The English Beat were a fabulous outfit out of Birmingham. One of the original ska bands their story is for another day. In a backstabbing tragedy worthy of a Shakespeare play the two singers/band leaders jettisoned the band in the interests of splitting the cash less ways and started an outfit called General Public. General Public went on to limited success and had one great hit titled Tenderness that you might recall. The guitarist and bassist from the Beat regrouped and went on to form the Fine Young Cannibals.

In 1985 the Fine Young Cannibals released their self titled debut album to little fanfare. One of the best break-up albums of all time it is laced with self indulgent misery not to mention a rythym section worthy of Sly and Robbie type acclaim and introduced a lead singer with a unique soulful sound. Before disappearing it provided a small club hit called Johnny Come Home that is not indicative of what the balance of the record contains. I urge you to check out Couldn’t Care More, Funny How Love Is, Blue, and Suspicious Minds. Suspicious Minds is a cover of an Elvis tune that features Jimmy Somerville of the Bronski Beat on background vocals (another story for another day).

The band only released one more true album that being the Raw and the Cooked five years after album one. This disc generated a worldwide #1 hit in She Drives Me Crazy and a hit from the movie Tin Men (worth seeing) called Good Thing. They never toured to any great extent and just faded away from there. They have the distinction of being the only band in history to have a number one hit and not record a follow-up.

Some other trivia not worth mentioning. Roland Gift, the singer, was more interested in acting. He did at least one solid film titled Sammy and Rosie Get Fucked (Laid in North America) that takes place in Brixton during the race riots. Dave Cox and Dave Steele the guitarist and bass player remain obscure. There is a funny episode of VH1 Reuniting the Band where the two backstabbers from the Beat attempt to get the band back together and they can’t even manage to get either of Cox or Steele on camera.

Happy listening.

This month we take a look at two Canadian Icons - Bob & Doug McKenzie.

Bob & Doug McKenzie first appeared on the classic Canadian television show SCTV in the late 1970s. The characters were created by Dave Thomas and Rick Moranis. The original intent of the skit was to protest government regulations for identifiable Canadian content in domestically produced media programming. Airing first on SCTV as the program “The Great White North”, Bob & Doug became almost instant national heroes. Despite the fact that the two dim witted brothers combined as many negative Canadian stereotypes as possible. The brothers embodied the stereotypical Canadian. Their dialogue was spiced with things like, “Eh?”, “Hoser”, and “Take off!” They guzzled beer, loved donuts and of course ate pounds of back bacon. They became so popular that “The Great White North” remained in the program when the skits were aired in the U.S. version. Thomas and Moranis were eventually made members of the Order of Canada for their contribution to Canadian culture. The New York Times called them the “Cheech and Chong of beer drinkers”, and they’ve been likened to Laurel and Hardy by the Bergen Record. Read more »

Let’s explore today the oft misunderstood heavy metal ballad, specifically from the hair metal genre. To completely grasp why the need for such a thing we must backtrack to the beginning of the metal bands and explore their reason to be. Ultimately guys make music for one reason, no not to pursue a disposition to honing their craft and carve their name into the annals of rock history, but rather to meet girls and hopefully get lucky. No one understands this better than Steven Tyler of Aerosmith. Through all their excess and abuse he said they finally realized they had a real problem when it occurred to him the roadies were getting more than they were, because he and Joe Perry had lost focus and were more about the drugs, and that was defeating the whole purpose.

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The origins of Halloween date back over 2,000 years to a popular Celtic festival called Samhain. At this time, the New Year was on November 1st and it marked the end of summer and the beginning of the long, cold, dark winter. Winter was a dangerous and uncertain time, and the presence of death lingered.

The Celts would celebrate on the eve of the New Year. They believed that on the eve of the New Year the boundary between the world of the dead and the world of the living became blurred and spirits would mingle with the living. Spirits would return to the land of the living causing trouble, damaging crops, and searching for bodies to possess. If a spirit took control of a living body, they could enter the afterlife.

To avoid being possessed by these roaming spirits the living would extinguish fires in their homes to make it uninviting and later relight their hearth fires from the common source of Druid fire located at Usinach (in the middle of Ireland). The living would also wear ghoulish costumes and parade noisily around the neighbourhood to try to confuse the spirits. This was meant to make it hard for the spirits to distinguish between who was dead and who was alive.
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The Stanley Cup is one of Canada’s most famous national icons It is sought after by the greatest hockey players in the world and is the oldest trophy competed for by professional athletes in North America. Canadian hockey players can be considered twenty-first century gladiators as they strive to win the cup on behalf of their fans. Although there are many in the National Hockey League, most will spend their careers and never get the chance to hold the Cup over their heads in victory. This fact only increases the allure and strengthens the competition in the quest for one of the world’s most prestigious sporting trophies. Let us look at the origin of the Stanley Cup.

We can thank Lord Stanley for his generosity in recognizing the need for a championship trophy that could be fought for each year by the best. Originally, Stanley donated this trophy as an award for Canada’s top-ranking amateur hockey club. Lord Stanley of Preston, the 16th Earl of Derby became intrigued with this popular Canadian sport while serving as Governor General from 1888 to 1893. Although Stanley was not a hockey player, he appreciated the sport as a proud hockey dad.
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Bud the Spud, Sudbury Saturday Night, I am the Wind, The Good Ol’ Hockey Game, The Moon-Man Newfie, Sasquatch Song, Big Joe Mufferaw and the list goes on and on. Stompin’ Tom Connors writes songs that are true to the average Canadian and they just don’t fit with any radio format. This Canadian is a legend and he epitomizes what true patriotism is. He has led an eventful life as a grassroots musician that has in turn taken him all over Canada. After more than 30 years, he is still performing and Stompin’ Tom has outlasted many once celebrated musicians. Guts, perseverance, persistence and spirit are just some of the words that describe this man.

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