Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Barry Davis Returns: Toronto Mike'd #488
Episode Date: July 17, 2019Mike catches up with Barry Davis before Barry kicks out the jams....
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We like our team, Barry.
Welcome to episode 488 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything.
Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Propertyinthe6.com, Palma Pasta, Fast Time
Watch and Jewelry Repair, StickerU.com, and Capadia LLP
CPAs.
I'm Mike from TorontoMike.com
and joining me this week to kick
out the jams
is Barry Davis.
I don't know this jam
in my top 10, but it'd be
like in the top 20, I'm sure. I hope so.
I'm sure it's on your playlist.
It's pretty impressive
that you have someone
that actually wrote and performed a song
just for you.
And he did it before episode one was recorded.
I actually approached him
before I launched this thing,
I don't know,
seven, eight years ago, whatever.
And I'm like,
Illy, this is what I want to do.
He writes this, records it, sends it over.
I played it for
episode one and i'm playing it for episode 488 it's getting a lot of airplay yeah i don't know
if that counts though in the uh see i have a buddy that billboard yeah i have a buddy who's written a
lot of the music for my shows but there's no there's no vocals there's no lyrics it's just
instrumental instrumental which is fine i'm not, I haven't written original lyrics
other than parody songs
in the last 10 years.
Okay, hold that thought.
Parody songs?
Yes.
Oh, that's old.
That's ancient.
I should get more,
update my...
Oh, yeah.
You haven't heard
my Kawhi song yet?
No, I wish you
had sent it to me.
I'll send it to you
right now.
Okay, that tells me
that I'm not doing enough social media. I follow you, I do follow me. I'll send it to you right now. Okay. That tells me that I'm
not doing enough social media. I follow you. I do follow you. You're the famous Barry Davis
with an underscore at the end. Yeah, because somebody else took my original one. Well,
that's a common name, Barry Davis. I think there's lots of you. There's only one other
one that has that one. Oh, yeah. Well. And he won't give it to me. He's like this old
guy who never tweets. When he dies, I know well. And he won't give it to me. He's like this old guy who never, never tweets.
When he dies,
I know somebody
at Twitter Canada.
We need him to kind of
kick the bucket
and see what I can do
for you.
Okay, I'm going to
send you the link
for the YouTube video
of this song.
Okay.
And I will,
then you can play it
at some point
because it's done,
it's done very well
on Facebook and Twitter.
I apologize
for my ignorance.
My research staff was so excited you were kicking out the jams,
they forgot to do any further research.
You know what happens, though?
And my wife tells me this all the time,
and this is why kids, if you are on social media
and you want people to see what you're doing,
you have to find a way to catch people.
Because people just scroll, scroll, scroll, scroll, scroll,
and if they see something it's got
to grab them that's true gotta grab them you're right it's a tough world out there you know it's
like trying to cut through the noise is more than half the battle well i have now sent you the video
for the kawaii song and you can do whatever you want with it you can play it to your heart's
content you can share it do whatever i sent I sent you the, you know, nobody listens or watches YouTube, I find, anymore.
Well, how did you send it to me?
To my email or to my...
No, I sent it on Twitter
because I don't have your email.
We're not close enough, apparently.
You haven't sent me any of this stuff.
But if you go,
if you go to my Facebook or Twitter page,
you can find it somewhere there.
So that's a call to action
for the people listening right now.
Yes.
Go find Barry Davis's, although I will try to play it here.
It is done to the tune of Bye Bye Miss American Pie,
but it is called Bye Bye Kauai.
Not that long ago, I can still remember how
your laugh used to make me smile?
And I knew if you had a chance to make the raps and be a chance,
then we would all be happy for a while. But July 6th, it came so fast
We were all afraid it would not last
Conflicting news on the wire
What was true, who was alive
And I wasn't sure what to say
When I heard he was leaving for L.A.
But I'll never forget the ride.
You've got to get to the chorus here.
Of course.
We won it all, but we lost Kawhi.
So bye, bye, we're going to miss you, Kawhi.
You left us for the clippers, but we understand why.
While there's no way to replace you, I have faith in the side.
We should get you out to a try.
You'll always be our fun guy.
I said bye, bye, we're going gonna miss you for a while
We left this for the Clippers
But we understand why
And while there's no replacing
I have faith in the side
You should get your arm to a try
You'll always be a fun guy
Well done, Barry. a fun guy. Ha ha ha ha ha.
Well done, Barry.
Makes me tear up whenever I
hear that. You know, when
the fact kawaii rhymes with
Maasai, like it's perfect, right?
I spent a lot of time in the car thinking about
that. Thinking about what I'm going to do
and how I'm going to. I knew I wanted to do
a parody song. I just didn't know what song
to make it for. And then I was just thinking of what rhymes with Kauai.
And I thought goodbye.
And then it just came to me.
American Pie.
Perfect.
No, it is perfect.
And there's a lot of CBD involved in the writing of that song, I have to tell you.
Maybe a little THC as well.
I was going to say you need the THC to get the buzz.
Yeah, I don't want to send the kids mixed messages, right?
You must be 25 or over, apparently, or it can be very damaging to the brain. Well, that is true want to send the kids mixed messages, right? You must be 25 or over, apparently,
or it can be very damaging to the brain.
Well, that is true.
I believe that.
Do you have kids?
Well, technically, he's not a kid anymore.
He's 19.
19, right.
Okay, 19 is perfect, though.
Okay, yeah.
You think I should be smoking up with my son?
No, I'm saying.
I've offered to.
He doesn't want to.
Wouldn't you rather he wait a little longer?
Oh, yeah.
Because I have a 17-year-old, and I have this chat with him all the time.
And I know you're going to smoke weed.
Yeah.
Just try to make, I don't know, get into your 20s or something.
Sure.
My son won't even drink with me.
Maybe it's just I'm not cool enough, right?
I'm still in that stage.
But I've offered him, hey, you know, you're legal now.
Let's go.
When I turned 19, you know what I did with my dad when I turned 19?
Tell me.
And this was like a lifelong dream of his.
Yeah.
Took me to a strip joint. Took me to a strip joint.
Took me to a strip joint, got me table dances, bought me beer.
That's the way to go.
That was, yeah, yeah.
He died like a couple years later, but at least he could say,
hey, I took my son to a strip joint on his 19th birthday.
Does your son not drink?
Not in front of me.
Okay, but he's never, you don't know he drinks maybe he just
doesn't drink yeah he's had like he's gone to the parties and stuff like that and he always gets
those drinks that taste like chocolate milk right oh yeah yeah yeah mud pie mud sling whatever they
call them right right so i've given i've given him a sip of beer he doesn't like the taste of
beer but i didn't like the taste of beer no no no you you have to acquire a taste right nobody
nobody grows up enjoying the taste of beer you grow up no, no. You have to acquire a taste for beer. Nobody grows up
enjoying the taste of beer.
You grow up
wanting to get drunk.
Right.
And then...
Like Southern Comfort
or something.
You're looking for something
to get you hammered
like quick.
Yeah.
That's funny.
But by the way, Barry,
you're kicking out the jams.
Yeah.
We'll talk about that
after we catch up
because we have some
catching up to do.
Sure.
But you are the 70th
jam kicker
so your number so there that's a milestone i think 69 would have been nice oh that was fred penner
that's a little inappropriate that's the greatest isn't he i have to show the periscope hold on
oh so oh you got a shirt yeah this i'm'm a Fred head now. After the recording, which was whatever, Friday,
he said, you're now an honorary Fred head,
and he gave me this T-shirt.
Fred Penner, I'm a Fred head.
That's awesome.
I can't believe it.
I remember having a conversation with him on my show too,
and you think that all he ever did was kid stuff,
but the dude's got a history behind him.
He's got the chops and
yeah he was here on friday i gave him his stickers from sticker you and he promised he'd put uh his
toronto mic sticker on his guitar case or guitar i can't remember which one which really like got
me really excited but you made the same before we pressed record you made the same promise i'm not
not putting it on my guitar itself,
but I'll put it,
I'll definitely put it on the case.
It's a lovely sticker.
I see you have one on the back of your car.
Yes.
On your bumper.
I have one on my bike.
I have one on each bike.
I have one on my car.
I think,
how about like a new tattoo,
like right,
right there.
Don't you think so?
I take this to the tattoo artist.
You can actually,
I think you,
that's your temporary tattoo. Oh, is it?
That came from Sticker You as well.
I put it right on my heart.
You put it on your heart and then you go to the tattoo place and say, make this permanent.
Sure.
Would you do that for me?
Hang on.
Let me give it some thought.
Let me process it.
No.
Oh, okay.
Well, then I'm not giving you your lasagna.
No, just kidding.
Oh, is this lasagna?
Yeah, that's courtesy of Palma Pasta.
I got to tell you, thank you very much
because my wife's been away for almost two weeks.
Oh, wow.
So I can only cook two things.
What can I guess?
Scrambled eggs and hot dogs.
You're pretty damn close.
I can do a mean omelet.
Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Most guys can do eggs.
Kraft dinner's pretty good too.
Okay.
I can barbecue anything, but you can't barbecue lasagna, yeah, yeah, yeah. Most guys can do anything. Kraft dinner's pretty good too. I can barbecue anything, but
you can't barbecue lasagna, right?
No, not recommended.
But I should just warn you,
you can't have that tonight because it's frozen
solid. You've got to thaw it in the fridge
for 24 hours, but tomorrow night.
This is my tomorrow night meal. This is Thursday night's
meal. You're going to love it. You're going to love it.
It's awesome. Courtesy of Palma Pasta,
great partners of Toronto Mike, palmapasta.com to find locations. You're going to love it. It's awesome. Courtesy of Palma Pasta, great partners of Toronto Mike,
palmapasta.com to find locations.
They're in Mississauga and Oakville.
We'll talk about Mississauga in a minute.
You're practically the mayor of Mississauga,
I'm hearing.
I see you're on buses.
Yeah, that was pretty cool.
Are you still on the buses?
I think they are done.
They crashed?
Yeah.
It was a 10-week campaign.
But I'm hoping we can grab a hold of those posters
and put them up somewhere.
I was going to say,
did you get some great photos?
Because, I mean,
you only need your face on a bus for like one day.
Get the photo and it lasts forever.
Well, it's strange because the station,
the studio for Saga 960 is actually in Etobicoke.
Right.
So you wouldn't think you'd see a Mississauga bus.
But in that area,
there is one Mississauga bus that goes by and the only time I ever saw the bus with that poster on it I was
just walking outside the station walking over to Starbucks to get a coffee and lo and behold this
Mississauga bus drives by and I run like a nutcase to try to get catch up to it so I can take a
picture of it right so i got a
picture of it amazing how vain is that no no no i would do the same thing are you kidding me if i
saw your car drive by and you had a toronto mike sticker on it i would do the same there you go
just a sticker so by the way maybe if i give you another one one on the car on my wife's car
definitely yeah she's away remember right exactly i don't know i don't even know how you're eating that's amazing so okay so uh yeah the lasagna is yours beautiful stickers again
sticker you.com you can uh get custom stickers of one or as many as you like go to sticker you.com
those guys are amazing i have a kind of a cool contest i'll be launching shortly
with sticker you i threw in uh you know, Lowest of the Low?
Yeah.
Great band.
Yes, they are.
So that Agitpop, so the one you,
Yeah, yeah, right here.
Okay, so they played at the Toronto Mic Listener Experience that we had on June 27th.
Yeah.
So Sticker You made up all these Agitpop,
that's the new album from Lowest of the Low.
So I threw that in the pile,
and there's a nice Toronto artwork.
Yeah, some beautiful stuff there, yeah.
Enjoy, enjoy.
By the way, before I go any further, if somebody's hearing us and they're like,
I want the Barry Davis deep dive, we did.
This is your second visit.
Yeah, but the first visit happened very soon after I parted ways with Sportsnet.
Are you suggesting you were still a little bitter or raw? No, I think I
was still kind of in a haze over the whole thing over what, and you know, over time, so many,
you know, stories or rumors broke about why I was no longer there. And the big one was
the players didn't like me. So because the players didn't like me, Sportsnet told me that I had to go. I hadn't even heard that one. That sounds ridiculous.
Well, it does. When you consider, if you look at the list of players that I've had on my podcast
over the two and a half years, by the way, and I need to thank you for that because it was soon
after I did the show with you that I was inspired to start my own podcast as well.
And this is out of the park?
Yeah. And then that branched off to a couple of other podcasts i do one now uh with a couple of criminal lawyers called
out of the court where we talk about the the worlds of law and sports colliding which is a lot
of fun sure and now we've kind of branched it into the three-hour radio show on saga 960 four to seven
by the way folks called the spin and um and even matt mcfarlane who does this show out of the
park with me and has his own show now on saga 960 on the weekends and it's all about coffee booze
and food and it's called drinks on us and he they basically they sample wine they talk about
you know different whiskeys they talk about barbecuing and yeah it's pretty cool
do they talk about beer oh of course do. They've talked a lot about beer.
Yes.
And speaking of beer, there's some stuff sitting here.
I've become much better at segues since your last episode.
Yeah, that's a very good segues.
Now, these all have different like colors and designs on them.
Are they different flavored beers?
They're different beers.
You have six different beers.
Is there anything that is light on the stomach?
Yeah, I mean.
Talk into the mic.
Come on.
You should be knowing
this kind of stuff, right?
I had to look, though.
My mic has to...
This is cool.
...come with me here.
Let's...
Okay.
I mean, they're all great beers.
I don't know.
You got to give it a go.
Yeah.
And maybe have somebody with you.
With the pasta.
Right.
Pour it into a glass
to make sure you like it.
And if you don't like it,
pass the can to your buddy
or whatever and say,
finish this off.
So thank you, Great Lakes Brewery. Yes. make sure you like it. And if you don't like it, pass the can to your buddy or whatever and say, finish this off.
So thank you,
Great Lakes Brewery.
Yes.
Their local fresh craft beer.
They're also in LCBOs and some grocery stores as well.
So find yourself some Great Lakes
and when you crack it open,
know you're helping.
What are you doing?
You're basically,
you're showing brands
and companies
that fueling real talk like this
is good for business.
Exactly.
That's why you buy your pasta at Palma Pasta, the stickers at Sticker U, and the beer at
Great Lakes Brewery.
And the lovely thing about any potential advertiser when it comes to podcasts is if you advertise
on TV or radio, once that ad runs, it's done.
But it's on the podcast.
It's there forever.
Somebody just discovers Toronto Mike.
They're going to go back and listen to, what, 488 episodes?
It happens all the time.
Yes.
And people are like, oh, you had, this exactly just happened.
A young lady's like, oh, you had Liza Fromer on?
I love her.
And they find the link to the episode,
and they're like, they're hearing it for the first time.
And they're telling you, oh, that was amazing, Liza.
Exactly.
That might be a four-year-old episode,
but it's new to them, you know?
So getting back to what I was saying earlier.
Yeah, you go.
Players don't like me.
Not true.
Not true.
Sportsnet fired me.
Also not true.
Okay, that's interesting
because the assumption out there is that,
okay, fired's a weird word.
Yeah.
Like, did you have a contract that wasn't renewed?
Nope, nope.
Like, did you just decide to leave?
Nope, not even that either. Okay leave? Uh, nope. Not even that
either. Okay. Tell me Barry. They made a decision that they were going to change the baseball
broadcasts and that I was not going to be a part of the baseball broadcasts anymore. And I was
basically given an option to take another assignment or decide to search other opportunities.
And I decided to search other opportunities.
There's a lot more than that,
but that's all I'm willing to divulge right now.
But it was a mutual parting of the ways.
I still have a lot of friends over there,
the ones that haven't been let go,
because the business is pretty nasty.
Even if I had still been, if I had stayed there,
who knows if I'd still be there now.
And I mean, there's more,
I hear there's more cuts coming.
Have you heard this?
It's brutal.
Yeah, it's happening all over.
It's not just Sportsnet and the fan.
It's everywhere.
And that's why it's great that we do what we do
because Mike, who can fire you?
Nobody.
This is your show, that's an excellent point.
This is your show, right?
That's right.
I love working for myself.
So Out of the Park is your podcast.
Yes.
By the way, when I introduced the fact that it's your second visit, I meant to tell people that if you're looking for the deep dive of Barry Davis, even though it was recorded shortly after this.
I was so young back then.
It was the 223rd episode.
So go to episode 223.
Mike chats with Barry Davis about his years at the fan,
his time at Sportsnet covering the Blue Jays,
why he's no longer there,
and his Tom Petty tribute band, We Ain't Petty.
Wow, we just started that up, I think, back then.
It's still going?
Oh, yeah. It's been great. We're we just started that up, I think, back then. It's still going? Oh, yeah.
It's been great.
We're hooked up with the Northern Heat Rib Festival.
So we're playing every Saturday night, 7 to 8.30,
in a different place in Ontario.
We're in Milton this weekend.
I don't know when the show airs.
Dude, I'm going to have this online 15 minutes
after we take that photo.
That's perfect.
So yes, this Saturday, 7 to 8, 30, we are in Milton.
And I believe next Saturday, we're out in the Thornhill, Vaughan area.
So we're all over the place.
Amazing.
Yeah.
I need to book you for a future TMLX.
Dude, we're in, man.
But I don't pay cash, though.
Like, it's beer and exposure and good vibes.
I could do a solo show.
Well, we'll talk. We'll talk we'll talk yeah so again episode 223
uh by the way that whole like jay's talk real quick jay's talk is the fact it tells me the
fact that we're trading stroman tells me that we're like we're still at least five years away
from being competitive if they trade stroman i think it's the most ridiculous thing in the world
and i have not been on the stroman bandwagon over the last couple of years just because of a lot of
things that have gone on on social media and stuff you know i've always liked him as a pitcher but i
think he's really come a long way this year i think he's growing up he'll probably be the first
one to admit that he's really growing up this year and i think he's become a much better leader in that clubhouse and if they trade him they're
going to need to now find someone to pitch and the someone that they're going to need is going to have
to click all the check all the boxes that marcus strowman has he's not over the hill he's still
going to be a big part of this thing when they're ready to compete i think this would be the most
ridiculous thing in the world i think you need to hold on to him
unless you're getting this unbelievable prospect in return.
But I have no doubt they're going to trade Stroman.
Do you?
Oh, it's pretty, yeah, because if they weren't,
they would have locked him up by now.
Yeah.
Right?
It's so sad that, you know, you have these,
you're looking at these parts that are part of the future
and you're kind of like into that,
like Vladdy and Bichette.
And yeah, you got some future parts,
Cav and Biggio.
You got guys like that.
But you have so many, it's an awful team.
Like it's barely watchable, this team.
And you got a guy like Stroman
and you're going to trade him.
And he's not that old, like you said.
So it's essentially a big sign that,
no, we're not going to be competing in two to three years.
Like we're looking five, six years.
Well, offensively, that's the thing though.
Offensively, they could be ready to compete
by mid-next season, right?ladimir guerrero and boba shed and cavin biggio
and rowdy tell us i mean these guys could be ready to all explode by next season you need to have
some pitching there right you need to have some pitching there and i'll tell you what um yeah
when shapiro and atkins took over i i was behind them for what they were going to do,
and I didn't give them the blame for the team going downhill.
I was supporting what they were doing.
I still support the idea of the rebuild
because regardless of who was the GM, they had to do this.
This team was not going to function anymore
with Donaldson and Edwin and Russell Martin
and Tori Tulewitzki and Jose Bautista.
That was going to end
anyway but and i've said this on the podcast many times they have no idea how to interact with the
fan base they are losing the fans the loyal fans that this team has had and some of the things that
they have done or haven't done really make me scratch my head
like you're referring to the fact they do some things i would call tone deaf like are you talking
about things like vladdy sitting on holiday monday absolutely and then that was the first game that i
went to this season i went with my wife who's not a baseball fan but thought oh this be cool to watch
vladdy right why wouldn't he be playing on this day so we go down there you know we get our hot dog and our beer and we're sitting there and no vladdy in
the lineup and i'm thinking this is absolutely ridiculous i mean i understand the load management
situation right but give him his days off when they're on the road i don't care if he plays
in baltimore right the fans in baltimore don't need to see him or plan a tuesday
or sit on a tuesday night or whatever yeah i hear you but yeah the holiday money and then
then the excuses that came out were just kind of like are you serious so yeah they they kind of
started to lose me when i heard the way that they started to spin this stuff and it just
it kind of spiraled out of control and then there's the edwin jackson situation and then
after everything,
Al,
they,
they DFA the guy.
So just things are a little confusing now,
even if you,
if you've seen Boba Shett,
some of the comments he made seems like he's,
if it's not bitter,
he's,
he's a little bit miffed as to why he's not with the team because he should be.
I,
I,
I think that's a good time for me to play a question. Sure.
In fact, it's a perfect time to play this question from Brian Gerstein from propertyinthesix.com.
So here's Brian.
Propertyinthesix.com
Hi, Barry.
Brian Gerstein here,
sales representative with PSR Brokerage
and proud sponsor of Toronto
Mite.
Lately, I've been doing lots of leases.
Got two clients' condos at Yonge and Eglinton and one a townhouse in Richmond Hill.
Late next week, I'll be listing a brand new suite at Minto Westside at Bathurst and Front.
Contact me for any rental or buy and sell needs you have, 416-873-0292. Barry, I am fed up with service time the way it is
currently calculated. Yes, the players foolishly agreed to it and collect the bargaining, but how
far will owners, and specifically the Jays, go with it to piss off their prized players and fan
base? Bobachet wants to be called up now and isn't, partially due to service time and partially
because the Jays don't want to platoon him with Freddie Galvis.
So until Galvis maximizes his trade value
and his move,
Bowe is stuck in the minors.
Where do you stand on this issue?
Great question, Brian.
And great timing too, Mike.
The whole idea of service time
is ridiculous in baseball right now.
And what it's doing it's it's preventing
these great young stars from being in the game as we saw at the beginning of this season it kept
vladimir guerrero jr down and here's what i'm thinking yeah bo bichette won't be called up
unless freddie galvis is traded and even if freddie galvis is traded i have a feeling that
if devin travis is healthy he'll get the call up
before Boba Shett only because of the idea of the service time and if Boba Shett gets up and plays
it all this year that time is going to be ticked off next year and you won't see Boba Shett make
the team out of spring training it will be a few weeks and because they don't want that just like vladdy
just like vladdy and it's ridiculous and all teams do it unfortunately this is not a shapiro
atkins thing this is a baseball problem it's something that they're going to have to work
out in the next collective bargaining agreement you mentioned a lot of uh former blue jays have
appeared on out of the park so i opened this episode with this. We like our team, Barry.
So that's Josh Donaldson.
Yes.
Which I mean, I loved it.
We like our team, Barry.
He's been on Out of the Park.
He was, yeah.
Yeah, we had some fun with him.
I even called him a bitch on the show.
And he agreed.
He was so good, man.
Man, how long was he here?
Two years?
I think he was...
15, 16. Yeah. And then when was he? Two years? I think he was... 15, 16.
Yeah.
And then when was he traded?
No, I think...
Yeah, he pitched...
He played in 17 as well.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, right.
He did play in 17.
We traded him at like the trade...
The end of...
The trade deadline, 17.
Yeah.
For like nothing.
Right.
Wasn't that last year?
Something told me...
Well, maybe...
Was it last year?
I think it was 2018.
I think he began this year.
That's funny how I can't remember i know that
he was injured and he didn't play and then uh he that was two years ago was it last year i think
it may have been last year and then he got traded to cleveland and then he he started playing right
and now he's with atlanta now he's great right back with uh back with alexanthopolis man um so
what kind of what kind of guy is john i've always like what kind of guy is Josh? I've always, what kind of guy is he? Like, did you get to know the real Josh?
He's a different kind of dude.
He can be a lot of fun, but he also has his moments.
And first and foremost, he's not a morning guy.
Okay, so Josh Donaldson in the mornings,
if the Jays play a day game,
you really tread carefully around him in the mornings.
And I joked about that with him on the show, about how he can be a little crust him in the mornings and I joked about that with
him on the show about how he can be a little crusty in the mornings and which is true if he's
if things are going well he's great and he'll always be a good quote I think that if you asked
him for an interview he'll he'll give you the interview and uh you know when I I hadn't spoken
to him since he had left the Blue Jays and it was, you know, trying to find him and trying to,
actually not since he left the Blue Jays,
because you'll see with the Blue Jays when I had him on the show,
I had left Sportsnet.
I hadn't seen him since I'd left Sportsnet.
And I just happened to see him at Winterfest
and asked him if he'd come on the show.
And he said, yeah, I'd love to.
And then I never heard from him again.
I've had a few of those.
Yeah, and then I just hit him up on Twitter.
And a few of my listeners kind of piggybacked on that,
and finally he said, sure.
And we set it up, and yeah, he was fantastic.
How long did he give you?
Like, he gave you a phone call, right?
How long?
Yeah, we did about 40 minutes.
That's amazing.
Yeah, we split it into two parts,
and the ones who are members on Patreon
got to hear part two of that, which is great.
That's inspiring to me.
So I might have inspired you on your first round,
but now you're right.
I need to, because every time I have that thought
of giving something special to patrons,
then I always have this moment of like,
well, you're creating that content, give it to everybody.
And I always end up giving it to everybody.
You know what?
I'm always caught in that as well.
So that's why whenever I have a guest on the show i split the interview into two parts and the first part goes
to everyone and the second part and what we do is we allow our members to send questions in
to the players so now the second part includes a lot of q a with our listeners who are members so
it's great i mean we've got ryan barucki coming up on this week's show. So a lot of times we don't have a lot of time to get it out there because we'll find out
today that we're recording with him tomorrow, which is the case. So now we've got 24 hours to
get our members to send questions into them. But good on you for figuring out a way to,
you know, give incentive to beyond just trying to, you know, help fuel the real talk.
Well, and on top of that too, I mean, and it goes for you as well. I mean, know give incentive to beyond just trying to you know help fuel the real talk as i said well and
on top of that too i mean and it goes for you as well i mean you and i we are we are making art of
some sort right and we aren't getting a weekly paycheck from a boss we are doing this for
ourselves and in you know it's not that we're asking for charity we're just asking for the
people that are enjoying the show and listen to the show to do what they can to help. And, you know, we're not asking for everyone to give me a hundred bucks
a month, right? We're just asking them to give what they can and to help out. Because if you
get a thousand people that each give you, you know, a buck a month, there's a thousand bucks
a month right there. Yeah, no doubt. Nothing to sneeze at there. Now, shout out your Patreon page
and then I'll do mine and we'll tell everyone to do both. Yeah, it's just NS to sneeze at there. Now, shout out your Patreon page, and then I'll do mine,
and we'll tell everyone to do both.
Yeah, it's just NSR Media.
In fact, if you go to our website, nsrmedia.ca,
there's a Become a Member tab right on the front page,
and you click that, and off you go.
And for as little as three, and it's U.S.,
and that's the one thing, I wish we had a Canadian version of Patreon.
I've had this discussion with loyal listener Grant.
I'm sure he's listening right now. That is an issue of some people. Let's create one. PayPal has something similar
where it's a recurring PayPal contribution in Canadian dollars. I'm looking into that right now.
Yeah. Well, if you get that going, you let me know. But for as little as three, and then we
have more incentives for the people that put in five bucks a month.
And, you know, we've got a few people that are donating even more
just because they're great people
and they like to help out.
No, I love to hear that.
And I encourage people to help you out
and then help me out.
I encourage them to help you out, yes.
Right, you know, we are two independent souls.
Like, I think that's huge in this day and age.
Yeah, and we're not PBS.
We're not sitting here.
We're not going to rant on for two hours
and then give you five minutes of content.
Do you remember, was it Goldie Gardner?
I'm trying to remember.
I think it was Goldie Gardner.
I think that's her name.
She was the PBS pledge lady that I saw growing up.
And every time I saw her on TV,
I'm like, oh, it's another drive.
Yeah, and you would, you know,
they have great programming on,
but you get a little bit of that
and then you get 12 minutes of them asking for the money.
And I, you know, Mom, could you please pay them
so I can watch the rest of this show?
Man, we should one day do a drive to get our patrons up.
Okay, so Out of the Park, that's your podcast.
But I need to know more about the spin.
Well, it's interesting because the original plan was that
I was just
going to move out of the park onto radio because saga 960 was launching and they were looking for
some people to host and um they had someone doing the afternoon drive so it just started that i was
just giving them you know a week once a once a day one hour show which was pretty much out of the park
just an extended version right Right. But live?
No, no. At first I was actually taping it from home and just sending it to them.
And then they would air it from six to seven.
Well, it wasn't long before they found that they had a hole in their four to seven show.
So they asked me if I would be interested in doing it.
But, you know, you have to go live and, you know, I asked. And you have to go to the studio.
Go to the studio and do it and do traffic and all that kind of stuff.
And I mean, quite obviously, I wanted Matt to do that with me.
But because it wasn't like, here's your gig and here's all your money.
You know, it's a station starting out.
It's independent.
And Matt couldn't give up his drum teaching, which he does it, you know, during the week.
So I went out looking for a co-host and I was very fortunate enough to find Michelle
Storino, who I worked with years ago at Sportsnet, and she was just totally gung-ho.
And what we're able to do now on the radio show is do some of the things that I do on Out of the Park.
In fact, I record an hour a day with Matt, and that goes from 6 to 7.
So we do the Out of the Park kind of stuff.
When Michelle's on, we talk about everything.
Yeah, not just sports this is not
just a sports show we have a lot of musicians that come in on a regular basis in fact friday we've
got darby mills from the headpins coming on the show because she's going to be performing in
toronto uh in august and um yes we got a lot of musicians on on wednesdays we call it wellness
wednesday we do physical health mental health we have a psychotherapist that comes on. I have a physiotherapist. I have Hal Johnson from Body Break that joins us every week.
Not Joanne as well? No, just Hal?
Joanne came on once and we teased Hal that we may have to replace him with her because she's a lot of fun.
I can't even picture them apart to be honest.
I know. I think every time he's doing the interview she's there with him.
So yeah, we do that. We have an entertainment writer that comes on every week.
So we talk some TV and movies.
We have a travel guy that talks about, you know, places to go on vacation.
So we try to just make it something that sports fans can enjoy without being just rammed with sports every day.
We're the anti-McCowan show.
And now that there's no McCowan, this is something that's available.
And even though the transmitter and it's a Mississauga Peel station,
you can pick it up all through Toronto.
You can pick it up.
I was in Newmarket last week.
You could hear it out there.
St. Catharines.
It's a pretty decent signal for a Mississauga station.
And that's 960.
So listeners of Toronto Mic, fairly recently, Mike Richards came back.
Yes. Always full value. This guy gives good podcasts. Oh, yeah. So listeners of Toronto Mic, fairly recently, Mike Richards came back.
Yes.
Always full value.
This guy gives good podcasts.
Oh, yeah.
You give great podcasts too, but Mike Richards, he shoots from the hip.
He does.
And I love Mike. He's the one who brought me aboard onto Saga.
Well, that's where I'm going with this.
And I won't reveal the details of the conversation because it was a private one-on-one phone call,
but I did have a lengthy chat with Mike Richards the evening before his before his first show oh my god 960 okay that was that was
pretty crazy there was a lot of things that went and it was a lot of serendipity i'd like to say
that uh you know had me go in there and help him out for that first show and it was being there
with him that first day that opened the door for me getting the time slot I got.
Okay, good.
Because it felt really like you were doing him a solid.
And you were, yeah, you were going to be there.
It was the night before.
Can you come in for five o'clock tomorrow morning?
Right.
Like, sure.
I mean, I'd never say no to Mike.
Well, I might.
I might if he asked me.
Within reason, right?
Within reason, yeah.
Well, you're a nice guy.
You're a good soul.
So was Mike Richard.
And Mike, no, I mean,
I got all the time in the world for Mike Richard.
He's a wonderful guy.
I just need excuses for him to come back.
He's tremendous.
So, okay, so you were there doing like news and traffic?
No.
What were you doing there?
What were you doing the first day?
No, the first day.
The first day.
I sat in with him and Dave and just, you know,
and I brought in a couple of guests to come on the show.
And then, you know, I was doing some traffic and stuff like that.
And, you know, after that first day, I said,
you guys don't need me here.
I mean, this is your show.
You guys do it.
I mean, I was here to kind of help you for that first day.
And, you know, Mike put in some words.
And it just so happens that people running the station were there that morning.
And one thing led to another. And next thing you know i got the the afternoon drive show there which is
kind of cool now do they uh and you know you tell me if it's none of my business but is this model
where you sell your own business model you sell your own advertising well they we have i have uh
and mike and i both have a small advertising team of salespeople that are going out and pounding the pavement and bringing in advertising.
And yeah, it's basically a revenue-driven type of thing for us.
So you get the three-hour time slot.
Yes.
And then now you are on the radio and you're reaching ears, if you will.
And then you can go to whatever, this car dealership or whatever and say uh would you like to be a
sponsor on the show exactly and so you're not necessarily getting a you know a big fat check
from the owners of the radio station but you can use that space that they give you on a very good
four to seven shift right and i own all my product right so that's the important thing it's like a
musician giving up the rights to your songs that everything that we do on that show belongs to me so i podcast it afterwards and i can do
whatever i want with the podcast version of those shows and cool yeah so there's a there's a spin
podcast there is yeah every pretty much every evening um i'll take the best of the three hours
and condense it into a one hour podcast now mike he was very open and honest about some early
struggles with the station like you mentioned now you're in etobicoke like there was a pretty
interesting story he told but have things stabilized nicely oh yeah i mean it improves
all the time right and because this is new and you know we we trying to figure out how we're
going to get things going technically and building making sure the studio is soundproof and making sure we've got the right equipment stokely dropped
by to help out with some andrew stokely's the best yeah he came and he offered up some great advice
and yeah with each show things are getting better now we're starting to do a lot more on you know
on the road remote broadcasts i know mike did one uh from the pump and i did one from woodbine
racetrack did one from the Mississauga steelheads golf tournament.
And this Friday we're going to be at a golf tournament in King city where
there's a whole whack of NHL players there.
Cool.
Yeah.
That sounds really cool.
And how often do you actually see Mike Richards though?
Cause he does the morning shift and he gets,
I was going to say you never crossed time.
You know,
and I don't even,
cause I'm not awake to listen to him live,
but the cool thing for him,
whether it's cool or not,
is that they replay my show
leading into Mike's show in the mornings.
So when Mike's driving into work,
assuming he's listening to 960,
I hope you're listening to 960, Mike.
He can hear my show on the way in
to work for his show.
All right, now I need to follow up
on a couple of other items
that Mike Richard introduced
in his most recent episode.
One is this move to traffic on the five.
Yes.
What can you say about traffic on the five?
I hate doing traffic.
I tell you that,
but,
but it's great because for the people that are living in the West end,
if you're,
if you're listening to 680 news or the fan or whatever,
you're getting Toronto traffic,
right?
You're getting,
you know, coming in and out of the city, but we're, we're telling you what's happening West of the city. whatever you're getting toronto traffic right you're getting you know
coming in and out of the city but we're telling you what's happening west of the city so we're
telling you what's you know happening on the 403 and any accidents that are there west of the 427
so this is really the only place to go if you live anywhere in the peel region as far as up
in caledon or whether you're living in burlington or Hamilton, we'll tell you what the traffic's like out your way. And there's lots of people living.
Sure. It's amazing. Mississauga, it's over a million people, right? Yeah. And you think about
that. There are a lot of very stable radio stations that are in very small markets.
And this is not only a pretty large market, when you take Mississauga and Brampton and put them together, but the fact that the station reaches out through most of the GTA.
Right.
Okay, so the traffic on the fives is the one thing that Mike was jazzed about.
I just wanted to make sure you were equally jazzed.
Oh, jazzy.
Oh, I'm jazzy with that.
The traffic on the fives.
thing that he talked about tell me if this is still happening but he said in 2020 saga 960 will be uh in the book the bbm uh that's the plan that's the plan but somebody has to cough up some
money to get in that book it takes time i think we're going to be getting some numbers within the
next month from some like stats radio or some kind of program i don't and it means it can't tell us
what our share is,
but it can at least tell us, you know,
how many people are listening and a breakdown of our audience.
I mean, I've already got some preliminary numbers
and I think I have more female listeners
than male listeners.
Hey, how are you?
Must be the picture that I posted
of what I'd look like at the age of 75.
Have you gone on this thing?
I refuse to.
I don't want the Russians to steal my data.
Check this out.
Somebody did this and sent this to me.
This is me at 75.
I think I'm looking pretty fine at 75, right?
Good looking guy.
I'm with you, man.
Yeah, yeah.
I look more like Tom Petty there than I do now.
I may not have to wear the wig when I'm older.
That's actually like that grizzled kind of handsome.
Oh, yeah.
I showed this to my wife.
She says, I can't wait till you're 75.
I may getch with you once in a while when you're 75. See, I do it i just don't want to install the app so maybe i'll use yours no i
don't have the app somebody did it and sent it to me i gotcha yeah i'm not that's the way to go
smart man that's the way i want to go many of these weird apps if any listeners want to do it
for me uh i would love to see what i'm going to look like at 75 yes so you'll be in the book now
uh mike is you mentioned you learned some data from some kind
of measurement system or whatever but i'm trying to think so you'll be going against primetime
sports and overdrive is that where i'm right yeah yeah i mean overdrive is a great show
no doubt about it those guys do a really good job but we give people something different
right right overdrive is great at what they do and they're very well very hockey heavy very very
hockey heavy but again we're the alternative that's what i look at it as we're the alternative we're not we're we're a
station for sports fans that's not a sports station right we do our share of sports but we
and it's it tags along with the whole premise of what out of the park is and it's out of the park
is the human side of sports we don't talk i mean we had a guy on from the argos the other day
and we did not talk once about the fact that they haven't won a mean we had a guy on from the argos the other day and we did not talk once
about the fact that they haven't won a game we never just yeah well he didn't want to talk about
no no you know i just made a joke at the end about it and he said something about it but we talked
he has his own clothing line his father was his guy's name is james wilder jr okay so his father
played in the nfl and he played in the nfl so we talked about growing up the son of a NFL player and, you know, adjusting to life here in Canada. And we talked about his life. We talked,
you know, and like I said, he has his own clothing line out. So we talked about how he likes to style.
We talk to people. We don't interview players. Gotcha. And that's exactly what we do when we
have musicians on. And what I love is, I mean, we've been fortunate enough to, you know, have a
lot of connections and I've had a lot of really good 80s acts on some real established artists from the
70s and stuff.
But we've also been able to be a good platform for a lot of new up and coming artists.
And at least once or twice a week, we have new young artists, independent artists that
come in our studio and we get their story and they perform for us.
And I love it.
our studio and we get their story and they perform for us and i love it i love getting the message out for new music because as a musician myself it you know yeah there you have more platforms
but you also have a lot more competition and it's very hard to get any kind of airplay for your
music and the same thing goes i mean i've had a lot of bands that were big in the 80s and i'll
give you an example honeymoon suite well they've had a lot of bands that were big in the 80s. And I'll give you an example, Honeymoon Suite.
Well, they had an album out in 2017.
No one's ever heard of it.
Well, when I had Johnny D on the show, I played a new song.
And I said, listen, anybody can turn on the radio and listen and hear New Girl Now or Burning in Love or Wave Babies.
Right.
I like the video for Wave Babies.
Yeah, the video's fantastic.
But I want people to be able to hear
what you're doing now.
So that's what I try to do
is to try to allow these artists
to promote what they're doing now
as well as talk about what they did in the past.
Well, good on you because as a society,
I feel we're all about the hits now.
And I mean, I mentioned Lois DeLow
when I gave you the sticker
and that new album, which is fantastic. So I had Lois DeLow when I gave you the sticker and that new album, which is fantastic.
So I did, I had Lois DeLow on and we just went through the new album.
We played the song and then Ron Hawkins talked about, you know, what he was writing about,
like what inspired, which was amazing.
But at the same time, people really want to hear, you know, Bleed A Little Wild tonight.
Of course they do.
You know, it's like, play me the hits.
Yeah.
And you can sprinkle in some new stuff, but make sure you don't forget the hits.
And that's a tough thing when you're a musician because you never stop writing.
You don't lose the desire.
You don't lose, you know, your skill to write a song.
And someone will write a song now that they think is wonderful, but they have to sneak
it into their set, like you said.
You're right.
You got to put it between some hits and then, yeah. And you've been playing the same bloody songs for years and years and years and it's like
well right hey we got something new here and you know the spoons have a brand new album out and
it's phenomenal i'm with you yes just an amazing album and i've gotten to know gordep really well
over the years and i had him in and i've played his out his new album i've played songs off it
little bits of it on the and you know you know, I'm really happy to see
the new stuff doing
as well as it is.
But even when he is performing,
he'll kind of like,
okay, here's the deal.
We'll play two of our hits,
but, you know,
here's one of our new ones
if you're cool with it.
Like I've seen them
a few times recently
and that's a band
that totally gets
why people are there.
They're there to relive the 80s.
Totally.
And they're totally conscious of it.
So yeah, you're right.
They'll apologize, here's a new song and then we'll relive the 80s. Totally. And they're totally conscious of it. So yeah, you're right. They'll apologize.
Here's a new song.
And then we'll get back to romantic traffic.
Right.
And if you listen to the new stuff on the new album,
it stands up with anything they've ever done.
But no, another, okay, back in the day,
you know, you got on the radio, you got on Much Music.
This was sort of the formula to sell.
Back when they played videos on Much Music.
Right.
But nowadays, what do you do?
Like, even if
you're a legacy act that gets airplay they aren't going to play your new stuff like there is no
radio for you anymore no so it's like you're kind of it's kind of hard out there yeah unless you're
an artist that has their own xm station right like tom petty does right i mean you won't hear
anything from the last 30 years from tom petty on the radio but if
you go to xm the tom petty channel you'll hear everything from his catalog but there's only a
few acts that have their own station so that's it becomes very hard you have to rely on the internet
and you also have to understand as a musician when you're writing these albums that your hardcore
fans are probably going to buy it.
They'll download it online, but
you are not going to get airplay.
I have a question
from a listener about
Tom Petty, and I'm wondering if I should save it.
I'm just making a decision myself. Maybe I'll
ask it real quick here. Firstly,
last time you were here, Tom Petty was
still alive.
So my condolences. I guess you heard from a lot of people that terrible day.
Do you know the most surreal moment of my life?
Well, one of them.
So we hadn't had a gig in probably about two months,
and we just locked in a show that we were doing,
and I'm like, oh, I got to get myself back.
I haven't played this stuff in a while.
So I was literally sitting at my computer.
I was playing along and I was doing the Tom Petty voice and I was playing a song and my
phone lights up and it was Matt or someone saying, did you see the news about Tom Petty?
He just died.
And here I was like in the middle of channeling my inner Tom Petty when I got the news that
he had passed away.
And it just like it freaked me out.
Like it blew me away because I didn't see it coming.
I had no idea.
No, because he was active on tour.
He looked healthy.
And, you know, it was so strange.
I mean, he finished the entire tour.
You know, it's almost like his body and his brain said,
you ain't dying yet, man.
You're going to finish this tour.
And then finding out later that he did the entire tour with a broken hip,
that he should have, that he was advised by his doctors to go have surgery before the tour and he said no no i have
told my fans that i'm going to do this tour people have bought tickets i'm not canceling shows i'm
doing this tour he shouldn't have been out there and he had planned to go get the surgery as soon
as the tour ended unfortunately he didn't live long enough to do that wow now basement dweller
says where does barry rank tomty and the Heartbreakers'
somewhat critically derided 1987 album,
Let Me Up, I've Had Enough,
which is now largely remembered, if at all,
for the Bob Dylan co-wrote Jammin' Me.
And this guy just puts in,
personally, I think it is quite underrated
despite some of the questionable production choices.
Well, you know what?
I think the people that were hardest on that album were tom petty and the heartbreakers themselves like
tom petty hates that album and i think a lot of it was the dress that it was was done under i think
it was the time where they were trying to really blend in with what the 80s sound was and i think
that they were having you know a few issues with uh some of the members of the band at the time and they've been doing it for so long
and they after that album that was when tom petty decided to go and do full moon fever which was the
solo album and what a comeback that what a comeback right having said that yeah there's some really
good songs on let me up i've had enough it's a great album it to me it's not one of his best
albums but there's some great songs on that
album and you have to really dig deep and if you're not a true Tom Petty fan you probably
only know Jammin' Me from that album if you're moderate you might know another song called
Runaway Train which was a really good song as well but yeah the drummer Stan Lynch was starting
to do a lot of his own writing on the side. He had written some stuff for Don Henley and it was starting to be the parting
of ways there.
So,
um,
yeah,
it wasn't a typical Tom Petty sounding album.
Let's put it that way.
Let's go in the time machine.
Speaking of older music,
time machine.
I love that.
30 years ago this week,
this was the number one song on the billboard.
Hot 100 30 years ago.
It's a great song.
That was 30 years ago.
Yep, 1989.
I got to tell you, when this song came out,
I wasn't crazy about it because I was still,
I was unwilling to give up the hair days, right?
Like I was sticking with my Def Leppards
and my Cinderella and Bon Jovi.
Motley Crue in there?
Motley Crue, absolutely.
Yeah, I wasn't quite ready for this yet.
Right.
And then when the 90s came, I honestly, it took me a long time to understand and get
into the grunge sound.
Because again, I was still...
Sure, because it was stomping on what you loved, like how you identified.
Totally.
I totally see.
And you had the hair and everything.
Yeah.
Yeah, it took me a while.
It wasn't until like, you know, maybe 93 that the hair finally went away.
I could totally see that.
If you're identifying as the hair metal guy and then this new grunge comes along.
Well, not that this is anything to do with grunge.
No, no.
But grunge comes along and wipes it out.
But this is Fine Young Cannibals.
Yeah.
Good thing.
Which is sort of like a throwback to the 50s, I want to say.
Again, now I listen to this stuff.
I really dig it.
I dig a lot of what the Fine Young Cannibals did.
You know, back then I knew She Drives Me Crazy, right?
Of course.
Which to me sounds very similar to an In Excess song.
Which one?
I Need You Tonight.
From Kick. Yeah. Yeah. The one? I Need You Tonight. From Kick.
Yeah.
Yeah.
The first single from Kick.
Yeah.
That was what an album Kick was.
Now, In Excess was a band I always liked.
And during the 80s, I was cool with what you'd call classified new wave if it had a guitar in it.
Gotcha. guitar in it gotcha right and i was and now all these years later i'm starting to appreciate a
lot more of the keyboard bands from the 80s the new wave bands and i've got a buddy who's really
big on that and he's brought a lot of great acts uh into classic bowl he runs that place and he
does a lot of these shows and um gotten to know the guys from images in vogue really well and you
know they're very highly keyboard oriented band and i've really started to appreciate that i've always been a person that says a good song is a
good song regardless of the the genre of it your buddy uh gourd dep now plays in flock of seagulls
he does yeah and that was this this buddy of mine ed souza the guy who brings in these bands to
classic bowl that kind of set up the fact that he was able to, yeah, he kind of got Gord into a flock of seagulls.
And it's pretty cool because Gord just finished playing
the Cavern Club in Liverpool with flock of seagulls.
How cool is that?
That is cool.
They played a few shows in England.
They were in London.
The group were across the street at Abbey Road and all that kind of stuff.
So it was a pretty cool tour for them.
That, let me do the math on that.
That was 50 years ago this year,
the final time the Beatles played together on top of the roof.
Yeah, 1969.
Yeah, I think it was like January or February of 69
because they were cold.
I feel so old, man.
You could see their breath in the...
I know.
The let it be doc or whatever.
And there's actually, you can hear at the end of one of the songs,
a line John Lennon sang,
you know, my hands are too cold to play the colds.
Right.
Hankering down under the jackets.
Okay.
So why am I playing a song from 30 years ago?
Because remember the time is brought to you by Fast Time Watch and Jewelry Repair.
Barry, I don't know.
You don't own a watch.
I see you don't own a watch.
Oh, I own a lot of watches.
Just none of them work.
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I know.
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Yeah.
Family-run business.
They used to be the watch repair that you'd get in Sears Canada locations.
Okay, yeah, yeah.
Sears, I can say this because they're not here, but they got effed over by Sears, who
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Right.
And now you got watch repair and jewelry repair experts,
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I need to do that
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My watches were kind of like that.
That was my thing when I was at Sportsnet.
I have a lot of great watches.
You were the watch guy.
Yeah, I was trying to get an endorsement deal
with one of the watch companies.
Well, listen,
this is a deal that you and everyone listening has got to take advantage.
You got to do it for no other reason than, A, they're great service.
It's going to be a great price.
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Well, if you tell them you heard about them from Toronto Mike, they give you 15% off any
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Amazing.
Okay, Fast Time Watch
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thank you so much.
And when Fast Time Watch
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Thank you.
So thank you, Rupesh.
Nice to him.
Okay, now we're going to kick out the jams. Yeah.
How hard was it for you to come up with this list?
This was impossible, dude. This is impossible.
If you were to ask
me how many favorite songs I have
that I call my favorites, that'd probably be
about 5,000 that I'd say are my favorite
songs. And you tell me to give you 10?
10? And it all depends on
the day, the week, the hour.
The mood. Right, yeah. I go through so many different songs that I say are my favorites. And then I have to
look at certain bands and then I'm okay. Now I got to tell them my favorite song from that band.
And even that changes. And you also said only one song per artist. And like, for example,
with Tom Petty, I didn't want to give you anything that we play in our set because the stuff we play
in our set, I'm hearing all the time. I'm playing them all the time right and i'm not sick of them but i just don't hear
them the same way now so i wanted to give you something a little more obscure an album track
that i love that we don't play because nobody will know it have you ever heard an episode i'm
putting on the spot here and you be honest with me real talk have you ever heard an episode of
toronto mic'd where somebody kicks out the jams not yet i like the honesty no and it's not that i don't want to but you know it's it's basically
every waking moment i have is working you know what i'm saying no i hear you so i can try so
i'm going to explain how it works since i was only asking that question to find out if you actually
have heard how this works so i'm going to though i'm going to start playing the song yeah and then
i'll bring it down at an appropriate time maybe after like
a verse chorus like a chorus and then i'll bring it down and then essentially we want to hear from
you why did you pick that song what do you love about it tell me any story anything about the song
hear from barry okay are you ready barry davis yes to kick out the jams damn right i am let's get it
going Damn right I am. Let's get it going. have changed some forever not for better some have gone and some remain all these places
have their moments with lovers and friends i still can recall some are dead and some are living. In my life, I've loved them all.
This song still gives me chills.
The sound of John Lennon's voice, it literally puts me into a trance when I close my eyes.
It's such a beautiful lyric.
Really an honest lyric from John Lennon.
Something that was very autobiographical for him.
Sprinkle in McCartney's harmonies
and the mix with Ringo's drums,
and if you're listening on headphones,
you hear them over on the right-hand side.
It's just a beautiful song,
and as you can see, I have in my life
tattooed on my right arm
because it's something that I always think about,
about everybody that has been a part of my life and has really inspired me and John Lennon being really, you know, number one
when it comes to music. And listen, John Lennon wasn't a perfect human being. And that's what
kind of gives me that sense of a connection because you think of these musicians and rock
stars being perfect. I mean, he had a really tough childhood and there were a lot of things that he did
he probably shouldn't have done,
but he also did a lot of amazing things,
including writing a song like this.
No argument here.
This song is gorgeous.
Unbelievably good.
And think about this.
This was, I mean, it's been remastered.
It's probably a remastered version,
but this was recorded back in 1966 on tape
on probably a four track.
I actually just let John finish it.
Double tracked his lead vocal on this,
then McCartney with the harmonies.
And you can hear the guitar buzz.
It's just so beautiful.
Now, it's definitely been remastered
because it was done in mono.
Yeah.
And then they...
A lot of the stuff they did in the early days
were in mono, and they would release them,
and it was kind of a fake stereo.
Yeah, there's a term for it
where you just play the mono in each side.
Like a cheap stereo. Well, in fact, the Sgt. Pepper album, Stereo. Yeah. There's a term for it where you just play the mono in each side. Yeah.
Like a cheap stereo.
Well, in fact, the Sgt. Pepper album,
the mono version is much more coveted
and they say that it sounds much better
than the stereo version of the album.
I have good news for you.
What's that?
So George Martin's son,
his name is eluding me right now,
something Martin.
I can't remember his name.
He has been tasked,
in fact, he's done this,
I think, a couple years ago.
Not Clive, no.
Giles.
Giles, okay, yes, Giles Martin.
He has remastered, so he's basically, his job was to,
their original intent in the mono version,
and with the modern tools, remaster it,
and it was like 2017 or something.
I have it on vinyl.
Right, so this is apparently, this is,
if you want to hear
what they intended to do
in mono in stereo,
you need the Giles Martin
remastered version.
Yeah, it's wonderful.
And there's two discs.
The second disc is like
outtakes and,
you know,
other versions.
Right,
because he had access,
yes,
and there's his dad's notes
and all this cool stuff.
He did the same thing
with the White Album.
Yes,
I haven't picked that up yet,
but it is, yeah, it's incredible.
Amazing.
Great start.
Yes, here, let's kick out another jam.
All right.
Totally not Beatles.
You tell me when you want me to talk about this,
but I want to listen a little bit to this.
A little Eddie Van Halen on the piano here. And here comes this voice.
Oh. Yeah, reach for the golden ring Reach for the sky
Baby, just spread your wings
Get higher and higher
Straight up, we'll fly
Get higher and higher
Leave it all behind
Run, run, run away Tell me why you love dreams.
So I was always a huge Van Halen fan right from the beginning.
And when I remember hearing that David Lee Roth was leaving the band,
I was miffed.
I was a little disappointed.
I never thought David Lee Roth was a great singer,
but he was a great performer, and he was a big part of that Van Halen sound. And I'll never forget where I was miffed. I was a little disappointed. I never thought David Lee Roth was a great singer, but he was a great performer.
And he was a big part of that Van Halen sound.
And I'll never forget where I was.
The day that I heard Why Can't This Be Love, the first single off this album, 5150,
I was sitting in my living room, and I had Q107 up,
and John Derringer was doing the afternoon drive,
and he said, brand new music from Van Halen.
And my first thought was was what in the world
is this and it took me a while
but then the song grew on me
I bought the album and I put
this song on and it just
just hit me
you know they started to use a lot more
keyboards and they were using
some electronic drums because it was the 80s
but I really love Sammy's voice
all these years later
this song still sounds so amazing to me uh of all the songs that Sammy did with Van Halen this was
my favorite Sammy song and again to me a lot of people thought you had to choose you'd either be
a Sammy guy or a David guy and if you were Sammy guy you hated Dave and vice versa but for me
it's two different bands and I love the David Lee Roth Van Halen.
To Me Little Guitars is my favorite David Lee Roth Van Halen song.
But for Sammy, I still love Sammy as well.
They did some incredible things with Sammy. And this song to me is
the epitome of what Van Hagar was.
No love for Gary Cherone? Oh my yeah and i feel bad for him because it
wasn't his fault you know he was great in extreme but this this was just not the gig for him it is
rather uh unusual like i mean acdc did it but he had to die like it's very unusual for a band to
be able to switch up lead singers and not miss a beat no you're right this was this was definitely
a huge thing.
Again, even when they do die,
sometimes it doesn't work.
And we saw what happened with NXS.
They ended up having to do a reality show
to try to find a replacement.
You have Journey has done it with...
The touring band.
The touring band, right.
Nobody, they did not put out albums.
Well, they tried, but they didn't record.
And then you get Foreigner,
and Foreigner is pretty much a Foreigner band now there's nobody from foreigner and foreigner anymore
right so that's what i love i was really disappointed when uh you know sammy has made
many attempts to reconcile with eddie and alex and very basically eddie hasn't returned any of
sammy's emails and he just wants to put put it behind him he'd love to go out and do a tour
with david again but when they did he said that one year they did it was it wasn't good because emails and he just wants to put it behind him. He'd love to go out and do a tour with David again
but when they did he said that one year they did it wasn't good because it was just like
so separate. David never really cared to get together. He actually recommended going on stage
and doing a song with David. David didn't want to do it. And I didn't like it when the last time I
saw Van Halen on tour I was in Tampa spring training, and that was the tour that Eddie had his son, Wolfgang, playing bass.
And this was just before Eddie went back into rehab.
And to me, I mean, Wolfgang's a fine musician, but it's not the same.
Michael Anthony's bass playing, Michael Anthony's voice.
And now Michael Anthony's still hanging out with Sammy.
So that tells you how he feels.
I just thought of another band that did this.
Genesis.
Genesis, yeah.
But Peter Gabriel
and Phil Collins.
Phil Collins was already
in the band.
That's true.
Right?
I mean, to just bring
a complete somebody else.
You're right.
It's a little different.
Absolutely.
All right, let's kick out
another Jamberry.
Remember I told you
I like New Wave with guitar?
There's a perfect example
of New Wave with guitar? There's a perfect example of New Wave with guitar. I've actually thought of putting together a Cars tribute band
as well as the Tom Petty tribute.
You could always combine them.
Yes.
Tom Petty and the Heartbeat Cities.
Oh, yeah.
Ah! Hold her down, don't want to break her crown But she says
Let's go
I like the night, night, baby
She says
I like the night, night, baby
She says
Let's go So in 1978, my older brother came home with the Cars debut album.
It was called The Cars.
And played it.
And right away I went, oh my God.
From the first song, My Best Friend's Girl.
I'm like, I like this band a lot.
I really, really like what this band is doing.
And then this album, Candio, came out.
And first of all, the album cover is just amazing. And this is something you don't get anymore because everybody's digital right
right thank god vinyl is making somewhat of a comeback but um the album cover is great and
this was the first single off it and i remember my mother bought this for me on a 45 and i played
it to death i can still see the green label spinning around
on my little turntable.
And the thing about the car is,
and I think not everybody realizes this,
but everyone knows Rick Ocastic.
He's the lead singer.
He's the songwriter.
He's the face of the band.
He didn't sing half the songs.
In fact, this song is sung by Benjamin Orr,
the bass player, who sang a number of their hits,
and their voices are very similar.
Because I don't think I knew that.
Yeah.
And I once heard an interview with Rick Ocastic, and they said, first of all, how do you decide
who sings what song?
And he said, well, whenever I need a really good vocal, I give it to Benjamin Orr.
So Benjamin Orr sings Drive, another one of their big hits.
He sings Just What I Needed.
So a lot of their biggest hits were sung by Benjamin Orr, who has a similar voice to Rick Ocastic, but can hit the notes that Rick can.
Unfortunately, Benjamin Orr passed away probably 15, 20 years ago. So no chance of a proper Cars
reunion now. But just I loved his voice. I loved everything about this band. I loved the fact that they had a good guitar sound in there,
but the keyboards were in there as well.
And then they followed this album out with Panorama,
which was pretty decent.
But then Heartbeat City came out in, I believe, 1984.
And that was just boom.
That just completely.
And now, thankfully, they're in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
And, of course, the, I'll say much music,
but the MTV generation, right?
Oh, yeah. Having a video that the, I'll say much music, but the MTV generation, right? Oh yeah.
Having a video that was,
I remember in the early days,
it was often in like top 10 videos
of all time.
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
And it was,
you might think.
Yeah,
you might think.
And because they did a lot of things
that were completely new.
And his wife was in there
and that wasn't too shabby either.
He's married to a,
Paula,
Pana,
Polish name.
Supermodel.
Yeah. No, no doubt. Supermodel, yeah.
No doubt.
Oh, well, good for him, man.
You bring back
a lot of good memories
here today.
Well, you mentioned
the 45s.
Yeah.
Because I'm a tiny bit
younger than you,
but I did also collect
45s for singles.
But that reminded me
real quickly
of the other reason
why it was important
to remaster
those old Beatles albums
because those LPs,
they had to be careful
because too much bass,
for example, would skip the needle. Yeah. Like there was a whole bunch of stuff they had to be careful because too much bass, for example,
would skip the needle.
Yeah.
Like there was a whole
bunch of stuff
they had to consider.
You can't skip the needle.
You just couldn't have
an album that was more
than really 45 minutes
worth of material
because if you put
too much material
on an album,
you lose the quality,
at least back then you did.
Right.
So there's a whole
bunch of limitations
we don't have anymore.
Right.
So if you,
you know,
if you can get
George Martin's son
to access the notes
and have access
to the four tracks and all that stuff, go for it.
Yeah.
All right, let's kick out another jam.
This goes back to my childhood, man. guitar solo
Saturday in the park
I think it was the 4th of July
Saturday in the park I think it was the 4th of July Saturday in the park
I think it was
the 4th of July
People dancing
People laughing
A man selling ice cream
Singing Italian songs
It could be He said nothing Singing Italian songs Can you dig it?
Yes, I can
And I've been waiting such a long time
For Saturday
You know, Dick Clark once said, music is the soundtrack of your life. And it's such a, you know, Dick Clark once said, music is the soundtrack of your life.
And it's such a fitting saying because when I hear this song, I go right back, right back to my childhood when I was really young.
And I think about being out in the, literally being out in the park and my dad hitting fly balls to me.
And then, you know, being out with my grandfather who lived in Illinois and watching baseball in the park and my dad hitting fly balls to me and then you know being out with my my grandfather
who lived in illinois and watching baseball in the park and this song it's just so reminiscent
of that and it just so is that's the beauty of this man i get to sit with someone like yourself
and kind of travel through your memories it's amazing and the thing about chicago is people
always associate chicago with peter cetera was, you know, through the 80s.
But, you know, again, like the Cars, Peter Cetera wasn't the only singer in the band.
They had other guys singing.
And some of those hits in the early days were so good.
And I got a really cool Chicago story for you.
Yes, please.
So around, it was the mid-70s.
My dad was a salesperson and he was always set up during the C&E.
He was selling these chairs that were reclining chairs that vibrated.
And, you know, so they were set up in him and his best friend were both huge con artists.
Like they were the best at conning.
Grifters.
Yeah.
So, yeah.
So one night during the CNE, Chicago was playing at Exhibition Stadium.
And I remember my dad's friend saying, because I was there with my mom, I probably about 10 you guys going to the chicago concert we don't have tickets you don't
need tickets come with me so we walked up to like the security gate and my dad's friend said yeah
i'm ron smithinson i am the manager of chicago these are my guests tonight uh can you just let
them in please sure sir no problem wow and we just walked in and we sat in the grandstand and
we literally had to move four or five times
because somebody would come and say,
this is where our seats.
But we ended up going to see Chicago for free
because my dad's friend conned us in.
Amazing.
That could never happen now.
No, that's what I was going to say.
In the 70s, it happened.
Nowadays, it could not happen.
Now they'd be asking for two pieces of ID,
making a phone call.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's the good old days, man.
Oh, good for him, though.
Amazing. Good or bad, one of the two. This Chicago stuff, like, yeah, yeah. That's the good old days, man. Good for him, though.
Amazing.
Good or bad, one of the two.
This Chicago stuff, like, and again, it's funny you mentioned the 80s satiric stuff,
because just like where my first exposure to the cars was essentially, you might think,
okay, my first exposure to these guys, you're the inspiration, right?
And then you realize, oh, they weren't always a schmaltzy, shitty.
No, they were, yeah, those horn sections, you know, they weren't always a schmaltzy shitty uh no they they were yeah they those horn sections you know they replaced the horns with with synthesizers back in the 80s and
right peter satara came there and then david foster got a hold of peter satara and the ego
went through the roof and right there's actually i don't know if it's still there was a great
documentary that was on netflix on chicago but peter satara refused to be a part of it
oh that's too bad i mean yeah is yeah. Did Michael McDonald ever sing for Houston?
No, that was the Doobie Brothers.
Doobie Brothers.
Okay.
Because the trifecta I sometimes get confused is
Steely Dan, Doobie Brothers, and Chicago.
And again, the Doobie Brothers had a completely different sound
when Michael McDonald joined the band.
Right.
But he was in, okay, who are the guys?
You're going to have to help me out here.
Steely Dan. I can't remember the singer's's name i won't put you on the spot there i know one just passed away
and the other one left okay here let's move on oh man here's speaking of icons who left just
uh recently and too soon yeah let's hear this jam
this may be one of the hardest selections I had to make. Do you remember a guy that's been
In such an ugly song
I've heard a rumor from crowd control
Oh no, don't say it's true
They got a message from the action man
I'm happy, hope you're happy too
I've loved all of needed love
Saw the details fall away
The shaking of nothing is giving just pictures of jackals in synthesis.
And I ain't got no money and I ain't got no house.
But I'm hoping to kick, but the planet is glowing.
Ashes to ashes.
Yes.
I've always felt a certain connection with David Bowie because,
and as I was younger, I used to say,
because we shared the same birthday, both January the 8th.
Oh, yeah.
And this song, Grade 6, and I remember it so well and used to listen to it all the time.
And I always, I liked David Bowie as a kid,
but once I heard this song, it opened me up to his entire catalog,
and I got to become more and more of a David Bowie fan as time went on.
And the cool thing about David Bowie is if someone says, do you like David Bowie?
And you're like, I don't really like that type of music.
And then I say, well, then listen to a different David Bowie album.
Because every David Bowie album was completely different.
Right.
You go back to the early Ziggy Stardust days, and then you get to this new wave stuff, and then you get stuff like Heroes,
and then into the 90s,
he was doing the drum and bass stuff,
and Real Electronic,
and I'm Afraid of Americans.
It was just crazy.
Yeah, like the Nine Inch Nails stuff.
Yeah, totally.
And the line,
I'm happy, hope you're happy too.
I'm going to show you.
I got tattooed on my leg here, along with the David Bowie lightning rod thing from his album.
So, yeah, usually things that really do something to me, that's what I want to have a part of me.
So, yeah, David Bowie, I've always felt this connection to.
Really, you know, if I had the look and I had one blue eye and one brown eye,
I would probably have done the David Bowie tribute, you know, because I love Bowie.
And again, I mean, a lot of people, their exposure of David Bowie was the Let's Dance album.
And that was, you know, that was huge.
You put him over the top and, you know, he really had a chance to expand at that point.
That was probably the poppiest album that he did.
I think you're right.
But that album also was the birth of a very famous guitarist
who made his professional debut
on that album.
Who?
A guy named Stevie Ray Vaughan.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Stevie Ray Vaughan.
Double Chum.
Yeah, Stevie Ray Vaughan
played on that album
and was actually going to go out
on tour with Bowie
to support that album.
Bowie, who had been just
so strong out on drugs
for many years.
There was a time in the mid-70s where the only thing he ate,
the only thing he ate was green peppers or hot peppers and milk.
Is this the Berlin era?
Yeah, hot peppers and milk.
That's all he had.
And so he had just gotten himself clean,
and he has Stevie Ray Vaughan,
and Stevie Ray Vaughan was just a junkie to the extreme
and basically said to Stevie,
I can't bring you on tour.
I can't, you on tour i can't
you know because i'm trying to get clean and you're a complete mess so stevie you know left
the band before the tour started and started his own career and had a pretty damn good career
himself unfortunately he was killed in a helicopter crash 89 yeah and he was just getting clean
himself at the time i had colin james on the show who was uh mentored by uh yes yeah yeah
gave him his name right yeah right right right right so yeah we lost stevie rayvon way too soon
and bowie too you've had a rough run with uh petty and you know yeah my wife and son always tease me
it's like you got to stop liking artists because as soon as we find out how much you love an artist
i'll read the biography or watch their they end up dying. You're not a Pearl Jam fan, are you?
I am.
Oh, no.
Yeah, yeah.
I got to meet Eddie at the World Series.
Oh, the Cubs.
Yeah.
Oh, yes, I remember this.
Yes, yes, yes.
I asked him if I could get a pic with him.
And instead of that, he gave me a guitar pic.
Right.
And then posed for a picture.
No, I just saw, in fact, fact bob willett turned me on to this clip where
um i guess it was the 19th birthday of lily cornell and eddie was telling this amazing story about
hearing from chris cornell that lily had just been born it was the first member of their group
they had a kid it was whatever and it was the same day as that tragedy in denmark where all the fans
were trampled at the pro jam concert. It was the same day. Right.
So before the concert,
they get news from Chris
that Lily was born
and then that, you know,
the worst day of their lives,
essentially.
I can't remember how many.
Pearl Jam fans, 19 or some.
I can't remember the number,
but many died.
And he was telling this story
and then he, yeah,
he broke into Seasons
by Chris Cornell, Ed Wedder.
Wow.
It was amazing.
You got to look this up.
I'll link you over.
I'll DM you the link. Yeah, please do. It's amazing. You got to look this up. I'll link you over. I'll DM you the link.
Yeah, please do.
It's amazing.
Okay, let's kick out another jam.
All right.
One of the greatest songwriters ever right here. I love you. Rolling and riding and slipping and sliding, it's magic.
And you, and your sweet design, you took me higher and higher, baby.
It's a living thing
It's a terrible thing to lose
It's a given thing
What a terrible thing to lose
It's amazing how there's a lot of connections
in a lot of these artists that I've chosen.
And Jeff Lynn, who has worked with Tom Petty, part of the Traveling Wilburys.
He produced a few of the Tom Petty albums.
And rightful spot in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
And actually touring in Toronto.
And I would love to go see him.
It's just not a cheap ticket.
I can imagine.
Yeah.
So this song here is from from an album called uh new world
record came out in the mid 70s another record that my older brother had bought and my brother
had seen them play in the 70s and he had these posters up in the room and i see this guy with
electric guitar who looks like bob mccowan honestly and i see these guys with these big
cellos and it's white cellos i'm like what in the world is this and he says well it's a lot of
classical violin orchestra stuff and rock and roll combined. I'm like, come on.
And then I heard this and I went, this is really cool. And, you know, they went on to do different
sounds. Of course, you know, Don't Bring Me Down was more of just a rock and roll type of song.
But there was a certain sound that Jeff Lynne had. And if you listen to anything that he's had his
hands on, whether it be
some stuff he's produced for George Harrison or stuff he's done with Tom Petty, you can totally,
totally hear the Jeff Lynne influence. And this, again, is one of hundreds of yellow songs I could
have chosen. Have you heard from Bob McCowan since he got the news no i haven't i haven't heard from bobcat in
a long long time is he coming on the show or what i'm working on it but i was hoping you'd help me
but clearly you're no help to me oh no i'm not but you can ask him if him and jeff lynn are
you know brothers from other mothers or something because they do look alike i'd open with that if
maybe i'll play the clip of you saying it. Yeah.
I mean, you see ELO now live.
It's more produced.
It's more polished.
You don't see the old style.
Like, they've got these brand new looking cellos.
But they used to be on stage and they'd spin the cellos around.
And it was just a whole production.
It was just a whole show.
And I'm glad he's still doing it now.
And just one of those iconic sounds.
You always know when you hear a song that if it's ELO.
I actually spoke to somebody a couple weeks ago
and I don't want to embarrass him,
but he had no idea who this band was.
I'm like, dude,
if you're in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame,
you've got to get to know them.
But I could see somebody,
I could see that happening
because they're not like,
they don't have that name recognition
of, I don't know, the who.
But they're in the Hall of Fame.
I know.
I know because, yeah.
But I could totally see that.
You're more likely, I think you'd be more likely to have heard of the Traveling Wilburys than ELO.
Exactly.
Exactly.
So very interesting.
All right.
Here's another legend of rock and roll.
All right.
Let's hear it.
Oh, yeah.
Again, I could have picked anything from any of his first five albums,
anything from the 70s from Elton.
Just love this lyric.
He found this war wound like a crown.
It causes child Jesus
Calls him lots to me
And he sends him to the finest school in town
Leave on, leave on lots of money
He makes a lot to save
Spends his days counting
In a garage by the motorway
He was born upon the two of pawn on a Christmas day
When the New York Times said God is dead
And the war's begun
Alvin Tostick held the sun today I've been tossing a hell of a son today
And he shall be a leave-on
And he shall be a good man
And he shall be a leave-on
And to dash him with a family plan
He shall be a leave-on And he shall be a good man You know, other than Lennon and McCartney,
I think the best songwriting team in modern pop rock music
has to be Bernie Taupin and Elton John.
And the fact that, you know, and I saw the movie
and there were things I liked about the movie,
but there was a lot of things I did not like about the movie.
I think they made it too much like a musical kind of thing.
And it was like, I don't want to hear Bernie Taupin singing.
I don't want to hear his manager singing, right?
I want this to be about
Elton's life.
Right.
That's what I wanted.
I did not want to see,
you know, characters in
the movie singing his
songs because it was
seeing dialogue.
I haven't, I have not
seen this, but you'd
want it to be like, for
example, Ray, the Ray
Charles biopic with
Jamie Foxx.
I want, yeah.
Or even the, the Queen
one we just had.
Right.
Exactly.
Now the stuff in the movie
that was about his life
was fantastic,
but just there was too much,
too much fluff put in,
too much of the sing-along stuff,
and it was just,
eh, it's not what I wanted to see.
I don't need to see somebody else
singing an Elton John song.
So, but, yeah, I mean,
Elton's career has gone through so much,
and, you know,
there was a time early in his career where Elton was done.
He said, I'm not going to tour ever again.
After Goodbye Yellow Brick Road came out, he had said, you know, I can't do this anymore.
I'm done.
And here he is now, still performing to this day.
And unfortunately, you know, in the 80s, he had to have throat surgery.
And after the throat surgery, his voice completely changed.
He lost the ability to do his
falsetto and for the early elton john stuff the falsetto was everything so you can perform the
old songs now it's just not the same you know he you know he definitely cashed in on music movie
soundtracks and a lot of people that are younger may not be as familiar with this stuff uh you put
on the soundtrack from Lion King or whatever,
you're like, oh, I know who that is.
That's Elton John.
Yeah, that's Elton John.
You're right.
If you look at 70s Elton, he could do no wrong.
There was a period of time where he could do no wrong.
Yeah.
I mean, he put out two double albums during the 70s.
That doesn't happen very often.
The second one wasn't as good as the first one, but Goodbye Yellow Brick
Road is one of the top albums
in rock and roll history.
It's just fantastic.
I love this song.
I feel like this song is
underrated. Totally. Underappreciated.
The thing is, what Elton would
do is, Bernie would write
literally a story and he would hand it to Elton and Elton would just pick things out of it. And the thing is, what Elton would do is, so Bernie would write literally a story.
And he would hand it to Elton.
And Elton would just pick things out of it.
He would not sing it verbatim the way it was written.
He would take things.
And a lot of times, if you listen carefully to the lyrics, you're like, something's missing here.
But it was just how Elton interpreted the lyrics.
Right. And he could instantly take those freaking lyrics, put them on the piano, and start singing a melody with it.
It's just unbelievable
that they've been able to do that for so many years.
Now, the only leave on I know is leave on helm.
This is not about leave on helm, is it?
No, I don't believe so.
I don't think it's ever been confirmed.
No, no.
If it is about somebody in particular,
it's probably about some crazy person walking around L.A.
thinking he's Jesus, right?
Right.
That's a great jam.
I'm glad you picked that one because it's one of those, you don't hear it all the time
like a lot of the Elton John standards, like your song or whatever.
Your song from his first album too.
Yeah, no, he's, he, he had a, I listened to a podcast and they were talking about when
an artist has an imperial period, like, you know, and Elton in the seventies, he just
bang, bang, bang, bang, bang,
hit, hit, hit, just could do no wrong.
In fact, what stopped his progress
was when he did a Rolling Stone interview
in which he said he slept with men.
And at that time,
that's why he stayed in the closet.
Actually, George Michael apparently,
George Michael saw that
and said, oh, look what happened to his career when he admitted he slept with men.
I think I'll stay in this closet a little bit longer, if you will.
Yeah, it's really sad that so many of these great artists had to pretty much live a different life.
And, you know, Freddie, you know, got married.
Fred's a great example.
Yeah, Elton John got married to a woman and, you know didn't work, and they eventually were able to be who they are.
But, man, it must have been tough.
I mean, there were places in England or in the UK where it was illegal.
It was illegal.
If you were seen in the streets, the manager of the Beatles, Brian Epstein, had to keep it quiet because he would get thrown into jail if people knew that he was gay.
How sad is that?
No, terrible. And I heard an interview recently,
much more modern,
but with Michael Stipe from REM.
And he was just,
he was remarking about how the fact,
because he stayed in the closet a long time.
Oh, yeah.
But he said he thought he made it obvious.
He was saying, you know,
I was wearing like dresses and makeup.
Like he thought he was screaming it out the world.
But it's like,
when it comes to artists,
like, you know,
I think it's because people see like Motley Crue and Poison
and the band's like,
you know,
makeup and,
yeah, it's just,
it's just,
you're an artist.
We don't think about sexuality that way.
But let's kick out another Barry Jam.
All right.
And there may,
some tears may flow from my eyes
when I hear this song.
I got to tell you.
Wouldn't be the first time.
Yeah.
There's just so much sadness in this lyric, the irony of it. The monster's gone He's on the run
And your daddy's here
Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful
I literally get goosebumps
listening to this song.
Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful
Beautiful boy
Before you go to sleep
Say a little prayer
Every day, in every way
It's getting better and better
Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful boy
Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful boy
You know, we talked earlier about how John Lennon was a flawed person.
He was just a kid when his mother was run over by an off-duty cop. know we talked earlier about how you know John Lennon was you know he was a flawed person he was
just a kid when his mother was run over by a an off-duty cop he was just reconciling with his mom
his mom kind of gave him up when he was young he never saw his dad he was raised by his aunt and
he was just reconnecting with his mom and he was 16 years old when she was I think it was actually
maybe 17 when his mom was killed and there was a lot of pent-up anger and stuff that really affected him.
But here he was.
He had just taken five years off of music completely.
Stayed at home.
Was a house husband.
Yoko went out and worked.
And he was baking bread and changing diapers and doing all that stuff.
And then finally, as 1980 approached,
he went to a trip to the Caribbean and got really inspired by the steel drums and stuff
and decided he wanted to get back at it again.
And so many of the songs off of Double Fantasy,
it's almost like he had a premonition, but in a strange way.
This line here.
That's my next tattoo, by the way.
That's one of my favorite quotes of all time.
Life is what happens to you while you're making other plans.
And so here it was, 1980.
He was just getting back into music.
You know, the first single called Starting Over.
This song literally telling his son he can't wait to see what he looks like when he's an adult,
but we'll just both have to be patient, you know.
And he was only 40 years old because at the time, I mean, I was 10, right, or 12.
And here I'm thinking, you know, that's old John Lennon.
That's not Beatle John.
That's old John.
But he'd cleaned himself up.
He'd become a grown-up.
He was a father.
He was a husband.
And he was back in there.
And if you listen to some of the lyrics, and even beyond this album,
he was recording another album at the time of his death.
And they took what they had of it and they put
out an album called milk and honey and there's there's some songs in there of course the lead
single was called nobody told me there'd be days like these right there was another song um called
living on borrowed time and he was recording that song in the days leading up to his death
wow and how crazy is that and yoko was recording a song called walking on thin ice
that were all on this album.
So, you know, to me, this was a guy that was ready to, you know,
start a new phase of his life and be a father and, you know,
start and he had a tour planned and the whole bit.
And I guarantee you that him and McCartney would have gotten themselves
back together again at some point.
And, yeah, just so much of this album,
just it literally gives me goosebumps and it makes me well
up hearing it all right this is called kicking out the jams the best drummer of all drummers
I think a lot of Led Zeppelin purists would say? You're not picking something from Houses of the Holy or Zeppelin 4?
What a great song.
Listen to the stuff John Bonham
does here. Maybe the fact that this was one of the few Zeppelin songs I could sing along with.
Right?
I didn't have to screech.
Right.
I have a feeling that 1979 was a pretty impactful year in my life.
79, 80, because a lot of the songs that I've selected here today
are right from that era.
Very common.
It's like, what were you listening to when you were 17, 18 years old?
That's the stuff that sticks with you forever.
I've asked a lot of people this before.
I'll throw this at you.
People always say if you were on a desert island, you could pick one album.
Okay, fine.
But if you were on a desert island, you could take all the music from only one year.
What year would you take?
Probably 91.
Yeah?
Probably a lot of stuff.
I'm the opposite. I did like stuff I still, that I just,
I mean,
I'm the opposite of you with the hair.
I did like the hair bands,
by the way,
quite a bit.
I loved Poison.
Look what the cat dragged in.
I loved it all.
Motley Crue,
but Guns N' Roses,
I adored.
Sure.
Still Fly the Flag.
Saw them recently,
but in 91,
that's when I guess you had your Nevermind.
You had your Pearl Jam's 10. Oh,
totally.
Yeah.
I think Bad Motor Finger was 1990.
I don't know if I'm allowed to carry that with me,
but I love Bad Motor Finger.
That's okay.
But for me, it was either 79 or 84.
Those are the two years that really resonated for me.
And again, I was 11 and 79, and I was a little bit older.
I can't do the math right now.
But this album, Into the Outdoor by Led Zeppelin,
it was the last album they really did
because they had other stuff afterwards. But after John Bonham died, there was never going to be Led Zeppelin. It was the last album they really did because they had other stuff afterwards.
But after John Bonham died,
there was never going to be Led Zeppelin again.
So yeah, this album I really, really dug
and played it constantly.
And it was really cool
because if you bought the album on vinyl,
it came in a brown paper cover
and then you took it out
and there was this really cool artwork on the cover.
And then you pull that out in the inner this really cool artwork on the cover and then you pull
that out in the inner sleeve it just looked like a white it was white painting and i remember
accidentally spilling some water on it all of a sudden i see color i'm like what in the world
and it turns out that it was one of those pictures that if you wet it the color would come out
amazing yeah and you discovered it by accident discovered it by accident wow oh my god what i
do i'm like oh look at that and i just took water and i just put it all over and all of a sudden the
painting comes out you're right we're uh we're not better off because everything's digital now
we don't get the joy of liner notes no exactly i would i would just i put the album on my turntable
and i still do this now because i have about a thousand vinyl records at home and i'll put i'll
put on an album and i'll just open it up and I'll just read the liner notes
and you know if the lyrics are there I'll go along with the lyrics and just stuff we used to do as
kids that people just don't have the time to do anymore I used to like to know who wrote the songs
like and then often I discover oh that that's a cover I had no idea that was a cover like a lot
of times you did that by reading the actually it's funny uh if Andy's listening hello Andy she for my
birthday and at TMLX3 she gave me a t-shirt that says I read the liner notes
oh that's awesome
and this scene you talk about writing the songs
the big majority of this album was John Paul Jones
John Paul Jones
and Robert Plant were a big part of this
Robert Plant and
sorry Jimmy Page
was in Bonzo were pretty much
absent
and then they were called in
and they did what they had to do
on this album
but amazing
I'm glad they didn't keep going
because to me
you think singers but to me
John Bonham was such a huge part of the sound of this band
and nobody can do it
there were a lot of bands in the 80s that tried to sound like Zeppelin
in fact well today
yeah what's that band Greta Van Vliet it. There were a lot of bands in the 80s that tried to sound like Zeppelin. In fact, well, today.
Yeah, what's that band?
Greta Van Fleet?
I was going to say Freddie Van Bleat.
That's right. Their first album was a total Zeppelin clone.
Now they have a brand new album out that sounds
nothing like Zeppelin.
Take it for what it is.
I could have chosen so many Zeppelin songs,
but to me, I wanted to go with
what was more in my era of my age
of really getting to dig music.
No, I love it, man.
Fool in the Rain is appropriate, too, because it rained most of the day.
Yeah.
I thought it was going to rain all day.
Oh, I saw there was flooding in parts of the city, too.
It was crazy.
Yeah, where you came from, you told me no rain, right?
No rain.
At least at the time we spoke.
Yeah, nothing.
Yeah, it rained all day.
It just stopped when Barry had entered the vicinity.
I'm fine if it rains during the week
because I just want it to be nice and dry
for our gigs on Saturdays
because they're all outdoor shows this summer.
Oh, sure.
That's everything, yeah.
So cross my fingers.
Man, I can't believe how many...
This was 10?
Well, yeah.
This is number nine,
and we've got one more to go.
And this one, I guarantee you,
unless your listeners are hardcore,
hardcore Tom Petty and the Heartbreaker fans, they will have no idea what the song is.
Spoiler alert.
Yes.
So it's not free falling.
It's definitely not free falling.
I love free falling.
Cool story.
You know, I like to, when I do the shows, I like to tell stories about the songs before I play them, you know, for certain songs. And I always love the story about this song, about Free Falling,
was that at the time it was his solo album,
but he and Tom invited all the Heartbreakers to play on it.
And Howie Epstein, the bass player, came up to Tom and said,
so this song we're doing right now, do I have to play on it?
He goes, you don't have to, but don't you want to?
He goes, no.
He goes, why not?
He goes, because I don't think it's a very good song.
Tom said,
okay,
fine.
And that was Free Fallin'.
And he got someone else
to play bass on it.
That's funny.
Yeah.
I don't know how much royalties
the bass player would get,
but he'd get some.
Yeah.
He'd get any off Free Fallin'.
It's interesting,
the taste.
Yeah.
You discover some people,
yeah.
But that doc,
and again,
we talked about this last episode,
but maybe we should get into it.ty, but that documentary is amazing.
Wonderful. Yeah, that was what inspired me. Four hours,
right? Yeah, pretty close to four hours.
Well, let's get into our, let me start the Tom Petty up,
which you're right, it's an obscure jam.
Very obscure jam, but lyrically, I find it
very eerie. Now, you just
talk as you will. I'll bring it down when I hear your voice
coming to me. Here we go, your final
jam. And this is from the album
Into the Great Wide Open
which is very, very much Jeff
Flynn influenced. And just the sound
here, this could be an ELO song.
Listen carefully to the lyrics
here.
When we're least expecting it the lyrics here. And again, goosebumps because to me, Tom Petty, and I remember writing a blog
about this. Tom Petty is the brother that never met me right so i always think of this song is that one
day one day you and i will meet again but for real kind of thing or maybe not for real but you know
what i mean sure of course and i just thought this was really a fitting song and um i'd always i mean
i'd love to play this song in our shows but no one would know who it is no one would know the
song i could pass this off as my own. But I just love the fact that
the feel, the sound of the song,
the ELO influence.
And if you listen carefully,
there's Jeff Lynne singing back up in this song.
I've got a feeling I've got a feeling so strong
It's like anything that Mutt Lang has produced, right?
Whether it be Def Leppard or that one Bryan Adams album
or The Cars Heartbeat City or Shania Twain.
I mean, you just know the sound.
And this has got Jeff Blinn's fingerprints all over it.
And it's just a cool song.
And I love my 12-string acoustic guitar, and he plays 12-string on this.
And it's just a gorgeous song and a really nice lyric and something that we don't play,
so something that I don't get to hear very often, which to me is pretty cool about that.
It's cool to introduce the audience to, you know, they've heard Refugees,
so this is a chance to hear something that maybe they're less familiar with.
exactly.
Exactly. And still feel so far away I hear a voice come on the wind
Saying you and I will meet again
I don't know how, I don't know when
But you and I will meet again
You know, and it makes me think of the connection
that music fans have with artists, right?
We don't know them, but when they pass away, it really hits it really hits us hard right i mean i'm sure you've had artists that you've been fans
of and you know you know we've talked about some of them here here today and chris cordell maybe
for one where it just hits you it's like why am i feeling this way i don't know this person i've
never been downy go down yeah you don't i don never met the man, but yet it hit so hard, right?
Why is it?
And it's that connection that they have with us,
and it's the joy and the utter peace that we get from music. And anybody that suffers from anxiety, music can really, really heal.
If I'm ever in a bad place, I just put on my favorite music.
Kicking out the jams, man, that should be something we all do just for our own mental wealth.
Music is magic.
It's not just a time machine.
It's therapy.
It is.
Exactly.
And it never goes away.
Right?
You can buy something that's really important to you and, you know, it could break.
It can, you know, you could lose it.
It could just go away.
It can expire.
Music doesn't.
Barry Davis, that was way too much fun.
That was awesome, man.
Yeah, we got to do this again.
I'll hold you up to that.
Yeah.
We're going to do it again, buddy.
Oh, totally.
Totally.
I come for the beer lasagna and stickers.
And you, of course.
Oh, thank you so much.
But thank you so much again.
Oh, thank you so much three times.
Amazing.
I really, really, really, really enjoyed that.
I did too.
Now, will this stay okay in my car this afternoon while I'm at work?
Yeah.
Is there a freezer at work?
I mean, it's frozen solid, but it's hot outside.
I don't know if you want to keep it in there.
It might be cooked.
I'll wrap this up and we'll talk about what we can do for you there.
It might be cooked for your drive home.
Oh my goodness.
That's right.
And that brings us to the end of our 488th show.
You can follow me
on Twitter.
I'm at Toronto Mike.
Barry is at
Barry Davis underscore.
Don't forget the underscore.
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See you all next
week.
Rosie and Grace Yeah the wind is cold Where you been? Because everything is kind of rosy and green.
Yeah, the wind is cold, but the snow, the snow,
warms me today.
And your smile is fine, and it's just like mine.