Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Kyree Vibrant: Toronto Mike'd #1431
Episode Date: February 16, 2024In this 1431st episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with Kyree Vibrant about Half Past Four and Big Rude Jake: Pursuing the Pearl of Great Price, the film she made with her friend Big Rude Jake. To...ronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, The Advantaged Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada and Electronic Products Recycling Association. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at mike@torontomike.com
Transcript
Discussion (0)
Welcome to episode 1431 of Toronto Miked.
Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery.
A fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times and brewing amazing beer.
Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. Palma Pasta. Enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees
from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville.
RecycleMyElectronics.ca.
Committing to our planet's future
means properly recycling our electronics of the past.
The Advantage Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada, valuable
perspective for Canadian investors who want to remain knowledgeable, informed and focused
on long-term success, and Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. Today, making her Toronto mic debut is Kiri Vibrant. Welcome Kiri.
Oh, thanks, Mike.
Not to be confused with Kyrie. I'm glad I spelled it out of the phonetically. Vibrant,
that's a real name or is that a stage name?
Well, it started out as a stage name many years ago, but I made it real.
It's real. Okay. So good to meet you. Can I share like our interesting origin story here
before we crack open our cans of fresh craft beer? Okay. So I'm glad you're here. We're
going to talk about Big Rude Jake. Yes. And we're going to, I got some songs.
You're going to call for certain songs.
We're going to talk about him.
What is the name of your Big Rude Jake documentary?
Well, it's not quite a documentary.
It's more like an art performance film.
Jake and I made it many years ago.
It's called Big Rude Jake,
pursuing the pearl of great price.
And where can somebody see, pursue this pursue this wonderful film that, uh,
I was named, I'm going to have to write down.
No problem.
Uh, well, we're doing our possibly last screening
or final screening this Saturday,
uh, February 17th at the Super Wonder Gallery.
Okay. So this is dropping on a Friday
and that means that's tomorrow.
So what location is this super wonder gallery?
Which I don't have hold on. I have to look up this
On Bloor Street and it's it's near Dufferin. Okay, the Dufferin mall is all you need
Count on us. Do you remember this at all this jingle? Does this ring any bells of you? Um slightly
Yeah, it is around the corner from the Dufferin. Yeah, that's why I'm singing
it because I, um, I would listen to blue Jay games on 14, third, this is all coming full
circle. So we're recording episode 1431. I just dropped episode 1430 cause that's how
it goes. It goes in order. And 1430 was all about, sports radio, 1430, the fan, which launched in 1992.
But before it was all sports radio, the fan, it was like the music of your life, but they
would air Blue Jay games and I would tune in to listen to Blue Jay games called by Tom
Cheek and Jerry Howarth. And I, these ads that would air during the Blue Jay game got
like tattooed on my brain. Like I can recall all these other CI, CIBC, get us working for you CIBC. All these ads are stuck in my head.
And there was an ad that would air for the Dufferin mall and it would go like that. The
Dufferin mall is all you need. Count on us.
Very nice. They had great little jingles back then, boy.
Well listen, if you want to break into any jingles during this
Conversation just feel free to do that. I will thank you. Okay, so this order to start. Okay, so I'm
This is back last summer. I think I
Needed a new pair of shorts is what I think like I don't go shopping very often
but once in a while you actually have to buy something and I needed a new pair of shorts and I went to
Winners in Cloverdale Mall. So I bike to
the Cloverdale Mall, shout out to the Cloverdale Mall and I'm in the Winners and I'm shopping.
And then there's a guy who's like, hey, Toronto Mike. And I'm like, hey, like this guy recognized
me as Toronto Mike and he was telling me he loves my show and we strike up this conversation.
And then he goes, oh, my wife has a great film with Big Rude Jake,
the late great Big Rude Jake, and that's you, Kiri.
Yeah, that's right.
My very outgoing husband, Johnny Kalangas.
Okay, and what does Johnny do
before we learn more about you?
Johnny is a filmmaker and he is a digital producer.
He works, he's a creative director.
He works at Cream Productions in downtown Toronto and he does lots of digital stuff and VR and film and
television, all kinds of stuff. Okay, before we learn more about you and talk
more about Big Rude Jake and your film, let's crack open our Great Lakes beer.
Put it in front of the mic. Yeah, okay, you go first. You got a logger there. Okay. Amazing. I've got myself
my burst. Here we go. Yours is better than mine. Look, I have a lot of practice doing
this. So cheers to you, Keery. Cheers to you, Mike. And your website's Keery vibrant.com.
That's right. Okay. People curious. K Y R E E vibrant is vibrant. Yep. All right. So
before we dive into the, the big rude Jake portion here,
and I'm excited because I have a bit of a bit of a big rude Jake blind spot.
Like I have a lot to learn about big rude Jake.
So you're going to educate me and you're going to really get us all excited to see
this film. But tell us a little bit about yourself.
Like I read the bio on your website, but now I want to hear from you.
Like, who the hell are you, Kiri? What have you been up to?
Well, I'm a Toronto-based artist. I am primarily a singer-songwriter.
For the last 18 years, I have been the lead singer and songwriter,
co-songwriter in a progressive rock band
called Half Past Four.
And that's kind of my main major love.
I have had numerous bands over the years.
I used to be a club promoter.
I started off as a club promoter and a filmmaker in Toronto.
I went on to do many projects with lots of people
I'm sure that you've had on this show and no
Did you ever get that list from your husband? He was gonna send you a list. Yeah, FOTM. Did you ever get that list?
Yeah, he sent it to me. I
Don't know it oh
Bob Wagner
Bob
Say the last name again. Are you friends with I don't know. He's just said Bob and I know a few Bobs
Yeah, there's a few Bobs and Bob will letette, we got a lot of Bob. Bob Elliot.
Great Bob Scott.
Yeah, well, you know what? No, it's James B is an FOTM. So that would be one.
Do you think James B is famous? When you think of James B,
do you think there's a famous person?
Well, I've known him for almost 40 years. So yeah, absolutely. He's famous.
Absolutely. He's famous because
he's a he's a fantastic DJ on Jazz FM. Yeah. And he's been in a lot of very infamous bands.
You know, like the Look People and the Royal Jelly Orchestra. He's toured everywhere. He's
been part of huge things. And he's a very, yeah, he's a really famous, amazing, huge guy who has created huge scenes in Toronto. In fact, I know a
lot of my most treasured friends only because I knew him back in the old days, back in the
early 90s when we used to do all kinds of stuff together.
Okay, so shout out to James B. Do you know this song?
I don't know, it's pretty good, isn't it?
There's a good singer in this. Hold on. So again, Half Past Four.
Yeah, that's my band.
So how long has Half Past Four been been doing its thing?
Well, they were together for a few years before I joined, but I joined about 18 years ago. We're going on our 19th and
we're working on our fourth album now.
Really? Yeah. And what's the name of this song? This is called It Strikes You and
it's off of our second album, Good Things. Let me just hear a little bit of
this as I
A song you don't recognize Not loud enough to hear properly
It strikes you as I
I'm digging it. I dig this vibe. Cool. You're cool. Thanks. Have you collaborated with
James B? Absolutely. Yeah. I was the first singer in the Royal Jelly Orchestra when he
first put it together, also many years ago. And I used to tour when he got signed with
the MG. We toured Canada together. You're blowing my mind right now. Oh my goodness gracious.
On one of his first Royal Jelly Orchestra albums,
Cocktail Shaken and Stirred,
I did Safety Dance.
You know, the songwriter of Safety Dance, also an FOTM.
Ivan Dorovchik.
Yeah, neat.
So if any other connections come in,
if your husband texts you any other names,
because...
He does.
He says Chris Finn.
Okay, yeah, Chris Finn came on with Blair Packham like a year ago yesterday.
Yep.
Okay, funny guy.
Yeah, he's great.
I love Chris.
Okay.
Kurt Swinghammer?
Kurt Swinghammer.
Yeah, Kurt Swinghammer is one of the unsung heroes in this city. Wonderful musician. He biked here and we had a great chat.
Yeah, swing hammer. He's great. He's another guy I've known for a long, long
time. Incredibly talented artist and musician. Alan's wig, Alan's why I think
it's why Alan came on. He's like the curmudgeon of the TMU, the Toronto, like
universe. Like I get so many notes. I had a day brave on the other day and we talked all like we was it just a very
deep dive and you know he I got my notes from Alan's wide, but he came on
with his brother as well, but teenage head apparently you know I apparently
we weren't clear enough that day brave was not the lead singer throughout the entire run of Teenage Head, even though I thought
we did state that, but this is the notes I get.
But I do love that Allen's Wig listens and I love his passion for accuracy and I love
the notes I get from Allen's Wig.
Okay.
Cool.
All right.
And the last one he said, maybe Mark Breslin.
Yeah.
Okay.
Founder of Yuck Yucks. Okay, yeah.
He and I were really good friends.
And in fact, I went to go see him speak at the Prosserman JCC the other night with my son.
I brought him to see...
He was going to tell his life story, kind of from the Jewish viewpoint, with Ralph Ben-Merkey.
And that was a great...
You know, Ralph's here next week.
Oh, wow. That's amazing.
I love Ralph. I love Ralph too.
Yeah. The best thing about Ralph lives in Hamilton wow, that's amazing. I love Ralph. I love Ralph too. Yeah.
The best thing about Ralph lives in Hamilton now
and he doesn't like the drive.
So he used to come over a lot.
He used to come over all the time
and he stopped coming over and then he wanted to zoom in.
And he, the other, he's, I got a note from Ralph.
He's like, hey, you haven't invited me on lately.
And I said, Ralph, I'm not zooming with you again.
Like, I'm just not doing it.
Like, if you drive in, you can sit here and talk to me.
And he said, okay, I'll make the drive.
So Ralph Ben-Murgy returns next week. Nice. I love it. You had any more names to drop because
I'm digging. Okay. So what can you tell me now? I have it correct this by the way
I dug that jam by the way, very good. So big rude Jake pursuing the pearl of great price. That is right
Yes, and this is a you and big rude Jake
You know wrote this wrote this film. Okay, and this performance is by you know, big rude Jake in this thing
So let's start let's assume the listener
Doesn't know who's this big rude Jake. Why is he being rude? Is he a big guy? What's going on?
What can you tell us about big rude Jake Jake? Well, Big Rude Jake.
Take your time, I'm listening closely.
Jake was one of the greatest talents Canada has ever seen in my humble opinion and in
a lot of other people's opinions too.
He sort of coined the term swing punk. He was the guy who was around back in the 90s
when the swing era, remember that swing thing
that was happening, it was like a movement?
The revival, you know who's, yes,
the guy from Stray Cats, right?
Yeah.
Jump, dive and wail.
James B was big on this.
Absolutely, yeah.
It was all kind of, we were all in it together.
Swingers came out or something. Swing dancers. Yeah, but even the kind of, we were all in it together and swingers came out or something.
Uh, swing dancers. Yeah. But even the, the movie swingers, I feel like might've been a part of this
resurging here. So, okay. So just to kind of warm us up. So I got a bunch of songs from you.
Yep. Now I'm, uh, I'm kind of a Jake purist. He, meaning I like his older stuff. So that's mainly
what I brought you because I feel like it reflects the movie, which I'm trying older stuff, so that's mainly what I brought you because I feel like
it reflects the movie, which I'm trying to promote.
But he is, yeah, he's an incredible, he had a wonderful propensity for remembering things.
He was an incredible mind, an incredible brain.
He was a historian, he was a theologian, he was really well educated, he was a philosophy guy, he
just spout philosophy and we would just talk for hours on every subject and just talk and
talk and he would come up with all kinds of ideas and you know those friends and you probably
have a lot of them because of this show but those friends were, you just do stuff with
them all the time.
They're people who, you know,
there's people that you hang out with,
but there's also people that make stuff with you.
And he's the guy who makes-
Oh, like Rob, he's like your Rob Pruce.
Yeah, like he likes to make stuff.
I just wanted to show Rob out
because I know you know Rob.
Yeah, I've known Rob for a long time too.
Just, yeah, and he's incredibly talented as well.
Wonderful guy.
So yeah. Yeah, annoyingly so.
But Jake is just one of those guys
that you make stuff with.
He's the kind of guy who, you know,
you'd be walking down the street,
bump into him and he'd be like,
hey, hey, you know, I was thinking about this thing.
What do you think of this?
And he throws some idea out at you
and want your feedback, right?
And then he'd take your feedback and he'd try it out.
You know, he was so open-minded and so brilliant.
His music was incredible.
People used to pack his shows
all the time. And he's an incredible performer, wonderful guitar player. Anyways, he was the
best man at my wedding. And he kind of narrated I had a wedding show, Johnny and I got married.
We are actually down here on the Lakeshore Strip at Casa Mendoza
and Jake was out there with us narrating the whole thing and it was incredible. And after
that I was like, you know, he's such an incredible guy, an amazing songwriter, but also an incredible
storyteller between songs. He would go off on tangents and talk about how the song came
to be and his reasoning behind it and, or just some ideas he'd come up with.
And I said, I want to accentuate that.
I want to spotlight the stories that you tell between the songs,
not just the performance of the songs.
So that's sort of the essence of this film
is that it is a performance film with him on stage with his wonderful band playing,
but it's also him coming off the stage in dreamscapes
talking to people or
at people or with people or just to the camera about his experience in life and it became
sort of about him and his sort of progression from when he first left his parents' house
to become a punk rocker in New York City or in Toronto and his fascination with the yonder belly of Toronto and the down and outs, the rough
and the tumble characters of gritty downtown and his love for Toronto and his love for
the big city.
And then all the different things that he went through mentally and philosophically
and spiritually in that time.
And it's kind of cool.
It's neat.
It has animation, it's got green screen, It's got all kinds of effects and the entire budget for the movie up until we finished it because I had to put some extra
Money into it later was about 300 bucks. Get out of here. Everyone just chipped right in
You can't you think this episode is gonna cost me more than 300 bucks. Oh my goodness gracious. Okay
Yeah, so best man at your wedding. I mean, it sounds like you were very very close to big rude Jake
So best man at your wedding, I mean, it sounds like you were very, very close to Big Rude Jake.
So like, let me just right off the top, give you my sincere condolences because those who
don't know Big Rude Jake no longer with us sadly.
So yeah, passed away in June 2022.
That that must have been, that must have been awful.
Well, because far too young.
It was.
Yeah, he was only 57. And he, yeah, it took him pretty quick. And none of us believed
that it was happening until it happened. And, and I promised him, you know, it was kind of a deathbed
wish, I suppose. I told him, sorry, I promised not wish that I would complete the movie, because we
kind of finished the movie, but it wasn't quite finished.
It needed a lot more work and we shelved it because we both got busy with families and
other things.
And originally I created it with the intent of promoting and like he wanted to use it
as a promotional tool.
But after a while he sort of changed direction with his music in his life and he decided
that it wasn't really about what he was about anymore.
So, so we shelved it for a long time but we had put so much blood sweat and tears into this saw into this movie that you know I told I
promised him that I'd finish it so I did have you made any movies in the past I
made I mainly yes I'm I made a short film that got into a few film festivals
a while back called Meeting Rock.
But mainly my love is making music videos and I've made an enormous amount.
And they're all on my website.
Kiri Vibrant.com.
Okay amazing.
So I've learned about, you know, and my apologies, I'm not the coolest cat in the room.
Like I mean, even when I met your husband at Cloverdale, I'm like, oh, this guy's cooler than I am.
Like I knew it right away.
Okay.
So it's like, I'm just learning about half past four.
At least I knew a big rude Jake, but I didn't really know a lot about, to be
honest, a lot about big rude Jake.
So I'm learning a great deal right now, but, uh, just really glad you're here.
We're going to play some more music, but I want to let people know so Big Rude Jake pursuing the pearl of great price which
you can see tomorrow Saturday at what time?
Um, doors open at 7 and we're gonna be showing it about 8 o'clock I believe.
And that's very close to the Dufferin mall okay so just sing that jingle as
you go to Dufferin and Bloor and what's the name of that venue?
It's called Super Wonder Gallery.
It's a wonderful name Gallery. Wonderful name.
Okay, so I will tell the people,
look, I feel like I'm part of your PR team here.
I wanna tell the people that this film,
Big Rude Jake, Pursuing the Pearl of Great Price,
it won best, I hope you're sitting down, Kiri,
best musical feature film
at the International Music Video Awards in Budapest.
Is that true?
Yes.
Really?
Yes.
Okay.
That's a big deal.
I have the award at home.
It's great.
It's the shape of a disc, like a record.
Like a, yeah.
Like a vinyl platter.
Yeah, sure.
Like a laser disc.
A platter.
Did you ever own laser discs?
No.
I skipped over laser discs.
Smart.
You know, sometimes you make the right call.
I always think, sometimes I don't really, I just wait to discs. Sometimes you make the right call.
Sometimes I don't really, I just wait something out to see if it's going to stick.
And then I realize it doesn't stick and I'm like, dodged another bullet.
There's a lot of people out there with like a room full of laser discs, right?
Yeah, I've never really been too into digital.
I've always been an analog.
I still have a wall of vinyl and it never left my house. my house. I've always had one. Sure, but when it comes to film like you need actual film like there's a
reel of film like how are you you know you got you know what do you know I mean I would love to I
got trained on that I mean I went to Sheridan College for film and that was when we used to
have 16 millimeter eight millimeter you know we would be in the steenbeck making the films but
yeah I mean it's a little more easy now with the digital in that
way, but music is better analog in my opinion.
No, I like your opinion.
You're here to give us all your opinions.
Okay.
So Budapest move over because now we're going to Munich because this film wins best musical
feature film at the Munich music video awards.
Indeed.
Yes.
Look at that.
What kind of war did they give you?
What did they give you? What is there?
There wasn't a word, but we didn't end up getting it because if they charge you a lot
of money for these things.
So let me understand this.
Let me understand.
You win the award and if you want the award, you got to send like a COD or whatever.
I don't know.
They get it.
You got to send a check for like 350 bucks or something.
You can just pay for it on visa or something.
Okay.
I know you like the analog.
I thought I'd bring it back there.
Okay.
That's bullshit, by the way.
Can I say, if you're gonna give me an award,
don't charge me for the award.
Yeah, but that's how they-
Do the Oscars do that?
Like, I won-
Yeah, yeah.
Really?
Yeah, they do, and so do the Grammys.
I remember a friend of mine won a Grammy,
and I went over and saw it, and I was like,
oh my God, and they said, yeah, it costs a lot of money.
And I was like, really? So basically, they said, yeah, it costs a lot of money. And I was like, really?
So basically, you're basically winning the rights
to buy the award.
Yeah, that's how they keep the thing happening.
Wow.
They keep the scene happening
by charging the artists money for the glory.
The artists are the ones who can least afford
to buy that award.
Yep, especially me and my $300 budget.
Cause you're not Taylor Swift, right?
You don't have a private jet.
No, no, that's not going to happen for me, but it's okay. I'm happy with what I have.
You're a true artist. Okay. I'm not done yet. A couple more and then we're going to get into
back to Big Rude Jake here. But best zero budget feature. It's not zero, it's 300 bucks. This is
bullshit. Okay. Best zero budget feature at the WRP and women's
International Film Festival surprised by that one. Okay, tell me why that one surprised you because well
Okay, because it was a woman's international festival and I thought for sure some of the sentiments expressed in the movie
We're gonna be a little bit
I know clashee is that a word just was kind of, I was a little bit worried
about submitting it to women's film festivals
because they tend to be very,
I don't know.
We gotta be more specific now.
What are these?
Well, I mean, I'm a woman director, yes,
but everything else in the film, I mean,
he's, you know, the character of Big Rude Jake,
and let's talk about that for a second
because he is a character when he goes on stage.
He's certainly, he certainly not himself, right?
Like a lot of us are, we go up on the stage
and we're characters.
Is this like a persona he assumes when he's on the stage?
Like Buster Poindexter?
Okay.
Well, sort of, cause Big Rude Jake, he was at one point,
he was a bit big and perhaps he was kind of body and rude.
But I mean, when you met him,
he was actually extremely polite
and very charismatic and sweet. So he definitely was not rude in real life so he he you
know he had a character so what was my point here I was talking about well you
wanted to talk about the fact that he wasn't he wasn't big rude Jake when he
was you know hanging out with you on a Friday night or whatever having dinner
with you he was he was Andrew Jacob Hebert.
Well, yeah, yeah, never. Well, he kind of abandoned the Andrew part at some point,
but his old, old, old friends, I'll still call him Andy. Right, right, right. He was Jake to
everyone. Okay. And just to finish up. So you were surprised because there's themes in this movie.
So when you say there's themes, that's what I want to ask you. So there's themes in this music you thought might not.
Oh, that's, that's what I was getting at. So he was a persona. Sorry. Thank you for stirring.
I remember. I remember. It's been a long day. Tell me about it. So yeah, I mean, I was a little bit surprised about getting that award because, you know, even though I'm a female director, you know, he's the star of the movie and he had pretty girls in the movie. He was talking about women.
He was talking very candidly about an ex-girlfriend where he had very strong
opinions about, uh, you know, their, you know,
how their relationship evolved and eventually separated them.
And it was raw and it was real and it was true,
but it was set within the context of his character. So was it real?
Was it really real? I don't know.
So are you wondering if they actually watched the film? Like did the WRPN women?
I don't doubt that they watched it. They probably just liked it because in spite of maybe some,
I don't know, you know how people get a little crazy these days, they're a little bit too
crazy.
Okay. But so this is obviously, this is an award you win for being like
with almost no budget.
Look at this piece of art you created.
Wow, which is amazing.
Right. So, you know, like, what was the limit?
Like, because it says best zero budget and you were like 300
bucks or whatever. But like, is it like you had to make your
movie for under a thousand bucks?
Do you have any memory of like what was this ceiling you were
allowed to spend on a movie in order to be eligible for best zero budget feature?
I didn't know. I mean, most, most movies are going to be made with like a million dollars
or something, a few hundred thousand at least. I didn't know. I mean, a feature film is expensive,
but I just have a lot of friends in big places, I guess. I didn't know.
Okay, look, I need to meet your friends here. I need some friends in big places too.
Well, listen, this is all in the kind of the framework of what the downtown Toronto scene was like back then.
Well, tell me. Tell me about the downtown Toronto. So again, just to recap here.
So Big Rude Jake, he kind of comes to be and I guess it's what the early 90s I suppose is when he...
Late 80s, early 90s when was when he hit the scene and that's when I met him.
And he had a wonderful band called the Gentleman Players and there's like three horn players and you know the usual.
And they would just blow up every place they went into. It was so much fun.
Crazy swing dancers and people going crazy. And it was very punk though. It was very kind of raw
and energetic. And, you know, we, he and I got, got to be really good friends because we both had
crazy ideas about art. And we also had a lot of love for downtown Toronto. And we decided to put
together a project called Hoity Toity. It was like our little production company, it was
just him and I at the Toronto reference library
looking through micro-fiches.
Yeah, micro-fiche.
I remember micro-fiche.
And we were doing research on downtown Toronto
because, you know, it was slowly becoming
gentrified, slowly becoming something that we
didn't like.
And this was before condos, before cell phones,
before anything digital.
And it sort of, the something that we didn't like, and this was before condos, before cell phones, before anything digital.
And it's sort of, the movie that we made later on,
this one, has a lot of scenes downtown
that take us back into that, because I guess
it was 20 years ago that we made it.
Lots of questions, but now what I'm craving right now
is I want you to pick, so we have a bunch
of big, rude, Jake songs loaded up, because you sent them to me.
Could you cherry pick one that we can just listen to now to get a vibe of that early
Big Rude Jake that you kind of fell in love with?
You can tell me which song I should play, and then I'm going to drink my beer and I'm
going to listen and we're going to talk about this.
Okay.
Geez.
All the ones that I sent you are my particular favorites, so I love them all very much, but
I think that Seventh Avenue is the one we should start with because it's a great song.
Okay, this is Big Rude Jake, Seventh Avenue. Top of the world my ha ha ha ha
Wish I was back, wish I was back with all them cats and tanned up men just like we used
to do.
Decked out like the devils on a butane fumes and bad cologne
And fleecing sheep along the avenue
When every wheel had a dame
And every dame looked so fine
With painted eyes and smoky blue perfume
Well, grab your Taylor drapes and your lucky dyes
Cause man, we going out tonight
They waiting for us along the avenue
we could be down at the diner eatin' red beans and rice
could be at the Coliseum sippin' the champagne and ice
well I'm tellin' you man there was no better place to be
than right then and right there and standin' next to me
ah the fine saloons and drinking holes, the
marquee lights and burlesque shows that open like a soft nocturnal bloom and the
jazz would feel the air and curl like smoke and lick your ear as it drips down
old Semmel's Avenue and I say take me back.
I say no more, take me back.
Take me back now. Back to Semmel, back to you. take me back downtown Toronto or late 80s, early 90s.
Can you name check other people, part of the scene here?
You got Big Rude Jake, who else you got going on?
Well, for me,
gosh, it was just an enormous amount of wonderful artists,
some of who became very famous and very big,
and some that ended up becoming sort of middling stars.
But in the early 90s it was an amazing place, downtown Toronto.
It was easy to live downtown, it was easy to work at some Joe job while you did your
art.
It was easy to find art galleries and artists run clothing shops and retro things.
So I mean it was such a great scene because I could just walk down Queen Street and walk
into any place and see ten people I knew and it was amazing.
So like who you said some made it big like are we talking about like Blue Rodeo?
Like who are we talking about like Blue Rodeo like who we talking about? Yeah Blue Rodeo is definitely part of me we used to hang out at at this
wonderful breakfast place on Bathurst. I'm not editing this Kiri okay?
Sorry I should have written down. Why am I blanking out?
It'll come to you later.
There's like ten people listening to this right now going,
Come on, Kiri!
Anyways, it'll come to me in a second.
Kiri, it's our favorite breakfast place.
I'm sorry.
Blue Rodeo used to go there.
All the downtown scene used to hang out down there.
Where else? Okay, so I can tell you you so Jim Cuddy's been on this program and he talks about handsome Ned for example
Yeah
Mm-hmm. I mean all the people who used to
Hang out at Cameron House and stuff like that when I think of handsome Ned, I think of the Cameron
Because it's interesting because Toronto's changed so much right here we are talking in 2024, checks his calendar, yes it is, okay.
But like, you know,
I don't know how artists even afford
to live in the city anymore.
Like when you think about the cost to live like,
like in the city, you know, I'm just,
now I'm just like, I have these conversations.
So Kim Mitchell will talk about how the,
all of Max Webster rented this house
and they paid a hundred bucks a month each or something and they could like afford to
like be starving artists and still live in the core. I had my own apartment in
1992-1993 around there I had my own apartment on Sherbourne right across from
the Phoenix and we used to I know I was a club kid I used to do I used to work
in the clubs I used to book places I worked at the reverb you know the Big Bob for course whole whole year when they turned
the reverb into a big rock club called rock 175 because that was the address
on Bathurst Street I've worked in the boom-boom room and you know club the
lizard lounge and all these different places I worked in many different
capacities and all the clubs I knew everybody downtown it was great I even
had my own jazz lounge called the Vibrant Lounge for almost, I don't know, I guess like between eight months and
a year I had that place.
Get out of here. Where was the Vibrant Lounge?
It was above a restaurant called Fabulous Nobody's on Isabella right at Young Street.
And it was a big fun for covered lounge.
You know, your husband undersold you. Like, I just want you to know, like, it was like
Big Roo Jake or whatever
But you know come on you had me at the vibrant lounge
But Jake used to come and visit me all the time
He'd go and he'd be playing in Yorkville or wherever and he and Michael Johnson his horn player
they were best friends and they would come into the vibrant lounge after their gigs and and
Sometimes they'd interrupt gigs. I had to have all kinds of people playing. I had left a name
drop but I haven't looked so... I'm having brain freeze. But anyways, the Bourbon Tabernacle Choir
were playing there once. Chris Brown, Kate Fenner. All those guys were playing. It was a crazy show
and they came in after and there was a huge crowd and it was a small place and it was just
packed and they all came through. The whole entire band, they all came through with their horns and they all set up on the stage and there's
like 400 people on stage and they all started playing mini the moocher. And it was like
the best night of my life. It was like so, so fun to have all those guys in my place
and just having the best time. And yeah, those were the days and we used to have the best
times.
Okay. Now I want to play the trailer for your film, which people can still see tomorrow
on Saturday.
You can still see this thing.
What's wrong with you people?
It's by the Duffer Mall.
It's called Big Rude Jake Pursuing the Pearl of Great Price.
Here is a trailer.
Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Mr. Big Rude Jake. I'm going to be a good friend of yours. I'm going to be a good friend of yours. I'm going to be a good friend of yours.
I'm going to be a good friend of yours.
I'm going to be a good friend of yours.
I'm going to be a good friend of yours.
I'm going to be a good friend of yours.
I'm going to be a good friend of yours.
I'm going to be a good friend of yours.
I'm going to be a good friend of yours.
I'm going to be a good friend of yours.
I'm going to be a good friend of yours.
I'm going to be a good friend of yours. I'm going to be a good friend of yours. I just want a nice clean show. And when he gets into realing, every mother demon may look kinda get some fun a feeling
Like they're all tied up in knots
Now step out out of the boat
Down on the felt and blue
Alright, no problem, bookkeeper. As clean as a daisy from now on.
Now step out of the boat were as clean as the days from now on. Come on, we'll sail somewhere now. Come on, we'll sail somewhere now.
Come on, we'll sail somewhere now.
Come on, we'll sail somewhere now.
Come on, we'll sail somewhere now.
Come on, we'll sail somewhere now.
Come on, we'll sail somewhere now.
Come on, we'll sail somewhere now.
Come on, we'll sail somewhere now.
Come on, we'll sail somewhere now.
Come on, we'll sail somewhere now.
Come on, we'll sail somewhere now. Come on, we'll sail somewhere now. here. Okay. So Big Rude though, similar to Blue Rodeo, but I remember, and Bourbon Tabernacle
Choir I think, but leaves Toronto, right? So Big Rude Jake goes to New York. So tell
me a little bit about like, I think he goes to Brooklyn and signs a record deal with Roadrunner
Records here, but tell me a little bit about, you know, Big Rude Jake bolting the T-Dot
here. Well, I mean, he had great ambition and he was always hungry for gigs and always trying
to come up with new things so that he could push his band forward.
And his band was amazing.
So they went down and they all lived together in New York.
And I don't know how well it went.
I mean, I wasn't there, but I did hear a lot of the stories. I think
there was some good times and there were some bad times and there's some very
nice in-between times. I think they did a lot of great. I mean I know he also did a
lot of touring over in Europe and stuff like that but when they were in New York
I think they did their best down there but I think that's when they kind of, I
don't know if they broke up completely but after that I think he was strongly considering having a solo career so I don't know
what happened down there but that's that's for maybe Michael Johnson or
someone else if you want to pull them on to the okay so tell me now let's get
specific about your relationship with the Big Rude Jake and making this movie
so yes like give me the nuts and bolts here. Like big rude Jake wrote this thing and then you helped him make it. Like when,
when was this film? Like just educate me there.
Okay. So, um, we made the film, uh, in 2000,
it was the end of 2004. Uh, I had just,
it was just after our wedding. Actually, I called him up and I said, Jake,
someone ought to make a movie about you.
And he said, oh yeah, all right.
Well, who's that gonna be?
I said, you know what, Jake, I'm gonna make it.
I'm just gonna make the damn film.
So we're gonna get together.
So when are you, okay, all right, come on over then.
So I went over and we went on one of our long walks
and talks, you know, you do that,
you just walk and you start talking and the ideas start percolating.
I told him I wanted to start writing scenes,
sort of like the ones that he, the stories that he told between the songs.
And so we would walk and we'd talk, we'd come up with all these ideas,
then he'd go home and he'd furiously write.
And then he'd send me some copy and say, what do you think?
And then I'd say, okay, well well I think you should take this out I think
you should put this in and then we kind of went back and forth and back and
forth and we got about I can't remember how many vignettes there are in the
movie but I think there might be about seven six or seven and we had these
stories and he wrote them out and then he memorized them like I said before he
had an incredible mind for memorization. He memorized every single word on these pages that he wrote
and they were long.
And then I came up with everything else, basically.
I got everybody, I got the place, I got the every,
and I got Jake and we rehearsed it
and then we would go in and we'd do it
and sometimes we would have a whole audience full of people
and other times we would just have one or two.
And we recorded it at the Fun House.
And the Fun House, well, I mean, we had a few other locations, but the Fun House was
the main thing.
Now the Fun House was a nightclub that was on top of what is now the Shoppers Drug Mart
on the corner of Queen and Ryerson, one street of Bathurst and it was a great club it was a big club and the
club owner loved Jake and so he gave it to us for free in fact he he fed everyone
too for free it was amazing. That's how you keep your budget to 300 bucks you gotta get free food
you gotta get everything's gotta be free what is it what did you spend that
$300 on I want to see the the line item. I think I gave it to Francois and Terry.
They were the green screen guys.
I think that's what I-
That's wild to make a movie
and just get to pay the green screen guys.
Yeah, but they had an amazing studio
and they were amazing.
They were so great.
I feel like I saw on Facebook yesterday
that James B is looking for a studio
to do some green screen stuff.
Like I was like-
I know, but they moved to BC ages ago.
He knew them. He was friends with them.
He was friends with everybody I knew.
Oh, he still is. I mean, sorry.
You know, absolutely.
James B is still a going concern. Okay. Wow.
In a couple of weeks, I'm going to be in his new movie.
Okay. You know what?
I feel like he told me once I was going to be
in one of his movies.
This is what I think he told me.
But then like, it's like, I'm not going to follow up.
But he's like, I feel like he might have called me up
or something and he had this idea for me to be in this movie.
And I'm like, oh, that's cool.
I've never been in a movie.
And nothing happened.
So.
Well, you gotta remind him, he's a busy guy.
Well, he's very famous.
That's a problem.
He has a lot of beautiful women around him
and it's hard to see him through all the beautiful women.
What is it?
So what is his, cause he does always have a lot of young, beautiful women around him and it's hard to see him through all the beautiful women.
What is it?
So what is his, because he does always have a lot of young, beautiful women around him.
What does he have?
Is it animal magnetism?
James Behan.
Oh come on, you've met him.
He's the funnest guy on the planet, that's why.
Wow, wild times.
Hey, speaking of people, like speaking of FOTMs, we didn't name drop her, but I'm just
going to ask you about Melly Fresh.
So I know I was reading about Half Past Four,
okay, your progressive rock band.
But it says on your official bio,
on your own personal website, Kiri,
it says you collaborate on EDM music projects
with Play Records.
Are you still doing that?
What can you share with us?
I found Melanie Melody to be a fascinating guest.
If you go on my website, one of the tabs is Melly Fresh and Pinky Skylark.
Pinky Skylark is my pseudonym.
Really?
You've got to write that down.
Curie Vibrant had as a pseudonym.
Yeah, it's going to say Curie Vibrant doesn't need a pseudonym.
Well you know, actually James named me, you know.
Okay, you know what that means?
That's a sense of ownership there.
I feel like we're drilling in here.
I don't think he'd want to own me.
Believe me.
It was back in the old days.
He used to run a club on Queen Street called the V hive.
Remember?
Listen, I was a singing and dancing waitress back then at the V hive.
I had bright pink hair.
I recognized you from somewhere here.
My goodness gracious.
Any thoughts on the whole dead mouse thing? I feel like that's the big controversial thing
going on there with the player.
Well, I don't think it's controversial anymore. It was at one point, but yeah, Melanie discovered
dead mouse. She, um, she invited him to her house to live there. Uh, when he was just
a kid in, in, uh, Niagara falls and we all, I remember going out for drinks with him
and he was like this amazingly talented kid
from Niagara Falls and they made a bunch of music together.
And then he went off and got signed to some, you know,
deservedly so he is an incredible talent.
Like did he outgrow play records?
Like is this basically,
I think that's what happened,
but he didn't do it in such a nice way.
He could have called her and said, getting signed to someone else. Like it's just basically, I think that's what happened, but he didn't do it in such a nice way.
He could have called her and said, um, getting signed to someone else.
But instead he just kind of, you know, lawyer called her or something.
I think that was the bullshit.
Yeah.
It was weird.
You ever collaborated with dead mouse?
No, I've never, I know there was never a overlap there in the play records catalog.
No Melanie Melanie collaborated with them and they did a lot of great stuff
together. I'm now going to let the listenership know that not only those I think I named like
three awards that were won by Big Rude Jake pursuing the pearl of great price, but you
were a finalist for best music feature at the Rome music video film festival. Yes it's true. Who beat you do
you remember? I have no idea. Well fuck them okay. I feel like that's bullshit.
It's Rome. Wedding Rome. Okay who knows what's gonna go down there. Would you mind cherry
picking another Big Rude Jake song that I could play? I want to play another one.
Well one of his most beloved songs that everyone loves to sing along with is his
double entendre song called, um, well, it's not really double entendre.
He has another one that's really great that I didn't put on the list.
Never mind. I'm just talking too much, but it's a queer podcast.
You're supposed queer for cat. OK, so I was hoping you'd pick this.
Do you want to like like your mic is open during this?
Did you want to sing along or whatever?
Maybe I'll play it and see what mood you're in.
How much beer, see how much beer you've consumed so far.
By the way, how is your Great Lakes Brewery Lager?
It is a fine brew.
It's absolutely delicious.
I'm gonna continue to drink this.
And you can bring some home with you.
So I have a pack of Great Lakes beer
that you're bringing home to you.
Wow.
And then my good friend,
I met at the winners
at Cloverdale Mall, Johnny, Johnny, Johnny, uh, he can have a beer as well. Bring it
home to him. Tell him this is courtesy of Toronto Mike. We're going to enjoy that. Enjoy
our porch in the warm weather. When it finally gets warm out, it was warm last week. Okay.
It's blizzard today. What happened? I was like, what? Well, listen, uh, I sarcastically, I went on Twitter to say it snows in Toronto in February
and somebody like replied back, like I wasn't being like funny with like, uh, are you surprised
or something? And I was like, that's the fucking joke. Like, uh, it's Toronto. I've been here
for five decades and, uh, it always snows in February. It'll snow well into five decades and it always snows in February.
It'll snow well into April like it always does. Get over it.
Right. You know, just be glad it's not going to snow in May. Okay? Just appreciate that fact.
Okay. So before I click play, do you and Johnny enjoy Italian food?
Be honest with me. If you don't like Italian food, just tell me.
I love Italian food. When we were in Rome last summer, we ate an enormous amount of Italian food and it was
delicious.
Okay.
Well, if you want to recapture that Rome experience, I've been to Rome too.
Just wanted to brag.
Me too.
I've also been to Rome.
But the closest thing you'll get to authentic Italian food from Italy is Palma pasta.
They have locations in Mississauga and Oakville.
I know you're a West End woman, so it's not very far for you.
Palma pasta.com.
They're going to feed us at TMLX 15 on June 27 from 6 to 9 PM.
Kiri, you and John.
John, he wants to be Johnny.
He's Johnny.
He's Johnny.
Johnny. Who's Johnny? He said and smiled in a wants to be Johnny. Is he going to be Johnny? He's Johnny. John who's Johnny?
He said and smiles in a special way. Johnny. Okay. Well, was that on this short circuit
soundtrack? I, you know what? I think it was. Yes. Johnny five, right? Yeah. And did you
know Fisher Stevens is not of South Asian descent? No. Telling you now, Kieran. Oh, the 80s. I'm glad you're sitting down. Oh, the 80s.
I just saw them in succession.
Okay, so you and Johnny should come to TMLX 15 on June 27.
It's from 6 to 9 p.m. at Great Lakes Brewery in Southern Etobicoke.
Palma Pasta is going to feed you and Great Lakes will give you your first beer on the
house and there could be other surprises in store.
But I'm actually going to send you home with a large,
it's frozen, it's in my freezer.
So this box will be full.
I just had a guy here, Tim Haffey,
and I told him I had my,
I had a lasagna for him in my freezer.
And he picks up this red box and he goes, it's empty.
I'm like, I just said it's in my freezer.
I'm going to put it in the box before you leave.
And I'm going to do that for you, Kerry.
That's exciting. Thank you. I feel very'm gonna do that for you, Kiri. Well, that's exciting.
Thank you.
I feel very like a giving man in Monty hall here.
Okay.
Ridley funeral home has sent over a measuring tape for you.
Kiri, you can do.
I can measure my casket.
Excellent.
Do you know 80% of guests make that exact same joke?
I expected better for you Kiri.
Cause that's the obvious joke. Think harder next time please it's only in inches what's
this is that oh no wait okay never mind I'm having trouble lately I don't know
how old you are but I'm I'm very old like I actually before I left because I
worked for myself now but before I left my corporate gig, I decided to bleed out the benefit plan I had with them.
So I got glasses because I was covered by this plan.
And now if I get glasses, I got to pay for it out of pocket.
Why doesn't OHIP cover my optometry?
Anyway, that's another, that's a very good point.
Thank you.
Full of good points, Kerry.
Stick around a bit, you're going to see.
But the fact is I have these glasses
and I got these five years ago or something,
but I never wear them.
And lately, I'm having lately,
especially as the night gets progresses,
like so now we're recording,
like as the night gets later, I get,
I'm unable to focus on things.
Like I know I'm gonna play,
what am I playing, Queer for Cat?
Yeah, Queer for Cat.
You gotta get computer glasses, that's what I have.
Oh my goodness, tell me more.
Like what is this, you get this at like a-
They have like a blue lens or whatever to stop the glare
and then you can actually see the, you know,
cause like glasses-
If there is glare coming at me
and the lighting's shit down here
and there's glare coming, it's Queer for Cat.
I'm gonna play Queer for Cat,
but it could be Queer for Kim. Like I don't know exactly. I'd be that too. You never know.
Is that a big rude Jake song? Okay. Queer for Kim. Probably. You never know. Okay. Depended
on how drunk he was when he sang it. So we're going to play this and then I want, I have
some more big rude Jake questions and uh, I want to tell you that if you and Johnny
want some investment advice, like we, I don't
know if you're doing your own investments or if you have a guy or a gal. Okay. This
is important. We have money to invest. Very, very personal question. Do you rent or do
you own? Okay. Can I tell you something? You're fucking rich. Okay. If you own anything in
this city, you're a rich woman. We were very, very lucky because we bought before everything went crazy.
How long ago did you buy?
20 years ago.
Okay.
So your house is tripled, maybe quadrupled in value.
All right.
Well, they take the money you get there and you go to, uh, you go to the
advantaged investor podcast from Raymond James Canada and you pick up a tip or
two, this is good, good, uh, best
practices and educational content that'll help you out. So hosted by FOTM Chris Cooksey,
the advantage to investor podcast from Raymond James Canada. You got it, Carrie?
I got it. Thank you. Okay. Wonderful advice.
And last but not least, cause I'm the advice man here, recycle my electronics.ca. I don't
know if you have a drawer full of old cables or
if you have old devices. I know you're going to throw that microphone in the garbage here.
So you have old, I don't know, electronics. Don't throw it in the garbage. The chemicals
end up in our landfill. That sucks. Go to Recyclemyelectronics.ca. I love it. So you
know what you're going to do and don't throw out that microphone. It still functions. I
don't have big bucks like you $300 for a move. I'm just waving my arms around and I have sorry about that. My goodness gracious
Okay, let me get to queer for cat. Enjoy
So now what exactly do you want me to do here?
I stayed up late last Saturday night And I finally made it home about three And oh my lord, when I got to the door Well what did you think I'd see?
With a hair up fine and a scoop neckline And a red dress and bustin' ass and seams
With the music slow and lights down low
I found my girl with the girl of my dreams Yeah, my gal is quill from Catsch
She's quill from Catsch And that's a fact
She likes them tall and slim and dark She says she likes it that I like it that
She likes it like that She says let's go swing and
Let's paint the town.
You and me.
We're killing it green.
Ain't no doubt about it.
We should get around.
Do you have any fun facts or information about this song?
What album it appears on?
Any insight?
like what album it appears on, any insight?
Well, I know it's about him and his lesbian girlfriend, which may or may not be true.
It sounds like it's about him and his lesbian girlfriend.
I don't know. I just know it was the biggest song.
Everybody loved it when he played it live.
Everyone was like, Andy Quirford, that's the only one anyone ever wanted to hear until they heard the
rest of them, which are all equally awesome. Well, one thing I like to do when there's an artist
coming on that's, you know, not Blue Rodeo or whatever is I like to see most viewed videos on
YouTube. Like I sort YouTube by the artist's name and most viewed videos. And this is a big one.
Absolutely. And also we played Swing Baby. That's number number one and then I was trying to dig in it's like oh it was like
a college radio hit oh well you know I believe it was Swing Baby that got
ripped off some other fella put that out as if it was his and didn't credit
Big Rude Jake and Jake was pretty furious about it and I have no idea what
was done about it but I haven't heard about it since so perhaps he got some I don't know I don't know
the end story of it but I know that swing baby some guy ripped it off people
do that it's weird it sucks because it's hard enough to be an artist in the
beginning there's an art I just read an article about Kevin Hearn. He thought he was buying art from an indigenous artist
and it turned out it was a forgery
and how he became a detective to figure out
who's behind this.
But you know, it's tough enough out there
to not deal with like...
Well, you know someone ripped off James B.
at one, just recently.
Tell me. Who's the guy who just did the halftime show at the Super Bowl?
I know what I actually do know exactly. His name's Usher.
Yeah, there's a big hit by Usher because my wife loves this song.
But the opening part is ripped off from a James B song.
I think it was a cover of tragically hit. No, I think it's crash test dummies.
Like I think it's a cover. Maybe, maybe I'm wrong. James, I'm going to call him up and
ask him. I think it's a cover of Superman's song, right? Superman never made any money.
I think that's a James B cover of that. That includes this, this horn section that usher
rips off and drops in front of that that includes this this horn section that Usher rips off and
drops in front of that song. I thought it was I thought it was the other one I
thought it was courage by Tragically Hip.
Couldn't come at a worse time.
Did you ever meet Gordowney?
I've never met him no.
Okay now you never will by the way he's a shadow at the Redleaf funeral home.
He's hanging out with Jake in the clouds.
Okay I like to think do you believe that to be true
or is that just something nice you said?
I do not believe that at all to be true.
No, neither do I.
Like I always think, you know,
Big Cheap Brew Jake is listening to us now,
but it's like, I don't actually believe that.
It just, that's a nice sentiment.
Who the hell wants to hang out on a cloud?
What is that?
And really, like, are you weightless?
You know what?
I like It's a Wonderful Life
because I just love the movie. It's wonderful life
Yeah, but the the angels and having said they send down
I don't know if that's heaven or not
But the angels up there send down Clarence to get his wings or whatever
And I was watching with my mom my mom is here and my mom's kind of sick of hearing about this loudmouth
Atheist son of hers or whatever she was raised as Catholic or whatever and then she's like, oh you you like a movie about
angels and and this and I'm like, well, mom, it's a fucking movie.
Like I don't think this is a documentary about Attaboy Clarence, but I do tear up
every time he says Attaboy Clarence at the end.
Yeah.
Okay.
So hopefully big, fantastic movie.
One of my favorites.
Okay.
I have it on VHS.
That's how much I love it.
Cause you're like, yeah, you don't like modern distribution of media.
Analog.
Right.
And even though your husband is a digital something or other, you're like, fuck digital.
Like give me the...
Oh, my husband isn't digital.
Well, is your husband AI?
I met him though.
Yes, you did.
So, you know, he's not AI.
And he seemed really nice, but you know what? I not a I and he seemed really nice But you know what?
I can't tell if he was nice or if he was just
When somebody meets me in the wild and it's like I love your podcast and I start talking about podcast
I just assume they're nice because they like my podcast like they could be a big fucking asshole
But if you just tell me you like my podcast, I think oh, what a nice guy
You know what I mean? Yeah, I guarantee you my husband likes the podcast
He loves he loves listening to podcasts
And if he likes you he likes it when James B comes over. It's the bottom line here. Okay. I love you love all of this
so
Big Rude Jake
Yes
Okay, so I just want to put a bow on this so Big Rude Jake
Do you feel okay one question, I have a few questions.
One is that when he passes away,
is he dies of cancer, right?
Yes.
And you mentioned only 59 years old.
This is only a couple years, no, less than a couple years.
I believe he's only 57.
Okay, you know-
They say 59 somewhere on-
Yeah, you know what?
On Wikipedia, they say 59.
But as I learned from Dave Thomas,
Wikipedia is not always right with these things
so 57 you think even worse okay did he what happened to the album he was working at on
at the time of his death like do you know the jackhammer sessions do you know do you
have any insight into what has become of that um I'm not entirely certain to be honest I
mean you know he was always working on a whole bunch of stuff
But if he had another another recording coming out, I'm sure that his wife is on that
You know and whoever he was working on it with
But yeah, he got into quite a few different musical directions after his original like, you know
Gentlemen players sort of era and then a couple of albums after that he got into a lot of spiritual stuff
He was into Buddhism, right? He was a Buddhist. Yeah
Interesting. Okay, so not a happy atheist like us. He's got he's got boots in there. Okay. Well, he had him
He I think his his background
was
Like not Amish but Mennonite. Yeah he had a few different areas or whatever I guess areas of spirituality
kind of in his background and he sort of riveted through a few of them to try to find himself.
So he was really into Buddhism for a while, but he was into spirituality in general, you know. Absolutely.
So Big Rude Jake pursuing the pearl of great price.
What is the plan like the future for that film?
Like are you looking to have it, I don't know, available on Hollywood suites or crave or
something?
Like what is the plan here?
Yeah, well, Johnny and I, Johnny's also a filmmaker and has a few films and we've been,
we have an agent and we're shopping it around to screeners right now.
So hopefully it will be on the to be near you who knows we're hoping
well I can send it to my buddy at Hollywood Suites if you like David
Kines we definitely love to put it on as many screeners as possible so people all
over the place sure love Jake and all of all areas of the world can have access
to it because it would be nice if people watched it and kinds is a big Toronto
music fan like I feel like he'd get the importance of this.
So we could totally.
Thanks, that would be lovely.
I would say I could close the fucking deal here.
I'm just gonna do the intro here.
Johnny, the other Johnny song,
I know we talked about who's Johnny,
but I gotta say that fine young cannibals Johnny
is fun to sing too.
Johnny, we're worried.
Got that falsetto, right?
Like I can't even pretend to.
I know Half Past Four has a song called Johnny.
It's not about my husband.
Who's it about?
John McEnroe?
Probably.
I have no idea.
The other guys in my band are Russians.
And when I came into the band, a lot of their songs
were in Russian, and we translated them into English.
And Johnny was one of the first songs
that they translated for me.
OK, that's a fun fact right there.
Please tell me what's next for you.
I mean, this thing sounds like it was made a long time ago and you just finished it up.
Like, am I right?
So like, like, is there another project?
I know you probably have a lot of things on the go, but is there anything coming up that
we should be looking out for?
Well, right now I'm editing a movie, a feature film for a friend of mine named Chris Minz.
He'd like to, he likes to go by Dr. Minz.
He is an incredible, is he a medical doctor?
No.
Well, then you can't go by Dr. Minz.
Come on.
Well, yeah, I can.
It's like Dr.
Smuggle.
He's an artist.
Artists can do anything.
He's a wonderful visual artist.
He's also a musician.
He played, he's, he's had an incredible history of music, doing all kinds of crazy music.
He is a really wacky off-the-wall, wild, amazing guy.
And he is also a filmmaker. So he made a film and I'm the editor of the film. It's called
The Rise and Fall of Dorian Why. And it's a wackadoodle, amazing, funny film.
And I'm getting into the kind of end game of finishing that up.
And my big project for this year, I think,
is just getting our album out.
We're gonna be recording in the late spring
and then hopefully doing some music videos
and playing a lot live with my band.
It's all about music.
["Big Rude Jake"]
Kieri, I'm all about Big Rude Jake right now.
I'm gonna dive in.
I feel like I missed out on Big Rude Jake.
That was a cool, you're right, that was a big cool scene downtown Toronto and at a time
when artists could afford to live in this city.
It kind of makes me nostalgic for this period in the city's history, which feels so long
gone now, unfortunately.
Yeah, he was a real master of that.
He had so many amazing things to say
about the about the city and it's really inside of all of all of his music. If you just put on
a pair of headphones and listen to a few of his earlier albums you really get a feel for it.
And other than Big Rude Jake and music that you're creating, like what would you listen to? I don't
know if you go for a run or if you just go for a walk or whatever, but if you're going to put on a put on music, like what kind of music does
Kyrie listen to?
Oh my God.
Uh, I listened to all kinds of different music.
I can listen to anything from wacky lounge music and moog music to, uh, um,
to jazz, to progressive rock, to sticks.
I listened to a lot, not really, but I listen to a lot.
And I've always had a passion for Canadian music.
So.
You know who the lead singer of Styx is right now?
Yeah, it's Gowan.
Right, he's probably by the Scarborough Bluffs right now.
So shout out to FOTM Lawrence Gowan.
I enjoyed this chat about Big Rude Jake. I hope your film finds some
streams so more people can see it.
Thank you. I'll get it into people's faces at some point. It's in some ways by hook or
by crook. I will. And hopefully if any of you are downtown on Saturday night and you
want to come see this film, it's a great way to start your evening. Um, just come by and see it. It's only 75 minutes and it's well worth your time.
And that brings us to the end of our 1431st show.
Wait, Mimi's Mimi's that was the name of the breakfast place. I knew it would come
to you. I feel like I just read about Mimi's.
I mean...
She was incredible. Force of nature.
Did she just pass away?
Oh, she passed away quite a few years ago.
Did she just pass away quite a few years ago?
Yeah, she did. Just quite a few years ago.
She was wonderful in her blintzes. We're second to none.
Well, somebody passed away, damn it.
If it wasn't Mimi,
somebody, someone passed away, somebody shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. You can follow me on Twitter and Blue Sky at
Toronto Mike. So in addition to going to Kiri,
vibrant.com, how can we follow you Kiri on social media?
Well, I guess I don't really. I mean, I'm on, you don't have to, on social media? Um, well, I guess I don't really.
I mean, I'm on.
You don't have to be on social media.
I'm on Instagram a little bit, but you know,
I'm on-
What's your Instagram handle?
Let's give them something.
It's, uh, God, I don't even know.
Did you know that we were going to record today?
I'm so ill prepared.
Tell me, tell me, I feel like this is what I want to talk about.
Okay.
It's like, this is when the good stuff comes out, honestly. Like,
so what was your day like today? What was your day like? Like, like,
I feel like we got, I just feel like you're done. The day's done.
And you're, you're done. You're just zonked. And you're like, Oh,
I got to fucking talk to this guy for now. I enjoy the chat. Don't get me wrong,
but it feels like you should just take a day off and go to a spa.
Then I would have had all these.
What did you do all day?
I work. I work.
Yeah, you did a real job, right?
Yeah, I did. I did a real job that shell lumpy identified.
You don't have to.
You don't have to.
And I worked. It was a long day.
And yeah, I have my son is sick.
Unfortunately, he has he's a head cold and he's missing his first.
Like, what do you call it?
It's not a prom, but it's like a semi-formal.
I missed all my semi-formals.
Okay. Tell him how he turned out.
Okay. So your son's missing his semi-formal because he's unwell.
Yeah.
I'm sorry to hear that.
That's all right.
He'll survive.
You can't stand it.
You're so frazzled.
He doesn't like modern music at all.
So he'll probably hate it anyway.
Much love to all who made this possible.
That's Great Lakes Brewery.
That's Palma Pasta.
That's Recycle My Electronics.
That's Raymond James Canada.
And Ridley Funeral Home.
See you all tomorrow when my special guest is Jesse Hirsch who's
making his in-studio debut looking forward to that see you all then Yeah