Great Big Sea

Part 1

0:00How you doing man? I'm good, how are you? Awesome. Where are you calling from? St. John's New Plan. Oh really? Yeah man. Still living out there? Oh yeah. How come, well let's actually start the interview there. How come you decided to stay there? How come you never felt the need to move to, you know you guys are a big band to move to a bigger city for the music business? That's a really good question. Hahaha. We just love it here, you know. This is where our home is, this is where our families are, and our goal from the beginning like many new commanders was to try to find a way to make work for ourselves so we could stay here. And it's funny in all the traveling and all the places and cool places we've gone, it's never really even occurred to me to live anywhere else. It's the only province I haven't been to, so I'm wondering what compares to it? There's Canada, but it's, St. John's is, you know,

0:50on the east coast and it was really a British. And it's only been a Canadian place for 50 or 60 years. Right. It was a British place for a few hundred years before that. So it's more, it has more in common with North America, to be honest. Well, even the sound of your band comes from that, I would think. Now, the mold's kind of being broken with the new bands from St. John's like, hey, Rosetta, they're not sounding, well, like you guys at all for that matter. But what is the scene there? Is it more your sound? Is it more of this new indie rock that's coming out of there? There's always been a mix of both, like, they're really cool and exciting about us.

1:37Be celebrating that if those diverse bands were all really good, I'd be going like, yeah, go on, I guess we've got heavy metal bands, but they're not any good. My world class amazing. Hey, Rosetta, are fantastic. You know, I can see somewhere in our gal. You know, it's just so much cool. Everyone I just mentioned is, you know, so it's an exciting kind. Have you thought about producing any of them? I know you did Russell's record and you did the one,

2:23you've only produced one great big C record, haven't you? Yeah, we did a couple, well, we did the first one together and we did our traditional record together. And, you know, a few others, yes, I have thought about producing them all the time. The time is always the issue and I mean, some of the bands I could probably help and out on it. I'm not sure, you know, there's much I could teach Tim from Heroes at it. Right. And they all are on their own right, so I'd be honored to get a chance to work with any of them, but who knows? Right, well, you've worked a lot of people. This new disc's got a lot of co-writes on it, safe upon the shore. Yeah, it was great fun, man. What made you bring all these people into, like, Joel Plaskit, Randy Bachman, Paul Lamb from from a band called Crush that people might remember?

3:11I was just fun, great fun. We had a chance to Russell or whoever made this little reach for ourselves in Western Newfoundland for a week. I think, often, China, Bob and Joel Plaskit and Jeremy Fisher in five days and that five or six of them made the record, so. Do you feel like you enjoy writing with people more? Because I assume in the beginning you want to write your own songs, right? You want to be the songwriter. Yeah, I don't know. I've never had that bug.

3:56I've always wanted, I'm a collaborator more than anything. I've written a bunch of songs on my own, but I don't know. I'll get such a kick out of sitting in the room with other people doing it. And I'm just a few women more competent about a song. Not a lot of people share that, but I don't know. Maybe I'm just about... I always wanted someone else in the room. Is that maybe why Sean's singing? I feel like Sean's singing a lot more lead recently. Well, Sean has become a really prolific writer as well. And so he's had a lot of really, really good songs lately. And he's got a couple of solo record out there, and I don't want to about to come out there. I think when we sat down to do the favorite on the shore record,

4:41I think Sean submitted, kind of, offered 54 songs. Wow. And usually good. And so Sean is a serious weapon. He's a serious gun. There's a couple of covers on there too. It's funny that you do Gallows pull the Zeppelin tune, and then you have a song on the record called Over the Hills and Fireway that is not the Zeppelin song. I like Sean freakishly high voice, and I sounded the folk song from...

5:35Oh, wow. Right. Is there any loot on this record? I heard you had to learn loot for the Robin Hood film. I do lose on one track. Oh, really? Yeah, of course. Well, I guess if you know the instrument, why wouldn't you throw it in there? Are you thinking about... Not much of a stretch, really. I mean, we play bazookies and we play, you know, if you're starting to play, weird, a lot becomes pretty common. I guess so. It's still a string instrument at the end of the day. We haven't got two places. But in the court, you're upside down and backwards. Are you thinking about putting out a loot record like Sting? No. No, okay.

6:21No, I'm not that advanced. I can press, although it would be fun. Yeah, I'm sure it would be. So, well, tell me about this Robin Hood experience, because that must have been extremely different for you. And I heard you left straight from the Junos when we all saw you perform with Hawk, and then flew right to set. That's exactly what happened. It was just a real journey, man. It was like getting the chance to walk in someone else's shoes for six months almost, you know. Like I did all the stuff that all those guys had training and learned my lines and, you know, do all that stuff that friends of mine do all the time, you know. But it was just such a cool opportunity that something with the best people in the world at it.

7:07You lit Wayne Gretzky. Yeah. It was amazing. Is it something you'd want to do again? Oh, definitely. You know, I really would. I'd love to be a part of, especially something that big. My God, it was like, you can't imagine the... Comes together to make a single frame of that. Like it's just, every day, it was amazing to watch. Either one of the other actors, or to watch, stunt collides. How does the collaborative process differ from making a record with a band and a producer, and I guess the studio execs that I would say at the end of the day and everything like that? Well, how do you mean, how is it different for you? Yeah, well, how does it compare? The process of making a record is to making a film.

7:53I know they're very different, but I feel like they're still collaborative efforts at the end of the day. Yeah, and that there's somebody or a group of people's passion to tell a story, you know, and then to do their own bit of art. And I said, like, the good, a couple of dozen things formed and it needs to be well, whatever. You know, I think there's a couple of dozen things that need to happen. Right. I think for a movie, it becomes, or 2,400, you know, it's just,

8:38it's like, it's, I mean, it's got to be the most single discipline is going on there, right? Whiting all the performance. Must be interesting to play a theater for you guys, because I, I don't know, I saw you at Nathan Phillips Square in Toronto a couple of years ago, outside, and it was a big party. I was through people dancing and you don't really get that in a theater, but I guess these new records are a little more mellow. So maybe it does work for you guys. Well, we've always done theaters, you know, like even since like our first little step outside the pubs of Newfoundland, we're to play the

9:24theaters of Atlantic Canada, ones that were poignant enough to, you know, and that's, that's one of the joys of being in a public, we can do a pub or post-posh theater in the city. And that many bands get to do that. No, fair enough. And you guys are big enough that you're going to sell out these theaters. And like you said, songs like, I don't know, clearest indication would do marbles in a theater, right? The great thing to do is I could tell there was a quieter, a couple or two off-mic.

10:19Yeah, I was going to say that would be cool. Donkey writing would be cool off, just off-mic and just with the, with the little, what is that little drum that you guys have? What's that called? Barron. Barron. Speaking of the live show, do you still remember the words to end of the world? Can you still remember every single word? I'm not sure I ever knew it. Fair enough. I'm sure I ever knew it. It's not an easy song. I just said a bunch of stuff in some protest kind of way and it felt appropriate. Sounds good. There's, there's something people did not know. That's awesome. I'd love to get some storytellers bits from you if you don't mind just, you know, some quick words on a few songs. And let's start with clear syndication because we just mentioned that one. I put it myself and Sean correctly and it was, it was, it was primarily a,

11:08a game time, it was kind of a, How did the referendum line come into play in that song? Well, we just got jamming about different pointy to grew up in a place like Newfoundland, the political uncertainty is kind of lived here. Oh.

11:53It's the 49 thing which was, oh, Brandon. Yeah, I did. I guess not. And we weren't. Look at that. I went through this, that works as well. Yeah. No, it was about it in 1999. Ordinary Day. It's got a very who sounding, even the harmonies sound like the who. Oh, thank you. Ordinary Day, myself and Sean wrote in that signed, maybe this 1995, but I have to be got signed and won her in, started writing this song that I wanted to capture the kind of essence of the song.

12:48And I can be a better word for everything. And the new one, nothing but a song. Nothing but a song is a song that Sean and I wrote about a, and we didn't have to play that. Of course. So, but somewhere between Toronto and I don't remember what it was, but I know that I was right.

13:39Of course. Apologetic. Anything for that? What's next for you? I mean, you said Sean's got a solo disc. What about you? You have a solo disc and it works? I do.

14:34And here we can expect a new Russell Crowe disc as well that you worked on. Russell and I are working on, had been working on a movie that has a lot of music in it. Oh, okay. It's been a feeling development. Right. Fair enough. In those meetings. Before I let you go. I know a guy. Right. Exactly. Before I let you go, we do something on the show called Five Questions. Five quick questions. One more answers. Do it. Road or studio? Road. Leonard McCartney. Leonard McCartney.

15:19Yeah. Leonard McCartney. Which one? Leonard McCartney. No man. Choose one. Come on. No, I can't do it. All right. All right. All right. All right. I'm going to throw this one in as a bonus question because I think a lot of people want to know. What's your favorite beer? Yes. All right. And one word. Great big C. Danny.

Part 2

0:06Nuh, nuh, nuh, nuh, nuh, nuh, nuh, nuh, nuh, nuh, nuh, nuh, nuh, nuh, nuh. Sir, very big CPXX. 20XX? Oh, yes. 20XX, but, 20XX seems a-a better-a better ring close. Yeah, like it sounds... Right. I-GVS-XX. I mean, yeah. Get this one custom. When we're 30 years old, you're not gonna want to buy the TRBLEX one. That's trying to be... You're gonna want to pass on that one, right now. There's so much stuff in here. I thought, maybe we could hold some of it up. This is- This is some of the stuff that's in the larger box set.

0:51So we have a calendar ball. I've only said 100 pages I think. Yes, it's a full issue of classes. When we put together the idea was that we would give fans a big box of, you know, a big sort of Christmas box full of Graping Sea stuff. And we had a ton of music, we had DVD, we knew we wanted to book the calendar, which is essentially a time out of Graping Sea history.

1:37Plus the stuff that fans love to keep for themselves, you know, the backstage passes and the stickers and the lures, you know, we had boxes and boxes and boxes of that stuff. And we wanted people to see it. And how much of this came from the book and research for the book? Well, we started with the book, we started looking for photographs, you know, and everyone had stuff. Most of us were doing, you know, just sort of snapshots and things people had it to us. When everyone pulled it and then we started asking around, you know, guys who've been in the crew or whatever stuff just came out of the woodwork. And to the point where we had to buy the end of it, we had too much, we had to start leaving stuff out. And what about the songs, curation of these songs? There's three discs. You got folk songs on one, pop songs on another, and then Roblade is a bunch of... It's a missus. It's a missus. And a French song. Yeah, the Roblade's disc is really a collection of two groups of music, one of which is popular

2:22great big sea songs that you may have known from the finished versions on records or live or whatever. On the Roblade's, you might hear, for example, the original demo of Ordinary Day, for example. Or a song, on some of the, you know, recorder around the coffee table and addressing them where we wrote the song that day, or a live version of it from some radio show or something like that. There's that kind of thing. There's also a group of music on the road waves that are songs that we work really hard on. We even produced them to the last moment, but didn't make it to great big sea records. And in almost every case, thank God, they didn't make it to great big sea records because they're, in some cases, awful. There was a lot of music that people kind of heard about, you know, didn't they? The song, I've never heard anyone play that live, whatever.

3:08So there's also a chance to kind of put some of that out there and say, no, here it is. There's no secrets anymore. Is that what the new songs are, too? Each of those songs kind of speaks to an era of the band. You know, the bottom of the door, but he speaks to the early kind of pop cover era of the band when we were just trying to fill three hours a night, you know, and play everything. Three hours a night. Well, we started playing the bubble of St. Joseph's, do three hour long sets. So we would, you know, play everything we could think of. And that run-run away, for example, which was our first save came out of that era and that kind of, you know, run-run away great, I'll play it, too. You know, there was a lot of that. One of the things that, like, in, that I've always tried to keep my ear open for work, is that it's, and it's like, for some reason, we have this thing where we have, you know, we odd instruments compared to most bands, you know, like we have, it's not played so many

3:55of them. And this is live in our world, you know, and, you know, like, Hoxley, Hoxley, I was, Hoxley worked when I was jumping up in at the Great Big Sea studio in Newfoundland and said, this is the only studio I've ever been in where someone says, past the bazooki, and someone says, which one? Then they, so, whenever I hear a pop song, you know, that has something in it that I think would work really well in one of our wacky instruments, I sort of make a mental note of it, and, like, for example, run-run away, I always thought that, you know, that riff of duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh, it sounds like the tin whistle to me, it always has, but it was played on electric guitar, you know, and, like, even with, with the Townsend song I always set that you know sounds like a horn thing

4:44play the keyboard on his record but it always reminds me of Bob's accordion because the way Bob plays like I'm going off for example you know that kind of horn section accordion I call it. It's where Bob plays a horn riff on the bong-dong accordion you know so it's like you know that one I always love that song you know it's sort of one of the things my role as I was like hey I got a numbers on course they do but see that's one not often it doesn't work right it's interesting the r.m. covers not on the on this record and the rules on those songs too that we we played so much when it was popular yeah that it definitely were on its welcome for us and from that this area the audience and then we just forgot about it you know I was like okay we're gonna play this again this sucks more so than you got a cover so something that was in the set list and it just never came back to the top again one thing to be able to do we

5:31tour this record over the next year is really digging that catalog and you know bring back some of those unload children and put them out on the front of the stage again yeah we're doing a two-set show so it gives us a bit more time to do a few songs that we haven't done at all but we're going through like some of the songs that are on here that are obviously like some of our favorites from different times and fan favorites but we haven't played in a long time like a song like going up for example I don't think we played that song regularly or at all in a decade for whatever reason you know just because well it's a court even one that's in G you know I have this other one or two others and it just that slot in the set list it's occupied by another thing for a while but I said let's play going up and what a act and some of those songs that are

6:17on the earlier records people probably there's a lot of people that have been come to see us for a long time they probably never heard us play those songs even though we played them thousands of times you know early on because we only had one record to play it all twelve of them I mean it's over a career like Aaron said we didn't really become popular in America until the early 2000s and why which one time a huge era of the band for Canadian fans you know the open-of-play records never made any person out there at all so you know the bulk of our career in America was records like seasonal cares and something beautiful and that forces favor that material dominates shows down there there's no Newfoundland shows on this tour well there's a few there's a few things like these two legs that we've announced already this are the first ones but then there's sneakily there's a whole bunch of summer stuff that we're

7:04not releasing yet which will include Toronto which is not an auto on the list convex cities non-the-list I don't think St. John's is nothing in Europe there's a ton of America that's out there just because there's other four legs or to be done so wow you know we're doing a little well into 2014 what I love about a box set and interviewing him the box is I get to ask you about songs that I wouldn't usually be able to ask about because we're always promoting a new record yeah so I thought and I thought there were some cool stories like Consquence Free is Austin Powers inspired yeah that's where the original lyric came from is a memory the some line that movie where he says as long as as long as people are still having unprotected sex in a consequence for a environment movie fun so he's where you look as he's come comes on frozen or something

7:49I can't remember what's that that's one of the lies I was like consequence free environment that would be awesome that would be awesome that's where that's where that came from a lot of songs that mean Sean wrote over the years were kind of like songs that Sean had that was like you have to go at this for a while and we played our good back and like or vice versa whatever but that's honestly one of the ones that we literally sat next to each other and laughed and kept passing lyrics you brought one of them up to the band it's not one of your own songs you know it's funny way that one came to me I'm friend of England who you know said makes tapes over those people did then you know pre-internet era and he saved his tape and you know it's fire to car and they do he had very clunky taste

8:35so the every hundred song very little which I would like to put now to get into the gym and put it in the first line you know and the fiddle riff and nobody had heard of the Oyster bandic antenna they didn't tour that stage and they had any releases you know so it was it wasn't like okay we're doing a well-known stone song here you know it just felt that it felt like I've been written for us you know kind of really philosophically and musically and the way John Jones saying was perfect for you like you know literally I was like yeah I remember you bring it on a tape for that's the play record right it's really clear and and bottom laid down put it except ours we had to record this song we listened to them yeah we had to

9:22record that song who's this bank on the Oyster band and in Johnson half grandmother and they're listed on the one of the early like as a thanks on the spirit of the West record or something that's all I ever heard about then he go look I encourage you to go look into the Oyster band and have a look as we could have done one of the same in songs and you know it did just occur to the most on-song sonwares in British history I think they're fantastic we could go through all 60 or whatever these days today so five quick questions one more answers okay road or studio oh road road out London or Mocarity George that's good first when you hear a song usually hits your first lyrics melody or rhythm there's no song you've written you're most proud of or do you day to

10:11recruit your surgeon and in one word great big C awesome laughter and that's awesome thank you so much guys really appreciate it and deadly is that what you are?