Latest / Booked On Rock with Eric Senich / A Leatherface Fan Journey: An Adventure of Friendship and Self-Discovery [Episode 228]

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A Leatherface Fan Journey: An Adventure of Friendship and Self-Discovery [Episode 228] · Booked On Rock with Eric Senich

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Speaker 1: We're totally booked rock and roll. I think I'll leave you.
0:05
Speaker 1: You're reading little hands this, It's time to rock and roll.
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Speaker 1: Roll out. We are totally booked.
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Speaker 2: Welcome back to Booked on Rock, the podcast For those
0:18
Speaker 2: about to read and rock. Find the podcast booked on
0:21
Speaker 2: rock dot com. Every episode is there, got audio episodes,
0:24
Speaker 2: video episodes, exclusive video segments from those episodes. You can
0:28
Speaker 2: link up to all the social media sites and also
0:31
Speaker 2: find out the Liz rockbook releases at Booked on rock
0:34
Speaker 2: dot com. Chris McDonald first time guest to the podcast.
0:38
Speaker 2: He's the author of the new book Days and Days,
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Speaker 2: a story about Sunderland's Leatherface and the ties that bind.
0:43
Speaker 2: Days and Days weaves together two stories. One is a
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Speaker 2: tale of friendship and self discovery that occurs during a
0:49
Speaker 2: backpacking adventure through England, Scotland and Ireland. The other celebrates
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Speaker 2: the highly influential yet underestimated UK band Leatherface, a group
0:59
Speaker 2: that The Guardian calls the greatest British punk band of
1:02
Speaker 2: the modern era. And I gotta tell you I did
1:04
Speaker 2: not hear of this band until reading this book. It
1:07
Speaker 2: is a great band. Got to check them out. I
1:09
Speaker 2: put together a playlist of their music. You can find
1:11
Speaker 2: it in this episode's show notes. So we're going to
1:14
Speaker 2: talk some more about the band Leatherface, but also the
1:18
Speaker 2: trips that Chris went on, like it says in the description,
1:21
Speaker 2: without so much as a single hostel, booked Chris and
1:24
Speaker 2: his friend Jason across the Atlantic. They sleep in train
1:27
Speaker 2: stations and Daryl hunting on top of a volcano in Edinburgh,
1:30
Speaker 2: were driven out of Belfast by the IRA and witness
1:34
Speaker 2: the Mother of All Storms. They also find themselves in
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Speaker 2: the rehearsal space of their teenage punk idols, Leatherface. So
1:41
Speaker 2: let's hear from Chris McDonald. Welcome to the Book Down
1:45
Speaker 2: Rock Podcast.
1:45
Speaker 1: Chris, thank you, Eric, thanks for having me.
1:48
Speaker 2: The preface describes the book as being about two stories
1:51
Speaker 2: woven together, so let's start there. Tell us about this
1:54
Speaker 2: book and one of the two stories.
1:56
Speaker 1: Well, one of the one of the narratives follows my
2:00
Speaker 1: friend and I, Jason, on this sort of rollicking backpacking
2:05
Speaker 1: journey through England, Ireland and Scotland where we ended up
2:10
Speaker 1: meeting up with the band Leatherface, And I suppose the
2:16
Speaker 1: other story is the story of Leatherface, and in a
2:22
Speaker 1: roundabout way, sort of bann.
2:25
Speaker 2: What a bit. I'm so glad that I read this book.
2:26
Speaker 2: Is I now have a new band I can listen to.
2:29
Speaker 2: Thank you.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, they're lesser known. They should be more well known
2:35
Speaker 1: than they are, I believe.
2:37
Speaker 2: Yeah. And let's talk about your friendship with Jason, special
2:41
Speaker 2: friendship that you have with him. You write quote, our
2:43
Speaker 2: dynamic was complicated. We're both bad news, only in different ways.
2:47
Speaker 2: I didn't live for confrontation the way he did. When
2:50
Speaker 2: did you first meet Jason?
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Speaker 1: Oh, I think it was probably I must have been
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Speaker 1: about seventeen sixteen or seventeen, I think somewhere in there.
3:03
Speaker 2: And what was your first impression of them?
3:06
Speaker 1: Trouble just trouble. I just knew he was trouble right
3:11
Speaker 1: from the get go. But you know, he also knew
3:15
Speaker 1: I was trouble as well.
3:16
Speaker 2: So as hit it off. You have a lot of
3:18
Speaker 2: stuff in common. Music.
3:20
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it really was music, the thing that that
3:25
Speaker 1: brought us very close together.
3:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, what did you mean were you in school together?
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Speaker 1: Well? No, Jason was from King City in Ontario, and
3:36
Speaker 1: I was from a little farther south than that, more
3:40
Speaker 1: in the city, but not that far. And you know,
3:45
Speaker 1: back then you know, we had a crowd of sort
3:50
Speaker 1: of punks and skaters and all that sort of thing,
3:54
Speaker 1: and we heard about Eventually those two crowds, the crowds
3:58
Speaker 1: from King City and rock Stales, sort of merged at
4:04
Speaker 1: some point, just because that's what you did if you
4:06
Speaker 1: heard about another crowd that was similar, you know, Eventually,
4:12
Speaker 1: eventually those two crowds just came together and it was
4:16
Speaker 1: a lot of fun.
4:17
Speaker 2: And he introduced you to Leatherface. He had a cassette
4:20
Speaker 2: of their music.
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Speaker 1: He did.
4:23
Speaker 2: He had it in his hand. He says, you need
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Speaker 2: to hear this, and you played it. You nail it
4:29
Speaker 2: with the vocals. Sounds like Lemmy's younger punk rock brother.
4:34
Speaker 2: That is perfect. It really was. That was what I
4:36
Speaker 2: was thinking when I first heard it. Yeah, you describe
4:38
Speaker 2: that moment, your immediate reaction to the music, because the
4:42
Speaker 2: way you describe it in the book, it's exactly the
4:44
Speaker 2: way I felt when I first heard my favorite band,
4:48
Speaker 2: Van Halen, just like lightning inside of You. And I
4:51
Speaker 2: think everybody was a song who has a favorite band
4:53
Speaker 2: knows that feeling. Describe.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, it's universal for sure, doesn't matter the type
4:59
Speaker 1: of music. But for me, for somebody who was on
5:05
Speaker 1: a constant search for music at that time. It was
5:09
Speaker 1: really the thing that was. Yeah, it was just driving
5:15
Speaker 1: me hard. And you know, discovery just what a beautiful thing.
5:20
Speaker 1: So and and when we'd go to that person's house
5:27
Speaker 1: in the book and we'd all just hang out and
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Speaker 1: literally just show each other new music or just you know,
5:32
Speaker 1: whatever we had at the time. And when he put
5:36
Speaker 1: that on, I I had never heard anything that sounded
5:42
Speaker 1: like that in my whole life, you know, And it was, yeah,
5:48
Speaker 1: it really was. It was it was life altering and
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Speaker 1: it just it cut deep.
5:55
Speaker 2: And you had never heard of the bend at that point.
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Speaker 1: No, And I was attuned to to most things in
6:04
Speaker 1: that genre, you know, punk and hardcore whatever, you know.
6:10
Speaker 1: And yeah, he was just his his finger was always
6:15
Speaker 1: sort of he knew a few people whose you know,
6:18
Speaker 1: finger was really on the pulse of things, so sort
6:21
Speaker 1: of trickled down, you know what I mean. But yeah, thankful.
6:26
Speaker 2: Well, I do want to get into the stories of
6:30
Speaker 2: your trip with Jason. We're going to get to that,
6:32
Speaker 2: but let's let's continue with Leatherface some more. The book
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Speaker 2: celebrates the band its impact on you and many others.
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Speaker 2: The Guardian called them the greatest British punk band of
6:42
Speaker 2: the modern era. You spoke to the band members, colleagues
6:46
Speaker 2: and friends of the band to put together the story
6:48
Speaker 2: of the band. They formed in nineteen eighty eight, How
6:51
Speaker 2: did they form? What's the origin story of Leatherface?
6:56
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't you know. I wasn't there, so
6:58
Speaker 1: I don't know the exact act way that it happened.
7:03
Speaker 1: But from what I do know, there's there's a place
7:08
Speaker 1: in Sunderland called the Bunker and that is basically a
7:13
Speaker 1: punk rock institution, a DIY. It started as a DIY
7:21
Speaker 1: space for for just all things under that umbrella. It was,
7:26
Speaker 1: you know, a rehearsal space, they held shows whatever. Now
7:31
Speaker 1: it's a record label and so it was a hub
7:35
Speaker 1: and everyone who was into that sort of thing was
7:39
Speaker 1: there at that time. And eventually, you know, Dicky Hammond
7:45
Speaker 1: was playing in HDQ at the time, and so it
7:50
Speaker 1: was Laney the drummer, and eventually they found stubs and
7:57
Speaker 1: and they just started. It started with like most bands,
8:01
Speaker 1: just in a in a rehearsal behind Frankie's house and
8:06
Speaker 1: in a in a garage and.
8:08
Speaker 2: Frankie Stubbs, right, Frankie Stubbs MM hmm. And Dicky Hammond yeah, okay,
8:14
Speaker 2: and then Laney came in a little bit after that.
8:16
Speaker 2: I think was it? The was Frankie and Dicky were
8:18
Speaker 2: the first two.
8:19
Speaker 1: Yeah, they started, they started new and it was It's
8:23
Speaker 1: a funny story because they at that time there's there's
8:28
Speaker 1: a guitar maker out there that's still going called Gordon
8:32
Speaker 1: Smith Guitars. And the two of them had the same
8:37
Speaker 1: guitar and that was really they were so stoked that
8:42
Speaker 1: the other one had the same guitar. They that they
8:47
Speaker 1: just started playing together and it turns out that they
8:50
Speaker 1: played really well together. And uh, and then Laney left
8:54
Speaker 1: HDQ and and joined with those two.
8:59
Speaker 2: How did the band get that name? Leatherface? Is there
9:01
Speaker 2: a story behind that?
9:03
Speaker 1: From what I was told from from a Frankie, Uh, yeah,
9:09
Speaker 1: he was. He was apparently pretty inebriated, inebriated with with
9:16
Speaker 1: Dicky Hammond one night in their apartment and literally lying
9:23
Speaker 1: on the floor and watching Frankie's favorite movie at that
9:27
Speaker 1: time was leather Face or a Texas Chainsaw Mass.
9:31
Speaker 2: Okay, I know it. I had a feeling and I
9:34
Speaker 2: had a feeling there was a connection there.
9:37
Speaker 1: And and it's literally playing on the TV while they're
9:40
Speaker 1: trying to think of a band name. And but also
9:47
Speaker 1: it was this this other funny thing that happened where
9:51
Speaker 1: Frankie had a bit of a light bulb moment and
9:54
Speaker 1: got up and pulled a book off the shelf. And
9:59
Speaker 1: I believe the author's name is Ernest Dudley. I may
10:02
Speaker 1: have that wrong, but if it might be right, And
10:06
Speaker 1: he wrote a book called leather Face, and he just
10:10
Speaker 1: between the two things they just sort of knew. And
10:13
Speaker 1: it does it. It works, It strangely embodies the music.
10:19
Speaker 2: And yeah, if you listen to the music, yeah, it's
10:22
Speaker 2: a perfect name.
10:23
Speaker 1: Yeah.
10:23
Speaker 2: There's an interesting comment regarding the sound of the band
10:26
Speaker 2: in the book. Simon Wells from the band's Snuff said
10:28
Speaker 2: Leatherface's distinction from other punk music can be traced to
10:32
Speaker 2: frontman Frankie Stubb's love for the band The Police, which
10:35
Speaker 2: is one of my favorite bands. They did cover Message
10:38
Speaker 2: in a Bottle, which is I think on the ninety
10:40
Speaker 2: one album mush Okay. Had you picked up on that before?
10:45
Speaker 2: Simon said that.
10:46
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't think I had picked it out for sure.
10:49
Speaker 1: It was reminiscent even the song how Lonely, you know,
10:53
Speaker 1: I think I caught that one sort of early on,
10:57
Speaker 1: but it wasn't until I started hearing other people. And
11:00
Speaker 1: you really can hear this similarity, especially with the guitar playing,
11:06
Speaker 1: you know, when you start breaking it down, And the
11:09
Speaker 1: most noticeable of those would be the song Little White God,
11:16
Speaker 1: which came off a later album called The Last. If
11:19
Speaker 1: you listen to that, the guitarring is like, it's so police.
11:23
Speaker 1: Even the song Construction.
11:25
Speaker 2: Everything book on Rock podcast will be back after this?
11:29
Speaker 1: Never ever, ever, under any circumstances, say I'll be right back,
11:33
Speaker 1: because you won't be back. I'm getting out of the beer.
11:35
Speaker 1: You want one, Yeah, sure, I'll be right back.
11:42
Speaker 2: Frankie's an interesting guy, big reader. One of his favorite
11:45
Speaker 2: books is One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kelsey.
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Speaker 2: You feel there may be parallels and Leatherface songs with
11:51
Speaker 2: this book.
11:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, I feel. I don't know. I think that Leatherface
11:59
Speaker 1: is when you start diving deep into those lyrics. They
12:04
Speaker 1: question everything. They're on a search for, like a much
12:09
Speaker 1: deeper truth than you know, the type of truth that
12:14
Speaker 1: doesn't the one that really matters. And I believe that
12:22
Speaker 1: some of the things that I read in that book
12:25
Speaker 1: were were similar in a sense. It's it's difficult to describe.
12:30
Speaker 2: Really, but he's a big reader just in general. Yeah,
12:36
Speaker 2: which seems to be a theme. I've said this now,
12:38
Speaker 2: I think mentioned this in two episodes recently. It just
12:42
Speaker 2: seems like the frontmen or the lyricists of a band,
12:47
Speaker 2: if they're a big reader, they're they're always great lyricists.
12:51
Speaker 2: It's because they have they've expanded their their language. They
12:58
Speaker 2: they're well read. I mean, they just just seems to
13:00
Speaker 2: be the correlation there is pretty often.
13:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, and Frankie, Frankie's a thinker like on on that
13:09
Speaker 1: level for sure.
13:10
Speaker 2: You're right about Dave Grohl asking leather Faced drummer Laney
13:13
Speaker 2: for his autograph tell us his story this isn't. Back
13:16
Speaker 2: in the mid eighties, Dave was in a band called
13:18
Speaker 2: Scream before Nirvana.
13:20
Speaker 1: This, yeah, Discord Scream And that was a story that
13:25
Speaker 1: Laney told me, and he was just he was so
13:29
Speaker 1: he was so stoked to tell it, you know. I
13:33
Speaker 1: guess they were playing at I think it was Punk's
13:36
Speaker 1: Picnic in Birmingham, and yeah, years before he joined Nirvana,
13:44
Speaker 1: but you know it was it just really lit him
13:49
Speaker 1: up that I mean, at that time, he was still
13:52
Speaker 1: pretty you know, had some notoriety just because of the band.
13:57
Speaker 1: The band was pretty popular, and uh, I think it
14:01
Speaker 1: felt pretty nice for him to just you know, he
14:04
Speaker 1: was a big fan of HDQ and came up to
14:08
Speaker 1: him with two full length LPs after the set and
14:11
Speaker 1: asked them to autograph them. And I think that I
14:15
Speaker 1: think that made him feel pretty all right.
14:17
Speaker 2: Hell yeah, yeah, back to Frankie, you say that on
14:21
Speaker 2: the street, you'd never know he was the lead singer
14:23
Speaker 2: of an important band and inspired the lives of so
14:25
Speaker 2: many around the globe. Quiet guy.
14:29
Speaker 1: At times.
14:31
Speaker 2: At times.
14:34
Speaker 1: He seems to have two side. I mean, he's a human. Obviously,
14:41
Speaker 1: there's many faucets, but from what I've seen, there seems
14:48
Speaker 1: to be two sides. He's really like, he's super joyful,
14:53
Speaker 1: he's super playful, he's you know, he's like a bit mischievous.
15:04
Speaker 1: But he is also extremely quiet and just very introverted.
15:10
Speaker 1: And you know, that was the funny thing in the
15:15
Speaker 1: on our journey was that, you know, I had never
15:18
Speaker 1: met him. I had met him once very briefly in
15:21
Speaker 1: Buffalo before our trip, and but it was literally like hello,
15:27
Speaker 1: you know, amazing, sad thank you. And at that point,
15:32
Speaker 1: I've been listening to them for years and it was
15:36
Speaker 1: enamored and had you know, I had sort of built
15:40
Speaker 1: up this thing in my head as we do of
15:42
Speaker 1: the people that we look up to, and you know,
15:48
Speaker 1: in my head, I did have it sort of nailed
15:51
Speaker 1: in a sense that you know, I just imagined him
15:54
Speaker 1: this person that was that that never talked to anybody really,
16:00
Speaker 1: you know. And then my first meeting with him in Sunderland,
16:05
Speaker 1: like at a pub where he showed up to hang
16:07
Speaker 1: out with us, and he walks in and he's just
16:11
Speaker 1: like like so funny and like a total animal, you know,
16:15
Speaker 1: and he's just has a whole place laughing and he's
16:19
Speaker 1: just on a tear, you know, and and it it's
16:22
Speaker 1: sort of it freaked me out because I was like, oh,
16:25
Speaker 1: maybe I don't have it right, you know.
16:28
Speaker 2: But what's he up to these days now? Is he
16:30
Speaker 2: just working regular day job? Is he in a band?
16:35
Speaker 1: Well, he's doing a lot of solo shows at the moment. Yeah,
16:40
Speaker 1: he's still playing, still filling filling clubs. And I mean
16:44
Speaker 1: not as much obviously, but it's been it's been a
16:49
Speaker 1: difficult road for them a little bit because you know,
16:51
Speaker 1: Dicky died and Laney died not that long ago, but
16:58
Speaker 1: he's uh, he's key been in alive and he's been
17:02
Speaker 1: playing with the last incarnation of Leatherface is with Graham
17:07
Speaker 1: Phillis Kirk, who's an amazing dude and longtime friend of
17:14
Speaker 1: the band, who played in bands all around the time
17:18
Speaker 1: that Leatherface was playing, and you know, they're tightly net
17:23
Speaker 1: and he was he was the last bass player, and
17:26
Speaker 1: so they still play and you know there's a side
17:30
Speaker 1: project coming.
17:33
Speaker 2: I mentioned because I think I was. I read the
17:35
Speaker 2: book and it was something he worked as in a
17:37
Speaker 2: car dealership. Is that what he was doing on.
17:40
Speaker 1: The Yeah, I think that's Yeah. I think that's what
17:41
Speaker 1: he does for a day job. Yeah. I don't. I
17:44
Speaker 1: don't know the details of it, but you know, he's
17:48
Speaker 1: sort of just described it like that that because he
17:52
Speaker 1: won't talk about it, you know, like he's he's that guy.
17:56
Speaker 1: He really you know, I doubt he's even going to
17:59
Speaker 1: read the Boo Book because I don't think he's ever
18:03
Speaker 1: read a review of the band. I don't think he.
18:06
Speaker 1: I don't think he. I'm not sure if he knew
18:10
Speaker 1: the importance and the splash that they made, you know,
18:15
Speaker 1: because he's just not interested in in the spotlight. It's
18:20
Speaker 1: not what he signed up for. He's just doing it
18:23
Speaker 1: because because it's like a higher it's just like a higher,
18:29
Speaker 1: higher state, you know. And maybe that's what I see
18:34
Speaker 1: in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Just this the
18:41
Speaker 1: real path, you know.
18:43
Speaker 2: Right, It's just the genuine passion of his that he
18:46
Speaker 2: followed him. Yeah, never thinking about anything beyond that. What
18:50
Speaker 2: led to what led to the breakup of Leather Face
18:52
Speaker 2: in ninety four.
18:55
Speaker 1: I don't, I to be honest, I don't. I don't know.
19:00
Speaker 1: I think I think there was a Yeah, I think
19:05
Speaker 1: like most bands, there was probably some friction between the characters.
19:08
Speaker 1: These are big characters, right, And yeah, I think Dicky
19:14
Speaker 1: Dicky Hammond and and Stubs probably weren't the weren't the
19:22
Speaker 1: greatest match at times, you know, where at other times
19:26
Speaker 1: they were like a perfect match, you know. But I don't.
19:30
Speaker 1: I don't know too much about that, and they they
19:33
Speaker 1: don't talk about it too much. There's rumors of them.
19:40
Speaker 1: I believe. I could be wrong, but I think that
19:43
Speaker 1: breakup happened on stage at a Toy Dolls concert. I think,
19:51
Speaker 1: but I could have that wrong.
19:54
Speaker 2: They reformed the ninety eight that lasted until twenty twelve. Yeah,
19:59
Speaker 2: it would be cool though if they for him again,
20:00
Speaker 2: at least even for one show.
20:04
Speaker 1: Well, I know, and and the members that were in
20:07
Speaker 1: it after eighty eight or ninety eight are still there's
20:14
Speaker 1: they're still live and they're like, you know, Davy Burden
20:18
Speaker 1: is alive and well in playing. And I talked to
20:21
Speaker 1: Leyton Evans as well. Yeah, in man, it would be amazing, right, Yeah,
20:30
Speaker 1: I don't know if it would ever happen, but.
20:32
Speaker 2: Well, sounds like from what you say about Frankie, it's
20:35
Speaker 2: for him. It have to be for the right reasons,
20:38
Speaker 2: you know something.
20:39
Speaker 1: That Yeah, I mean, they're for sure. They're for sure
20:44
Speaker 1: with this, with this side project, which is with Hugo
20:51
Speaker 1: Moody from a band called the Saint Catharines who has
20:55
Speaker 1: done other projects with them, They're for sure gonna play
20:59
Speaker 1: a bunch of shows and it's the next best thing.
21:02
Speaker 1: It's pretty close to it.
21:05
Speaker 2: Chris McDonald is the author of the new book Days
21:07
Speaker 2: and Days, a story about Sunderland's leather face and the
21:10
Speaker 2: ties that bind so Throughout the book are stories of
21:12
Speaker 2: your journeys across the Atlantic with Jason. You sleep in
21:16
Speaker 2: train stations, you indoor a haunting on top of a volcano.
21:20
Speaker 2: Let's get to this one. This is in Scotland. You
21:22
Speaker 2: write quote running parallel to the city was the imposing
21:25
Speaker 2: peak called Arthur's Seat in I think it's pronounced Is
21:29
Speaker 2: it holy Rood Park or Holyrood Park? I think so, yeah, yeah, yeah,
21:34
Speaker 2: either one.
21:35
Speaker 1: I mean there, it's probably pronounced.
21:39
Speaker 2: The long Ridge watches over Edinburgh and offers an incredible
21:42
Speaker 2: view in all directions. One of the many myths of
21:45
Speaker 2: Scotland claims that the hill is actually a sleeping dragon.
21:48
Speaker 2: A more foreboding aspect involved seventeen neatly arranged mini coffins
21:53
Speaker 2: that were discovered somewhere up on the hill. Tiny wooden
21:56
Speaker 2: figures dressed in rags were found inside. We set off
21:59
Speaker 2: weaving them the streets with our packs hoisted over our shoulders.
22:04
Speaker 2: By the way, great, great rider man, this is the
22:07
Speaker 2: stories you tell, beautifully written.
22:10
Speaker 1: So what did what.
22:12
Speaker 2: Did you find? The goat man? And what did you
22:16
Speaker 2: find there?
22:17
Speaker 1: Go? Oh no, I mean I was just okay, So
22:20
Speaker 1: this is pretty funny stuff for me, because yeah, it
22:23
Speaker 1: was the goat man was just some it's just a funny.
22:27
Speaker 1: Like when I went to camp when I was young,
22:30
Speaker 1: it was that was one of the stories that the
22:33
Speaker 1: camp counselors would tell us. And it was a camp
22:36
Speaker 1: that was sort of on the side of a mountain,
22:39
Speaker 1: basically a very small mountain next to Hamilton in Ontario,
22:44
Speaker 1: and so they told this story of the goat Man,
22:46
Speaker 1: which is like, you know, classic, like he was a
22:50
Speaker 1: miner and got his his legs were trapped in a
22:54
Speaker 1: landslide and then he chopped his legs off and attached
22:57
Speaker 1: the goats and blah blah blah.
22:59
Speaker 2: But it was a story.
23:01
Speaker 1: Yeah, I just I just love that story. Yeah, it
23:04
Speaker 1: was just always on my mind. So whenever and something
23:08
Speaker 1: about that walking up Arthur's seat, it was similar in
23:15
Speaker 1: a sense, it's this really steep incline and yeah, so
23:19
Speaker 1: I just thought about the goat Man. But it was
23:24
Speaker 1: freaky because also at that time, right before we left,
23:31
Speaker 1: I had watched The blair Witch for the first time.
23:35
Speaker 1: Like that's right about the time when blair Witch came.
23:38
Speaker 2: Out nineteen ninety nine. I think, is yeah, this story.
23:42
Speaker 1: I swear, yeah, I feel like I just watched it
23:45
Speaker 1: like months before we left, and and next thing, I know,
23:50
Speaker 1: we're in a tent on the side of this mountain.
23:55
Speaker 2: See that movie does not help. I mean I even
23:59
Speaker 2: was creeped out by my own back yard.
24:01
Speaker 1: It's a great movieard, Yeah, and it's and it tapped
24:06
Speaker 1: into for sure, you know. And and being in Edinburgh, it's,
24:11
Speaker 1: you know, one of the more haunted cities in the world.
24:14
Speaker 1: I think it's one of the you know. And I'm
24:17
Speaker 1: a bit you know, I'm a bit susceptible to that
24:21
Speaker 1: sort of stuff. I love ghosts, but I also hate them.
24:25
Speaker 1: But anyways, yet we're just camping on the side of
24:29
Speaker 1: this thing, and I I swear, I like, I don't know.
24:36
Speaker 1: To this day, I still think about I could hear
24:38
Speaker 1: footsteps for sure around the tent, but it could have
24:41
Speaker 1: been it could have been I don't.
24:43
Speaker 2: Know, your imagination running wild booked on Rock podcast will
24:49
Speaker 2: be back after this. You've gotta come back with me.
24:52
Speaker 1: Where the future.
24:56
Speaker 2: You're in Belfast, Northern Ireland, driven out by the IRA.
25:00
Speaker 2: What happened while you were there? This is nineteen ninety nine. Yeah,
25:03
Speaker 2: I could feel that sense of discomfort and tension, yes,
25:07
Speaker 2: among the people there.
25:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I don't know if we're actually driven out.
25:12
Speaker 1: But all right, but it was it was pretty sketchy.
25:16
Speaker 2: You weren't welcome. I guess it is probably a better way, right.
25:19
Speaker 2: It was kind of like they give me those vibes,
25:22
Speaker 2: like what are you doing here?
25:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, there was a lot of tension there, you know,
25:25
Speaker 1: because it was you could still feel it all and
25:30
Speaker 1: it was the I don't know what it's like there
25:32
Speaker 1: at the moment, but in nineteen ninety nine, Yeah, it
25:36
Speaker 1: was still separated into three sections, you know, Catholic, Protestant,
25:42
Speaker 1: and Neutral, and you know, it was it was just
25:48
Speaker 1: very heavy. It was very, very heavy. And ultimately when
25:52
Speaker 1: we ended up in the Catholic section on the Lower
25:57
Speaker 1: Falls Road, right across the street from headquarters, I mean
26:02
Speaker 1: I was starting to get the impression that we stuck
26:04
Speaker 1: out like a sore thumb, you know, probably from our looks,
26:10
Speaker 1: but for many reasons and and this this we ended
26:17
Speaker 1: up in an IRA support store, which was one of
26:20
Speaker 1: the scariest things I've ever seen. Like it was just
26:24
Speaker 1: at that point, I had never been exposed to that
26:26
Speaker 1: sort of thing. And it's hard to understand a lot
26:32
Speaker 1: of people don't know what happened there. You know, it's
26:35
Speaker 1: like they've heard about it, but they don't understand how
26:38
Speaker 1: how bad and how intense it was. Like you know,
26:42
Speaker 1: when you have to build a peace barrier between two
26:47
Speaker 1: crowds of people, you know, to two different beliefs, so
26:52
Speaker 1: that they don't kill each other, it's like whoa. And
26:57
Speaker 1: being in that store was just yeah, it was wild
27:01
Speaker 1: and maybe you know, we met this old guy and
27:05
Speaker 1: I tried to describe it the best way I could
27:09
Speaker 1: from memory and from what happened. I don't know whether
27:15
Speaker 1: he's trying to protect us or whether he was just
27:19
Speaker 1: genuine and really wanted us to go out to the coast.
27:23
Speaker 1: Maybe a bit of both. I don't know, but it
27:26
Speaker 1: was you can feel it, right, you feel when something's
27:29
Speaker 1: a little a little off.
27:31
Speaker 2: I felt for the people that lived there because they
27:33
Speaker 2: didn't seem like they could feel comfortable just living in
27:37
Speaker 2: their own country.
27:40
Speaker 1: Absolutely scary, scary business. And I think really one of
27:46
Speaker 1: the one of the most frightening things that I'd seen
27:50
Speaker 1: on that on that day was I mean everything it
27:56
Speaker 1: just hits home, you know, but being in the Catholic section,
28:02
Speaker 1: and I think I wrote it in there. You know,
28:05
Speaker 1: just this one alleyway where we walk by and I
28:08
Speaker 1: look up and there's just this giant white spray paint
28:15
Speaker 1: on the wall, just super ragged, and it's you know,
28:19
Speaker 1: a little girl, you know, with her name, killed by
28:23
Speaker 1: rubber bullets, you know. And you could just feel, you
28:28
Speaker 1: could feel everything just by looking at it. It's like
28:31
Speaker 1: you feel the pain, you could feel the the fright,
28:35
Speaker 1: you could feel anger.
28:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, you also tell the story of being in a
28:40
Speaker 2: terrible storm. You write, quote, I fell head over heels
28:42
Speaker 2: into the most beautiful trouble I've ever been in, and
28:45
Speaker 2: I'm better for it.
28:46
Speaker 1: Oh, that was That was just a little segment written
28:49
Speaker 1: by Dickie's partner, and I just I just asked for
28:55
Speaker 1: a few words from her about about Dickie, and so
28:59
Speaker 1: she just wrote that lovely little paragraph. And I love
29:03
Speaker 1: that last sentence. You know, it seems to encapsulate everything
29:08
Speaker 1: that I've heard about him. It's like you just magnetic.
29:12
Speaker 1: You just fall in love with him, and you know
29:14
Speaker 1: he's a little bit a bit of trouble, you know.
29:17
Speaker 1: As thankful that she contributed that to it.
29:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're right. Quote. What I know about life is
29:23
Speaker 2: that you'll begin to see what you're truly looking for
29:26
Speaker 2: as long as you keep searching. It's a universal order. Adventure,
29:29
Speaker 2: romanticism and inspiration were revealing themselves to us. This is
29:34
Speaker 2: in reference to being in the rehearsal space of Wetherface
29:40
Speaker 2: he punk Idols. This is a building steeped in cultural
29:42
Speaker 2: significance for the Sunderland music scene. How did you end
29:46
Speaker 2: up there and what was that experience like for you?
29:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, it freaked me out, for sure, it was so
29:55
Speaker 1: that was that was a surprise actually because it wasn't
29:58
Speaker 1: planned and we we'd arrived and you know, meeting up
30:03
Speaker 1: with them actually wasn't planned. Like this trip. It was
30:08
Speaker 1: sort of serendipitous in a sense because Jason and I
30:12
Speaker 1: had planned this trip and there was a whole thing
30:16
Speaker 1: that happened before we got to England and Ireland and Scotland.
30:20
Speaker 1: We're all through Europe. The whole thing was about two
30:22
Speaker 1: months and it was about two months before we were
30:28
Speaker 1: about to leave for the trip, and we got word
30:31
Speaker 1: that Leatherface was playing in Buffalo and this would be
30:34
Speaker 1: our first time ever seeing the band live, and so
30:38
Speaker 1: we go there. All of Toronto goes to Buffalo and
30:42
Speaker 1: that's where we ended up meeting them and Jason, you know,
30:45
Speaker 1: he's so, you know, he made fast friends with them,
30:49
Speaker 1: you know, and and he just asked the drummer he was,
30:54
Speaker 1: he was like, or actually the drummer Laney, you know.
30:58
Speaker 1: He said, if you're gonna be around Sunderland, give me
31:02
Speaker 1: a call. Jason called him like at that time in
31:06
Speaker 1: life where you just you actually did that, you picked
31:09
Speaker 1: up the phone. So he called him and he was like, yeah, sure.
31:11
Speaker 1: So we were visiting Jason's family in England somewhere around there,
31:17
Speaker 1: and so we ended up going out there and hanging
31:20
Speaker 1: out with him. But when we were there, we ended
31:23
Speaker 1: up meeting up. We're just on a bus going back
31:27
Speaker 1: into Sunderland and Davy Burden gets on the bus and
31:32
Speaker 1: he's like, you guys should come to a practice tomorrow morning.
31:36
Speaker 1: And we're like wow, yeah, And so we ended up
31:41
Speaker 1: in their actual rehearsal space, and at that time, they
31:47
Speaker 1: were rehearsing for their upcoming release, Horsebox, and to be
31:54
Speaker 1: an observer in that room was yeah, it was. It
32:00
Speaker 1: really moved me, you know, going from and especially being
32:05
Speaker 1: there with Jason, you know, because he's the one that
32:08
Speaker 1: introduces me to this band way across the ocean back
32:13
Speaker 1: home in this little dingy basement up in North Toronto,
32:18
Speaker 1: and then how many years later and we're in their
32:22
Speaker 1: rehearsal space together watching them create a new song, and
32:30
Speaker 1: it was it was fantastic. It was, it was. And
32:34
Speaker 1: to this day that chorus of that song, Sour Grapes
32:37
Speaker 1: is like, it's one of the greatest choruses I've ever heard,
32:41
Speaker 1: but probably because of how you know, nostalgic.
32:44
Speaker 2: It makes me such a cool story. And you see,
32:47
Speaker 2: the trip with Jason was like a leather Face song
32:50
Speaker 2: where and this is what you're right where beneath we're buried,
32:53
Speaker 2: beneath a gruphic sterior, something grander was unfolding, and like
32:56
Speaker 2: the lyrics, we wouldn't understand the magnitude of our journey
33:00
Speaker 2: for years to come. What will you remember most about
33:02
Speaker 2: that experience?
33:05
Speaker 1: The trip? Yeah, yeah, I mean exactly like what it
33:11
Speaker 1: said it was. I remember being on the trip and
33:15
Speaker 1: getting home or you know, it's about to end in
33:21
Speaker 1: us talking about what we were gonna, you know, because
33:25
Speaker 1: we're both so interested in songwriting and expression, and I
33:29
Speaker 1: remember telling him I'm gonna I'm going to write this
33:33
Speaker 1: thing and he's like, I'm gonna let it sink in
33:37
Speaker 1: for a while. And it's funny, I remember, I remember
33:41
Speaker 1: that so clearly, but it really is it parallels a
33:47
Speaker 1: leather Face song in the sense that it took me.
33:52
Speaker 1: I knew that the trip was important. It was our
33:54
Speaker 1: first big trip, you know, we were getting out, you
33:59
Speaker 1: know where twenty three, seeing the world, you know, seeing
34:03
Speaker 1: new experiences and experiencing all these amazing things. It just
34:11
Speaker 1: it did take a long time for it to sink in.
34:16
Speaker 1: And it's just weird the way that it really did
34:19
Speaker 1: begin to parallel leather Face in the sense that, yeah,
34:26
Speaker 1: it was there's it was just complex, and it meant
34:31
Speaker 1: a lot. And when you start digging there's it's full
34:36
Speaker 1: of substance, you know.
34:38
Speaker 2: So I'm sure people are wondering, Jason Dwyer, what's Jason
34:41
Speaker 2: up to these days? Do you keep in touch with them?
34:45
Speaker 1: Yeah? We I mean, you know, we we drifted, for sure.
34:49
Speaker 1: And that was That's what I found most interesting about
34:56
Speaker 1: the book. I don't think it would have been as
34:59
Speaker 1: interesting if we were like still the tightest friends. I thought.
35:04
Speaker 1: I thought it was really interesting that we went through
35:08
Speaker 1: this huge thing together and and a lot of different
35:13
Speaker 1: moments and then and we drifted, and I guess that's
35:17
Speaker 1: where the ties that bind, you know, or or just
35:21
Speaker 1: one of those. One of the threads for sure is
35:25
Speaker 1: him and I do.
35:27
Speaker 2: You know as he read the book?
35:29
Speaker 1: You know, no, no, But I'm getting one to him today,
35:34
Speaker 1: that's yeah. And uh, you know, I hope he likes it.
35:38
Speaker 1: If I know him the way that I did, he should.
35:44
Speaker 1: But you know, writing about other people's always a bit weird.
35:48
Speaker 1: But at the moment, Jay is he is playing. He
35:52
Speaker 1: still plays, and he plays in a new band called
35:57
Speaker 1: Drift Current with our friend and John DeMarco, who is
36:03
Speaker 1: also in the book. And yeah, it's a great band.
36:08
Speaker 2: Well you thanked Tim. In the acknowledgments, you say thank you.
36:12
Speaker 2: Thank you to Jason Dwyer who urged me to be adventurous,
36:15
Speaker 2: for the miles and memories and for introducing me to
36:17
Speaker 2: one of the greatest records ever made. Mm Yeah, Days
36:21
Speaker 2: and Days, a story about Sunderland's Leatherface and the Ties
36:24
Speaker 2: that Bind. It's out now. You can find out wherever
36:26
Speaker 2: books are sold and if people want to reach out
36:28
Speaker 2: to you, Chris, where can people find you online?
36:33
Speaker 1: Almost anywhere? I'm on Instagram at the Red Beauty Chris McDonald.
36:41
Speaker 1: There's even a shop Instagram under my thumb tattoos. I'm
36:45
Speaker 1: on Facebook, Gmail under my thumb tattoos at gmail dot com.
36:54
Speaker 1: I'm around.
36:55
Speaker 2: You're around, all right, man. Thanks so much for taking
36:58
Speaker 2: some time to talk about the book. Congrats on the
37:00
Speaker 2: great job.
37:00
Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you for having me. I really appreciate it.
37:04
Speaker 1: M mmmmm, that's it. It's in the books.