#49: Elvis Costello Live at the El Mocambo

I wasn’t there. But listening to it on CHUM-FM reassured me that I was on the right track. Punk and new wave would solve all my problems. Soon after hearing it (“this song is about the radio because the radio is NO USE”) on the radio (!), I bought a bootleg copy of it either at Records on Wheels or the Record Peddler. I played it more than any other record I ever owned. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_at_the_El_Mocambo_(Elvis_Costello_album)

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#48: Harold Bloom

Harold Bloom, R.I.P. These are the books of Bloom’s that I finished reading (the others a victim of my distracted consciousness, not a reflection on his writing). I will perhaps write more at some point, but I wanted to mark the passing of a writer who helped me how to read great writing.

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#47: John Giorno

I Resign Myself to Being Here

John Giorno, Rest in Peace 

So many memories of John Giorno. The first was at the Wholly Communion of Poets at the Cactus (Toronto, 1982), the taping for the Poetry in Motion documentary. 

Then, when I was working with Elliot Lefko (then a poetry promoter), Giorno was part of his regular roster, at events promoting Ron Mann’s Poetry in Motion film (for which, I believe, Giorno was given a producer credit), but at other events about town, readings in small venues and, eventually, on the bill at events at the Danforth Music Hall featuring William Burroughs and Lou Reed. 

Along the way, I purchased a copy of Sugar, Alcohol and Meat, a compilation of Dial-A-Poets readings (Burroughs Sr. and Jr., Patti Smith, John Cage, Peter Gordon, Ted Berrigan, et al), produced by Giorno, and just a glimpse into his Giorno Poetry Systems empire. 

Speaking of empire, Giorno was the person sleeping in Warhol’s Sleep, a 5 hour and 20 minute film made in 1963, early in Warhol’s filmmaking career. Giorno was Warhol’s lover at the time. 

Besides turning me on to performance poetry, Giorno’s projects suggested to me that there was a big world of avant-garde artistic production that was loosely networked, and consisted of poets, composers, filmmakers, video artists, and performance artists. It seems like it was what I was looking for, the direction I needed. I took the direction and never looked back.

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#45: The Art of Song

My last window as a music programmer during my first time around at the AGO (1989-1998). After many hundreds of jazz, classical, world, childrens, avant-garde, and hip hop shows, I went out with this series dedicated to some of the heroes of the Toronto songwriting scene. Co-programmed with Molly Johnson, from whom I learned a lot, and with graphics by Kurt Swinghammer, himself part of the Toronto visual and music culture, the series could have been great. But it wasn’t. It was too expensive in a city of too much competition. We were in my favourite space for such things (the Gallery School) but it was lonely and cavernous. Still, the performances were actually all memorable: Carole Pope with Kevan Staples; Sylvia Tyson (with Clay Tyson); Colin Linden; Gordie Johsnon; and Tom Wilson. Sadly, the Dave Bidini and Kurt Swinghammer show was cancelled and, though I was a bit sheepish when I informed the artists, it was the right thing to do. “You gotta know when to hold ‘em, know when to fold ‘em.”

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#44: Bruce Mau Design

26 Things I Remember Fondly About Working at Bruce Mau Design

 

Jim Shedden

July 22, 2011

From 1998 until 2010 I worked at Bruce Mau Design, which proved to be an extraordinary time of growth for me, both personal and creative. It’s now been 18 months since I last worked there, so I thought I’d put a few thoughts down on my time there for posterity and, I hope, commentary by others who worked there over the years. I’m not sure how much sense it will make to people who haven’t had an association with BMD, but I’m throwing it out there anyhow.

It's all a bit random, so don't feel neglected if I've failed to mention you in any significant way. I limited myself to the 26 letters of the alphabet to give this note some structure, and myself some closure. Also if I didn't tag you, please don't take offense: I think there's a limit on the number of people who can be tagged. 

 

“Amanda”: three wonderful people, all called Amanda: first Sebris, then Ramos and then Happé. It’s helpful for me to remember that, aside from Bruce’s leadership, the simple but lovable physical design of the studio, and our impossible-to-top roster of clients, the support of my colleagues over 11 1/2 years made my experience there great. With each Amanda I learned some crucial life lessons. Sebris and I learned how to manage someone as complex as Bruce (can’t say we ever figured it out), the ups and downs of the New York art, design and culinary worlds, and the art of making exquisite books as we argued about whether it was the end of print. With Ramos, I learned how to remain ruthlessly and tirelessly creative, even when it seemed as though we were never going to get it right, and to have fun traveling, whether we were in Copenhagen, or Holland, Michigan. And with Happé, the one Amanda who remains at the studio, I was reminded how important it was to always remain optimistic, curious, open-minded, and, something we often forget, friendly.

 

Bruce: Brilliant. Infuriating. Introverted. Extroverted. Gregarious. Shy. Generous. Self-absorbed. Perfectionist. Laid back. Serious. Constantly joking. Obsessive. Open-minded. Straightforward. Complicated. Ambitious. Easygoing. I learned a lot from Bruce: lots of predictable stuff about typography, design, books, architecture, and art, but more importantly many things about managing clients, staff and business, especially when we were failing at those things. For many of the years I was there, Bruce seemed like my best friend, but we reminded each other that we weren’t. He could fire me, and I could quit, and the extremes implied in those plausible actions suggested all the other possibilities that ultimately make it difficult, if not impossible, to be friends in that context. So, while I often saw Bruce 7 days a week, all day and into the night, here in Toronto and around the world, I’ve barely spoken to him over the last couple of years. Around the time I left the studio, Bruce’s own relationship to it changed radically, allowing him to invent some new directions, and the studio to reinvent itself as well.

 

Change, as in Massive Change. Our biggest project, with so many branches it’s staggering looking back on it. The most fun I ever had at BMD, the most exciting it ever got. This isn’t the place to detail what that project was about, but you can get a good glimpse at the http://www.massivechange.com blog, sadly out-of-date, so it feels like a ghost town, but dig a little and the project is all there: the ideas, the research, the people, the project elements, and so forth. There were some major residual effects of the project. First, the Institute without Boundaries (http://www.institutewithoutboundaries.com/), which we founded in tandem with Massive Change, as a “machine” for producing the projects. It continues to thrive at George Brown College, and the work they produce has a Massive Change flavor. Second, inspired by the vitality and forward-thinking we found in Chicago, the final location of the Massive Change exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Bruce moved there. For a while we had a studio there, which is another story altogether, but the upshot of the move is that Bruce is in Chicago, and Bruce Mau Design is in Toronto, and they are pretty much autonomous. From 2002 until 2004, when the project opened we produced: a manifesto and gobs of research; a best-selling book for Phaidon (still in print - it’s really good too: http://www.phaidon.ca/store/general-non-fiction/massive-change-9780714844015/); a fantastic exhibition for the Vancouver Art Gallery that travelled to the Art Gallery of Ontario and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; a marketing and communications campaign; public programs; products; a website, which morphed into the blog I referenced above by the time we opened in Chicago, an educational website for the Virtual Museum Canada project (http://www.massivechangeinaction.virtualmuseum.ca/), and many other vehicles. Jennifer Leonard, one of the students in the first year of the Institute without Boundaries, started an amazing radio program that you can still access (http://www.massivechange.com/mcradio), and from which much of the content for the book was derived. Once the project opened in Vancouver, it seemed as though everything else we were doing was either a spin-off or continuation of Massive Change, or an opportunity to approach more traditional design work using the Massive Change lens. I can’t say for certain, but it seems to be that the spirit of what we started back in the summer of 2002 still informs the studio’s approach. It definitely informs Bruce’s, as he has started a new entity, along with his wife Bisi, called the Massive Change Network (http://mcnonline.massivechangenetwork.com/). I’m not entirely clear on what that is, but the spirit of it is clear. My experience of Massive Change was the highlight of my time at BMD intellectually and creatively.

 

Downsview Park: In the year 2000, our team, which included Rem Koolhaas and OMA, Petra Blaise and Inisde Out, and David Oleson, won the competition to convert 150 acres of the Downsview military grounds into a public park, with our proposal “Tree City.” It was a major international competition so it was huge pleasure to win. At the same time, we had our reservations about entering the competition in the first place. It proved to be the beginning of the end of the studio’s relationship with Rem and OMA. That was fine: all things must pass. Besides, the proposal was really driven by BMD, and we led the project for the next six years after the competition. Bruce and our team, led by Anita Matusevics and Jason Halter, developed a fantastic concept, where poetry meets pragmatism, and the rural, urban and suburban dance together. Later, the team would evolve. I can’t remember all the individuals involved, but Cathy Jonasson and Henry Cheung led it through to the final design documents, but dozens of others came in and out of the project over the years. Though I had very little to do with this particular project directly, I have a huge passion for urban parks, and I was really inspired by the philosophy and the design that we developed for Downsview. It was a long process (11 years so far), but it looks like they’re finally building a version of the park, more-or-less according to BMD’s final Design Development specifications. Here’s the original concept: http://www.downsviewpark.ca/eng/park_design_concept.shtml. Here’s an update on the construction: http://www.downsviewpark.ca/media/constructionmap_may2011.pdf, although this suggests that it’s significantly more banal than we envisioned: http://www.downsviewpark.ca/eng/illustrations.shtml.

 

Eating: There’s no way around it, my time in the studio involved a lot of great eating. My first official day at the studio I went to New York with the rest of the studio to celebrate Bruce winning the Chrysler Award. Bruce spent the prize money bringing us down, and feting us at a number of great restaurants. It was a great introduction to what was to follow. Shortly after returning the trip, I remember going to a Scaramouche (for my first time ever) for a last minute meeting with Bruce, André Lepecki,  and Bill Boyle (Harbourfront Centre), where the idea for our video installation STRESS was launched. Our trip to VIenna to meet with the curator and the director of the MAK involved, of course, seriously great meals. And on it went. Some of my favorite or most memorable meals? Every meal we had in Lisbon, whether haute or peasant, back in September, 2001, a very strange but fantastic time. All my meals with Shaw Contract (carpet), whether they were in Atlanta, the outskirts, Chicago, or Toronto: they were all such fun dinner dates, and brought a gregarious and open-minded spirit to the table. Cheesecake Factory (don’t laugh) with Sara Weinstein Kohn in Marina del Rey (LA). Christmas parties at Bruce and Bisi’s house, and then a few in the studio (see Xmas below). Eating cake tops from Dufflet, when our studio was above her Dovercourt factory, when I was still a client (Dufflet was connected to the studio from the beginning in various delicious ways. All birthdays and other festive occasions were celebrated with a variety of her cakes, Bruce lived above her store for many years, and that apartment became an extenions of the studio when Bruce bought a house. Eventually we even redid her identity, taking the spiral design that Lisa Naftolin developed in the 80s, and making a system that was chocolatey, delicious, classic French and American fun. It was one of those projects that many of us worked on, but Helen Sanematsu eventually cracked and perfected. As light as the whole thing seemed, I frequently showed prospective clients the Dufflet standards manual because it was so clear and tasty.). Long days that would often start at lunch and go till closing time at the Queen St. W. location of Le Select, at a table I called “the office”, the only one without the dangly bread basket. The only restaurant where we had a corporate account, though we should have had one at Bar Italia in the late 90s and Terroni throughout the last decade, and probably Mildred Pierce in the mid-90s, again when I was a client, but often found myself discussing everything that mattered with Bruce and company over a great meal. A few great meals at Susur Lee’s various establishments, most impressive with out-of-town clients, but also of interest when we were working on a cookbook with him (we left the project, but our stamp seems to be on the finished product in any case). Great meals were also had with clients at Canoe, still one of the great Toronto experiences. Elaborate, impeccable Italian meals at the home of Rolf Fehlbaum, then CEO of Vitra, and his wife, the curator and architecture scholar Frederica Zanco. Over the top, old school steak dinners in Chicago, one at Smith & Wollensky’s with Bruce, Bisi, Joanne, and Kris Manos (Herman Miller), the night that Massive Change opened at the MCA; and several at a place whose name I always forget, but it seems like it’s right out of the height of gangland culture, Chicago in the 1930s (when I find the name, I’ll revise this). Breakast with Joanne often, in various cities, but my favorite being Lou Mitchell’s in Chicago (http://www.loumitchellsrestaurant.com/).  Everything I ever ate in Denmark, a country where everything is perfect including the food. And the best for last: ice cream cones and sundaes with Kris Manos, Bruce, Amanda Ramos, and Judith in Holland, Michigan.

 

Frank Gehry and his studio gave us the best opportunities imaginable, and not just the opportunity to work with the world’s most important living architect. Frank invited us into an astonishing group of projects, always demanding that we play the role of the cultural research team, and inventors of innovative approaches to user experiences, whether we were developing graphics and wayfinding systems, as in the case of the Walt Disney Concert Hall or the M.I.T. Stata Centre or whether we were conceiving an entire museum from the ground up, as was the case of the Panama Museum of Biodiversity. What Frank never did was engage us in pointless, meandering research or strategy exercises. There was always a real world design deliverable. Some of those projects came to pass in very big ways: Walt Disney Concert Hall, M.I.T. Stata Center, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the IAC headquarters, the Gehry exhibition at the Gugggenheim, and various books along the way.The Panama Musuem of Biodiversity, one of the studio’s most ambitious projects is under construction. A number of projects never ultimately came to pass, at least not for BMD, like the Schmidt Museum of Coca-Cola Memorabilia, Saks Fifth Avenue, and many others. Almost as important are the projects that came into the world through Gehry but became programmatic challenges for BMD even after the Gehry studio left them: Riversphere in New Orleans is the most significant of these (http://riversphere.tulane.edu/), but so, too, were the Connecticut Historical Society; the Bathurst Jewish Culture Centre; and the World Youth Centre (Toronto Olympic Bid 2008). When we were hanging around the Gehry studio in Playa Vista (L.A.), we were usually aware that we were in the middle of something special, even if our colleagues there, Frank included (usually), were just down-to-earth, experiencing the same daily struggles as the rest of us. I learned a lot from Jim Glymph, George Metzger, Craig Webb, Marc Salette, Keith Mendenhall, and many others, sometimes just by standing around, drinking coffee and waiting for Barry Diller to show up at the studio in order to dismiss our collective efforts one more time. Even then, I like how L.A. days were usually far less stressful than NY days, for the simple reason that it’s impossible to go from meeting to meeting to meeting. Our days would wind down by 4 or 5pm and then evenings might be spent eating Mexican food (or Cheesecake Factory!) back in Marina del Rey, or wandering around Santa Monica, the easiest part of L.A. for a Torontonian to love (and I do love it).

 

Gagosian: So many books, exhibitions, special projects, invitations, advertisements, crazy meetings, dinners, nightclubs, angry phone calls, happy phone calls. At the end of the day, however, we got to work on these projects, often with these artists (the ones who aren’t dead): Rauschenberg, Lichtenstein, Rosenquist, Warhol, Douglas Gordon, Richard Prince, Richard Serra, Cy Twombly, Baselitz, Cecily Brown, Beuys, Ellen Gallagher, Picasso, Cindy Sherman, Franz West, Schnabel, Glenn Brown, Artschwager, Bacon, Basquiat, Boetti, Calder, Michael Craig-Martin, John Currin, Dexter Dalwood, de Kooning, Gorky, Gursky, Richard Hamilton, Neil Jenney, Jasper Johns, Mike Kelley, Kiefer, Martin Kippenberg, Koons, Vera Lutter, Tim Noble & Sue Webster, Ruscha, Jenny Saville, Elisa Sighicelli, Taryn Simon, David Smith, Phillip Taaffe, Al Taylor, Robert Therrien, Richard Wright. Holy crap! That was an incredible time and I’m reminded that I left the AGO back in 1998, because I thought I would have a better chance of engaging with the living culture at BMD. I was absolutely right on at the time, and now things have come full circle, because the AGO seems like the right place to be. Regardless, that’s a staggering list.

 

Hospitals, like the Massachusetts General Hospital, elements of which were designed by our client nbbj, the “largest architectural firm you’ve never heard of”. They asked us to produce a monograph because they liked something we had done for Pelli Clarke & Associates. With Bruce’s encouragement, I somehow convinced them to let us take on a much more ambitious scope. Without going into all that, I’ll just say that this seemingly unsexy megafirm changed my ideas about what constitutes good architecture. The journey we went on with them over the next couple of years was an education on dozens of levels. Because they were all great people - smart, generous and social - it was also a great time. Yes, great meals were part of the equation: in Seattle, Columbus and New York. We didn’t produce as much as we wanted to, but the main book for the firm, Change Design, has some great ideas in it, backed by compelling stories that demonstrate a very different role architects can play in designing change.

 

Identity: Identity was at the core of everything we did, and still is for BMD as far as I can see. That started, it turns out, with Zone Books and certainly carried to Massive Change. For every client, and for every self-generated endeavour, our work always involved crafting a client’s story, “by any means necessary”: a visual identity; a story or approach to language; actions, events, environments, etc. So Tree City, STRESS, Too Perfect, the Panama Museum of Biodiversity, and Massive Change were no less identity projects than the more conventional visual branding systems we developed for Indigo, Roots, the AGO, Harbourfront Centre, or the Gagosian Gallery. This notion was very attractive to me, and I try to bring it to bear on my work whenever it makes sense.

 

Jonasson, Cathy: When I was 21, I started colaborating with Cathy Jonasson. She was the film curator at the AGO and I was a university student with ambitions to make the Innis Film Society a force within the tiny, insular world of avant-garde film. Colaborating with the AGO on the premiere of Bruce Elder’s 8 hour Lamentations (his best film, in my opinion) was an important stepping stone. Then, in 1988 Cathy and I collaborated on a series and catalogue for the AGO called Recent Work from the Canadian Avant-Garde. Then Cathy was on the Board of Directors that hired me to coordinate the International Experimental Film Congress in 1989, an event that changed my creative and professional life like almost no other. When the Congress was over, Cathy hired me to stay on at the AGO to clean up a few things administratively, but then asked me to manage the Peter Greenaway series that Bart Testa was programming, The Body in Film series that Bruce Elder curated, an Ulrike Ottinger series, and so forth. I never left until 1998 when I came to BMD. Cathy left the AGO in 1996 to go to BMD and, with Bruce, hired me to manage a project, Mutations, that never happened, at least not for BMD. See a pattern? I don’t know why I was so blessed with someone who made such leaps of faith, but there you have it. Thanks Cathy!

 

Kevin Sugden: Kevin is one of the reasons I wanted to join the BMD studio. I first worked with him on the Michael Snow Project film catalog. For that book, we had an insanely small budget, and I was really impressed with how Kevin and Bruce were invent creative ways of making it work. I look at it today and it doesn’t feel compromised at all, and I doubt that more cash would have made it a significantly better book. Good design and good art requires open-ended entrepreneurship. And that’s what Kevin is at the end of the day: an entrepreneur, always cooking up ideas, and not daunted when any one of them - or dozens of them in a row - were rejected by the client, by Bruce or by his colleagues. At the studio Kevin was a master on both our identity projects and what we called “programming” projects, but I guess they could be called cultural invention or something along those lines. Riversphere in New Orleans, the Panama Museum of Biodiversity, the Schmidt Museum of Coca-Cola Memorabilia, the “Culture of Work,” and even the initial concept for the Institute without Boundaries were all led by Kevin, or had his stamp on them. And I should never forget that his role on S,M,L,XL went from design assistant to design manager by the end of the project, his brutal aesthetic an integral characteristic of the book. And as far as the identity projects go, Kevin’s graphic design approach wasn’t always immediately attractive - in fact, it was often clunky and unappealing - but he proved that a smart and rigorous process would lead to the best, most intelligent solutions and they would invariably be beautiful. Hence, the identity for the UCLA Hammer Museum, which Kevin developed, has proved to be one of the most effective, and attractive, visual identity systems in the studio’s history. Similarly, Kevin was able to help the studio develop and articulate their most ambitious identity projects at the time: Indigo, the Rotman business school, and Access Storage Solutions. Finally, I admired and emulated Kevin’s openness to the world. As the studio has matured over the years, it became mandatory that everyone have an openness to the world, to all the crazy possibilities that might present themselves. But in my early days there, I remember certain prospects emerging, like the Taco Bell account with a San Francisco advertising agency, and there was general disdain, of the “I’ll quit before I work on that” variety. But Kevin was open to it, as he always was, and that inspired me on the best of days.

 

Life Style: It’s too big, so like S,M,L,XL it doesn’t get read. Those who do read it seem to only come upon the Incomplete Manifesto. At the time, the book was a fantastically crazy essay on where the image economy was going, but it went there so fast that the book looked quaint and naive only a few years later. Research for the book was not primarily accomplished online: that really only happened at the end of the image research. Only three years later, the entire Massive Change project was researched and developed almost exclusively online, which sort of proves what Life Style was all about. Most people, even those who work in the studio, never caught on to the Life Style thing and just write it out as Lifestyle. We developed it at the same time that we developed STRESS. Kyo, the book’s main editor and champion, became my best friend in the studio for a while. We were the the leads on both the Life Style and STRESS teams, she being Bruce’s right hand person creatively, and with me as producer on both. We kind of were the whole Life Style team, but then added Bart Testa to help push the editorial work uphill, and then we were joined by an evolving team of designers, eventually led by Chris Rowat, with Reto Geiser, Michael Barker, Dave Wilkinson, Nancy Nowacek, and others. It was so difficult to get from 90% to the 100% that Phaidon needed or the 110% that Bruce wanted, that Phaidon sent the editor, Megan McFarland, up to Toronto to park herself in the studio to get the job done. It got done, we took everyone to New York to launch it and it was a great success. I joined Bruce on the road for some of the launch tour and, while the book is a wonderfully succinct articulation of Bruce’s approach to typography and identity, to which I still refer people, the less baked discussions of the image economy, optimism, collaboration, and the future would end up determining the shape of the studio’s work for the next decade. Definitely one of my favorite moments in the studio.

 

Marigold Lodge: Herman Miller was one of my 3 or 4 favorite clients and, no, we didn’t sit around talking about Charles and Ray Eames and George Nelson. Our time with them was not about chairs, as much as we were all fans (like, I wish I had an Aeron in my office at the AGO - I get by with some Staples reject, but I’m not actually complaining). Instead, this was an opportunity to finally explore the Culture of Work and, as it turns out, the inherent values driving a company like Herman Miller. Something I learned doing this project is that I don’t know always know what I want. I would always default, if given the choice, to clients in New York, San Francisco or similar centres. For Herman Miller we had to fly to Detroit or Cleveland, then fly to Grand Rapids, where a car would take us to Holland, Michigan, about an hour away. What I found out the first time I was there was that that meant going to the Marigold Lodge on Lake Macatawa, a stunning group of buildings designed by its owner Egbert Gold, all set within a horticultural utopia. There, to put it simply, we were taken care of. It worked, The early core team on the project - Bruce, Amanda Ramos, Judith and myself - were completely eager and engaged. Whether we were at Herman Miller’s main campus in Zeeland, Michigan, or at Marigold Lodge, where we often worked, ate and slept, they were special times, creative in ways that 45 minute meetings in New York never made possible. In the context of the rest of our work, it was such a pleasure to slow down, be civilized, enjoy the lake, the flowers (especially the tulips - it’s Holland after all), and our colleagues at Herman Miller. In the end, as far as I know, nothing concrete came of our work with Herman Miller. This was distressing at the time, but I really learned a lot from it. When we started the work, we were careful to describe, in painstaking detail, exactly how we would realize the various projects and initiatives we were proposing. By the end of the project, we were producing Power Point presentations about brand hierarchy and strategy. Deadly. Necessary, I guess, but there are hundreds of agencies that are good at that song and dance. Ultimately I feel that Bruce Mau Design was about cultural insight and creative execution. A simple image explains it all: when we started the project, we wowed the Herman Miller folks, in their pristine offices, with our crazy foamcore boards that didn’t quite fit, but allowed us to look at fields of information and ideas, and work together, moving them around and revising them, and creating something out of the noise; by the time we finished the project, we were creating single channel Power Point presentations. So the frustrating inertia that developed helped me understand what mattered to me (culture, creativity), and what didn’t (hideous “marcomm” consultantspeak).

 

New York: My favorite place on earth, aside from wherever I’m currently living with my family (so far always Toronto). I spent so much time there over the years that it eventually made sense for me to get an apartment in Brooklyn, which was both a magical time, and the worst time of my life. Not New York’s fault: it just coincided with some mental and emotional difficulties that came to a head during that time. But my first day on the job was spent in New York, and as many as 100 other trips followed. I’m so lucky to have had that experience, learning in ways not otherwise possible, and meeting an insanely talented, eccentric and just plain interesting cast of characters. I’m not sure if it’s true now, but for many years at least half the studio’s revenue was generated out of New York. During my time there we were able to work with: MTV, the New York Jets, the New York Giants, MoMA, the Guggenheim, the Gagosian Gallery, Saks Fifth Avenue, Terry Winters, IAC, Phaidon, the Cooper-Hewitt, OMA-NY, Ian Schrager, Rockwell Group, and dozens of other artists, galleries, museums, and businesses. And, while my heart is in New York, over the years I also enjoyed my less passionate flings with Chicago, Boston, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Atlanta, Denver, Holland (MI), Seattle, Vancouver, Copenhagen, Vienna, Rotterdam, Ghent, Essen, Basel/Weil am Rhein...

 

Open: The weirdest project ever. A trip to a Renaissance castle in Lisbon, where Bruce, Hamilton Fish (who runs The Nation Institute), a photo editor, and a client who we just discovered was recently released from prison for fraud. If we hadn’t discovered it, she was going to tell us one night over drinks to shock us. Anyhow, this strange meeting, in this stunning but bizarre setting where we also had a staff at our beck and call (and a tour guide and bus driver), all managed to happen during 9/11. So the magazine we were to develop, OPEN, about the new, open world we saw, was threatening to become CLOSED. I can’t quite put into words who weird this whole experience was, but I have to say I remember it fondly. We were incredibly productive, if argumentative, ate exceedingly well, and probably had a good distance from which to watch the insanity unfolding in the U.S. and Canada. For Hamilton it was especially difficult, however, because he lives in TriBeCa and his wife and young daughters experienced the horror that morning, so his trip was mainly taken up by figuring out how to get back. Weirdest moment: when the client and I took the bus one afternoon to check out Fatima, truly one of the most bizarre experiences I’ve ever had. After promising to bring all of our families to a lovely setting in the south of France at Christmas, the client stopped paying our bills, and stopped answering our calls. Petra Chevrier, Bryan Gee and Helen Sanematsu continued to develop fantastic prototypes in our studio, and we didn't want to stop even when it was obvious it wasn't meant to be. The best ideas from Open ended up in Massive Change so it’s just as well. Developing a new magazine proved to be one of the stupidest things one could do in the 21st century.

 

People. I’m going to screw this up, so I’ll keep revising it as new memories surface. Names will be misspelt here and there. Some of these people remain good friends of mine. Some were not friends. But I fondly remember each. It’s not meant to be a complete list of people with whom I worked. A small number are deliberately missing, either because I didn’t get to know them very well, or where the word “fond” would be nothing but a lie. In no particular order: Joanne Balles Crosbie. Kyo Maclear. Anita Matusevics. Jason Halter. Mary Moegenburg. Amanda Sebris. Amanda Ramos. Amanda Happé. Ruth Silver. Quinn Shepherd. Cynthia Budgell. Eha Hess. Henry Cheung. Andrew Clark, Paul Kawai, Rafael Santos, Harry Choi. Rob Sawden. Kevin Sugden. Chris Rowat. Chris Pommer. Louis-Charles Lasnier. Cathy Jonasson. Aaron Currie. Kelly McKinley. Michael Waldin,  Julie Ezergailis. Koto Sato. Judith McKay. Breanne Woods. Natalie Black. Beth Mally. Chris Bahry. Barr Gilmore. Danella Hocevar. Julie Netley. Peter Blythe. Heather Thelwell. Mark Cohon. Jackie Rothstein. Alan Belcher. Lisa Molnar. Catherine Rix. Kristina Ljubanovic. Jyhling Lee. Christina Bagativicius. Laura Stein. Carolina Soderholm. Dane Solomon. Elva Rubio. Monica Bueno. Seth Goldenberg. Simon Chan. Reto Geiser. Sara Weinstein-Kohn. Sarah Newkirk. Eric Leyland. Robert Labossiere. Petra Chevrier. Bryan Gee. Julie Fry. Pauline Landriault. Alex Quinto. Alex Seth. Tyler Millard. Alexis Victor. Alita Gonzalez-Vucina. Ayla Newhouse. Britt Welter-Nolan. Chris Braden. Clementina Koppmann. David D’Andrea. Dan McGrath. Dave Gillespie. Jonathan Seet. Maris Mezulis. David Shantz. Dieter Janssen. Donald Mak. Doug Chapman. Jill Murray. Jennifer Leonard. Ilene Solomon. Eha Hess. Duncan Bates. Enoch Chan. Emily Waugh. Rochelle Strauss. Evelyn Wang. Gisele Gass. Glenna Wiley. Gina Doctor. Grant Cleland. Gary Westwood. Greg Van Alstyne. Helen Papagiannis. Ian Rapsey. Jayne Brown. Greg Judelman. Jack Fisher. Jason Severs. Jeremy Stewart. Jill Holmberg. Joanne Freedman. Kelsey Blackwell. Kar Yan Cheung. Jonathan Seet. Jonas Skafte. Leilah Ambrose. Leslie Alpert. Lisa Mamers. Marc Lauriault. Mark Beever.  Lorraine Gauthier. Nancy Nowacek. Michael Dudek. Doug Chapman. Mike Bartosik. Milena Vujanovic. Anthony Murray. Neeraj Bhatia. Paddy Harrington. Diane Mahoney. Philip Wharton. Sarah Dorkenwald. Whitney Geller. Tanya Keigan. Tobias Lau. Keely Colcleugh. Tania Boterman. Kate MacKay. David Shantz. Robert Kennedy. Blair Johnsrude. Vannesa Ahuacztin. Vanessa Ward. Randi Fiat. Norah Farrell. Judith Hoogenboom. Sonny Obispo. Lisa Santonato. Lena Senstad. Nina Ladocha. Angelica Fox. Laurel MacMillan. Gina Doctor. Randi Fiat. Jeremy Stewart. Helen Sanematsu.

 

Quiz: Two advertisements we placed in Now, the first one full-page and the second one two full pages, took the form of elaborate cultural quizzes one had to answer and then submit to us, along with other crucial pieces of evidence. These were audacious, perhaps a bit arrogant, and tons of fun. The first quiz, which has a history to it before we placed it in Now, is reproduced in the book Life Style. About a hundred people took the trouble to reply to quiz #1, and a couple of hundred to the quiz #2. Almost everyone we hired out of the process proved to be major contributors to the studio creatively. The names I remember include Michael Barker, Maris Mezulis, Alan Belcher, Amanda Ramos, Bryan Gee, Robert Labossiere, Kelsey Blackwell, Julie Fry, but I know there were a few others.

 

Rem Koolhaas: “Fondly remember” “Rem Koolhaas”? Well, yes, I do in a qualified way. I remember this fondly: I was in New York with Bruce doing the rounds. One night we were to meet Rem Koolhaas at Da Silvano to discuss Mutations, and probably a handful of other projects. I was new. I was green. I was in awe. I was nervous. Rem arrives. Bruce excuses himself because he’s suddenly violently ill. So I’m left with Rem, and I’m freaked out. He alternated between questions about the project, to pointed questions about my qualifications for Bruce’s studio. At one point he told me that he wasn’t afraid to go bankrupt, that he’d done so several times, but that Bruce was terrified of it so I must promise to do whatever I could to make sure it didn’t happen. After two full meals and a dessert, which Rem shared with me, he took off, I picked up the bill, and then our relationship proceeded to get much weirder over the next three years. Still, I remember it fondly.

 

STRESS: An eight-screen video installation (+ objects in some variations), this was one of my favorite projects, not because of the content, which I no longer love, but because I love to work in situations where, regardless of all the obstacles, hardships and whatnot that one experiences, the final product is never in question. From the time we started STRESS to the time we finished, DVD technology was introduced, the G4 was launched, Final Cut Pro was launched. That all sounds primitive now, but it allowed us to actually do the project completely in our studio and, since we only finished it 11 years ago, it’s a reminder that one should never get too comfortable with hardware, software, or standards. More importantly, it was a great experience because we discovered that we could produce work as a team, taking Bruce’s direction when he was available and ready, but taking the bull by the horns when he wasn’t. We produced a couple of iterations of this installation. The internal team - mainly Bruce, Kyo, Robert Kennedy, Maris Mezulis and myself - were joined by André Lepecki, a dramaturg who helped shape the piece, and John Oswald and Phil Strong on sound. In a new version we created for an exhibition at the Power Plant in Toronto, we redid the sound with Kyo and Dave Wall.

 

Too Perfect: The idea behind this project was pretty promising: a kind of “applied Massive Change”, working with Danish architects and designers. In a letter describing the project we said: “Dear Denmark, Remember the late 1940s? That was when a group of young Danish architects anddesigners decided to throw off the shackles of tradition-bound design. They formed a distinctly Danish movement, inspired by natural materials, organic forms, handcrafting, and Danish humanism. Worldwide, Danish Modern became a sign of being innovative and experimental. Today it means nothing – an invisible image. Fifty-odd years later, Danish Modern is so pervasive in Denmark that it's become a stylistic canopy blocking the light necessary for new developments to flourish, a formal straitjacket that's "too perfect." Isn't it time for a new generation to break free? The Danish Architecture Centre (DAC) had a hunch that in order to cut a clearing in the forest for reinvention and to return Danish design to a leading position on

the international scene, it was necessary to look at Danish culture and tradition with

new eyes. DAC called in our Canadian design studio, Bruce Mau Design, to work with

a team of Danish architects.” The execution: simultaneous exhibitions of seven propositional projects by Danish architects and designers as well as BMD itself, presented  in Toronto, as part of the Superdanish festival at Harbourfront Centre, the original comissioner; in the Danish pavilion at Venice Biennial of Architecture; and at the Danish Architecture Centre. A funky looking catalog. A website of sorts. The funny thing is, because this opened at the same time as Massive Change, it was strangely underwhelming. Also, Massive Change had the distinct advantage of being a documentary project, whereas these propositional exercises were less compelling. Once again, however, what I remember more is the experience: in this case, of being immersed in Copenhagen as we (usually Bruce, Amanda Ramos, Angelica Fox and me) planned this project with Kent Martinussen, director of the DAC, as well as PLOT, a young architecture firm led by Bjarke Ingels, who is now a superstar, and Julien de Smedt, and a brilliant young guy called Rasmus Bech Hansen from the firm Kontrapunkt. Yes, we liked to make fun of his “Beck Hansen” name. I could go on and on, but I’ll just say this. Denmark may be “too perfect” but it is perfect. Everything about it: buildings, infrastructure, parks, transportation, public bicycles, maintenance, theatres, museums, and, of course, food. I just love it there.

 

(The New) Urban (Deal): A major project in Tokyo, our first big thing after Life Style and STRESS, sharpened our thinking about cities, globalization, and design. For the Mori Building Company and their monumental Roppongi Hills development (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roppongi_Hills) we produced a book on the future of Tokyo; a video installation on the same theme, Tokyo Countdown; a mile-long collage on the construction hoarding; an identity; product; and a public programming concept for the information centre. It was a huge learning experience for everyone involved (Bruce, Amanda Sebris, Donald Mak, Maris, Jason, Bruce, Julia, Michael, and myself - though I’m probably forgetting someone), one that I was certainly grateful for. Aside from the all the funny things one learns about dealing with another culture, what I took away from it was that (almost) everything is design; that this fact is a reason for great optimism; that all my assumptions about cities might be wrong, and I should open my mind if I really want to learn anything, and effect positive change. By the way, “The New Urban Deal” was an essay by Mr. Mori that directed his thinking about the development.

 

Vitra: The great designer and cultural force Tibor Kalman had just died and Rolf Fehlbaum, the CEO of Vitra, was looking for a new designer to help steer he creative communications direction for his company, the manufacturer of great designer furniture (http://www.vitra.com/). We were going to have a blast. An initial meeting suggested that Rolf was open to our “Culture of Work” concept, a project Bruce had cooked up a number of years earlier as a way of engaging with one of his obsessions: the cultural significance of the changing world of work. Could we use Vitra as an incubator, a think tank for generating research and ideas around this topic, in a manner so robust that they would “own” this territory and that the value of the intelligence created by the Culture of Work project would transfer itself to the Vitra brand. Many trips to Germany and Switzerland (Vitra’s operations were split between the twin cities of Basel and Weil am Rhein), side trips to New York, visionary work, not-so-visionary work, an ambitious and complicated exhibition on Barragan at the Vitra Design Museum, lovely meals at the Kunsthalle in Basel, and many nights (completely sleepless) in the strange, lovely but ultimately alienating (for me) Teufelhof Hotel (http://www.teufelhof.com/de/teufelhof.html): all this didn’t add up to much. I can’t remember why. It would be easy to say it’s because Rolf was ultimately more interested in “design” in the fussy, precious sense; and we weren’t quite ready to put a stake in the ground about our different perspective on design, the way that Massive Change allowed us to five years later. Even so, it struck me that Bruce, Kevin and I, the usual suspects on the Vitra junkets (along with Anita, who led the Barragan project, and took over the overall Vitra relationship later on), were more interested in culture, and less in the world of celebrity design. So what though? Ten years later, I realize that our inability to realize the “Culture of Work” ambitions, except in a kind of watered-down form in a few publications, isn’t that important. It may have been a bit of a bummer at the time, but the experience, like all experiences, allowed the studio to move forward, learn a lot about itself (as I did about myself personally), refine the ideas and approach, and realize the ambitions in a more profound way later on. The chase is better than the catch, to quote Motorhead. I assume that Rolf and Vitra learned a lot about themselves, too, and I was impressed to see how they continued to engage communication designers after our stint with them in ways that were probably more in sync with their needs.

 

World Leaders: A high moment for me at BMD, a project that was rooted in doing Harbourfront Centre’s visual identity, grew to helping them with their communications approach in general, and then inventing, with Bill Boyle and his staff at Harbourfront Centre, World Leaders: A Festival of Creative Genius. Secretly, I always wanted to work at Harbourfront Centre because I love the who they are and what they do, but this was better, because I got to be the consultant and, therefore, naively recommend something so ambitious, risky and audacious, that I’m sure it wouldn’t have happened had I been a staff member there. In other words, Bruce and I were unencumbered by reality. Not everyone’s going to want to hear this, but that’s often we did our best work at BMD. The upshot of this project: 14 gala evenings celebrating 14 creative geniuses who each changed their fields forever, such that no artist coming after them could do their work without taking into account the contribution of the genius in question. Lily Tomlin dropped out owing to 9/11 fears, but later made it up to Harbourfront Centre. The other 13 were Frank Gehry, Philippe Starck, Issey Miyake, Robert Lepage, Guy Laliberte, Joni Mitchell, Stephen Sondheim, Quincy Jones, Harold Pinter, Robert Rauschenberg, Peter Gabriel, Pina Bausch, and Bernardo Bertolucci. On top of the gala evenings, Harbourfront Centre organized another 100 supporting events that were free to the public and focusing on local talent. An amazing organization.

 

Xmas: We loved Christmas at BMD. Dinners at Bruce and Bisi’s were incredible, and sometimes featured guests, like Jamie Kennedy cooking for us one year, including a special meal for the kids who played in the basement, and a portable fryer for his frites, the best in town. In those years we were still very much about books, so everyone in the studio would get a special book not produced by BMD, chosen by Bruce (later by me and Bruce’s assistants), and spouses and partners would get one of the studio’s books. We grew out of the house, so tried various restaurants around town, and a few years where the party moved into the studio, a lovely idea with mixed results, owing to obsessive working happening in tandem with dinner. We also had a few years where we invited Bootysmacker to play for us, first at their default venue, the Winchester on Parliament St., so we were able to invite clients, suppliers and friends to join our Christmas festivities, and later the Drake, probably the most successful of our hipster venue parties (more so than the Spoke Club and other places). The whole tradition continued to evolve and, while I don’t want to sentimentalize, there was a certain energy to the whole thing that seemed impossible to continue capture no matter what we did after 2002.

 

YYZ: I spent huge amounts of time in airports while at BMD, but nothing close to Bruce, and probably a few other people. I’m sure I was at Pearson departures 200 times during my time there (so 400 visits in total) and got quite used to getting my shoes shined there, eating lots of marble cheese, buying every magazine and newspaper that might possibly be of interest, dealing with delays, the institutional food, and occasionally drinking too much (happily, not in the last few years there). So that must have meant 100 or so trips to New York, 20 to Chicago, 10 to Atlanta, 10 to Los Angeles, 10 to Grand Rapids, 25 to various places in Europe, 5 to Vancouver, and another 20 misc. trips. While I don’t miss all that travel, I’m so grateful that I had that opportunity. There’s no better and faster way to learn about the world than to travel.

 

Zone: In 1985 I  bought a copy of Zone 1|2 at Pages Bookstore. I was craving interdisciplinarity, so was seduced by the collision of architecture, design, literature, philosophy, urbanism, and film. Since that time, interdisciplinary publications have exploded (in fact, I’m on the advisory board of a very good one, Alphabet City), but it was somewhat rare in 1985. I was also seduced by the graphic design itself, which I later found out was meant to model the City, the theme of the first issue, rather than illustrate it. And it kind of does that. All I knew then was that I loved he book I was holding, that it was a new thing, and that maybe the 80s weren’t going to be entirely terrible. Shortly after that, I met Bruce Mau at the public launch of Zone Books, an event that took place at the Rivoli which I attended because Michael Snow was a guest and would be “playing” The Last L.P. That’s literally what he did: he put it on a turntable and walked away (and even then, I found out that what was actually playing was a cassette tape of the LP). Anyhow, I was totally intrigued by Zone, Mau, the books they were putting out (these were the days when I got pretty jazzed by Foucault, Deleuze, Bataille, et al), and the whole promise of the enterprise. Looking back, buying that copy of Zone 1|2 was the moment I became interested in architecture, design, and urbanism, and none of that has waned since. It was also the moment I knew I needed to work with Bruce Mau, and so was jealous when my friend Greg Van Alstyne became the first person that Bruce ever hired. By the early 1990s, however, I was working with BMD on the Michael Snow Project, then The OH!CANADA Project and, then, in 1998, in the studio. By then Zone’s place in the studio was less central and it seemed to me that the ambitions of the early Zone project got taken up by BMD, while Zone settled down into a perfectly fine, but no longer ground-breaking, academic publishing outfit. I still get excited when I see a new book, reliving what I felt in the 1980s, but I rarely go so far as buying the books. I’m grateful that Zone gave birth to BMD, however, and that BMD, in turn, afforded me the opportunity to take an extraordinary creative journey.

#43: The Ramones

The Ramones mattered the most. 

I’m talking about bands I heard in high school during the punk/postpunk/new wave eras, 1977-1982. 

It’s hard to write that. What about Patti Smith? OK, maybe it’s a tie. But it’s just that when I first heard “Blitzkrieg Bop,” “Beat on the Brat,” and “Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue,” I knew I had what I needed. I knew that this was the real thing, this was going to get me through day, and maybe even high school. 

I bought all their albums. I loved them all. I made lame excuses to myself for End of the Century but, in fact, I still kind of like it. 

Thanks to the Garys, who booked the Ramones more than any other promoters did (so we had more shows in Toronto than any other city did), I saw a pile of gigs. I’m showing a bunch of ticket stubs, though I was at only one (the Music Hall) of these particular gigs. There were three gigs at the Concert Hall, one at the Kingsway (I think the same place that became the Kingsway film theatre?), and one or two others I might be forgetting. 

In 2010, in my Facebook blog/group, I wrote the following about “Beat on the Brat” (orginal is here https://www.facebook.com/notes/1000-songs/song-417-beat-on-the-brat/10150209795826451/): 

Few days have been as exciting as the first time I heard “Beat on the Brat,” by the Ramones. It was 1978 and probably around the time I first heard the late (last night) Captain Beefheart, who has nothing in common with the Ramones on the surface, but for me, growing up in Scarborough, they both meant being alive, creative and social possibility, and differentiation. A lot of that was naive, adolescent stuff, and certainly many other artists represented those things for me back then, but most of them don’t matter so much to me today. And, while I don’t listen to The Ramones or Captain Beefheart much these days, when I do I am definitely brought back to the moment when I fell in love with them musically, and I’m reminded of all the positive energy that they gave me, even while it was all caught up, at the time, in equally strong, or more powerful, negative forces: fear, loathing, isolation, self-destruction.

I guess I’ll never know for sure what music was really most dominant in my life back in those days. I misremember things, so I often tell people it was Elvis Costello, or Elvis and Dylan. It was probably more accurate to say a mix of The Doors, Patti Smith, Dylan, the Velvet Underground, Elvis. I think from 1978 to 1980 it was probably The Ramones, on the one hand, and Bruce Springsteen on the other. In every case it was single songs, not necessarily their best nor even my favorites today, that sealed the deal. “Born to Run.” “Because the Night.” “Riders on the Storm.” “I Want You.” “Radio, Radio.” “I’m Waiting for the Man.” 

And, for the Ramones, it was definitely “Beat on the Brat,” the first song I ever heard by them, followed immediately by “Blitzkrieg Bop,” “Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue,” and “Chainsaw”, “53rd and 3rd.” These songs, and that entire 1976 Ramones debut album epitomize punk for me. I judged all other punk according to it. There were punk albums prior to it, but they definitely feel “proto-punk”, like “Punk B.B.B.” (Punk Before Blitzkrieg Bop), and everything that follows, including every other Ramones album might be interesting, but it was never quite purely punk the way these songs are. 

This isn’t actually a critical observation, by the way, just an account of how I perceived things. 

Punk was: loud, fast, sloppy, bass-guitar-drums only, built on two chords, simply produced with no overdubs, funny, witty, pissed-off, Levis, sneakers, leather jackets, sunglasses, New York. Strangely, it was artful and pop. I liked a lot of UK bands, of course, but my heart was in New York, my image of this scene having been painted by Lisa Robinson, Lester Bangs and others in the pages of Hit Parader, Creem and Circus. 

At first I thought that punk was all about reviving some rock and roll spirit of the 50s that had been lost, and that’s certainly how everyone was talking back then. It quickly became clear, though, that punks like the Ramones derived more of their energy from the 1960s. Earlier I wrote on a few of their covers, “Needles and Pins” and “Surfin’ Bird,” and it’s these songs - along with other definitive covers of theirs like and “California Sun” and “Do You Wanna Dance” - that demonstrate their deep love of girl groups, surf, garage, psych, Spector, The Beatles, and bubblegum. 

It’s been said, maybe by me here one day, that the Ramones are somewhat of a bubblegum band. I won’t be so perverse as to argue that “Beat on the Brat” is a bubblegum song but...

I didn’t care about that then. I just loved them. I saw every show they did in Toronto from 1978-1981 (1982?), had all their albums, t-shirts, buttons, etc. I played this song and a this album in the mornings to get going, to wake up and get an aggressive attitude on, sort or a cross between happy and angry, which is what I hear in their songs. 

The album was produced for $6400 in four days, during the days when people were taking years and hundreds of thousands of dollars to make records. We could hear it and that intelligence wore off on us. It was the beginning of D.I.Y., something many of us took up and which, I have to say, still keeps me going today. 

 In the Nicholas Rombes 33 1/3 book on this album, he argues that though the album sounds like "the ultimate do-it-yourself, amateur, reckless ethic that is associated with punk," but that the band approached the whole process with a "high degree of preparedness and professionalism.” It’s punk, but it’s thoughtfully executed and, oddly, precise. 

Rombes quotes Joey Ramone on the origins of the song: “When I lived in Birchwood Towers in Forest Hills with my mom and brother. It was a middle-class neighborhood, with a lot of rich, snotty women who had horrible spoiled brat kids. There was a playground with women sitting around and a kid screaming, a spoiled, horrible kid just running around rampant with no discipline whatsoever. The kind of kid you just want to kill. You know, 'beat on the brat with a baseball bat' just came out. I just wanted to kill him.”

Not nice, but let’s face it, we’ve all felt it. I could relate, in a way that I couldn’t to “London’s Burning” and “White Riot.” 

The bottom line: I’m blown away that this song and album still sound so bloody great. 

PS: When I was in New York recently I swung by 53rd and 3rd, as I’ve done a number of times since my first trip there in the mid-1980s. I just can’t imagine anyone trying to turn tricks on the corner. I always stop when I’m there, though, to see if I can’t see what the Ramones did back in the mid-1970s.



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#42: Wizard of Oz

80 years ago (on August 15, 1939), the Wizard of Oz had its debut at Grauman's Chinese Theater in Los Angeles. Today it remains one of the greatest films. Weird, clunky, and creepy, for sure, but it is great in part because of its weirdness, clunkiness and creepiness, as well as its timeless characters, miraculous transition from b&w to colour, the revelation that the Wizard is a bit of a charlatan, and "Somewhere over the Rainbow," one of the greatest vocal moments in the history of cinema (it just doesn't become cliché, no matter what).

#41: Alain Resnais's Muriel

I know I saw Alain Resnais’s Muriel before this afternoon’s revelatory screening at the TIFF Lightbox. But that would have been around 1984 - yes, 35 years ago - in Bart Testa’s auterist Personal Visions film course at U of T, which I was auditing, having already taken it a year before with someone else. I remember almost nothing from it, and I certainly don’t remember liking it. I was probably too fixated on Marienbad, Hiroshima and Night and Fog to actually get that this was possibly his best film. I certainly didn’t think of it as was one of the best films I had ever seen, but I felt that very strongly today.

The TIFF Cinematheque programmer, James Quandt, agrees. “The purest expression of Resnais' central theme — how the present is the prisoner of the past, can never elude its snares — Muriel is singled out by many critics (correctly!) as the director's masterpiece: Jean-Louis Comolli called it "Resnais' most beautiful film," and Godard loved it so much he featured its poster on a wall in Two or Three Things I Know About Her. A middle-aged widow (Delphine Seyrig) living in an antique-stuffed apartment in Boulogne summons her ex-lover (Jean-Pierre Kérien) from Paris. As she attempts to recapture the (illusory) happiness of their past, her stepson (Jean-Baptiste Thierrée) is driven to violence in a futile attempt to extinguish the memory of his actions as a soldier in the Algerian War. Filmed with what has been called "hallucinatory realism," scored with unnerving songs by German composer Hans Werner Henze, and acted with stylized intensity by Seyrig, Muriel" surpasses [the] better-known Last Year at Marienbad and Hiroshima mon amour … a subtle, precise, and wrenching film" (Dave Kehr, Chicago Reader).”

This is a beautiful film to watch  The shooting is impeccable, and the cutting makes the best use of jump cuts I may have ever seen. The streets, architecture, sets, props, and costumes are precisely deployed. And yet, the film is borders on impossible to watch, given the relentless alienation of the characters. Everyone seems to be in denial, dishonest and manipulative. Everyone seems unlikable to me, although it’s hard for anyone played by Delphine Seyrig (Hélène) to be entirely unlikable. 

Bernard, Hélène’s stepson, is creepy, possessed by his memories of “Muriel” (I’ll leave it at that), but the big surprise for me today is that he makes home movies throughout the film: home movies of the war, home movies of the present violence, etc. I don’t remember this at all, and it is a very useful feature for me given a big project I’m working on.
That’s not the only reason I loved this film, but it’s definitely one of them. 


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#40: Bill Shedden on his 84th birthday

75 random memories of great times with my dad. 

June 17, 2012; revised May 5, 2019


I first posted this on Father’s Day, 2012. That’s almost 7 years ago, so I decided to revise it a bit and make it 84 random memories, on the occasion of my father’s 84th birthday. 

 

1. Going to Expo 67. Riding a ferris wheel with my dad, or maybe checking out some multi-channel film installations. My first memory in life, I think. 

2. Driving around downtown taking a look at my father's old neighbourhoods - Palmerston, Fallis and Landsdowne - and developing a fantasy about living in neighbourhoods like that (which I ended up doing for the past 35 years). 

3. Climbing granite rocks in Killbear Park. 

4. Going to the dump in Killbear Park. 

5. Washing ourselves with mud in Killbear Park. 

6. Getting fake tattoos with magic markers in Killbear Park, modelled on my father's own that he acquired in his navy years in the 1950s. 

7. Fishing in Grundy. 

8. Pinery. 

9. Serpent's Mound. 

10. A road trip to Florida in 1968, involving camping in Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia and Florida, many welcome rest stops (complimentary OJ in Florida, but Coca-Cola in Georgia of course). 

11. Riding shotgun in the various parades in his Model A Ford pick-up. 

12. Going downtown to the University Theatre to watch Apocalypse Now when it came out. 

13. Playing a trivia game in our little white (rental) cottage in Eastham, Cape Cod. 

14. Arriving in hippy dippy, and very gay, Provincetown for our first time in the early 70s. 

15. Going to the army/navy surplus store in Provincetown. Having my dad explain what all the stuff was. 

16. Various decks, tool sheds, saunas, swimming pools, walkways, gardens, fireplaces, shelving units, and other household features that would seem to just show up. 

17. An odd assortment of part-time jobs and businesses that, though different from anything I would ever do, helped ensure I had a driven work ethic, and an entrepreneurial sensibility. 

18. Climbing the waterfalls in Ocho Rios. 

19. Eating crepes in Yorkville, when it was still just barely a counter-culture destination. 

20. Going to Sam's and A&A's on Yonge St., approximately annually. Buying a serious stack of 45s there once to populate our new jukebox, a big old, German beast of a machine. 

21. Converting said jukebox from one designed for 78s to one that would play 45s. Imperfect but charming results.

22. Minis, MGAs, MGBs, BSAs. 

23. A Falcon, replaced by a big black Chevy (a retired OPP car), and then our first ever new car, a Datsun (before it became the generic, anemic "Nissan") station wagon, considered a compact car at the time. Replacing that with a gigantic Plymouth Satellite Sebring, our first new car ever, and then replacing that with a Dodge Omni, my parents' worst car ever. 

24. Driving to Halifax in that Datsun when my mother's aunt (her primary caregiver) died. An earlier family trip to Halifax on the train occurred earlier but I don't remember it. 

25. Staying home with my dad while my mother and sisters went off to church and Catechism (sadly, the party was over for me when I turned six, when I too had to be saved). 

26. Watching Red Skelton. 

27. Watching Ed Sullivan. 

28. Watching The Birds. 

29. Going to Evita. Not my favourite musical by a long shot, but it was still a fun experience. 

30. Seeing Sinatra at the CNE. It was a wretched evening, and I think my dad hated it, but still...

31. Open face, broiled Kraft slices on Wonder bread. 

32. Tobogganing. 

33. Arriving home one day to one of those newfangled "coloured TV" sets, complete with UHF, so that we could watch all those reruns on channel 29, of mostly black-and-white 50s shows). 

34. Coming home one day to a fabulous, vintage jukebox (Tommy-style), thus making it impossible for me to like anything even vaguely electronic or digital in the games realm. 

35. Picking up the Christmas trees (once we stopped using the artificial one). 

36. Feeding massive amounts of catnip to our cat Walter, as well as our neighbor's, Tiger. 

37. Going downtown to check out this insanely-OCD model railroad (HO) installation, and not being entirely bummed that we weren't going to turn our basement into such a thing. 

38. Getting my first gun, one my dad crafted out of a spare piece of plywood and a broom handle. Just because I loved this gun, and the cowboy revolvers that I got a year or two later, doesn't mean I would ever give a kid a gun though. 

39. His raccoon coat. 

40. Taking the family to Earthquake (in Sensurround!) at the Fairlawn theatre the first New Year's of his sobriety. Great night. Terrible film. 

41. Taking us to see Chinatown at a drive-in in Welfleet, Cape Cod, when I was 10 or 11. This masterpiece was preceded by The Big Bus, perhaps inspiring me to become a film programmer so that no one would ever have to suffer such insanity. My first ever drive-in and a life-changer it was. 

42. Same drive-in two or three years later to see Star Wars, another life-changing moment, the only difference being that Chinatown still has huge power over me. I assume dad didn't know how important those trips to the drive-in would be though. (PS: the second film on the Star Wars bill was Carry On, On the Bus or something like that - bizarre.) 

43. Fudganas and Banana Supremes at HoJos, especially the night where we just ended up in Niagara Falls, on a whim, for said treats. 

44. Hanging out on Roy Brown's boat. 

45. Chilling in Bill Furness's "bunker", hearing his authentic, WW II banter, and checking out the fascinating, spooky paraphernalia. 

46. Model A picnics. 

47. Learning how to use the Gestetner 26 and 66 printers in our basement, so that I could produce fanzines and help my dad with the Model A newsletter. 

48. The Model A expedition to Dearborn (50 years of the Model A), Ford's headquarters, and then to Arlington, Virginia and Washington, D.C. A tough trip in a 1928 sedan at times, but a great experience. 

49. Popcorn. 

50. Making our own peppermint taffy. 

51. Playboy playmate centrefolds, and stacks of Playboys that I honestly did enjoy for the interviews and other articles. Which doesn't mean I didn't like the airbrushed breasts. 

52. The antique phones. 

52. The light fixtures made from Lily cups. 

53. A love of cats, shared with the rest of the family, sometimes to the point of insanity. 

54. The back-to-school, George Brown College days. 

55. Paint by numbers. 

56. Making tables out of industrial wire spools, featuring varnished, vintage ads. 

57. Vintage signage and other hardware. 

58. Solar heating experiments and composting decades before anyone else seemed to care (and he's not a hippy). 

59. St. Marie-among-the-Hurons.

60. Waffles at the old Eaton's Annex. 

61. Converting our 1960s German stereo console into components that I could use instead, integrating my fabulous Fisher double cassette deck into the mix. 

62. Making stilts. 

63. Making clackers. 

64. Sam, our dog (ever so briefly). 

65. Making 8mm films, and borrowing a projector from the public library so we could occasionally watch them (they jumped, as the film sat precariously in the gate, but that was part of the charm). 

66. Having the cleanest swimming pool in Scarborough, I think. 

67. A day trip to Cambridge during our last trip together to Cape Cod, in order to indulge me at the height of my bookwormish days (1988?). 

68. Fish and chips. 

69. Flying kites on the beach in Cape Cod. 

70. Making kites. 

71. Short wave radios. 

72. Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman. 

73. Black licorice. 

74. La-Z-Boy chairs. 

75. The Whizzer

76. Refridgerated Solarcaine

77. Stacking firewood

78. Tobogganing at behind Ceaderbrea

79. Christmas Shopping at Scarborough Town Centre on December 24th

80. The biggest bon fires in the provincial park

81. Singing Weavers songs on long car trips

82. Ernie, the cat, R.I.P. 

83. Doodle Art, particularly “Progress” and “Jungle.” 

84. Spending time with, quite regularly, with Bill and friends of that other Bill. 

#39: Record Store Day (30 Great Record Stores)

I haven’t really participated in recent years, but I still have a deep fondness for record stores. I remembered 30 of them fondly back in 2014.

30 Record Stores for Record Store Day (Facebook, April 19, 2014)

From 1969, or thereabouts, until 2005, or thereabouts, I spent as much time as I could in record stores. They were the most sacred places in the world, the places where I learned everything about music, made purchases that changed my life more times than any other action, and sometimes even made friends. 

These are the ones that changed me the most, kind of in order. Some of them were obviously fantastic, while others were comparatively lame, but sometimes the latter served as my emotional lifeline anyway. 

From 1969, or thereabouts, until 2005, or thereabouts, I spent as much time as I could in record stores. They were the most sacred places in the world, the places where I learned everything about music, made purchases that changed my life more times than any other action, and sometimes even made friends. 

These are the ones that changed me the most, kind of in order. Some of them were obviously fantastic, while others were comparatively lame, but sometimes the latter served as my emotional lifeline anyway. 

1. Sam's Yonge St. HQ - The first record store I ever went to. We’d go as a family maybe once a year, buying mostly 45s. My favourite place in the whole world for a few decades. 

2. Sam's Cedar Heights Plaza in Scarborough - Saturday mornings I’d ride my bike from my house on Ivy Green down this street that we still have to name every time we’re there - “Hiscock” - to go to Sam’s for their 9am, $1.99 special. 

3. Vortex, Dundas & Church (original location AFTER the Augusta St. location in Kensington that I think I missed). Bert Myers sold our fanzines, This Tiny Donkey Looks Rather Lost and The Hanged Men Dance, in this tiny store where I traded in a hundred records or so, and bought closer to a thousand. I also bought cassette bootlegs of live shows here, including three very memorable ones: Patti Smith, Richard Hell and John Cale. One of the guys who worked there did this as a sideline and Bert let him keep all the money to help out his situation. 

4. Kop's (when it was mostly 45s and in its location much farther west on Queen St.) 

5. A&A's Yonge St. HQ. Lisa and Kim worked there. The 45s selection was pretty decent, and they had a “BASS”, so we were always there getting concert tickets. 

6. Records on Wheels Yonge St. - Rob Bowman. Steve Kane. Carla MacDonald. Debra Lary. Tickets - lots of tickets. The best place to get tickets. Bootlegs. Picture sleeve 45s - lots. Zines. 

7. Record Peddler - Ben Hoffman, and his long hair. Punk Brian (Youth Youth Youth). Some shitty intimidating times, but eventually it became a bit of a comfort zone. Buttons! Lots of buttons. Tickets. Zines. Melody Maker. NME. New York Rocker. Probably the best punk and new wave and marginal music selection ever (?) in Toronto. A regular hangout for me and various friends, especially Sara, Grant, Dave Keyes. 

8. Star Records (also Eglinton Ave. E. in Scarborough) - Star Records, the same chain as the famed store from Oshawa, was a one of the few places you could buy bootlegs in Toronto. There, RoW on Yonge and the Record Peddler. Managed by my friend Dave Curtis for many years. 

9. Vortex - Queen St. W. & Portland upstairs. I think they merged with Kop’s by then, or something like that? I know I continued my buying and selling here well into my grad school days. 

10. Peter Dunn’s Vinyl Museum - bought many of my Scott Walker, Walker Brothers and Love records at the Yonge St. location. 

11. The Disc Shoppe (or Discus?) - Super crappy record store in Cedarbrae Mall in Scarborough. Still, it was one of the two places I’d go to pick up my weekly CHUM Chart, and I frequently bought singles and K-Tel albums there while my mother was off at Woolworth or Zellers. Right across from “Signor Marco Pizza”, where I first enjoyed pizza (as bad a pizzeria as this was a record store, but culture happens where it happens). 

12. Rotate This - saw bands like Sloan (I think?) play there, or maybe I’m misremembering. Glad it emerged, even as I was starting to buy fewer records. 

13. Zounds (Eglinton Ave. E. in Scarborough) - speaking of Lisa Godfrey and speaking of BASS (see A&A's above), this OK record store often found me lining up to get concert tickets, though sometimes Lisa helped me avoid that chore. 

14. Sonic Boom - I go in to buy 33 1/3 books, t-shirts and just to look around. I’m not a record or CD buyer anymore, but I’m glad there is still sacred ground for those who are. I generally go to the big one on Bathurst, but happy to swing by the Kensington location from time to time. 

15. She Said Boom - I tend to buy books there occasionally, not CDs or LPs, but feel warm and cozy knowing that great used record stores still exist. More of a College St. thing for me, but I like the Roncy store too. 

16. Driftwood - Queen St. W. Kind of nondescript. Still managed to buy a hundred or so great records there over the years, usually while doing the rounds of other record stores and bookstores. Grew out of Round Records at Bloor & Bay (where Holt Renfrew is), but I may have missed that entirely. 

17. Ernest Tubb’s Record Shop - Nashville. Was tempted to buy many 8-Track recordings, still in their plastic, as well as Johnny Cash reading the New Testament. 

18. HMV Yonge St. - For a few brief years in the early 90s they had great selection, great prices (all those $3.33 specials), and it was bright and fun. I would go from loving it to hating it. Sam’s still generally had a better selection, so I’d usually end up going to both. 

19. An incredible used record store in Ann Arbor where I bought a shitload of blues, jazz, “serious rock” and other fine matter in 1989. 

20. Lunch for Your Ears - New York City, late 1980s, purchased some Minimalist and guitar noise recordings. Tiny but great place. 

21. Tower Records HQ in NYC in their heyday. 

22. The Jazz and Blues Record Store or whatever it’s called in Chicago, before it got forlorn and depressing. 

23. A&A’s, Scarborough Town Centre - met Gord Cumming there. My sister’s friend Rosemary worked there (I think that was her name). She dated Ivar Hamilton from CFNY, I think. 

24. Soundscapes - I am one of those people who would be happy to own everything that Soundscapes sells. 

25. Vortex - Yonge & Eglinton. Still there, right? 

26. Around Again - on Baldwin. There forever. I bought and sold my copy of LaMonte Young’s record there. Sold the best stuff I had before moving, and just generally found it a mellow, peaceful place to sit with music for an hour or two on weekends.

27. Cheap Thrills on Yonge St. - the first used record store I ever went to maybe? 

28. Pandemonium 

29. Paradise Bound 

30. Don's Discs (Queen & Landsdowne - can't remember when it closed)

#37: Nirvana

Kurt Cobain left us on April 5, 1994. I remembered where I was (sort of): sitting at the bar of either John's Italian Cafe or Cafe le Gaffe on Baldwin St. 

A number of years later, "Smells Like Teen Spirit" would become one of my 1000 Songs entries, and a very thoughtful discussion followed, which would be continued sporadically in the months and years to come. 

You can still find it in the FB Group, but the entire text follows as well: https://www.facebook.com/notes/1000-songs/song-192-smells-like-teen-spirit/10150228405286451/

Song #192: Smells Like Teen Spirit
By Jim Shedden on Monday, July 4, 2011 at 10:58 PM


Jim Shedden

1000 Songs in 1000 Days 


September 2, 2008 

Song #192: “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Nirvana, Nevermind, 1991. 

Sometimes I feel so hopelessly unoriginal. 

You know my story. Big pop and rock music fan from an early age, up until the early 1980s when, with few exceptions, I just shut off, owing to my perception that music had gone completely to hell. For me, 1984 was Depeche Mode, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Duran Duran, Wham!, The Bangles, a Meat Loaf comeback, Skinny Puppy, Banarama, Gary Numan, Spandau Ballet, Simple Minds, Hall & Oates (not the good stuff), Dead Can Dance, Talk Talk, The Thompson Twins, Alphaville, and on it goes. Tired releases by Foreigner, Styx, Don Henley, Nazareth, Toto, Donna Summer, Chicago (17). I ignored the fact that REM, Husker Du, the Meat Puppets, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Kevin Ayers, the Minutemen, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Flipper, The Smiths, Los Lobos, Robyn Hitchcock, The Gun Club, The Replacements, Robert Earl Keen, The Waterboys, Cyndi Lauper (yes, I like her), The The (yes, I like them), Roger Waters (mixed feelings), Prince (Purple Rain), Tina Turner (mixed feelings), Sonic Youth, Big Country, Talking Heads, The Fall. So it really wasn’t that bad, but that wasn’t my perception. 

At the same time, it wasn’t 1979, or 1969, or 1959. I was convinced that it was over for me and I listened to anything but the new pop and rock for almost a decade. I got into jazz. I got into 20th century new music. I listened to Bach and Mozart. I got into Zappa. I got into world music. 

As I thawed out in the early 1990s, I started hearing about “grunge”. Since the people I knew who were into this music also tended to be in punk – ie, especially the L.A. and D.C. scenes, and bands like Black Flag, Minor Threat, and the Dead Kennedys – I expected to hear that in the music. And it’s there, to a degree. But I immediately made the connections to Neil Young and Crazy Horse, 1970s “hard rock”, Led Zeppelin, and then The Dream Syndicate and the Gun Club, especially The Dream Syndicate, whose Days of Wine and Roses strikes me as the first “grunge” album. 

But here’s where I’m 100% unoriginal. “Smells Like Teen Spirit” stopped me in my tracks. Got me back right back into rock music again. Gave me enormous hope that something brilliant was happening. 

The funny thing is, album for album, 1984 might have been a far better year for music, but I’m actually fairly ignorant about most of the releases of 91. The tired releases by Queen, Sting, David Lee Roth, Rod Stewart, Gary Numan, Michael Bolton, The Rolling Stones, Pat Benatar, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Cher, Joe Walsh, Simple Minds, etc. continued. And there was a lot of hip hop, which I’ll get back to: 1991 was a high point in hip hop history. There was good stuff like Fugazi, Dinosaur Jr., REM, Elvis Costello, Green Day, Tom Petty (his first “solo” album), Sarah McLachlan, Soundgarden, but all in all it seems like it was a pretty meager year. 

So Nevermind really, really sticks out. 

It’s not the beginning of grunge, but the end of grunge. It’s the album where Nirvana moved away from Sub Pop and the self-marginalizing Seattle scene, a scene that really defined itself in 1986 but had its heyday, as an alternative scene 1989-1991. 

Nevermind, and especially the hit “Smells Like Teen Spirit”, weren’t “alternative” because it had too much appeal, it struck a chord with the mainstream. “Teen Spirit” was the song of the summer of 1992. 

The song was written by Cobain and Dave Grohl (and also credited to Krist Novoselic, after his significant contributions to the rhythmic counterpoint of the song) and produced by Butch Vig. Cobain had admired his work for Killdozer and wanted to sound as heavy as them, and they pulled it off. Cobain has also credited the Pixies as an influence on this song: “We used their sense of dynamics, being soft and quiet and then loud and hard.” I’ll have to return to the Pixies, a band I missed the first time around because of my closed mind in the 1980s. 

The song basically consists of four power chords – F5, Bflat5, Aflat5, Dflat5 – played by Cobain in a syncopated sixteenth note strum. That’s my mind of song. Add to that that the chords were “double-tracked”. I can’t describe what happens technically any more than that. I will say that there’s an incredible drama created by the unpredictable presence and absence of the chords, the occasional suspension of the trajectory of the song, the alteration between quiet verses with lyrical guitar and Big Ass Guitar Chords. It all ends in Cobain’s strained voice singing “a denial” over and over again, finally closing with guitar feedback.

I was into Nirvana from that moment in for almost a decade. I like almost all their other songs, admittedly the better known cuts like “Rape Me” and “Heart-Shaped Box” the most. I also really like MTV Unplugged in New York, especially their covers of two favorite songs of mine, “The Man Who Sold the World” and “Where Did You Sleep Last Night?”. 

Mostly I’m grateful to Nirvana, though, for being a catalyst in me opening my mind and my ears again back in 1991.over a year ago · Delete Pos


Alan Zweig

It was a great song. I'm glad you didn't include the lyrics because I never had a clue what the song was about and I still don't. I saw some "behind the music" type doc recently where they explained the origins of the song but I quickly forgot it.


And it's time you stop beating yourself up about missing this or that period of rock music. That totally makes sense. To be honest, I think what makes less sense on some level, is that you ever came back.


On some level, you're not supposed to. You're supposed to grow up, right?


So if your story were, you grew up, you moved on, and then you heard this amazing song and it drew you back and once you were back, you could never totally get away again, that would be a lovely story.


As I write this, I'm going through a whole bunch of recently acquired "alternative rock/indie etc" stuff and maybe it's the road pavers outside my door driving me nuts but none of it is working for me today and I'm wondering whether this might finally be the end for me.


Dramatic maybe. Or maybe not. Sometimes I do think that you can get to the point where you've heard too much or seen too much and you have to distract yourself in new ways.


Or just stop completely paying attention.


Then again, somebody plays you something as great as this song and you'll probably be back.


I'm making a circular argument, aren't I?


Well then all I'm going to say is that it's interesting for me to see you trying to explain the song structure here.


As an aside, do you know that when they make a trough in your street, they don't just pave over the trough. First they completely remove the rest of the street's surface and then they repave the whole thing.


On the day they remove the street's surface, you should be somewhere else.


But I digress.


The thrilling thing about this song is what you're calling those "big ass guitar chords".


I like his voice too. And I think Cobain was a great songwriter. Maybe Grohl too. And the thing, I think, that distinguished Nirvana songs from other grunge songs, was that Nirvana was, I guess, poppier.


Other grunge - I'm thinking of Soundgarden, certainly Alice in Chains - came from more of a heavy metal/blues rock place. Nirvana on the other hand, reminded me more of a new wave band. 


Pop music with heavy guitar.


I think you could dispute that. Cobain said he liked Killdozer. Fine I'd say. But you AREN'T Killdozer (who for me, existed for one reason and one reason only, namely their brilliant cover of "I am I said".)


Writing about some of your songs here, I've come to realize that I have a pretty consistent - if somewhat indefensible - theory of pop music running in the back of my head.


There's folk music, there's pop music and then there's this other thing I don't know what to call because blues doesn't say it. Let's call it "heavy" music.


And all so-called rock music breaks down into folk music with loud guitars, pop music with loud guitars and then this third less melodic, less poppy thing with loud guitars.


I think I'm just typing to get the sound of roadbreakers out of my head. So I'd better go.


But yeah, the big ass guitar chords in that song were big ass enough to restore your faith in electric guitar. And if that's what they did, that only makes sense.over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post






Dan Bazuin

It's hard to imagine the impact of this song with out mentioning the video. It's one of a hand full of videos that made pop culture turn a corner. You get an almost perfect song, you got a vision of what life would be like in Grunge high school -sexy, smokey and loud ... it even gave you a picture of the school uniforms.


And over night the gods of flannel smiled down upon us and made Ben Hoffman look hip.over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post






Rick Campbell

First of all, what the hell is wrong with Dead Can Dance? I've got two beers in me and am feeling feisty!


Secondly, "....this might be the end for me." Alan Zweig Sept. 3, 2008.


But not until you tell me what you think of Fleet Foxes, the album, and also their Sun Giant EP. Then you can piss off if you want to. But I will hunt you down like a dog and play great music for you until you come back.


Blitz AKA Michael Kaler introduced me to Nirvana. I always thought it was before I moved to Vancouver, but he must have played Nevermind in Innis Pub on one of my visits back. Although, I distinctly remember him going to a club at Ossington and College to hear Nirvana, Soundgarden and Alice in Chains. I saw the band All (a terrific offshoot of Descendants) with him there. I can't remember the name of the venue. Maybe that was before Nevermind came out.


How strange to have my memory so wrong!


Anyway, I moved to the Pacific Northwest just as grunge became the big movement it did---Sept. 1990. And let me tell you, it is the closest I'll ever get to feeling like being in Swinging London. Only with the flannel instead of the paisley Edwardian thing. But that was great too. The thing was that all my clothes that I've pretty much worn (my style I should say) since around 1975----excluding when I want to make an impression in show business, which is what it's all about isn't it?----STUPENDOUSLY came back into fashion. 


In short it was okay to dress like Neil Young. In fact, a lot of people were dressing like Neil Young again. This was very exciting for about four people. But I was one of those four people! It also proved my theory about musical trends. Could a Sex Pistols reunion tour "sell out" be far behind? NO! Beautiful. Check and mate.


But beyond all that crap was how much I loved the music of that scene. I loved Nirvana (who always sounded like The Beatles to me), I liked the Zeppelin/Sabbath/Crazy Horse panache of Pearl Jam, and the metalish tinge of Soundgarden. I liked the misanthropy of Mudhoney and the Doorsy dour of Screaming Trees. I thought "Rooster" by Alice in Chains was just what I needed the first time I heard it. And I still hear grunge in Queens of the Stone Age (and their affiliates) and many other bands today. Even Seattle's Fleet Foxes, who have about as much to do with grunge music as the poor, lovely Seattle pop band of the grunge period, The Posies did), remind me of what is at the heart of the Pacific Northwest scene cannot be replicated elsewhere. That DIY spirit. That sound of rainy winters and too much rain that I hear in all their music. I saw virtually everybody while I was there EXCEPT Nirvana.


I was also lucky enough to see The Pixies during this period. They opened for U2, when their Achtung Baby tour came to town the first time, the hockey arena tour, before the stadium Zooropa thing and the irony got to be too much. What a fantastic set The Pixies played. A nice healthy set too. Respect to U2 for that. I saw Kim Deal in Vancouver a couple of years later with The Breeders. "Cool As Kim Deal" is one of my favorite pop songs.


I was one of those who was genuinely upset and bereft when Cobain killed himself. I thought that In Utero was a masterpiece. I loved its uncompromising quality. As much as Butch Vig's production on Nevermind is stunning, I loved that Cobain stuck to his guns (sorry) and made that record. It was brave. And if you listen closely to "Serve the Servants", you can hear how much he was influenced by The Beatles. Just speed that song up a bit, add some polish, and it wouldn't be out of place on the Beatlemania album.


I remember the video for....oh god I can't remember the name of it, and I won't wikipedia now...the video where they're playing on an ersatz Ed Sullivan-type show better than "Teen Spirit". A wonderful song too. I remember Crazy Al Yankovic's superb parody of the "Teen Spirit" video better. That was the high water point of video. I doubt that Sarah MacLaughlan and many others would have had the careers they had without video. Now it's all so trivial and dull. I find it astonishing that much of the new music I still love I heard/saw for the first time on MuchMusic. Remember the death metal videos they'd show? IN THE AFTERNOON??


Nirvana were a superb trio. Great attitude. Great players. I truly regret not seeing them in 1993 at the PNE. Or earlier. I had a few chances. I was so happy that people were playing rock music again, or that , beyond hardcore, and straight edge, which I liked (thank you Blitz) there was something that spoke to me, back in the mainstream. Something less ideological. More universal.


The song itself remains awesome. Tori Amos' version is superb too, and strips the song bare of it's Pixie-construction to reveal a stunning piece of pop. I love her for recording it that way so we could see where Cobain is coming from. Cobain himself was a musicologist of the first order. Too bad we lost him, but I hear his spirit in the voices of some of the people who write for MOJO and on this site.


Pop and rock is better off for having had Nirvana. And that's all I can say without getting maudlin. Or maybe I did already. I'm going back to Fleet Foxes.



Rick Campbell

It occurred to me that perhaps my little note to Alan at the beginning there might be misconstrued. That it might not be seen as being written with warmth and yes, a little affection.

It was.


Alan Zweig

I meant finished in terms of keeping up with indie rock. I'm not quite finished keeping up with you and your joyous rants.over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post




Dan Bazuin

*Ben Hoffman is the legendary flannel clad gnome and owner of the Record Peddler, the first(?) punk new wave record store in T.O. I could never determine Ben's actual tastes, but he seemed to love Lemmy and co. I didn't make the connection at the time but Neil Young may have been his sartorial guru.over a year


Alan Zweig

Oh, you mentioned the Record Peddler. Hated that place.


HATED.


I can laugh about it now.over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post


Rick Campbell

I was not a fan of that place either. I really wanted to like it but never bought a single thing in there. Too cool for school.

And Alan, I know what you meant, which was why I mentioned Fleet Foxes which, if you haven't yet heard them, may get you back on the road. But you must do it old school. You must play their Sun Ginat EP in its entirety. You must play the eponymous album in its entirety. No sampling. No jumping away after the first minute and a half of a song.


Yeah, I can hear you now. "Don't lay your Establishment trip on me, old man."

I'm guessing but, happy thing day that we must ignore.over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post

Rick Campbell

Okay, the Ep is called Sun Giant, not Sun Gnat.


Sun Gnat. Good name for a band.over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post

Dan Bazuin

I'm curious, was that the queen street store, or college street store? I think I remember our first conversations were at the Queen street store. When Charlie started the bookstore, he shared a door with the Record Peddler and Ben Hoffman, one of the owners, was always good to us. He helped us import a book from Britain that paid the rent for 2 months. The store moved across the street and I joined up a year later as something of a casualty of the counter-culture and the counter-counter-culture(punk?) We were neighbors of the record peddler and did some import and bootleg business with them, but now, looking I back I realize that most of the staff were a pain in the ass. We also did business with Steve at Records on Wheels on Yonge Street. More fun. 

I have the same knee jerk reaction when someone mentions the Funnel.



Rick McGinnis

The Peddler. The Funnel. Impulse magazine. The staff at the Rivoli. Toronto was such a friendly place, so full of welcoming people who needed to share.


It was all very intimidating for a naive working class kid from Mt. Dennis who'd barely seen a half dozen subtitled films in his life at that point. I'd never been to a store where people seemed to find my money distasteful before, or who handled their own stock as it passed over the counter like it was smeared with mucus.


I bought quite a few things from the Peddler, even briefly dated a girl who worked there, but I always felt depressed whenever I left the place. I hate to say it but I was actually kind of happy when it closed - one more miserable relic of a time when even the supposed outsiders let me feel like an outsider.


And yeah, I really liked the Nirvana record, too.over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post

Rick Campbell

Anyway...to rip off TS Eliot, this song proves that one can totally "get" the meaning of a great song without understanding the lyrics.


The other video I mentioned which, as it turns out, looks to be a parody of American Bandstand, is for the song "In Bloom".


I told MY favorite "Steve at Records on Wheels story" somewhere else on this site. That was a great era. I remember when that store first opened. It was if a prayer had been answered. When I go into She Said...Boom I'm reminded of those days.over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post

Steve Campbell

At the time that grunge was ruling the world, which effectively came from this record, I was turning it off in my brain. Naturally, I hadn't really "listened" to any of it. There were a couple of excellent bands in the UK, Blur and The Auteurs who had written coded two finger salutes to grunge mainly because they were pissed off that no-one was listening to bands in the Uk anymore. On top of that quite a few UK bands were trying to be either Nirvana or Pearl Jam or the Pixies and it was just PISSING US OFF!

This is an attitude that is easy to take the piss out of for lots of reasons all based on what happened next. What happened later was that Blur's best selling song was effectively a grunge song right down to the quiet loud structure. It was especially big in the US. I wonder if the band found that ironic. I know it only lasted one album (and really only existed in that one song). More importantly what happened next was Brit-pop and all its excesses creating some of the best but also some of the most execrable english pop music of the 90's.


But the reality was that in 1991, Britpop was just a twinkle in Noel Gallagher's eye as he roadied gear around for The Inspiral Carpets and danced to the fag end of the Stone Roses and The Happy Mondays down the Hacienda. Gallagher sick to death of American music permeating the English conciousness, quit his job, grabbed his brother and formed a british pop band; the only decent music around being made by a bunch of Creation bands (My Bloody Valentine, Primal Scream and Teenage Fanclub) that's where he ended up.


So yeah, without listening, I bought into the two fingers and avoided grunge for another year or so. Funnily enough it was not Nirvana that got me listening to America again but The Throwing Muses. They'd been around for years but I'd never really heard them before they appeared on my telly with some video off the Real Ramona (a great record). I was taken by misses Hersh and Donnelly and promptly went out and bought it. When I heard that Donnelly had left for some other band called The Breeders, I thought I'd better have a listen to them as well and Hey presto, this US rock scene sounds pretty good to me!


Obviously, exposure to Deal led me to The Pixies and then finally after reading something about Nirvana having ripped off the Pixies quiet loud schtick, I listened to Nevermind, probably a tape from my brother. During 1991 and 1992, I remember arguing with Rick about how grunge was too big RAWK sounding, how it had no nuance. By 1993, I was listening to Pearl Jam, The Smashing Pumpkins, the Screaming Trees and even giving the odd UK version of the music a chance (Bivouac).


Retrospectively, my shutting out this stuff for the best part of a year or more seems ridiculous to me, especially considering that I was not of an age where I would have expected to have such a closed mind to music (this wasn't 1979, it was fuckin 1992!) but anyway, pretty soon it was all over. By the time I was getting into it, grunge was going commercial and sounding less punk. Nevermind was the deathknell and Cobain knew it.


However, his ultimate reaction was as ludicrous as any other rock and roll suicide (although who knows what really was going on). The best reaction was In Utero and there was no reason why he couldn't have just carried on ignoring the business and playing what he wanted. But what do I know, fame is a bugger.


Finally, I just have to say that I couldn't agree more to the Beatle comparison. Back a long time ago I did a compilation tape where I placed About a Girl next to I'll Be Back. It seems pretty obvious to me. Nirvana were a pop/punk band. I don't know if Cobain had a problem with that (see In Bloom) but he did have a penchant for writing wonderful melodies.over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post


Mark Brownell

Round Records on Bloor was my favourite place.over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post

Rick Campbell

I still think it's funny that Blur's "grunge song" gets played at North American sporting events. I remember being at a hockey game and hearing it just when had come out and thinking Blur just beat Oasis. But I was wrong. America still couldn't care less about either one of them----well...maybe Oasis in some major centres.


But I think Blur's 13 album was more influenced by the then American Indie scene----bands like Pavement and Sebadoh. Wasn't it?over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post


Steve Campbell

Absolutely, that's why I say that their grunge moment only existed in that one song. I have to say that for me, Blur will always be a far more interesting band than Oasis. They constantly changed and demonstated a restlessness that was quite unique in the music scene in Britain at that time. Damon is quite the clever fellow (if still up his own ass so much that it must hurt) and still putting out interesting music.over a year ago


Sara Lewis

I'll preface my mumblings by stating outright that a) I'm wearing a Nirvana Bleach t-shirt and b) writing this in my dining room, directly beside the wall with two framed sepias of Kurt holding an infant Frances Bean.


I don't just love the 'DC, y'know. :)


Having said that, the last time I listened to Nevermind was...was....was...I can't remember. It's my least favourite Nirvana record, by far.


Bleach was released in 1989 and that's when I saw the band play at the Danforth Music Hall. They were a notoriously spotty live act, but that night, they were incredible. Kurt pretty much embodied every guy I ever liked in high school, and that attraction coupled with the fact that Bleach is an enormously hooky record cemented my forever-love for Nirvana.


Nirvana's a band that for me is all about the sum of its parts - unlike, KISS, say, which is all about Ace. Individually, they're decent musicians, and Dave's certainly gone to do some listenable (yet hardly groundbreaking) stuff with Foo Fighters. RS ranked Kurt in their Top 100 Guitarists of all time, and as much as I love Nirvana, I felt that was stretching it, to put it mildly.


When Teen Spirit came out, I felt a wave of disenchantment. To my ears, it sounded like the Bon Jovi of grunge. Slick, overproduced, and made for the masses. Even the band hated playing it. 


I get why people like the song, and there are some decent tunes on Nevermind (I like Lithium the best, if only for the lyrics and the best loud-quiet-loud this side of The Pixies) but after the shadowy-grey raw shine of Bleach, Teen Spirit was a letdown for this fan.

Sara Lewis

One more thing:


The Peddler. The Funnel. Impulse magazine. The staff at the Rivoli. Toronto was such a friendly place, so full of welcoming people who needed to share.


It was all very intimidating for a naive working class kid from Mt. Dennis who'd barely seen a half dozen subtitled films in his life at that point. I'd never been to a store where people seemed to find my money distasteful before, or who handled their own stock as it passed over the counter like it was smeared with mucus.


I bought quite a few things from the Peddler, even briefly dated a girl who worked there, but I always felt depressed whenever I left the place. I hate to say it but I was actually kind of happy when it closed - one more miserable relic of a time when even the supposed outsiders let me feel like an outsider.


WORD!!!!!!


:)over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post






Sara Lewis

I lied.


One more thing:


I guess another reason why I dislike Teen Spirit so much is because of its utter cynicism. Kurt became a whining misanthrope, and it really bugged. The whole "I hate being a rock star" ethos rubs me the wrong way. Quit the band; go live in a cave. Pull a Syd Barrett. Who cares. 


When a band does a complete 360 - from Bleach to Nevermind, goes with Butch Vig as a producer, and makes a radio friendly unit shifter (later the name of a track on In Utero - cynicism, thy name is Kurt Cobain) like Teen Spirit, it becomes difficult to take the self-involved "I never wanted this" angst all that seriously.


Can you tell that this record really pissed me off? 


:)

over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post






Lorna Bell

I never liked this song, because I didn't understand what the lyrics were, something about a potato, and don't be stupid.


I thought it was cool when Paul Anka did a remake....then I could understand the lyrics, and I like his musical arrangement of the song....'runs and hides'.over a year ago · · Report · Delete Post






Jim Shedden

You know what I like about all of this? First, that people seem to be comfortable going back in the 1000 Songs time machine and putting some more meat on the bones. Makes me feel less anxious about posting the next one, though I will get to that tomorrow I promise. 


More importantly: it seems clear to me now that, when it comes to pop music, we can completely agree on facts, and even on interpretation, but ultimately part ways where judgment is concerned. Reading your take on this song and this album, I have to agree with your observations. But I love the song and I love the album, but my situation was different and I have completely different associations I guess. 


That's what I love about pop music.over a year ago · Delete Post






Rick Campbell

Maybe it's because I'm a fogey but I don't condemn people for their contradictions or else I'd have tossed out all my John Lennon albums years ago. I do, and this is probably wrong of me---life is too short--- condemn people like John Lydon who, (apparently) like to put on an act at other's expense, but I'm even getting over that now. 


Nirvana gave me much pleasure. And I just heard Teen Spirit again and remembered everything I like about it and that record. And it was a getway song for a generation and that made me very happy (see above). And without it there would have never been an In Utero which is a magnificent record. Let's face it, whatever shit he was complaining about (and I don't think TS is about how hard it is to be a rock star AT ALL), he was troubled, made decisons on the fly like we all do and later regretted them, as we all do. He could have chosen his friends (and wife) more carefully. 


Also, if someone comes out condeming the ethos of hair band culture or whatever and gets famous doing it then I have no problem with that either. Again I direct you to the man who died twenty-eight years ago today. One of the great hypocrite rock stars of all time.


But I wish he and Kurt were still here making their thrilling music.over a year ago 



Sara Lewis

Having had to work with John Lydon on more than one occasion, I can assure you, it's no act.


TS isn't about how hard it is to be a rock star; the whining about hating rock stardom commenced after TS became a huge smash. I think it's hypocritical to make a shiny near-pop record like Nevermind, release it to the masses, and then whine about how you hate fame. 


And Courtney's a decent songwriter, Rick. A lousy guitar player (they cut her sound more than once up at Molson Park it was so terrible) but a decent songwriter who inspired a lot of young women just like I once was to pick up a guitar and write a tune. I don't blame her for Kurt's unhappiness; I blame Kurt for sticking a needle in his arm the first, second, third, fourth time.


One thing we agree on here - In Utero's a magnificent record. Filled with self-loathing, and a difficult listen, but a magnificent record. But not nearly as great as Bleach
Don Busbridge

Dan TheMan
Dan TheMan Listened to it a zillion times. I was 18 in 1990. First time I heard it was Leaside High School upstairs boys bathrooms. Great song.

Alice Lenore Sellwood
Alice Lenore Sellwood I made the horrible mistake of using the term "world music" in a review I wrote last year. I got quite the unforgettable lecture from my Professor regarding its generalization. I guess it is a little vague. What "world music" were you listening to in those days?
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Rick Campbell
Rick Campbell World beat was the monicker when I worked at Sam's in the mid-90's.

Jim Shedden
Jim Shedden We knew world music and world beat were "problems" back in the day (hey, I even worked on the last WOMAD in a minor way) but it worked. Language is funny that way. If I said "world music" in the early 90s it could certainly mean any of African, Latin American, Indian, Caribbean, American regional (Tejano, Cajun, Bluegrass, etc.), Celtic... It was clear that it wasn't classical/renaissance/baroque, jazz (unless...), rock (unless...), pop (unless...). I don't use either term today, because everything is so much more available, so much less "exotic", and so much more integrated. This is all good.

#36: Jonas Mekas

Originally posted on Facebook on Jan 23, 2019, 6:03 PM.

Where would I be without Jonas Mekas? Jonas, who passed away today at age 96.

I first heard about him in Andy Warhol’s Popism: The Warhol 60s, which I read when I was 17. I read it because I loved the Velvet Underground, but took away from it this guy Mekas, who ran the Film-Makers’ Cinematheque in New York in the 1960s and showed Andy Warhol films. He was such “an academic” as Warhol said, that he even showed films by Stan Brakhage. So thanks for the leads, Andy, even if you were unappreciative of Stan.

I knew reading those passages about the underground film scene that it was my scene, and that Jonas was at the centre of it. This was all without seeing his films. I wouldn’t, in fact, see any Mekas till I was in the CFMDC preview booth on Portland and Kate and I watched Report From Millbrook, Hare Krishna and The Brig. I understood the context for Millbrook (Timothy Leary freaking that town out), but not yet The Brig (The Living Theatre, avant-garde performance that overlapped with Mekas and the underground film world).

I made a pilgrimage to New York in the late 80s and finally met Mekas. I spent a day at Anthology Film Archives, one of the more venerable and influential avant-garde film institutions that Jonas founded. My friend Mike Zryd was working and researching there, and I became a regular whenever I was in town. I also met Robert Haller helped make it all possible (strange but true). I bought every issue of Film Culture magazine, Jonas’s journal - no film periodical ever mattered as much to me. Brakhage’s Metaphors on Vision was a special issue, as was a great issue on Expanded Cinema designed by George Maciunas (that I show EVERYONE who comes to my office, because I still love it so much), and a Maciunas-designed Warhol issue.The Paul Sharits issue still confuses and excites me.

I also bought as many other books and periodicals as I could stuff in my luggage.

About six years after that I brought Jonas to Toronto for screenings organized by Innis (but at the AGO?), and to talk about Snow during the Michael Snow Project (and be interviewed for my Snow doc.). By then, as much as the Film-Makers’ Coop, Cinematheque, Anthology, Film Culture, Essential Cinema, etc. mattered and still matter deeply to me, Jonas’s films entered my psyche for good. There’s almost nothing that I like more than first-person, low-budget, poetic, diaristic, autobiographical films: Mekas is the ultimate. My favorites:

• Award Presentation to Andy Warhol (1964) • Walden (Diaries, Notes, and Sketches) (1969) - 3 hours
• Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania (1971–72)
• Lost, Lost, Lost (1976)
• He Stands in a Desert Counting the Seconds of His Life (1969/1985)
• Scenes from the Life of Andy Warhol (1990)

But, there are dozens of others that I’d be happy to see right this second.

#35: Cancer

Listen to your doctor.

Originally posted on Facebook on May 16, 211, 12;05AM

May 16, 2011 at 12:05 AM

Listen to your doctor.

A few months ago I went to my doctor for a routine check-in. I take lithium and other bipolar meds that require my blood to be checked regularly. On the last go round, my lithium was low for some unexplained reason, but my doctor also noticed that my hemoglobin counts were low. A follow up blood test showed no change, and confirmed that my ferritin (iron) count was low.

I’ve been feeling progressively lousier for the last several months, and perhaps longer. Sleepy, foggy and unbalanced. It turns out I was anemic and, because I was am neither a vegetarian nor a woman, my doctor thought I should have a colonoscopy and a esophagogastroduodenoscopy (EGD) to see if anything was amiss internally: colitis, ulcers, etc.

I wasn’t showing any of the other external signs of any of these afflictions (losing blood for example), I was skeptical. The pharmacist that dispensed the ferrous gluconate to me suggested that maybe I was just having a hard time absorbing iron. I wanted to believe him but I’ve learned to discount my fear-voice, so I found an ounce of courage and made an appointment for the double scope procedure.

I was a little spacey from the Demerol - usually administered to anyone getting both procedures simultaneously - but I could hear that the doctor performing the colonoscopy found and removed a polyp, probably benign, but also found a very large, “messy” tumor: colorectal cancer.

A CT scan verified that the cancer had not spread. My surgeon advised me that with cancer good news is the absence of bad news. In other words, there’s always a small chance - very small - that the CT scan simply failed to detect some microscopic but deadly cancer cells.

On Tuesday I go into Mount Sinai to have the cancer removed. Tomorrow (Monday) will be spent fasting and purging, and then I have to be at the hospital on Tuesday morning at 6. I will then be anesthetized and operated on at 8am. If all goes well, I will be cancer free later that morning. A 7-10 day stay in the hospital will be followed by 6-12 weeks of convalescing at home. Sometime in July I hope to be back at work, and fully engaged in my usual activities.

While I’m in Mount Sinai, I’m able to have visitors (2 at a time) between 2pm and 8pm. Presumably by Thursday I should be ready. Then I’m happy to have visitors at home if I know in advance.

If things go less well, I may have to do chemotherapy for a well to eliminate residual cancer cells. There is that tiny chance that the cancer is worse than it seems, or that something will go wrong in surgery. But I am 100% optimistic that it’s going to turn out well. I’m not exactly looking forward to it, but I am looking forward to feeling better.

Because I listened to my doctor, I probably avoided a much worse and possibly fatal scenario. I’m grateful to our medical system, especially my doctor and the fantastic people at the Rudd Clinic, Princess Margaret and Mount Sinai, for their diagnoses, attention and sensitivity. I’m also grateful that I was somehow able to summon the guts to follow through on the scoping, that I was able to ignore my internal voices of fear and denial.

Thank you.

#34: "100 Canadian films that I really like"

Originally posted in the Toronto Film Review (http://torontofilmreview.blogspot.com/2017/12/100-best-canadian-films-jim-shedden.html?m=1&fbclid=IwAR1Qr5LTCS2oSLdnXvTQ-p6LuWQYv3j0p3RZF_DU6fre5VxVbXqOPOkzjlM) in on Christmas Day, December, 2017.

David D. asked me to make a personal list of “100 Best Canadian Films.” I’m really glad that the responses to this have been idiosyncratic, as my list won’t be like any of the others.

What follows is 100 Canadian films that I really like, 100 films that somehow touched me emotionally or intellectually. There is no attempt at balance: more than half of them are by experimental, avant-garde and artist filmmakers because that’s what I have liked about filmmaking from our country more than anything else. I haven’t divided the films by genre, however, because I’m going to pretend that, for today, it doesn’t matter. The films are organized by director. There is no hierarchy within the list of 100.

That being said, there is no attempt to put forward a definition of Canadian film other than films made by people who consider themselves Canadian. They weren’t all shot or finished here (nb.Wavelength as the most famous example in that regard). I’m interested in various theories and histories of Canadian film, and I am, in fact, working on one myself with a couple of other people, but ultimately I can’t abide by a theory of Canadian anything that excludes an interesting book, film, play, or movie made by a person born here or living here or otherwise considering themselves Canadian, because it doesn’t match a theoretical picture of “Canadian”.

I am including multiple films by a number of filmmakers. However, I do tend towards earlier films, ones that I saw two and three decades ago, like Peter Mettler’s student work. I don’t include any work by Elder after Consolations, and no work by Snow after So Is This. That doesn’t mean I don’t like the newer work, but the older work rewired by emotional infrastructure when I saw it, partly a testament to the work, and partly a testament to the openness of Jim Shedden the teenager.

There are, I’m sure dozens or even hundreds of interesting Canadian films that I simply haven’t seen yet. It’s obvious from people’s lists. I think the only lists where I’ve seen over 80% of the films are Mike Hoolboom’s and Stephen Broomer’s. Even there, I feel very far behind on the current crop of avant-garde films. There seems to be a lot of good work coming out faster than I can see it. I have yet to see Stephen Broomer’s Potamkin, for example, so it’s not on the list.

I am woefully ignorant of Québècois cinema. And I’m not happy about the overall diversity of the list that follows. It’s mostly white males. More work needs to be done, but this is where I’m at today. – J.S.


Jim Shedden’s 100 Best Canadian Films

1. Kay Armatage. Jill Johnson: October 1975, 1977.

2. Jennifer Baichwal. Manufactured Landscapes, 2006.

3. Michel Brault. Les ordres, 1974.

4. Donald Brittain and Don Owen. Ladies and Gentlemen, Mr. Leonard Cohen, 1966.

5. Stephen Broomer. Christ Church - St. James, 2011.

6. Stephen Broomer. Pepper’s Ghost, 2013.

7. Carl Brown. neige noire (w/ John Kamevaar), 2003.

8. Dan Browne. Alberta, 2014.

9. Colin Brunton. The Last Pogo, 1978/2008 + The Last Pogo Jumps Again, 2013.

10. Colin Campbell. Janus, 1973.

11. Jack Chambers. Circle, 1968-69.

12. Jack Chambers. Hart of London, 1968-70.

13. Shawn Chapelle. Natalie of Wood, 2001.

14. Christopher Chapman. A Place to Stand, 1967.

15. Janis Cole and Holly Dale. Hookers on Davie, 1984.

16. David Cronenberg. Rabid, 1977.

17. David Cronenberg. Videodrome, 1983.

18. David Cronenberg. The Dead Zone, 1983.

19. Keewatin Dewdney. Maltese Cross Movement.

20. Keewatin Dewdney. Wildwood Flower.

21. Atom Egoyan. Next of Kin, 1984.

22. Atom Egoyan. Krapp’s Last Tape, 2000.

23. Bruce Elder. The Art of Worldly Wisdom, 1979.

24. Bruce Elder. Illuminated Texts, 1983.

25. Bruce Elder. Lamentations: A Monument to the Dead World, 1985.

26. Bruce Elder. Consolations (Love is an Art of Time), 1988.

27. Clint Enns. A Knight’s Walk, 2014.

28. Graeme Ferguson. North of Superior, 1971.

29. Vera Frenkel. The Secret Life Of Cornelia Lumsden, 1979-80.

30. Chris Gallagher. Seeing in the Rain, 1981.

31. Chris Gallagher. Mirage, 1983.

32. John Greyson. Fig Trees, 2009. 

33. Barry Greenwald. Taxi!, 1982.

34. Rick Hancox. Home for Christmas, 1978.

35. Phil Hoffman. On the Pond, 1978.

36. Phil Hoffman. Kitchener-Berlin, 1990.

37. Mike Hoolboom, Subway Stops, 2017 (installation).

38. Stanley Jackson, Wolf Koenig and Terence Macartney-Filgate. The Days Before Christmas, 1958.

39. Chris Kennedy. Towards a Vanishing Point, 2012.

40. Richard Kerr. Vesta Lunch, 1978.

41. Richard Kerr. Six Stories (On Land, Over Water), 1981.

42. Richard Kerr. Morning… Came a Day Early, 2016.

43. Alan King. A Married Couple, 1969.

44. John Kneller. Axis, 2013.

45. Wolf Koenig and Roman Kroitor. Glenn Gould On the Record + Glenn Gould Off the Record, 1959.

46. Eva Kolcze. All That is Solid, 2014.

47. Zacharias Kunuk and Norman Cohn. Nunavut (Our Land), 1994-95.

48. Helen Lee. Sally’s Beauty Spot, 1990.

49. Arthur Lipsett. Very Nice, Very Nice, 1961.

50. Keith Lock. Everything Everywhere Again Alive, 1975.

51. Brenda Longfellow. Shadow Maker: Gwendolyn McEwan, Poet, 1998.

52. Andrew Lugg. Front and Back, 1972.

53. Guy Maddin. My Winnipeg, 2007.

54. Ron Mann. Imagine the Sound, 1981.

55. Ron Mann. Poetry in Motion, 1982.

56. Ron Mann. Comic Book Confidential, 1988.

57. Ron Mann. The Twist, 1992.

58. Bruce McDonald. Knock! Knock!, 1985.

59. Bruce McDonald. Roadkill, 1989.

60. Normal McLaren. Pas de deux, 1968.

61. Lorne Marin. Rhapsody on a Theme from a House Movie, 1972.

62. Peter Mettler. Eastern Avenue, 1985.

63. Peter Mettler. Picture of Light, 1994.

64. David Morris. Super 8 Cycle.

65. Brian Nash. bp: Pushing the Boundaries, 1997.

66. Midi Onodera. The Bird Chirped on Bathurst, 1981.

67. Susan Oxtoby. January 15, 1991: Gulf War Diary, 1991.

68. Andrew J. Paterson. Basic Motel, 1980.

69. Madi Piller. Untitled, 1925, 2016.

70. Kathleen Pirrie Adams and Paula Gignac. Excess is What I Came For, 1994.

71. Sarah Polley. Stories We Tell, 2012.

72. John Porter. Wallpaper Films (18-film cycle for Fifth Column), 1983-1990.

73. John Price. View of then Falls from the Canadian Side, 2006.

74. Isabella Pruska-Oldenhof. This Town of Toronto, 2012.

75. Isabella Pruska-Oldenhof. Her Carnal Longings, 2003.

76. Al Razutis. 98.3Khz: (Bridge at Electrical Storm), 1973.

77. Steve Reinke. The Hundred Videos, 1989-1996.

78. David Rimmer. Variations on a Cellophane Wrapper, 1970.

79. David Rimmer. Bricolage, 1984.

80. Patricia Rozema. Into the Forest, 2015.

81. Tom Sherman. TVideo, 1980.

82. Michael Snow. Wavelength, 1967.

83. Michael Snow. Standard Time, 1967.

84. Michael Snow. <——>, 1969.

85. Michael Snow. La région centrale, 1971.

86. Michael Snow. Rameau’s Nephew by Diderot (thanx to Dennis Young) by Wilma Schoen, 1974.

87. Michael Snow. So is This, 1982.

88. Lisa Steele. Birthday Suit, 1974.

89. Barbara Sternberg. Transitions, 1982.

90. Barbara Sternberg. A Trilogy, 1985.

91. Barbara Sternberg. In the Nature of Things, 2011.

92. Leslie Supnet. In Still Time, 2015.

93. Gariné Torossian. Sparklehorse, 1999.

94. Joyce Wieland. Sailboat, 1967-68.

95. Joyce Wieland. Handtinting, 1967-68.

96. Joyce Wieland. Rat Life and Diet in North America, 1970.

97. Joyce Wieland. Pierre Vallières, 1972.

98. Joyce Wieland. A and B in Ontario (w/ Hollis Frampton), 1984.

99. Alan Zweig. Vinyl, 2000.

100. Alan Zweig. When Jews Were Funny, 2013.

#33: Scott Walker

This is mirrored in a blog post (500 People, Places and Things to Define Jim Shedden, (http://www.jimshedden.com/500-people-places-and-things-that-define-jim-shedden/), and in turn derived from a number of 1000 Songs entries I made between 2007 and 2014 (https://www.facebook.com/groups/1000Songs/). 

If any artist belongs on this list, it’s Scott Walker. I was a fan the second I heard him, at age 18, and relentlessly so until the present day. 

When I started my Facebook Group (which was really a collective blog) where we discussed music for 7+ years, Scott Walker’s “Seventh Seal” was the second song we discussed (the Allman Brothers’ You Don’t Love Me/Soul Survivor was #1 and, for context, Laurie Anderson’s “O Superman” was #3). 

Song #2: "The Seventh Seal," by Scott Walker 

1000 Songs in 1000 Days

October 4, 2007

Song #2: "The Seventh Seal." Scott Walker, from Scott 4, 1969.


"Anybody seen a knight pass this way

I saw him playing chess with Death yesterday

His crusade was a search for God and they say

It's been a along way to carry on." (Scott Walker, after Ingmar Berman)

I first heard "Seventh Seal" back in 1981 when I my friend Lisa Godfrey gave me Fire Escape in the Sky: The Godlike Genius of Scott Walker, a compilation of Walker's self-penned songs collected by Julian Cope (The Teardrop Explodes). I knew nothing about him, or even The Walker Brothers, his wildly successful pop balladeer group (especially their "Make it Easy on Yourself," and "The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore."). The album was very seductive, especially to my pretentious high school sensibility: a beautifully-packaged album of impeccable, madly idiosyncratic pop songs, thrust into an unsuspecting world by another madman of pop, Julian Cope. I think Lisa G ended up giving this to me, having a love-hate relationship with Cope, Walker and Brel. The "romanticism" of the work always borders on sentimentality at best, and misogyny at worst.

After the breakup of the Walker Brothers in the late 1960s, Scott Walker (really Scott Engel) started releasing strange solo albums featuring covers of much of the Jacques Brel catalogue, as translated by Mort Shuman (many of them were performed in the edgy musical Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris). Walker also began to record his own compositions which were strongly influenced by Brel, but which were much more eclectic in their influences, drawing on classical music, Broadway and the American songbook, Lieder and Gregorian chants.

The albums were dark, introverted, existential, and definitely not chart-toppers. The apotheosis of this period is Scott 4: if there is a masterpiece in this career, this is it. It was a tremendous bomb, however, and led to Walker reorienting his career around his British TV series, Scott, with covers of popular film tunes, ballads, country and western songs, showtunes, etc. I have a fondness for this material as Walker's voice remains beautiful and haunting, and his interpretations and arrangements are usually compelling.

Hearing the Godlike Genius compilation meant all my other musical obsessions had to take a back seat for at least a year: the Velvet Underground, Bowie, Eno, Dylan, Elvis Costello. I had to learn everything there was to know about Walker, get every recording there was to get (thank God for Peter Dunn's Vinyl Museum in Toronto!). And I had to meet any like-minded souls. There weren't many of us, but the late Steve Banks (Ministry of Love, Trans-Love Airways) was one; Marc de Guerre, a painter at the time and leader of the band Rongwrong, was another (though he reminded me that I introduced him to Walker’s music); Kathleen Robertson, as she was known at the time (Fifth Column) was another, though she definitely had a hard time with aforementioned misogyny (I remember her especially bristling at the interpretation of Brel's "The Girls and the Dogs").

Getting back to Scott 4 though. This is the first Walker album of entirely original compositions, each of them Big, Dramatic and Earnest, highly original and beautifully arranged. The song that stuck out for me from it was "The Seventh Seal". I played it more than any other song for a year, maybe two. It was my introduction to the films of Ingmar Bergman. The Seventh Seal became my favorite film for years, and I became obsessed with the theological problem of "the Silence of God". All of this from what might be, in retrospect, a mighty cheesy pop song. But, still, the hair on the back of my neck still stands up when I hear:

"My life's a vain pursuit of meaningless smiles

Why can't God touch me with a sign

Perhaps there's no one there answered the booth

And Death hid within his cloak and smiled"

There's a beautiful understated ghostly choir, Spanish-influenced horns and strings, and Scott's voice at its absolute hauntingliest best.

I can't decide, but I think it's a masterpiece of pop music composition and execution. Perhaps that's still my adolescent insanity talking though.

Song #202: Black Sheep Boy

1000 Songs in (more than) 1000 Days

September 26, 2008

Song #202: "Black Sheep Boy." Tim Hardin, Tim Hardin 2, 1967.

I came to this song, and to Tim Hardin, through Scott Walker. Two giants I wasn't expecting to encounter while still hoping for punk salvation.

My fall into Scott Walker started with his own songs as collected on the compilation Julian Cope put together, Fire Escape in the Sky: The Godlike Genius of Scott Walker. I was so taken with songs like "Seventh Seal" (#2 in this group), "Plastic Palace People", and "The Amorous Humphrey Plugg", that I can honestly say that all my ideas about what constituted great music were forever changed.

That infatuation opened up many doors. I soon got into the Jacques Brel covers by Scott Walker, themselves mostly derived from the incredible Eric Blau/Mort Shuman translations from the Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris revue (I had the privilege of seeing the 2006 revival of it off Broadway). And I got into the Walker Brothers which, in turn, opened a lot of doors. And then, finally, I got into the final group of Scott Walker's music, the non-original, non-Walker Brothers, non-Brel material. What a fabulous hodge-podge!

"Wait Until Dark"

"The Impossible Dream"

"Will You Still Be Mine?"

"If"

"Ain't No Sunshine"

"Any Day Now"

"Sundown"

"Delta Dawn"

"The Look of Love"...

Songs by Kurt Weill, Charles Aznavour, Andre Previn, Kern/Hammerstein, Barry Mann, Morricone, Rota. And, starting with his first solo album, Scott, songs by Tim Hardin: "Lady Came from Baltimore", on that first album, and "Black Sheep Boy" on the second album. To the best of my knowledge, those are the only two Hardin covers that Walker recorded.

I love a lot of things about Scott Walker. With his own compositions it's one thing, because the unorthodox lyrics and arrangements, along with his haunting and powerful voice, stop me in my tracks still to this day. With the Brel material, there's a special alchemy of the sort you hear with Sinatra doing Cole Porter, Miles doing Gershwin, and Jennifer Warnes doing Leonard Cohen (thought I'd throw that in). But it's so fucking strange and perfect all at the same time.

I think Walker-does-Brel is almost equaled in these two Hardin songs, though Hardin, on the surface, was so much more conventional than Brel. After the Walker covers, I first heard Hardin himself shortly thereafter when my friend Barry made me a tape of his songs, or included the material on a compilation. Of course, then I realized that I already knew "Reason to Believe" by Rod Stewart, "If I Were a Carpenter" by Bobby Darin I guess (and now many others including the Four Tops and Johnny Cash), and even "Eulogy to Lenny Bruce" by Nico on Chelsea Girl.

So what is it about Tim Hardin? On the surface, he sounds like just another singer-songwriter, a Jackson Browne or Tim Buckley who didn't quite break through. Indeed, his output is uneven and his career was seriously damaged because of his anxiety and heroin addiction, which eventually killed him in 1976.

Because Alan recently wrote on Okkervil River, who put out an album called "Black Sheep Boy", inspired by the Hardin song, and including a cover of BSB, I thought I'd let the band's Will Sheff help to unravel the Tim Hardin question.

Some general remarks. The best Hardin material is on Tim Hardin 1 and Tim Hardin 2, though there are gems that you'll find on later releases. Listen to the Hardin versions. And then listen to the various covers over the years. It seems to me that most artists have picked up on a latent Hardin, the one that might have become Jackson Browne or Tim Buckley: big, full and showy. The other Hardin, the Hardin that comes across most obviously on his own recordings, is tentative, introverted and in considerable pain. That's the Okkervil's Hardin, as you can hear in their stunning cover of "Black Sheep Boy."

"Black Sheep Boy" is probably my favorite Hardin song. It seems to capture his sensibility and autobiography succinctly and poignantly. And, though Scott Walker's version is more polished, more extroverted and almost boisterous in comparison, it seems to have integrity as Walker himself is definitely a black sheep boy. Like Will Sheff. 

Here's what Sheff has to say:

"These famous songs were my first exposure to Tim Hardin, and I knew them long before I knew his name. I knew them as sung by artists whom I mostly scoffed at, like Bobby Darin, with his hit versions of "If I Were a Carpenter" and "Lady Came from Baltimore," or the insufferable Rod Stewart crooning "Reason to Believe." When I heard Hardin's original versions, though, I found that they were nothing like those covers. Their arrangements were largely acoustic and elegantly simple, mixing the earnest earthiness of singer-songwriter folk with the sophistication of Cool Jazz artists like Chet Baker. And Hardin's voice - though possessed of a tremolo quality that's very different than what's in style today - was startlingly intimate, emotional, and direct. Hardin's music transported me to the same tender, warm little world that I associate with artists like Nick Drake and Van Morrison, and I realized that both of these artists were probably in fact deeply influenced by Hardin and his then-famous, jewel-like little songs. (These days, Van Morrison is a legendary figure and Nick Drake has achieved a posthumous fame as perhaps the definitive treasured cult songwriter, but Tim Hardin's revival has been slow in coming.)"

I agree with almost everything Sheff has to say. The invocation of Chet Baker. The comparisons with Drake and Morrison. The "intimate, emotional, and direct" voice. The "tremolo quality".

But I don't agree where the covers are concerned. I'm not a huge Bobby Darin fan (though if you have a copy of "Gyp the Cat" please e-mail it to me!), because of the homogeneous quality of his recordings. But I've loved so many of the covers. I mean, I really, really like Rod Stewart's "Reason to Believe" (hey Rick C. - wasn't that ACTUALLY the b-side to Maggie May, not I Know I'm Losing You)?

On the other hand, listening again to every Hardin recording I have, and then the covers, I came to the conclusion that his recordings were even more original, beautiful and terrifying that I ever remembered them being. And the covers are starting to fade from view for me. At least for a while.

I'm listening to "How Can We Hang on to a Dream" right now and I can hardly do anything else. I don't know why I never noticed the staggering greatness of this cut before.

Sheff goes on to say: "As I listened to Hardin's first two records over and over again, I also started having that weird proprietary feeling that I get towards Drake and Morrison: no matter how famous their music is, I have this odd and comforting sense that each time I cue up the record they're singing just for me. I became obsessed with Hardin's songs on Tim 1 and Tim 2, with the economy of their language, their swooping, lyrical string arrangements, the halting rhythms of Hardin's acoustic guitar playing. At first my favorite Tim Hardin song was "It'll Never Happen Again," then it was "Don't Make Promises," then it was "Misty Roses," but before long I became especially obsessed with the song "Black Sheep Boy," with its mysterious lyrics and darkly confident theme, which, as far as I could figure out, could be summed up thusly: 'I know I'm fucking up - leave me alone'."

WOW. The "odd and comforting sense taht each time I cue up the record they're singing just for me" describes how I feel with Hardin and Drake for sure, and maybe Astral Weeks Morrison. And maybe Scott Walker (doing his own material though).

So many great songs. I'm listening to "Simple Song of Freedom Right Now." "Red Balloon" was covered nicely by Rick Nelson, who had a Hardin-like quality to him, but with all the edges smoothed out. The Small Faces also covered it, and I'm posting a sub-adequate YouTube instance of it, but what the hell.This love song to heroin is somehow more convincing than the Velvet Underground:

Bought myself a red balloon and got a blue surprise -

hidden in the red balloon, the pinning of my eyes.

You took the love light from my eyes. Blue, blue surprise.

We met as friends and you were so easy to get to know,

but will we see each other again? Oh... I hope so.

If you want to keep digging through the Hardin material after the first two albums, you'll eventually get to the 1970 album,

"Suite for Susan Moore and Damion: We Are One, One, All in One." Sheff's take on this album is dead on: "Suite for Susan Moore and Damion - We Are - One. One, All In One is an unbearably sad record, and its sadness comes not from contemplation or from clear-eyed and hard-won wisdom but from how empty Hardin's pronouncements on romantic commitment and fatherly love ring. There's a sense of despair to the album, but deeper than that there's a sense of confusion, of disconnectedness, not just of Hardin from his message but of Hardin from his muse, and maybe from himself. It's one of the most enervating records I've ever heard, full of directionless melodies, words that seem vulnerable and sincere but that barely add up to anything, clumsy and vapid noodling, songs that strain to mean everything and mean less than nothing. Here and there, though, Hardin stumbles onto lyrics as great as in his heyday, as in "Magician," when the clouds seem to part and Hardin presents the listener with what's probably a warped self-portrait:

You should see the troubles that he goes through

to free his house from sin.

Magic wands and weapons together in a room..."

And I'll close with this last observation of Sheff's: "We too often associate drugs and heavy drinking with wild creativity, but in the case of Tim Hardin - and in many more cases than I think people realize - all of his great work was done in spite of drugs, not because of them. Drugs ruined Tim Hardin as an artist, and in many respects they ruined him as a human being. Still, as he makes clear in "Black Sheep Boy" and, as I guess is part of the point of our little record of the same name, that was his choice."

As I said, get Tim Hardin 1 and Tim Hardin 2. You will be blown away.

Song #277: Jackie

1000 Songs

April 12, 2009 (Easter)

Song #277: Jackie. Scott Walker, Scott 2, 1968.

I discussed my Scott Walker obsession back in entry #2, where I covered "The Seventh Seal" (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5553156450&ref=ts#/topic.php?uid=5553156450&topic=3811). I also discussed "Black Sheep Boy," a Tim Hardin song that he covered (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5553156450&ref=ts#/topic.php?uid=5553156450&topic=6145).

My Walker obsession was one of those where I spent years trying to convince people, through mixed tapes and rhetoric, why he was a genius. And, yet, as soon as I encountered other people, especially in the music media, making a similar case, my reaction was one of "he's not THAT great." Sound familiar to anyone out there? Bitter when Tom Waits became (sort of) popular? When Nick Drake and Elliott Smith songs started appearing in popular films?

Anyhow, these days I honestly do feel like Walker is a genius, but he's so idiosyncratic that I have very little fight left in me for anyone who might disagree. I'm not necessarily convinced myself.

After I borrowed my friend Lisa Godfrey's copy of Fire Escape in the Sky: The Godlike Genius of Scott Walker, I did what research I could on him (damn those pre-Web, pre-Wikipedia days!) and discovered that he was in a band called The Walker Brothers. I remember searching the bins of Vortex (Church and Dundas) and Peter Dunn's Vinyl Museum (Yonge St., near Sam's and A&A's). Before I found a Walker Brothers album, I found a copy of Scott 2, with a very odd cover that I haven't seen since, as if a discount label was reissuing it or something. It was a pretty exciting moment, though, revealing a context for the oddball original tunes that I loved so much, mixed in as they were with covers of Jacques Brel and other material from the pop music archive:

"Best of Both Worlds," not the Miley/Hannah song, but a Lulu classic that I'm sure I'll have to return to.

"Black Sheep Boy," previously discussed here.

"The Amorous Humphrey Plugg," one of my favorite Walker originals.

"Next," one of several Brel songs translated and intrepreted by Mort Shuman for the musical, Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris.

"The Girls from the Streets," an exquisite Walker ("Engel") original.

"Plastic Palace People," a candidate for the best Walker song ever.

"Wait Until Dark," the Mancini song for the film.

"The Girls and the Dogs," a hilarious Brel/Jouannest/Shuman composition.

"Windows of the World," an under-rated Bacharach/David tune.

"The Bridge," one of Walker's only unsatisfying original compositions on these early solo albums.

"Come Next Spring," a song I don't know outside of Walker's version and Tony Bennett's, and it very much sounds like a Bennett song.

Wow, what an incredible album! This opened up so many doors for me. For one, I almost immediately managed to find every other Walker solo album. Second, I did get my hands on the Walker Brothers Make It Easy on Yourself, as well as a compilation that that I can find no reference to online. Most importantly, it got this iconoclastic punk to slow down and listen to music that I'd either dismissed before, or just didn't know about.

I didn't know about Jacques Brel, that's for sure. I was allergic then, and still mostly am, to pop music in any language but English. But I did read an article somewhere on Walker where they discussed the transformative effect Brel's music had for him. And, I was hooked very fast. I bought an actual Brel album. I stumbled on a very expensive Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris at Sam's and quickly connected the dots. Walker's Brel was Brel via Mort Shuman, Eric Blau and company. I'd seen Pomus/Shuman on a bunch of singles that I owned, including "This Magic Moment." I was beginning to understanding something of the "parallel 60s" zeitgeist, and I was ready for it, having overdosed on the official 60s, at least for a while.

I also noticed Brel's songwriting credits on Sinatra's Reprise albums, including "I'm Not Afraid," and "If You Go Away," though these were not Shuman translations but Rod McKuen. I then heard the originals by Brel and my French was just good enough to realize that McKuen's translations were very loose, as were Shuman's (to a lesser extent). I figured out that "Le Moribund" was the original of "Seasons in the Sun," and realized that I'd been living with Brel for longer than I thought. It was all so fascinating, especially as even at that age I had assumed McKuen was the worst poet in the world. But even then I knew there was a big difference, in most cases, between what works on the printed page and what works as a pop song.

"Jackie" is a hoot. A combination of autobiography and fantasy, it's the story of a decadent chanson superstar who descends into a world of prostitutes and drugs and, worst of all, his own ego. Walker cranks up the volume on Brel's version, with larger and louder strings, and a quicker tempo. The lyrics are pretty faithful, but there are entirely new lines in the Shuman version. Brel's original would start something like "Even if one day at Knokke-Le-Zoute I become like I dread a singer for old ladies," whereas Shuman has it : "And if one day I should become/A singer with a Spanish bum/Who sings for women of great virtue."

These lines are fabulously ironic:

"And if I joined the social whirl

Became procurer of young girls

Then I would have my own bordellos

My record would be number one

And I'd sell records by the ton

All sung by many other fellows

My name would then be handsome Jack

And I'd sell boats of opium

Whisky that came from Twickenham

Authentic queers

And phony virgins."

I was still a romantic youth listening to this, hoping to find, in fact, a decadent hero I could emulate, a creative genius who indulged his hedonistic whims. But I also knew that was bullshit, and appreciated that comic relief in this song, especially in the context of Walker's very serious, very existential side. I can't say he was ever without a sense of humor, and that may have gone a long way to saving me from myself.

Scott 2, and especially this song, opened up all the doors I discussed above. But when I look on it now, I realize that it also opened up my interest in the American musical, be it Broadway or off-off in the case of the Brel piece, but also those crooners. I think my fascination with Sinatra began right around this time, and probably displaced the Walker obsession, given that, ultimately, there was more to Sinatra, more to sustain me over the years (and that obsession is going on 30 years).

A couple of years ago we were in New York, when Meredith was still 9 (or was it 8?). There were no big Broadway musicals that we wanted to take her to on that particular trip, so I bought tickets to the Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living Paris revival. I think she was fascinated, if a bit confused by the absence of obvious narrative. I was blown away at the chance to see it in something like the original context.

I'm listening to a Walker original right now, "Big Louise," and I'm positive we'll be coming back to him.


Song #278: The Amorous Humphrey Plugg

1000 Songs

April 13, 2009

Song #278: "The Amorous Humphrey Plugg." Scott Walker, Scott 2, 1968.

I started to reply to Alan and then thought, why not get another Scott Walker number in? "The Amorous Humphrey Plugg" is from the same album as "Jackie," Scott 2. Alan says he doesn't like the weird stuff, but prefers the ballads. This is one of the weird ballads. That's my favorite stuff my Scott Walker. I'm mostly into the 1960s and 1970s. Besides the Walker Brothers, that would be Scott 1-4, Scott Walker Sings Songs from His TV Series, Any Day Now, and The Moviegoer (I wish I had that whole album!). 1970's Till the Band Comes In is great, but already looks forward to the "weird stuff;" I like about half of it. And then Iike Stretch and We Had it All (the "Sundown" album). Then Walker doesn't release anything for a decade when he puts out Climate of Hunter, and then another decade before Tilt. Then Pola X OST (soundtrack to the film by Leos Carax), and most recently The Drift. The material from the past 20 years is hinted at in Nite Flights, the last Walker Brothers studio album.

I mostly love the pop covers, the Brel covers and especially the "Scott Engel" original material from Scott 1-4. I loved hearing all that material gathered together on the Fire Escape in the Sky compilation, but hearing it in the original context added a lot to it for me. The combination of the Brel/Shuman compositions"Jackie", "Next" and "The Girls and the Dogs," along with work by Bacharach, Tim Hardin and Henry Mancini, all mixed into the same gumbo with Engel originals like "The Girls from the Streets," "Plastic Palace People," and the song under discussion here was so disorienting, but so seductive, to my 18 year old ears back in 1981, that I still haven't recovered.

I did find music that I could compare it to, perhaps Jimmy Webb or Love or "Touch Me" by the Doors, but it mostly stood, and still stands, on its own. I had a high tolerance for his idiosyncratic and eclectic approach. Why NOT combine psychedelia, deep crooner vocals, lush orchestration, and romantic/surreal lyrics? Why wouldn't I like a song called "The Amorous Humphrey Plugg."

I knew it was a song by a loner, and I romanticized isolation then. Not that I actually was a loner but I craved solitude. I now see that as a form of mental illness, but there's no doubt that it has probably helped Walker produce his strange, imaginative songs. I know I've been quoting lyrics perhaps a little too often lately, but I must again in this case:

Hello Mr. Big Shot

Say, you're looking smart

I've had a tiring day

I took the kids along to the park

You've become a stranger

Every night with the boys

Got a new suit

That old smile's come back

And I kiss the children good night

And I slip away on the newly waxed floor

I've become a giant

I fill every street

I dwarf the rooftops

I hunchback the moon

Stars dance at my feet

Leave it all behind me

Screaming kids on my knee

And the telly swallowing me

And the neighbor shouting next door

And the subway trembling the roller-skate floor

I seek the buildings blazing with moonlight

In Channing Way

Their very eyes seem to suck you in with their laughter

They seem to say

You're all right now

So stop a while behind our smile

In Channing Way

It almost makes sense; and then it doesn't. But every single line evokes fantastic images in my mind, perhaps because Walker sings with such fabulous conviction, like when he's singing "The Impossible Dream," or perhaps because the strings (of the bowed variety and the plucked and strummed variety), the horns, the subtle percussive elements make it all seem so Meaningful.

When I first heard this, and "Plastic Palace People," and "Seventh Seal," I wondered why there wasn't more music like this. I think that more than anything I'd ever heard since those first magical moments with Johnny Cash, I was moved to rethink what I wanted from music, to reassess what I thought was good and cool. It led me down many incredible paths.

Despite all that, I was always a bit embarrassed introducing Walker to anyone. Evangelical, but embarrassed. I knew it was a huge stretch for those of us committed to punk and new wave, ska and reggae. I couldn't exactly invoke Julian Cope, because I didn't know anyone besides my girlfriend and me who liked them. As I said in the "Seventh Seal" entry, I was thrilled when I found a handful of people in Toronto who shared my passion. It’s hard to imagine this now that we’re more than 25 years into the Web, and more than a decade when everyone suddenly embraced social media in its various forms. 

Good call, Alan, on Strangers When We Meet. As it has Kim Novak in it, I've seen it. I think that, and Sirk, are good analogies for Walker, as well as the obvious Bergman angle, and Sergio Leone.

"Mathilde" and "Next" are favorites (both Brel). "We Came Through," too, but I agree with the "The Old Man's Back Again:" something different is starting to happen there (both originals; "Seventh Seal" too).

It's possible that Walker's best work is overblown, almost, but then it's restrained. That may not be so true for "We Came Through."

By the way, the Brel musical opened in January, 1968, but Walker had already recorded some of the Shuman translations, including "Mathilde" on his debut solo album, Scott, in 1967.

Maybe there's room for one more Scott Walker. But, if you include "Black Sheep Boy," I guess we're already at 4. I really like "Will You Still Be Mine?" though.

1000 Songs

April 3, 2013
Song #762: "Amsterdam." Jacques Brel, 1964. 

Speaking of Pin-Ups, Bowie's version of "Amsterdam" was recorded in 1970 but released as the b-side of "Sorrow" in 1973. Pin-ups was exclusively UK 60s covers so "Amsterdam" didn't qualify. Nor would it have for the sequel, had Bowie released it, of American 60s covers. "White Light/White Heat" would have been part of the sequel.

I first heard Bowie's version on Bowie Rare, which apparently came out in 1983. I could have sworn that I had it in high school but, as is so often the case, my memory is impressionistic rather than photographic.

I really love Bowie's take on this song, but it is really Bowie after Walker after Shuman after Brel.

I heard Scott Walker's version first. Like a number other Walker songs, it changed my notion of what pop music could do, and most importantly what it could do for me.
I first heard it on either Scott Walker Sings Jacques Brel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Walker_Sings_Jacques_Brel) or Scott (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_(album). I bought both albums in quick succession at Peter Dunn’s VInyl Museum in late 1981, shortly after my friend Lisa Godfrey gave me her copy of Fire Escape in the Sky: The Godlike Genius of Scott Walker (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire_Escape_in_the_Sky:_The_Godlike_Genius_of_Scott_Walker). Hearing Fire Escape, the  classic Julian Cope compilation of Walker’s solo compositions, changed my musical landscape more than almost anything. Discovering the Brel side on the compilation and the first solo album was too much to ask for. Walker’s own compositions were enough, but to be joined by “Jackie” (https://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_5553156450&view=doc&id=10150226521116451 - where I also discussed the incredible album Scott 2); “Next,” “The Girls and the Dogs,” “If You Go Away” (https://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_5553156450&view=doc&id=10150216585281451), “Funeral Tango”, “Mathilde”, “Amsterdam,” “Sons Of,” and “My Death”? Well that’s an insane set of compilation albums. 

Scott revealed even more layers to Walker’s musical depth. “Montague Terrace (In Blue)”, “Such a Small Love” and “Little Things (That Keep Us Together), three of Walker’s own brilliant compositions, are joined by not only three intense Brel numbers (translated by Mort Shuman), “Mathilde,” “My Death” and “Amsterdam,” but also by Tim Hardin’s “The Lady Came from Baltimore,” “When Joanna Loved Me,” and other songs that feel like standards when Walker gets a hold of them. 

Those three purchases led to finding Scott 2, Scott 3, Scott 4, Any Day Now, and Scott: Scott Walker Sings Songs from his TV Series. I went into that rabbit hole and never came out. 

One day at Sam’s I came across the soundtrack to the off-Broadway musical, Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris. I bought it. And then I got that that was where Walker found his translations and interpretations of Brel. The album blew me away and a whole new world opened up for me. (I had the great pleasure of seeing a performance of the revival in NY in 2006, along with Shellie and Meredith, who was 8 at the time but managed to derive something from the experience). 
Check out “Amsterdam” from the soundtrack: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGoavSHFOHo. I wasn’t in the land or rock, pop, punk, or new wave, but they led me there and this is where I landed: 

In the port of Amsterdam

Where the sailors all meet

There's a sailor who eats

Only fishheads and tails

He will show you his teeth

That have rotted too soon

That can swallow the moon

That can haul up the sails

And he yells to the cook

With his arms open wide

Bring me more fish

Put it down by my side

Then he wants so to belch

But he's too full to try

So he gets up and laughs

And he zips up his fly

In the port of Amsterdam

You can see sailors dance

Paunches bursting their pants

Grinding women to paunch

They've forgotten the tune

That their whiskey voice croaks

Splitting the night with the

Roar of their jokes

And they turn and they dance

And they laugh and they lust

Till the rancid sound of

The accordion bursts

Then out to the night

With their pride in their pants

With the slut that they tow

Underneath the street lamps

Fantastic! I love this song, and all of the great interpretations, beginning with Brel’s original. Apparently there is no studio version: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMzAmrNS164

So I went from Walker to Shuman back to Brel and then over to Bowie in 1983 when Rare came out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6wKKQMDNHo. It seems likely that Bowie heard Walker’s version on the 1967 Scott LP, but he also saw a London performance of Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and LIving in Paris. He apparently planned to end side of Ziggy Stardust with Amsterdam, twinning side 2’s “Rock and Roll Suicide” closer. I’m not sure why he didn’t, but it could be that he thought his execution of this song was too much in awe of Walker and Brel, without entirely delivering the goods. 

Walker’s version is the gold standard for me: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uF_eVJ7WYaY. Nothing beats that huge, deep voice that never gets a chance to pause, the accompanying accordion, the quickening of tempo, and the strange tension that’s created by the incredibly earnest delivery of a song by someone who clearly never experienced the tale that he’s telling. It’s an apocalyptic tale, echoing the paintings of Breughel.

Dave van Ronk has a convincing enough version: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7t-R9KH770

I didn’t know that John Denver had recorded it though. First in 1970, and then as part of his live show throughout the 70s: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5pwk3AAjjk. It’s not too bad. 

And Rod McKuen, the other great English translator of Brel’s songs, translated the song slightly differently: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4psm7_3bIHs

#32: A Place to Stand

I originally posted this as a Facebook Note back in 2014,. It makes sense here, however, as part of the 500 people, places and things to define Jim Shedden. Also, I’ve had reason to think about the Expo 67 films + the Eames’s film installations lately. Here goes:

Film #3: A Place to Stand. (Christopher Chapman, 1967.)

I frequently declare that my first memory in life was hearing "Ring of Fire" in our living room on 30 Pixley Cr.

A close second, or even a #1 contender, has to be watching A Place to Stand at the Ontario Pavilion at Expo 67. I was three years old, a month or two away from turning four. I've always been able to recall memory fragments of that trip: the Buckminster Fuller geodesic dome - the US Pavilion - that eventually burned down; a few rides; possibly Michael Snow’s Expo Walking Woman; and then a handful of "expanded cinema" pavilions.

A number of researchers at York University did a project on the “expanded cinema” features at Expo 67, describing the works presented there as: “the most important films to have disappeared from the Canadian film canon. These seven multi-screen productions challenged both the cinema production technology of the day, modes of screening, audience reception as well as the received wisdom as to what cinema was or could be. Roman Kroitor, Colin Low and Tom Daly’s Labyrinth Pavilion – a five story building designed around two multi-screen productions – has been described as the “last, and most complete, statement of the collective humanist ethos of the NFB’s Unit B” (Morris). Michel Brault’s Settlement and Conflict and Charles Gagnon’s The Eighth Day were major works by two of the most gifted Canadian filmmakers of the day. Graeme Ferguson’s Polar Life and Christopher Chapman’s A Place to Stand demonstrated the potential for large screen cinema exposition that Ferguson and Kroitor would shortly thereafter develop as IMAX. Two other multi-screen productions – Canada 67 and Francis Thompson and Alexander Hammid’s We Are Young – contributed to a growing body of alternative cinema widely seen as the future of the medium.”

It’s hard to know with early memories how real they are or how after the fact information leads one to reconstruct them as memories. It’s a little of both here for me, but I have to say that I don’t entirely believe that my memories are true memories. 

And yet when I look at A Place to Stand in these very substandard representations, I remember the experience of the film very clearly. Here’s Part One: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rt-5tAWJxvU. And here’s Part Two: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Shc36l-6p_Y

Now, the AGO owns a 16mm print of the film but all the years that I was the film curator, I’m not sure that I ever once screened it. I was tempted because of my fond memories of the piece and films like it, but I always felt that a 16mm print would be depressing, given that it was made in 70mm and like the other films at Expo 67, anticipated Imax. There may have been one exception where I broke down and looked at it, but maybe not. The irony of me so easily taking it on on YouTube isn’t lost on me by the way. 

Maybe I also saw the film at the Ontario Place Cinesphere as well, but I can’t imagine that they gave up screen time in those early years to anything but full-on IMAX films, from North of the Superior to everything that followed. 

Maybe we saw it on the portable Bell & Howell in 16mm in our classrooms. That’s more likely. 

The point is I remember it well and I love pretty much everything about it. It, and the other films at Expo 67, seemed to have planted a seed in me making me appreciate that films might: 

have polyphonic image tracks

might not be narrative 

might be experienced primarily viscerally 

might be optimistic 

might be a way of celebrating the natural and the built environments, not to mention “man and his world” 

might be propaganda

might be without dialogue 

might have music tracks that place them in a very particular place and time

might be installed as part of larger environments

Specifically, I remember loving the multiple frames, and remember it in fact as multiple projections (which it’s not). Not only are there multiple frames, but the number of frames, and the size of the frames varies, and the frames themselves sometimes move while moving images are taking place within them. 

I loved all this elegant visual complexity. It totally predetermined my interest in avant-garde films that I would come to love as a young adult. 

I definitely remember A Place to Stand. I also know that I saw other installations there, but I’m not as clear about them. The Labyrinth feels pretty familiar though. According to the York scholars, “Labyrinth/Labyrinthe

(the French title is occasionally used in English language writing about it) was an Expo pavilion produced by the National Film Board of Canada under the direction of Roman Kroitor. It was commissioned as part of the exposition’s theme, Man the Hero and designed around the myth of the minotaur. The Pavilion contained three chambers, the first and third of which were screening venues. In Chamber One, audiences stood in four stacked rows of elliptically shaped balconies to watch a two -screen film. The work was projected on 50 foot (15 meter) screens, one placed horizontally along the floor and the other horizontally at the far end of the chamber. The two sets of 70mm images were screened in a horizontal aspect ratio. The shots in the two separate films were edited so as to provide reflective images of a loosely structured universal life story (e.g. the often reproduced image of a baby on the floor screen with a father looking down at the baby projected onto the wall screen). Between the two chambers, the audience moved through a labyrinth-like passage constructed of two way mirrors through which they could see thousands of small light bulbs. Emerging from that labyrinth, the audience was ushered into a conventional auditorium. In this third chamber they were shown a multi-screen film, projected on five screens arranged in a cruciform. The film, co-directed by Kroitor, Colin Low, and Hugh O’Connor and edited by Tom Daly, used a variety of images shot in various global locations (e.g. the African jungle, the GUM department store in Moscow, the funeral of Winston Churchill in London) to elicit the idea of trial and triumph. This second work, under the title Into The Labyrinth, remains an enduring masterpiece of multi-screen cinema.” 

A-ha! So there were multi-screen films and this sure sounds familiar: I definitely was having my first memories of life in that amazing, historic environment. 

Here it is, abridged and in two parts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1BT1xt6yq8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YsT-wO4Nv5I

For many years, until film and video installations became as commonplace as landscape and portrait painting in galleries, I was excited by any installation that involved multiple projections, any complex dance between the already complex image track and a complex music track, and any use of split screen in films. 

Jewison’s The Thomas Crown Affair

Godard’s Sauve qui peut (la vie) 

Woodstock 

Carrie

Nam June Paik 

Chelsea Girls 

Epileptic Seizure Comparison (Sharits) 

Christmas on Earth (Barbara Rubin) 

Various works by Bill Viola, Gary Hill and others 

etc. 

And then I had the privilege of producing two multi-image works at Bruce Mau Design, STRESS and Tokyo Countdown (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GihcpCmMVBE) both of them somewhat inspired by the Expo 67 ethos, as was our project Massive Change. 

Whatever I saw at Expo, and whatever I really remember, it had a huge effect on my life. I still get goosebumps thinking of those films. 

#31: Montreal

SHEDDEN 500 BLOG: 500 people, places and things that define Jim Shedden.

#31/500: Montreal

I like Montreal. I love Montreal.

I’m going next week to attend to some family business (in Laval), but Shellie and I will have a day or two to explore the city again to see if we can rekindle the romance with that city again.

I love Montreal, but it’s not that simple sometimes. While it’s the only city in Canada that I’d want to live in other than Toronto, I’ve never done it and it doesn’t mean I don’t love Toronto.

Still, it’s all Toronto + Montreal for me, not Toronto vs. Montreal. Even for that brief moment in childhood when I was into hockey, it was all about Boston vs. Montreal for me in any case.

My mother was from Îles de la Madeleine and moved to Halifax quite young when her mother died. Much of her family ended up in Montreal and the surrounding area, so I spent a lot of my time visiting Montreal as a kid. I don’t remember the name of the area where my grandparents live, but it seemed a bit rural (but becoming suburban), kind of like Manse Road or Military Trail in Scarborough did. I do remember there was a dépanneur within walking distance and I admit that buying candy and other sugary garbage there is the strongest memory I have of that house.

My aunts and uncles and a few dozen of my mother’s 100 cousins all seemed to end up in Verdun, specifically the working class area of Wellington-De l'Église, with its mainly 2 and 3-plexes and outdoor, winding staircases and balconies. Verdun was its own city until it amalgamated with Montreal in 2002, and was mostly dry (maybe it still is)? The retail and residential street life was designed for success, along a couple of main streets at grade (with walk-ups above), but always seemed a bit subdued or even depressed. I hear this has turned around significantly since the 1990s, and it doesn’t surprise me. Verdun always seemed like it had the potential to be one of the more attractive and lively parts of Montreal. I haven’t been there since 1992. I used to crash at my Aunt Simone’s walk-ups when I was there for Montreal World Film Festival, then a bigger deal than the Festival of Festivals. Maybe it’s worth a visit in the short period of time we have there on this visit to see if my slightly romantic memories of Verdun have any substance.

When I was 3 (almost 4) we went to Expo 67. Who knows how real this is, but it seems that my first memories in life may be attending this World’s Fair and taking in a couple of the spectacular multi-screen film installations: A Place to Stand (the Ontario Pavilion) almost for sure; and possibly the NFB’s Labyrinth Pavilion. These are the two that are the most discussed these days, and I am very consciously paying homage to A Place to Stand with a multi-screen installation that I am working on. But my father has mentioned The Telephone Pavilion, a total wrap-around whereby 1500 people would stand in a room surrounded by nine large film screens. I was apparently there, so perhaps I have a lingering memory of that one as well. It was commissioned by Canada’s telephone companies and made by Disney.

There were many other installations at Expo 67. I may have seen We are Young (Francis Thompson and Alexander Hammid, who I know from the experimental film world), which is a wonderful record of those optimistic, progressive times. Whatever I attended or didn’t, it’s all I remember from Expo 67, and the whole idea that I was at the most cinematic of all World’s Fairs (and they were frequently cinematic), one that meshed with the “expanded cinema” vibe at the time, has always been exciting to me. It seems that I truly became conscious in Montreal.

Over the years, I also became aware of few other features of Expo 67. Habitat, for example, Moshe Safdie’s masterpiece, and what I still consider the greatest building in Canadian history. I say that as someone who hasn’t been insider, nor even very close to it in real life. But I have been close enough and I’ve seen photos and models and I am always excited to see it in any form, including an artwork by Brian Jungen when he makes a miniature version of it as a cat residence. I love it.

There was also Bucky’s American Pavilion, one of his great geodesic domes. Unfortunately it burned to the ground.

I am moved by the story of how the theme, Man and His World, was chosen. It was a group comprising a group of prominent Canadian thinkers—including Alan Jarvis, director of the National Gallery of Canada; novelists Hugh MacLennan and Gabrielle Roy; J. Tuzo Wilson, geophysicist; and Claude Robillard, town planner, who met for three days at the Seigneury Club in Montebello, Quebec in 1963. It seems that we would not be so bold, or confident, to turn this sort of thing over to writers, scientists and planners now, but who knows?  The theme, "Man and His World", was based on the 1939 book entitled Terre des Hommes (translated as Wind, Sand and Stars) by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. Roy explained the theme as follows:

“In Terre des Hommes, his haunting book, so filled with dreams and hopes for the future, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry writes of how deeply moved he was when, flying for the first time by night alone over Argentina, he happened to notice a few flickering lights scattered below him across an almost empty plain. They "twinkled here and there, alone like stars. ..." In truth, being made aware of our own solitude can give us insight into the solitude of others. It can even cause us to gravitate towards one another as if to lessen our distress. Without this inevitable solitude, would there be any fusion at all, any tenderness between human beings. Moved as he was by a heightened awareness of the solitude of all creation and by the human need for solidarity, Saint-Exupéry found a phrase to express his anguish and his hope that was as simple as it was rich in meaning; and because that phrase was chosen many years later to be the governing idea of Expo 67, a group of people from all walks of life was invited by the Corporation to reflect upon it and to see how it could be given tangible form.”

Since then, I have had many good, great and transformative experiences in Montreal. I’ve had some bad ones, too, but I mainly chalk that up to me being in crappy frame of mind.

I was at the 76 Olympics.

I have a false memory of being in Montreal right after the referendum where Jacques Parizeau blamed the loss on on "l'argent et des votes ethniques", and I remember being there with my friends Dave, Tracy and Art, me for the film festival and they for general hanging about. But the referendum was in 1995 and I think that trip with those three was in 1991 or 1992. Anyhow, good times with them, good times with Shellie in 1995 maybe, and bad times with Parizeau, who made it clear that nationalism always ends up being ugly.

I went to a few smaller film festivals in Montreal, too, including the Festival of New Cinema (or whatever it’s called now), and then I had a documentary in the Festival of Films on Art (my Michael Snow Up Close piece).

I’ve walked up and down St. Laurent dozens of times. That’s how I generally structure my time. I may wander over to St. Denis or Ste. Catherine, but St. Laurent has always led me to great things. For example, Schwartz’s Deli is on that great street. This is an establishment that I like so much that I’ve often had briskets delivered to me via FedEx, or my friends Jim and Joanne who visit frequently. I’ve patronized the competition over the years too, including The Main and Ben’s: they’re praiseworthy too.

I love the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and the Musée d’art contemporain. The CCA is always up something intriguing as well.

I’ve been to the jazz festival numerous times.

I like that I can always go to L’Express for lunch or dinner and it’s always great. I always like that in a city, and lament that my own town doesn’t foster longevity in restaurants, bars, cafes, etc.

I love the popularity of rotisserie restaurants, thanks to the Portuguese population.

Bagels: I’ll take St. Viateur or Fairmont. Usually I go to the former, just out of habit.

I love wandering into Drawn and Quarterly to find out what’s happening in the world of the graphic novel.

I love the vintage shops in the Mile End, though I have never found anything that fits me there.

I like wandering around Old Montreal.

I like the tiny (compared to Toronto) Chinatown and have eaten well there.

Happy I attended a St. Paddy’s Day Parade there once, and I’m happy to never do it again.

Many of my friends have lived there, or visit often, so feel free to give me advice. That also applies to my very good friends who live there now (full or part-time): Sasha Johnson, Ella Stewart, Richard Kerr, Dave Morris, Emilia Angelova.

#30: Martha Shedden, 1937-2018


Marie-Marthe Shedden (née Boudreau) died a year ago on March 7, 2018. As she suffered from dementia (Alzheimer’s-type, but not quite Alzheimer’s), we witnessed her passing one week at a time, or one day at a time in my father’s case (as he visited her in the nursing home almost every day for several years). For several years - 10? 15? more? - she was slip sliding away. Her vitality, energy, memory, and other cognitive faculties gradually declined in such a cruel way that it wasn’t obvious exactly what was going on. We were confused, sad, angry, embarrassed, and helpless. 

Eventually, after a tortuous emotional and bureaucratic journey, we were able to get Martha the care she needed. During that time, the decline was more obvious and I think it’s safe to say we began mourning her passing years before her heart stopped beating. 

On my mother’s 75th birthday, I wrote this list of 50 fond memories of Martha, this warm and loving wife and mother, grandmother, great grandmother, sister, daughter, neighbour, and friend. I can’t remember if she was able to read it, but I think Bill at least brought it to her attention. My list might be slightly different today, but only slightly: 

50 Martha Memories (for Mom's 75th Birthday, October 30, 2012) 

1. Visiting dozens of cousins in Montreal on many occasions. Always being served 7-Up despite being told about all the Pepsi Montrealers drink.

2. Going downtown so that she could buy textiles and accessories on Spadina Ave. (pre-”new economy”!), and so that I could troll the comic stores and used book stores.

3. Meeting at the Lite Bite Coffee Shop at Queen and Spadina after our those hunting and gathering missions.

4. Always talking about going to the Bo Peep restaurant. Maybe going once.

5. Bert Kampfaert, That Happy Feeling.

6. Bert Kaempfert, A Swingin’ Safari.

7. All soap operas.

8. Slangy, Québécois French.

9. Map-O Spread. (Well, it reminds me of her sister Cecile, but by extension).

10. Voulez-vous.

11. Boney M.

12. Lasagna.

13. Home-made popsicles (half Kool-Aid, half Jello).

14. Lobster on New Year’s Eve. 

15. The lunch counter at Eaton’s Shopper’s World.

16. Taking us to the Santa Claus Parade and standing on the north west corner of Markham and Lawrence, all the while knowing that the real Santa was at Eaton’s downtown (only to find out later that the real, real Santa was at Macy’s in NYC).

17. Chocolate coconut cluster cookies (I guess if we were in the south we might call them Chocolate Kokonut Kluster Kookies, as they tend to do with these things still). 

18. Playing bingo the whole time we were on the Midway at the CNE. That could be 4 or 5 hours, every single year. 

19. Monopoly. But mostly Scrabble and, when her sister was visiting, cribbage. 

20. Falcon. Datsun wagon. Plymouth Satellite Sebring. Dodge Omni. K Car. 

21. Endless chauffeuring (though I backed off of that service pretty early on).

22. Calm detachment during a couple of parties that were going on in her basement, and tolerating things I won’t be tolerating when Meredith’s that age I was then.

23. Mowing the lawn (a shared activity between Bill, Martha and Jim, but I have clear images of her engaged in the Suburban Pastoral ritual). 

24. Fish and Chips after church in Highland Creek. The Fish and Chips are a stronger memory than church.

25. McDonald’s after church and catechism at St. Martin de Porres. Again, it was always about the fries. It still is. By the way, she would generally go to church while we were at catechism. Our teachers, and even Father O’Brien, would tell us that it wasn’t enough to go to catechism. We also had to go to church or we would end up in, yes you guessed it, hell. Yes, I would like fries with that.

26. Pop Shoppe! A 2-4 of the good stuff would include Cola, Root Beer, Ginger Ale, Lime Rickey, Lemon Lime, Black Cherry (!), and Cream Soda.

27. Shabby shops like Family Wear House.

28. Bi-Way. 

29. Those not-frequent-enough trips to Sam’s and A&A’s downtown, especially when her sisters were visiting. 

30. Pies. Strawberry-Rhubarb. Raspberry-Rhubarb. Pecan. Lemon Meringue. Key Lime. Peach. Blueberry. Apple.

31. CKEY, 590. 

32. Smoking. Many activities revolved around getting smokes, lighting smokes, smoking smokes, cleaning ashtrays, etc. That was true for most people back then, so I’m not judging. It’s just a strong memory that I have. 

33. L’Eggs. 

34. Much sewing. The Singer sewing machine. Patterns all of the floor. 

35. Découpage. On every surface imaginable. 

36. Waiting for us when we got out of the dentist’s office, frozen, sore and befogged from the gas still, songs like “That’s What You Get When You Fall in Love” still ringing in our ears (fused with the sound of the drill of course). 

37. Working at the Borden’s employees store! The best times ever. We always had lots of ice cream and frozen treats on hand then, as well as chocolate milk: treats became the norm. 

38. Being drunk, just once, in Jamaica. I think about this occasionally when I consider how many of her ancestors were alcoholics, and how many in her immediate family are alcoholics. 

39. The food cupboards downstairs, sort of resembling a bomb shelter. 

40. Collecting. Lots of collecting. At first this rubbed off on me and I collected coins, then comics, then books and records, then movies in their various formats. I eventually couldn’t do it and decided to work for an institution whose mandate is to collect, and I ceased collecting everything. I make these lists instead. 

41. Making our lunches and putting in way too much junk for our own good. Rooti Root Beer. Club bars. Wagon Wheels. Joe Louis. Mae Wests. 1/2 Lune Moons. 

42. Running the show whenever we were camping. The amount of work she (and Bill) had to do to make that work somehow convinced me never to take my family camping, though I loved it and tell myself that I might still like it today (but I think I’m lying). “Darling I love you but give me Park Avenue...” 

43. Doing the same in our little cottage in Cape Cod. A little easier, for sure, but not too much. 

44. Johnny Cash’s Greatest Hits. Johnny Cash Live at Folsom Prison.

45. Simon and Garfunkel’s Greatest Hits. And the singles of “Cecilia” and “Fakin’ It” which weren’t on the album. 

46. Two trips to Halifax, where she was raised (for the most part). I only really remember the second one, after her Aunt Rose died. 

47. I have stronger memories of visiting her father’s house in “rural” Montreal (it wasn’t quite suburban yet, and definitely wasn’t urban, and the various relatives in Verdun (where so much of that 7-Up was consumed), and my first memories in life, at Expo 67. 

48. The Hudson’s Bay coat that Bill bought her. 

49. The crock pot. 

50. Eggnogs for breakfast for a good five years there, maybe longer. Lots of healthy stuff in them, of course, but also remember a scoop or two of vanilla ice cream being part of the formula. Delicious!