SPEAKER_02 0:15

Welcome to How's This Duel, the show where we pull up this duel and find out how things are really going. Not just the gigs, not just the music. What's happening when the lights and the answers are because if you ask a musician how they're doing, you'll get one answer. But if you check this duel, you might get the truth. I'm your host, Dave Randall, and today I'm sitting down with John Donnelly. Greetings and salutations, John Donnelly. Hello. Welcome again, buddy.

SPEAKER_01 0:54

Welcome again. We had some technical difficulties, but we're back on the air. We're back.

SPEAKER_02 0:58

It's nice to have you here. Thanks for joining us. Oh, thanks for watching. We're gonna look at your stool from both sides. But before we get into it, tell us a bit about yourself, your age, your name, your hair color, where you come from, where you're going, where do you call home, your pronouns, and do you have any questions for me?

SPEAKER_01 1:17

Well, my hair color was originally brown, but all that's gone white. But my red hair and my and my blonde hair is still there, so I got this really interesting look. But it's all you. It's all me, and it's very long. And people ask me why I wear my hair so long. I say because I can, because I notice a lot of my friends can't.

SPEAKER_02 1:38

No, it's true. Like, yeah, longer hair on your hair starts to thin, but you still seem to have a solid base there.

SPEAKER_01 1:45

I seem to have been pretty lucked out with that. Yeah. Yeah. Well, anyway, yes, I am Sean Robert Donnelly. That is my full name, and I've used it professionally, uh, other than Sean Donnelly. And uh and I was born in uh Vancouver, BC, 1957. Uh and that's where I uh lived till I was about uh till I was six. Um and I said was we were talking about before. Um it was there that uh we used to watch Ed Sullivan every night, um every Sunday, every Sunday night, I should say. Uh it was a big thing in our house. And one time in February 64, my sisters go, The Beatles are gonna be on the Sullivan tonight. And I'm going, There's gonna be bugs on Ed Sullivan. And uh so uh yeah, we all we all got in the den together. We did this every Sunday. It was kind of neat, you know. I usually snuggled in with my mom on one big chair, and my dad sat in his big chair or whatever.

SPEAKER_02 2:43

We all sat around and what year was that, the first Beatles? That was 63, 64, right?

SPEAKER_01 2:49

64. It was February February 6th, 1964. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 2:54

I was I was only four years old. I don't really remember Ed Sullivan because my mom and dad would let me stay up to watch Topo G Gio.

SPEAKER_01 3:04

It was it was it was so many acts got their start on that, but it was uh that that night though that they came on, and it was like the the the famous thing that he introduces them and and and Paul does that five count that they would do for all my lovings, so because it had a an extra bit of silence, you know, and that was the and so he does the five count and they come in and my sisters are like freaking out over their hair, going, Look at their hair, my god, they they look like girls. And my dad's going, they look ridiculous. And I'm just mesmerized by them. And of course, they played like five songs that night. They did, yeah. Three with the first set and two the second, I think. And um, and then they were on for three weeks straight. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah, yeah, they they then they went to Florida and did a show in Florida, an outdoor Florida in Florida with with the Ed Sullivan show, and then they came back and did another one at the Ed Sullivan Theater again, and that was their first North American tour with one show in Washington that they did with the rotating stage that they kept trying to turn with Ringo. You can look that up on online and stuff. Yeah, they and they did uh you know little tiny sound systems and things, and you couldn't hear anything. The girls were just screaming like crazy.

SPEAKER_02 4:20

Having watched the Beatles documentaries, I I don't know how they performed live at all. Given themselves at all. The state of the equipment, I don't know how that like the audience couldn't possibly have heard much.

SPEAKER_01 4:30

Ringo said at Jay Stadium, he kept time by watching John's drumming. You know, because he couldn't hear a thing, you know, like you could, it was just noise. But uh yeah, that was a fabulous night. But I decided then that was the spark that lit me to be a musician. Uh wanted to be a drummer first because I thought Ringo was so cool. Um but my dad worked for TCA. We got transferred to Montreal that same year, and so that's how I ended up here. And uh uh and my sisters, I was uh uh made friends. I had older sisters, two older sisters, and they were teenagers at that time. So boys started started showing up at our door in Baider Fay uh in the droves, motorcycles, all sorts of stuff, and they made friends with bands, and there was a band that practiced down the street. And um, so they did a uh a show at this place called The Coop, which was Baider Fay's the Barn now, or whatever they call it, where the the the pool is and everything. Right, right, yes. When you look at it to the right, there's this thing that looks like a a chicken coop thing area, you know, it's a that was called the coop, and it's actually what it was. It was a chicken coop and it was a barn, and then that was the fire station. Yes, that's where the fireman and the police station was, and and Chief Gray, who was the chief of police in Beit Urfe, there were two policemen in one car, and and he lived right there beside the the pool. Huh. An old house that was there. That was in Beid Urfe a long time ago, 60, 1964. So um they they the con this band called the Condemned that played down the street and practiced down the street from where I lived, they were doing a show at the coop, and my sisters got it that I could go to the coop, because it was only for the the teenagers and and the chaperones, and and they let me sit behind the stage, like behind the the off to the side and watch the drummer play. Because I just wanted to watch the drums. And so that was my first rock and roll show. I was like seven, whatever, like that. And that's that's that was my roots. That's what I wanted to do.

SPEAKER_02 6:29

And uh but you wanted to be a drummer at that time.

SPEAKER_01 6:31

At that time, and then sort of, you know, the 60s went on, music went on, the monkeys came on TV, you know, and and that's another thing, but the Ed Sullivan show. I was point that I wanted to make was that after the Beatles played the British invasion happened. There was bands on every week. You had the Hermits Hermits, you had the Dave Clark Five, they were great. Um you know, um, the four seasons, you had uh uh God, I can't just they just kept coming, you know. And so that's how we got to know all the bands, you know, who they were and stuff like that. Um but eventually I just wanted I started to want to play guitar, and uh so I I started that in in grade six, so I was eleven. Okay, and um my dad had my dad had a guitar, he played. Okay, and he had this uh um silver tone Sears that my mom got him in 1962 for Christmas or something, or maybe even early in that. Yeah, and so he put some nylon strings on it for me and bought me a book, and then he sh showed me what he knew and then which wasn't a a lot, but my dad had an ear and he had a rhythm, and that was what I got from him. Um he had this sort of do that type of ear. Yeah, that type of rhythm, he could do that and skiffle sound. It's a kind of a skiffle sound, yeah. And he also like he he just knew a few chords, and but he was showing me my first chords, and and he was showing me a song, and it was on top of Old Smoky. First song I ever learned on top of Old Smoky, and he's playing it C F and G7, is what the three chords were. But I go, how do you know when to change the chords when you're singing the song? Which is singing the song. That was a very good point I'm making. Yeah, if you want to play and sing, start right away. I know people who learn to play and then all of a sudden, oh, I want to sing, and they they step up to the mic and they stop playing, you know. Yeah, exactly. I have a bass player like that. He can't do backup vocals the minute he sings, he stops playing.

SPEAKER_02 8:42

Well, I'm not a bass player really, but when I am playing bass, I cannot sing for my life. But a guitar just seems uh you are playing the rhythm with with your hand, one hand anyway, and so it it goes along. Whereas on a bass, it's it's not to me, it's not as intuitive anyway.

SPEAKER_01 8:58

My friend says he can do that with a guitar, he can sing and play a guitar, but bass no. But yeah, so I um he was showing me the chords and stuff, and I said, How do you know when to change it? And he goes, it's it's in it's in how the song goes. If the song, if you're playing in C, the melody kind of goes like this. But when the melody goes up, you're gonna go to the F. Right? And then when the melody goes back down, you go back to C, and then when the melody drops, you go to the G7. Which and and and of course I learned it as tonic, subdominant, and dominant. Right. So, and so he taught me that, and of course, oh it changes back to the C goes back down to the G. And that's and that stuck with me. Yeah, and that gave me I I I learned when I'm playing a song and listening to the singer, I know when there's a chord change coming. And so it made it very easy for me to follow.

SPEAKER_02 9:54

So you assimilated music structure pretty naturally.

SPEAKER_01 9:58

In the long run, years later, what happened was that I could get up with any band and they'd go, Do you know this song? And I go, Well, I've heard it. What key do you do it in? And that would be it. That's about all I need, and I'd be able to follow the song. I did that with the Cadillacs one night, actually. Somebody came up and said, Hey, you guys used to do um, I used to see you guys and you used to do uh was it do why diddy. And and so can you still do it? And of course I just joined the band and they went to me, do you know it? And I go, I know the song, but I've never played it in my life, right? And they go, what key is it in, right? And they go, it's an E, right? Uh or something like that, E or B, I think it was in B. I said, anything tricky I should know. And of course, Pete goes, Well, yeah, when you get to this part, you're gonna hold this chord just a little longer. And I'm okay, fine. Got up on stage and played it like I'd played it a hundred times, kind of thing. But that's just and that goes back to my dad going, listen to where it's going. Yeah. So he taught me that, and then after that, I was just a sponge. I just started to play.

SPEAKER_02 10:58

Were you listening to records and learning them by ear, or did you go out and buy music but no, I didn't, I just played.

SPEAKER_01 11:05

And I played and and learned what people showed me. My mom got me some lessons, so I learned how to play uh Alice's Restaurant and something by you know the Beatles. And so I started to learn how to do different different things, but I was um I was a sponge, and and then I discovered uh you know Led Zeppelin and Jimmy Page, and uh that was I wanted to start doing leads and everything.

SPEAKER_02 11:36

So is that really your first uh sort of realization of of the next level of guitar was to become playing lead and lead in a band, yeah, getting into a band.

SPEAKER_01 11:47

And Jimmy Page was Jimmy Page was big on that. Um uh there was a guy that played in Steppenwolf that I really liked too. Oh, yeah. Um, because I was really I really liked Steppenwolf back then, but no, Page was a big one. Um and then as it went on, the big guitar players for me that really did it for me. Um Pete Townsend was a huge one for me as well. Me too, me too. I loved the way he played, I loved his aggression, yes, and um and his approach to music. And as a songwriter, he was big for me.

SPEAKER_02 12:18

Yes, very much. That's like Jimmy Page was sort of fun to for me. I could never play like Jimmy Page. I could play like Pete Townsend, though. Yeah, crank it all up, and but yeah, like you said, he's um he he really brought rhythm rock guitar out to the front, and then yes, when you start listening to him, really it's his songwriting and and the arranging. And I think the first album that he wrote that just blew me away was Quadrafinia. I remember smoking a spliff and lying on the floor with headphones on, and it's going back and forth, it's so orchestral and oh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:55

I saw that tour when they came to Montreal. Seriously, yeah, yeah, and it was like, oh, they're coming the who are coming, and it was the Quadrafinia tour. Wow, it was like my second show, I think I'd ever seen. My first show was was my one of my big influences on guitar, and that's um Alvin Lee Ten Years After. Oh yeah, and that was my first show at the forum. Okay, and and Alvin Lee, there was just he was amazing, and and ten years after is still by far one of my top favorite bands.

SPEAKER_02 13:22

And the ticket to that show is probably five dollars. 350.

SPEAKER_01 13:26

350, 450, and 550. 350 was in the blues.

SPEAKER_02 13:31

Oh my god, it's such a different time.

SPEAKER_01 13:34

550 or down in the front.

SPEAKER_02 13:36

You say 550 now, and it means 550. Yeah, it's crazy. Yeah, so yeah. Um, Alan Lee, first concert.

SPEAKER_01 13:45

Yeah, it was my first concert, and he was my first guitar hero. And and uh so you know, and then um who else was big with me? Um later on, the big one that came along for me as well was was Brian May of Queen. Right. Yeah, Queen just kind of like, oh my god, what's this guy doing? Like it was just and he yet he played like he played like a folk player. He played, you know, he knew how to strum, he knew how to get voicings out of his guitar and everything. But that hand that homemade guitar is unbelievable.

SPEAKER_02 14:17

Yeah, it has a very unique sound. Yeah, like all the mids are scooped out of it or something.

SPEAKER_01 14:22

And plays with a sixpence. Oh, really? Yeah, he plays with a coin. Oh, I didn't know that. Every queen song, Bohemian Rhapsody, all those leads, all done with a sixpence. Wow. That's how he gets that sound.

SPEAKER_02 14:34

Interesting. I had to switch to uh fin picks because if I played even with a medium pick, I'd break strings. I just was so hard a player, like it you know, just push the stuff.

SPEAKER_01 14:46

I'm 88's uh like the green ones are for for um for electric and anything like that. Yeah, acoustic. I like the yellow ones now. I I I I like thicker picks though. Yeah. But but yeah, that's so it it was then about I wanted to be in a band really bad. And I did and I was very shy.

SPEAKER_02 15:06

Had you met other people at school, say, that were no, no.

SPEAKER_01 15:09

I was the only kid in my school in elementary school that was really playing. Which elementary school was it? I went to Oak Ridge, which is the German school in Bader. Oh yeah. Okay. Is that called Dorset now? No, Dorset was there. It was there, too. That's the one comments across from. Yeah, I thought that was a German school. No, the German school's up on Victoria Drive. Oh, okay. And it was the school I went to, elementary school, um, Oak Ridge. And so I hit high school and 13, and uh I had my amp set up in the basement with the spotlight on me and my microphone, and and I'd go down there with my sort of rickety thing electric I had and bash out songs and sing into the mic and pretend I was a rock star. And it was it was about May of 71. I was in grade eight, right near the end of grade eight, and I had been kind of invisible in grade eight. I was I didn't like I didn't like school. I didn't like school at all. And I was starting to grow my hair and get I wanted to be cool and everything. And so one day in uh my French class um this kid who was in grade nine, he had flung French, so he's in grade eight French, and he's he comes in and he's sitting right behind me. And uh he's boasting how he's managing this band. He's got this band, and he starts talking about who's in the band, and he's telling the girl next to him, kind of show off, I guess. And I'm I recognized one name in the band. No, two names in the band. I knew who they were. Excuse me, and he says, but we need a singer. He says, We have two guitar lawyers, bass and draw, but we need a singer. And I'm saying I'm a guitar player, but I'm sitting there and I'm going, okay. You know, okay, Sean, you're gonna turn around. And so I turn around and I look at him and I go, I can say he goes, can you? And I said, Yeah, and I can play guitar too. And he goes, Oh, and he said, Well, and so we talked a bit and he says, Well, okay, well I'll uh we'll audition you. And a couple of days later, he I think on the weekend, he showed up at my door and uh and uh this is my good friend Paul Minard, who's been my friend for years now, but and and he's a guitar repairman extraordinaire. Uh but he uh he shows up at my door and and remember back then the the the the fashion for the boys was in the long hair and the army jackets, you know, and and my dad just saw this kid. So he comes in and he uh my dad lets him in, and there's somebody here to see it. So we go down and I plug in and he sits there and listens to me play a whole bunch of songs. I think I played Born to Be Wild and a bunch of other Johnny Be Good, probably. And and he goes, Okay, I'll let you know. And he leaves. And then that Friday I get a call from one of the guys in the band who I knew, David Boyd, and he he calls me up and he goes, Hey, you want to jam? And I'm going, Yeah, sure. He says, So get my stuff together and take it down. My dad drives me down to the drummer's house, and I set up my gear and everything, and they're sort of looking at me and everything, and then I get my guitar and I plug it in. I said, Well, let me show you my sound I've gotten. I had one amp overdriving another amp. So I had this really van halen kind of sound, and I just start wailing these leads and just playing away, just playing fast and stop, and then I stop, and they're all standing there, like staring at me. And I realized, oh shit, you know, like because I didn't realize I just played at home. I had no idea where I was in playing, and they're staring at me, and I'm realized, am I the best player in the room? Like it was really when we jammed and I got into the band. That was the first band there called Valhalla. Okay, and we did quite a few gigs around. We played at St. George's Church, we played at the Bader of Fey Mall when it was a mall. Um we played um uh we played at uh oh, was it Christmas Park School? Did a gig there.

SPEAKER_02 19:29

And what were you playing? What what kind of music?

SPEAKER_01 19:32

Steppenwolf. Okay. Uh we we got into doing original stuff. Oh, good. We did some Black Sabbath, uh, and it we were terrible. We I don't um uh um that band also in that band was um Manfred Ottinger and Harold Ottinger. Oh, I know Manfred. Yeah, and yeah, both of them now. Um they both passed now. They both passed now, yeah. And uh that was a shock when Manfred went. Um, because I'd seen Manfred about a few months before. You know, we were jamming together again after 50 years. Yeah, kind of strange.

SPEAKER_02 20:09

Yeah. I remember Manfred came out to uh an I think it was some kind of open mic at the at the shot and he got up and he played Flowers on the Wall by the Statler brothers, and I'm like holy, that where did he pull that nugget out of?

SPEAKER_01 20:27

I know he's he's he was like that, yeah. No, he's and his artwork's incredible too, and he stuff he did on his videos. Yes. But he he and I ran into uh into each other years later and we were talking about Valhalla, and he and he pointed out something that I never thought about, but he goes, I never recall us tuning. I have about 15 seconds of us on tape, on a cassette tape, somewhere. And then that so David Boyd and I left that band and formed Tobal Kane with uh a drummer named Bob Hansen. He was the best drummer in the school, and and then when Bob was in in the music program at Mac, and so was I at the time. I did grade nine, I did the first year music there, and and then when I went in grade 10, I was gonna be in I was in second year music, and I had a uh a run-in with the teacher in front of the entire class, yeah, and was asked to leave, and I never came back. So that that that's that's typical of me. Anyway, uh um but there was um but um Bob was in the music program and he got Glenn Hamilton to be our bass player. Oh, I know Glenn is. So Glenn came in and and so we were played and we um one of the big things we did was a a a muscular dystrophy drive that the school did and we ended up playing for it 'cause we would play for free. And and uh we played in front of the The entire school was part of the drive, and so all Max, not a big school, but all 500 kids were packed into the gym. Nice, you know, and we played. And the next couple of weeks walking around the halls, people people were really impressed. You know, we had a couple of conga players come up and we did Soul Sacrifice when Bob did a drum solo and everything. We did the whole we did uh I don't need no doctor by uh humble pot. And it just it was probably awful, but it it the everybody really liked it. Everyone really liked it. It was rock and roll. So I knew that's where I wanted to be, you know. And and then, you know, that broke up and everything in high school went on, and everything.

SPEAKER_02 22:43

I didn't that was still Valhalla.

SPEAKER_01 22:45

No, that's that's Tobo Kane. So both bands were in Mackay when I was in Mackay. So by end of grade 10, that was all done. And I didn't really play in anything. I sort of I I decided about 16 I wanted to be a serious songwriter, you know, because that was the thing in the early 70s, right? Remember there was the it was, you know, you know, uh all the folky acoustic, you know, Kat Stevens and Dan Hill and Seals and Cross and all that whole that type of singer-songwriter thing. So I was into doing that. And I started writing songs seriously. And uh it took me a couple of years to write my first really good song and uh that I still play that's still on my good song list. Good for you. Um but I started doing that, and then uh I guess like when I was 17, I was working at the airport uh uh at the duty free shop, and uh got a job through with a friend of mine, got me at he worked there, and one of the women women or girls that he worked with, um her boyfriend had a band, and they were looking for a guitar player, and so I got suggested and I went and met her boyfriend and met the band and we jammed and that started a band uh which turned into the band Starfighter. And I had that band for about two years, and we did a lot of original stuff, and we we just banged it out, and we went and um played jamborees and everything, and that's and through the playing the jamborees and stuff around, I met David Henman from um who used to be Naper Wine and the Dudes and everything. And he had a band called The Debutants, and he really liked us, and he would always invite us to their Jamborees, and um in fact the first time I ever played on the in the Mapes on stage was with the debutants um doing uh a blues song um with them, and uh so like David became a really good friend, and he was kind of like instrumental in getting me into the music thing, and that kind of carried on like we we our friendship, and every time he played somewhere where I'd go see him. I had a friend, we'd always go see the debutants, and uh about 19 um 1978. I'm still um still nineteen at the time, I guess. Or because I turned 20 in 78. No, 21 and 78. No, I was 20, not 19, I was 20. Okay, trying to remember all this stuff. They're just numbers. I go over to my friend's house and he goes, the debutants are playing at the Ark, which is a Ark motel which was on Saint Jacques or I remember that. Yeah, dive. Okay, let's go. But it's a Monday night of all things, and we go down and it's it's basically jamboree night or open mic night for the bands. Right. That could come down and use the band's gear and play. So we're down there and and uh I'm sitting with my friend, and there's a couple of guys walking around, one guy walking around, definitely dressed as a punk. Now, punk rock was brand new. And at earlier that year, right after Christmas, um I bought Nevermind the bollocks by the Sex Pistols, because I'd heard them on the radio, and something in me went, What the hell is this? So I went out and bought the record. My friends laughed at me. People I'd play it for them and they would laugh. And they go, Why do you like this? And I said, I don't know, but it's amazing. So I see this guy playing punk, you know, dressed as a punk in the thing, and and my friend goes, Oh, he he's a bass player. I know him. He goes, he knows uh Mike Root. And Mike Root was a drummer that I jammed with um a couple years before. Really, really good drummer. So I was said, hey, you know, call him over and I do you know Mike Root? And he goes, Yeah. And he sits down, so we start talking. And I said, Yeah, I used to jam with him back you know not long ago. And he goes, He says, I think Mike told me about you. And I go, Oh, really? And he goes, he says, do you like punk? And I went, well, I'm interested in it. I said, I got the Sex Pistols album. Now I had long hair, a mustache, sideburns, aviator glasses. You know, I look like like I was gonna go to Berkeley. Right? It was that type of good, I was getting into that type of guitar playing and everything. And so he goes, Well, we don't like the guitar player we got in our band. So watch us tonight and see what you think. Now the lead singer was this guy named Arthur May, and he was from England, and he was over here illegally.

SPEAKER_02 27:36

Very punk.

SPEAKER_01 27:37

Very punk. Um, and it was his band and it was his songs, and he was very British, very punk. Um they came on and I was like, Oh, yeah, oh yeah. And so as I'm leaving, he goes, What do you think? I said, Oh yeah. And next day I got a call. It wasn't like, you know, do you want to? He goes, I get a call. I goes, you're in the band. I wandered around my house. I'm going, I'm in a punk band. Like, and this is you know, this punk scared people. Punk really freaking scared people. So anyway, the band, we we rehearsed, and oh, we went to do a gig. First gig, never played together. They wouldn't let us play because we were a punk band.

SPEAKER_02 28:29

So we were talking about your punk experience.

SPEAKER_01 28:31

Yeah, the punk band, yeah. And um, yeah, we were supposed to do this gig and and with and the drummer was there, and never played one, we never played anything. I sort of run through the songs, and we went and played this place, and they wouldn't let us play because we were a punk band. And they were terrified we were gonna vomit and spit and and and and stuff. And which you were no, we didn't do that. No, no, but we you know, we wore ripped-up clothes, and it was it was really exciting. I felt like I was on the brink of something. That's what it was. I felt like music had become really homogenized and and and very, you know, precise again. Like it was, it was going, it was turning into jazz kind of thing, you know what I mean? Like it was it and and rock and roll needed uh a boost, and you had to kind of go back to the root of it. And it wasn't so much that you know, the punk bands, that's a particular style, but the the energy that came from that permeated right across the board. You know, bands started to even Queen rolled back their sound. You know, uh News of the World was there like not so many overdubs and more, you know. Um for Queen. For Queen, yes. So we didn't we didn't get to play that night. So we stayed the night at this place. It was out in Eastern Township somewhere, and then we went over to next day to Ormstown because we heard Straight Racer had been playing there. Right. So we went there and they were all gone for the day, except out of one door, big bushy hair, David Hazen gets his head out, going, he doesn't go back to town, he likes to sleep in. So he's there, and I go, Where are we behind? You know, and we're punk band and da-da-da-da. And he goes, and he says, Well, everyone's gone. He said, just me. And I knew it was a drum. And he said, he goes, So we go, do you want to jab?

SPEAKER_04 30:26

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01 30:26

So he goes, sure. And we go down and we set up in the because there's nobody in the bar, and we set up and plug into their gear, and we run through Arthur's songs with him. And we turn and look at him and go, Do you want to join the band? Mm-hmm. Because he's this guy's an amazing drummer for one. But he just he had he knew the stuff. Like he was listening to punk already.

SPEAKER_03 30:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:52

He was kind of like, oh yeah, I like this stuff. So we said, You want to join the band? And you know, this is straight raise, you know, we're asking their drummer to join us. He did. He called like the next when he got back, he said, Yeah, I'll join. And and Bill apparently went, sure, go ahead. That sounds like and um we started playing, we did a handful of gigs for about three months, but every gig we did blew people away. They'd never seen anything like it. Our set was about 20 minutes, that's about all you could take.

SPEAKER_02 31:24

And it was it was well that that was kind of the way with the the punk probably. It was like you would have several bands playing over in the course of an and they each get up due 20 minutes, kind of like comedians, but um and were you playing for money at the time, or was you just passionate?

SPEAKER_01 31:39

This was pure passion and getting because I felt that we were on the brink of something and that this wasn't about getting paid right now, this is about getting signed. Okay. And I have a tape or a recording of which I think I still do, I couldn't find it recently, but of the band of a set at the arc that we did that somebody recorded, and they sent the tape to Arthur, he lives in Spain now, and he had it digitized, and and I and so when I heard it, it was the first time I'd ever heard the band. You know, I played in the band all those years ago, 1978 for three months, and never heard it, you know, just always played it. Yeah, you know what, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, sure. And I heard it and I went if I'd been a record exec and I knew what was going on, and I'd walked into that bar at that moment, I would have signed us. Because I'm listening, going, This this is brilliant, it was great, but no, it was just a little too maybe far to the left. But through that band, I like we made um, it was like hen David Hemman loved us, and then uh uh we became good friends with uh Bob Segerini.

SPEAKER_03 32:52

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 32:52

And he really liked us and he brought his band down to play and stuff, and uh the Segherini band. So that was a really cool scene. Um, but the band broke up, and I ended up playing with uh Andrew Henderson for about a month in his band, Self-Defense, and so did Hayes and and and and and and the bass player. It was uh Doug Dyer was his name. And um So you ended Straight Razor? Yeah. Pretty much. Pretty much, yeah. And um then it just that band I left. It was like okay, and then I sort of sat out the summer, and then about August, I'd been thinking about a lot of things and and about what I wanted to do and what I wanted to achieve. And uh, like I'm 20 going on, 21, you know, and and I get a call from Bill Laura and says, We're working on a band. Hazen and I are got a band together. He said, You interested? And I said, Well, I've been thinking. And he goes, What? And I said, I want to cause mania. He said, I want rock and roll mania. I want the Beatles. I want to be the next Beatles. You know, it creates something like that. And he went, good, that's what we want to do. So that was where the the subject kind of it started. I went, we started to work on it. We had another bass player, um, he played left-handed and had this beautiful voice, and uh, you know, and we did three-part harmonies, and it was like it was really, we sounded really authentic rock and roll 60s. Um Bill couldn't stand the bass player, so that was that was and if you knew Bill, you know. Yeah, and um, so he was gone. And um we're trying to think who can we get as a bass player, and uh at that time he Sass, Jordan, who's 17 at the time, um and she'd been on an um uh I forget what the name of the band.

SPEAKER_02 35:14

She was was it Oh, I didn't know she was in a band.

SPEAKER_01 35:17

Oh, she was she sang um yeah, uh Rolling Thunder or something like that, I think they were called. Oh, okay. And uh and her boyfriend was in Firefly. Uh I believe. Anyway, she was hanging out with with David Hazen at his house. And David Hazen's mom went, Well, why didn't you get Sass to play bass? Teach her how to play. And right away, you know, the you mean like the talking heads? Yeah. That's a great idea. Sass went, I'm in. So we rented her a bass. Her boyfriend showed her some stuff. I went out over and showed her um one, four, five changes and one, six, four, five changes. I said, This is what you're gonna need to know. And I said, Everything else we're gonna show you song by song. And that was her. She did her first gig with us three weeks later. Wow. Three weeks of playing bass, and she's doing her first gig. And did she play guitar before? No, no, she didn't play. Nothing. She didn't play any instruments. Wow. And she played, she picked up the bass. Now, you know, from my the way I saw it, she didn't struggle with it whatsoever. Like she was Sass is a an exceptional talent, you know, and she just took the bass right away. She took to the whole image right away, she took the whole thing, and we so there we had it. We had that lineup, and we we set out to rehearse for the end of 78, right before Christmas, a couple of weeks we rehearsed every day. And then took a break for Christmas, came back, and all of January and into February we rehearsed every day except the weekends, you know, we went Monday to Friday, like a job. And we went and put it all day. And then we got the agent to come and out. Now, one of the things that I had been pushing for when the band started, and it was the news before it was called the news before it was the pinups. Oh, okay. We had no name with the pinups. Um I suggested a couple of things. I had these wild concepts. I said, one, I said, I don't want to use any colored light. Just use white light. And Bill went, you need a color, one color. And I went, okay, red. Red gets you going. Red. So that's why our shows were all white light and red light and different views of red light. And the other one was, I said, I think we should go direct. Like, why? And I went, well, amps make too much noise. And sound men complained that they can't get a clean mix because the amps are bleeding off the stage. We all lose our hearing. You know, I said, if you have it all going through the board clean, the soundman can do anything to it.

SPEAKER_04 38:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:07

I said, so your soundman is kind of like your fifth member of the band. And they went, okay, we'll try that. What was your soundman's name? I remember his name was Mike, the first one. And I I it's funny, I don't remember a lot of people I knew, they That's the domain of Soundman. It's also the domain of being a musician because you you tend to meet so many people.

SPEAKER_02 38:30

Yes, well, this is true.

SPEAKER_01 38:32

You know, and and after a while and you get, you know old. You know, you uh little little things you don't lose them, they just flip into little places where you can't find them.

SPEAKER_02 38:47

But yeah, so it's so you guys went direct. I do remember that now. I I remember your stage was so clean and devoid of wires and crap.

SPEAKER_01 38:58

I want people to walk out and have it look like we're on the Ed Sullivan show. A set of drums on a riser and three microphones up front. And that was our look. And then we eventually got a backdrop which was made by uh the graphic art department at Humber College when we played there. Well, I had a good friend who was going there, so he arranged it and they made this beautiful backdrop that we had and we used for a long time. And I think I think eventually got stolen, I heard after after I left the band. But yeah, it was we we rehearsed and then we went. And I remember doing the first gig and looking across at everybody and kind of going, okay, this this is good. This is good, you know, because um no I well I yeah, there was the other one uh one other thing we got sass into, but then after that, we did a bunch of gigs with Sass, but about a month or so of gigs, and then Bill goes, I quit. I'm gonna be a lawyer, and he goes off to Queens to study law, right?

SPEAKER_02 39:52

Yeah, I don't remember him playing, ever playing with you guys, but but you were we were the news, the news still at that time.

SPEAKER_01 39:58

And then so and we did play St. James, then he went, okay, I'm off. And so um there was a band that that had played at the Ark when we were there, come down to play in the open mics, and they were called Blue Max. And um the bass player is Carlos Stonebanks, and the guitar player was Dave McNally. And so Dave McNally um had one of the most gorgeous faces you've ever seen. Yeah, like he made me. I really I don't know how the place to put it, but he looked really good and he played well.

SPEAKER_02 40:35

No, I mean he he looked like uh the lead singer of Cheap Trick. There wasn't Robin Zander.

SPEAKER_01 40:41

Robin Zander, yeah. And and he and he and he sang decently, you know. He he was a good he was a pretty good singer. Like that was that was something we learned, you know, having you didn't have to be like as long as you just did it and what looked right, and and and a lot of rock and roll singers weren't really good singers anyway. So what we got no, he was fabulous. He really I have recordings of us that are that nobody has from off the board at the Maples. Oh yeah. And they're they're record quality recordings, they're really good from a first set, just a first set.

SPEAKER_02 41:14

Well, this is it with no amps on stage. Like you said, the mix that the sound man creates is what comes up front.

SPEAKER_01 41:22

Yeah, and and we just had it come back through the monitors, and uh so we we we at one rehearsal um shortly before Bill announced that he was leaving, I said, I said, you know, I was thinking about that guy, Dave McNally from Blue Max. He would make a great frontman for a band. He's really good, good looking. And Bill stopped him and says, Yeah, you're right, that would that's a good idea. And I didn't think about it because then next thing you know, I get a phone call and say, Well, Bill's leaving. And I said, Well, then call Dave McNally. And they go, We already have. Done. And then there was a cheek trick over there. And um, so that was it. He was in the band. And that's when we did that, that's when we settled down and did the the six weeks of rehearsal in Dave's basement and and went out and then and Music Market got us our first gig. They argued that we should have amps on stage, but we said no. Um and they argued that for a while, but every gig we did, they stopped arguing a little less, a little less, because the feedback that came back from the clubs was this is the best band you've ever sent us. Which was kind of cool. You know, I mean there was a lot of good bands. There was a lot of good bands, you know, but we just knacked into something. Um we were doing all the new music. We were we were uh you know, yeah, Hazen and I were die hard punks, you know, so we we put that drive into it, and and it just we played one gig after the other, and that's we didn't we had no control. Yeah, there's no control. It it just the the the gig the places got fuller every night, right? And um the ovations got longer, the ovations got more, the um it's um the overtures or whatever, the um encores got more got more, like one, two, three. Um then all of a sudden it's like you know, uh we got the management or the the booker from the Mapes that are coming to see us and going, okay, you guys are ready for the Mapes, and we're going, okay. Right? And we go into the Mapes on a Wednesday night. I think it was a Wednesday night. It was like it was a right in the middle of the week type of thing. And I think it was only for like two nights or something. He just wanted to try us out. And I remember going in and we set up our thing, and then the sk you know how the Mapes was, you know, just sort of a scattering of people through the through the place. And we come up on stage, and they're looking at us really strange. There's no hamps and everything. I get up on the drum riser, and we opened with Hello There by Cheap Drick. So I start the guitar riff and everything. And Day Hayden's doing and the song starts, hello there, ladies and gentlemen. Then when it goes into the when the band kicks in, I do one of my jumps off the riser and land on the floor right when the my thing was to hit right as you hit on the beat, boom, and it was like I felt something go boom out across the room. Because everybody kind of went like that. By the end of the next night, the place was packed to the rafters. And people were taking our posters off our wall and holding them up. And we're standing there going, What the fuck's going on? You know, like it was just amazing, you know.

SPEAKER_02 44:42

Yeah, uh you guys were quite a juxtaposition uh uh uh at the Maples at that time. I mean, it it's you're coming into this at the end of the 70s, like 78, 79. 79.79.

SPEAKER_01 44:56

And we're not to boot, we're wearing makeup.

SPEAKER_02 44:59

Well, there I was just gonna say, so the the Mapes was a classic rock place, and you know, I mean I'd seen everybody. Big City band, right? Sunny, Terry, and Brown and B G, big city band. They played the night before we played. Dave Mason band, uh geez, I saw I saw Lover Boy warm up. I saw Cory Harty Hart warm up there. But but never they were a a hard rock biker kind of drinking bar. And that was the thing that struck me is you guys got up there, no gear on stage, you were dressed pretty, you were all pretty, and you had makeup on and uh there's gonna be a fight here. But you you you presented something that was new, that was fresh. Okay, so um along with a lot of old rock and roll songs.

SPEAKER_01 45:50

We were doing I Wanna Hold Your Hand, last train to Clarksville, um but you want in a new wave way.

SPEAKER_02 45:57

Like I classified you guys as new wave, not punk. I know that probably insults your sensibilities, but but I saw it as you were that new wave that the cars. Um that was another one Elvis Costello, uh that uh cheap trick genre, cheap trick, that genre. And I remember having a uh heated discussion with somebody on the porch at the shot going, oh they're uh they're a new wave band, I think it's great. And they're not new wave, they're doing the Beatles and they're doing this and that. And I'm like, oh okay, anyway, wait and see. And uh yeah, it was new, it was fresh. And and I think the thing for me that the music you're playing, people could dance to, whereas a lot of like it was real because it was real rock and roll. Yeah, uh, but I mean all the songs were upbeat, tempo, and and danceable. Whereas, you know, I had just finished playing in a classic rock band. We did the doors, we did deep purple, you know, and and uh I look back now and realize that was fun to play. Like Highway Star is a great song. Um, but uh you can't dance to it, really, really, unless you're really, really drunk. And really we didn't dance.

SPEAKER_01 47:06

We didn't have any, we didn't do ballads. Oh. Um we had a bunch of songs like at the beginning that we did, and they slowly got dropped as as they either, you know. Um one we did the first cut is the deepest. That was one ballad we did um at the beginning, it got dropped fairly soon. Um, but the one that we did that we would be I would consider a slow song is we used to do because the night song. Yeah, Patty Smith's song, yeah. So um that was about as slow as we got. Yeah, we were pretty much rock and roll all the way, and then we started putting originals in too. We we had a quite a slew of originals, and then next thing you know, one day at the Mapes we're playing there, and Donald K. Donald shows up. Hi, boys, girls, we like to do business with you. Yeah, and and I would, you know, that was the beginning of the beginning of the beginning of the end, you know. Um the my biggest, you know, I was the oldest in the band. Um not by much, but I was the oldest in the band. Um, and I just I had certain attitudes about it that I don't know where I got them, maybe just from myself or whatever, but I knew the dangers of rock and roll in with egos and uh and just what it does to you, you know. And it can change your personality if you're not freaking careful. Oh, absolutely, yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's sort of what started happening. There was a separation, like uh Dave Hazen and I always hung together with the road crew, and we always partied with them because we like to party. Um McNa David McNally and and and Sass, they didn't like to do that as much, so they kept to themselves a little bit more, and it started to create camps. And um but the thing that happened, because something did happen, and it was it was and it it falls on me, um, is that I started to suffer something that I find out now and later in my years in life that a very, very, very common thing in rock and roll is I started to experience extreme anxiety attacks at n at sometimes very inopportune times, but I was experien and they kept getting worse and worse. Now back in 1979 and into 80, because it was we we played uh I left in April of 80, is when I left the band. Um they kept getting worse. And, you know, I mean I found out a story recently about Guns N' Roses, and you know, um Duff McKagan was having a terrible time in that band because he was having anxiety attacks, you know, and and and terrible time getting on stage at night and everything because of these anxiety attacks, who Lady Gaga suffers from as well, right? A lot of rock stars suffer from anxiety attacks. Mental health and entertainment is pervasive. Um and he had trouble with it, and and they said, Oh, cool, just finish the tour, and then we're gonna be able to take a break, you know, and everything. Well, when they finished the tour at that time, appetite for destruction came out. And you all know what happened to Guns' Roses after that happened. They went from zero to a hundred, right? Like in in no time flat, you know, that made them super superstars, and rightfully so. It's a fucking great album. Yeah. But um that was the thing. I was experiencing these uh anxiety attacks, and uh and there was a separation through the band and comments, and then they didn't they didn't like my songwriting, and um I think there was a probably some jealousy problems in the sense that that uh I worked really hard in the shows and I put on quite a show for people and and I felt that I worked a lot to get us that popular, you know, and a lot of people knew what I did, and I'm not sure if there was jealousy or not. There might have been, you know, and that you know, and maybe they were afraid that who knows, you know, it's just because they started writing together, Dave McNally and his house, they started writing together, and I there was kind of a sense, okay, we're writing the songs, and you're just the guitar player. Which and and I'm I'm somewhat passive aggressive, I I I keep it inside and don't say anything, you know, I'm the nice guy, you know, and everything. So that's I think that also contributed to my anxiety attacks till till finally one day I had a in in a hotel in Toronto I had a full-blown breakdown. Yeah. Full blown breakdown. And um when I had the breakdown, or in the middle of the breakdown, I was fired. So nice. Yeah. So that was that was it. That was the end of it.

SPEAKER_02 51:59

And back then there was n like mental health issues weren't really well known, so you probably didn't have anyone you could really talk to or turn to.

SPEAKER_01 52:06

And well, I'll I'm gonna tell you an interesting story. And the story has never been publicly stated, but I've told it to a few people and around because it it was um an interesting moment in my life uh to do with that, that whole thing. But um a preceding story for it just quickly is that I, you know, um after it all broke up and then the band went on for a couple of years without me, and they they you know Sasp and they they they they kept it going, and uh, she got a friend of hers to fill in to the last year uh on guitar and keyboards as well. Uh okay, I didn't know that they were. Yeah, they kept going for about two years. Oh, okay. They just didn't play Montreal very much. Oh, okay. Um and uh but after they broke everything, uh I was in university, I was studying theater at Concordia, and and and McD McNally had me over for dinner and stuff, and so I I said to him, you know, I said, so yeah, we everything's fine, you know, like everything's fine. Like I'm not water under the bridge. Yeah, I'm not a not a bitter person. I have no, you know, life is life. Yes. And I've I've been through a lot worse than that. But I said, whatever happened to the contract, because we signed a big contract with with Terry Flood management. And he said, he said, it went null and void. Didn't do anything. I said, oh, okay. So fast forward to a uh mid-80s. I'm playing at Deja Vu with the Lakeshore Rockers.

SPEAKER_03 53:39

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 53:40

Andrew Henderson, Gord Bird, and Mike Dyedick. We'd play there lots of times. I'm sitting there with my then wife Linda, mother and my my son. Um we're sitting together, and in walks um Brian Greenway and um a guy, uh Bill Ward. Billy Ward. Billy worked for Donald as a production guy. Okay. And I'd known Billy for he used to have a band called Billy Cream and the Teenage Dream. Billy passed away of cancer quite some years ago. Um and uh but he was well loved by a lot of people, and and but he had a band called Billy Cream and the Teenage Dream, and they played at our high school and stuff. But I met him through through radio friends and stuff. And um he comes in with with Brian and they sit down across from in a booth with Linda's next to me, and and they're across from me. And Billy suddenly goes, Sean. This is about six years after the pinups had happened, you know, and he goes, Sean, it's been six years. I think there's something you should know. And I go, What? And he goes, Well, you remember when all that trouble was happening with the band and you? I said, Yeah. He says, Well, they were coming to the office and having meetings without you. I said, Yeah, I I knew that. He says, Yeah. He says, He says, but uh what you don't know he says was I was at those meetings. And I went, oh okay. And he says, and what you don't know, and what they don't know was that I was at the meetings after the meetings. And I went, Oh. And he says, You want to know what was said? And I went, okay. And uh also if I should tell this he said, but we're we're anyway, so he goes, uh I said, sure, right? And he said, Well they were coming in and they were saying that they were having problems with you and blah blah blah, you know, and I said, Yeah, you know and they you know they weren't sure quite what to do. And they left. And he says, so the discussion after they left was uh, well, they're having the band is having its first crisis. Now we're talking to people that have uh managed April Wine all these years, right? And everything they talk about a band that went through crises, right? And and and member changes over the years and everything, right? So they know the business. They said they're having their first crisis. And they said, and so their decision was well, if they talk to Sean and they work it out, we will back them 110% to start him, to super start him. If they fire him, we drop them like a hot potato. Yikes. We don't do anything, and the contract will go null and void.

SPEAKER_02 56:34

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 56:34

And that's exactly what happened. So there's there's a lesson in the music business right there, you know. But anyway, but I I don't know what happened after that because Sass obviously remained with uh contact with them and ended up getting, you know, becoming Sass Jordan. And she's done quite well at that and and and and created some she has created some really good music. I I liked Racine and Rass. Those two albums were really, really good.

SPEAKER_02 57:03

I I I I've heard her songs on the radio.

SPEAKER_01 57:05

I never I yeah she didn't sing like that in the band in Pennace. No, she didn't. She didn't she did all the the blondie stuff and everything and she kind of had the other voice and she could do jaggered. I never knew if she could scream like that.

SPEAKER_02 57:19

I mentioned this quote to you earlier. It sounded like an apropos time from uh from uh Hunter S. Thompson is that uh the entertainment industry is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free and good men and women die like dogs. There's also a negative side. So yeah, yeah, no, I um I I'm not a fan of the music industry. Um it's and what you went through.

SPEAKER_01 57:51

Well, it just it happened too fast. That's my take on it. And yeah, you know, um Dave McNally went on to go into uh you know um video production and uh film direction. He directed two two uh Hollywood films. Oh wow, yeah, he directed uh Coyote Ugly. Really? Yes, and he directed uh Kangaroo Jack. Wow. But I understand you did a lot of commercials and stuff. I don't know all his stuff.

SPEAKER_02 58:17

Hey yeah, you to make a bit uh uh a living in in uh the movie industry, it doesn't have to be hit movies, you just uh yeah, just Jesus. I want a job writing jingles for commercials. That'd be fun. But uh yeah, that must have been a massive toll on you to have to live through that and and then you still wanted to play music after that.

SPEAKER_01 58:40

And and yeah, I had to I had to get up and the first thing I did was s start another band, which wasn't really a good idea, but it seemed like I just I didn't want to lose my momentum. I felt like this is awful, right? So I put a band together with uh uh guy named Peter Ferrara who I ended up playing with again bands later, but um he was a young bass player and he had a drummer, uh what was his name? Elio Del Olio. There's a name. They're both two Italian boys, and boy, they uh the band meetings could be interesting. I didn't know that Italians yelled all the time when they talk. It just sounds like they just why are you guys yelling at each other? And they start laughing. We're not, we're just talking. So you put another band together. So I put another band together that lasted about three months. I just I couldn't do it. And and then I was also engaged to get married, and so I ended up getting married. And when I was um, you know, sort of taking some time off and arranging to get married and um Andrew Henderson called me. He was had his band, the 88s, and he asked me to join the 88s, so I joined them. Okay, and I played with them for about six months, and then I played Bill Lawrence had another band together called the movies, so I played with him for six months, and then I was like, I was starting to get like I was not happy with it, and I wasn't happy. I felt like I was just repeating the same cycle over again.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:04

I couldn't get that pickup because not happy, not just not happy with that band, but not happy with where everything was going.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:12

I wasn't going anywhere with that and and didn't like sure sure what I wanted to do. Uh and in early, I think it was 81 or so, um a girl at uh Concordia was doing, she was in the theater department uh taking theater at Concordia, and she had a friend in the dance department, and they decided they wanted to do a production, full-blown production of Tommy. Oh wow. At the uh was it the FC Smith Auditorium that'll be a few years? Yeah, I remember that little church, the old church there. Yeah. Um so they somebody said to them, Well, you know, if you're gonna do this show, you know, you you should get, you know, Sean Donnelly to come and play guitar for you, you know, because uh and so some because some people knew me or whatever, and so I get this phone call from um her name is Charmaine LeBlanc, and I end up working her with her in other bands years later too. But she calls me up, she goes, We're doing this show. Would you play guitar for it? And it I was kind of like, you know, it's the same old, same old. I go, sure, on one condition. And she goes, What? I said, I can audition for a part. And she goes, Okay. And I guess I went down and auditioned for a part and I got one. Uncle Ernie? Uncle Ernie.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:32

No way.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:33

I was just about. Oh, yes, that was a that was fantastic.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:42

I was just kidding.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:44

And uh I had made a lot of friends in that. Um I met Fred Jensen there, who I ended up doing my rock opera with in Concordia. Um Peter Stewart was would play Tommy. He's he has a stuff on on if you want to listen to him, he's Louderman. He has stuff I'll call Louderman. Okay. He lives in Berlin.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:05

A real artist.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:07

Oh, yeah, yeah. He's he's uh oh, he wrote some really, really, really cool stuff. Um, but that was that was my first taste of theater. You know, and I well I had some taste of theater, but not an on-stage acting, so and doing a musical, and that did it, and then she did another production of a Tommy, very, very different, rewrote it almost, for a professional theater uh festival at John Abbott that summer. So I did that, and then I played Ernie and and cousin Kevin in that. I did a dual role, so that really gave me the the thirst for theater, and I thought I want to use theater in my music and everything. So I applied at Concordia and uh I got in and uh did my first year there in theater. What year were you there? Uh first 83, 84, and 83 and 45. Oh, okay. Those two smell, those two years. And um, and there was a guy who was in I was in Tommy with that was taking his first year there, a guy named Fred Jensen. And at the end of the first year, he goes to me, Wanna do something this summer? I said, sure. He goes, Wanna do a show? We'll do put a show together. I said, sure, that sounds like a good idea, you know, like all the stuff we've been learning about theater. And he says, you know, we should do something with music. I said, Yeah, that would be a good idea. I said, Okay, I said, let me go home and see what I got. And I went home and I took all my songs that I'd written from about 1980 to 1984 at that time, and started going through and I I came up with an idea for a rock opera or a rock play. And I had I came up with a plot and I laid out the plot and the scenes and everything, and then I took my list of songs, and I went, okay, that's gonna start it, and this one's gonna be the scene, and this one's gonna, and each scene had three songs to it, and I mean, and I put it all together, and I went over and I said, Okay, I've written rock opera.

unknown 1:04:06

He's got what?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:08

And I played it for him, and he goes, That works. So I go, Okay, so we decide we're gonna do it, and we were gonna put it on at Concordia in in September before the school year started, you know. And we went to the school and they said, No, no way, you're first-year students, you can't do this. But Fred's really good at politics. Really good at politics. So in the end, we ended up being able to do it for absolutely nothing, because we do it, did it as a charity. Um, the costume department, the lighting department, the set department, um makeup department, all the all the things in the theater thing heard I was doing a rock show. They all wanted to help. I had the whole school's help. I had all the lights, I had the theater. It was a D.B. Clark theater. Uh, I had um a set designer, and all I did was I say, this is what I want. If you have a better idea, let me know. And that worked like a charm because I got the coolest shit. I didn't get the set I wanted because you can't do it. But I came up with this idea, and I'm going, oh, that's neat. It was with ropes and stuff. It was really cool. So we put that on. Never was recorded. I have some photographs, that's about it. Nice. But still have the rock opera, though. I still have it up here and written, you know, like it's but I learned one day I'm gonna release it.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:30

Well, that must have been a really nice effort for you to dive into and get it was a great creative put your past in the behind.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:37

Yeah, it gave me a great so when I came out of that, I I started to put another band together after you I did two years of university, and then it wasn't going where I wanted, so I did said, you know, screw the degree. I don't want the degree. I I just I learned what I wanted. And I got to do something that that no other students ever got to do, was do my own show like that. So um then I I put a Together with sort of the idea of doing something like that. And we did uh one or two gigs. And it was a cool idea, but and then my friend Andrew, uh I had no, I had to rent some microphones to do a recording, and he had some, so I went and rented them from him, and when I went back to take them back, um my friend Eric Mitchell was there, and they had a band going that they were working on. He said, We're putting a band together, we're gonna do some gigs. Wanna join? Went over and it was like all 50s and 60s rock and roll and stuff, and and half the songs I I knew just by heart, just by you know, and it was that's that that following, like, you know, this one's an E. Oh, okay. And we started playing around and we played, you know, deja vu series, like Lakeshore Rockers, and played all over the place with that. And it was a gig, it was money, and all of a sudden I'm making money, like weekly, a weekly salary playing playing gigs. So that was good.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:51

Yeah, the 80s you could do that.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:52

You could do that, yeah. Um, but that kind of fell apart, and then and then by the I had a my son was born in '90. And uh and then by ninety-three, his mom and I split up. And we were splitting up actually when he came along. It was kind of like uh he wasn't expected. But we were certainly happy he came along because it sure it oh he's I have a fantastic son. And um but I I so I moved out and I looked moved to NDG and everything, and I played another like some other I also oh I I did some touring with a couple of really big bands in the early 90s after Lake Sharok because I joined this band called Hello Holly with Andy Cook and um and Mitch Castner and uh Andy Cook, the guy who does bookings around.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:40

He was a drum, our drummer.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:41

Okay, and and Mitch Castner was the bass player, and again, and and we were like a hair rock band. It was Todd Kennedy, who was our vocalist, one of the best singers the city ever had. And that's what the reason I joined the band, because he was in it. Okay. Kind of thing. And we would we went on, we played around. We were good. We were like a hairband, we were really deaf leopard and stuff. It was great fun. Uh, we went and did some gigs out east, and and I just thought, no, this isn't gonna work. The you know, the money isn't really there, you know. And I needed money because I had a pregnant wife at home. Sure. And then I that's my friend Peter that I had the illusions with after the pinups, the little band I put together. He had a band I joined his, and it was called um Um the Whoopi Cats. And we toured, it was an A-circuit band with a big French agency, and we played all over Quebec, and Quebec City was wonderful. I love playing Quebec City.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:34

Yeah, I was gonna say, why didn't you hook up with one of those big uh you know touring acts and stuff like that?

SPEAKER_01 1:08:39

I was doing that, and it was great, and then I blew my ears. Oh no. I got tinnitus from hell. Oh no. And I and I went and I got earplugs, and I got my ears tested, and I went to get earplugs, and the person who tested my ears says, Give this to the audiologist when you get your earplugs made. I said, Okay, and I gave it to her, and she goes, Well, why are you giving me these? You know, we were just and I said, Well, the woman who did it said, you know, that you'd want to see these. And she looked at it and she went, Oh my god. I hate to tell you, she says, but you're going deaf.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:15

Oh no.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:16

I'm like, Oh my left ear. She says, Your left ear here, she says, see that? I had a 45 dB drop at 4K. Oh my god. And she's like, You're gonna do it. I played it for a little longer with the earplugs, and the pain was just awful. I can imagine my tinnitus would hit would would kick in on stage and it would be louder than the band. Sure. And I just I can't do this anymore. So I quit. And I started playing in other bands, like just lower volume, and I just thought I'm gonna go acoustic and everything. And then I decided to get out of here and I went to Ontario. I had my parents moved there, and they were living in Oakville, and they were getting old. And I'm going, and I'm the only one in my family. I have one sister living in Chicago and another sister living in Barbados. And if anything happened with my parents, it would be me who would get the you gotta go down there. And so I decided to move there and be close to them. So I moved down to Oakville and there I got into an acoustic duo. Nice. Right, where I was telling you before what I had a duo for years, and that that's when when I was doing with Tom where we just played around gigs and it was just and I didn't take it that seriously, but it you know, it was it was money. Because you had the music in you. And I had started teaching.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:36

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:36

And I ended up teaching for about fifteen years, and that was my main Oh, nice. My main focus. I I I um I had my own teaching business for a while where I taught at home and everything. But I got a a job at this little music store that this guy had bought from another guy, and he turned this thing into this huge, beautiful music store with like tons of teachers and uh lessons books. So I I like working for someone who books the lessons, because if you've ever been a teacher, that's the worst part is booking the lessons. Yeah. So I did that and I taught, and that's what I liked. I made a living at it, and doing the the duo gigs on the weekend, and then I joined some bands and had some fun and just did it for fun.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:18

Yeah, I hate to say this, but uh, even despite my delays, we're we're running down our time here. Uh you're playing with Sean and Tom. With Sean and Tom. With Sean and Tom. And you're playing at Duke and Divine's in Friday night for week. Yes, this week. Which is just our first time there. And look, I think. Yeah. Is that right?

SPEAKER_01 1:11:41

Yeah. Um I'm looking forward to that. It's the first time there. I've seen a couple other people play there, and I like like the room, so I'm looking forward to it.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:47

I think they'll it's a very nice warm room, and it's very intimate because uh you're right there. The only thing I don't like, and uh I was telling Tom about this, is that there's a whole other audience back there over by the bar. Yeah, I know. And I don't know if uh I've played there once in it. But uh no, it'll be fun.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:03

Um Yeah, I think the way we we do set up and everything will go over well there because I know I don't think they want anything loud, but you know No, I don't think so.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:10

No, there's no need to be loud in that environment. Absolutely. You want to draw people in.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:15

We got a cool repertoire though. You do, absolutely. That was the thing when we set out with the duo, it's like okay, um, I I I go by David Bowie's philosophy, don't play for the gallery. Play what you like, and and and uh so and that was my my thing in the old duo I was in too. I said, let's just play songs we like. Yeah, right, because that way you don't get oh I need a song you know once you're playing it, you know. And yeah, I've been there, done there, yeah. And it's like so we did that, and and that's what I said, let's play what we like, you know, be a little obscure sometime, but it'll be right on in other times, you know. But all stuff that we relate to and we like. We don't play something just because everybody likes it and they'll dance to it. You know, um and so we went with that and and uh just uh the two back and forth vocals, and uh we have a whole bunch of things that we we wanted to do, and that's the feedback we're getting back from people is oh you got a great repertoire, and all you the vocals are great and and you know, and it's it's it's it's neat to see, you know. So that's that's exactly what you want.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:20

It's uh wonderful, wonderful. And you're happy.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:23

I'm happy. I'm I'm I'm now back here, but I moved back here uh back in 2017 after two horrific marriages and and and and hell and and uh oh I went through hell, I was homeless, I was uh uh all sorts of things uh well Sean, it sounds like you need to come back and dish some more. Yes. Pretty much everybody except I have I haven't even got to the real stool here.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:51

And I only limit it because uh the gods of the podcast world tell me that I should try and keep it within. This is fun. I would gladly do this. I can't tell you how much I appreciate you coming and your honesty and and uh opening up to us here is it's what I need. It's what it's like I said, why I started this. I I have so many feelings from having tried to be an entertainer, and it's nice to commiserate with other people to share experiences, oh my god, I know exactly how that feels.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:25

Have you been watching uh Billy Corgon's The Magnificent Others? I have not. Well, there's a podcast for you. Oh yeah. He's going he's interviewing entertainers across the board. Like he's not um Not just musicians, not just musicians, he's got actors and and and and and such, and and um but he w asks really cool questions and and and of course he recounts his own stories with the person. Yeah. Have you seen Bill Mayers? No. Bill Mayer's uh podcast he does where they where where they they he he he smokes joint after joint and Bill Maher, like the political guy? Yeah, really? Yeah, his his podcast is uh there's nobody else in the room like this, but all his cruising, and he's just I'm being myself. He drinks, he smokes his he smokes his weed, he's a pothead. Okay, he is a pothead, and he emits it fully, and uh, and he gets other people on, and they he I've seen him interview also he had Woody Harlton on the other day, and they got the two of them, the two of them got so high they couldn't talk.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:28

I mustn't have been able to see the root through the room between each other because of the smoke. Awesome. I would love to do smoke a joint before doing this show, but I get so distracted when I'm high. I still like that's an afterthing, as you can see. I'm all set up for it. I noticed that. But uh yeah, no, it's um I I do uh I do like um a microdose of psilocybin gummy, like a little lip dose. I I do it helps me focus. I don't do too high, but it just like keeps me on track, keeps me focused.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:58

I have uh I have a I I get bags of I've got golden teacher and I have a scale and I do a point one every morning. Yeah, I grind it up and put it in my hot chocolate.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:08

That's some of these things. You use the gummies, hey? Well, I bought these over.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:12

I find I tried those and I just find that that the um it's not natural, like or whatever. I find it I get a little kind of with it. I I same thing with the golden teacher. I I had a golden teacher one in the mushrooms were this big. Three of them, three of them were were were an ounce. And they were great. And I got another bag of them, and they're all these little tiny, mini ball mushrooms with heads, so they're more potent. Uh-huh. So I you know, I could do like the other one, I could do a 0.2 as my microdose, and I'd be like, wow, this is great. I did 0.2 of the little ones, and I'm like, I see colors. It's not an exact size. It's not an exact but it is. It uh it is exceptionally good for depression and and getting shit done.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:56

Absolutely, 100%. That's why I I started. I mean, I not every day, but I regularly when I have to come down here and do some work, it just keeps me focused and it kind of helps the time fly by while I'm doing it too, which is amazing. You clean the house.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:13

I've seen ads on Facebook for the gummies and the the for for the for the mushroom gummies. Everything says, Well, my husband didn't know he thought they were regular gummies. And he took some and just says, Let's see what he does. And he did two loads of laundry, clean the house, put out the garbage.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:31

Oh yeah. Oh well, for me it's it's doing computer work. It's like usually I'm like, uh fuck my eyes, or but they they're they're very good. But because they are gummies and they are candy, and even though they do taste like shit, I have to hide them because I have a seven-year-old granddaughter, and she likes coming down here and hitting the drums, and it's like, God forbid she ever finds her mother would kill me. No worries, Lauren, they're safely put away. You wouldn't be able to get them. Anyway, uh, Sean, again, I've had a great time talking with you, man. It's uh it's really nice. I I This is great. I've known who you were for many years, but I never knew you. So I'm glad I got to check in your stool here.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:13

I'm a strange man, yes. Good for you.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:19

All right, thanks. Uh, if you like what you heard,