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Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the Thing.

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Speaker 1: At times, I just don't know how you could feel

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Speaker 1: anything but beautiful. Over the course of a career that

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Speaker 1: has lasted more than fifty years, Canadian singer songwriter Gordon

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Speaker 1: Lightfoot has achieved a global stardom and exceptional influence. Bob

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Speaker 1: Dylan's a fan. About Lightfoot's songs, Dylan said, I can't

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Speaker 1: think of any I don't like. These songs, which include Beautiful,

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Speaker 1: The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, If you could read

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Speaker 1: My Mind and many others, have been treasured by generation

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Speaker 1: is of popular musicians and listeners around the world. Many

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Speaker 1: people know about the folk music revival that brought Bob

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Speaker 1: Dylan to New York in the early nineteen sixties, but

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Speaker 1: north of the border there was an equivalent explosion of

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Speaker 1: talent at that time, and Lightfoot, who got his start

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Speaker 1: singing in boys choirs, found himself heading to Canada's cultural

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Speaker 1: capital to try his luck. Beautiful, Well, I was down

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Speaker 1: in the in Toronto here looking for work, and I

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Speaker 1: got a job as a coral performer and in a

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Speaker 1: television series that was on every week, and at the

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Speaker 1: same time I branched out and began working in the folk,

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Speaker 1: uh oriented place, just because the the folk revival had

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Speaker 1: occurred around about nineteen sixty and I would have been

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Speaker 1: maybe twenty twenty years old there about one and uh

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Speaker 1: so I'd be working on the TV show in the

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Speaker 1: daytime and going and working at the coffee houses at night.

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Speaker 1: You had a period we wrote jingles for commercials, correct

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Speaker 1: I tried. They locked me in a room one time,

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Speaker 1: a manager in a place on Madison Avenue and just

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Speaker 1: left me there all afternoon. That well, I I wrote

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Speaker 1: the commercial, but they didn't like it. They didn't play

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Speaker 1: your version of the commercial. But you didn't, didn't You

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Speaker 1: weren't in New York for a long time, correct Well,

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Speaker 1: I would go back and forth in New York all

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Speaker 1: the time. Before my management company was in New York.

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Speaker 1: I was one of the fortunate ones who was able

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Speaker 1: to acquire a management situation south of the border, so

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Speaker 1: to speak, down in the States, and I was in

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Speaker 1: New York and it was a great manager. He recognized

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Speaker 1: my songwriting ability immediately, and uh I got a couple

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Speaker 1: of tunes to recorded by Peter, Paul and Mary, and

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Speaker 1: one of them went up to number five on the

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Speaker 1: Board chart for for loving Me. That's what you get.

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Speaker 1: Full of me, that's what you get. Everything head as

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Speaker 1: you can see, that's what you give me. And so

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Speaker 1: I was introduced to the industry in the States really

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Speaker 1: as a songwriter before they even knew that I sang.

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Speaker 1: You know, it was it sort of happened on its own.

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Speaker 1: Do you think you would have been Do you think

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Speaker 1: you would have been happy to just stay in that

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Speaker 1: place and just produce records and and write music and

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Speaker 1: was performing the goal all along? Did you want were

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Speaker 1: you aching to do that? Oh? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I

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Speaker 1: wanted to even as a child. You know, I didn't

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Speaker 1: mind singing in my grandmother's house and the Sunday get together,

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Speaker 1: you know that they would single me out and I

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Speaker 1: would solo. I enjoyed the feel of the communication that

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Speaker 1: I and I could fail it then, and uh, that's

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Speaker 1: what I feel now ifel I feel a communication. I

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Speaker 1: have a wonderful band and we have a great repertoire,

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Speaker 1: and we just lay the stuff right out there for them,

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Speaker 1: just pure joy. Yeah, joy doing that when when you

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Speaker 1: were take care of off it pays the bills. That's

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Speaker 1: a that's a desirable silver lining. There benefit all that

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Speaker 1: hard work. Well, but when you were writing, when you

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Speaker 1: turn that corner and singing takes over. You know, I

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Speaker 1: was doing that, like like small time stuff. And all

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Speaker 1: of a sudden I was asked to come to New

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Speaker 1: York and open for Paul Butterfield concert sixty six thereabouts.

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Speaker 1: I suppose you won the radio then recording. No, we

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Speaker 1: didn't actually get on the radio until about seventy one.

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Speaker 1: And what was the first song that? I mean? I

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Speaker 1: have a list here, but what was it? If you

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Speaker 1: could read my mind? If you could read my mind,

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Speaker 1: you oh that goost is bea and I won't never

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Speaker 1: be said free as long as I'm I'm a ghost,

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Speaker 1: you can't see. The record was out. It was my

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Speaker 1: first album on Warner Brothers, and uh it was out

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Speaker 1: for eight months and there was no single, and all

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Speaker 1: of a sudden, rather promotion guys said to his girlfriend,

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Speaker 1: well listen to this and come back and give me

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Speaker 1: an opinion. On Monday morning, his girlfriend, she likes, if

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Speaker 1: you could read my mind, where the heart he's gone,

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Speaker 1: the hero would be me. Hero often feel you won't

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Speaker 1: read that book because they just do. If you could

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Speaker 1: read my mind, hits the charts, so to speak, it

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Speaker 1: becomes a big hit for you. What changes for you?

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Speaker 1: Like did you just have to sit there and say, oh,

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Speaker 1: I people are telling you to do things differently and

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Speaker 1: now you're gonna be a success and they want you

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Speaker 1: to we get so basically we got to hire an aircraft. Literally,

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Speaker 1: that's what happened. We had to hire an aircraft. Everyone

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Speaker 1: wants to book same give in the same place, two

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Speaker 1: different places in one day. So and when you reach

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Speaker 1: that point of the and then that turning point is

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Speaker 1: the is the next imperative, You've gotta start coming up

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Speaker 1: with more songs and writing more songs. Oh yeah, record yeah.

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Speaker 1: We made three more albums and nothing happened, but we

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Speaker 1: but I kept doing one a year and something had

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Speaker 1: to give eventually, and then, uh, one summer I wrote

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Speaker 1: that song Sundown, and I knew that it was it

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Speaker 1: was going to happen, that it was it was the

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Speaker 1: right thing, and it did. When we were up to

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Speaker 1: number one. That was our second one. That it was

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Speaker 1: almost seven two albums later that we had the wreck

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Speaker 1: of the Avan Fitzgerald. And that happened all by itself too.

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Speaker 1: That became a responsibility. It did very large responsibility, became

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Speaker 1: a responsible Fitzgerald. But but tell me in your own words.

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Speaker 1: Many people go on about that, about the tragedy and

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Speaker 1: the history, and it's a very important song to people,

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Speaker 1: you know, doing Canadian history. People talk about it very reverentially.

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Speaker 1: Why was it important to you? Because it was only

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Speaker 1: one verse, uh contained any conjecture of any kind, and

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Speaker 1: the rest of it was taken from directly from newspaper

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Speaker 1: articles and the aftermath, which only lasted for about three days.

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Speaker 1: If I had not wrote that song, everybody would have

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Speaker 1: forgotten about it a week after it happened. Uh, I said,

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Speaker 1: people are all around the Great Lakes area are going

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Speaker 1: to wonder if this song is appropriate, And some did

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Speaker 1: wonder about it, whether it was appropriate for me to

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Speaker 1: have written a song of that kind. But I had gone, uh,

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Speaker 1: pretty much with the newspaper articles that I scraped up.

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Speaker 1: We had no CPS in those days. And you went

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Speaker 1: back that, you went to the publisher and got the

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Speaker 1: back copies of the newspapers, and uh, so it's it's accurate.

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Speaker 1: It's it's it's accurate in the way the story unfolds.

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Speaker 1: I remember the night I wrote it. I was working

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Speaker 1: in a deserted house, and there was there was a

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Speaker 1: heck of a windstorm going on right in Toronto that night,

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Speaker 1: and I remember myself wondering, g I wonder what it's

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Speaker 1: like up on the on the Great Lakes right now,

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Speaker 1: because I sailed up there myself. I had a couple

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Speaker 1: of two different sailboats up there, and I wondered always,

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Speaker 1: I wonder what the Great Lakes are like tonight, because

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Speaker 1: you're always hearing, but what things happening up in the

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Speaker 1: Great Lakes. And eleven o'clock in the evening, there was

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Speaker 1: a report of a ship sinking three hours earlier in

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Speaker 1: Lake Superior. And they're out looking for the people and

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Speaker 1: they never found any of them, and uh, twenty nine

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Speaker 1: people gone. And I had a melody and I had

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Speaker 1: some chords that I was knocking around in this deserted

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Speaker 1: house with the wind howling outside. My Really, it was

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Speaker 1: kind of kind of a classic sitting to to write

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Speaker 1: a song like that. So I began writing the song

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Speaker 1: and finished writing like two or three weeks later. We

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Speaker 1: were right in the middle of a recording a series

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Speaker 1: of recording sessions at the times that we put it in,

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Speaker 1: and it didn't work. The first day. We put it

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Speaker 1: in the second day and uh, did you ever stomp

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Speaker 1: and Tom Connors? No, I will. Now I'm gonna run

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Speaker 1: down get all of stomping. Tom Connor. He was recording.

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Speaker 1: He was one of our very famous Canadian folk artists.

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Speaker 1: Stomping Tom Connor's poaches hit and so that sounds like

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Speaker 1: a hit. He just heard the the elogy going like

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Speaker 1: he didn't heard the lyrics or anything, so that the

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Speaker 1: appeal of the song is definitely in the melody and

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Speaker 1: the card changes, and then the story of the actual

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Speaker 1: event itself. I got as accurately as I could by

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Speaker 1: pursuing old news articles. The wind and the wires made

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Speaker 1: the tattle tale sound in the wave roble. The really

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Speaker 1: every man who asked the captain did was the witch

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Speaker 1: should love? And stealing the dunk came late in the

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Speaker 1: breakfast had to wait when the girls in November came

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Speaker 1: slashing afternoon came at the squeeze and rain in the

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Speaker 1: pace of herdricay in west wind? What was recording and

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Speaker 1: performing music like back then? Did it seems im blur

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Speaker 1: to you? Is it? Is it? What was it like

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Speaker 1: for you to be you and do what you do

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Speaker 1: in the early days as compared to later on into

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Speaker 1: now for that matter. The first time I started doing it,

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Speaker 1: I felt like not confident in what I was doing,

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Speaker 1: what I was hearing, I didn't I didn't like what

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Speaker 1: I was hearing of your own stuff. Yeah, I like

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Speaker 1: the sound of the sound of my voice bothered me.

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Speaker 1: And you know, I I started working on that stuff

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Speaker 1: and I and I have been working on it ever since,

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Speaker 1: on my vocal and I have worked on my my

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Speaker 1: antonation on my instruments. Someone told me that that when

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Speaker 1: you land, because you perform in so many different areas,

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Speaker 1: you really dwell on tuning your instruments a lot. Correct. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: sometimes I changed it around too. But but but I've

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Speaker 1: learned through the years that there is a method that

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Speaker 1: you can get me into into Scarborough fair Country, you know,

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Speaker 1: like the like the sound that Simon and Garth Uncle

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Speaker 1: used to get on there acoustic orchestral ranges that they

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Speaker 1: put together for their songs. And uh actually only came

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Speaker 1: it came real for me maybe six or seven years

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Speaker 1: ago after I was recovering from a mini stroke that

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Speaker 1: I had and I had to practice a lot more

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Speaker 1: all of a sudden, So it really got me zero

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Speaker 1: in on it, and it it all comes down to

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Speaker 1: the fifth and the octaves. You know, just leave it

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Speaker 1: at that. I'm just a handmaiden here for all you

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Speaker 1: guitar people out there. That's Gordon Lightfoot's gift to you

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Speaker 1: and his present to you. That's the fifth and the octaves.

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Speaker 1: And I don't have one day fifth and the I

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Speaker 1: don't know what the hell he's talking about, but there

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Speaker 1: it is. There's his message to you today. McCartney told

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Speaker 1: me when I spoke to him once, Paul told me

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Speaker 1: that he said in the beginning they would go into

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Speaker 1: a recording studio of the Beatles, and he said, you know,

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Speaker 1: it was really these weren't his words, but the message

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Speaker 1: was kind of like time is money. So these guys

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Speaker 1: were luck. You know, we want two songs in the morning,

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Speaker 1: and then you go have a lunch break and go

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Speaker 1: down to the pub and you have a cigarette, you

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Speaker 1: have a pufficient chips or where you come back. They

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Speaker 1: want two songs. And after they really moved along at

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Speaker 1: a clip when they were doing the first albums for

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Speaker 1: Parlophone or whoever it was, or E. M. I. And

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Speaker 1: then when they became you know, the success they obviously became.

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Speaker 1: Then they would take a year, you know, all musicians,

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Speaker 1: and then they would take a year to do their

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Speaker 1: next album. You know, they would do Sergeant Pepper's or

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Speaker 1: whatever one really really luxuriate and getting every name, and

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Speaker 1: they gave them more time because it was worth. It

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Speaker 1: was worth that investment for them. Was the same true

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Speaker 1: with you. Do you find that the more successful you became,

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Speaker 1: the more time you wanted to make music. Perhaps later on,

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Speaker 1: but I I pretty much stuck to the to the

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Speaker 1: schedule as much as I could. We made like eight

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Speaker 1: or nine albums and ten years there, so you didn't

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Speaker 1: feel rushed by them. No, we were getting more time.

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Speaker 1: But but I was also also improving because what I

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Speaker 1: didn't like hearing I was I was changing all the time.

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Speaker 1: It was always an improvement venture like a guy building

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Speaker 1: himself up and for playing an important sports team. You

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Speaker 1: know they got it. This just not just the game,

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Speaker 1: it's the preparation. Say you haven't played for for a

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Speaker 1: month and all of a sudden you've got to get

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Speaker 1: back up on stage. You should be able to crank

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Speaker 1: it or just like it was just you did the

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Speaker 1: show last night, but you liked rehearsing. Yeah, well you

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Speaker 1: believe in rehearsing. Are you're learning new material or you're

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Speaker 1: going back into the the old catalog, which we do

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Speaker 1: because I have a rotational situation going on. The biggest

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Speaker 1: problem my whole life been too many tunes, too many

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Speaker 1: women for my listeners. Right now, Gordon Lightfoot is turning

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Speaker 1: sheepishly towards his wife with a sheepish quin on his face,

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Speaker 1: and she just patted his shoulder to say, it's okay, Gordon, Well,

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Speaker 1: I can't step on your toes. You know you can't

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Speaker 1: do that. But but I remember reading I remember listening

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Speaker 1: to an article. I remember reading an article that the

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Speaker 1: Rolling Stones did years ago, and I was taken by

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Speaker 1: how you know, in terms of musicianship, Jagger and Keith

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Speaker 1: for two, were very, very married to rehearsal. And for

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Speaker 1: you to say that that as a great meaning to me.

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Speaker 1: For you, someone who as great an artist as you are,

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Speaker 1: that the preparation and the preparation aforehand so that when

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Speaker 1: you when the audience is there, bloom, you strum that

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Speaker 1: guitar and you're you're ready. You're ready, yeah, and we

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Speaker 1: we have the the artistra itself. I have four really

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Speaker 1: challenged guys and very loyal people. I read about that

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Speaker 1: your band is very loyal to you. Well, I mean

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Speaker 1: it's that there's no reason why they should not be.

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Speaker 1: You know, we're all we're all the same path. I mean,

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Speaker 1: we we just want to do a great job and

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Speaker 1: you gotta make it almost make a science out of it.

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Speaker 1: I don't know. My guys are all professionals. I mean

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Speaker 1: they're they're serious musicians. Yeah, yeah, and they do other things.

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Speaker 1: I just got to let them know what's coming up.

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Speaker 1: You know, what were you listening to back then in

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Speaker 1: the sixties when you were coming up? Who did you

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Speaker 1: listen to? Well, I was as the country music, you know,

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Speaker 1: hack Snow and then folks. It was Pete Seeger, and

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Speaker 1: it was Bob Gibson. It was Bob Dylan, and and

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Speaker 1: Simon and Garfuncle and you know Peter Paulamary and and

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Speaker 1: Ian and Sylvia. They were a duet and they were

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Speaker 1: it was a beautiful act that they had. Eventually you

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Speaker 1: met these people, well, I met when you became one

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Speaker 1: of them my management company, because they were the first

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Speaker 1: ever to do one do any of my songs. It

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Speaker 1: was Ian and Syphia which one for Loving Me and

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Speaker 1: Early Morning Rain. I found an opening with the Folk Revival,

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Speaker 1: you know, so I was lucky to be a part

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Speaker 1: of that, to write that one through and survive. Uh,

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Speaker 1: there's there's nothing much out there these days. You know,

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Speaker 1: they're they're they're busking. We We've got to a whole

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Speaker 1: bunch of people here in Toronto who are horvering around

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Speaker 1: all the time, that the folk oriented artists who are

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Speaker 1: songwriters and you know, trying to get somewhere, and some

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Speaker 1: of some of them are succeeding in summer or not.

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Speaker 1: I get to hear a lot of the stuff because

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Speaker 1: it comes across my desk and I get to hear it,

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Speaker 1: and you wish, you know that something grant could happen

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Speaker 1: for these people, but you don't know what to do.

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Speaker 1: Alegandrews respond, encourage. Yeah, where do you think people learn

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Speaker 1: to hone their craft as a musician in in in

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Speaker 1: clubs and performing live? Well, I was as well as

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Speaker 1: I was working in bars too, you know, like bars

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Speaker 1: and lounges as well as the coffee houses. And so

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Speaker 1: I had a the kind of a repertoire that was

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Speaker 1: acceptable to play a bar. So I got him following

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Speaker 1: in a couple of these bars. Then then I've started

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Speaker 1: moved uptown into the the village area of Yorkville, which

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Speaker 1: was just coming into bloom here in town, and get

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Speaker 1: into places like like the Purple Onion, and then the

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Speaker 1: river Boat, which was really the plumb of the whole lot,

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Speaker 1: was the Riverboat. Because Bernie Feeder brought every person into

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Speaker 1: that place. You could fastly imagine played there James Taylor

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Speaker 1: to Joni Mitchell, to to Neil Young, right on down

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Speaker 1: the line, is he is he a friend of yours? Yes?

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Speaker 1: He is? Yeah, your songs and you're singing of your song,

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Speaker 1: you're performing of your songs is so vulnerable and so emotional.

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Speaker 1: What was the most difficult song for you to write

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Speaker 1: or among the most difficult songs for you? Right, I'll

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Speaker 1: tell you that a lot of times you don't know

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Speaker 1: what you're doing it. You've you you're drawing the material

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Speaker 1: from your subconscious You don't you don't actually know what

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Speaker 1: you're doing. You're you know, you're drawing it from somewhere.

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Speaker 1: And then later down the line, three or four weeks later,

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Speaker 1: you're gonna sign it back to uh, the actual event

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Speaker 1: that brought it on. I mean, that's like if you

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Speaker 1: could read my mind, just it's about actually the the

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Speaker 1: crumbling of a relation with that painful for you to

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Speaker 1: write No, because I didn't know what I was doing

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Speaker 1: when I wrote it. It It just I didn't tell me

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Speaker 1: that all these beautiful folks songs that people weep when

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Speaker 1: they listen to, you're just like tossing it off, like

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Speaker 1: I don't really know what this is. Let's take a

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Speaker 1: song for example. Let me let me pick one song

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Speaker 1: and one of my favorite songs of yours. I mean

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Speaker 1: a song that I just kills me is beautiful described

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Speaker 1: to me recording the song beautiful, I mean you go

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Speaker 1: out with your friends and you get ship faced drunk,

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Speaker 1: and you come in with a hangover and just lay

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Speaker 1: this thing down and you play poker roll night. Or

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Speaker 1: do you enter a state? First? I get a card progression,

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Speaker 1: Then I get a melody. It's fifth syn octaves, people,

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Speaker 1: it's fifth se octaves. Then I get the lyric. You

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Speaker 1: got the melody, you got the cards, but you don't know,

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Speaker 1: so you draw. You find an idea that that that

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Speaker 1: fits the fits the melody. That's Gordon Lightfoot, this songwriter,

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Speaker 1: Gordon Lightfoot, the singer the performer. Do you enter a state,

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Speaker 1: do you take yourself to a place when you perform

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Speaker 1: your recorded music or you don't, Well, I can, I

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Speaker 1: can use my imagination. I actually saw it as a

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Speaker 1: sincere love turned to a guy for his wife or

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Speaker 1: his his girlfriend. It reminds me when when I was

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Speaker 1: I learned how to sing with the emotion. When I

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Speaker 1: was about twelve, when I was doing handling material from

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Speaker 1: Handles Messiah over the voice of Him who Criss and

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Speaker 1: the Wilderness and all that sort of thing, and I

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Speaker 1: learned what emotion meant when when I were saying handle

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Speaker 1: Handles Messiah. At age twelve, I sent a competition, uh

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Speaker 1: so so I could apply. It was easier for me

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Speaker 1: to apply to summon up that emotional uh something or

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Speaker 1: whatever it is when it came time to put that

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Speaker 1: song down. But I didn't have it to the point

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Speaker 1: at the beginning that I wanted to have it. And

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Speaker 1: that's how I've been working on all my life, is

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Speaker 1: getting controlling that emotional approach to it and making it

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Speaker 1: work for me. You don't want to overdo it, you know,

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Speaker 1: you don't to get do you know? I think that's

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Speaker 1: what's beautiful about your music is you go right up

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Speaker 1: to a point, but you don't do a lot of handholding.

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Speaker 1: You let the audience do the crying for you. You

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Speaker 1: know what I mean, you're your We we balance it

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Speaker 1: off with a lot of toe chappers. For a prime

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Speaker 1: example of the delivery Gordon Lightfoot does so well. You

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Speaker 1: don't have to look beyond this song sundown. I can

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Speaker 1: see you back in setting this where you do what

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Speaker 1: you don't confess you better ticket coming up. Lightfoot talks

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Speaker 1: about some of his musical inspirations. It explains why he

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Speaker 1: and Bob Dylan didn't get along right away. Explore the

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Speaker 1: Here's the Thing archives. I talk with a very different

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Speaker 1: kind of song writer, Tom York from the British rock

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Speaker 1: band Radiohead. He tells me how his producer gave him

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Speaker 1: the confidence to explore wild new electronics sounds. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I was like, um, a kid being given a hammer.

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Speaker 1: I was just hamming rely on stuff. I didn't really

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Speaker 1: know what I was doing, but he was kind of

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Speaker 1: fascinated about that, you know, and he'd come and literally

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Speaker 1: tidy up the mess. Take a listen at Here's the

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Speaker 1: Thing dot Org. I'm telling you that you beautiful. This

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Speaker 1: is Alec Baldwin and you were listening to Here's the thing.

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Speaker 1: Gordon Lightfoot has straddled the worlds of pop and folk

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Speaker 1: music for decades, but his confessional songwriting appealed to country

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Speaker 1: music performers like Johnny Cash, Hank Williams Jr. And Glenn

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Speaker 1: Campbell as well. They all covered his songs. And there's

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Speaker 1: good reason that's what Lightfoot was listening to when he

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Speaker 1: started thinking about what kind of musician he wanted to be.

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Speaker 1: It was probably a country music I made the crossover

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Speaker 1: into adult contemporary music, you know, fairly soon. And there

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Speaker 1: was a lot of good writing going on in the

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Speaker 1: folk revival too, and I got I was influenced by that.

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Speaker 1: So you didn't come into the music business and say

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Speaker 1: I want to be Sinatra, I want to be Elvis,

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Speaker 1: I want to be Dylan. Think you want to find

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Speaker 1: your own voice. Yeah I didn't. I certainly did not

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Speaker 1: take light of the fact that I was really influenced

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Speaker 1: by Bob Dylan because of the not only the quality

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Speaker 1: of the work, but the the output that they achieved.

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Speaker 1: He was prolific. Yeah, that was the amazing part. But

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Speaker 1: and it said, oh, it can be that easy for him,

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Speaker 1: I must surely be be easier for me. I mean,

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Speaker 1: if he can do this much work, surely I can

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Speaker 1: can do this much work. Will appreciating the music that

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Speaker 1: he was producing at the time. When did you first

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Speaker 1: meet him? Uh, nineteen? Was that like in Woodstock? Well,

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Speaker 1: it was a it was an interesting time. I we

401
00:25:19,240 --> 00:25:23,879
Speaker 1: actually didn't didn't get along when we when we first there,

402
00:25:23,480 --> 00:25:31,040
Speaker 1: he criticized my my my rules at playing Manhattan on

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Speaker 1: his pool table in Woodstock, and I got a little

404
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Speaker 1: he got a little sarcastic about it, and we were

405
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Speaker 1: all he was very sarcastic, and I started seeing this

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Speaker 1: coming on to me and I left. I left their

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Speaker 1: their house. I went back down the hill to Albert's house.

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Speaker 1: Albert's Albert Grossman, who he was the manager. I had

409
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Speaker 1: to be sure part of that stable stable sons to say,

410
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Speaker 1: said to him. For so many years after that, because

411
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Speaker 1: we're all working in the same place. I became sort

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Speaker 1: of party party central for them when they when they

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Speaker 1: came to Toronto, which was often, and with the band

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Speaker 1: and everybody, and we had a great time, and I

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Speaker 1: you know, it was good to have known have known

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Speaker 1: Bob um. Is it safe to say because I've read

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Speaker 1: this in different articles and so forth when I was

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Speaker 1: reading up about you. Um, then when you say you

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Speaker 1: got together and had a good time, was there a

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Speaker 1: period of your life where you had too much of

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Speaker 1: a good time? Well, I mean there was lots of

422
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Speaker 1: drinking went on there. There was a little bit of everything.

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Speaker 1: It just depended upon how severely were affected by it

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Speaker 1: and what kind of a constitution that you possessed. I did.

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Speaker 1: I drank heavily right up until and then all of

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Speaker 1: a sudden I stopped. And I asked how I stopped

427
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Speaker 1: for twenty three years because it was good. I was

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Speaker 1: going to ruin my career and I was making unrrational,

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Speaker 1: irrational decisions. And one night I tried to climb from

430
00:27:07,480 --> 00:27:10,399
Speaker 1: from one balcony to the next in an apartment building

431
00:27:10,400 --> 00:27:13,920
Speaker 1: on the tenth floor. Sure, as a party going on,

432
00:27:14,640 --> 00:27:17,880
Speaker 1: and what you want to go from one? I love that?

433
00:27:17,960 --> 00:27:20,360
Speaker 1: What was a better party in that other wing over there?

434
00:27:21,320 --> 00:27:24,359
Speaker 1: Say there was two folks, There was room for me

435
00:27:24,440 --> 00:27:28,160
Speaker 1: to jump from the one balcony to the next. Did

436
00:27:28,160 --> 00:27:30,639
Speaker 1: you make it? Yes, Well I've said it. I've just

437
00:27:30,720 --> 00:27:32,639
Speaker 1: here talking. Do you want the phone and broken your

438
00:27:32,720 --> 00:27:34,960
Speaker 1: leg or something? Who knows I was on the tenth floor.

439
00:27:35,200 --> 00:27:38,640
Speaker 1: I wouldn't be here, you wouldn't be here. Things like that,

440
00:27:38,800 --> 00:27:41,320
Speaker 1: you know. The other things that I did, they were

441
00:27:41,359 --> 00:27:45,240
Speaker 1: bad judgments, you know, and you know, with people, and

442
00:27:45,240 --> 00:27:48,040
Speaker 1: I felt that I was offending people sometimes and I

443
00:27:48,080 --> 00:27:51,760
Speaker 1: did the last thing I wanted to offend anyone, you know.

444
00:27:52,760 --> 00:27:55,040
Speaker 1: And uh, that's what I felt when I wrote the

445
00:27:55,080 --> 00:27:57,640
Speaker 1: Fitzgerald I said, I hope I'm not going to offend

446
00:27:57,680 --> 00:28:01,040
Speaker 1: any of the relatives of these men. You know. Was

447
00:28:01,480 --> 00:28:04,160
Speaker 1: he never communicated to you that you had Did anybody

448
00:28:04,160 --> 00:28:08,119
Speaker 1: suggest that? No? No, it never appreciated what you've been honored.

449
00:28:08,200 --> 00:28:11,320
Speaker 1: We we just went to the fort anniversary ourselves just

450
00:28:11,359 --> 00:28:14,560
Speaker 1: this last novembery week. Where was it? Health Lake Superior,

451
00:28:14,680 --> 00:28:20,160
Speaker 1: up fifteen miles thirty miles northwest of South Say Marie

452
00:28:20,400 --> 00:28:24,840
Speaker 1: at the white Fish Point. Wow. Um, you know you

453
00:28:24,960 --> 00:28:29,000
Speaker 1: have had some very impactful health issues. You had a

454
00:28:29,119 --> 00:28:31,400
Speaker 1: stroke and then you had Bell's palsy and you couldn't

455
00:28:31,440 --> 00:28:33,920
Speaker 1: have what's it like to lose feeling in your fingers

456
00:28:33,960 --> 00:28:37,320
Speaker 1: and you were a guitar player? Well, asked me what

457
00:28:37,359 --> 00:28:41,000
Speaker 1: it was like when I had the ortal aneurism. Okay,

458
00:28:41,080 --> 00:28:44,560
Speaker 1: what was it like when you had the a ortal anyism. Well,

459
00:28:44,640 --> 00:28:47,800
Speaker 1: putting me out of business for two years didn't really? Yeah,

460
00:28:48,360 --> 00:28:50,880
Speaker 1: business for two What do here? Was that two thousand

461
00:28:50,920 --> 00:28:53,680
Speaker 1: and two? What were the symptoms of that? You pass

462
00:28:53,720 --> 00:28:56,880
Speaker 1: out and you don't wake up, I mean the annualism

463
00:28:56,880 --> 00:28:59,360
Speaker 1: bursts for six weeks. What were you feeling in the

464
00:28:59,400 --> 00:29:04,320
Speaker 1: weeks prior? I would have bouts of stomach ache and

465
00:29:04,360 --> 00:29:06,880
Speaker 1: I'd have to lay out on my belly on the

466
00:29:06,880 --> 00:29:10,840
Speaker 1: bed for a while. Yeah, then I would subside. And

467
00:29:11,080 --> 00:29:14,880
Speaker 1: that went on over a period of several years, and

468
00:29:15,080 --> 00:29:18,680
Speaker 1: it started about ten years before the actually event occurred.

469
00:29:19,640 --> 00:29:22,960
Speaker 1: So there is a warning, there is there's third warning

470
00:29:23,000 --> 00:29:29,000
Speaker 1: signals it's a pain, pretty bad stomach ache and lights.

471
00:29:29,720 --> 00:29:34,360
Speaker 1: Yeah that was years ago. That yeah, seventy two, I

472
00:29:34,360 --> 00:29:37,600
Speaker 1: think they're about Yeah. I had to stop performing for

473
00:29:37,840 --> 00:29:40,960
Speaker 1: three months and then I got enough of a where

474
00:29:41,120 --> 00:29:43,840
Speaker 1: stopped puffing enough that I was able to go back

475
00:29:43,880 --> 00:29:49,880
Speaker 1: to work again. So I just I just bolted boulder

476
00:29:49,960 --> 00:29:52,280
Speaker 1: through so so to speak. And then you had a stroke.

477
00:29:52,320 --> 00:29:55,000
Speaker 1: Gradually came back that that was a mini stroke that

478
00:29:55,040 --> 00:29:58,800
Speaker 1: effected my right hand, which was very disturbing. That wasn't

479
00:29:58,840 --> 00:30:02,880
Speaker 1: two thousand six, That was when I really started practicing,

480
00:30:02,880 --> 00:30:06,080
Speaker 1: and that's when I really improved, learned how to really

481
00:30:06,120 --> 00:30:09,640
Speaker 1: get my instruments in tune at the same time. So

482
00:30:09,680 --> 00:30:14,360
Speaker 1: I derived a benefit from from that. How do American

483
00:30:14,560 --> 00:30:20,800
Speaker 1: radio interview hosts differ from Canadian radio interview hosts. No

484
00:30:20,880 --> 00:30:24,800
Speaker 1: difference that I can see, No difference. Folks are folks.

485
00:30:24,840 --> 00:30:31,000
Speaker 1: I always appreciated the cousins cousins here in North America.

486
00:30:32,520 --> 00:30:34,840
Speaker 1: You're not political, that's probably I never moved down there.

487
00:30:35,160 --> 00:30:38,320
Speaker 1: I've I've got, I've I've follow I'm I'm I'm a

488
00:30:38,360 --> 00:30:45,320
Speaker 1: political fan. I'm a fan of of watching the political process. Observer. Well,

489
00:30:45,360 --> 00:30:47,400
Speaker 1: you you had the situation with the song in Detroit

490
00:30:47,520 --> 00:30:50,560
Speaker 1: Black Day in July. Yeah, been from the Detroit Riots

491
00:30:50,880 --> 00:30:52,800
Speaker 1: and you wrote a song about that and then cause

492
00:30:52,840 --> 00:30:54,920
Speaker 1: you a little bit of a Grief and the record

493
00:30:54,960 --> 00:30:56,840
Speaker 1: we released a single. Did you and you do feel

494
00:30:56,880 --> 00:30:58,800
Speaker 1: that that was something that you resented or like, how

495
00:30:58,840 --> 00:31:00,720
Speaker 1: did you feel when you got pulled? I kind of

496
00:31:00,720 --> 00:31:03,480
Speaker 1: shouldn't have done that. It was almost like like the wreck,

497
00:31:03,560 --> 00:31:08,000
Speaker 1: well like like it was, uh, well, I should have.

498
00:31:08,040 --> 00:31:09,960
Speaker 1: I was working in the city a lot, in the

499
00:31:10,960 --> 00:31:13,800
Speaker 1: always circuit. There there was something but I kept saying,

500
00:31:13,840 --> 00:31:16,040
Speaker 1: maybe I shouldn't have written a song like this. You know,

501
00:31:16,360 --> 00:31:18,479
Speaker 1: it was written as a folk song for an album.

502
00:31:19,640 --> 00:31:21,760
Speaker 1: The record of the Fitzgerald was written as a folk

503
00:31:21,840 --> 00:31:25,200
Speaker 1: song for an album. And the political purposes as signed

504
00:31:25,200 --> 00:31:27,000
Speaker 1: by other people. You didn't have a political purpose when

505
00:31:27,040 --> 00:31:33,719
Speaker 1: you wrote the song interesting, just a story. And the

506
00:31:33,760 --> 00:31:41,440
Speaker 1: soul of Motive City is spared across the land, is

507
00:31:41,520 --> 00:31:45,080
Speaker 1: taken in the heads of the son of the fathers

508
00:31:45,280 --> 00:31:54,600
Speaker 1: who came into this lack And when when the record

509
00:31:54,600 --> 00:31:57,080
Speaker 1: company took the song off the air, so it didn't

510
00:31:57,120 --> 00:32:02,360
Speaker 1: piss you off. The record company's never pissed you off. No, never,

511
00:32:03,240 --> 00:32:05,040
Speaker 1: when they told you what songs to put on the album,

512
00:32:05,080 --> 00:32:06,480
Speaker 1: what songs not to put on the album, I never

513
00:32:06,480 --> 00:32:09,440
Speaker 1: bothered you. Well, we saw we always worked that out together.

514
00:32:09,600 --> 00:32:14,080
Speaker 1: You did, yeah, uh, with with the exceptions that's necessary.

515
00:32:14,160 --> 00:32:16,760
Speaker 1: Early in the career too, before I had and the

516
00:32:17,840 --> 00:32:21,040
Speaker 1: level of authority that I that I needed to establish,

517
00:32:21,520 --> 00:32:24,200
Speaker 1: I was in, I was produced and I and I uh,

518
00:32:26,360 --> 00:32:30,120
Speaker 1: I used to be able to discuss the custom discuss

519
00:32:30,200 --> 00:32:36,280
Speaker 1: things with them there and very fortunately fortunately to be

520
00:32:36,320 --> 00:32:39,240
Speaker 1: able to do that. What song that when you sing it,

521
00:32:39,280 --> 00:32:41,600
Speaker 1: you could sit there and go, Man, I really really

522
00:32:41,680 --> 00:32:44,000
Speaker 1: nailed that. That's a good song. So there's a lot

523
00:32:44,000 --> 00:32:45,400
Speaker 1: of them, But what's one that just comes out of

524
00:32:45,480 --> 00:32:48,960
Speaker 1: East of midnight, East of midnight, East of midnight. That's

525
00:32:49,000 --> 00:32:55,040
Speaker 1: that's one of my my very best ones. But midnight,

526
00:32:56,720 --> 00:33:12,960
Speaker 1: west of anywhere around. I don't do that. I usual

527
00:33:12,960 --> 00:33:15,480
Speaker 1: to do it. No, don't you know why I don't

528
00:33:15,520 --> 00:33:19,520
Speaker 1: do it, though you're such a funny East at midnight's

529
00:33:19,560 --> 00:33:22,640
Speaker 1: my best song, man, I don't do that. If I

530
00:33:22,640 --> 00:33:31,080
Speaker 1: did it for years. This is my last four or

531
00:33:31,160 --> 00:33:34,640
Speaker 1: five albums are probably the five best albums I made,

532
00:33:35,400 --> 00:33:38,600
Speaker 1: But unfortunately my my momentum had run out with the

533
00:33:39,520 --> 00:33:42,960
Speaker 1: record company at that point. But I still kept producing

534
00:33:43,000 --> 00:33:45,480
Speaker 1: because it isn't that interesting. You just said my last

535
00:33:45,600 --> 00:33:49,080
Speaker 1: four or five albums with the best albums I've ever

536
00:33:49,160 --> 00:33:53,160
Speaker 1: do really believe that? Sure you do? Yeah, you'd become

537
00:33:53,160 --> 00:33:57,560
Speaker 1: one of those albums between what period of time nineteen

538
00:33:58,600 --> 00:34:03,720
Speaker 1: Nino and in two thousand and six? Do you recorded

539
00:34:03,720 --> 00:34:05,600
Speaker 1: in an album in two thousand six, right before you

540
00:34:05,600 --> 00:34:10,719
Speaker 1: got sick? Five five nineteen years, I made five of

541
00:34:10,800 --> 00:34:13,319
Speaker 1: the best albums I've finished an album while I was

542
00:34:13,960 --> 00:34:16,640
Speaker 1: when I was down with the aneurism. I finished an

543
00:34:16,640 --> 00:34:20,719
Speaker 1: album there. I took my mind off my condition entirely,

544
00:34:21,560 --> 00:34:24,040
Speaker 1: so it was very fortutors that I had a whole

545
00:34:24,080 --> 00:34:27,000
Speaker 1: bunch of stuff City and the h and the can

546
00:34:27,120 --> 00:34:29,440
Speaker 1: at the time, as they used to say, And the

547
00:34:29,520 --> 00:34:33,160
Speaker 1: best one of the whole lot is East Midnight. Do

548
00:34:33,200 --> 00:34:38,640
Speaker 1: you write songs now? I could? I always have four

549
00:34:38,760 --> 00:34:40,799
Speaker 1: or five tunes on the on the back. Your wife

550
00:34:40,840 --> 00:34:44,560
Speaker 1: is practically groaning behind your nodding head, like, yes, of course,

551
00:34:44,760 --> 00:34:50,080
Speaker 1: there's always tunes in the back burner, beautiful songs. What

552
00:34:50,120 --> 00:34:51,680
Speaker 1: do you when you write songs? Now? What do you

553
00:34:51,680 --> 00:34:55,520
Speaker 1: write about? I just very read jumping from one to

554
00:34:55,600 --> 00:34:58,320
Speaker 1: the other, want to kill you? I just write about

555
00:34:58,320 --> 00:35:03,080
Speaker 1: whims there. I try to sound sound intelligent. Yeah, what's

556
00:35:03,120 --> 00:35:05,640
Speaker 1: on your mind? Though? Well, I was thinking about the

557
00:35:05,880 --> 00:35:09,759
Speaker 1: but the one that has the turtle in it. I

558
00:35:09,840 --> 00:35:11,719
Speaker 1: like that. I think she likes to think that I

559
00:35:11,800 --> 00:35:15,680
Speaker 1: introduced a turtle into this song. Is that the further

560
00:35:15,880 --> 00:35:18,600
Speaker 1: you're liking about it? Darling? You know you know what

561
00:35:18,600 --> 00:35:23,080
Speaker 1: I'm seeing. It's it's amazing. Your wife is this gorgeous

562
00:35:23,120 --> 00:35:26,360
Speaker 1: young woman, and I realized the glue of this marriage

563
00:35:26,400 --> 00:35:28,960
Speaker 1: is you write songs about turtles for your wife. It's

564
00:35:30,200 --> 00:35:33,200
Speaker 1: that don't have that advantage, that that's just what one scene.

565
00:35:33,520 --> 00:35:36,200
Speaker 1: I've got a bullshit my wife every day and convinced

566
00:35:36,200 --> 00:35:38,759
Speaker 1: her into staying with me, and you just sit there

567
00:35:38,760 --> 00:35:41,839
Speaker 1: and go. I wrote the song for your baby, song

568
00:35:41,920 --> 00:35:45,759
Speaker 1: about a turtle. I know, I know. It's it's like,

569
00:35:47,080 --> 00:35:51,160
Speaker 1: come if you will. Well, the earth is still fertile, lady.

570
00:35:51,440 --> 00:35:56,160
Speaker 1: I see society through the eyes of a turtle. Turtles

571
00:35:56,160 --> 00:36:00,120
Speaker 1: are soft and they they've got feelings too. Maybe they

572
00:36:00,160 --> 00:36:03,279
Speaker 1: think too correctly for me or for you, and it

573
00:36:03,320 --> 00:36:09,799
Speaker 1: really doesn't matter. We gotta end there maybe well maybe not,

574
00:36:10,000 --> 00:36:11,880
Speaker 1: maybe not, just to show you the kind of a

575
00:36:11,920 --> 00:36:15,759
Speaker 1: stuff and okay, into the microphone. Many well, back to

576
00:36:15,840 --> 00:36:19,360
Speaker 1: the stable, lady, I see Marilyn Monroe and their stands.

577
00:36:19,440 --> 00:36:22,960
Speaker 1: Clark Gable held me off the cow. She'll stop the show.

578
00:36:23,480 --> 00:36:26,200
Speaker 1: There's many a good hand felt a chilly wind blow,

579
00:36:26,480 --> 00:36:31,480
Speaker 1: and it doesn't really matter. Don't ask you. You know

580
00:36:31,560 --> 00:36:35,840
Speaker 1: why I write that stuff? Asked him about for loving me?

581
00:36:36,920 --> 00:36:39,600
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, well, we'll see. I I sang for twenty

582
00:36:39,600 --> 00:36:42,640
Speaker 1: five years. But it's really vicious. It's it's it's just

583
00:36:42,719 --> 00:36:47,120
Speaker 1: a very vicious. The song of a un quite a

584
00:36:47,160 --> 00:36:50,520
Speaker 1: love song, and it was. It was written during the

585
00:36:50,560 --> 00:36:53,280
Speaker 1: time when I was I was, I was still married,

586
00:36:53,320 --> 00:36:57,279
Speaker 1: and I wondered, my goodness, what what does my It

587
00:36:57,400 --> 00:37:00,040
Speaker 1: was like almost like a wild Chamberlain. I've had a

588
00:37:00,120 --> 00:37:02,480
Speaker 1: hundred more like you. I'll have a thousand four him

589
00:37:02,560 --> 00:37:05,040
Speaker 1: through it was one of the lines in it. And

590
00:37:05,080 --> 00:37:09,560
Speaker 1: I was married to someone, and I, you know, I

591
00:37:09,640 --> 00:37:13,120
Speaker 1: hated singing the song, and finally I stopped singing it

592
00:37:13,800 --> 00:37:17,120
Speaker 1: the same way as I stopped drinking in But even

593
00:37:17,120 --> 00:37:20,600
Speaker 1: that only lasted for twenty three years. Been sang it again. No,

594
00:37:20,800 --> 00:37:22,879
Speaker 1: you don't sing the song, you won't think a lot

595
00:37:22,880 --> 00:37:28,160
Speaker 1: of people do. But other people recorded singing Elvis Elvis

596
00:37:28,239 --> 00:37:31,200
Speaker 1: press for loving me. That's what you get for loving me.

597
00:37:33,480 --> 00:37:35,200
Speaker 1: I gotta say, I look at these album covers. You're

598
00:37:35,200 --> 00:37:36,719
Speaker 1: You're one of the best loping guys I've ever seen

599
00:37:36,719 --> 00:37:38,719
Speaker 1: in my life. I mean, was that tough for you?

600
00:37:39,080 --> 00:37:43,560
Speaker 1: To tough part of your career? Well? I think it

601
00:37:43,600 --> 00:37:47,880
Speaker 1: helped you probably, I'm sure. I'm sure it did, but

602
00:37:48,840 --> 00:37:51,480
Speaker 1: I'm sure sure what's next? When are you going on

603
00:37:51,520 --> 00:38:03,440
Speaker 1: the road again? Friday Morning, A little Blue. There's still

604
00:38:03,600 --> 00:38:10,680
Speaker 1: a lot of things and I should know anyone can

605
00:38:10,760 --> 00:38:18,000
Speaker 1: get I don't know how to friend my Saturday Lo.

606
00:38:21,200 --> 00:38:23,720
Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you were listening to here's

607
00:38:23,760 --> 00:38:32,680
Speaker 1: the Thing I feel, saying to watch them leave go

608
00:38:33,040 --> 00:38:42,160
Speaker 1: because I don't believe the happy times. Agoe, I can

609
00:38:42,239 --> 00:38:45,360
Speaker 1: still boot mysel