WEBVTT - Gordon Lightfoot - Summer Staff Picks 0:00:00.440 --> 0:00:03.560 This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the 0:00:03.680 --> 0:00:07.800 Thing from My Heart Radio. We're nearing the end of 0:00:07.880 --> 0:00:11.760 our summer Staff Picks series. Over the last few weeks, 0:00:12.039 --> 0:00:15.040 you've heard from the staff as they showcase their favorite 0:00:15.040 --> 0:00:19.080 episodes from our archives. Now it's time to hear mine. 0:00:19.760 --> 0:00:21.880 I wanted to share with you an episode from one 0:00:21.920 --> 0:00:24.560 of the kindest people I've met in the making of 0:00:24.680 --> 0:00:30.960 this podcast, musician Gordon Lightfoot. My conversation with the Canadian 0:00:31.040 --> 0:00:34.960 singer songwriter of the nineteen seventies hits If You Could 0:00:34.960 --> 0:00:38.640 Read My Mind, Beautiful Sundown, and The Wreck of the 0:00:38.760 --> 0:00:43.000 Edmund Fitzgerald covers his beginnings in the industry, what changed 0:00:43.080 --> 0:00:46.080 in importance to him over time, and his battle with 0:00:46.159 --> 0:00:51.440 some serious health issues. Here's my two thousand sixteen conversation 0:00:51.800 --> 0:01:17.360 with Gordon Lightfoot. At times, I just don't know how 0:01:17.520 --> 0:01:23.200 you could feel anything but beautiful. Over the course of 0:01:23.200 --> 0:01:26.760 a career that has lasted more than fifty years, Canadian 0:01:26.920 --> 0:01:30.840 singer songwriter Gordon Lightfoot has achieved a global stardom and 0:01:31.040 --> 0:01:39.160 exceptional influence. Bob Dylan's a fan. About Lightfoot's songs, Dylan said, 0:01:39.520 --> 0:01:42.680 I can't think of any I don't like. These songs, 0:01:42.680 --> 0:01:46.200 which include Beautiful, the Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, If 0:01:46.240 --> 0:01:48.960 You Could Read My Mind, and many others, have been 0:01:48.960 --> 0:01:53.320 treasured by generations of popular musicians and listeners around the world. 0:01:54.600 --> 0:01:57.760 Many people know about the folk music revival that brought 0:01:57.840 --> 0:02:00.560 Bob Dylan to New York in the early nineteen sixties, 0:02:01.120 --> 0:02:04.320 but north of the border there was an equivalent explosion 0:02:04.360 --> 0:02:07.320 of talent at that time, and Lightfoot, who got his 0:02:07.360 --> 0:02:11.440 start singing in boys choirs, found himself heading to Canada's 0:02:11.480 --> 0:02:15.880 cultural capital to try his luck. Beautiful Well, I was 0:02:15.960 --> 0:02:18.200 down in the in Toronto here looking for work, and 0:02:18.240 --> 0:02:21.760 I got a job as a coral performer and in 0:02:21.800 --> 0:02:26.400 a television series that was on every week. And at 0:02:26.400 --> 0:02:29.120 the same time I branched out and began working in 0:02:29.160 --> 0:02:34.840 the folk uh oriented places, because the the folk revival 0:02:34.919 --> 0:02:39.160 had occurred around about nineteen sixty and I would have 0:02:39.200 --> 0:02:43.239 been maybe twenty twenty years old there about one and 0:02:43.480 --> 0:02:46.160 uh so I'd be working on the TV show in 0:02:46.200 --> 0:02:48.640 the daytime and going and working at the coffee houses 0:02:48.680 --> 0:02:52.160 at night. You know, you had a period we wrote 0:02:52.200 --> 0:02:56.440 jingles for commercials. Correct I tried, they locked me in 0:02:56.520 --> 0:02:59.200 a room. One time, a manager in a place on 0:02:59.320 --> 0:03:03.280 Madison Avenue just left me there all afternoon. That go well, 0:03:03.320 --> 0:03:07.680 I wrote the commercial, but they didn't like it. They 0:03:07.720 --> 0:03:10.440 didn't play your version of the commercial. But you didn't, 0:03:10.480 --> 0:03:13.040 didn't You weren't in New York for a long time? Correct? Well, 0:03:13.080 --> 0:03:14.720 I would go back and forth in New York all 0:03:14.760 --> 0:03:18.440 the time. My management company was in New York. I 0:03:18.520 --> 0:03:20.920 was one of the fortunate ones who was able to 0:03:20.960 --> 0:03:25.440 acquire a management situation south of the border, so to speak, 0:03:25.480 --> 0:03:27.400 down in the States, and that was in New York, 0:03:27.520 --> 0:03:33.320 and it was a great manager. He recognized my songwriting 0:03:33.360 --> 0:03:36.480 ability immediately, and uh, I got a couple of tunes 0:03:36.600 --> 0:03:40.200 recorded by Peter, Paul and Mary and one of them 0:03:40.240 --> 0:03:42.720 went up to number five on the Which on Board 0:03:42.840 --> 0:03:49.160 chart for for loving me. That's what you get full 0:03:49.240 --> 0:04:01.960 loving me, that's what you get everything as you see, 0:04:04.200 --> 0:04:11.000 that's well you get me. And so I was introduced 0:04:11.000 --> 0:04:13.520 to the industry in the States really as a songwriter 0:04:13.680 --> 0:04:16.320 before they even knew that I sang, you know it was. 0:04:17.720 --> 0:04:20.680 It sort of happened on its own. Do you think 0:04:20.680 --> 0:04:22.120 it would have been Do you think you would have 0:04:22.160 --> 0:04:24.920 been happy to just stay in that place and just 0:04:25.000 --> 0:04:28.800 produce records and write music and was performing the goal 0:04:28.880 --> 0:04:32.040 all along? Did you want were you aching to do that? Oh? Yeah, yeah, 0:04:32.040 --> 0:04:35.359 I wanted to even as a child, you know, I 0:04:35.400 --> 0:04:40.040 didn't mind singing in my grandmother's house and the Sunday 0:04:40.120 --> 0:04:42.479 get together, you know that they would single me out 0:04:42.520 --> 0:04:46.720 and I would solo. I enjoyed the feel of the 0:04:47.120 --> 0:04:51.839 communication that I and I can feel it then, and uh, 0:04:52.320 --> 0:04:54.080 that's what I feel now. I feel I feel a 0:04:54.120 --> 0:04:57.359 communication when I haven't wonder if a band and we 0:04:57.400 --> 0:05:00.680 have a great repertoire and we we just lay the 0:05:00.720 --> 0:05:03.960 stuff right out there for them, just pure joy. Yeah, 0:05:04.720 --> 0:05:07.800 joy doing that. But when when you were take care 0:05:07.800 --> 0:05:11.360 of if it pays the bills, that's a that's a 0:05:11.400 --> 0:05:16.400 desirable silver lining there benefit. Yeah, all that hard work, well, 0:05:16.400 --> 0:05:19.320 but when you were writing, when you turn that corner 0:05:19.600 --> 0:05:23.080 and singing takes over. You know, I was doing that 0:05:23.279 --> 0:05:25.599 like like small time stuff, and all of a sudden 0:05:25.680 --> 0:05:30.200 I was asked to come to New York and open 0:05:30.320 --> 0:05:37.440 for Paul Butterfield concert sixty six thereabouts. I suppose you 0:05:37.480 --> 0:05:40.880 won the radio then recording. No, we didn't actually get 0:05:40.920 --> 0:05:43.520 on the radio until about seventy one and what was 0:05:43.560 --> 0:05:45.320 the first song that? I mean, I have a list here, 0:05:45.320 --> 0:05:46.800 but what was it? If you could read my mind? 0:05:46.839 --> 0:05:51.400 If you could read my mind, you know that Google 0:05:51.640 --> 0:06:02.040 was just beating I be as long as you can't see. 0:06:03.960 --> 0:06:06.000 The record was out. It was my first album on 0:06:06.160 --> 0:06:10.279 Warner Brothers. And uh it was out for eight months 0:06:10.279 --> 0:06:12.320 and there was no single, and all of a sudden, 0:06:13.440 --> 0:06:17.159 rather promotion, guys said to his girlfriend, we listen to 0:06:17.200 --> 0:06:20.040 this and come back and give me an opinion. On 0:06:20.160 --> 0:06:23.200 Monday morning, his girlfriend she likes, if you could read 0:06:23.240 --> 0:06:27.720 my mind, where are the heart? He's gone? The hero 0:06:28.400 --> 0:06:37.840 would be baby hero. Often you won't read that book 0:06:38.800 --> 0:06:44.440 because the just if you could read my mind hits 0:06:44.480 --> 0:06:47.080 the charts, so to speak, It becomes a big hit 0:06:47.160 --> 0:06:49.960 for you. What changes for you? Like did you just 0:06:50.000 --> 0:06:53.360 have to sit there and say, oh, I people are 0:06:53.400 --> 0:06:55.400 telling you to do things differently and now you're gonna 0:06:55.400 --> 0:06:57.520 be a success and they want you to we get 0:06:57.560 --> 0:07:00.839 so basically we got to hire an aircraft. Literally, that's 0:07:00.839 --> 0:07:03.400 what happened. We had to hire an aircraft. Everyone wants 0:07:03.400 --> 0:07:06.800 to book the same give in the same place, two 0:07:06.800 --> 0:07:11.680 different places in one day. So and when you reached 0:07:11.720 --> 0:07:13.880 that point of the and then that turning point is 0:07:13.920 --> 0:07:16.040 the is the next imperative. You've gotta start coming up 0:07:16.040 --> 0:07:19.800 with more songs and writing more songs. Oh yeah, record, Yeah. 0:07:20.600 --> 0:07:24.000 We made three more albums and nothing happened, but we 0:07:24.120 --> 0:07:27.320 but I kept doing one a year and and something 0:07:27.400 --> 0:07:30.680 had to give eventually, and then, Uh, one summer I 0:07:30.720 --> 0:07:34.400 wrote that song Sundown. I knew that it was it 0:07:34.480 --> 0:07:36.760 was going to happen, that it was, it was the 0:07:36.880 --> 0:07:39.320 right thing, and it did. When we're up to number one. 0:07:39.360 --> 0:07:42.840 That was our second one. Then it was almost seven 0:07:42.840 --> 0:07:44.600 two albums later that we had the wreck of the 0:07:44.640 --> 0:07:49.360 Evan and Fitzgerald. And that happened all by itself too 0:07:49.840 --> 0:07:55.360 that that became a responsibility. It did very large responsibility. 0:07:55.400 --> 0:07:58.720 The song became a responsible Fitzgerald. But but tell me 0:07:58.760 --> 0:08:01.080 in your own words. Many bowl go on about that, 0:08:01.120 --> 0:08:03.720 about the tragedy and the history, and it's a very 0:08:04.040 --> 0:08:07.680 important song to people, you know, Canadian history. People talk 0:08:07.720 --> 0:08:10.240 about it very reverentially. Why was it important to you? 0:08:12.120 --> 0:08:17.960 Because it was only one verse, uh, contained any conjecture 0:08:18.000 --> 0:08:19.920 of any kind, and the rest of it was taken 0:08:20.000 --> 0:08:24.520 from directly from newspaper articles and the aftermath, which only 0:08:24.600 --> 0:08:27.160 lasted for about three days. If I had not wrote 0:08:27.200 --> 0:08:31.520 that song, everybody would have forgotten about it a week 0:08:31.600 --> 0:08:38.160 after it happened. Uh, I said, people are all around 0:08:38.200 --> 0:08:40.959 the Great Lakes area are going to wonder if this 0:08:41.080 --> 0:08:45.280 song is appropriate. And some did wonder about it, whether 0:08:45.320 --> 0:08:47.760 it was appropriate for me to have written a song 0:08:47.920 --> 0:08:53.200 that kind. But I had gone, uh, pretty much with 0:08:53.360 --> 0:08:56.040 the newspaper articles that I scraped up. We had no 0:08:56.160 --> 0:08:59.679 CPS in those days, and you went back that, you 0:08:59.760 --> 0:09:02.160 went to the publisher and got the back copies of 0:09:02.240 --> 0:09:07.760 the newspapers. And uh, so it's it's accurate. It's it's 0:09:07.880 --> 0:09:12.720 it's accurate in the way the story unfolds. I remember 0:09:12.760 --> 0:09:14.600 the night I wrote it. I was working in a 0:09:14.760 --> 0:09:17.600 deserted house and there was there was a heck of 0:09:17.640 --> 0:09:20.960 a windstorm going on right in Toronto that night, and 0:09:21.040 --> 0:09:24.720 I remember myself wondering, G, I wonder what it's like 0:09:24.840 --> 0:09:26.920 up on the on the Great Lakes right now, because 0:09:26.920 --> 0:09:29.000 I sailed up there myself. I had a couple of 0:09:29.080 --> 0:09:33.600 two different sailboats up there, and wondered always, I wonder 0:09:33.679 --> 0:09:35.960 what the Great Lakes are like tonight? Because you're always 0:09:35.960 --> 0:09:39.280 hearing but what things happening up in the Great Lakes, 0:09:39.280 --> 0:09:42.600 And eleven o'clock in the evening, there was a report 0:09:42.640 --> 0:09:46.599 of a ship sinking three hours earlier in Lake Superior. 0:09:47.200 --> 0:09:51.360 And they're out looking for the people and they never 0:09:51.400 --> 0:09:56.520 found any of them, and uh, twenty nine people gone. 0:09:56.559 --> 0:09:59.040 And I had a melody and I had some cords 0:10:00.320 --> 0:10:04.400 that I was knocking around in this deserted house with 0:10:04.480 --> 0:10:09.840 the wind howling outside my Really, it was kind of 0:10:09.920 --> 0:10:12.880 kind of a classic sitting to to write a song 0:10:13.000 --> 0:10:16.240 like that. So I began writing the song and finished 0:10:16.240 --> 0:10:19.280 writing like two or three weeks later. We were right 0:10:19.280 --> 0:10:22.480 in the middle of a recording, a series of recording 0:10:22.559 --> 0:10:24.840 sessions at the times that we put it in and 0:10:25.280 --> 0:10:28.080 didn't work the first day, we put it in the 0:10:28.120 --> 0:10:33.080 second day, and uh, did you ever stomp? And Tom Connors? No, 0:10:34.200 --> 0:10:36.720 I will. Now I'm gonna run down and get all 0:10:36.760 --> 0:10:39.040 of stomping Tom Connor he was recording. He was one 0:10:39.040 --> 0:10:43.680 of very, very famous Canadian folk artists. Stomping Tom Connor's 0:10:44.040 --> 0:10:47.800 Poaches hit and so that sounds like a hit. He 0:10:47.960 --> 0:10:51.839 just heard the the melody going like, he didn't heard 0:10:51.880 --> 0:10:54.760 the lyrics or anything. So that the appeal of the 0:10:54.800 --> 0:10:57.199 song is definitely in the melody and the chord changes, 0:10:57.920 --> 0:11:00.679 and then the story of the actually vent itself. I 0:11:00.760 --> 0:11:05.000 got as accurately as I could by pursuing old news articles. 0:11:07.679 --> 0:11:11.160 The wind and the wires made the tattle tale sound, 0:11:11.480 --> 0:11:18.680 and the wave rope over the really and every man you, 0:11:18.960 --> 0:11:22.520 as the captain did to was the witch should love 0:11:22.400 --> 0:11:30.000 and stealing the don came late in the breakfast, had 0:11:30.040 --> 0:11:35.760 the week when the girls in November, came slashing in afternoon, 0:11:35.960 --> 0:11:39.559 came at the squeezing rain in the face of a 0:11:39.720 --> 0:11:51.920 hurricane west wind. We'll have more with Gordon Lightfoot after 0:11:51.960 --> 0:12:02.880 the break I'm a mic Baldwin and this is here's 0:12:02.920 --> 0:12:06.199 the thing. I spoke with musician Gordon Lightfoot in two 0:12:06.240 --> 0:12:11.040 thousand sixteen. I was curious how his musicianship had changed 0:12:11.160 --> 0:12:13.880 over time and what it was like for him recording 0:12:14.160 --> 0:12:18.400 and performing in the early days. The first time I 0:12:18.480 --> 0:12:23.400 started doing it, I felt and like, not confident in 0:12:23.480 --> 0:12:26.320 what I was doing. What I was hearing, I didn't. 0:12:27.320 --> 0:12:30.640 I didn't like what I was hearing of your own stuff. Yeah, 0:12:30.840 --> 0:12:33.840 I like the sound of the sound of my voice 0:12:34.040 --> 0:12:37.320 bothered me. And and you know I I started working 0:12:37.320 --> 0:12:39.280 on that stuff and I and I've been working on 0:12:39.360 --> 0:12:43.200 it ever since on my vocal and I have worked 0:12:43.200 --> 0:12:47.240 on my my antonation on my instruments. Someone told me 0:12:47.280 --> 0:12:49.400 that that when you land, because you perform in so 0:12:49.440 --> 0:12:52.680 many different areas, you really dwell on tuning your instruments 0:12:52.720 --> 0:12:56.080 a lot. Correct. Yeah, sometimes I changed it around too, 0:12:56.080 --> 0:12:59.680 but but but I've learned through the years that there 0:12:59.840 --> 0:13:03.080 is a method that you can get me into into 0:13:03.160 --> 0:13:06.040 Scarborough fair Country, you know, like the like the sound 0:13:06.080 --> 0:13:09.360 that Simon and Garfunkel used to get on there acoustic 0:13:11.559 --> 0:13:15.800 orchestral ranges that they put together for their songs, and 0:13:17.360 --> 0:13:21.080 actually only came it came real for me maybe six 0:13:21.160 --> 0:13:24.880 or seven years ago after I was recovering from a 0:13:24.960 --> 0:13:27.040 mini stroke that I had and I had to practice 0:13:27.080 --> 0:13:29.920 a lot more all of a sudden. So it really 0:13:29.960 --> 0:13:33.080 got me zero in on it. And it it all 0:13:33.080 --> 0:13:36.240 comes down to the fifth and the octaves. You know, 0:13:36.440 --> 0:13:39.120 just leave it at that. I'm just a handmaid in 0:13:39.200 --> 0:13:42.400 here for all you guitar people out there. That's Gordon 0:13:42.520 --> 0:13:44.959 Lightfoot's gift to you and his present to you. That's 0:13:45.000 --> 0:13:48.079 the fifth and the octaves. And I don't have one, damn. 0:13:49.200 --> 0:13:51.120 The fifth and the I don't know what the hell 0:13:51.160 --> 0:13:54.319 he's talking about, but there it is. There's his message 0:13:54.360 --> 0:13:57.760 to you today. Open McCartney told me when I spoke 0:13:57.800 --> 0:14:00.560 to him once. Paul told me that he said, in 0:14:00.600 --> 0:14:03.599 the beginning they would go into a recording studio of 0:14:03.640 --> 0:14:06.640 the Beatles, and he said, you know, it was really 0:14:06.960 --> 0:14:08.840 these weren't his words, but the message was kind of 0:14:08.880 --> 0:14:11.200 like time is money. He said, these guys were luck. 0:14:11.240 --> 0:14:13.480 You know, we want two songs in the morning, and 0:14:13.480 --> 0:14:14.959 then you go have a lunch break and get down 0:14:15.000 --> 0:14:16.360 to the pub and you have a cigarette, you have 0:14:16.440 --> 0:14:18.199 a pufficient chips or wherever you come back. They want 0:14:18.200 --> 0:14:20.520 two songs. And later they really moved along at a 0:14:20.560 --> 0:14:25.000 clip when they were doing the first albums for Parlophone 0:14:25.080 --> 0:14:27.080 or whoever it was, or E. M. I. And then 0:14:27.080 --> 0:14:29.520 when they became, you know, the success they obviously became, 0:14:29.640 --> 0:14:31.520 then they would take a year, you know, all musicians, 0:14:31.520 --> 0:14:33.320 and then they would take a year to do their 0:14:33.320 --> 0:14:36.120 next album. You know, they would do Sergeant Pepper's or whatever. 0:14:36.160 --> 0:14:40.280 One really really luxuriate and getting every time. They gave 0:14:40.320 --> 0:14:43.120 them more time because it was worth it was worth 0:14:43.400 --> 0:14:45.440 that investment for them. Was the same true with you 0:14:45.480 --> 0:14:47.600 do you find that the more successful you became, the 0:14:47.640 --> 0:14:50.640 more time you wanted to make music. Perhaps later on, 0:14:50.760 --> 0:14:54.160 but I I pretty much stuck to the to the 0:14:54.200 --> 0:14:56.880 schedule as much as I could. We made like eight 0:14:56.960 --> 0:15:01.760 or nine albums and ten years there, so you didn't 0:15:01.760 --> 0:15:05.280 feel rushed by them. No, we were getting more time. 0:15:05.840 --> 0:15:08.880 But but I was also also improving because what I 0:15:08.920 --> 0:15:11.560 didn't like hearing I was I was changing all the time, 0:15:12.120 --> 0:15:16.240 and it was always an improvement venture. Like a guy 0:15:16.320 --> 0:15:19.840 building himself up and for play on an important sports team, 0:15:19.880 --> 0:15:22.800 you know they got it. This just not just the game, 0:15:22.880 --> 0:15:27.280 it's the preparation. Say you haven't played for for a 0:15:27.360 --> 0:15:29.520 month and all of a sudden you've got to get 0:15:29.520 --> 0:15:31.280 back up on stage. You should be able to crank 0:15:31.280 --> 0:15:33.360 it or just like it was just you did a 0:15:33.440 --> 0:15:38.280 show last night. But you liked rehearsing. Yeah, well you 0:15:38.320 --> 0:15:41.160 believe in rehearsing. Are you're learning new material or you're 0:15:41.200 --> 0:15:44.600 going back into the the old catalog, which we do 0:15:44.680 --> 0:15:48.240 because I have a rotational situation going on, the biggest 0:15:48.600 --> 0:15:51.720 problem my whole life been too many tunes, too many 0:15:51.760 --> 0:15:55.480 women for my listeners. Right now, Gordon Lightfoot is turning 0:15:55.800 --> 0:15:59.640 sheepishly towards his wife with a sheepish quin on his face, 0:15:59.680 --> 0:16:03.040 and she just patted his shoulder to say, it's okay, Gordon, Well, 0:16:03.080 --> 0:16:05.600 I can't step under your toes. Yeah, you can't do that. 0:16:05.760 --> 0:16:08.320 But but I remember reading I remember listening to an article. 0:16:08.720 --> 0:16:11.040 I remember reading an article that the Rolling Stones did 0:16:11.400 --> 0:16:14.000 years ago, and I was taken by how, you know, 0:16:14.080 --> 0:16:17.720 in terms of musicianship, Jagger and Keith, for two, were very, 0:16:17.840 --> 0:16:20.320 very married to rehearsal. And for you to say that 0:16:20.440 --> 0:16:22.080 as a great meaning to me. For you, someone who 0:16:22.120 --> 0:16:24.800 as great an artist as you are, that the preparation 0:16:24.880 --> 0:16:28.320 and the preparation beforehand so that when you when the 0:16:28.360 --> 0:16:31.280 audience is there, bloom, you strum that guitar and you're 0:16:31.320 --> 0:16:36.680 you're ready. You're ready. Yeah. And we we have the 0:16:36.680 --> 0:16:41.520 the orchestra itself. I have four really challenged guys and 0:16:41.640 --> 0:16:44.080 very loyal people. I read about that your band is 0:16:44.160 --> 0:16:48.280 very loyal to you. Well, I mean it's there's no 0:16:48.360 --> 0:16:53.000 reason why they should be. You know, we're all we're 0:16:53.040 --> 0:16:56.120 all the same path. I mean, we we just want 0:16:56.160 --> 0:17:00.520 to do a great job and you gotta like make 0:17:00.640 --> 0:17:02.680 almost make a science out of it. I don't know 0:17:03.560 --> 0:17:08.080 my guys are all professionals. I mean they're they're serious musicians. 0:17:08.480 --> 0:17:12.160 Yeah yeah, and they do other things. I just got 0:17:12.160 --> 0:17:16.360 to let them know what's coming up. You know, what 0:17:16.400 --> 0:17:18.400 were you listening to back then in the sixties when 0:17:18.400 --> 0:17:20.880 you were coming up, Who did you listen to? Well, 0:17:21.440 --> 0:17:24.439 I was sing country music, you know, hack snow and 0:17:24.480 --> 0:17:28.120 then folks. It was Pete Seeger and it was Bob Gibson. 0:17:28.200 --> 0:17:32.240 It was Bob Dylan and and Simon and Garfuncle and 0:17:32.400 --> 0:17:35.240 you know, Peter Paula Mary and and Ian and Sylvia. 0:17:36.400 --> 0:17:38.560 They were a duet and they were it was a 0:17:38.600 --> 0:17:44.240 beautiful act that they had. Eventually met these people, well 0:17:44.280 --> 0:17:46.879 I met, but you became one of them my management 0:17:46.920 --> 0:17:49.240 company because they were the first ever to do one 0:17:49.680 --> 0:17:53.840 do any of my songs. It was Ian and Sylphia, 0:17:54.040 --> 0:18:00.280 which one for Loving Me and Early Morning Rain. I 0:18:00.359 --> 0:18:03.119 found an opening with the Folk Revival, you know, so 0:18:03.160 --> 0:18:05.600 I was lucky to be a part of that, to 0:18:05.720 --> 0:18:10.720 ride that one through and survive. Uh, there's there's nothing 0:18:10.800 --> 0:18:15.200 much out there these days, you know, they're they're they're busking. 0:18:15.200 --> 0:18:18.439 We We've got a whole bunch of people here in 0:18:18.520 --> 0:18:22.760 Toronto who are harvering around all the time that the 0:18:22.800 --> 0:18:27.800 folk oriented artists who are songwriters and you know, trying 0:18:27.840 --> 0:18:33.479 to get somewhere, and some of some of them are 0:18:33.560 --> 0:18:35.520 succeeding in summer or not. I get to hear a 0:18:35.600 --> 0:18:39.399 lot of this stuff because it comes across my desk 0:18:39.720 --> 0:18:43.720 and I get to hear it, and you wish, you 0:18:43.760 --> 0:18:47.840 know that something grand could happen for these people, but 0:18:47.920 --> 0:18:49.919 you don't know what to do. All you're gonna do 0:18:50.000 --> 0:18:55.000 is respond encourage. Yeah, where do you think people learn 0:18:55.119 --> 0:18:58.080 to hone their craft as a musician in in in 0:18:58.160 --> 0:19:01.720 clubs and performing live? Well, I was as well as 0:19:02.000 --> 0:19:04.879 I was working in bars to you know, like bars 0:19:04.920 --> 0:19:09.760 and lounges as well as the coffeehouses, and so I 0:19:09.800 --> 0:19:15.560 had a the kind of a repertoire that was acceptable 0:19:15.600 --> 0:19:18.480 to play bars. So I got him following in a 0:19:18.520 --> 0:19:22.520 couple of these bars. Then then I've sort of moved 0:19:22.600 --> 0:19:27.639 uptown into the the village area Yorkville which was just 0:19:27.800 --> 0:19:32.280 coming into bloom here in town, and get into places 0:19:32.400 --> 0:19:36.080 like like the Purple Onion and then the Riverboat, which 0:19:36.160 --> 0:19:38.280 was really the plumb of the whole lot was the 0:19:38.359 --> 0:19:43.440 Riverboat because Bernie Feeder brought every person into that place 0:19:43.480 --> 0:19:47.200 you could fastly imagine played there from James Taylor to 0:19:47.320 --> 0:19:51.520 Joni Mitchell to to Neil Young right on down the line. 0:19:52.320 --> 0:19:56.280 Is he is he a friend of yours? Yes? He is? Yeah. 0:19:56.640 --> 0:20:00.600 Your songs and you're singing of your song, you're performing 0:20:00.600 --> 0:20:03.440 of your songs is so vulnerable and so emotional. What 0:20:03.480 --> 0:20:05.480 was the most difficult song for you to write or 0:20:05.520 --> 0:20:08.480 among the most difficult songs for you to write? I'll 0:20:08.520 --> 0:20:11.240 tell you that a lot of times you don't know 0:20:11.240 --> 0:20:14.879 what you're doing it. If you you you're drawing the 0:20:14.960 --> 0:20:19.800 material from your subconscious you don't you don't actually know 0:20:19.840 --> 0:20:23.320 what you're doing. You're you know, you're drawing it from somewhere, 0:20:23.359 --> 0:20:26.760 and then later down the line, three or four weeks later, 0:20:26.800 --> 0:20:31.720 you're gonna sign it back to uh, the actual event 0:20:31.840 --> 0:20:37.040 that product on. I mean, that's like if you could 0:20:37.040 --> 0:20:41.320 read my mind. Just it's about actually that the crumbling 0:20:41.359 --> 0:20:44.679 of a relation was that painful for you to write. No, 0:20:44.800 --> 0:20:46.480 because I didn't know what I was doing when I 0:20:46.480 --> 0:20:49.680 wrote it. It just I didn't tell me that all 0:20:49.720 --> 0:20:52.480 these beautiful folks songs that people weep when they listen to, 0:20:52.960 --> 0:20:55.000 you're just like tossing it off, like I don't really 0:20:55.040 --> 0:20:57.480 know what this is. Let's take a song for example. 0:20:57.560 --> 0:20:59.440 Let me let me pick one song and one of 0:20:59.480 --> 0:21:01.199 my favorite songs of yours. I mean a song that 0:21:01.240 --> 0:21:04.760 I just kills me. It is beautiful. Describe to me 0:21:04.880 --> 0:21:07.520 recording the song beautiful? I mean, do you go out 0:21:07.560 --> 0:21:09.760 with your friends and you get ship faced drunk and 0:21:09.800 --> 0:21:11.359 you come in with a hangover and just lay this 0:21:11.400 --> 0:21:13.600 thing down and you play poke ro all night? Or 0:21:13.600 --> 0:21:19.560 do you enter a state? First? I get a card progression, 0:21:21.359 --> 0:21:25.200 then I get a melody. It's fifth syn octaves. People, 0:21:25.640 --> 0:21:29.440 it's fifth syn octaves that I get the lyric, You 0:21:29.520 --> 0:21:31.960 got the melody, You got the cards, but you don't know. 0:21:32.080 --> 0:21:36.160 So you you draw. You find an idea that that 0:21:36.160 --> 0:21:40.399 that fits the fits the melody. That's Gordon Lightfoot, this songwriter, 0:21:40.840 --> 0:21:45.159 Gordon Lightfoot, the singer, the performer. Do you enter a state? 0:21:46.280 --> 0:21:48.600 Do you take yourself to a place when you perform 0:21:49.080 --> 0:21:54.520 your recorded music? Or you don't? Well, I can, I 0:21:54.560 --> 0:21:59.160 can use my imagination. I actually saw it as as 0:21:59.160 --> 0:22:03.320 a seer love turned to a guy for his wife 0:22:03.440 --> 0:22:08.119 or his his girlfriend. It reminds me when when I 0:22:08.200 --> 0:22:11.480 was I learned how to sing with the emotion when 0:22:11.480 --> 0:22:15.480 I was about twelve, when I was doing handling material 0:22:15.600 --> 0:22:20.800 from Handles Messiah over the voice of Him who Criss 0:22:20.840 --> 0:22:23.840 and the wilderness and all that sort of thing. And 0:22:24.160 --> 0:22:29.159 I learned what emotion meant when when I were saying 0:22:30.480 --> 0:22:35.680 handle Handles Messiah at age twelve, I sent in a competition, 0:22:37.200 --> 0:22:39.840 uh so so I could apply. It was easier for 0:22:39.840 --> 0:22:46.240 me to apply to summon up that emotional uh something 0:22:46.320 --> 0:22:48.320 or whatever it is when it came time to put 0:22:48.359 --> 0:22:51.639 that song down. But I didn't have to the point 0:22:52.080 --> 0:22:54.119 at the beginning that I wanted to have it. And 0:22:54.160 --> 0:22:56.879 that's how I've been working on all my life is 0:22:57.320 --> 0:23:03.560 getting controlling that Inhal approached her man, make any it 0:23:03.680 --> 0:23:06.399 work for me. You don't want to overdo it, you know, 0:23:06.200 --> 0:23:09.960 you don't. You know that's what's beautiful about your music 0:23:10.280 --> 0:23:12.159 as you go right up to a point. But you 0:23:12.160 --> 0:23:14.160 don't do a lot of handholding. You let the audience 0:23:14.160 --> 0:23:15.680 do the crying for you. You know what I mean, 0:23:15.720 --> 0:23:19.280 you're your We we balance it off with a lot 0:23:19.320 --> 0:23:26.200 of toech happers got lots of For a prime example 0:23:26.320 --> 0:23:29.680 of the delivery, Gordon Lightfoot does so well. You don't 0:23:29.680 --> 0:23:34.920 have to look beyond this song sundown, I can see 0:23:34.920 --> 0:23:41.320 you learned back seven Christ where you do what you 0:23:41.520 --> 0:23:55.280 don't confess your better ticket coming up. Lightfoot talks about 0:23:55.320 --> 0:23:58.760 some of his musical inspirations that explains why he and 0:23:58.840 --> 0:24:03.399 Bob Dylan can't get along right away. Explore the Here's 0:24:03.440 --> 0:24:06.560 the Thing Archives. I talked with a very different kind 0:24:06.600 --> 0:24:10.320 of songwriter, Tom York from the British rock band Radiohead. 0:24:10.680 --> 0:24:13.240 He tells me how his producer gave him the confidence 0:24:13.240 --> 0:24:19.199 to explore wild new electronics sounds. I mean I was like, um, 0:24:19.200 --> 0:24:21.119 a kid being given a hammer. I was just hamming 0:24:21.119 --> 0:24:22.840 rely on stuff. I didn't really know what I was doing, 0:24:23.080 --> 0:24:24.919 but he was kind of fascinated about that, you know, 0:24:24.960 --> 0:24:28.080 and he'd come and literally tidy up the mess on 0:24:28.119 --> 0:24:31.800 the computer. Take a listen at Here's the Thing, dot Org. 0:24:36.240 --> 0:24:45.199 I you that you beautiful. This is Alec Baldwin and 0:24:45.240 --> 0:24:48.320 you were listening to Here's the Thing. Gordon Lightfoot has 0:24:48.359 --> 0:24:51.200 straddled the worlds of pop and folk music for decades, 0:24:51.600 --> 0:24:55.720 but his confessional songwriting appealed to country music performers like 0:24:55.800 --> 0:24:59.120 Johnny Cash, Hank Williams Jr. And Glen Campbell as well. 0:24:59.600 --> 0:25:02.280 They all covered his songs, and there's a good reason. 0:25:02.640 --> 0:25:05.400 That's what Lightfoot was listening to when he started thinking 0:25:05.440 --> 0:25:09.240 about what kind of musician he wanted to be. It 0:25:09.280 --> 0:25:13.399 was probably a country music I made the crossover in 0:25:13.680 --> 0:25:19.359 adult contemporary music, you know, uh, fairly soon. And and 0:25:19.640 --> 0:25:21.399 there was a lot of good writing going on in 0:25:21.440 --> 0:25:24.679 the folk revival too, and I got I was influenced 0:25:24.720 --> 0:25:27.760 by that. So you didn't come into the music business 0:25:27.760 --> 0:25:29.840 and say I want to be Sinatra, I want to 0:25:29.880 --> 0:25:34.560