Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Steven Page: Toronto Mike'd #631

Episode Date: April 28, 2020

Mike chats with singer-songwriter Steven Page about the Barenaked Ladies origin story, his time with the band, going solo, touring with the Trans-Canada Highwaymen, reuniting with BNL at the Juno Awards, his new musical, his Zoom concerts and much, much more.

Welcome to episode 631 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times, and brewing amazing beer. Palma Pasta, enjoy the taste of fresh homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. Garbage Day Weekly reminders for garbage, recycling and yard waste pickup. Visit GarbageDay.com slash Toronto Mike to sign up now. StickerU.com

Create custom stickers, labels, tattoos, and decals for your home and your business and the Kite-ner group. They love helping buyers find their dream home. Text Toronto Mike to 59559. I'm Mike from Toronto Mike.com. And joining me is singer, songwriter, Stephen Page. Stephen Page, welcome to Toronto Miked.

Nice to finally be here. Now we need to thank the almighty Ralph Ben-Murgy because it's Ralph. You were recently on Ralph's fantastic podcast, Not That Kind of Rabbi, and we kind of met each other, although I wasn't, you know, I was muted during the episode, but I was kind of in the room, if you will.

So we got to thank Rob for, Ralph, Rob. We'll thank Rob later, but we got to thank Ralph for bringing us together. Yeah, thanks, Ralph. That was nice. It was nice to meet you then. I'm glad we could do this.

And also shout out to Humble and Fred because you were on their show yesterday, right? Indeed. I was great to see those guys again, too. It's funny because Ralph and Humble and Fred, they go way back with you.

You know, the early days of Bare Naked Ladies. Meanwhile, I'm just some guy you've never heard of. So this is, must be a great disappointment. I've heard of you, Mike. It's all right.

All good, I hope. All good, I hope. All good. All right, we're going to start it light here and warm you up. So I'm going to play a jam, and we're going to talk about this. Same time. Please join me. Hopefully you can hear that song in your headphones there. I sure can.

Name that tune, Stephen. That would be the theme from Canadian game show Bumper Stumpers. So I made a fun fact. My friend Mark Weisblatt from 1236 turned me on to all this. And can you tell us maybe a little bit about your experience with the Canadian game show Bumper Stumpers? Yeah, when I was a teenager, it would be on TV and,'d be home from school or on the weekend or whatever and you'd see a litany of Canadian game shows. And Canadian game shows are always super entertaining to watch, especially back in the 70s and 80s when their prizes were significantly worse than any American game show. And production values were worse and so on.

game show and production values were worse and so on but uh bumper stumpers was one where you know so you had to guess the uh what the vanity license plate on the screen meant right and what it was saying and so my friend jeff pounce it and i used to fantasize about being on the show just so we could dance to that theme song um and that was the only reason why we ever wanted to go on and we found out they were doing a uh a call for contestants we went out for it and got was the only reason why we ever wanted to go on and we found out they were doing a a call for contestants we went out for it and got on the show and lost horribly but we didn't even care because all we cared about was dancing where did they film it uh that was at uh the uh the global studios on barbara green wow okay that's that's i also that's the same place where i i went as a kid to watch them filming um what will they think of next science international with joseph campanella and t.u

leak and also uh what else i see there oh and when i went to see that i saw in one of the other studios they were shooting what was then called second city sctv amazing and is that the uh is that the cast we all know and love, or was that near the end when it was kind of shifting? No, it would have been before they moved to Edmonton. So, yeah, the classic cast. Right, John Candy and, yeah, amazing cast. That's amazing.

Now, you didn't win anything in Bumper Stumpers, but kind of in the similar era, I think I'm going to take you back. I recently read something that Ed Robertson was saying about the gifted program. So I really related to this because I was in the gifted program. Like I believe you were there with Ed, right?

Is that where you kind of meet up with Ed? And Ed said something about feeling like an, he had like an imposter syndrome of sorts that I experienced where I always felt like I didn't belong in the gifted program because these people I was with were so smart and they were all like you know writing computer program codes they were writing video games and kind of solving the world's problems and I just felt like there was a mistake like I didn't belong there and I just thought it was interesting to read what Ed had to say about that. Yeah, and I definitely felt the same way.

And, you know, I was not the, I was not a straight-A student. You know, looking back, I probably wouldn't have survived in the regular stream nearly as well because, well, honestly, I was a pretty lazy student and sloppy. And, you know, I was bad at math and all that kind of stuff but i guess you know they found there were other elements of me that learned differently and and could keep up and the best thing was for me looking back was just to find this um sense of belonging with this group of weird misfits. But inside of myself, I always had this imposter syndrome.

Like I'm not gifted enough to be here or I'm a fraud and they're going to find out one day or I've lost the thing that made me special a year ago. And those are things we carry with us for the rest of our lives. True that.

And it seemed like it was all based, my memory is it's all based on these standardized tests we took in grade three. Is that your, do you remember this? Right. So we did,

like we did these, like we, they do these tests and yeah, the gifted program for us started in grade four. Yeah. Where did you go to school?

Okay, so I'm going, I was in the Catholic system. So I was going to grades, Jane and Bloor. I was at St. Pius X. But we all went to near Honest Ed's. There was a school.

I can't remember what it was called now, St. Mark's or something. But it was near Bathurst and Bloor where we all would go once a week. So one day a week, we all collect, all the smart people from the board collected for the gifted program. But what happened was the rest of the class that you left behind one day a week started to sort of resent you like you were special. Totally. So what happened is it's like, I didn't feel I fit in with the gifted kids,

but I started to like be alienated by the regular, the normies, if you will. Yeah, that was totally the most, probably the most traumatic thing for me was, you know, I'd have to get on the short bus every day. I guess they had like a weekly, what they called enrichment program, That was totally the most – probably the most traumatic thing for me was I'd have to get on the short bus every day. I guess they had like a weekly what they called enrichment program, which they then converted to a full-time gifted program in Scarborough. And so I had gone – I'd taken a bunch of standardized tests and they'd sit me down with like a school board psychologist who'd do all kinds of other testing with me and stuff. psychologist who'd you know do all kinds of other testing with me and stuff back when i was in grade beginning of grade one and they um skipped me up to grade two which was weird enough like when

you're six and you're in a classroom full of seven-year-olds it's like being 10 in a classroom full of college students um it just feels like you're a mile apart from them well steven there's a reason they won't do that anymore. Like they just won't do it. They keep you age appropriate for that exact reason. Yeah. And, you know, hopefully they can reach kids at their own levels inside of that social construct. And then, you know, when we did this whole process again and the gifted program started in grade four, I went, you know, get on the short bus every day. And my friends in the

neighborhood just kind of i don't know i think i felt guilty and weird and shameful about it which i probably carried with me into any kind of social interaction but i felt like they they had ostracized me and i think some of that comes from their parents too you know parents saying all those people think their kids better than my kid or that. Whatever. No, you know what? That's hard for kids to carry with them. Well, I actually felt almost relief. So this is only a couple years ago I read this thing from Ed. It was around the time of the Juno Awards when you guys were being inducted in the Hall of Fame there.

And I actually felt some release because I didn't realize what I had been carrying all these years. And it was so, it was, I realized, like, it's like, yeah, that's how I felt. Like, I felt like, oh, I'm, like, it's like, yeah, that's how I felt. Like, I felt like, oh, I'm not alone.

It just felt good to know that. So you, me and Ed are in an exclusive club here of people who are traumatized by being labeled gifted back in primary school. There's a great song by the band Prefab Sprout

that was called Couldn't Bear to Be Special, which I always, always carry with me as one of my favorites for that reason. Because it's like, it's like, boo-hoo, you get some special treatment, boo-hoo. But it also, anything that you do that is outside of the general populace is going to make you feel

somehow isolated too at the same time. Right. I'm glad you said isolated because at the end of this program, I'm playing this very cool song for you called Isolation. Nice. I've heard good things about it. Heads up. Now, is it fair to say

we can thank the gifted program for the formation of Bare Naked Ladies? So essentially, that's where the kernel of Bare Naked Ladies starts in that gifted program? We just inhaled some coffee.

Oh, no. I've done that. I've done that. Oh, I'm dying. No, I'm fine. Yeah, we, I've done that. I've done that. Oh, I'm dying. No, I'm fine. Yeah, we went to the same school. We were in different grades. And like I was saying, when you're a grade apart, you're kind of in other worlds.

So we were definitely aware of each other. Okay. But it wasn't until we went to music camp. Back then, the Scarborough Board had this amazing music camp they would do at the end of the school year up in Muskoka area. And it was just incredible. You know, you could go and be in a band or choir or whatever else and kind of have this intensive music programming and then have a great kind of social experience as well. And, you know, I knew Ed from school and he was always the guy who walked around playing the guitar.

He was kind of the rock guy back then, but he'd have his acoustic guitar walking around singing songs. And one day he walked up to me as I was sitting around outside and he was singing one of the songs that I had written with my friend Jeff, the guy I was on Bumper Stumpers with. Right. We'd made a tape and had passed it around the school and he'd heard it and learned some of the songs and so he started singing it and I started singing harmony with him and right then and there I think we both kind of knew that it was something special. That was the beginning of the band. That's the origin of Bare Naked Ladies. Where does the name come from or when does the name show up on the scene? Well that summer, I mean Ed and I, we really didn't think we were starting a band.

Like he was in a cover band. I had this group going with Jeff. I was in university. I think Ed was just finishing high school and I wasn't thinking about being in a band. I didn't, honestly didn't think I was good enough at anything to be in a band. I wanted to be a writer, but I was such a mediocre instrumentalist. I didn't know how to play covers or anything else, which is what you did back then. So we sang and we enjoyed it and we enjoyed hanging out.

We just started hanging out that summer. And I saw him at a party and I said to him like do you um do you like bob dylan and he said no and i said oh i've uh i've got tickets for the concert if you want to go and he goes no thanks and i said uh well i've already paid for them it's free and he goes yeah okay so we went basically just to walk around the x and eat terrible food and we laughed and went on rides and then went to the show we were like in the second last row at the cne grandstand and could barely hear anything and so we just were doing shtick just pretending that we were like old rock critics talking about you know all this you know

remember those bands, there was like three bands that played before the camera started rolling at Woodstock and they were really good, but no one knows about them because they, you know, just didn't get in the history books. Like, you know, that one, Bare Naked Ladies, it was two guys with hip waders who sang about tomato soup, whatever, and just kind of goofing around like that. And then a week or so later, Ed calls me and said, you know, I was supposed to do this fundraiser for Second Harvest at Nathan Phillips Square with my cover band, but we broke up. And, you know, do you want to do it with me? And I said, yeah, sure. And he goes, okay, good, because I already told him you would.

They called me and said, well, we're really counting on you for this gig you all ready and i just said yeah yeah we're ready to do this and they said okay what's the name of your band and he said i told them we're called bare naked ladies wow i said you told them what and he said and then after so we did this thing we were and we were going to rehearse you know there's all these bands playing covers you know metal band and new wave band and whatever else. And we kept meaning to get together to rehearse and then just never did. And then, so we show up at the gig, I've got my Casio keyboard and he's got his guitar and we're like huddled in the stairwell. And he's going, do you know, uh, miss you much by Jan Jackson? Yep. Do you know Psycho Killer? Yep. Okay, we'll do that. And we just kind of like did some bits.

And so we said to the organizers, it might be better if we don't compete in this. It was a battle of the bands. Right. Maybe we shouldn't compete. Maybe we can just, because it's just the two of us, we can go out and kind of entertain while other bands are setting up. And they said, yeah, that that's fine and then we ended up winning anyways wow um and then uh so one of the prizes was like i think we got like 200 bucks or something and we also got the chance to open for the razorbacks or the horseshoe love the razorbacks

yeah they're awesome and we were huge fans of thebacks. And so we went and that was our prize. And so, of course, we're like, well, we can't change our name now. Like if people saw us at either of these gigs and they liked us and we changed our name, how are they going to find us? So we got stuck with that name. I love that origin story. And if you've ever heard an episode of Toronto, Mike, then I won't even put you on the spot and ask if you have. But if you had, you'd know we're all kind of fascinated with the City TV Moses era, and Speaker's Corner in particular.

And famously, at least in my world, famously, you guys, the first time we see Bare Naked Ladies is on Speaker's Corner. Can you give us a little bit of insight into what made you decide to do it, ladies is on Speaker's Corner. Can you give us a little bit of insight into like, like what, what, what made you decide to do it? And that whole performance of Yoko Ono on Speaker's Corner in the early days?

Well, I mean, you know, we certainly watched the compilation show every weekend and loved it, you know, and I just, at that point, you know, I'd be hanging out at Ed's house with his parents. We were watching that and laughing at stuff, whatever. And we'd say, well, we should go down and do something. And then, you know, cut to a little while later, and we kind of started the band in earnest. And although we'd never intended to be buskers, per se, we realized we had the tools in order to do it.

So we would be, let's say, we're playing at the Rivoli and, um, you know, we didn't really have much of an audience. So we would just set up on the street in front of the club earlier in the day with a little sign telling people that we're playing there that night and we'd play it on the street. So we got pretty good at that. Um, you know, we would just start to do that kind of thing all over the place. We'd do it like CFNY has their big local talent concert that we tried to get into and didn't get. Is that the new music search? Yeah, they did the new music search. And we were like a bonus track on their CD.

We had submitted our tape. I'll tell you a little bit about that. We submitted our tape for this. we had submitted our tape. I'll tell you a little bit about that. We'd submitted our tape for this. And Hal Harbour, who was at CFNY back then, gets back to us and says,

you know, I love the song. You didn't make the final cut, but we're going to put you on as a bonus track, which means you don't get to play at the showcase, but we still want to put the song on there. So can you send us your master tape? And I'm thinking, you already have our master tape. We did it on a four-track cassette and sent him the cassette that I dubbed down from this thing.

But I didn't have the guts to tell him that he had the master tape because I thought that seems like not very professional. So we very quickly got together and went into a studio and re-recorded the song in the studio one night and you could you could get a rate from like 11 p.m till 7 a.m for really cheap and um re-recorded the song and then sent him that mix which was totally different from the one that had got us onto the thing sorry which song is this yoko ono this this would be my yoko ono yeah amazing okay continue please so they they put it on the disc,

and I think there were lots of people at CFNY who hated the song, and then there were some people like Hal and others who loved it, and it started getting played and started getting requests. You know, many of the requests were me calling, hey, can you play that Naked Lady song, Yoko Ono? And they're like, stop calling. We were relentless. And so when they got to their big showcase,

I think it was at the Copa, because we weren't able to play on the showcase, we just set up in front. And so as people were walking in, they could see us play. And that was just our way of trying to be part of anything we could be part of. But people really took notice. And so it was easy for us to go into something like the Speaker's Corner booth and just do the Yoko Ono thing. We still had no expectation that they would ever air it.

We thought maybe somebody, some editor watching this might get entertained or something. And we had cut down, because I think you only have a minute or two minutes or something in that booth. Yeah, two minutes, I think. It was two minutes. So the song was already like just two and a half. So we cut it down to exactly two minutes, crammed into this booth, and did it.

And then we got a call from people at Much Music who had seen it they put it on speakers corner on the on the city show and the people at much said this is like this is what we were hoping people would do in this speakers corner so we're going to start showing it so they started actually just putting it in rotation on much i remember man i mean you name these two places cfny and uh much music that's where I got the wealth of my exposure to music was those two outlets. Well, I think having for us CFNY, Much Music and CBC Radio were the best things for us. And we got very lucky being at a time where we had CFNY who were really big on promoting and helping local talent and finding new local talent.

Much Music, who were always looking for stuff. And because of who we were and how we acted and we were easy to get along with and fun, they invited us to do stuff all the time, as did CFNY. they invited us to do stuff all the time as did cfmy like whether it's like you know back your barbecue backyard barbecue promos or or showing up at a party or whatever else to you know busk a couple songs like we were shameless and happy to to be wherever anybody wanted us and cbc was the same way like they you know being able to be on a national show like Morningside or something like that right all of a sudden would take us just like with Much would take us out of being another Toronto Queen Street band because I think we were pretty conscious that we didn't want to live in just in that world or be seen just as that we wanted to be canadian and seen as as kind of belonging to

the whole country and things like much music and cbc gave us that opportunity really quickly so that when we'd go on the road and we'd show up in victoria there'd be an actual crowd there and the crowd would be made up of you know teenagers and senior citizens and whatever, people who heard us and saw us everywhere. Now, a little fun fact. I like to drop a fun fact now and then. Do you know the origin of the handle Hal Harbor? Well, it's Halifax Harbor. Oh, yeah.

There you go. A lot of people don't realize that, but you're a gifted individual as we've already established. That was easy for you. Yeah, Halifax Harbor. I think he's out east now. I think he's back home in the Maritimes now. I believe you're right.

But speaking of CFNY personalities, I was told, a little birdie told me that, and tell me if it's true, the first time, maybe the first time the public heard the song Brian Wilson, this would be a good time to play it. actually I'll play it in a second but would be on Bookies, Dave Bookman's CIUT show where you played it live, is there any truth to this wonderful story I heard? That's probably absolutely true

we would make whatever, we'd write some new songs and then just play them. I remember playing the Danforth Music, or not Danforth Music Hall, the Bathurst Street Theatre, where Randolph is now. And it was our first kind of outside of the clubs show in Toronto that Elliot Lefkoe had set up for us. And looking back, we started that show

with like five new songs that we'd never played before, which is ridiculous. But we were so excited to do that kind of thing. And yeah, Dave Bookman was a huge supporter from really early. Like the first time we ever went on his show on CIUT was when the band was still just me and Ed. So, you know, knew him from probably 89 onward. Right. So it sounds like, and I'm just playing it in the background. I hope it doesn't, you've probably heard it before, but.

I have. Yeah, I've heard it. Are you allowed to perform without singing this? Like, can you do a show without performing this song? I rarely, rarely do. I feel like, I feel it's important to do it. I think it's a nice moment in the show, too. People get to, you know, sing along and rock out.

Right. So I'll give it a few seconds to breathe, and then I'll ask you another question about Bookie. Bookie. So I'm lying here Just staring at the ceiling tiles And I'm thinking about Oh, what's I think about Dude, I gotta say, you take some credit here.

You wrote this song. One of my favorite songs of all time still as we speak in 2020. Thank you. I wrote that when I was like 19 too, which makes me feel very weird. I hear that baby voice coming out of those speakers. It's like, who is that child? And now I'm hit with a wave of nostalgia. Oh my goodness. But Bookie, so for the record, you probably, it sounds like you probably, played this song for Bookie on CIUT before you even had it recorded? So there's not even before it was recorded?

Yeah, it was one of those songs that we had in our, I think I probably wrote it in 89, and I don't think it really showed up on the Hello Tape until 91. So there was a time we were playing it live and still just working it out. I'm pretty sure the first time we played it was probably for Bookie. And, you know, I used to see him in his band, The Bookmen, with Tim Meck, when I was a teenager, before I even started BNL. I used to go downtown in the rain and try to sneak into clubs underage. And one of the bands I used to go see was the Bookman.

I always thought he was just totally awesome. I mean, a great loss for all of us, but especially those who knew him personally. I mean, this city, you can't replace a Dave Bookman. He did so much for so many bands, He did so much for so many bands, just, you know, both in Toronto and international bands, bringing them to prominence in Canada. He was just, he was an amazing guy, just, you know, loved, loved music, loved hockey. But he was just, you know, one of those amazing, obsessive, cool guys. You know, a city needs, like a city like Toronto needs characters like that. They're so vital.

And then sometimes you don't appreciate them until they're gone. And then you realize, oh, we were so blessed to have that guy here doing that. And now he's not. And we don't have anyone to fill that void. Well, just think of it. A guy whose physical tick is to air guitar. There's nothing cooler than that. Right.

So here's a fun fact as well that was revealed on this program because I have a lot of sports media personalities on Toronto Mic'd, and one of my favorites to have on is a guy who writes for the Toronto Sun. You might have heard of him. His name is Steve Simmons. My cousin Steve. So for the record, because Steve's the only source on this so far, but we need to corroborate that, right?

Because he also told me that a Kessel hot dog story that may or may not have been true. So I need to... And Steve, I know you're listening. Love you, man. Great FOTM, Steve Simmons. And his son's even been on the show. So for the record, how are you related to Toronto Sun's Steve Simmons?

Steve Simmons is first cousins with my mom. They have the same grandfather or grandparents. So my mom's dad and his dad were brothers. So I guess that would make him my second cousin. Steve's awesome. He said yesterday, he told me that your mom is awesome. He said that your mom, Steve Page, is the best. She is the best.

I am a lucky son to have Joanne Page as my mom. And Vic Page as my dad. They're great people. And is the name of the album Gordon named after your dad? No, not specifically, although he's lumped in there. You know, we do have a list of honorary Gordons on the inside of the, and Gordons on the inside of the record. Because I think we felt like it was like the most um canadian name out there you know it's you know kind of being playing upon our kind of scarborough shtick that we did back in in the early 90s it felt like the

most kind of like um you know gordon gordon was the most kind of like canadian guy and i mean i'm sure for me that's typified by my dad as well though no you're absolutely right would be it like a gordon lightfoot or gordon sinclair or gordon sinclair and gordon sinclair i guess and of course then you have gordon downy but of course gordon uh gordon stelic gordy how of course of course i'd miss the big one gordy how i mean it's hard to name non-canadian gourds that's right there aren't a lot. I mean, think about it. I can't think of a non-Canadian Gorde off the top of my head. Well, I can name two, okay, only because I've thought about this in the past because that's what I do as a former gifted student. Gordon was a guy on Sesame Street.

I was like raised on Sesame Street. street so i think i i honestly think that if you were to ask us back then okay name the gordon you're thinking of we were all thinking of gordon from sesame street right and he's he's american i believe and the other gordon i think of is uh is ridiculous but the real name of alf oh of course gordon shumway but neither of them were gourd or Gordy right that's a good point I think Steve is under the impression maybe that Gordon is named after his uncle but it sounds like he's lumped in there with other great Canadian Gords

many Gords when I was born they looked at me and said what a good boy what a smart boy what a good boy, what a smart boy, what a strong boy. And when you were born, they look at you and say, what a good girl, what a smart girl, what a pretty girl. Got these chains hanging around our necks, people want to strangle us with them before we take our first breath. I hope you're enjoying this conversation with Stephen Page. He's a sweetheart.

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if you want to attend it live. And if you have any GTA real estate questions for Austin Keitner, he's here to help. Thanks again for listening. Thanks for all your support. I can't wait for all this to blow over and for us to get

together at a TMLX. TMLX6 can't wait for all this to blow over and for us to get together at a TMLX. TMLX6 can't come soon enough. Enjoy the rest of this conversation with Stephen Page. This name is the hair shine I wear And this hair shine is woven from It's woven from It's woven from hair This song is the cross that I bow Bear with me Bear with me

Bear with me Be with me tonight When I was born He looked at me and said What a good boy What a smart boy What a strong boy When I was born, they looked at me and said, What a good boy, what a smart boy, what a strong boy. When you were born, they looked at you and said, What a good girl, what a smart girl, what a pretty girl.

Now, coincidentally, I just exchanged a note with Bernie Finkelstein. This is a complete coincidence this morning. Because Bernie, of course, he's formerly True North, of course. Now, I think his primary client remains the great Bruce Colburn. So, I want to ask you a little bit about Lovers in a Dangerous Time. Maybe I'll play a bit of it here. Because I talk about, you know, Mike, name your favorite songs of all time. Brian Wilson's right up there,

but your cover, and with apologies to Bruce, I prefer your cover of Lovers in a Dangerous Time from the Kick at the Darkness compilation. It's right up there. So maybe I'll play it. Give me about 20 seconds of this great jam and then we'll talk about this.

We never get to stop and open our eyes there. So maybe I'll play it. Give me about 20 seconds of this great jam and then we'll talk about this. And next you're dazzled by the beauty of it all Lovers in a dangerous time Honestly, the video's great too, man. So anything you can share with us here about why this song, were you already a Bruce Colburn fan and the video, anything you can share? It's funny hearing that. It's the original Barenaked Ladies

theory that if your backing vocals are out of tune, just double and triple track them and that'll somehow make that go away, which just doesn't actually work. But only your ears hear the flaws and we don't hear that. It's charming to hear them. It's pretty

and I think, you know, we were asked because we were starting to gain some momentum in Canada. We were asked by Intrepid Records, who put out that compilation, whether we would be interested in being part of it. Of course, we were thrilled to. And back then in the early 90s, it was kind of the heyday for tribute albums. There were lots of them. And they were doing this tribute to Bruce Coburn. And we thought, you know, I like Bruce Coburn. I'd seen him do a live

solo show at the Ontario Place Forum before and so on. But I wasn't like an obsessive fan where I knew his whole catalog and none of us were. And part of the Barenaked Ladies attitude at the time was like, everybody else thinks you're so cool.

We'll show them we're not. And that was kind of our bit. And we figured with a lot of those records, people are always going for the most obscure or the deepest or the least known cut to kind of show how big a fan they are. And we're like, no, we're going to try and go with the, why don't we choose the one that is the biggest hit in our minds? You know, and we had grown up with Lovers in Dangerous Time on Much Music and on the radio and stuff.

You're probably on a 680 CFTR probably. That's right. And with Mike Cooper in the morning. Oh yeah. We, so we chose that song, and then we went into the studio to record it, and I remember the A&R guy was like, well, can you do it a little more four on the floor?

And we realized what he was asking us to do was do it like the Bruce Coburn version, rather than having the train beat. I think that was kind of, seemed a little cute to them. But we're like, no, this is how we're going to do it. And we did it, and they decided to make it the single. So we did that video for incredibly cheap, like $6,000 or something. And this is a time where videos were costing $100,000 or more.

And I think the video just really struck a nerve with people because it was you know us driving around the back of the pickup truck around uh around scarborough and playing road hockey with our friends and the rio statics and the skydiggers and uh you know people just connected with it i remember um being in the studio with the, with the Rheostatics when they were making whale music, we were singing some backup vocals on some songs and the late great Neil Peart showed up to play some percussion. He played a drum, drum duet on the song Guns and then played percussion on the song Rain, Rain, Rain. And Rhe rio static said why don't you stick around and play some percussion on that too so we all did sat in a circle and neil came in and he saw me and he said hey it's the happiest face on television referring to that video

which was i thought was super sweet that's amazing i don't think bruce particularly cared for our version of the song at first but uh i think he came around to it i think once he understood the band better um he actually wrote us a really nice note and then we had the opportunity to actually play the song with him a few times which was you know a huge thrill yeah i think you're right he's one of the best i haven't actually had the pleasure of chatting with bruce but i've talked uh for a few a few hours with Bernie, and I believe you're absolutely right. I think he came around, but I'm not sure he loved it right off the bat. No, the quote I remember reading from Bruce first was, this is everything that was wrong with folk music in the 60s.

I was like, oh, that hurts. That's not nice. A few years later, we played a festival with him in Boston. I remember we came back onto our bus after we played, and there was a note from him on the table in the bus saying, you know, I apologize. I, you know, I was, I spoke out of turn and I was wrong and I totally get it now and love it. Now, I don't know if you can see my video here. No one can see this, but you, but do you see, uh, so I've got my, uh, my six 80 CFTR, uh, memorabilia here. I, and what, I don't think Mike Cooper did mornings ever. I feel like it was Tom

Rivers at the time when Mike Cooper was doing the... Tom... There you go. Tom Rivers in the morning. It's important to get these facts correct or people will be misled. Was it Mike Cooper who spent the whole CNE in

the Ferris wheel? Yeah, but when he was at 1050. That was at 10.50, yeah. That was at 10.50, chum, okay. And I don't think he was, I don't know, I feel Tom Rivers was mornings then too, but again, I get, the 10.50 stuff, I'm a little bit young to kind of appreciate that era, but yeah, he was on that roller coaster

when he was at 10.50, chum. See, at, for me, the era, the thing was between 79 and 80 when i was kind of an avid am radio listener right um was about which station played disco when which one didn't um because originally you know 10 50 chum said they would never play disco and then they started playing disco and it was like it's back and forth between who was going to play it um so i was always torn to it i didn't know who which uh station to admit that i listened to well yeah it's but when you're that age i think it's uh your excuse is i was young and dumb and you can listen to anything you want right well i see it but in the classroom at the

time you can't say that and you can't say well I listen to CKY in the mornings because that's what my mom has on. Right, right. I hear you. No, it's more of our trauma we carry from primary school. We should have a support group. All right. Now, because of time constraints, I'm going to skip ahead a bit. Just play this jam and ask you a question here.

Talking to the old apartment Just as well we used to live. Broken glass, broken hungry, broken hearts and broken bones. This is where we used to live. All right, a few things, Stephen. Firstly, that's still a banger, man.

I still love that jam, the old apartment. So, awesome. Thank, that's still a banger, man. I still love that jam, The Old Apartment. So, awesome. Thank you. And I also would just like to shout out local musicians who would drop Toronto references in their songs, which I always loved.

And it's funny because your yellow tape, which I bought two copies of, by the way, at Sam's at Young and Dundas there. I believe it broke the record for... You'll correct me here, but didn't it beat the Shakespeare My Butt record for independent sales in this country? Well, I think it came out before Shakespeare My Butt.

Oh. Okay. But I know it was the first, what they said was independent cassette to go gold in Canada. I think it sold like 85,000 copies. 85,000, you said? 85,000, yeah.

I mean, I think there were certainly other independent releases before us, like obviously the Cowboy Junkies or Lorena McKenna, that sold more than the Yellow Tape did. But the Yellow Tape was five songs only and just on cassette and still sold that much. What year did that cassette, was that 1990? Tell me, 1990? 91, I think.

I'm just trying to find out if Shakespeare, My Butt came out before or after. Not that it matters at all, except every episode of Toronto Mike closes with a song from Shakespeare, My Butt. And I love those guys too because they would always drop references to the Carlisle Street Bridge or they would just drop all these. And you drop in this song, for example, it talks about buying an old house on the Danforth, which I don't think you could afford today, but this is an old song.

But tell me, I guess. I bought that house on the Danforth for $269,000. Did you sell it? I sure did. Like four years later or something. Imagine buying a Van Forth for under $300,000. No, I mean, my first home was actually on Islington because I'm a West End guy.

And I still remember I paid like $200,000 and a little bit, like maybe $206,000. You can't get a shoe not to borrow like bare naked ladies you can't get a shoe box for uh that price that's right all right so why am i playing the old apartment well it's a great jam but also i need to i want to know like uh about cracking the u.s market if you will like like how important was it to the band to have success uh south of the border? Oh, it was super important to us. I mean, at first, we had the kind of the youthful naivety and stupidity that kind of assumed that when our record,

like just the same way we assumed that we'd send one demo tape off to a label and get signed, we also assumed that when our album came out, we'd be famous, like successful. And that wasn't the case. I mean, it happened in Canada. We built it up over the course of several years. But we went down, when we signed with Sire Records for Gordon, we went down to the U.S. and just toured relentlessly. Borden, we went down to the U.S. and just toured relentlessly. And, you know, we built up an audience, but it took us years, like six years to build an audience where we had the same, you know,

an equivalent level of success. But at first it was just like we had so much going on in Canada and we'd go to the U.K. and whatever else in Europe. But after our second album came out and I mean, it did fine. I think it went, I don't know, double platinum or something in Canada, but the perception of it was that it was a comparative failure next to Gordon. So playing in the US became even more of a necessity for us in order to keep going. You know, in Canada, there are only so many places to play before you burn out your audience. Where in the U.S., there are so many cities. You can just, you know, every night for a year play a different town.

And in doing that, we just kind of under the radar built up our own fan base. And the old apartment was kind of the culmination of that. And how much credit can we give fellow Canadian Jason Priestley? Oh, I think a fair bit. I think he said, let me direct your next video. Because he had been around and we'd shot the video for Shoebox, the single before that, which was a fiasco and crazy expensive. And the song kind of did very little. And he was mad on our behalf.

And he's like, I'll direct your next video. I'll march it into VH1 and MTV and say, play this thing. And he did exactly that. And, you know, I think, and then he got us on Beverly Hills 90210. We played the Peach Pit after dark. And that was all because of Jason. And I think through that, you know, he used whatever power he had to help us out. And it really did help big time.

Like, it's funny because pre i guess pre uh one week if you will as a proud canadian who loved baronica ladies from the beginning like from the time cfny was playing everything including that mcdonald's girl cover which i recorded to cassette and i i still have it somewhere because i can't buy that thing right right no it was never released it was always just from that uh live at the elma combo show that cfny had Right. No, it was never released. It was always just from that live at the El Macombo show that CFMY had recorded. And that's great, but that's another, that'll need another hour to talk about the McDonald's girl, because I still

have the lyrics back. By the way, who's the original artist? Do you remember? That's Dean Friedman. He actually toured with me. He was my opening act on my last US tour. And did you perform that song? We didn't on tour, but I just did his, he does a weekly

live stream, the Dean Zine live stream. If you go to deanfreedman.com, you can see it there, but I just was on it on Sunday, and we did it as a duet there. Okay, amazing. I gotta go dig that up.

So the two moments I recall is like, oh, the guys are making it south of the border, right? I believe would be sort of the Peach Pit appearance, like Peach Pit after Derek appearance, which was a big deal for us. And my favorite talk show at the time was Conan O'Brien. Like it was appointment viewing for me. I loved Conan O'Brien.

And you guys showed up there, as I recall. And I'm like, the ladies are on Conan. Like this is the big leagues. Well, we were Conan. Conan was really good to us. And,

uh, we were, I think the second musical guest on his show ever. I think we were, you know, on his 10th show or something like that when it first started. So that was in 93. I remember doing,

uh, I think we did maybe brian wilson on that and then we came back and we did enid with the horn section from his band um i think we might have been on it like half a dozen times um but you know our kind of rise was along the same time as conan's rise so it was you know it was a great thing for us a A lot of, a lot of synergies there. Okay. So now you, you, you break the U S market. You got a number one hit and, and fine and dandy. Now I have to ask you about you leaving the band. Now I'll read this because it's easier to read it and get it right.

But in 2008, you were arrested for drug possession in New York state. You live in New York state, right? Like I'm talking to you now in New York State. Yep. Yep. I'm still in jail. It's a very nice cell we have here. You got good Wi-Fi there, which is good. Yeah.

They let us plug right into the router if we're doing a live stream or a podcast. Well, you know, what we're learning is jail's not so bad if you have a good Wi-Fi connection, right? Like, we're all kind of in jail right now. Yeah. Alright, so you got these charges were dismissed. Just around the corner from where I live now is actually where that all went down. And these charges were dismissed, but

this is, to me, we see this as the masses, the great unwashed. We see this as the catalyst of sorts that kind of results in you leaving the band. What can you share with us about that? Was it a mutual decision? Was it the arrest and this Disney album or this kid's album?

Was it just a bad recipe? Please share with us the real talk here. It was a whole bunch of that stuff. I think my first marriage had broken down the year before and then the arrest and we made a kid's record where I was certainly, you know, there and present in the studio every day, but I was not writing at the quantity that I was before. Uh, and then, uh, you know, they were ready by, by the time the kind of the charges were dropped and all that kind of stuff, the other guys were ready to make another record. I wasn't yet. And, uh, I was just trying to figure out how to be an adult in the world. And, uh, we just weren't on the same page through that whole process after getting arrested.

Um, when we were doing gigs, like in the U S I would have to cross the border separately from them and, uh, you know, meet them at the gig. So that was like 10 months of us traveling to gigs separately. And so when you, you know, you basically only meet up when you're about to go on stage together. I think we just kind of fell away from each other. And it was, it wasn't easy't easy i mean it was painful um but uh you know i think things on both sides have turned out really well and i think every you know everybody's in a good spot right now but it was a tough few years for sure now you've been very open and honest

about your uh mental health struggles uh is it bipolar disorder that you were diagnosed with? I have been diagnosed with that. I mean, you could see, you know, a different clinician and get a different diagnosis every day of the week. But yes, I think that, I mean, anxiety, depression, and manic behavior are all parts of the things that I struggle with. So it's, it is, it is a bipolar diagnosis for sure. And I've been pretty, I've been pretty good lately. I feel, I feel, feel all right, despite being locked indoors under quarantine, I've been, you know, in good spot. Amazing. And we're going to play some solo material.

I mentioned isolation and we're going to talk about, although sadly, I think I read this morning that the 2020 Stratford festival schedule, like they paused the entire calendar year. That's right. But we're going to talk about how that affects you because you, you had something exciting going on there. But I, first I want to ask about the big bang theory and that theme song and

whether I know I read in the paper, there was some, some legal stuff going on. Like is everything okay with you and the band now regarding you know, money and that song and everything related. Yeah. That stuff's all been settled now. You know, it's, it's never, never fun for either party to be in those kinds of disputes and some, you know, most of them go on behind the scenes, but we're certainly not in dispute about anything and uh you know although we don't we don't really connect that often um

i have no bad feelings about those guys and i like to think that they feel okay about me as well well okay well let's do that and then i want to ask you about uh trans canada highwaymen because i'm a fan of all four of you guys and your former or current bands, depending on who it is. But let's talk about that then, that you had a very public reunification, would that be the term? Sure. At the June Awards, like a couple of years ago. And on this very show, I mentioned earlier, Mark Wiseblood, he comes in once a month and

we do this like 2.5 hour marathon on the previous month's stuff in the zeitgeist and we had a little bet between ourselves if you will where I felt that was a one-off like I felt like you were gonna do it it was gonna hopefully feel good for you guys we were gonna enjoy it but it was not gonna result in you rejoining the band or you guys creating new material and he said no it's they're going to get back together so uh maybe you can update us on like what is your relationship like with those guys since the juno awards and is there any chance of you uh creating new music with the rest of the bare naked ladies i mean the relationship i think is fine i never talk to them i get you know an occasional little text conversation with Kevin Hearn and,

you know, Ed even more rarely. So I don't think there's anything in the near future. I would certainly entertain. I don't, I don't want to do it full time. Like I don't need to be in that band again. Like I loved my time in that group and I'm proud of everything we did together. Like it's, you know, it's a big part of me and my story and my identity and everything else. But I've, I love to do what I do now. So if there was a chance to work with them again, whether it was a show or a collaboration of some sort, I'd be all for it, but I don't know if they're all for it. Right.

There was no talk beyond that Juno performance about any other projects. And I hear you in that. I totally, of course, I respect that. You guys are adults. You've gone your own ways. And it's been working out for both parties, if you will. But do you find the fans have trouble accepting that little kernel?

They want you to realize on stage at the Junos that you're meant to be together and forevermore it's going to be together and forevermore you're gonna you know it's gonna be Ed and Steven do you find that the the fans are having trouble kind of grasping that little reality that you dropped on us oh I'm sure some of them do and some of them like you know whatever no matter what you do you put it out there and uh you're proud of it and people say kiss and make up with the other guys like as as if it's that simple. Like, um, yeah, I always wonder how many of those,

of those dudes are divorced. And, uh, if I, if I told him to kiss up and make up, make up with her, with her ex wife, you know,

the divorced and remarried. Right. Um, it like, you know, you can have, you can be proud of the stuff you did together and still like the other person.

Um, but not necessarily get back into bed with them again. And I will say I'm, I'm, I'm a fan of your solo work and i'm a fan of the uh and i'm big fan of when you tour with trans canada highwayman which i want to talk about in a moment but also i have seen the bare naked ladies without steven page i saw them at massey hall a few years ago and i will say there is something strange for a lifelong fan when the the bare naked ladies perform brian wilson for example and you're not there like there are some songs in fact one of them for example oh what a good boy there are certain songs that i feel are steven page songs and it just never sounds quite right when you're

not part of it yeah i haven't i'll admit i haven't watched that stuff it's because it feel would feel a little weird for me too but i'm glad they play this stuff because I'm proud of it and I'm glad that they feel it's like part of their catalog and their legacy. And that's awesome. But like on the other side of the coin, I do those songs in my shows. But like, you know, there's ones that I don't do. And actually the ones we did in the Junos, Million Dollars and One Week, I had suggested that that's what we do at the Junos because I've kept those separate. Like, I felt like those are duets between me and Ed and I would feel weird, you know, even though I was involved in the originals of those songs, I would feel weird doing them without the other guys. I get that. Yeah. So that's what, that's what made the Juno thing so fun for me though,

too, was that we got to do something that I don't normally get to do. No, I totally, to me, it totally makes sense. And that divorce analogy really kind of, you're like, of course, like, yeah, you can see your ex. Like I have an ex wife. You can see her cause you know, your kid's graduation or something and have a good time and remember that the good memories and maybe even love her still, of course,

but you don't get back together with her because you've moved on, you have your own lives, and things are better now. Yeah, or different now. Different now, right. How much it took to become unentangled and then, like, to think that it's just easy to go, yeah, let's just do it again anyways.

Like, that would take a lot of desire for both parties for that to happen. I don't think that's there with me and the other guys. And the other thing is I think about jobs that people have. Like people work in a job for 20 years. That's pretty good. And then you move on to another job.

Imagine like people walking up to you and saying, go back to blah blahs i'm okay over here at whole foods right now or whatever it is you know man you know because i talk to a lot of like radio personalities but that happens all the time in radio like somebody like let's say a humble and fred who you were on their show yesterday like you know guys are still coming up to them and like man i loved you on you on the edge. It's like, we're still doing our thing somewhere else and we're doing it every day and we're still alive. And, you know, yes, that was great for whatever, 15 years or whatever, but yeah, we've moved on and, you know, you can still hear us over here now. It's just not the edge, but yeah,

I totally get that completely. So can we talk about TransCanada High Women? Because, let's see, Chris Murphy from Sloan and Moe Berg from Pursuit of Happiness have been here. Now you can't be here because there's a COVID thing going on so we're doing this by Zoom. I haven't yet had the pleasure of talking to Craig Northey from The Odds but maybe I'll do that via Zoom in the next few weeks. You should. He's

about the nicest person in all of music. Maybe the nicest person in the world. In great bands. All those bands. Sorry, go ahead. Yeah, you'd have a good chat with Craig. So Barenaked Ladies, where you were a member for many years, and then you have Pursuit of Happiness. Mo's still doing Pursuit of Happiness stuff. And then Sloan, they're still going.

I just saw them at the Phoenix like six months ago. And The Odds. Great Canadian bands. And you guys all kind of collected. And in concert, because Lieve Fumpke, who's an FOTM. She's a listener of the program. She says,

can you ask Steven page if there is any more highwaymen concerts? This is obviously going to be after COVID runs its course. I think it was two years ago when we went to see them on my birthday. Uh, happy birthday, leave a Fumpka. Uh, what can you tell us about getting together with these guys and any plans for the future with the Trans Canada Highwaymen?

We did it for fun. I think I had talked to Craig. Craig and I play together. Craig plays with me in the Stephen Page Trio. And then also when I play with a full band, quite often what I do is I have the odds as my band. Or I get to sit in with the odds and play and sing with them too which is a you know a blast because we used to tour with the odds a lot in the 90s especially in the U.S. and you know they're just one of my favorite bands and they were always kind

of my dream band for me to have as my you know if I was to to have a rock band backing me up I dreamed it would be The Odds. And I've been lucky enough to be able to do that live with them, and they're the band on most of my last two records as well. So Craig and I were talking about, wouldn't it be fun if we got Chris Murphy to do a thing with us? If the three of us, because like Chris, we all get along and make each other laugh, and maybe we could do a thing with us like you know we all if the three of us because we like chris we all get along and make each other laugh and maybe we could do a thing with the three of us and then

mo started talking to chris about doing something and uh chris mentioned it to craig and me and we went well let's do this together and we'll just play each other's songs um and we'll just switch instruments which is i mean poor chris chris chris has to get me and uh mo and craig to play drums chris who's one of the best drummers in rock um singing drummers he has to give up and have us lame-ass drummers ruining his songs behind him but we're laughing the whole time. It's so much fun. And actually, so we did a tour and, you know, we've talked about what do we do next as far as making a record? Do we do originals, new songs? Do we do covers? And then this whole lockdown has happened. So we've done some videos. We've put two of them out so far of us each playing separately from afar.

If you go to the TransCanada Highwaymen YouTube or Facebook or Instagram, you can see our videos there. We did one of the Barenaked Ladies song, Alcohol, and then we just put one out last week of the Sloan song, Ready For You, and then we'll see what the next one is after that. But we're just having a blast with that. And most of the time it's just kind of um hilarious group text threads that's really what trans canada highwayman is but we do we do have uh we actually had some shows planned for this coming fall but i don't

think they're going to happen now uh with uh the covid crisis but uh i know we also have some that are not next not yet yet announced, but we're planning for next spring. So hopefully there'll be more of that next year. Yeah. Oh, here's hoping, here's hoping. But in the meantime, while we wait to all collect and enjoy live music again, and we're waiting for it to be safe to do so, you've actually been putting on gigs via Zoom, right? Like I saw that you just sold out another performance, but tell us what you can about these $8 Zoom performances where you let a thousand fans kind of enjoy.

Tell us about that. Yeah, this is the thing. I was, you know, looking at my friend Dan Mangan, a great Vancouver singer-songwriter, runs a company called Side Door Access, and it was designed to facilitate house concerts, which is kind of a growing sector of the live music market. And then when the lockdown happened, they quickly pivoted to doing online stuff,

and Dan started doing these shows where you could sell tickets in advance and, you know, these shows where you could sell tickets in advance and um you know have up to a thousand screens in there where you can actually see the audience and they can see you and it's amazing like i watched one of dan's shows and i was like this is the sense of community it's not it's i'm not over hyping it like people actually you know they're they're in the chat saying hey i'm from japan i'm from sweden i'm from peterborough whatever and uh and connecting with each other and they can see each other and you know i'm playing requests i'm just in my basement the same place i'm talking to you from right now and it was just such a blast when i did it last week and i didn't know we were going to sell it the biggest plan you you can get on Zoom, unless you're, you know, a giant corporation is a

thousand people per meeting. Right. I thought, you know, it wouldn't be great if I could sell 300 of these. But I'll see, I'll wait and see whether I'm going to bump myself up to the over 500 plan until I sell enough. Right. And then the thing sold out. over 500 plan until I sell enough.

And then the thing sold out. So I put this Saturday's show up for sale yesterday and it sold out. So today I'm going to put up the show for May 9th. So if you want to see one of these, sidedooraccess.com and you'll see my show is up for sale there. It's a blast. I'm loving it.

And the fans seem to be really loving it too. Well, it's amazing that you've got a thousand people joining you via Zoom for a concert you're doing in your home, and they're paying eight bucks each. Even the racists out there will want to get in on the action, right? Well, that is what happened. I think last time we had what they call the Zoom bombing, where somebody got in there and started saying

all kinds of horrible stuff in the chat. My wife, who was running it quickly, shut down the chat. But this week, we're locking down some of that stuff. Yeah, you've got to moderate that. Yeah. I'd read about this Zoom bombing stuff and laughed at it, because people are coming into classrooms and putting up pictures of porn and stuff, and I thought it was kind of funny, actually.

And it was kind of funny actually and it was kind of funny but um uh you know i can handle this stuff i just hate that it's wrecking it for other people um uh because i don't want people you know we're there for good vibes not for bad stuff oh yeah no and no one wants yeah no one wants that to show up at your party no it's good that you can you can put your wife on moderation alert or whatever, and she can kind of zap it and you just, yeah. Ban the zoom bomber, uh, as soon as possible.

That's, uh, yeah, totally. Okay. So congrats on that. Cause I, if you had told me,

Hey, I, I'm just, uh, I'm impressed, I guess eight bucks times a thousand you'd perform in your basement. Like to me, that's really cool that you get to continue to perform and you continue to,

you know, actually, you know, earn revenue from your uh art which is something a lot of people are struggling with during this uh during this pandemic so on that note you wrote a musical for the stratford festival called here's what it takes yeah tell me about that and then of course then we'll have to end that on a sad note because uh it won't happen 2020. But please tell us what was supposed to happen and then what the plans are for Here's What It Takes. Well, I wrote a musical.

I had an idea for a musical years ago and had a chunk of songs that I felt were part of a bigger story. There was some arc and I didn't know what the story was. part of a bigger story like there was some arc and i didn't know what the story was and i've been working a lot at the strafford festival doing uh scoring for some of their uh classical plays and they had asked me several times like so when are you going to bring us a musical um so i had this group of songs and i took it to the people at strafford and said here's what i have here's what i'm thinking. What do you guys think? And they, uh, they, uh, introduced me to a bunch of different potential, uh, partners and ended up, um, collaborating with Daniel McIver, the playwright who is just awesome. And we become great friends and really great collaborators. And it's just one of my

favorite people. And he came up with a story. He wrote the play part, the book they call it. And he came up with a story that's not my story, but it, you know, it is about a, a music,

a rock band, a duo of, of guys and their life together and apart over the course of, I don't know, 40 years. So, but, you know, it's certainly informed by my experience, but it's not the story of my experience. We've just kind of, it's also Daniel's experiences and it's a story about love and friendship and music. And, you know, the title of Here's What It Takes, is sardonic. It's not just about, you know, here's what it takes to make it, kids,

but it's more about here's what it takes from you when you decide to enter in the life of creating things. And we've been working on it for about seven years, and then this year it was finally going to premiere in June. So we started rehearsing every day up at the Stratford Festival, the first week of March, and did that for two weeks until we were all sent home. And now they've put the whole season on hold. So my hope is that we'll run it next year,

but I don't know for sure. Well, it sounds amazing. I hope, yeah yeah hopefully things are back to normal in 2021 that's that's for sure let me play uh a new steven page uh jam here everybody in the house next door everybody on the ocean floor everybody in the grocery store saying, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. Everybody says the bacon bread. Everybody feels a creeping dread. Everybody going back to bed like me. I'm here to stay.

Everybody taking online courses. Everybody with the tiny horses. Everybody due to unseen forces. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. Everybody with the broken dreams. Everybody on the big sport teams. Everybody with the big sport teams. Everybody with the big news memes in isolation. Isolation.

Isolation. Isolation. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. Everybody with an empty mind. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh Everybody wants that Stephen, you must have written this song after the, you know, the physical distancing order kicked in in mid-March. When did you write this?

This is the isolation, this is the pandemic anthem we've been waiting for. I think I wrote it on March 14th. I'd been sent home from rehearsal or back to my apartment in Stratford and wondering what the heck was next. We were then just, you know, relentlessly scrolling through social media and news and whatever else and trying to imagine what life was going to be like for all of us. And I wrote it really quickly and set up my phone and put it on YouTube.

Just me with the guitar, I think the second time I played the song through and the response was great. So when I actually got home home a few days later, I did a studio version here. So Isolation is not a Joy Division remake. No. Although

that's a great song. I could do that as the B-side. Right, right. Now, we started this episode by thanking Ralph Ben-Murray. Our national treasure, Ralph Ben-Murray. I love Ralph. There's a lot to love. I actually really love Ralph, too. So I produced his podcast,

and I also produced Humble and Fred, so I do think that if people want good companion episodes, find Steven Page on Humble and Fred. It I do think that if people want good companion episodes, find Stephen Page and Humble and Fred. It was yesterday. And Ralph Ben-Murray's conversation with Stephen Page is really the reason this is happening right now. And in that conversation, I'm going to steal a little bit,

but we'll call it a teaser, right? But can you just close with the story? I think a lot of people wonder, did Yoko Ono ever hear the song Be My Yoko Ono? And did she like that song? Would you mind sharing that story that you shared with Ralph about that would kind of help us get a clue into this great question that Canadians have been pondering for decades? Apparently, yes, she did. And she absolutely has heard it. I remember when we first put the song out before we were signed, I remember we went to the New Music Seminar in New York City and we were trying everything we could to try and get some attention.

So we'd invited Yoko Ono to our showcase and she didn't come, but a 15-year-old Sean Ono Lennon came to the show, and we had our picture taken with him, and he was a total sweetheart. And then later, I saw an interview on Much Music where Yoko said, Oh, yes, Sean played the song for me, and we laughed. And I thought, Oh, that's so sweet. actually shot the video for the song um she gave us uh a whole bunch of film footage of her and john to use in the video so that was all you know provided to us by her which was awesome and uh i remember doing another another like it was like an a and e live question answer thing or something like that years later where she sent flowers to us and stuff so she's wow awesome yeah she's one of the greats is that an intimate and interactive it was like that but it was on it was on a and e in the states but i think it was their version of an intimate

and interactive a and e in the states is where every single day i watched an episode of law and order for years and years and years and years yeah see. See, it used to be A&E stood for arts and entertainment, so they still had some arts and entertainment. But now it's like cops and cops. It's all whatever that PD Live now, and it's offshoots. And that brings back bad memories for you, so we won't...

The thing is, I can't stop watching that stuff. I got to say, for my money, no one beats Briscoe and Logan. Man, those are my years of Law & Order. I agree. Lenny Briscoe's the greatest. And I'm a fan of Ben Stone, the DA. Stone, yeah. But McCoy was good, too. But you're right.

Those early years where you got Ben Stone and then you got Briscoe and Logan on the cop side, man, that was the best. Law and order. I still watch every episode of SVU as it comes out though. My wife has to leave the room because it's so dumb. It's like, I don't know, I'm just eating

junk food that it's totally comforting. And that's the iced tea one, right? Iced tea's on that show. Yeah. Iced tea is definitely on that. So original gangsta, from an original gangster to a sweetheart. Thank you, Stephen Page, for your time today. I thoroughly enjoyed this.

Thanks for doing it. Me too. Thanks, Mike. And that brings us to the end of our 631st show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike. Steven is at Steven Page. Steven's with a V, not a PH.

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See you all next week. I want to take a streetcar downtown Read Andrew Miller and wander around This podcast has been produced by TMDS and accelerated by Rome Phone. Rome Phone brings you the most reliable virtual phone service to run your business and protect your home number from unwanted calls. Visit RomePhone.ca to get started.