documentary proper because a little bit of it is in from there

where Ron actually starts crying in it. So it's kind of like this moment of like, you know, like he puts his hands over his eyes, like he's, you know, that happens in the real documentary. But in this thing, they're just listening to tracks and it was just such a great day.

And now we have everything digitized. So I have all the multi-tracks. I could get copies. Give me something to practice on Pro Tools. It's just such a, it's just to me, it's like, and Ron actually is funny because he's, Ron says what he feels. And Ron's like, you know, I like this so much.

You should call the real documentary. You should call that extra footage and call this the documentary. So it comes highly recommended by the band. Okay, so people can get that today. Absolutely. The link would be in the description, but I can say it's gumroad,

oh, the lowdoc.gumroad slash L slash SMB. Okay, and yes, you're right. It is rare to get like a sit down with like ron hawkins and steven stanley these days but i just now need to like just let everybody know that there's a very recent episode of toronto mic with ron hawkins sitting right there and steven stanley right there and they talked for and we had a third member join us for that 90 minute chat and that was chris brown oh that was the browns hot yeah yeah so three gentlemen there and it was really cool actually to see how well they get along steven stanley and roggins because the

legend and you know what you hear and then you see them together and they are just two good guys who love each other and get along swimmingly yeah and as you age and get older you start realizing like you know maybe what we thought was bad in the day isn't as bad as it would be today because we're older and wiser, one would think. You know what I mean? It's funny I mentioned Blair Packham real quick because I was at Blair's house actually. What day was that?

I think it was Saturday night. I was at Blair's house in East York. But Blair Packham, of course, of the Jitters. But I met him many times because he's been over a few times. But when Stephen Stanley, he played Pete Fowler's backyard for this event during COVID when we couldn't see live shows. And it was really amazing.

But also on that bill, that's when I met Blair Packham because Blair Packham was, I guess, the closer. And Stephen Stanley kind of opened for him in Pete Fowler's backyard, which is a small world. Stephen was doing a weekly stream as well, as well as Ron.

Ron was doing his Tommy Douglas Tuesdays. Yeah. I have a t-shirt somewhere. I should have wore it. All right. One jam to go. Andrew, you ready for your final jam? Yes.

And I don't think people would really get this one. But anyway. But if they've heard you kick out the jams on Toronto Mike, they actually know what's coming. Like the spoiler alert. If you're really up to date on your really stokely jam campaign. I'm sure they were. Here we go.

Track two. It's like watching murder through your fingers at the theater. It's like finding out Klaus Barbie was your neighbor Only weirder And when I saw you on the tube With a six-foot cop on either side of you That's when I knew That's when I knew

That's when I knew All the pain that was shacked up inside of you Well, so long, Bernie, you're the friend I never knew And never will I never will She didn't even know your name But you put a six-inch blade inside her all the same She couldn't possibly know why

When you became Dr. Jekyll, you knew you had to hide Yeah, when you became Dr. Jekyll, you knew you had to hide Well, now I know, well, now I know All the pain that was in your mind Is still inside your soul Well, so long, Bernie You're the friend I'll never know I'll never know I'll never know No, no, no, no, no, no

You're the beast inside us all I don't want to fade out this part, but I do want to hear Andrew talk about basically your favorite song from your favorite album. Yes. So Long, Bernie. You're a violin man, Andrew. This is a violin song.

It is, but it's up-tempo. It's a second track. But for me, it's a personal issue, and that's only since when I went to Raihai, I played drums as a kid, but I really wanted to learn to play guitar. And I realized I suck at picking, and I can't. But I was really good at chords, and I figured out the chord structure for this song. And this is what kind of helped me figure it out.

And, I mean, what it is to say about the song, I mean, I love this track. I've only actually ever seen them perform this once live. Really? Yeah. I don't think they played it for a number of years.

They did it last year at the, was it the Kitchener Blues Fest, the, whatever that thing was. It was in a tent. It was stinking hot. That's probably, I don't remember it that much. It was super hot.

There's actually, the story about this guy, Bernie. Yeah. They actually get into it in the song for song mini doc. They talk a little bit kind of where this came from and sort of how it all, how, and it's got member, there's a friend of the member of one of the members of dig circus. It's based on this one person and it's not necessarily a murder, but I mean, I don't want to spoil it too much, but they talk about sort of how he came up with that premise of a song and a story. Basically, it's like,

these are the people among us. You know, here we are. Yeah. That's sort of the idea. That's kind of what I... It's like a Henry Neeson, you know, Henry's just a guy in a park. It's just, it's a great track.

It's got a wicked drum part by Dave and in this version you in this the anniversary you can hear John's bass a lot more on the original yeah you can't like if you ever found if you still have your old cassette copy you you don't even know that there's a bass in the actual album there's um yeah they're when they're listening to these takes and you can take apart the drum kits and you can hear how how it was done it's so simple especially the guitar recording like the recording of the guitars there's empty tracks in this 24 track recording and like why didn't we just fill it up for stuff and it's like well that's we didn't need it there's even you know and it's just not every note is important um everything about this

record was was thought about and it took a long time to do the overdubbing which kind of gives it that sense of um it's realized but all these songs were then there was no editing there was no um producing really yeah what was all it was you said it was a two-inch master so just capturing what it is and say that's good take let's move on and oh by the way it's recorded again because something's fucked up with the drum kit good times in a recording studio that's why i like live if i screw it up only the people listening that's right and then they tweet about it and i get that i get that a lot oh i guess to reddit and then forevermore yes when you google it you can learn about andrew's rare mistakes okay oh you two guys, tech guys,

I know you have a lot of electronics at home. I want to let you know that if you want to dispose of some old tech, some old electronics, some old devices, you don't throw that

in the garbage. You guys know this because there's dangerous chemicals in there that will be bad for the landfills and bad for Mother Earth. But you can go to

recyclemyelectronics.ca to find a safe place near you to drop off this old tech and they will properly recycle it and dispose of it so thank you recycle my electronics.ca before you leave you're gonna simon don't forget i got a lasagna for you it's in my freezer right now and we got some great lakes beer for you thanks again to uh getting hip to the hip an evening for the downy wenjack fund i'll have more info on that soon,

but go to gettinghiptothehip.com right now to learn more, and then when you buy your ticket, or two, or three, or four, use the promo code FOTM10. This, Simon, was amazing. You've got a cool history with music, and now you're a director.

This is your first... First thing. First thing you directed. Okay, so there's still hope for me. One day I'll direct something. First thing. I'll do what I thing i'll do what i'll do the rusty can i do the rusty dog absolutely you don't have dibs on that do you i know no you can have it you watch tonight he's gonna go home and go i'm gonna beat mike to that rusty dog but i also had scott mccullough from rusty on my dog on my uh sorry on my i had the whole band down here oh okay come on i wouldn't

that one easy and you know what somebody, someone who knows him referred to him as Scotty Mac, and it confused me for a moment because you've been calling Scott MacArthur Scotty Mac, and of course, they're both Scotty Macs.

Yeah, yeah, it's Scotty Mac, yeah. Yeah, there's multiple Scotty Macs that are FO2s. Look, you've got a great podcast, and you're doing a great

thing, but you will not defeat me in the showdown. No, you've got a much better setup down here. Chuck D's been on Toronto Mike. Oh, shit, yeah, absolutely. You've had a lot of awesome people on your show. I the showdown. You've got a much better setup down here. Chuck D's been on Toronto Mike. Oh, shit.

Yeah, absolutely. You've had a lot of awesome people on your show. I'm goofing. Love this. I wanted to say, I lied earlier. I said we had one more Shakespeare My Butt song to go, but actually, there's one more here. We closed it up for Shakespeare My Butt.

I wasn't about to select this track. You couldn't play it twice. I would do that for you if it was one of your jams. There you go. You're too smart a producer mind to do that. Sure, let's go with that. Do you have any sound effects of beer cans opening? What, do you want one?

No. It's almost, oh, now you're afternoon. You can drink away here. I could drink in a year and a half ago. Did you? Yeah, I did. So I shouldn't give you this crap beer? My wife, no, it's not like I needed to.

I just, I wanted to, but I can give these to my family. My son's 20. He can drink now. Yeah, you know, my daughter's 18. She was at a bar drinking Great Lakes on Saturday night when I called her. And I'm like, wait a minute. And she doesn't even look old. Like, she looks to me.

Like, to me, I look at her and I see a 14-year-old. Mine's 19. He's up north. He's gone for the summer. Is he planting trees? No, he works at her and I see a 14-year-old. Mine's 19. He's up north. He's gone for the summer. Is he planting trees? No, he works at a summer camp. He teaches ropes and rock climbing. He's gone for the summer.

I love it. That's the way to go. But I will because my daughter spent the winter in Montreal where you can drink at 18. So she's been drinking all year legally. And then she's here and she's not yet 19. And she's like, she finds a place. Is she at McGill? Yeah, she's here and she's not yet 19 and she's like uh she finds she mcgill yeah

she's at mcgill uh she must have um i imagine she's been to the peel pub and classic uh i guess so i don't know i try not to ask too many questions but she's having a good good life uh which is all that matters but simon thanks for making the long drive to make your toronto mic debut thank you so much for having me mike i appreciate it very much And Andrew, good to get you back on the program. Any excuse to get some Stokely on Toronto Mike? You were great. It's been a while. It's nice to be back here.

That's the Stain documentary I'm going to direct. It's been a while. I hope that's just as popular as my Rusty documentary. It could very well be. And that brings us to the end of our 1,289th show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike. Simon, what's the best way to follow the happenings in your universe?

I am on Twitter, but very briefly, at SimonHead666. That's the devil's number. That is the devil's number. Instagram, at SimonHead666, but it's mostly pictures of my bicycle. Like a bicycle bicycle? Yeah, that's the code for my penis. That's a bicycle. Do you bike a lot?

I do, I do. So do I. Once or twice a week. Oh, jeez. This is where I check out now. You did the tech talk earlier. I do about 100K a week, like two rides, 50K, but I do trails. Good for you, man.

I'm actually, so I have a visit tomorrow to North York, and then I realize in this one week I will have visited all six boroughs because I was at Cam Gordon's wedding in Scarborough, and then I went to Blair Packham's party in East York. I'm in Etobicoke. I'm close to York and Toronto. North York is a tough one for me, but I'm going there tomorrow. Nice. I'm doing this, what's it North York is a tough one for me, but I'm going there tomorrow. Nice.

I'm doing this, what's it called, the Simcoe County Loop. It's not very far. It's like a two-day ride. Nice. Yeah. Okay, good for you. Good for you. Andrew, what's the best way to follow you?

Is it still Twitter? Yeah, it's still Twitter, Stokely Audio. Yeah, that's the same as Instagram. But I mostly just have barbecue pictures on there. Yeah, you're a big meat lover. Yeah. I just got a smoker the other, like, for Father's Day. Oh, nice.

And I can't, I almost exploded. Did you get that green egg thing or no? No, it's called, it's a Chef King or something. Chef Camp King or something. It's not a Traeger. Camp Chef. See, if we talk long enough, we'll get to the cunnilingus reference. That's right.

We're just coming up. It's coming up. Okay. Great Lakes Bre See, if we talk long enough, we'll get to the cunnilingus reference. That's right. It's coming up. Okay. Great Lakes Brewery. They're at Great Lakes Beer. They're going to host TMLX 13 on August 31st. You should be there 6 to 9 p.m. Be there. Okay.

Palma Pasta is going to feed us that night. They're at Palma Pasta. Getting Hip to the Hip is at Getting Hip Pod, and they will be entertaining us the next day. Get your tickets here it comes recycle my electronics are at epra underscore canada the moment lab are at the moment lab and ridley funeral home are at ridley fh see you all later this week when donovan bennett from sportsnet drops by to kick out the jams.

We'll see if he kicks out any songs from Shakespeare My Butt. We'll find out later. See you all then. 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 and everything is rosy and gray Thank you.