Interview with Alan Doyle and Seán McCann of Great Big Sea, by Dave Palmater on WUMB 91.9, Boston, MA
[Transcriber's note: I've remained as faithful as possible to the spoken words of this interview, but it is difficult to fully convey in written words the joking mood and laughter that was present, and impossible to capture the warmth and charm of Alan and Seán's Newfoundland accents. A Real Audio version is available on Mike's Great Big Download Site.]
>>>Song played: "Fast As I Can"<<<
DP: Folk Radio 91.9 FM. Now, you actually composed that.
AD: Yes, wrote "Fast As I Can" about... oh God, I guess close to four years ago now, as the result of a request upon from some young lady to write a song for her. And as you can tell by the chorus, having a chorus like "I'm not ready to say I love you yet," the relationship ended very quickly thereafter, and...
SM: She's no longer your friend.
AD: ...it's a song that I got into a lot of trouble for! (laughter)
DP: That's Alan, by the way, from Great Big Sea. Now you were in a band before Great Big Sea that was doing mainly originals?
AD: Well, both Seán, Darrell, and Bob played in Rankin Street as you know...
DP: Yeah, OK...
AD: ...and played a lot of trad stuff...
DP: Yes, because they have no imagination, right....
AD: ...and I played in a band that did mostly, like parody spoof original comedy. And it was absolutely ridiculous, the stuff that we did. We played some original songs, but it was mostly (laughs), it was mostly just spoofs and stuff, and we used to play across the street from Seán's band, Rankin Street, and we used to get their lineup and stuff, so that's how Seán actually came over one night to see us play, I think.
SM: I was on break, yeah. (very seriously) I've never been so disturbed in my life! (laughter) A disturbing show!
AD: We used two acoustic guitars, you know, and myself and my friend John Brenton, who actually sells drugs for a living now. He works for Eli Lilly Pharmaceutical...
DP: (laughs) Thanks for dropping in with that, yeah...
AD: He sells Prozac and stuff...
DP: Yes, some of my friends sell drugs for a living too, but they don't work for Lilly.
AD: Altogether a different flavour. But we used to do like acoustic versions of AC-DC "Thunderstruck" and stuff like that...
SM: Metallica, it just was very strange...
AD: It was very silly.
DP: Is that where the version of "Run Runaway", that you do with Great Big Sea, came from?
AD: Not really, no, that was kind of an altogether different function, that was another foolish recording story. After we finished recording the entire UP record for Canada, we had this big jam, big party at the end of the recording session, and we sat there under the influence of several glasses of Chilean red wine, if I remember correctly...
SM: Yes...
AD: and started jamming out old 80's tunes that we knew...
SM: It always happens with the Chilean red...
DP: I guess...
AD: ...and out came a couple of Slade songs...
SM: ...leads to 80's tunes.
AD: ...and the producer, Danny Greenspoon, just freaked...
DP: Yeah, I understand that a nice Portugese red will get you 70's tunes every time...
SM: Portugese red will get you back to the 70's, yeah.
AD: ...and anyway, out came "Run Runaway"...
DP: But it's Boone's Farm if you wanna do Grateful Dead tunes, that's all there is to it. (laughter)
AD: Port, however, when you... No, so anyways, that's the "Run Runaway" story, to make a long story short, and it was a... he said, "That's amazing, we should record that." And it was like, "But it's a Slade song," and he was like, "Exactly!!! It's a Slade song!" so it was like, just bizarre enough to do, so....
DP: Did you have any kind of idea, going in to this, what kind of an effect having these songs on the radio, and the videos in heavy rotation on MuchMusic in Canada would have? You know, the idea of somebody doing an old 80's tune with accordions and fiddles and all that?
AD: Well, I think in terms of making some kind of a landmark into the folk world in Canada, and to what we thought we could do something in that regard, because we thought that what we had to offer was unique enough, and it was a unique blend of Newfoundland music and our own originals and stuff that we'd heard growing up. I never thought that the pop success that the band has had would actually come, and we're obviously delighted that it has come. I mean, I think more to the point on it in that stuff is like three weeks ago, "Lukey", the song off the Fire In The Kitchen record with the Chieftains, was on Top 10 radio in downtown Toronto, on rock radio. And ya know, I dunno, Seán, I think our grandfathers would.... "Lukey", as those of you at home may not know, is probably a million-year-old Newfoundland trad song that.... I dunno how our grandfathers would feel about it being in Top 10 radio in Toronto! (laughter)
SM: Highly unlikely event.
AD: They're either jumping for joy... or they're (chuckles), spinning in their graves, as we speak. But I mean, it certainly is notable, that for the first time probably ever, traditional music is making it on, side by each with Tragically Hip songs and Our Lady Peace songs and stuff in Toronto.
DP: Side by each?
AD: If you don't mind my... (laughter)
DP: This is Great Big Sea on 91.9 FM.
>>>Song played: "Lukey"<<<
DP: Folk Radio 91.9 FM. Now, is there a video for this one?
AD: "Lukey", yeah, we did one...
DP: There is!
AD: ...it was a horrible day, horrible day, we had to...
SM: Woe, woe, woe...
DP: So you were filming in Newfoundland, were you?
AD: ...oh the crosses that we bear, my friend...
SM: It's so hard...
AD: ...we had to get flown over to Killarney in the south of Ireland...
DP: Oh jeez!
AD: ...for two days, and film...
DP: Aw, that's tough.
AD: ...and sit in an Irish pub with the Chieftains...
SM: (painfully) Oh, that hurt, to fly to Killarney...
AD: ...to record and film a video. I think it's actually the first video that the entire group has ever done. Like Paddy and Martin and stuff have done a few here there and everywhere, but I think it's the first time the Chieftains have ever did, like, a video...
DP: All in one place...
AD: ...I mean, not a documentary-type thing, but actually, 'cause they've done millions of movies and stuff of course, right, but a music video, and it was quite funny, because, you know we all sat around in a circle and got the cameras all straight, we played through it once and they all scattered! And then these directors of course are panicking, like, "What's going on? What's going on?" We said, "No, we have to do it at least twenty more times," and they're like, "What??? Noooo way!!!" We managed to get them set up two or three more times to do a few performance stuff, and then, was off to the pub! (laughs)
SM: Yeah, that was the highlight of our career, actually. We actually sat down in a pub and played with the Chieftains, for like four hours, in a pub, acoustic, in Killarney. And, Kevin Conneff didn't show up, so I got to play the bodrhán.
DP: Are you serious?
SM: Yes, oh yeah, he had to...
DP: So you got to basically sit in the same seat that...
SM: ...I was a Chieftain.
DP: ...Kevin Conneff has played in, and Peter Mercer has played in, and oh man...
SM: Yup, I was a Chieftain for like four years. For four hours, not four years.
DP: And that's worth it? You...
SM: Well it was worth it, I don't think I'm gonna top that, right...
DP: You can die a happy man now.
SM: I mean, what am I gonna do, like play bodrhán for Céline Dion or somthing? It's not gonna happen, right? But the Chieftains, that was something that I could believe in, and that happened, so... I'm done! (moving away) See you later, bye, finish dealing with things on your own!
AD: Shoot me now!
SM: (laughing) I'm done!
DP: You've done some big tours of major festivals in the British Isles and Western Europe...
SM: Yup, all over Europe, the most notable of which was this year, in Tonder, in Denmark. We went to the best organized festival in the world, I would recommend that you go some time if you have a chance, big music festival... met the likes of La Bottine Souriante there, great band.
DP: (laughs) Now does this strike you as unusual, that you would have to go to Denmark to meet a band, that if you crossed over to Labrador and drove around, you could be in their backyard.
SM: You know, we'd probably never cross over Labrador, that's the thing about it...
DP: Well of course, exactly...
SM: ...that's the weird thing about being Canadian, there's a whole chunk of Canada as an artist that you don't even go to unless you're French, you know. Which is very sad and unfortunate, but, luckily we met them on neutral territory! (laughter)
DP: Yeah! Where no one spoke the native language!
SM: Where no one spoke the native language, it was neither French nor English...
AD: Moreover it was Denmark, and it's difficult in different places in Denmark to figure out what the native language is, 'cause it is one of those European countries where they speak like eleven or something like that. But it was great, though, and they're a great band, and we're hoping to do some work with them in the future, actually. They're La Bottine Souriante, for those of you who don't know who we're talking about. The best folk band in Canada, bar none.
SM: "The Smiling Feet" in English.
AD: One of the best ones we've ever heard. And it was good, we did Denmark, we did two or three in England this year, we're gonna go back and do Celtic Connections again in Scotland coming up, and we did down in Sidmouth, and we're coming back, we're doing two more in Germany, and I think we're gonna do some more stuff with the Oysterband in Germany again in January, so...
DP: Oh this is good, this is good..
AD: ...and, good things to come.
DP: Celtic Colours?
AD: Ah, coming up in... I think it's like now!
SM: Yeah, it's like now.
DP: It's like the sixth weekend.
AD: Yeah, it's... the bill is good, It's Rita, right, this year, and then...
SM: Rita MacNeil
AD: ...it's Rita and Altan are playing...
DP: Oh that's not bad...
AD: ...I think Alasdair Fraser is playing, I don't remember who else. It's probably not as international as the bill they had last year.
SM: They never asked us to play.
DP: Are you serious?
SM: (with a stronger brogue) Noooo. We're not Celtic enough for them I don't think. (laughter) Or we're not colourful enough or something... no, we don't know, but we didn't get to go. We didn't get to go last year either.
AD: No, I don't think we've been asked.
DP: Really?
AD: No.
SM: No we're not.
DP: That's kind of strange.
AD: It's bizarre.
DP: Do you find that there is now, a bit of a, now that there is a certain amount of, oh, how do we put this, "commercial success" that...
AD: No!
DP: ...there's a little dichotomy between you and some of the folk bands who have been struggling for decades that haven't had the commercial success...
AD: No, not really, no, I mean we're lucky to be from that area of the world where, I obviously want to sell one more record than Ashley sells, you know...
DP: ...well of course, yeah...
AD: ...and he wants to sell one more than I sell, you know, but Ashley just came and played with us and the Chieftains at the festival too. We're in that kind of a niche where by internationally speaking, it's everywhere that Ashley does well is good for us. And everywhere that the Rankins do well is good for Ashley, and everywhere that we do well is good for everyone else. There is that kind of fraternity internationally speaking, that, however big the Atlantic Canadian movement gets, it's good for all of us. You know, in that regard, it's just... I don't know what the deal is with Celtic Colours. I don't... Maybe we have been asked and we just don't know about it! (laughter) They wouldn't exactly phone us anyways. No, but it is a really good festival, and it was really successful last year. I mean, the economy and stuff in the northern parts of Nova Scotia and in Cape Breton Island are not exactly booming right now, so, I think that's one of the problems they're having with it, but those...
DP: As opposed to down home, where the economy is just...
AD: Yes, of course...
SM: It's just fine there...
AD: But I mean they're like Newfoundlanders up there, they certainly know how to deal with hard times very well, so.... And another notable thing about Sydney is that Jesus appeared there last week.
DP: Really!
SM: (laughing) Yeah, in a Tim Horton's!
AD: On the wall of Tim Horton's!
DP: You've got to figure that if Jesus is coming back, you know, he's heading for a Tim's, first thing.
AD: This is true. We have 'em at home, and...
SM: It was either Jesus or his brother Bob, but somebody...
AD: My apologies to those who are listening from Cape Breton, I didn't hear this directly, I heard this, like, sort of...
SM: Second hand.
AD: ...second hand, but apparently this is the case, and I'll try to repeat it as verbatim as I got it. It's that Our Lord Himself appeared on the wall of a Tim Horton's in Sydney...
SM: and asked for a double chocolate. (snickers and laughter)
AD: ...but anyway, people are flocking and paying homage to the Tim Horton's wall in Sydney.
SM: Oh my God...
AD: So stand by, the Celtic Colours might even be overshadowed by a Fatima incident or something.
SM: News of the World.
DP: With Rant and Roar being kind of a collection of previously recorded things, are you now looking towards the next project?
AD: Oh yeah! When we get home we're doing some pre-production and recording, and we're actually doing three or four new pieces in the show.
DP: Really?
SM: Yeah, we've been writing songs, and singing songs, and the show's new songs. And hopefully, well actually most of the songs have withstood the test of the audience - as opposed to leaving or booing, they've liked the songs. Which is good because that's what we did with the last record in Canada, Play.
AD: Yes, but it's been our policy to...
SM: try them out
AD: ...play tunes, before we actually record 'em, you know...
SM: (laughing)
AD: We're not the kind of band that... we don't like going into the studio, we don't like recording records anyway. We don't, so...
SM: No, bor-ing.
AD: ...I'd rather play fifty shows than record a record.... You know we're not the kind of band to go in and start with a little idea, and noodle our way through three months of recording one song in the studio, like... well I dunno anyone who does that... The Beach Boys or something...
SM: Oh, Brian Wilson's new record's amazing...
AD: It's brilliant, by the way.
DP: Are you serious?
SM: Oh yeah!
AD: It is!
DP: Did he get out of bed for this one?
SM: Oh no, this is amazing. The first track's amazing, it's worth buying the record for, one track, "Your Imagination".
AD: It is brilliant. He came to mind because we just saw a documentary, and they were talking about how they recorded "Good Vibrations"...
DP: Oh yeah!
AD: ...and it took three and a half months to record "Good Vibrations"...
SM: One track.
AD: ...well he went over it so much, and....
DP: In three and a half months, you've played 100 shows...
AD: I'd be swinging from a rope...
SM: (laughing) yeah!
AD: ...if it took me three and a half months, I mean most of our records are like, plug in, plug in, plug in, mic, mic, mic...
SM: Play!
AD: ...get ready then, alright, here we go, la la la la la, thank you very much, OK, next song.... I think we can do that one again. Nah, don't bother. Here we go now, what's the next one?
DP: Now, what's the repetoire these days looking like, is it kind of 50-50, originals from you guys, or...
AD: Well there's probably a few more original songs than there was, as opposed to songs by other writers, 'cause we're writing a lot now, but we're still not the kind...
DP: Now both of you are writing these days.
AD: All four of us!
DP: Really?
SM: Yup. Everyone's writing all the time.
DP: Wait a minute. You're letting Bob write?
AD: (chuckles) Bob is a great writer.
DP: Yeah, OK...
AD: Bob wrote some of the songs on the other records that we're proud of, like "Old Black Rum" - that's been a wonderful tune....
DP: Pleased to mention Bob, by the way.
AD: We're not the kind of band that wants to record songs just because we wrote them, OK, and it's like, our songs have to stand up next to 500 year old Newfoundland trad songs on the records, and we're still doing... You know, the record will probably be half trad songs again, because, you know, we don't do those songs because it's some cross or something that we bear. We do 'em because we love 'em, and they're fun to play, and fun to arrange.
SM: (mock serious) I've written about 50 songs that Alan won't sing, for example, and probably doesn't even like.
AD: (laughs)
DP: Oh this is a problem!
SM: Yes! I think they're all great. Of course he doesn't agree with me, you see.
AD: (jokingly) I've written 75 that Bob hates. (seriously) No, but I mean there is a lot of that, I mean, we write a lot of songs, and some of them go into a pot, and we go like, well that's a good song, but I don't think it's a good song...
SM: You should finish it...
AD: ....Does it come in men's?
SM: Yeah, that kind of thing...
DP: Nice start, but where do we go from here?
AD: Exactly.
DP: Is it a process like that, trying out songs on everybody in the band?
SM: It's a process of extreme, extreme, severe criticism.
DP: Really?
SM: Self-criticism, yeah. (laughter) You have no egos left to whittle away at... Luckily we're still great friends, and... but I mean, you do censor yourselves, and I think that's the route to the better record, at the end. So whatever songs get past Bob... (laughter) ...we know they've gotta be happy....
DP: So if if you can keep Bob's attention for 3 minutes and 25 seconds, you've pretty well got it.
SM: You're onto something there, anyway....
AD: You can even narrow Bob down to one of the 12 instruments that he plays...
DP: Yeah, that is the problem with him.
AD: Yeah, he's got pipes down now, by the way...
DP: Are you serious?
SM: Yeah, he's playing.
AD: He decided two weeks ago that he was going to learn pipes, so he picked up a chanter on the bus, and I walked in yesterday and he was playing the hardest Scottish bagpipe tune - backwards. He makes me ill. It took me nine years to learn how to play guitar, and he absorbs instruments like sponges. He's an amazing man, our Bob.
DP: Speaking of pipes, leading to Paddy Moloney, how did the connection with the Chieftains come about?
AD: Primarily when they were doing the Fire in the Kitchen record, they wanted to do that Atlantic Canadian thing. I think their original idea was just to do a Cape Breton record, but when they started researching it, they saw so many bands in the other sort of Celtic areas of Canada, including La Bottine Souriante, and Great Big Sea from Newfoundland, and a couple of the New Brunswick bands. They wanted to do a Canadian thing, and primarily an Atlantic Canadian thing, and I guess when they got researching around, they said, "to a degree the biggest band in this region is Great Big Sea, and you should have them on this record!"
DP: Yeah, there is a certain cachet to having the first gold record ever sold out of Newfoundland... several times over now.
SM: First double, second double platinum record.
DP: Yeah, but let's be honest about it - we're talking Canadian double platinum here, which means means your mom and your dad each bought a copy.
AD: The first conversation that we had with Paddy, was actually when we were on tour with the Oysterband in Germany, and got this message when we checked into the hotel, to "phone Paddy Moloney at such and such", and I was like (chuckles), WOW! Here I am in Germany, I flew from St. John's to Germany, to phone Paddy Moloney who had left Dublin and was in Vancouver, or something like that... so we chatted for a while, and we talked about what songs we might do, and we talked about "Lukey". I said, "This is a great one, because it's very easy to sing along, and it's fast and uptempo, and I know that the Chieftains could play along on it really easily," and... bang-o.
DP: Just out of curiousity, what were some of the other alternatives you bounced off?
AD: We talked about a couple of acapella songs, like "Excursion Around the Bay", that we sing. We were just going to sing, and then we'd have an instrumental section in the middle that they would... but we thought that the best thing we could do, is do something that was a real collaboration. And I think that's one of the reasons it's one of the highlights on the record, is because it sounds like we played together, because we did, you know...
DP: Yeah, it doesn't sound like the Chieftains came in later.
AD: ...it wan't stuff that was taped on, here, there, and everywhere...
SM: The track was recorded twice, we played that twice, and this whole recording session was all of half an hour, so...
DP: Which is one more than you usually do for one of your own records...
SM: (laughs) Yeah exactly, just one more time, just to make sure. Paddy had a bum note or something, he said, "No, I gotta try... I think I'll change that." It wasn't even bad. We did it again, and then after that, I played shaker on it, and it was over.
AD: We also tried to keep in mind what we thought other people were doing on the record, and Paddy had recorded some of the record already, and he said there's a lot of slow stuff on the record, so if you guys could play a fast one that'd be great. And we said, well...
DP: (laughs) Yeah, what a stretch...
AD: ...it is our forté...
DP: It is professionally what you do.
AD: Yes. We are yellers and bawlers by trade.
DP: And, one more performance on this tour, and then you're headed home?
AD: Tonight! Live!
SM: House of Blues, tonight, early, 8:00 or something I think...
AD: There's also a band called Entrain which we don't know of, but we're hearing wonderful things about.
DP: But if you see the Jordan's Furniture commercial on TV, that is the band in the Jordan's Furniture commercial.
SM: And then we're home.
AD: Then we go home, so you're gonna have to come to Newfoundland to see us for the next few weeks, because we're going home, and...
DP: Which of course is not a bad idea.
AD: (chuckles)
SM: No, time to go home now. Although I must apologize now in advance for the state of tonight's show. I'm sure it will be... a very silly show, because it's our last night, of course...
AD: Yes, 'twill be spirited... you gotta understand...
SM: Probably "unfocused" would be a better word...
AD: ...it's the last night of the tour, for God's sake! (laughter) So if you see us wandering around Boston like 4 in the morning, send us to the airport for God's sake!
SM: (laughs) Directly, yeah.
DP: (warmly) Great seeing you guys.
SM: Thanks for having us, Dave.
AD: Cheers, thanks for having us.
DP: A little bit about "General Taylor" - now how did "General Taylor" wind up in the band's repetoire?
SM: This guy Fergus O'Byrne, who's a great friend of mine at home, he now plays with Jim Payne, and on his own. He's formerly of Ryan's Fancy which is a band that was huge in Canda, had their own TV show for like six years. And Fergus is in St. John's, he's still gigging around, and he's constantly feeding me material in the traditional vein, and he's also known as "Captain Shanty," that's his nickname where we come from. But he's a brilliant artist, and he deserves full credit and he gets full credit for the arrangement and giving us that material. He's quite happy, every now and then I get up with him at home in small pubs and sing "General Taylor".
DP: This is Great Big Sea, here on Folk Radio, 91.9 FM.
>>>Song played: "General Taylor"<<<