One of Canada's most beloved bands, the Tragically Hip, are back with a surprise new release, Saskadelphia, a six-song record featuring six tracks, five outtakes from the Road Apples session and one live song, "Montreal," recorded in 1990.
Saskadelphia is the first release from the band since lead singer Gord Downie passed away in October of 2017 from a brain tumor. I spoke with guitarists Rob Baker and Paul Langlois, who admitted it is still understandably hard for them to listen to the old recordings. But after thinking they had lost old masters in the Universal Fire of 2008 on the Universal Studios Backlot, the band, led by drummer Johnny Fay, decided to mine the archives, where they found these six songs.
I spoke with Baker and Langlois via Zoom earlier this week about finding these old songs, what those songs represent to them and being presented with a Humanitarian award, by Rush's Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson, at Canada's JUNO Awards next month .
Steve Baltin: A lot of artists typically don't ever go back and revisit material. So are there things that surprised you. Where you were just like, "It's 30 years later and I don't remember that but that's actually really cool?"
Paul Langlois: Yeah the searching process started a couple years ago and we weren't necessarily focused solely at the time. But then gradually it was kind of appearing like wait a second, we should maybe focus on Road Apples just because its thirtieth anniversary was coming up. Johnny our drummer lives in Toronto, he has a keen eye for this kind of stuff so he was kind of leading the charge to find the tapes. We actually found the songs we were looking for and were sent the mixes. Our guy Mark Vreeken remixed them in good faith to Don Smith who produced it, I was very hesitant to push play. I just thought, "I don't know." And to say I was pleasantly surprised is putting it mildly. It was like, Wow this is way, way better than I was expecting. So that's a great feeling, we were a tight little rock and roll band back then apparently.
Rob Baker: Yeah you mentioned how a lot of people don't go back and look back at their archives. We were definitely that way. It was always about what's next so if a song didn't make a record it didn't get revisited for the next record. And sometimes the reason they didn't make a record had nothing to do with quality, it had to do with length, or we have one too many ballads or there's already a number at that tempo. So to hear these songs after not hearing them literally not hearing a note of them for 30 years was kind of incredible. You think, "Wow that didn't make the record? That's pretty good."
Baltin: As you go back and look through it then and realize that the songs hold up does it make you want to go back and revisit other material?
Baker: Yeah I think this whole thing really started with the news of the Universal fire breaking and then that leading Johnny to doggedly pursue our masters and find out where all the tapes were. We knew that there was a lot of stuff, that Road Apples had somewhere between six and 10 songs that we had recorded that didn't make the record. But every record has at least two or three sometimes more. So yeah, I think, as this process rolls on we will get all those tapes amalgamated and transferred to a digital medium so that we can hopefully preserve them. I would assume that there will be more of this that we will be checking out all these songs that we haven't listened to in decades so.
Langlois: Yeah, you can see why Neil [Young] and Bruce [Springsteen], prolific songwriters, they record all the time and honestly that's what we did. We toured all the time, but we also wrote and recorded a lot more stuff than has been heard, and what the fans want is to hear this stuff. There's just no gray area. If they're a fan of the band they're interested in anything they haven't heard. It's been an interesting process. It's kind of got us back together, we were pretty much in a grieving sort of fog for almost a couple of years and for the past year, especially with COVID. But we're having a lot of zoom calls and there's an enthusiasm back. Gord's brother Pat is on every call. He represents Gord's family's interests and represents Gord and we feel like we're honoring him. We feel like he would want us to be doing this, digging up stuff . I think we'll just keep looking. This is gonna keep going we're going to keep looking for good ones and kind of enjoying it.
Baltin: I spoke with Pat and Josh [Finlayson, co-writer] in regards to the solo album. And one of the things we discussed was you need that time to grieve and step away. Do you feel like now, you had enough time that you can go back and just appreciate the music?
Baker: Yeah I think it's getting there, slowly getting there. I can only do it in small batches and there are a couple of points listening to stuff. Hearing alternate versions of songs, working versions, there's a song called "Fiddler's Green," where we're just working it up, just Gord and I. And hearing Gord talking before the take and you're listening on headphones and it's like he's in your head and it got a little overwhelming. I kind of had to stop so it's taken some time. But we're getting there.
Baltin: When you went back and listened to the songs specifically were there things that you guys heard in there, that surprised you or specific songs that really held up for you?
Baker: I was surprised at how well they all stood up really. And I was kind of shocked by the sort of a youthful energy, I don't play guitar like that anymore. It's a very different approach to the instrument than I have now, I just I don't think I could play that way.
Langlois: It wasn't until I heard it that I remembered being in my own mind, just kind of under confident with it. I was kind of thinking those other guys are probably thinking I'm too busy on this one and I kept expecting either Don or Rob or Gord to kind of say, "Hey you're a little busy there on the chorus." But then I heard that, it was like, "Oh this totally works, you can hear it all happening at once, and as Rob mentioned that's what I thought of it again. I don't think I play that way anymore either, but, at the time, we would have been fresh off the road and playing all the time, all the time and really trying to rock rooms and I think that's a lot of the inspiration for why they're all so rock and roll. We were just used to trying to turn on a big club, the room, or whatever so we just attacked things with aggression.
Baltin: Are there things from this that you now look forward to incorporating with how you guys play today and mixing that useful aggression and energy with the experience that you have 30 years later?
Baker: Yeah, I think that aggression, energy is refreshing. You can hear how young and confident we were. I agree with Carlos [Santana], you become a better musician as you get older. And I think in some ways, you become a better person as you become less certain about things. I think all that certainty is not really reflective of reality. All that crazy confidence that we have when we're young is certainly not reflective of my reality now that's for sure. If I could incorporate that youthful enthusiasm, I would. I just don't know if it's still in the well and how I would harness it. But, but as Paul said when you're that age we certainly were all about trying to rock a room a big crowd of people and get them fired up and on the verge of explosion and at a later point in your career you're about trying to turn yourself on and the guys who are in the players room with you. And you're trying to find things that are musically more satisfying and it's maybe a little bit more of a thoughtful process less of the pure testosterone thing.
Langlois: And I think there's evidence to that effect, actual evidence. The next record was Fully Completely. And the difference between that and Road Apples and the difference between that and Day For Night, which was the next one, and then Trouble At The Henhouse… I just think our growth as musicians is all in the records. There’s evidence in the records and the albums we made and the types of songs we chose to put on the records. It's not like we stopped rocking, but I think we allowed ourselves to be exploratory and Gord was right along with us. But again I’m surprised that the songs were as good. I was like, "Oh my God, so how did 'Ouch' not make it?"
Baker: I think "Necessary" was one that was guaranteed to make the record, it was almost, the first thing we wrote, for the record. When we were in New Orleans we wrote "Little Bones." And it was like, "Wow, they're kind of the same tempo, they're both aggressive out of the gate kind of songs." We made the choice and left one off and put "Little Bones" on, but "Necessary" sounds great.
Langlois: Yes, it's a really good feeling too to know that it wasn't mediocre material. So moving forward if we kind of check out whatever it is, Day For Night outtakes or other masters from others that didn't get on the album it's a good sign for the future. So hopefully there's more of that going forward.
Baltin; I need to ask as well about the JUNO Awards honor and getting it from Geddy [Lee] and Alex [Lifeson]. I'm sure it's going to be good to connect with them and to get this humanitarian award.
Baker: It is a great honor and to get it from Geddy and Alex, our first time playing a proper arena was playing Maple Leaf Gardens opening for Rush, and it was a benefit show, because those guys gave back in massive ways, always did. And they showed the way for a lot of bands, certainly for us. And a pretty unique set of musicians, they carved a pretty unique career. So as you say, receiving it from musicians is an added bonus, from people that you really respect and admire.
Langlois: Yeah, big honor I always looked up to those guys. And so it's very nice. Tell me they've received this award.
Baker: Yeah they did, I think.
Langlois: Be a little awkward if they hadn't. And we learned from them. Charity, I think, came, naturally, I mean it was good to see their example, but we were already doing charity stuff. We're from Kingston, a small city but we were getting the opportunity. The more you get known, the more opportunity you have to do charity things, so we started our charity runs early. There are five of us hyper democrats so sometimes it was difficult to choose the charity because charities are personal ones but we managed and we did do it consistently for 32 years. So that feels good.
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