Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - The Strange Saga of 'Hey Joe' and Popular Music's History of Violence: Toronto Mike'd Podcast Episode 1816

Episode Date: December 11, 2025

In this 1816th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with Jason Schneider about his book "That Gun In Your Hand: The Strange Saga of 'Hey Joe' and Popular Music's History of Violence". Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, Nick Ainis, RetroFestive.ca and RecycleMyElectronics.ca. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at [e-mail].

This is Jason Schneider, author of the new book, That Gun in Your Hand, The Strange Saga of Hey Joe and Popular Music's History of Violence, and I'm really happy to be back here on Toronto Miked. Welcome to episode 1,816 of Toronto Miked, proudly brought to you by RetroFestive.C.A., Canada's pop culture and Christmas store. Save 10% with the promo code FOTM for a limited time. Great Lakes Brewery, order online at Great Lakesbeer.com for free local home delivery in the GT Palma Pasta, enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. Visit palmapasta.com for more. Nickaini's, he's the host of Building Toronto Skyline and Building Success, two podcasts from Fusion Corp that you ought to listen to. Recyclemyelectronics.c.a.committing to our planet's future means progress.

Properly Recycling our electronics of the past. And Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. Today, making his return to Toronto Mike, it's Jason Schneider. Welcome back, Jason. Hey, Mike. It's pledged you to be back.

Well, you know, I counted you in for that cold open. And for a split second, I thought you maybe forgot your name. Like, there was a moment you were tripping on Jason. Thank you, right? Like when you hear it back, you'll be like, yeah, like, there's a moment. I'm like, what's my name again? I blame the cold. I blame the cold.

It is cold, right? So let's timestamp this thing, which is it's Thursday, December 11th, 2025. And this is like a legit cold day. You made the long trek from Guelph and we're what, minus 15 of a windshield or something like that? It's about that, yeah, yeah. But, you know, nice and sunny. So you got to take the good with the bad today. You take the good.

You take the bad. you take them both and there you have. Tell the listenership who haven't seen the photo we're going to take by the Toronto Tree after this great chat about your latest book. Tell the listenership about your t-shirt. Who's on your t-shirt there? Well, just for you today, I wore.

It's a t-shirt commemorating the great 1980s CBC TV show Seeing Things, starring Louis Del Grande. How this came to be was really, there's a guy in Kitchener who started making custom t-shirts using all kinds of classic CBC symbols and things like that. And I just happened to suggest to him, I think it would be great to do a seeing things t-shirts. So he made one for me. Okay, I love it so much.

You know your audience, right? You're like, oh, Toronto Mike will love this. And I told you before I press record that your homework, maybe on the drive back to Guelph, is you're going to listen to Ashley McIsaac making his Toronto Mike debut because he tells this bizarre story of like buying an old convent from Louis Del Grande. Oh, it wasn't just a house. It was a convent. Yeah, like it was some, so now there's like.

Well, that raises all kinds of other questions. Well, listen to me, your next book, and I don't know if you have an idea for your next book, we're going to talk about the latest book, but your next book should be about Ashley McIsaac and possibly about him buying Louis Del Grande's convent in Nova Scotia. All right. Well, if you can hook me up with them, we'll see what we can do. Consider it done. So I want to remind the listenership who you are.

You've been over a few times. And then we're really going to get into it, man. I loved your new book. Let me just shout at it again. It's called That Gun in Your Hand, the Strange Saga of Hey Joe and Popular Music's History of Violence. So I loaded up a bunch of songs. I got questions. We're not going to read the book, obviously.

Like, this is a great book. So congrats. I loved it. Thank you. Thank you very much. Yeah. Was it written like Cust, said this is just like this t-shirt. This book is for Toronto Mike.

Well, I wasn't thinking of you specifically. But I think there is a type of dude who would definitely enjoy reading this book. The Cam Gordons of the world, the Michael Barclays of the world. old, and I bring up Michael on purpose, because people should remember that you co-wrote have not being the same with Michael. That's correct. That was... That's a great book, too.

Thank you. Yeah, that was the first book I had published. Yeah, with Michael and Ian Jack. That was, yeah, the first edition was 2001, so it's been a while. Are you going to do anything for the 25th anniversary? That's a good question. really thought about it. We did do a 10th anniversary updated edition. So, yeah, we'll keep that in mind. Something to consider. But the last time, I believe this is the last time you visited, it was,

was it with Art Bergman? Is that the last time it was? Yeah, that was the last time he was in town to play at the horseshoe. I saw him at that gig. Yes, we were there, yeah. Yeah. And I mean, I'll tell you at a moment, I'll remind the listenership that you wrote the longest suicide, the authorized biography of Art Bergman. So that was the most recent book before this went on Hey Joe, right? Correct. Yeah. Yeah, Art's book came out in 2023.

So, yeah. May I share with you now? I don't think this will even shock you. But that in-person episode of Art Bergman, because you had helped arrange to Zoom prior to that, but the in-person episode of Art Bergman, one of my favorite episodes of Toronto Mike of all time. Yes.

I, yeah, I remember you saying, yeah, art, true, art, he, he mentioned, he mentioned that's, mentions that to me frequently as well, yeah. Does he, because I didn't know that. Like, so I always wondered, does it, because art does a million things? Does art remember that at all? Like, does he have any fond memories of chatting me up in my South Atobico basement? Oh, sure. Yeah, no, he, he, he told me he had a great time down here and it was a great interview. So, yeah, he's, he's back out in Vancouver right now, doing well.

Yeah, I follow him on social media, and he seems to be doing fine. Yeah, no word yet on any new music, but, you know, there's, there's rumblings. So, yeah, as soon as I hear anything, I'll be sharing it with people. Well, speaking of rumblings, I had on Alan Zweig fairly recently. It might have been last month. And Alan Zweig teased a future film involving Art Brighman. Yeah, that's correct, too, yeah. I don't know what's, he put that in the public domain.

So I feel like we should anticipate some kind of an Alan Zweig documentary of sorts about art. Well, I guess, I guess... Time to make the announcement, Jason. Well, no, I'm not going to say anything official, but I will say that I did meet with Alan probably around the same time. He was here. And, yeah, we had a filmed chat. So I'm not sure if I'm going to be in the movie.

But, yeah, there's definitely something happening. happening. Something is brewing. And I know Alan likes to remind me. Art said something very kind to me. He said something and I hope, I don't think I'm paraphrasing even. You might know better than I do, but something like, he did say that was like his episode of me was, he said, my favorite interview of all time. And then my assumption is he says that to everybody who interviews him. But Swig doesn't think that's the case. But I do remember in the chat, we were, I was playing a song he wrote about his wife who passed away. correct yeah and I remember so I you were here right so he kind of rolled off into the against the wall do you remember this like he left the table and kind of and he turned his head to me and I guess he it was obviously affecting him remembering his wife who had passed away suddenly and far too soon and I just remember that was like a first for this show where somebody needed to kind of leave and spend some time alone but I mean he could have had as much space as he wanted and whatever, like I was just, uh, wondering like, oh, maybe I shouldn't be doing this. Like,

am I, uh, triggering him somehow? Like, am I, uh, I didn't know. But it all worked out in the end, but it was such a, uh, roller coaster of emotions in this chat I had with art. And I just want to say thank you for making that happen. Yeah. Well, it's, um, I mean, if art, I don't know if art's listening, I doubt he is right now. But once this is posted, uh, you know, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll make sure that he gets the good wishes. Well, yeah, let our know. And I love to show at the horseshoe. Yes, yeah.

That was fantastic. Jeez, okay, you didn't know this was another 90 minutes on Art Bergman. No. No, but it's, yeah, it's, well, that's a great thing about your show. I mean, there's, as far as I know, there's no time limit, so. So we're going to set us up here. Again, I have a lot of music and we're going to cover a lot of ground. But I guess my first big question here before I play the first.

song here. I loaded a bunch of music up. This is going to be really cool. Yeah. And you're not going to get in trouble in any YouTube copyright trouble with this. Okay. All right. Like I will. Yeah. I will. I will. I will. I absolutely will. And I don't care. All right. That's what I'm going to do. And don't wait because the overwhelming majority of people who listen will hear it on the podcast, regardless of what YouTube's up to. But what made you write a book about Hey Joe? well it really kind of goes back to um the first time i played my dad's copy of uh jimmy hendricks's are you experienced when i was about 10 years old and uh it was one of those moments that um you know hopefully all of us get to experience when we're young of just putting on a record and just time standing still you know for 45 minutes or whatever and and hey joe when that came on was one of those

songs that just uh just got to me and um and from that point on as i you know my musical range expanded i would see you know different versions of hey joe pop up by different artists and uh and you know looking at the credits um all of them seem to have different songwriting credits which kind of got got me intrigued mysterious right you're like this is mysterious yeah it's like okay who actually wrote this song. Oh, and also, I'm going to, can I guess something that happened to me, that you assumed at first, I assumed at first, having heard the same album in the same song and loving it,

I assumed it was a Jimmy Hendrick song. Well, yeah, yeah, I mean, that's... It all depends on how old you are. For sure. I mean, that's an easy, easy assumption to make. But yeah, but looking, you know, looking at the credits to already experienced, it says, hey, Joe was written by a guy named Billy Roberts.

So, you know, as time went on, I, you know, expected at some point i would find some information about billy roberts but in this pre-internet age you know there was nothing there's no information about him anywhere yeah like that's not a name you know unlike you know all along the watch tower it's like oh i know the guy who wrote this song yeah you know we all know the original of this song but who the hell is billy roberts yeah yeah exactly and um and you know the the the most prominent thing about it was he never actually officially recorded hey Joe himself so there's no official recording of him doing it anywhere so yeah so as just time went on and you know i would think about this periodically you know who is this guy um yeah

it really kind of set me off on this um mission i guess just to find out who he was and uh uncover some of the mystery so after the art bergman book which was also great like was it just that oh this is something I've been noodling for decades now. I need to get this out. I need to find out who who the hell is Billy Roberts and what is the deal with this song? Um, yeah, I was a little bit like that. Um, mainly just trying to, you know, find a publisher who would be interested in letting me do this. And, you know, thankfully, um, I worked with, uh, Anvil Press from Vancouver on arts book. And, um, once that came out, I pitched the, the, the, Hey Joe idea to them. And, um, yeah, they were open to it.

So that gave me, you know, I'd already done a lot of, you know, work on the manuscript and a lot of interviews. And, you know, that gave me another year and a bit to finish it. And, yeah, it was a great experience. Okay, firstly, my apologies to you. I just realized, I think I said you were from Guelph. Did I say you came from Guelph? Yeah, well, no, well, I did live in Guelph for quite a while.

Because you came from Kitchener, right? Yeah, Kitchener's where I'm back, back in my hometown. So you did at some point live in Guelph? Yeah, I did, yes. Did you ever drive here from Guelph? I'm sure I did, yeah. Okay, okay. Only because I feel like I don't even remember what I said before I press record,

except I feel like I said you had made the trek from Guelph, and I just want to correct the official public record here because in the future, when somebody writes a book about you, they're going to hear me say that you came from Guelph, and they're going to say, this was unusual. I've got to look into this. But you came from Kitchener, so there's my apologies. And also because I'm about to play the first song

and we're going to kind of, I have questions and we're going to walk through some of this. But again, all FOTMs listening right now, if they want like a, if you're into like music history, just cool stories, like that gun in your hand was a great read. Like it's kind of like I was just reading it, all these fun facts and these mind blows and who the hell is Billy Roberts

and finding out more about him and all this. And I have loaded up for later a recording, somebody actually made of Billy in Vancouver which we're going to hear that you talk about in your book all this stuff it's called that gun in your hand the strange saga of Hey Joe and popular music's history of violence so much ground I got to cover with so much music but I want to let you pop that

pun intended it's called hop pop from Great Lakes Brewery Ooh nice Now that is the coffee flavored hop pop So I know a lot of listeners they are into the hop pop There's no alcohol in the hot pop. That's the coffee-flavored. I need a review.

Troy Birch was here earlier today, and he tells me it's amazing. How is it? Well, I can honestly say I've never had anything like this before. Yeah, it's like, yeah, coffee-flavored soda. Like hoppy, like that's so it's, there's no alcohol in there. But okay, you can buy this at Great Lakes. So I want to just say, I am sending you home back to Kitchener, not Goelph, back to kitchener with some fresh craft beer from Great Lakes Brewery.

Awesome. That's yours, buddy. Thank you, Mike. And I'm also sending you home. I feel like I need to have a drum roll or something, but I have in my freezer upstairs a large beef lasagna, courtesy of palma pasta. You're going to be eating well, my friend.

It's worth the trip. It's worth the drive to South Atobico? Yes, absolutely. The old hide house is gone, right? That's what I heard, yeah. I heard, because I actually had my mom's aunt. What is that, a great aunt? I had a great aunt who lived, basically, she took care of the priest in Acton.

So she would live with the priest and giant St. Bernard. There's a whole book we could write about this, actually. But I used to go to Acton on the reg, and the old Hyde House was like a big deal in Acton. It was worth the drive. Well, I know you did the Consumers Distributing episode this week, so maybe an old hidehouse deep dive is... I need somebody who worked at the old hidehouse to be my special guest. that consumer's distributing app is going to win me a Pulitzer. It's amazing.

I hope so. It's like somebody who is it? Somebody pointed out it's like since the Enron documentary and you learned about, you know, what's it called? The smartest people in the room. Yeah. That Enron dock and the mind blows and you can't believe it. The corruption and everything.

That, this is the next one, man. This consumers distributing deep dive I did. I urge everybody to pause this. Go listen to that and get your asses back here. Okay. So I have a measuring. tape for you from Ridley Funeral Home. Okay.

I have some advice for you, which is to go to recycle my electronics.coma to find out where you can drop off your old electronics, old cables, old devices, so they could be properly recycled. And we can keep the chemicals out of our landfill. So that's a pro tip for you. Love it. And a thank you to Nick Ieini's from Fusion Corp. He will actually be here tomorrow morning and we're going to have a chat. But he stepped up to help fuel the real talk.

We're talking cutting checks here. you know how hard it is to fuel your passion projects with great people like Nikainis, and I want to say thank you to Nick in person. I'll save that for tomorrow. But here we go. The first song on our guided tour of some of these highlights that I noted here. And Jason doesn't know what I'm going to play. Throughout history, surprising him.

There have been many songs written about the eternal triangle. This next one tells the story of a Mr. Grayson, a beautiful woman, and a condemned man named Tom Dooley. When the sun rises tomorrow, Tom Dooley must hang. Hang down your head, Tom Dooley, hang down your head and cry. Hang down your head, tom, duly, poor boy, you're bound to die. I met her on the mountain. There I took her lie. Met her on the mountain.

Stabbed her with my knife? Stabbed her with my knife? He said that what's great. Please, who are we listening to here, Jason? Well, I'm assuming it's the Kingston trio. Yes, this was a, if people can believe it, this was a big hit. Number one. It was the number one hit in the 1950s, yeah.

So I had this, I had these golden oldies, and all these cassettes, and it had Tom Dooley. I was pretty young. I was really into, like, 50s and early 60s, like gold and all these stuff. And I loved this song, but I don't think I ever stopped to consider what it was about. But it's unbelievable that this song is about Tom, duly it's about a murder yeah yeah yeah and um yeah that's kind of where i i i wanted to take the story of hey joe is to bring it back to the uh you know the murder ballads of the um early 20th century um you know back to really the beginnings of recorded music you know these

were the songs that were among the first music to be recorded in america America, so, yeah. America's got a very violent history. Yes. Well, yes. I don't think we need to, uh, to, uh, we can still see that today, actually. Uh, you know, they all got, yeah, absolutely, uh, Mike. Well, what, I, yeah, well, I mean, this, a slight digression, but I don't know if you caught

any of the new, that new Ken Burns documentary on the American Revolution, but. Not yet, but I do enjoy my Ken Burns. But, man, the, the violence in that was just. Unbelievable. I mean, the thought of even, like, living during that period is just incredible that people survive from day to day. Well, every once in a while, there'll be a, you know, historical discussion on the differences between Canadians and Americans. And it all comes back to the history and a couple of obvious facts, which is one, we literally, I guess we went to the queen, Queen Victoria, I believe it was, I don't know, but we went to the queen and just said, please, ma'am, may we be independent now? And then she signs a document. Like, that's our history.

And theirs is the bloody revolutionary war where they, you know what I mean? So right there and that, okay, that's different. And then the other thing to consider is the, what's the bloodiest war in U.S. history? Probably the civil war. Yeah. You know, so America versus America, we have no, you know, we had a referendum or whatever, you know what I mean? Like, so the, you know, the fact that Americans are so adamant that they have the right to bear arms and everything, you know, the British are going to show up and try to take the. back and we got to be ready to defend ourselves like we no wonder our cultures are so radically

different yeah and that's um i mean i don't really get too deep into that and into the book but i mean no we're writing your next book right now but yeah i mean you know the the post civil war ever era when uh you know western expansion really got underway uh you know the genocide of native peoples um you know we can go on and on you can go on and on so you're telling me and And it's in your book, of course. But this Kingston trio, Tom Dooley, is an example of a song about violence. Yeah. But that not only is a piece of popular music, but goes to number one on the Billboard charts.

Yeah, correct. And, well, yeah, I should probably just add to that it is purportedly based on a true story of an actual murder. And, you know, that, you know, one of the connections I draw with a lot of, these songs is that, you know, during that period in the early 20th century, a lot of these songs serve the same role as kind of, you know, true crime podcast do today, you know, people have always had a fascination with these sorts of crimes. And, you know, one of the main ways they heard about them was through, was through records. So, yeah. Can I play another big number one hit for you? Absolutely.

The night was clear and the moon was yellow and the leaves came tumbling down. I was standing on the corner when I heard my bulldog park. He was barking at the two men who were gambling

in the dark. It was Stagherly and Billy, two men who gambolet. Slagullied through seven, Billy swore that he threw eight. Slagallie, told Billy, I can't let you go with that. You've won all my money and my brand new, Stux and had. Staggerly, Staggerly

Went home Staggerly Who the hell was Staggerly? Yeah, again Evidently a real-life character The late 1800s in St. Louis He was a pimp, basically, and part of a network of

Underworld characters back then And, you know, the legend goes, as the song, you know, lays out, he was in a saloon one night talking to an associate named Billy Lyons. They got into an argument, and Billy grabbed Staggers Stets and Hat, Staggers shot him. Who would have thought all these number one jams that have a good, you know, you could dance to this, it's got a good beat going on here. I feel like Dick Clark here, happy New Year's everybody. Yeah, well, this version by Lloyd Price. I mean, it came, you know, many years after a lot of other early kind of, well, this really kind of became a New Orleans standard in the early, early century. And it was written basically in the immediate aftermath of the crime.

A lot of these saloon piano players in St. Louis, they would just make up these songs based on current events. And, yeah, that was the case with Staggerly. well that was our social media back then exactly yeah all right now we're going to get closer to Billy Roberts and of course in the version everybody hears first which is Jimmy Hendricks we're going to get closer

but here again Jason has no idea what songs I'm going to play here so he gets to find out when you find out here we go baby what you're going to do in town Baby what you're gonna do in town I'm gonna sit in a bar when the feet tucked in drinking all the beer and whiskey and gin out

I'm looking at the young man always hanging round Looking at the young man always hanging round What you're going to do in town? Baby, what you're going to do in town? I'm going to talk to those young men very soon all tonight till tomorrow noon and tell him how my man he puts me down Tell him how my mind he really puts me down.

Baby please don't go to town Baby please don't go to town Baby please don't go to town Because when you're flirting I'm full of gin One of those boys is gonna do you in And your man he won't be around These songs are so short, I can just play the whole damn thing here. Because I didn't know that song.

I didn't know of that song until your book. Yeah, most people didn't even, yeah, I didn't really. And I'm really glad you played that. Yeah, that was an artist named Niela Miller. And the song, that's one of her original songs called, baby please don't go to town and um yeah this is kind of where you know the story of hey joe i mean there's there's a lot of confusion you know right off the bat with it um because billy roberts um once he uh came to grenad he was really originally from south carolina and he came

to greenwich village um at in at the start of 1960 um almost exactly one year before Bob Dylan came from from Minnesota and yeah he was a folk singer and wanted to check out the scene in Greenwich Village which was you know kind of the center of folk

music at that time and he met Niela and they moved in together and her song if you know people with close you know close years could could hear

of the chord progression, the lyrical structure. It bears a lot of similarities to, Hey Joe. So in your book, when you mention you basically, they're dating, they're living together. And this song, we should be very clear, this song that by Niela Miller predates Hey Joe, right? And so without a doubt, there's similarities and inspiration there, but no songwriting credit ever is given to Niela Miller. no and well the reason for that partly is um at that point in time in the in the folk music scene most of the artists especially in grange village they really adhered to you know the concept of

the oral folk tradition where songs were just free for anybody and you know if if if you happen to write a song that somebody else felt you know was good enough to perform you know that was considered a badge of honor nobody really put any thought into uh copywriting anything or or even even making records you know one of the great interviews i did in the book was with uh the late um richy havens who uh like he came right out and said it that nobody at that time even wanted to make records i was considered a hassle so um so yeah so the you know the the the whole argument of well did billy robert steal hey joe from the yellow a song. Yeah, sure, there's definitely similarities, but, you know, that was a time when that was

just common practice. Absolutely. Now, let's talk a little more about Billy Roberts. So you mentioned Billy Roberts, a folk singer playing in New York. Now, you point this out in your book. In 1964, the Driftwood Singers, which consisted of Billy Roberts, who we're going to talk quite a bit about here now. Lynn Shepard and Steve LaLore, they came from Seattle and played the bunkhouse coffee house and the Ark Coffee House in Vancouver. So there's a little Canadian connection here.

And then in 1965, Billy Roberts played a solo gig at the Ark and a guy named Doug Geisman. Yeah, I believe that's how you pronounce. Let's go of Geisman. Okay, so Doug Geiseman, he records a bunch. Like, he, this is in the 60s, everybody. He records 13 songs by

you know, Billy, including the jam that inspired your book, Hey Joe. And I have, like I didn't do anything special, I found it on YouTube, but I uncovered, I digitized this cassette tape, but we have that recording. Maybe now is a good time to actually listen to the recording of Hey Joe. Yeah, I'll just preface it by saying that, yeah, by the time this recording has made, Billy had made, you know, a couple demos of it. Um, but most crucially, um, on his way out west, he'd spent some time in the Washington, D.C. folk music scene. And while he was there, um, it just struck him one day to go to the library of Congress and copy, actually copyright,

Hey, Joe. So, um, so, so by this time, I mean, the, um, the, um, the whole ownership, uh, confusion hadn't been sorted out yet, but Billy did have, you know, a copyright on the song by the time. But you say, so these demos were never released though, right? Like, we don't have, we don't have a studio version of Billy Roberts saying, Hey Joe, right? No. Like, this is this the best we have? Um, yeah. I mean, there's, there's a couple other of his demos floating around on YouTube, but this recording that Doug Geisman made is by far the, the best quality. And of course, uh, this is Vancouver, BC. This was recorded there. in March

1965. So let's just listen to Billy Roberts singing Hey Joe, and then we can get back to some of the confusion that you helped iron out here.

Joe, where are you going with that money in your hand? Hey, Joe, where are you going with that money in your hand? Chasing my woman, she ran off with another man. Going downtown and buy me a 44. Going downtown by me a 44 I get through That woman she won't run no more Hey Joe

What are you gonna do gonna do take my pistol and kill her before I'm through It's interesting If you only know the Jimmy Hendrix cover Of Hey Joe This version sounds a lot more

Like the Neillam Miller song Don't Go To Town Yeah, yeah, exactly And yeah, it's great again to hear these back to back, I mean, you can definitely hear the similarities. But, I mean, again, so much detail, so many great stories. We really learn about this mysterious figure, but did Billy Roberts, did he write Hey Joe? He did, yeah.

I mean, as the song exists, as we know it, he did. But as you can hear, you know, through his version, they're, you know, lyrical chant you know he was pretty free with the lyrics um but um where the story kind of takes a turn around this period was uh there was another guy who billy knew in new york who went by the name of dino valenti and um he was actually a much more colorful character than than billy was and you know a lot probably a lot more influential on a lot of artists during that period So, yeah, Billy and Dino became friends, and naturally they would swap songs, and Dino began playing Hey Joe himself, doing his own versions of it. And sometime in 1963, I believe, a young kid, folk singer from L.A. happened to stop by New York, a kid named David Crosby, and he became close friends with Dino, and he learned Hey Joe through Dino.

Brought it back to L.A., began playing it in his folk performances. And in no time, he had formed a band called The Birds. And I think we're going to hear the Birds version right now. I'm going to find me blue steel 44. I'm going to go down down, going to find me blue steel 44. When I find my woman, she's not going to run anymore. Hey, Joe, I hear you shot your woman, dear. Hey Joe, I hear you shot your woman dead.

Yes, did you know, I've found them both in the same damn bad. And David Crosby had to convince the other members of the birds to cover this, right? Like, this was like a Crosby's insistence. Yeah, I mean, it wasn't the, kind of song that you know naturally fit into what the other members wanted to do roger mcguin jean clark being the other principal you know members so but um at the same time you know by all accounts this was one of the birds most popular early live numbers you know you can almost hear from the beat you know you can picture the the the teeny boppers dancing to it on shindig or whatever but uh um but

Yeah, but they were, the birds actually weren't the first band to record it. It was just prior to them. There was another L.A. band called The Leaves, who have the honor of actually being the first band to record it. Oh, we're going to flow right into it. Did you go, why are you going with that gun in your hand? I said, hey, Joe, why you're going to find my woman now? She's been running around with some other man.

Did a piss off Crosby that the leaves snuck in the back? door and I yeah it's a good question I would imagine it probably you know perturbed him slightly but but yeah the incredible thing is

you know after you know the leaves version came out Hey Joe became just this phenomenon within the LA scene it seemed like every band in LA had to had to record the song and nobody knew who wrote it

so you know some versions credit Dino Valenti, he actually signed a publishing deal in order to raise money to get himself out of prison on a drug charge. And that finally led to Billy Roberts realizing that, hey, maybe I'd better, you know, do some business here and make sure that I get credit for this song. So, yeah, so during this period of, you know, 18 months maybe between 1965, in 1966, literally dozens of versions of Hey Joe came out by garage bands all across America.

Who wrote the foreword for your book? An amazing guy named Lenny Kay, who a lot of people will know as Patty Smith's longtime collaborator and guitarist. But he also is, he's probably the first garage rock aficionado. He's famous for putting together the original Nuggets compilation for, Electra Records in the early 70s and, yeah, getting him to, to contribute to the book was just a dream come true. I think it's a dream come true for me to be playing these jams and talking to you about this fascinating song.

Yeah, this is fun, man. You're on the, you're on the, you're on the, you got the mix happening. Absolutely. I'm going to play a different 60s cover in a moment and ask you about that because you covered it in your book. But I, well, actually, I'm going to do it right now. Why not? It's my show.

I can do what I want. You can't stop me. Where are you going with that money in your hand? I'm going to go downtown by blue steel 44. I'm going to go downtown by blue steel 44. Hey, Joe. See, where you go with that gun in your hand? Hey, Joe, where you go with that gun in your hand?

I'm going to shoot my woman. I caught it with another man. See, now I can hear Hendrix's version. Yes. Yeah, we're getting closer now. So this is a version by a guy named Tim Rose, and this is where the story really takes a completely unexpected turn. Because while all these garage rock versions are being recorded on the West Coast, Tim Rose was on the East Coast, and he claimed that he had never heard any other version of it until he heard another of his Greenwich, Village compadres play the song for him. And he just, you know, took it upon himself to create his own arrangement for it. And as you can hear, yeah, he definitely made it a lot bluesier.

And, yeah, this became the version that really most directly influenced Jimmy Hendrix. So do we know how Jimmy comes to hear Tim Rose's cover? of Hey Joe? Yeah, yeah, we do. And it's, it's another, you know, mind-boggling kind of... Well, your book's full of mind-boggling shit, Jason. So we're giving people like a taste, and then they got to get this book for the music fan in their life.

Okay, okay, well, let me set the scene then. So it's, it's the summer of 1966. Okay, I'm there. Yeah, Jimmy Hendricks is in New York and playing around Greenwich Village. He's just made the final decision not to back up. R&B artists anymore, which is what he'd been doing for the past few years, playing with people like Little Richard and Wilson Pickett and stuff like that. So, you know, he's really set on doing his own thing. He's getting gigs around the village. And one night, he's playing in a club

and a woman named Linda Keith, who was a British model. And at the time was the girlfriend of Keith Richards. Yeah, we have to make sure we get Linda Keith and Keith Richards completely separated. Although at the time, it was Keith Richard. True. Okay, yeah. It's only because I just watched the Gimme Shelter. Yeah, that's right.

That's a whole other story. But anyway, the Rolling Stones are on tour, and Linda Keith is in New York doing some modeling work and waiting for the tour to be over. And she sees Jimmy Hendricks playing in this club, and as anyone would, she immediately falls in love with them. Of course. And, you know, just sort of sets about trying to do whatever she can to, you know, give him a break.

Oddly enough, no one in the Stones camp is really interested in helping out. But then she bumps into another of her, you know, British connections, a guy named Chas Chandler, who is the base player in the animals. and he was in And they know how to cover a traditional song Yes, yeah, absolutely And they were Yeah, they were on tour at the same time

And Chaz told Linda that he was He'd already informed the band He was intending to leave He wanted to move into doing record production And management And he said specifically that He wanted to find someone Who could cover Tim Rose's version of Hey Joe

because he was convinced it would be a hit in England. So when Linda Keith heard this, her immediate reaction was, well, have I got a guy for you? Yeah. And she wasn't kidding. She wasn't kidding. So, yeah.

So Linda Keith connects Hendricks with not only with, Hey Joe, but with that specific version that we just listen to. That's right. Yeah. And yeah, so the story that Chas Chandler always told was, you know, after Linda Keith told him to, you know, he had to go see Jimmy at the Cafe Wah on such and such a day, that, you know, as soon as he, as soon as Chas walked into the

club, the first song he heard Jimmy do was, hey, Joe. Now, whether, you know, Linda specifically orchestrated all that, I'm working under the assumption that she did because at the time, you know, Jimmy had no money, he couldn't buy records or anything like that so um you know my my theory that i'm pretty confident in saying is that you know linda told jimmy about chas's scheme and said okay you got to learn this song hey joe and make sure you play it as soon as you see him walk in the club so that's what happened and chas was immediately sold and uh yeah in just a matter of weeks um you know he brought jimmy back to england with them. Um, they'd formed a new band, uh, the experience and they were in the studio recording

Hey Joe, which was Jimmy's first, uh, time singing in a professional studio. Oh, geez. Like, give me, give me another copy of this book and I'm going to read it again. My goodness, there's so much ground to cover here. Uh, very soon. I feel like we made, we made the listenership wait almost, uh, 50 minutes before we played some of Jimmy Hendrix's Hey Joe, which everybody's pretty much. I'd say safe to say everybody's first exposure to Hey Joe is through Jimmy Hendricks. But now, you know what? Let's do it now. I feel like, why drag it out?

So we won't play the whole thing because Jimmy's version goes about three and a half minutes. But I guess before I press play on this, I'm curious because I've heard the song a million times in my life. I love Hey Joe by Jimmy Hendrix. But like, so he's got his gun and he's going to go shoot his old lady because he caught her messing around of another man. but like we don't know he murders her right like there's no there's nothing in the song to say there's a body or whatever right well technically no yeah i mean like i mean it's kind of open in the sense that he's got intent to kill and he's gonna go take it but we don't know he kills her yeah all we have is well well we do have his word he he does tell his friend you know his friend asked him

you know i'm gonna shoot my old lady yeah and and uh you know he he basically joe basically does admit the crime in the song. So then, you know, the question becomes, well, then where are you going to go? And Joe's answers down to Mexico. Okay, yeah. So he's got a plan. And this narrator of Hey, Joe, is this bystander, right? So somebody who's kind of who bumps into the guy who's going to do the killing.

That's right. I love, I see, I'm going to play Jimmy. I'm going to chat a little more. But I have other songs. So some of them you mentioned. some of them you didn't, but just some other like murderous jams that we all kind of love. Like I kind of like this

idea. In fact, like I do this monthly toast thing. I think a good topic for toast would be like, killer jams. I just got to check and see, maybe I've done this before. It's possible I've done it before. But I kind of like this idea of like murderous jams or something like that. But here is the big

one. Hey Joe, where you're going with that gun in your hand? Hey Joe, I said where you're going with that gun at your hand. I'm going out to shoot my old lady. You know I caught a mess around with another man Yeah I'm going down to shoot my old lady You know I caught a mess around with another man

I'm ready to fool Hey Joe I heard you shot your woman down You shot her down now Hey, Joe I heard you shot your lady down And shot her down to the ground Yeah

Yes I did Oh yeah, he's admitted it right here Okay Okay So yes I shodder Okay That's a confession He's adamant

You know, I've got my own lady That's around town And I gave her the gun I shot! I shot! What a great song. Yeah, it really is. I mean, you know, it's...

Well, the amazing thing about it, I mean, structurally, you know, the core progression is this thing known as the circle of fifths, which, you know, people who, you know, know, know, basically blues songs have folk songs that have three chords but the way and again i tie this back to neella miller's

song because she used the circle of fifths it you know adding those two extra chords it really adds this whole new dimension where you know the whole song never seems to resolve itself it just kind of keeps repeating over and over and also the fact that it doesn't have a chorus like you know you just have to sort of roll with the story and that i i feel just draws the listener in. And it's a great true crime story, which we know from the podcasting world is always, I'm just always hot, but yeah. And then, yeah, where are you going? Yeah, I'm going to Mexico. Okay. Geez. Oh, and that baseline, that goes back to the Leaves version, the baseline. So Jimmy really

He really kind of Combined the Tim Rose version And the BLA version In a brilliant way Absolutely Am I right That the UK version of this album Doesn't include Hey Joe

No no because it was It was released as a single originally And then back then You know That was kind of the policy In the UK where, you know, bands would release singles and then, you know, the album would just kind of be like an afterthought.

So, yeah, it didn't appear on the UK, are you experienced? Okay, it was sure on the version I had. Yeah, yeah, that was the, yeah, the U.S. version that came out later in 1967. Okay, so we finally got to Hendricks, but now just really, I'm not going to do it, just like 20 seconds of the Billy Roberts and then 20 seconds of Neila Miller. Just so you can hear this compare. One last time here.

Hey, Joe, where are you going with that money in your hand? Yeah, yeah, I always thought so true. We're going to Another few seconds We're going to fade it down Chasing my woman She ran off with another man So keep in mind

This man, Billy Roberts Who writes this great song That would eventually Be covered by Jimmy Hendrix He was living with The woman who wrote this song I'm I'm no music

I'm no musicologist Okay Jason you know this And again If you only know the Jimmy Hendrix version You could be like Oh yeah I can see some similarities Some commonalities But when you play the Billy Roberts version

And the Neil Miller version of her song don't go to town here. Too close for comfort. Yeah, I would say so. But part of the story again is that, you know, this was an era really before, you know, singer-songwriters realized the importance of publishing, song publishing.

And, you know, Bob Dylan really changed the game with all of that. You know, once he really began making an issue, impact and having other people cover his songs, you know, that's when people started realizing, oh, okay, this is how you make money. You write songs and get other people to cover them. But Billy Roberts has your book, you know, your book has got information on Billy Roberts that didn't exist in the public realm until now. No, no.

And that's something I'm really proud of. And I really wanted to, yeah, find as much, you know. Like he's so obscure. Yeah, yeah. exactly and yeah i ended up finding going back to like south carolina census data from the 1930s just to confirm his parents his birthplace and you know where his parents worked and all that yeah it was uh it was a great adventure absolutely so you know learn things about billy roberts we simply didn't know he's obscure singer like where did that come from yeah he wrote hey joe it's

like where did that come from and uh your book ties it all nicely together do you think about me just playing some some other songs yeah well i guess we've really kind of covered well now that i didn't want like i didn't want to read the book because there's so much in the book and it's so rich but i thought like give a little arras to some of the mysteries and some of the what's fascinating about this song yeah well it's yeah well i kind of structured the book you know in in in two parts and you know the first part we've basically covered now which is you know starting of murder ballads and then bringing it up to to jimmy and then And, you know, the second half of the book really talks is everything kind of post Jimmy where, you know, how, how Hey Joe had this really incredible afterlife of so many other diverse artists covering it right up until, you know, the past decade.

Well, yeah, okay, absolutely. Some great covers out there. Some of them I pull, but this, these won't be covers of Hey Joe so much as different murder, murder songs. So I pulled this song, which this woman only. needs one name to introduce her, but this woman did cover Hey Joe, and it's pretty bad. Like, it's not a good cover of Hey Joe, but this is a different song. Who I actually, it's funny, because yesterday I was walking with my wife, and she said something, she was in these new boots. She's got for winter, and she said, these boots aren't made for walking, is what she said. And then I

said, oh, I said, Nancy Sinatra does a great cover of bang, bang, my baby shot me down, because it's in Kill Bill, for God's sakes. That's right, yeah. And it's amazing. But let me play this. I was 5 and he was 6. We rode on horses made of sticks. He wore black, and I wore white,

He would always win the fight Bang Bang He shot me down Bang bang I hit the ground Bang bang That all poor sign Bang bang My baby shot me down

He shot me down seasons came and changed the time and i grew up i called him mine he would always laugh and say remember when we used to play bang bang i shut you down bang bang you hit the ground bang bang you hit the ground bang bang bang that all Okay, so Cher, this is obviously bang bang my baby shot me down. I prefer the Nancy Sinatra actually. But the cover of Cher's cover of Hey Joe might be the highest charting version of that song. Yeah, I'd have to double check that. But it's no good. Well, yeah, she recorded it after Jimmy's became popular.

So, yeah, I didn't really get to. too deep into shares version because yeah it's it's there's nothing really it's flat right yeah there's nothing really you know spectacular about it but yeah but but the fact that you know her as a as a woman you know recorded the song right that that sort of set a new uh set a new standard for it her uh hairstylist in the early 70s and through a in too much of the 70s is a gentleman who's been on the show named gary chowen oh yeah i don't know him but yeah i don't know him but yeah i I think I remember seeing that. Okay, Gary Chowen,

Cutting Share's hair. This guy, this guy, I saw him this summer. I love this guy. I got to play this jam. Sit with me while we do nine and a half minutes of this summer. You don't mind, right? You got nothing better to do you. Well, yeah, I mean, you know.

This is obviously one of my favorites. You want to talk it up and hit the post? Well, we might, you know, we might just last until the first verse, maybe, but... Yeah. Be on my side or be on your side, baby. There is no reason for you to hide. It's so hard for me staying here all alone. when you could be

taking me for a ride she could drag me over the rainbow but send me away town by the river I shone my baby Down by the river Dear Yeah

And yeah So this came out So, yeah Down by the River came out in 1969 And by this time You know America again It's, you know

Waves of violence just, you know, around the nation, riots, race riots, you know, anti-war protests, all kinds of, you know, various, you know, terrorist activities. You know, this was a violent period in America. So this rise in, you know, songs dealing with gun violence, it was a thing. And, yeah. Yeah, well, he also sang. Ohio.

Yeah. The Kent State. Four day in Ohio. And I think this is true because I've always been told this is true and you're going to devastate me now by telling me this is an urban legend. But he wrote this in Cinnamon Girl

while he was feverish with the flu or something. You've heard this, right? Yeah, no, I think he wrote that in the liner notes to decades. So Cinnamon Girl and down by the river. And I think Cowgirl and the Sand, I think all three of those. He wrote, yeah, I think he wrote them all on the same day while he was... What a fever.

That is the best fever in the history of rock music, right? Yeah, I would stick that claim, yeah. Wow. Okay, Neil, we know you guys six and a half minutes more to go, but I want to get to another legend, if you don't mind. I shop the sheriff, but I didn't shoot the captain's here. Oh, no.

I shot the sheriff, but I didn't shoot the deputy. Ooh, who, woo. Yeah. All around in my hometown, they're trying to track me down, yeah. They say they want to bring me in guilty for the killing of a deputy. for the life of my deputy I love it's like I didn't kill that deputy. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, what I found interesting I didn't know about that apparently Bob's original intention for the song was to actually say that he killed a cop. And he was advised that, you know, maybe being that specific is probably not a good idea. So let's make it a sheriff. That's not really something that, you know,

that's more cowboy days. I just say, I watch Duke's a Hazard, okay? It's not Cowboy Days. It was happening in Hazard County. Roscoe Pete Coltrane Now I'm just trying to picture Bob Marley on the Dukes of Hazard

That's not a pretty picture Anyway Well Bob doesn't pass till 1980s So it's possible he watched the Dukes of Hazards I guess it's possible Yeah It's possible So okay

Shout out to Eric Clapton We'll keep the Bob Marley version If that's okay But so you got Bob Marley Are you telling me Bob Marley not a cop killer Is that what you're telling me?

Uh, well, no, I, I, I, I just think he was, he was advised not to specifically say that he killed a cop, but, uh, but no, I mean, this, this is the chapter. Yeah, I, um, I do. This record is dedicated to some personal friends of mine. Oh, thank you. The LAPD. For every cop that does ever take an advantage of somebody, beat them down or hurt them, because they got long hair, listen to the wrong kind of music. wrong color whatever they thought was the reason to do it for every one of those fucking police I'd like to take a pig out here in this parking lot

and shoot them in their motherfucking face I do not endorse that message I do not and I want to be specifically clearer but I but I do write about you know kind of this

evolution I guess from from you know the outlaw aesthetic in reggae and how that kind of led into um you know the the gangster rap phenomenon in the 1980s well you spend some time of iced tea am i right that ice tea also has a cover of hey joe yeah yeah it was his metal band uh body count they've they yeah they recorded it well this is body count right yeah yeah they they recorded hey joe for uh jimmy hendricks tribute album called uh stone free but i'm glad we cut we spend some time in your book talking about iced tea because, of course, he has the song Colors from the movie Colors.

Yeah. And then what I remember, six in the morning. Yeah. And then I remember on the original gangster album, I was a big ice tea head, okay? So I owned all these discs. But I remember he had a song called Midnight, which was like a sequel to Six in the Morning, Midnight Chilling. And it had that, it had a Led Zeppelin. No, Black Sabbath.

The song Black Sabbath by Black Sabbath was like sampled in the background. And it was really heavy and dark and cool, but not that I condone this violence either, Jason. You know that. It's just art. I'm just listening to art, not Art Bergman, but Ice-T. But this song, Cop Killer, you and I remember the media hype around the fact

that Ice-T's body can't release Cop-Killer. Yeah, yeah. And I think, again, this was a turning point in, in sort of how music was sort of perceived as the influence again on on society you know taking this step to actually make a statement about

you know killing police officers is you know no one had ever done anything close to that before so yeah it's what's that Jason oh no that's not Jason fuck the police fuck the police

fuck the police yeah That aforementioned album, original gangster, I think it was called. Definitely had OG original gangster on it. But that album, I used to dig it. But at the end of that, he kind of introduces Body Count. He had a song called Body Count by his new punk, thrash, whatever metal band. Yeah, I think they debuted on the first Lola Palooza tour, if I'm not mistaken.

Yeah, I didn't see that one But I remember, yeah Exhibition Stadium Wow And of course Ice Tea Would record the original gangster song For the movie

No, what was the movie? He played a cop in the movie Way before Law & Order stuff Yeah Okay, now you're putting me on the spot Well now because that's embarrassing So I have to go now quickly to No, New Jack City

It just hit my head I didn't Google it, but it came on top of my head. So he recorded the song, New Jack City, New Jack Hustler. New New Jack Hustler. So he had that jam from the criminals perspective or whatever. But in that movie, he plays a cop. And that sort of sets the ground for the fact that this guy who sings cop killer right now in the background, he's going to play a cop on Law & Order for like 20 years.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there you go, Jason. You can write a book about that. Okay, this is one more, not covered in your book, but this is a song from like the, I guess the mid-90s that I always liked. I've always been kind of into the 90s alt-rock, but I always like this song.

I'll let us start now because it's, you know, we'll let ice tea wrap up there. So I'll let a brew in the background. Oh. Make up your mind. Do you know the song? Let's give it a moment here. Around the late tonight, around the late tonight, by my side.

I'm not going to lie I'll not be a gentleman Behind the boathouse I'll show you my dark secret Bring it down for a moment to say that I always liked it Because I think I like these darker songs with these darker themes Yeah, well, I've got to admit I'm drawing a blank on this song.

Okay, so I'm going to help you out with that. So this is a band called The Toadies. Oh, okay. And this is their big jam, Pawsome Kingdom, which tells this story over the next few minutes in great detail, and I might turn it up again at the end. But a serial killer in some place called Pawsome Kingdom, like rapes as victims.

It's really, like, dark and criminal. But you can dance to it. You can dance to it. It's a heavy, cool track with, you know, terribly dark themes, but sort of in line with the spirit of, hey Joe. Yeah, no, it's, I can't deny that for sure. I'm going to say 94 is when, you know, and it would be played on CF and Y at the time,

102.1, the edge. And, yeah, you can, you can dance to it. So we're going to play this. Do you have any idea what your next book is about? well funny you should ask um i i have also recently had my second novel published um which is called the city knows this is fiction it yeah that novels are fiction i'm an english major from you of t okay i was just wondering if you knew that right no but yeah this was actually something i've been working on for i started about 20 years ago and um

Wow. Yeah, and just going through many, many drafts. And I was fortunate to hook up with a publisher in San Francisco last year who became interested in the story. And we finally whipped it into shape. And yeah, yeah, it's called The City Knows. It's published by Montague Press. And I, yeah, this is only kind of still recently, so I'll be. talking more about it in the new year, but thank you.

You're multi-talented, not just telling these true stories, but you can tell a creative... Yeah, but I guess to further answer your question, you know, doing all this stuff with the Hey Joe book, it has gotten me more interested in crime fiction, and I think that might be something I might... Oh, maybe your next book's about Possum Kingdom, because this is a true story apparently.

Okay, yeah. I'll have to look into that. I like this part here. Hold on, yeah. Nice and dark. Nice and dark. Do you want to die, do you want to die? Do you want to die?

Do you want to die? I promise you I would treat you well, my sweet angel. So help me, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Thank you for letting me finish that song, because I was digging it. Well, I could tell. You have to let me dig it. I dig that song. So your book is called That Gun in Your Hand,

The Strange Saga of Hey Joe and Popular Music's History of Violence. How would you like somebody to pick this up if they're going to pick it up for the music fan in their life this holiday season? Well, it's published by Anvil Press in Vancouver, so you can order it directly through them on their website. And I'll link to that website on the permalink on Toronto Mike.com. I'll make sure I link to that. And, yeah, if you prefer Amazon, you can get it from there. And if you have a great bookstore in your community, you can always ask them for it,

and they can get it for you. Okay. And we're going to close with Hey Joe, a cover. I want to play some of it. And I want your honest review of this cover. Okay. I feel like you're now the definitive expert when it comes to Hey Joe covers. Well, I hope I am.

Okay, well, let's listen to this one. Heyo Where are you going with that gun in your hand? Hey Joe, I said where you're going with that gun in your hand. I'm going down to shoot my old lady. Are you know I caught her messing round with a woman. Are you familiar of this cover? Absolutely.

Well, the last chapter of the book is kind of dedicated to, um, kind of dedicated to, um, Well, Nick Cave's version and this version by Charlotte Gainsburg in collaboration with Beck, which sort of became the perfect way to sort of tie up the whole story. She recorded this for a film called, she starred in called Nymphomaniac by Lars von Trier. And, yeah, part of the stipulation of, you know, the stipulation of, of her being, you know, starting in the movie. Her character is named Joe and Lars von Trier actually, he insisted that she recorded,

record the song for the soundtrack. So, yeah, it, you know, I, it's, you know, the movie, it's, it's a little too, you know, complicated to. His movies are like that. Yeah. Was it Bjork was in, this, I know this director and these are some wild movies, yeah? Yeah, but I think what makes it interesting, again, having Charlotte Gainsburg sing it flips the story on its head, having a woman be the killer, and, you know, which is part of what the movie's based on as well.

But yeah, this actually, you know, I tried to, you know, in this last chapter, the book, expand the range of the story to show how. you know, this was part of, you know, women kind of taking back the power and, you know, a lot of the, you know, revenge, you know, female revenge fantasy, you know, waves started happening around that time. And, you know, we could see that, you know, Tarantino's Kill Bill, he's re-releasing that, the girl at the dragon tattoo, all kinds of other examples. So, yeah, Hey Joe sort of morphed into, you know, something that women could take part in as well. Love it, love it, love it. And so what is your final, you know, review of this cover?

My final review. Yeah, like, you don't have to give it like out of ten stars or whatever, but what do you think of this cover? Oh, oh, Charlotte's version specifically. Oh, yeah. I mean, it's definitely in my top five. Yeah, it's... Do you have a top five? Could you ring off the top five?

Yeah, yeah, I could actually. Well, you know, Jimmy's version aside, I think my favorites would be Lee Moses's version. Great Southern Soul version recorded in the early 70s. Patty Smith's version, that's essential. this version by Charlotte for sure and then one when I was maybe

expecting you to play was one of the last versions I kind of stumbled upon it was by this Japanese band called the Golden Cups and they were they were the house band in a bar

on a U.S. Army base in Japan in the mid-60s so they learned all of Their repertoire through Armed Forces Radio, and their version of Hey Joe is just, it's bonkers. It is at the right speed. Going downtown, going by my gun, dear. Going downtown, going by my gun, dude. Hey, Joe, we're going to go to your hand now.

Hey, Joe, Joe, Joe, now we go to your hand. We're going to shoot the sky while he's been floating my girlfriend now. The Golden Cups. Yeah. Yeah. I think that was actually the name of the bar, so they just, they just use that as their name as well. The Golden Cup and then the Golden Cups. Well, Jason, I love this very much. Like, this was a thrill for me. Yeah, no, thanks, Mike. No, this was a blast. I mean, just getting to play the songs, just to, you know, give people, you know, better understanding of what this is all about. Yeah, that's fantastic.

The book is so rich and dense and full of fun facts and mind blows and, you know, learn more about Billy there. And I urge people to pick up your book and I love it and I can't wait to talk about your next book. Before we do our official goodbyes, though, I want to remind the listenership that it is the holiday season. Okay, this is December 11th here. And retrofestive.ca is where you can go for not just pop culture stuff, but Christmas stuff. They have a store in Oakville. and tomorrow is, and I hope I get this right, December 12th, but spelling 12th with the word elf in it,

they have like a whole bunch of activities and stuff planned. Like a, I guess an elf, as you know, they eat like pasta with maple syrup and all this stuff. Like they're going to have a contest with that. But there's a whack of cool stuff planned for December 12, which is tomorrow, at least if you're listening in the day, I drop this thing. So go to retrofestive.ca to learn more about that.

This is real cool stuff happening there. And if you want to save 10% on anything Elf related and beyond, in addition to the discounts that they're going to have for December 12th, you can use the promo code FOTM and save 10%. But we love Ty the Christmas guy, his family, and everything happening at retro festive in Oakville. I just wanted to give you that pro tip, Jason. Love it. Yep. It's, uh, yeah, 12th, 12th with elf.

Yeah, so you just get a spell it. Yeah, it's brilliant. And, uh, time is wasting. morrow, so go find out more. Do you have a favorite Christmas movie? Oh, Christmas movie? Oh, man. I guess I'll go with... That's a tough one for you.

Maybe I'll just go as Scrooge with Bill Murray. That one always kind of... Can't go wrong with that. It's great. I saw the week after I saw the naked gun in theaters, and I feel like that worked against it. Like, when I watch it now, I enjoy it more than I did at the time, because I was rolling in the aisles for the naked gun the week before and Scrooge was funny but it didn't have that roll in the aisles thing

that I experienced with the naked gun. I thought you were going to ask me what my favorite Christmas song was. What is your favorite Christmas song? Well, I hope I'll impress you by saying the Skydiggers version of Good King Wenselessless. Well, you say it better than I say it because I did just kick that out on toast. Oh, great. With Rob Proust and Bob Willett. I did that last week. Nice. One of my favorite Christmas songs. And I love a, a Skydiggers Christmas show. Yeah, yeah. It's, yeah, they do the season well.

They do it up well. Well, thank you. Everybody, pick up Jason's new book. He's not going back to Guelph. He's going back to Kitchener. Do not confuse those two fine Canadian cities. Don't leave about your lasagna from Palma pasta and make sure we get our photo

and you have to show us Louis Del Grande on the T-shirt there. Absolutely. And that. Subdivision. You know, that's Mark Daly in Russia's subdivisions. He knows Jason's nodding. And that brings us to the end of our 1,816th show. Go to Torontomike.com for all your Toronto mic needs

and much love to all who made this possible. That is retrofestive.ca. Great Lakes Brewery, don't forget your beer. Palma pasta. I got your lasagna. Nick Aini's. I'll see you tomorrow, Nick. Recycle my Electronics.ca.

and Redley Funeral Home. Don't miss the most recent episode of Life's Undertaking with Brad Jones. He made a big announcement regarding his personal health and I think it's... I'm glad he's sharing. So you can learn about that

in the most recent episode. See you all tomorrow with Nick Aienis. Bye for now. Thank you.