EPISODE 18: Mike Campbell

In this episode of Reinvention of the VJ, Erica gets personal with Mike Campbell about why MuchMusic may not have existed without him, his profound effect on the Canadian music scene, and the hilarious story behind Mike and Mike's Excellent Cross Canada Adventures. Mike opens up about his favorite spots in Canada, how he has remained relevant in the music business for over thirty years, and the woman who became his guardian angel when he was about to lose his home.

Show Transcript

0:03

The guys from kiss have arrived this snuck in the back door to spend your whole life during the first few albums and then suddenly everybody needs your attention.

0:11

Good vision of the vj a flashback on the career that made them who they are today. On this episode.

0:20

Hi, I'm Mike and Mike Austin. Welcome to Mike and Mike's excellent cross Canada adventures. But the new music was one of the very few places in the country that promoted Canadian artists. And I remember it was simulcasts combo, and it was actually in Toronto. At some of those shows. This is Erica Ehm.

0:38

We eventually vj Now, here's Erica Ehm.

0:42

Hi there. I'm Erica Ehm. And thank you so much for tuning into this episode of my reinvention of the vj podcast. Today's guest is one of those people who embodies the concept of reinvention. He's been described as the patron saint of music. He's worked in all aspects of the music business, although weirdly enough, his first few jobs at muchmusic had actually nothing to do with music. He's crossed the country something like 20 times, he's hosted three shows on muchmusic. He's launched the Halifax bourbon folk fest. He manages bands, and most recently overseas, one of the hottest music venues in the country. My guest today is my good friend, one of the stars of Mike and Mike's excellent cross Canada adventures, Mike Campbell. So, before we jump into our interview, I need to thank you so much for choosing to listen to the show today. Also for subscribing and for reviewing the show. It's really helping spread the word about reinvention of the vj. Also, I have to tell you, I love getting all your feedback. I'm getting emails from you and private messages, comments and social media, I read them all. And it just, it feels really amazing knowing that you're loving this podcast, probably as much as I am. This is your first time tuning into the show. Let me give you just a bit of background reinvention of the vj podcast is my up close and personal conversations with some of the eclectic and talented personalities he may have grown up with on muchmusic. Some of them I worked really closely with with like our guest today, while others came after my time. And, you know, while all of our personalities and approaches were really different, there's one thing that we all have in common. Each of us played a small part in Canada's most influential pop culture platform. And then we left the sad part at different times for different reasons. Each of us went off on our next adventures. And you know, it's that story of what happens after much the reinventions and the resilience, the luck, the tough times, and the perspective, that's what intrigues me. So my chat with Mike Campbell is probably going to be a bit of a trip down memory lane for you. But I'm also hoping that you find some interesting tidbits or insights into what it takes for you to get what you want in life, what you need to reinvent or deal with tough times, and maybe even redefine what successes. I know that these days, a lot of us are going through some challenging times. And as we grow up, we're forced to do reevaluate our priorities and our choices in life. Maybe what Mike has gone through will inspire you in some small way to look at your life with new perspective. And now it's time to introduce today's guest from Halifax please welcome my old buddy Mike Campbell. How are you Mike?

3:47

I'm great. Okay, how are you?

3:48

I'm so good. And I'm so happy to talk to you. First of all, I got to say kind of pissed off at you. Oh, okay. Mike, you are sitting in the famous Tiki lounge. Am I right?

4:02

That is correct.

4:03

Explain what the Tiki Lounge is?

4:05

Well, my Tiki lounge. When I moved to Halifax, I bought a house which is one of the things that was virtually impossible for somebody in my position to do when I was living in Toronto. And in the backyard of the house was a 20 by 20 foot garage built out of two inch non dimensionalize lumber probably built in the 30s. It was absolutely beautiful building but completely impractical for parking the car in. So one day I got up and my roommates at the time had piled everything that was in the garage out in the backyard and informed me that we were about to embark on the renovation of the garage into an office which is something I've been talking about for seven or eight years. And it has since become my office. It was my office when I worked at much I don't know if you can see probably it's hard to tell because there's tears in the way. But behind me there's a bar. There's a beautiful glass block wall. It's fully insulated and heated. It has everything except plumbing. And it's an absolutely perfect place for a home office. And over the years, especially when I was doing the much thing, it's become a drop in place for many, many, many, many, many, many Canadian international artists. A great number of which I'm sure you know,

5:31

can't Well, you know, I pissed off at you. Because you've never been here. I've never been Mike. How many times have I been in Halifax? Hey, Mike, I'm coming to town, never an invitation to the famous Tiki lounge.

5:44

I think that's because probably you have very, very busy when you're here. As I recall, you did find time to drop into the Carlton though. And that was a great many of my staff were very excited. Erica Ehm in the Carlton. And I think you actually had stuff to do otherwise they would have twisted your own kidnapped you. As you may recall, I was kidnapped once on a trip with you to rejoin it that we were on and pulled you into the Tiki for some fun and frivolity, which would have made the next morning very difficult on you.

6:17

So Mike, I think what I've been, I think I've waited how many over 30 years to tell this story about how you and I first met because we met way before much music.

6:35

Well, certainly a couple of years before much.

6:37

Oh, at least because I don't know if you remember this or not you better. We we used to play baseball together in Ottawa.

6:49

Yes.

6:50

When I worked at the record store, I worked at records on wheels and was friends with Peter. And Peter invited me to join the baseball team. And the baseball team was it was it music industry people I can't remember

7:06

just a bunch of just a bunch of freaks. There were a bunch of music industry people involved. A lot of people that worked in record stores. And I knew most of them at that point in time because I had worked in record stores in Ottawa, I used to manage a treble clef record store in the curling wood mall. And so there were a bunch of folks that worked in for Collingwood. There were folks that worked at records on wheels. There was some tremendously colorful characters that didn't really have anything to do with the music business. But it all kind of revolved around a local pub downtown called Alfie's, which was below a restaurant called the marble works, which is one of those feast places. And playing softball was an excuse to get together so that when the games ended, we could go to Alphys and drink beer and play darts. And I was one of the boys who showed up there to play softball, I think you were you've been to Ottawa, you taking communications or something, right? And then at the end of the summer, you buggered off to, as you put it, go to work at Sydney TV in Toronto, I think on the switchboard with something that's right,

8:19

yes. And I stayed in touch with my friends from Ottawa, and worked at City TV, answering the phones, and working at the new music, which was the coolest thing. I was answering the phones for Jamie and JD, and just sort of warming my way in. And about two years later, there was buzz in the office, because chum, which owned city TV was applying for the broadcast rights for a music channel. And in order to get this music channel, you have to go before the CRTC in these very fancy hearings, and plead your case. And so there was a call to everyone who worked in our small office at the time, if you know anybody in the music business that you think would be well spoken. And, you know, present in front of the CRTC. Let us know. So I went oh, you know that Mike Campbell guy. He was really smart. I know. I was on a baseball team with him. And I know, but he was in the music business was me. And so I put your name forward. And somehow you got chosen. And I remember that Nancy Oliver and john Martin were freaked out because there was no way in hell that one of young air because I was 20 or 22 at the time, that one of my friends would be well spoken enough to present professionally so they were worried that it was more My friend. And in the end, you blew everybody away. Tell me what happened at that, at that time?

10:07

Well, my recollection of it was I had been working at attic records, the Canada's at the time, Canada's largest independent record company, before I met you. And there was a downturn in the music business in the early 80s. And I wound up getting laid off. And there was not really much point applying to other jobs in the music industry, because people were getting laid off because the industry was in the dumper and had not come out of it yet, because MTV had launched in the States, but its effect wasn't quite known. So I started my own business called Art attack, which was a shrink wrap framing business.

10:54

I've thought about that.

10:57

And I was doing that in Ottawa and commuting back before I had a place in Toronto with my girlfriend, and I had an apartment in Ottawa, and I would go to Toronto on the weekends sometimes. But mostly I was in Ottawa. And so I was busy work one day, and you called me and asked and told me about this application for much music, which at the time, thought was the dumbest name I'd ever heard. But did realize it was an anagram for chm, the parent company, so I kind of got it. And you told me what it was about and asked me if I'd be willing to write an intervention letter to the CRTC.

11:37

Right, it was the letter that's right letter.

11:40

So I said as I would, I worked at ACC, and of course, advocate a lot of domestic artists, like triumphant teenage head and Johnny g rays, and the list does go on. But the new music was one of the very few places in the country that promoted Canadian artists. And I do remember the simulcasts from El Mocambo. And I was actually in Toronto, at some of those shows. I used to be upset because they take a beer off the tables when they were doing it. But everyone appreciated the amount of attention that Sydney TV page, the Canadian music industry. So when you asked if I'd be willing to write a letter, I said, Absolutely, I would. When do I have to have it? And if and unless my memory completely fails me? And I doubt it. It was like, two days later, it was due at the CRTC. So yes, of course. So I basically had a day to do it. I was so busy at my work, there was no way I should have done it. But I'd never been involved with the CRTC before and I was curious. Plus, I really did think that the city TV had the best chance because I knew that they could get this thing from from zero to 60 in about 20 minutes. Whereas anybody else applying would have to set up an entire television station is going to take them forever. And MTV was always making was already making huge inroads via satellite dish to a lot of Canadian households. And I knew that because we used to go to bars and had satellite dishes specifically to show MTV we were completely blown away by it. But I thought that, you know, city was the one that should get it. They've been doing the work in the past. So I sat down to compose a letter. And for some of you younger listeners that involved at typewriter carbon paper, you can imagine and he make a mistake, I'm one of those babies. It's not like go into your computer and just, you know, cutting and pasting and deleting and doing all that shit. You actually had to write the letter. And it was a considered letter. So it was many pages long. And so I needed it copied for city TV, I needed a copy no citytv needed two copies, I needed a copy for the CRTC and one for me just to hang on to you which I've since lost, I'm sure. So I sent everything off to the station. And then that was that I didn't think about it at all for a couple of months. And then I got a call from the CRTC saying you wrote a letter of intervention on behalf of muchmusic the license for music channel Would you like to appear at the hearings in person as

14:27

shit broke?

14:33

And I was like, Well, I'm the people that wrote the letter on behalf of do not know me from a hole in the ground.

14:41

Baseball with Erica Ehm

14:45

I could have been anybody off the street because I've written the letter I had the right to appear at the entrance. But I was smart enough to at least check first. So I called the station I didn't even know who I was calling. I just eventually got a hold of I think it was more on water, right? For sure. I'm said, Well, we are going to be in Ottawa to meet with the CRTC. On such and such a date, we'd love to talk to you about it. Would you come to dinner? You can bring a friend if you like. And I was like, Yeah, sure. So I had a friend kicking around at loose ends, another friend of play baseball, Chris Hudson, who you may remember. And I said, Yeah, I'll drag Chris along, just to be, you know, my sidekick at this thing. And so I had dinner in a beautiful restaurant in Hall, not too far from CRTC headquarters. So it was Ron waters, Moses Neymar. And Dennis Fitzgerald, who was the general manager of city TV. And we, like,

15:44

How crazy is that?

15:47

Well, pretty goofy. And we just had a conversation about, you know, what I was doing? What I thought the future was going to be what I thought that something like much music could do for the industry, etc, etc, etc. So that wound up doing like two hours. And at the end of it, Moses looked at me and said, we would love for you to appear at the hearings. So I waited around for the call. I got a call. I forget what day of the week it was. But the CRTC said, Can you come in tomorrow afternoon. And I went Sure. So we went down there and sat in all afternoon was not called and then was and then had to come back the next day. And it wasn't called until the very end, I was like the last intervene, or I was also the only private citizen who intervened in person for any of the licenses. They were all, you know, Canadian Association of Broadcasters and advertisers and all kinds of other like minded folks, but no other private citizens.

16:55

How old? Were you at that time? Mike?

16:57

I was 29 or something? I

17:01

think, right?

17:02

That makes sense. And, yeah, cuz I was so well spoken. So I got caught up in front of the panel and sat down at a table and read my letter word for word. That's it. And then I thought that was gonna be it. And then the commissioners questioned me for like 20 minutes, something like that, or at least 20 minutes. And at the end, they said, thank you very much for stepping forward. And we hope that at some point, you will be able to get a job back in the music industry again, because I told him, one of the reasons that I was doing what I was doing was, there were no gigs in the music industry. So I got up from the table, they closed the hearings, and then every other applicant came running out there with their stuff, like their little pamphlets and their books and their applications. and was like, I just did this for chum, and then forgot about it. Again, it was an interesting experience. Like a really interesting experience. And then I forgot about it. And then I started another company in Ottawa called fire for hire, which was an independent promotion company. This is something I noticed when I worked in retail in Ottawa, that the sales offices for all the major labels, and there were many more of them than those that were in Montreal, and the promotional department, the public relations, people were all in Toronto, and they didn't really talk to each other. And even though it was the city of about a million people, it really wasn't getting the attention that it should. So because I still had contacts in the business in Toronto, I started this company, where I would contract myself out to labels to help work records when their artists would come into town. So as a for instance, when Huey Lewis his album, sports came out, I went to all the record stores in Ottawa, and I went through the Huey Lewis sections and did an inventory and made sure they had stock. And they sent me display materials. So I put displays up and stuff. And then on the day of the show, I yeah, along with cam carpenter, who you know, who was at MCA at the time, we drove around Ottawa to various radio stations, and had Huey Lewis do sports, so they do the sports and the radio station. That's so cool. And then I went to the show, and then after the show, I took the band to Barrymores to see another person that you know, Tom Wilson, and his old band of Florida razors were playing Barrymores to about four people. It's a club that holds about 300

19:42

this is like 1984 Is that right? is

19:46

like, yeah, this is this is 83 Yeah, 83 ish. So so that's the kind of thing I would do. You know, so the Huey, who end up getting up and playing with Tom and it was a it was Real Thing like 10 of us that were there, it was one of the coolest things ever. But that was the kind of thing I was doing. So I went to Toronto for Canada Music Week to promote my new company. I was still doing the shrink wrap framing thing. This is the sideline thing called fire pro hired. And unbeknownst to me, like the lunch break for the session I was in, they were announcing the winner of the license. Really, seriously. So I'm sitting with a bunch of friends. And the CRTC announces that chum has won the license. Moses gets up and does the speech, you know, this is gonna be the best thing ever, you know, much music, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then they break for lunch. So I get up to try and find Moses just to congratulate him. And I was like, Hey, man, not that I ever thought there was any question but you know, congratulations. So I find him. And he's with the Ron waters. And Dennis. Well, I had dinner with in Ottawa, though that was many months before. And he looks at my name tag, which says fire for hire on it. And he says, Well, he thanks me. And he said, oh, by the way, do not underestimate the impact of your intervention at the hearings. And I see your name tag says fire for hire. I don't suppose that means man for hire. And I just kind of looked at him like what? And he said, I think it's I think it's admirable that you're doing that you've started your own companies and stuff. But I think you'll go farther if you come work for me. And I went, really? And he said, and he said, Ron, give me a card. So Ron gave me his card, Ron waters son of out of waters won't jump the time, the family, the jump group, and runs and, and Ryan said, you know, like, give me a call, you know, let me know what you want to do. So I walked back into the room, apparently, it was white as a sheet. And I sat down with my friends and they said, What is? Are you okay? You seem a little shook up. And I said, Well, unless I miss my guest, I just got offered a job at muchmusic. And everyone freaked because everybody wanted a job. And of course, they wanted a job at muchmusic. So I didn't really know what to do with that information. I didn't know what jobs there were, I hadn't worked in television before. I mean, I had a fair idea of what might be available, but the only thing I could think of was like a DJ job. So I set a letter off a kind of a resume with my music, business experience and stuff. And they wanted an eight by 10. I assumed and the only the only eight by 10. I had was by a friend of mine. It was in photography school doing a project and Diane Arbus and her photographs were all like hyper hyper close up so you can see every pore on the face. And a few months earlier, I'd been running from the house, I was living in a couple of years that we've been running from the house, I was living into the laundromat in the wintertime. And I put my clothes in I was running home and it was trying to get there fast because we were having a party at the time. And I was running in like a long, great coat with my hands my pockets and I turned a corner my feet went out from underneath me and I've landed on my face. So I have this color photograph of this my the right side of my face all scabbed up and scraped people thought I'd been in a fight. And so Chris had me get up close to his camera with a cigarettes, they'd be cigarette smoking, all the rest of it took a took an eight by 10. So that's, that's what I sent in with my application. And of course, I didn't hear anything back from anybody that much. And then run waters for me one day and said, Look, I've got an opening in my department as an affiliate relations Rep. And I'd like to offer you the job. And I was gone. I don't know anything about cable, except I hate it. And he said

24:16

What the hell is affiliate relations?

24:18

Guys, we're in the corner, right? We were in the basement of one point in a hallway. And so I said, Yeah, I said, Well, I don't know anything about cable, you know, blah, blah, blah. And Ron says it's okay. It's fine. You're smart. You'll figure it out. Can you be in Toronto and Monday, this is a Wednesday, I think in July the thing for and I said okay, so I turned around to my friend Peter who I ran the art attack with and

24:50

my friend Peter,

24:51

my friend Peter, and I said give me $1 give me $1 and I signed over the business to him and said sorry, because I was leaving and with You know, this business to run by itself? And I took off and I went into the office on Queen, Queen Street East on the Monday. And on Wednesday. Oh, yeah, on Monday go up. And I find ron wyden is it gives me a book, I forget what it's called. It's a big binder, all the information of all the cable companies in Canada. And then two days later on Wednesday, I was on a plane to Vancouver with Nancy, all of her, Kathy Hahn. And then, of course, john Martin, the people that were afraid to have somebody like a friend of yours speak from commission, because the Canadian cable television Association convention was up there. And on Friday, I was in standing in front of a ballroom in the hotel, Vancouver, 500 delegates, telling them what much music it was gonna be.

25:56

It takes a very special person to be able to do that. And I'm not being facetious for a second, Mike Campbell, you are a special guy. That story, no one knows that story. No, I

26:07

don't tell that story very often.

26:09

That's because you are incredibly bright. You're very passionate, you're very articulate, and you are able to assimilate information, and you're charming, you have such an amazing ability to connect with people, you disarm people, and look what happened. And to me, like, for people who are looking for opportunities, that's a great one, when someone asks you to help or for help, frickin do it.

26:40

When I talk to students and I have on occasion, and certainly I did when I was at much I go to, you know, places that have broadcast schools and that kind of thing. I do them often with JD back in the olden days, me and you. And, you know, quite often, you know, the first question everybody to ask us, how much money do you make? We're just like, okay, you shouldn't be in this class. But the second comment was, you know, there's several things about that story that I find hugely interesting, just in the human experience. One, if Peter had invited you to play softball, none of this happened. That's right. And secondly, if I was so busy, and so disconnected, that you would follow me and ask me to write a letter. And for some reason, I thought, well, I don't have time, or what's going to come with this. I didn't do it, because I thought anything was going to come from it. I did it because it's an experience I hadn't had. And why not. And I also believe that they should have the license. So there were a couple of steps there, that if those things hadn't happened, and I hadn't responded to your call, with action, my life would have changed irrevocably, and I have no idea where I would have went where it would have gone English, perhaps I be a billionaire, perhaps

28:10

would have been way successful.

28:14

But I decided to, to follow this path where it took me and it took me to some very, very interesting places, you know, and there were a bunch of things about that affiliate job that kind of suited me right down to the ground, I was an Air Force brat. So I was born in Vancouver, I've lived all over the country. My dad's idea of a summer vacation was load the kids in the car and drive across Canada. And I mean, drive across Canada, like the whole thing. So I did that a bunch of different times. So when I was going out to visit people that, you know, visit cable operators, my job is affiliate Relations at the time, as you know, but many of our nav listeners might not It costs money to get much music when we first started. So it was a paid service. So somebody had to go out and talk to the cable companies and convince them that a it was worth people paying for and be helped them to market the service. So that their their customer service reps could sell it to their customers, and we could get a decent subscriber base so that we can grow. So

29:21

you would take us so you'd take me or JD or Mike or one of you would would one of us would go on the road. And we were kind of, you know, the honey for the advertisers or for the cable company to you know, get to schmooze with the star so to speak, but also we were sent out into the field with you to talk to people who were from that city to build community. There was this very unique, I think, brilliant approach to create a deep relationship with the viewers. So you would think equated clubs. We'll talk about that later on Mr. gamba, we know. He would take me to different clubs or take me to schools or I would speak at different schools. And people got to know us as people, the on air people, people started to fall in love with us. And it was such an incredibly brilliant grassroots approach, which is the exact antithesis to every major broadcaster, they still, to this day, push, they're the most important, and we will listen to them. But much music and city TV never had that approach. It was we are you and you are us. And we were never allowed to have any errors. You know, like, on our people, we we were treated like shit. Like you treated us like shit. And I mean that with respect, sort of, in the sense that it was like come on, get up. Let's go we got to go have breakfast with these guys. We got to go over there. We got there was no hair, no makeup. No, none of that it was, you know, we we flew economy and you know, eight and shitty restaurants and but it was awesome. Right? Like it was

31:21

the thing about the vj stuff. And I pitched it hard because it costs money. Yeah, obviously, which I didn't like to spend. No, they Well, there was no money for anything. And I pitched it hard because I discovered that, especially that first trip with Roberts. I mean, I even I even a tour t shirts printed up that I gave the cable affiliates that were especially great to work with that it was called sleepers for wimps to her. And I listed all the cities that we went to, and like this schedule was insane, we get up at six in the morning, we fly, we get into a place we do a morning, meeting with the customer service reps at one of the cable companies, then I take them out to lunch, then we go to a place where they were selling our mirch which as you might recall with like Sears back in the olden days next to the lawn mowers, it's on the stitches, yes. And then we would go to and then we would go to the second cable company in town and then we would go to dinner. And then we'd go to a club and throw a party and stay there till two in the morning and then get up and go to the next cities six. But not only do we fire up the customer service reps who certainly in jadis case were generally young women who were very impressed with JD as they should have been. But every major media outlet at the same time, we'd get like a color photo on the front page of the entertainment section of every major newspaper for free. And that is the kind of like you can't what you could buy that kind of advertising but it was well beyond the budget that we had. And and that and then it also helped to create a sense of also this is what the country is about with the vj is that hadn't traveled that much in it and I was lucky enough to know most of the country already. And another little known fact that you probably know but you might not. Because I always wanted to take cameras on the road. With JD and well JD at the time, Chris didn't want to go anywhere. So we did with JD before we before you came along, and Mike Williams and everybody else that I made the same tour with but I thought that we should be shooting video flow on the road. And JD agreed with me. But they wouldn't give me cameras half the time because they said they didn't have it. And at the time, much city TV as well was using three quarter inch camera gear which, again, anybody who's not of a certain age, I have no clue what I'm talking about. But trust me, it was horrible. It's terrible. The amount of crap you had to carry around and shitty quality

34:07

heavy that

34:10

were huge.

34:11

Yeah, he had a big recording deck on his shoulder and stuff and have a tripod, holy shit. So I went to Ron and said, well, they won't give me a camera. So Ron said, well, let's buy one for us, the marketing department, which is the ages I was under, and we bought the station's first beta camp, which was the future of broadcast quality at the time. And we had been by my department my budget paid for the first beta camp. So where do you think that beta cam was the first time I went to use it? I'll tell you where it was in Africa with some band called refugee that the new music had taken the camera buggered off with and when they brought it back, it was full of sand It had to be repaired.

35:02

Let's talk Regina. I'm going to tell a little story. And then you can tell I'm going to tell it from my perspective. And then you tell me because memory is a is a funny thing, right? And we remember things differently. But as you mentioned, each of us would go on the road with you, and we would meet people and go to bars. Now, as we both know, man, do I hate bars? I was probably your least favorite travel mate, because I was no fun. True. No,

35:33

you were plenty of fun. You just didn't like bar. Okay,

35:36

great. So you said let's go to this particular bar, or we had to go to a bar, there was a party of some sort. And there was this really handsome guy who agreed to be my chaperone for that night, while you were off, you know, meeting people and, you know, spreading the much word in your style, which was having a drink or two. Was it the morning or at night? You got Okay, you got kidnapped?

36:04

What happened? As part of our usual vj tour thing? I was buying lunch for a bunch of people, including radio folks, newspaper folks, cable company, folks at this upstairs restaurant in Regina. So it's lunchtime. I was I there. He was sitting at the table with me. Just as my food arrived. I could hear this huge ruckus on the stairs, and four or five guys ran up the stairs. They had ballot clubs on they had battery operated water pistol machine guns. And they came flying up the stairs. They looked at the room, they looked at our table. And for one desperate moment I thought Jesus No, because I knew it was a friend of mine. And I thought they were gonna go after you. But they didn't go after you. They came immediately up to me, dragged me out of my chair and then took me back to this place they called pylon central is a bunch of well known lunatics in in Regina, one of them was the weatherman at the local TV station. One of them was a Rhodes Scholar weighed 300 pounds. Derek Cornish, who was a social worker, and other guy was doc Mark Daugherty, who was also a social worker, who, incidentally is now the Speaker of the House in the legislature in Saskatchewan, his third term, third term member of provincial Parliament now anyway, they took me back to their headquarters when such as you know, the crashpad were all lived. They sat me in a chair and I kid you not they made me drink beer for hours. And I'm protesting the whole time. Like,

37:56

I'm sure you were sure you were like, Oh, no, please. No,

38:00

I have things to do. Eric is supposed to like I've got this whole schedule for Erica, they said, Don't worry, we've got Eric and taken care of, don't worry about Erica. So we'll have to be at the keg, like five o'clock, because I have a whole bunch of other people I'm buying dinner for. So they promised to give me back to the keg at five. So they delivered me back to the keg at five o'clock I get another 12 people or so buying dinner for your there as well. And they, they'd actually organize the band to play in the keg. Because we were there that never happened. One of the guys in the band I think turned out to be Graham Yates, who we know from much music he wound up working at or Bravo something. And anyway, they were playing. And I'd had a lot of beer me so I had to go to the bathroom. Every time I had to go to the bathroom, I had to walk by the bar. Guess who the bartenders were the same guys who kidnapped me. And they're members of the rugby team. So I would walk by the bar had been those days, my hair was fairly grabbable. So they would pull my they would grab my hair, pull me backwards over the bar, and then pour whatever they happen to have. I remember that into my mouth.

39:14

I remember that. And then and I was aghast because I'm so straight.

39:21

You don't know

39:24

I'm watching this because I'm sort of on my own because you're the guy who sort of takes care of me when we're on the road. Especially when there's drunk guys around and there's my protector who is getting more and more blasted. Okay continue the story

39:41

that was not like it was by Troy these guys, which I know is terrible. Oh wait. Regina is a special place for those guys have done way worse stuff to me since then, on subsequent trips, but anyway, they dragged me back to their house completely hammered at this point. They tried to give me to their female roommate, Aaron, who was the manager of the keg at the time. And honestly, I think I was fighting, but it was more like I was probably just useless at that point. They threw me on a couch to sleep. And at the end table at the end of the couch was a parrot that just kept going. All night That is true. But I passed out. And then I woke up with Dick, the 300 pound guy shaking me and going, Mike, you've got to get to the airport.

40:34

We That's right. We had to catch a plane. I was like, well is

40:38

Campbell. So he put me in his car drove me to the hotel where I opened the door, and reached in and my bag was there because I never even had time to unpack in the first place. So I just grabbed my bag, and got to the airport. Luckily, the airport's really close in retirement. It's a five minute drive. And I saw you and I was like, Oh, thank God, Erica managed to get herself in here where I think I can remember this too. And, and you were like, absolutely, totally relieved to see me because he had no clue what had happened to

41:12

you had the plane tickets. No, I

41:14

had the plane tickets. There we go. That would be another good reason.

41:18

But what we didn't talk about was those bastards. Had there was some sort of a I don't know, like they were they were gambling. That one of that the cute guy who was my chaperone would beg me that money. And you in a drunken state.

41:40

I did not put money on that.

41:42

You might have but you said you said don't do it. You were like, Joseph, and I was like, What the hell are you talking about? And then the next morning, he said, Where did you ask me? Where did you sleep last night? Or where Where's buddy? Like, whatever his name was? I was like, I

41:59

don't know.

42:01

And he said, and you said, Oh, thank God. I said, What's going on? He goes, they were all betting that he would get you in bed. And you didn't do it. He said, I think you said I bet against cuz

42:16

I know you. I would never. That sounds like Rob Middleton and Rob, wound up running MTV Asia for a while, you might be happy to know.

42:28

I missed out.

42:33

I have wanted to talk about that story. Well, so long. And that was really an amazing time. Like that was just crazy. And you were so much fun to travel with. Except that one time when I was a beard.

42:50

But over the course of those trips, I met a lot of local people. Yes. I mean, some of them I knew before. Much but not like the Regina guys. I met on the first trip with JD and with ron ron waters came along that trip

43:07

is loved you loved you. Loved love you. Yeah, you you find these characters. And you have in every city, you have your people. It's incredible.

43:19

So that played well, virtually everywhere we went. And I got a lot accomplished in that job. You know, we we transitioned to basic cable at that point, we were becoming a force. I've managed to, you know, get Chris Ward to agree to come out on a trip. Mostly because he was putting out a record on the label I used to work for, and he wanted to do promotion for it. And this seemed to be the best way to do it.

43:49

And to get drunk. What happened on the road.

43:52

Chris probably had a few drinks a couple of times when he was working really hard because he was busy trying to get the A Atlanta miles record done and a record contract in place. So he was telling me how that was coming along on the whole trip. So I was like what you do what and he was blaming some of the tunes like, holy shit, man, this is Jesus. This is Are you kidding me? You wrote this stuff. Holy shit. And so at the end of it all, I think it wound up we were doing. We were doing a big ticket with honeymoon suite in Halifax. And the night before they were doing a show at the Aiken Center, which is the big Arena in fredericton. And we still had a bunch of stuff that I'm trying to remember exactly why we had to do this, but at the time, oh, Neil, the director of the show, needed more time in fredericton and said can you find us a way to Halifax tomorrow afternoon So didn't have to leave when everybody else left. And I went, No, there are no flights but I can charter a plane. So I found a guy with a four seater Cessna. And Gary lon bass player from honeymoon suite heard that we were taking the plane so he didn't get on the band's bus. He said, I said, Yeah, there's one more. There's one more seat if you want to get on a plane with us. So Gary, Tom O'Neill, me and JD flew in this. Cessna, I think, out of fredericton. On the flight, I'm talking to Tom O'Neill, the director. I have a photograph of the two of us JD is in the copilot seat. He claims he landed the plane in Halifax. I don't know if they actually let them do that, but they shouldn't. And, and Tom is talking to me, he says, you know, you know a lot about music. And I said, Well, you know, I've worked in the industry for a long time, I was the kid with the best record collection everywhere I lived

46:08

in at much didn't know you as a music guy. You were the cable relations guy. You're the people party guy.

46:14

Yeah, nobody really asked me about it. I mean, you know, anybody who was on the road with me knew that. So JD, and you didn't like all the people I worked with. And Tom was beginning to find that out because of the conversations he was having with folks. And he said, you know, you should do, he should do a demo tape. And I say What do you mean? Because just grab one of your camera guys, and just do a 10 minute thing, tell a story, do anything and give it to Moses. And I was like, really? And he goes yeah, yeah, you know, but I think you should do it. You know, you could be you could be an honor guy. You're, you're smart. And I'm wearing Okay, so we found go back to Toronto and found Tony Wanamaker, one of our camera guys. And certainly one of the guys that I used all the time at the my trips across Canada, and came over to my place like Hyde Park Avenue one Saturday afternoon, nice sunny day, and I had no real clue what I was going to do. But I wound up telling a story about you know, how I came to buy the first Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers records and then going to then driving to New York for the first time to see Tom Petty at the bottom line in 1977. Something so I tell the story, but it kept screwing it up. I was so nervous. I mean, when a lot of people don't realize and you certainly do. You can talk to a human being all day. Well, when it comes time to just focus and talk to a piece of glass in a camera adds a completely different thing. Here, right easy to screw up. It's it's, you have to trick yourself then I never did master it. JD was a genius at it. But almost everybody else I knew really had to work at it to do it. So I kept screwing it up. And Tony suggested I have a drink. It's 11 o'clock in the morning. Fine. So I go to the kitchen. Oh,

48:08

he's been on the road with you. So he knows how you work? Yeah,

48:11

so pound a couple of shots and buka and then sit down in front of my record collection and pull this record out and tell the story to the camera. You know, this is I never bought records by people I'd heard of or heard on the radio. I always bought stuff that I'd never heard of. So look in the miscellaneous bin. This is miscellaneous p i don't know what this is coolest logo I've ever seen. guy looks rock and roll leather jacket. It was pop rock days. Look at the back of the record. Everything looks cool. recognize the name of the producer. song titles are all cool. Seems a little short. But the Glee guitars players name is Mike Campbell. So yeah, I'm buying that record. And then it turns out to be one of my favorite records of all time. Anyway, take the tape, Tony pops it out of this camera gives it to me. I just put a thing on it and give it to Moses secretary. The next day. Moses calls me in and says I want you to be the national field reporter. And I just go What's that? And he said, Well,

49:13

he just made it up. That's what he does.

49:14

Sure. Well, he'd heard like, there were lots of stories coming back from the VJs and various camera guys about how much fun we were having on the road and that kind of stuff. Or you know, it was a great trip and all this kind of stuff. So Moses wants me to just randomly go around the country and shoot stuff for rock news or rock flash. And I could totally do this with the cameramen because basically when the VJs were doing stuff I was field producing for the most part so I knew how to do it. I knew how to do with throw, I knew how to do all the rest of the stuff. But I'd since met Mike Rhodes who was working on rock flash at the time, who was desperately trying to get out of the building. It was driving me crazy. We're in the new building at this point. And so, so I lied and said I couldn't do it, I probably needed a producer, which got Mike sprung. And then the two of us are growing across the country, we were shooting these things fine. We were getting pieces of news and stuff. But it's not like today, you know, you know, just go to a satellite uplink. And, you know, mingling, being in the editor scattered in front of them. We had to courier the tape to the airport, and then it had to fly. And then, you know, the airplane had to not lose it. And then it had to arrive at the station at six. And somebody had to remember to give it to an editor. So by the time physical

50:42

tape had to be carried, oh, my god,

50:46

there's no, no, Hell no, there was nothing even approaching it. So. So by the time our items were getting back, they were stale. You know, this is not really news. And it was something else. And we also rose. And I also had to tell the camera, guys, when you come back, the station just shut up. We don't want everyone to know how much fun we're having doing this. Because most of the stuff that was happening to us was well, after the camera was put away, it was just being out at night, go into places, meeting people and, you know, they drag us up to see stuff and do stuff. And we go to parties. It was great fun. So after about a year this we got called to Dennis Fitzgerald's office, and I'm coming from the marketing department in Rhodes is coming from downstairs. Basically, at this point,

51:39

the creative space,

51:40

yes, the creative space, and we meet outside Dennis's big glass office. Yeah, I'm getting fired. Damn straight, we're getting fired. There's no other reason Dennis could possibly want to speak to us. And so we sit down. And well, you know, Dennis, so he's a very imperious sort of figure. And he starts off, and it certainly looks like we're going to get fired. Because he starts off with like how much money it's costing to do this, how little of the stuff that we're doing is actually making it to air although he didn't get it wasn't through any fault of our own. And he said he had been hearing stories about what's been going on on the road. So then we were sure we were gonna get fired. And he said, so one of the biggest problems is that we don't really have time to promote this stuff. So what we're going to do is we're going to give you a half hour show, and you're going to go out and do what you've been doing. But shoot the stuff that you haven't been shooting.

52:39

Wow. Now, that was not his idea. There's no way cuz that guy did not have a creative bone in his body. Where did that come from?

52:46

I'm not sure whose idea it was. But it sure as hell wasn't john Martin. He didn't want it. Anything to do with this. So we get booted down to John's office. And Mike and I have a brief talk after we do the dance of joy that we weren't getting fired and looking at each other going. What just happened happen? Do we just they just give us our own show? Yes. So we go downstairs to have the meeting with john is not happy to see us doesn't want to have anything to do with us. Really. I mean, Mike was a very good friend of his but he didn't, he did not cotton to me for the longest time. Mostly because I came from outside think. And he didn't have any control of me. So that bothered him. But he'd been told that we were going to show so there we go. So we go over to meet him at the fryer, whatever across the street. And he sits down he goes and I'm sitting Okay, so the way I see it is you know, we can go into all these places we can do like a rock and roll a survival guide. You know, like we're a cool place to stay that aren't particularly expensive. You know, where can I get where the music stores where can I get guitar strings where the cool clubs in town? Where's the late great late night eatery, you know it plays we can go for food and all this shit that you would want to know if you're a musician or a music fan traveling to one of these downs. And he goes nap as well than what he goes. I want you to do a cross between real people. That's incredible. I forget what the global show that Fini AK was on like all of these shows. And I was just looking at him go like, give me a for instance, like what should we shoot? Because we'll go to some high school and blah, blah, blah, anywhere. Get the camera on top of the building, get the entire student body out on the field and spell much music with their bodies. And well, that's a start. And then and then that was it. Oh, and the show's gonna be called Mike and Mike's excellent cross Canada adventure and some bill and Ted's adventure was like, No, don't, don't, don't please don't do that internally. That's terrible. No. And he said that's, that's all there is to it. And so we started off with this vague show. idea. The name We didn't want. And then we got called basically and told, we're told that the show had to start on April 13, or something, which is completely arbitrary as far as I was. And, and we asked SeolA about it, she said something like, something to do with like Gail Goldman's mother died or something like that. Something terrible. But what's that got to do with the start date of our show? Didn't really make any sense to us. And that made even less, I love

55:30

this podcast so much.

55:36

Can you tell these stories, it gets so much better. So So then we go downstairs to Nancy Oliver to book cameras, because we have to shoot the show the show supposed to be on the air, like we've got to go and shoot the show. And it has to be on the air on such and such a date. And so we say okay, so we need to we need to book a camera from here to here. And, you know, then we have to figure out where we're gonna go. But I think we're gonna go to Edmonton, Alberta, because we have some contacts there. And why

56:05

don't you go to Regina, go to Regina Mike.

56:10

And then she says, Yeah, there's no cameras available. And I said so. Okay, so. So we're going to push back to start date from the show. For the show, which she said no, it has to start on the 13th. And we have to shoot it. Like between now and the 13th.

56:31

You have no cameras,

56:32

but you can't have a good but we can't have a camera? No. Well, how are we supposed to do this? You will figure it out. This is Those are the words out of her mouth.

56:42

I can see it, I guess see it.

56:44

So iPhone, my friends, the cable station, one of the cable stations in Edmonton. And I asked her Shannon Havard. And I asked her, like, Is there any chance any of your cable 10 guys could, you know, take some time off and shoot our show for us. And she checked around and one guy was keen to do and I can't remember his name, but I should terrible, I can't remember his name. But three quarter inch gear all the usual just crap. And they wouldn't pay him. They didn't want to pay him a per diem, and they didn't want to pay for him to stay anywhere. And we're like going from Edmonton to Calgary, Red Deer to all these other places for two weeks.

57:28

And you're and also what people don't know is that you're paid shit. It's not like you've got a TV show, and welcome to Hollywood. It's like you've got a TV show. And here's a bit of money.

57:39

Well, well, I I was lucky in the sense that I didn't start off at the programming department. I started off in a marketing department. So and I had been excelling at the marketing department. So they were

57:51

in the wrong department. They

57:53

were actually paying me a not unreasonable amount of money. Not JB Roberts money, but you know, certainly better than a starting DJ would have been getting. But I was more concerned about the poor camera guy. We eventually were allowed to, you know, buy him a motel room or something, but they wouldn't pay him. I think I actually managed to weasel some per diem money out of them. Or we bought his food with our per diem money or something

58:21

goes to sleep in the car or something. What was the plan? Hey,

58:26

how are we supposed to do the show without a camera? Nobody had an answer for that either. So the first three, Mike and Mike episodes were shot by a cable 10 camera man from a cable company in Edmonton. And then when we arrived back from that, we only had like three four shows in the can. So the show was about the air. And then when we got back, john or Nancy called us and said the armed forces is doing a entertainment for the troops tour, the Middle East, and none of the V J's will go and they want to pay to have somebody go so you guys go. And we're like, Alright, I'll totally do that. Like, why wouldn't anybody want to do that trip? So so the next batch of shows we did, were from the Middle East and this time we did have a camera man, Tony Wanamaker who went to lar in Germany went to El Gora in northern Egypt. We went to Sharm El Sheikh, then the Sinai Peninsula. We went to Tel Aviv, we went to the Dead Sea. We went to Cyprus, we went to all these places. And the entertainment tour was being produced by john Allen Cameron, the godfather of Celtic music and the father of Stuart Cameron, we may know plays a bunch of bands and plays with Matthew Goode and plays with all kinds of purposes that is one of the best guitars in the country. And we slept around there for an entire month and got it awesome tan and had a killer time. And then when we find I got back in started to get our road schedules together and our cameras together. You know, we could never get cameras in the summer because that's when all the camera guys took their vacations. So we would be doing the mike and Mike show in the winter in the prairies, that kind of thing. You know, like, oh, here's the boys, man, the home of the turtle races in a blizzard. And here's a giant turtle, which also started us doing our whole big things series. We're just

1:00:29

okay, well, I'm gonna stop you right there. Because I invite people who listen to the podcast to call in and leave comments or questions. And one came in, which I would like to play for you right now. Hi, Erica. My name is Stacy. And I'm calling from lloydminster, Saskatchewan. I was a huge, much music fan during the 90s. And one of my favorite programs was Mike and Mike's excellent adventures. And I wondered if you're going to be speaking to either of the mics. As you can ask them, what was the most unique thing that they found in a community, maybe one or two different communities, something that really surprised them? It was really enjoyable to watch them, go across the country and highlight some communities that may be normally people wouldn't get to see. And that was one of my favorite programs. So I would really like to know if they could answer that question for me. Thank you.

1:01:20

Well, that's a tough question, Stacey.

1:01:24

Why is it tough? Because it's hard to choose?

1:01:26

Yeah, there's just so many, just so many situations that we got ourselves into, or someone else got us into, in a place. I do remember lloydminster. It's hugely fun day because the border between Saskatchewan and Alberta runs right through the middle of the city. So last call on one side of the city is an hour later that it isn't the other side of the city. doesn't make any sense. But I remember the visit there Well, I think the big things always drew us to places like in many cases, we would go to a place simply because they had a big thing. The one that killed me was again in Alberta. We drove from Edmonton one day to a place called God Now am I gonna forget the name of the place?

1:02:19

Come on. It's only 30 years ago might have Yeah,

1:02:21

no. Glenda, so we leave Edmonton, we're driving to this place called glendan, which is north of Edmonton. We leave in the middle of the afternoon. And we're going there. Because we've heard thanks to Mike Rhodes dad who sent us a clipping that they just built the world's largest Parag on a fork. And we obviously had to see it. So we're driving, it's taking us far longer. The sun is starting to set. It's like oh my god. Oh my god, it's gonna be dark when we get there. So it is dark. But luckily, this whole thing is new. And there's a big light on it. And it is world's largest Parag on a fork, and it's about, I don't know, 25 feet high or something. And it looks great. That looks absolutely fantastic. So we go around, do our usual thing, you know, wrap on it. What's it made up? Well, it seems to be fiberglass is the fork fiberglass, as well as the fork metal and you know, blah, blah, blah, our usual rant. And then I remember walking around to the front of it, the folded part of the perrotti. And I mean, you know, for all the world, it looked very much like female genitalia. So I'm just making this comment at the end. And I'm looking at addressing roads who's standing there with the camera is? Is it just me or does this look exactly like and then that was the out cut for the laugh because you could not possibly miss it. And it looked great. We played it back to the camera and stuff and said, Well, you know, at least it was lit Can you imagine if it wasn't all this stuff. And then we thought well, we should go and this glendan is like there's a store and there's a grain elevator. And the giant parochial as far as we can tell that's about it. So we went to the store thinking that maybe there's some glendan thing that we could buy. And it's nine o'clock at night or now there's something that what's the middle of the week, and we open up the door and it's kind of a combination, you know, grocery store, hardware store drugstore, like everything all in one store. And there's a kid behind the counter reading a newspaper, and we walk in and I swear to God, this is true. The kid looks up from his newspapers sees us and goes, Mike Mike, I was wondering when you guys were gonna get here. So he sold us some clendon glendan lapel pins and we left and when we got back to the station, there was a package waiting for us. It was a letter from a letter from the mayor of glendan with a cassette tape of somebody doing a song about the giant Parag he from glendan and an open invitation to come back and visit them. And they saw the segment and they just loved it, and they were thrilled about it. Fast forward a couple of years later, after that trip to the Middle East, I made friends with this, the PR officer for the armed forces. And while we were in lar, we heard a bunch of FA teens flying and I mentioned to him that, you know, I was an Air Force brat, I give half of your salary to fly in and FA T. And he said, Well, you have a TV show. I said yes. And he said, Well, we can make that happen. So two years later, we went back to northern Alberta to cold Lake, which is about an hour north of glendan, the Parag capital and went flying in FA teens. So the day after we did that we took the pilots that we've gone flying with, and took them to glendan. And just on a lark went down to glendan, because they'd never heard of it. So my God, you've been stationed in cold Lake, you don't know the world's largest prerogative of the four kings in Clanton, what the hell. So we drove them down there, and we walked into the community center, and it was like perogy days or something. And we walked in today, and the mayor lost his ship, he was like, Oh, my God, Mike, and mike got a huge hug out of the guy. They had, they had coolers full of Portuguese, they pulled the Portuguese out, then I had to share a drink of rye and coke in the can with the mayor, we all had our pictures taken and all the rest of it was just the absolute love fest. Always remember that place. And I think maybe Newfoundland was the other place that we just love to go to. It was just such a beautiful, different spot. And people were open and friendly. And well, you've been there so you know what it's like. But I could literally talk all day about, you know, the very special parts of almost every part of the country.

1:07:06

Well, maybe we'll do that. Maybe you and I will do another piece of the podcast where we just tell stories about Canada, which would be really special. You've got stories of that yours. Yeah, I would love that. So you are just such an interesting guy. Because you did this for five years. And you made a huge name for yourself. But at the same time, I think you also expanded what much music was an added to the fabric of what much music was it wasn't just music, you were talking about culture, which is in the culture of Canada, those, you know, really big things that's part of the fabric of our great country. And I think you have interesting perspective. Because you've traveled so much. You've spoken to so many people, some who are, you know, rabid music fans, others not so much about what made much music so special, and what its role was in its heyday.

1:08:13

Well, I think it brought the country together in many respects, as you say, part of my job not dictated to me but one that I felt very strongly about, which is why I fought to bring cameras on the road during the vj tours. And because we made a great, great deal of noise about being, you know, the nation's music station. But if you weren't paying really close attention, it was coming from Toronto, and it was nothing but Toronto, you weren't getting anything. I mean, Mulligan was fighting the heart out on the West Coast with much West. But I also always thought that, you know, there should be a much east as for instance, and and that just wasn't happening and wasn't happening and wasn't happening. And you can see the difference that was making in, in the lives in the careers of Canadian bands who used to, you know, bust their ass is on the northern Ontario rock room route. In the in the winter, of course, for some reason Canadians insist on doing that in touring January and February, March, God and you know, just busting it out and and if you weren't in played on the radio, you were screwed. And one of the things I've loved about much music, almost more than anything else was was was the fact that we didn't pay any attention to a consultant. So we didn't do research. We didn't do any of that shit.

1:09:39

I like radio stations did like people don't know that. So that's how radio stations mainstream radio has consultants and they do research and they test audiences and test music and they don't play the music they love. They play the music. They think the audience will react positively to

1:09:57

write in 10 seconds on a phone you So I love the fact that we would play, anything didn't make any difference, it didn't matter if it was reporting in retail, at least in the beginning, it didn't, it didn't matter, all of those things meant nothing. So we were breaking bands, a band could get a video on much in two weeks, two weeks later, take a tour of the country and sell out rooms. And that is a game changer. And that was the game changing thing about music, video period, MTV, much music, and all of those stages that spread around the world. Suddenly, bands were in people's living rooms, living rooms, and there wasn't this gatekeeper keeping the music away from folks. And that was a hugely, hugely important part of, of what much music did and because of my experience traveling the country, I knew how disenfranchised some parts of the country felt. And you know, you know, from traveling with me that people fucking love to see us, you know, and the big tickets could only go to so many places, although you know, what, halifaxes, for instance, we shot a bunch at, you know, being clubbed in this new moon out here, which is famously no longer with us. But, you know, all of those things meant a huge, huge deal. I remember Mike, I'd forgotten I'd even done it. But Mike and I hosted the northern pikes big ticket in Newfoundland, and just found online. I was watching it, and it was like, Oh, yeah, we host Oh, my God, I forgot completely about that. But we roll in a town. And it was a big deal when we did that stuff. And so, you know, when I had the opportunity to move to Halifax, which many friends in Toronto thought it was absolutely out of my mind. Insane. And like, why would you do that? And I'll tell you why. Because I knew that that show was coming to an end, our budgets were being cut every year. At one point, we had almost no travel budget. So we would have to react to you know, people saying, Hey, why don't you come up here to add a coking, you know, near Thunder Bay, and we do snowmobile races on open water in the summer. That sounds fantastic. I would love to see that. We have no budget. Well, we'll fly it, then definitely, we'll come up there and cover your insane event. But I knew the show was gonna end at some point, budgets being cut. When, why

1:12:13

why you were doing so well, much music was doing well at that time.

1:12:18

It's the nature of the beast, its budgets were being cut, for the same reason that we weren't playing videos that we liked anymore. You know? I'm not sure exactly when the change in the programming department came. I remember going on a vacation to this is a true story to to Jamaica, and Judy Morgan, who was our muchmusic stringer on the east coast. He worked for one of our chama and radio stations, and he would do the odd interview out here. So I was going on vacation and Jordi wanted to go on vacation as an All right, well, let's go. So we went to new grill for like three weeks or something on my way to the airport. From the studio, I looked in the you know, the big discard box and all the producers through the shit they didn't want him to that the plebes could come by and go Oh, that looks nice. So I grabbed this tape on the way out. Because I looked at him and like the name of the band, recognize the name of producer again, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah through my bag, go to the grill. Get there. Jodi's plan was delayed by snow. So the first day I'm just by myself, I wind up putting this this tape in my portable sound system, which had an auto reverse tape deck, and it was the first Black Crowes record. And I completely lost my mind, I did nothing but play that thing. Non Stop for three weeks. So I come back to the station. And I want to play it on my show. But I want to make sure that it's not coming out of flow into my show.

1:13:51

Oh, hold on a second.

1:13:52

What show Mike and Mike,

1:13:54

you played music and Mike and Mike

1:13:57

Damn straight we did. Every piece had a video that followed it to the point and we I swear to God, we played stuff that nobody else played just because it fit the theme of the piece. As a for instance, we were in North Bay one day and they were actually towing a fighter plane down the highway to retiring they're gonna put it on a plant someplace. And it was a voodoo cF 103 Voodoo and it was on the road in front of us. And so we got the camera out, shot that talked about it, and then came back and started looking for songs to play and there's a song by Bobby Wiseman called airplane on the highway. And we played it. So we used to play music. Yeah, absolutely. And sometimes really obscure, whacked out stuff and sometimes nothing to do with a piece but just a great song. So I went down and talked to Craig halkett and said, I want to play blackrose jealous again, in our show, I just want to make sure that you don't have it in the previous block or that you know enough not to programming in the next block. And he goes oh, that's no problem. We're not playing What What are you? What, uh, what do you mean? I said, there's a video, right? And he goes, Oh, yeah, I said, we'll get it. So he gets it. We put it in the screening machine and watch the video. It's sensational. It's a great, it's one of the best rock songs I've heard in forever. And it's like, why are we playing it? And he said, and I quote, well, radios not on it retails not reporting it. And I just stopped him there. And I went, since when did we start giving a shit about what radio and retail we're doing? We used to force radio to play stuff. Now we're waiting for radio before we close my heart. That makes no sense. And I said, Okay, we may not be programming it, but I'm playing it. So I went through, so I played it in the show.

1:15:48

When was this? Mike? What do you remember what year this is, is that like,

1:15:53

She's like, early 90s, like 91 or so whenever that record came out. Wow. And because nobody was playing it. And then as luck would have it, the band was playing rock and roll have an opening for some la band called junkyard or something. And I went to see them. I think there were 15 people in the audience. There was more staff there than anybody. So the Black Crowes rip through set, I'll go backstage to talk to them, because I'm raving about it. And all, thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. And I told Craig at the time, like I'm playing this thing. And if this is not a hit record, these sneakers I'm wearing, I will put them in a pot, I will boil them, I will make soup and I'll eat it from lunch for a month. And then three months later, they were playing in text and their own show with 3000 people. And we were playing King record, you know, final right. But that did not happen. There was a sea change much where it became much more corporate. And just like everything else. In a corporation, everybody's trying to make you the most money possible. So whoever sitting in the gms job plays the shittiest music, it's their job to cut expenses. And our shows ratings were not great. They moved to Mike and Mike show around to the worst time slots in the history of the world. And nobody even knew when it was on. I'm amazed we had an audience for to talk. But we were necessary for the renewal of the CRTC license. So every year when the license renewal came up, the day before it came up. They needed a report, or every two years, whatever it was, they would call us and ask us where we'd been in the country the past year or two.

1:17:26

You were the Canadian content. Right?

1:17:28

We were the Canadian content. We were the we were the ghetto, the ghetto show. But we took it seriously. And there's a lot of people in the country that did and I know that because for years I get recognized just because of that show when it was not one of the one of marches big marquee shows.

1:17:45

Well, actually, when I was watching your your last show, there was graphics said the most commonly asked question is Hey, Mike, where's Mike? So where is Mike

1:17:58

somewhere in Halifax? I haven't seen him in a while. When I moved to Halifax, I tried to convince him to come with me. They said Andy can act out he was the theatre company, all the rest of it. They're going to cancel the mike mike show the writing's on the wall, man. But if we're out east, we can actually do stuff out east because we have no presence of East at all. And he didn't wouldn't do and he didn't want to refer. So for whatever reason. And the day that show was canceled. He called me to say that he just heard from Denise and that to get ready for it because the show was canceled. And I went okay, and I and I hung up the phone and Denise called. And she said you know bad news is of canceling the mic and much so and I said well, that's not any kind of a secret. When it happened. That began my I am going to have to prove myself to the music community in Halifax because they're going to look at me as just some Toronto asshole who showed up here and being forced down their throats. And I mean, I it's lucky because I did. I lived in PDI for my grade 12 year of high school. I went to university that cadia I've been traveling out with much for years and years and years and years. So I wasn't completely unfamiliar. But he was Yeah, I had to be on my toes and I had to cover everything from travel to country to alternative like everything and the Halifax scene was just starting to take off.

1:19:34

quote

1:19:37

about you. I'm going to read you this quote. Mike is the patron saint of music. There needs to be a statue of him like there's statues of St. Anthony Lord knows he doesn't make any money. That guy's constantly trying to make his mortgage his phone bill yet he is a tireless supporter of musicians. If you were to leave There would be a void in Halifax. He's built that place and he's cultivated a scene with his own two hands. Now he's talking about you starting the Carlton.

1:20:11

Huh? Wow. Well, that's, you know, that's the postmatch side of things, which is, you know, Halifax has been an interesting place. Like I said, I had an awful lot to overcome, I had to learn how to shoot I have to learn how to do you know, basically they sent URL but down here for a day,

1:20:30

a robot our cameraman,

1:20:32

yeah, yes. Dave robot, our head camera man, senior cameraman sent him down here for like a day with, you know, a lighting kit tripod, the beta cam, like all the stuff. And so he thought he was gonna give me, you know, like, I don't know what he thought he was going to give me. I think he thought he was going to give me like a two hour Crash Course and beta cam. I mean, if you talk to any of the cameraman or artists, you know, it's a very, it's a complicated piece of machinery, you know, but when it suits them, it's like, yeah, monkey could run it. So he was planning on flying back the same day. And I was like, No, that's definitely not happening. What are you insane. So I made him stay. So he changed his flight, got him a hotel room and stuff, and then took him down to the marquee club, to teach me how to shoot live music. And then the day after that, I think we did a little interview bit that he helped me out with.

1:21:33

So like you learned how to shoot live music in one day.

1:21:36

Yeah, that about two hours. Now, to be fair, I'd watched our guys on the road for years.

1:21:45

Yeah, watching and actually looking through the viewer. And you know, the aperture and focus, that's a completely different experience.

1:21:57

Let's see, it's a little daunting. But knowing the pieces that you needed to shoot put together a performance clip, you know, we needed this much of the lead singer vocal in this, you know, wide shot, you need a whole bunch of other things to put it together, that party figured out fairly quickly. And the interviewing stuff I'd been doing for years, so that didn't really bother me. And I was very comfortable around the musicians I was talking to, you know, I wasn't in on them or anything. There were a couple of cases where I pretty sure I was a little nervous, nervous about talking to them, but for the most part that I got a lot. And I did that was one of the most rewarding parts about working much was working on that show. Going coastal. Now this is much east. This is much east, which I started like months after Mike and Mike stopped. And, you know, obviously on the cover the coasts magazine, or, or halifaxes version of now magazine, because the show had finally come. And everybody out here was waiting for it. And I've heard from so many people that I've worked with over the years, you know, like somebody from my friend tionesta ism is a music supervisor. It was like living in Yarmouth. And I'd gone out to cover some local band called Black at the time, and shot them in a crummy club and the sounds terrible and stuff. But they did make a shoddy little video. And I interviewed them and shot it and she just couldn't believe that somebody from her town of 5000 people was on much music, you know? So

1:23:38

how how would you shoot it? You would? You wouldn't be in the shot? Would you just put the camera on your shoulder and hold the mic like a videographer? Or did you set the shot up like a tripod and were you in it?

1:23:50

No, I hated tripod. So I would shoot, I would shoot the interviews with the camera on my corner, corner camera on my shoulder with the microphone videographer style not too long into the show, much sprang for, you know, a small budget so I could have a camera assistant who could shoot me on a high eight camera, like the wide shot, that kind of thing. So that's what you know, rather than turn a tripod around, do ri asks and all the usual tricks that we would do. If it was just, you know, a vj with a with a cameraman. And when I didn't have that, you know I get used to shooting while I cheat on my throws for my cheese with a camera just pointed at me and put it in the back of my muchmusic vehicle or it shoot into a you know the glass of the building or something. budget you try a lot of creative ways but X number of throws per show 50 shows a year you quickly run out of you know gimmicks and that kind of thing. So when I had a camera system worked out, you know well and that could also train somebody else on it and so Have mentored them and stuff. And most of the people that I had working in that position have gone on to do other things, which is great. Mike Campbell,

1:25:05

what can you not do?

1:25:11

I can't play an instrument.

1:25:12

Really? That's interesting. No,

1:25:15

how come? Um, when I was in school, I always had the best record collection of anybody. But I was the sports guys. So I played basketball, I played football. I was a quarterback in my high school football team, I was recruited to play football for the Acadia axman, which is how I wound up going to Acadia, but decided that I was not going to get any bigger, and I didn't want to spend my life in the weight room. But when most people were learning instruments, that's what I was doing. You know, I thought it was getting to be a professional athlete, something who knows what crazy thing is going through my brain, you

1:25:49

are a good baseball player back in the day.

1:25:51

I was I was an athlete, it was a pretty good athlete. Yeah. But that sort of took up my time. So I never did learn the instrument. But I was always good friends with the musicians in in both high school and university and I could move seamlessly between, you know, the jock crowd, and the music crowd. I've often said to people that dazed and confused the movie, the guy who's the quarterback of the football, that that was me. That was I was that guy was you know, the nice guy was an asshole. I was a nice guy who played sports, but also was deeply into music. I mean, to the point where I left university to take a job in a record store, which is not the smartest career move of all time for most people.

1:26:43

So Mike, while you're figuring out how to run an entire TV show by yourself, hosting, shooting, editing, producing, etc. are you at that point, also starting to manage Joel plaskett.

1:27:01

Yes, that is happening simultaneously. As the much East like jaw was one of the artists that I interviewed for much east. When he was in his first band, not his first band, the band first band that drew attention, thrush hermit, which I thought was hilarious. And I think the first interview I did with the band, he would have been in grade 10 or something. They just released the smart bomb, EP on Sloan's murder Records label. And it took me a while to figure that band out. It was like really? I'm not sure you know, is one of the things coming from like mainstream. You being used to major label records and mainstream stuff, too. Okay. Now, this is a ground level. This is an indie scene. You know, when I first got here, Harper's Bazaar, just published that article, you know, calling Halifax the new Seattle, they just started the Halifax pop explosion. So there was you know, Sloane thrush hermit, Eric's trip, Jael hardship post, all these local bands coolblue like that. There's dozens of them. The Halifax was just it was insane with talent at the time. And plaskett grabbed me immediately. He was at the point where he didn't have any management. He didn't think he had an agent. He definitely had an agent but he didn't have a manager. And I knew that there were record labels interested in him, but they wouldn't sign them unless he had management because that's the stupid thing to do. So I knew one manager at the time and Halifax Sherry Jones who managed who manages tools Joel now but managed Gordie Sampson, a bunch of other people she can stop them can stock. Yeah, Shay, of course. I've got a picture of the place you live with with Kim stock with a kitchen table with john Runyon's. That was what st does add on. That was on

1:29:11

Mackenzie Crescent.

1:29:13

Yes, there we go. So So I tried to get shared and listen to the record forever. And she just wouldn't. For whatever reason I just couldn't get her interested. Maybe she wasn't looking to manage anybody. And when New Year's Eve, I think it was New Year's Eve she got stuck downtown and snow. Like the palace or something at three o'clock in the morning at 230 in the morning, couldn't get a cab, which is not unusual in Halifax. So on the off chance I was still up she phoned me and I drove down the much vehicle to pick her up and put the CD in the in the in the CD player in the car and cranked it and made her listen to it. And then your captive audience she can use it all She certainly had to be my appreciative audience because I was given her a ride. So I blasted it. And then there was a showcase event, I took her to see the band showcase of never like really good sound lights and everything. And she just blew her away. So she said, Well, I would consider managing him, but only if you would co manage him. And I never managed anybody,

1:30:23

just like you'd never shot anything with a camera.

1:30:26

So the basics were Sherry and I started a company called soapbox racer entertainment, which I came up with is like, yeah, you put this thing together, put it on the top of the hill, push it, and it goes fast down a hill. And hopefully you don't win the race to nice little graphic, and we started the company, specifically to manage Joel, but we hadn't talked to Joel about it. So we had two meetings with Joel and Sherry, like very, you know, low key coffee at a local coffee shop kind of thing. And after the second one, he kind of looked at us and went, alright, let's do it. We shook hands. And that was that Sherry. Now, here's the nice tag team method for management. She would be the daytime person do all the important stuff, the smart stuff, the lawyer stuff, the label stuff, you know, from nine in the morning to six at night or whatever. And then when it came time to schmooze people in clubs or dragged him out to the, to the bar to see the band, then that was my job. So I must stay up late with anybody that I could make. Listen to the record. I would do all of those things. So

1:31:34

you take them all to your tiki bar or club a lot. Let's not invite Erica, let's just go here.

1:31:42

A lot of them. A lot of them. I famously famously played that album. For my friend, my very good friend, Steve poults, who I don't know if you've ever heard of but Jesus, you should. He's the. He's the single best solo entertainer on the face of the earth. He was born in Halifax. He lives live in San Diego. He lives in Nashville now. He's he's played the Carlton 60 times 66 zero. We've only been open for 13 years. But we have this raging party at the Tiki one night in this jewel saga. Later the moon came on. And Steve just shut up and just started listening. And at the end, he said this is this the guy you're managing. That's the most beautiful song I've ever heard. And that's since put the two of them together. Steve's produced an album for Joel's I've had to play shows together. It's a beautiful friendship that I helped make, but you really

1:32:39

have influenced the music scene in Halifax. And like I said before, you are considered the patron saint of music in Halifax. And I think that that is partly due to your time at much being sort of a promotional, but more importantly, when you launched the Carlton, you launch to home for music in Halifax. Again, kind of crazy for you to launch a club since you'd never had done anything like that. So large endeavor, what the hell were you thinking,

1:33:16

but when I started going down the bar restaurant side of things that was like now, you know, Halifax is still super happening at the time. And it was like, Okay, I just want to open a really cool bar with good food and stuff in place people can hang out and the music will be great. And, and you know, I'll have a place that we can turn into a stage and I'll book like one artist a month, on off days, like Sunday and Monday or something. But artists that will sell a place out solo and can do multiple nights, you know. So the first artists I picked was Joel plaskett. And the second one, I think was Gil barber. And the third one with it might have even been pulse at that point. Because I'd seen Steve a bunch of times and he was coming through Halifax. But those shows proved to be so successful that my partners started encouraging me to book more live entertainment. And I'm like this is a slippery slope. Because once you start going down that slope, people are going to start thinking of it as a venue instead of a really good restaurant, which it is. And sure enough, Oh, of course, yeah, I opened the bar in May of 2008. And if you will recall, there was a global financial crisis in the fall of 2008, which murdered business dad for about a year and a half. And that's when I had to start booking more stuff. And, you know, as it turned out, we made sure that our sound system was great sound people were great. I instituted a policy for acoustic shows that if you've talked during the show, I'd throw you out. which didn't sit well with a lot of people but I used to get up on stage and tell people it was in the show description that if you buy ticket. You can't talk through the show.

1:35:03

So did people go you know You arrogant x much music dude, did you get that?

1:35:08

Probably, probably I had all kinds of he was like I paid my money you should be able to talk. The problem is our room, the sound system is so good that you can hear a pin drop in that place during an acoustic performance. Because the acoustics are great, and the sound system is perfect. It's an array system. It's a bunch of small speakers everywhere, as opposed to just two big speakers moving air towards you. That kind of a sound if you talk, it doesn't necessarily carry beyond the person you're talking to. If you do it in a room like mine, everybody in the place can hear every word,

1:35:45

as any man says voices carry, no shit. So you're you built this beautiful venue, place where musicians played people could also have dinner, etc. And then you got stuck in traffic. And I'm not making light of it. I understand that across the street from you, one of the largest government buildings or venues was being built, which basically shut down the entire area that you're in, and nobody could get to the Carlton. True.

1:36:22

It was the largest development project Nova Scotia history, it was about a billion dollars. So firstly wound up tearing the the Ironically, the building they tore down to make room for it was the Chronicle Herald building the newspaper building, which used to have hundreds of newspaper people in it who used to like to go across the street for lunch.

1:36:44

And that kind of they left.

1:36:46

They tore their building down. So they left and then there was just a big, nothing just horrible, whole square city block full of rats and shit for several years before they started construction. And then they blasted for the better part of the year, five, six storeys down, where you had to get people to get in on the sidewalk and dust and dirt and all the rest of it. And then a build, which was supposed to take maybe two, two and a half years to five years.

1:37:14

Meanwhile, you actually had to go to the media, didn't you? I mean, you, you basically were going to lose your place.

1:37:21

I certainly did. I the Carlton has a newsletter. And I used to use the I used to have an editorial space at the bottom of it called rant me question mark. And I would just rag on the mayor or the counselors and the developers and everybody else was doing nothing to help, you know, for that matter. And, you know, just struggling to keep my nose above the water until all of this shit finally finished.

1:37:50

But wait, is it true that you literally had to declare bankruptcy?

1:37:56

No, I did not have to declare bankruptcy. But it was very, very, very, very, very close. I'd the first set of investors I had bailed after a couple of years because the construction was starting was starting businesses just terrible. And they wanted out. So they want to just shut the business down. I said, No, geez, let me let me see if I can find somebody else to help with this. So I found it a friend of mine person means who agreed to at least partially buy them out and defer the rest of the buyout to later kind of thing. And then we got a little bit of money to try and you know, renovate the space a little bit because the building across the street was starting to look like it was going to get finished to the point where there would be parking spaces downtown again, and all that kind of stuff. But people did not flock back to downtown. It was very, very, very difficult. And it's still like half the businesses on my street closed. But I've managed to keep my head above water. And then finally, like I just couldn't do it anymore. And so I was trying to sell the place. And I had a bunch of other business owners on the street. It might location is great. It's beautiful. So a lot of people wanted like a cut rate price. Oh yeah.

1:39:18

So they're just like See ya. And I was like,

1:39:21

yeah, yeah. And I was in no position to you know, like bargain with anybody. So the budget folks were helping me with the sale and stuff and everybody in the creditors have all gotten together and they arrived at a price that I would need to sell for to satisfy everybody to the extent that you can satisfy anybody you know, banks being first and foremost I hate them. First and foremost on the on the food chain. So there were a couple of guys I knew who own business wanted wanted to business below me it's press gang restaurant, and a new place next to me called the lot six all In the same complex as I was, and we had a handshake deal on that, and they were going to buy from me, we had a closing date, all of it. And I'd signed something to say that I was not going to entertain any other offers.

1:40:16

So get something bad happened.

1:40:20

Oh, yeah. So it's exactly this time of year, it might have even been this same day that we're having this conversation in 2017. It was supposed to close on New Year's, so I run the whole place up to the idea that we were closing on New Year's, and then they were going to take over. And then they wanted me to manage the place for a few more months, while they figured out what they want to do with it. And I was like, fine. And then two days before, and then leading up to my birthday, which is tomorrow. It was like the 10th of January or something. I get a phone call from the guy who's handling the sale from Deloitte. And he goes, Mike, I don't know how to tell you this, but these guys just withdrew their offer. And I went, what, what I've been buying all the booze on my personal credit card and everything to keep the place open. And then I realized they've been played for a sucker, that they've been talking to the landlord, who was also their landlord and the other two places. And they were just going to pull the plug on me, let me go down the toilet and then pick up everything, like all the restaurant gear, everything for free. And I just heard this The next day, I was supposed to be doing an interview with the Carlton with the local CBC affiliate. Because they were asking me about Hugh's room, which was closing. And they knew that I'd been selling that I was in the process sewing place. So I show up to do the meeting, to do the interview and the the the woman before the she asked for its wealth microphones out. She says, Oh, we just heard that the deal you've had to sell a place has fallen through. You know, how is that?

1:42:11

How do you feel Mike?

1:42:14

And I was like, great. How do you? How do you know? Because I didn't tell anybody. The only person I told was my, my my good friend Stuart from the hotel bill says what kept me sane through most of it. And I said he cuz it's true. I said, Yeah, yeah, that just happened. He said, so, you know, like what, you know?

1:42:38

What can you do? You know, like, what? Can you keep going, you know, like, what are the odds?

1:42:47

And I said, and this is true. Also, I said, Do you ever seen the movie Dumb and Dumber? You know, whatever your name is, Linda. It just looks heavy like this. You know the scene where Jim Carrey's characters trying to ask call Laura and Holly's character wrote, and she has no interest in at all. And she's telling him to fuck off. And he says, Yeah, but what are the odds and she says a million to one. So he says, so there's still a chance. That's exactly where I was two days later. So I was going to go belly up on the weekend. This was a Thursday, I think I did the interview. On Saturday was going to be the last night of the bar. On Friday, I had a meeting downtown, I had friends fly in, I had a couple of friends fly in from other places in the country, just for moral support and stuff. And I had a meeting with the Deloitte guy at Starbucks on Barrington Street, at like, five o'clock know what, like three o'clock in the afternoon, and I had a bunch of my friends with me. And he said, Okay, so here's what's gonna happen. The bank is going to move on you probably on Monday. So they're going to take your house. And I don't think there's anything we can do. You know, here's some people, you know, I don't think that a bankruptcy person can save your house. I think you're gonna lose your house. But we'll see. And then, so all of this is sinking in, right? I've got a roommate at the time, like, what am I going to tell him? He's these homeless now? Like, what the fuck am I going to do? And so the friends that had flown in and a couple of other close friends here, we'd already agreed that we're going to take me to dinner that night, which they were openly calling the let's take Mike to a nice dinner so he doesn't kill himself dinner. And so I went home to get changed to go back downtown to have dinner with my friends. And at about five o'clock, I got a phone call from the Deloitte guy saying I was just talking to a lawyer His name is blah, blah, blah. And I think you should talk to him. You know, I think he's, I think he's talked to him. And I was like a lawyer at five o'clock on a Friday in January, like, I thought he was talking about maybe bankruptcy lawyer or something. So I didn't really know. But he sent me a phone. And I said, What like now? Because Yeah, phone him now. So I found the guy. And he says, My name is so and so I worked for Stuart McAfee or something where the big law firms in town says, I have a client, the person means who heard what happened to you? and thinks they might be able to help. What? I said, What? And he said, Yeah, they might be able to help, would you be able to meet with them? On the weekend? I was like, yeah, I'm 100%, complete. And he said, Great, or I'll either be in touch, or my client will be in touch with me directly. So then I go downtown. And I'm sitting there having drinks waiting to get into the restaurant to eat. And I tell the story to everybody. And everyone's just looking at me going, are you fucked? Like, what is it? How can you sit there? I mean, what do you mean, with a horseshoe stub so far up your ass? How is it possible for you to sit at this moment in time? In the middle of that conversation, I get another phone call from a different guy to loi to saying, how's your day going? Going? Well, it just got a lot better. And he goes, Oh, yeah, what? Because he hadn't heard about this other phone call. So I tell him, and he goes, wow, that's interesting. Because then a couple of guys just phone me. I can't tell you who they are. But if I said their names, you would know exactly who I was talking about. And apparently they were out last night and they heard about what's happening to you. And they think that they might be able to, you know, like help you. Because like, Are you fucking kidding me? So I go back into the room with this other information. So then the lawyer calls me back. And he says, My client would like to meet with you on Sunday. Could you meet with her on Sunday is like her because he never told me was he or she or whatever? And I said, fuck yeah, of course. So I went down to meet her at two o'clock on a Sunday. Oh, the Saturday night. I left out the Saturday part Saturday night part is my birthday. Everybody's heard the news. It's like everybody. The heartbroken around town Stewart Cameron. Royals band they're playing

1:47:50

plaskett plays Mays place. Mark crit shows up from 22 minutes. Shaun Majumder shows up for 22 minutes. Everybody pays everybody knows it's the end of the bar. staffs crying, everybody's fucking crying this point. People are saying the nicest things about me. Except my jumper jumper. And I'm sitting at the table like this big booth right in front of the stage. Everybody's saying is the mo Kenny is singing you know? I'm a sucker for your face and all that stuff. And it states a fucking love. And so this is like the second one of these things I've had. They set this one into my own club. And the Majumder gets up. He's like, at the very end of the night. Majumder is like, I don't know anybody saying all this stuff about Mike Campbell. You know, I was at his place. You know, I was at this bar not that long ago. And I had to get up, go to the bathroom. And I came back you know, finished my drink. And they don't remember a fucking thing later, except they woke up in the Tiki on the couch and I ate holy raped. laughing and fucking then, of course, everybody like half the bar shows up back here. Taking the band's give me all the money. I paid them back. People gave me birthday cards pull up cash. The next day I go down had this meeting with this person. I unlocked the door. I made a pot of coffee unlock the door, and this woman standing there. Fuck I know you. She's a customer. Like she used to come to all kinds of shows. Her name's Karen Spaulding. So she'd been a customer and she'd been away for a while and she just come back and she used to come to see her her name on the ticket lists all the time. And if I if I put her in a lineup, she's like, late 50s. I learned later she was like 60 if I put her in a lineup with a bunch of people and said which one's the rich one? Never in a million years you would not guess he's just not that way at all. She's an accountant by trade, all of this stuff. So we have this I tell her this whole fucking story and tell her the whole story of getting fucked over and all of that shit. And she goes, I will buy it for what you were selling it to the other people for.

1:50:11

But only if you stay and keep booking the band's.

1:50:19

That's a tough deal, huh? Yeah to think about that one for a long time, right?

1:50:23

Yeah. Give me a couple of hours. I'll get back to you. I was like, Fuck Yeah, absolutely. And she said, we have to keep the live music thing going because that's what I'm doing this for. So I took a deep breath. It was like Jesus, okay. And she said, Okay, so tomorrow. He said, okay, you're good with this? Yes, I'm good with this. We shake hands. She said, Okay, now I turn it over to the lawyers, and all the people for the paperwork and all that stuff. But tomorrow, I will start taking care of things. So she became the bank, while it took the time for the new company to be struck, and the liquor license to be transferred, and all the rest of it. And she kept paying me through the whole thing.

1:51:03

So she's both a hero, and a guardian angel.

1:51:08

Jesus,

1:51:09

I tell that story to people and I

1:51:14

it's karma Baby,

1:51:15

I don't even know what to say about

1:51:17

karma. You have given so much to Canada, Canada just gave it back to you. I'm going to ask you one last question. So you were given the industry builder honor at the 25th anniversary of the cmas. You also receive the second annual scene builder award from the Halifax pop explosion. I know that the Carlton is littered with awards that you've earned or been given. Some people consider that a symbol of success. For you tell me, would you consider yourself successful? And if so why or why not?

1:51:59

I consider myself successful when I when I give my time to think about it. By any metric, except the financial one. I mean, you know, like you, I think, doing the jobs that I've done, it's more important, the work is more important than, you know, owning three cars or owning a giant places something like I'm not broke, I have a beautiful house that I bought in Halifax when houses were cheap. And they are no longer cheap. They're very expensive. And my house is getting very expensive. So it's the only investment I have at this point. I pulled equity out of it to keep me alive. But at the end, I'm counting that there'll be more equity than I'm going to need in my twilight years, because I'm not even thinking about stopping work, you know, you've gone on to do a bunch of things. I'm talking to a bunch of folks about some really interesting projects that probably have to do with this garage, much the same thing. We've been talking with talking with a bunch of friends out here, but starting at 50 watt radio station called a squirrel FM, which will outfit this place with cameras so it'll be viewable. We can go over the air in the Halifax region plus, online Of course, I've had musical performances in this garage. Gordy Johnson when the big sugar is played here. PLAs gets played here, a bunch of other people who played here, there's lots of things that I can do with the room. The Carlton will stay involved with for as long as I can. It's I don't know what I do with myself what I would do with myself if I wasn't working. So I still feel like there is still time for me to get rich. Erica, you know, I mean, there's still time. But that isn't what I do. What I do for I would probably do it if nobody paid me and being able to be at this stage. And think, yes, you know, I do have all I need at this point. And there's something you can look forward to not anytime soon, but soon at some point in your life. You too can collect CPP the old age pension. And that makes all the difference.

1:54:22

And on that note, Mike Campbell. Oh my god. This time with you has been precious. Thank you so much. You're an amazing storyteller. Before I met you, you were into the music business. And you were a young guy working, you know, at record stores and then a label and look at you now you are the force behind the Halifax music scene and you continue to reinvent so I think you're just awesome. And maybe one day you'll actually invite me to your Fucking Tiki lounge. And that would be nice, by the way. Okay,

1:55:06

I will cook dinner for you. In my beautiful house. I'm also an accomplished chef at this point.

1:55:12

Wow. And so in. And as for you, my awesome listener, if you're still listening to this conversation, which is going to really clock in at the longest conversation so far and well worth it, I may add, if you enjoyed today's conversation, and how can you not, please remember to rate our show, hopefully with five stars, review it, and definitely subscribe. So many super cool interviews to be posted. You know, Mike Campbell hasn't even listened to the show yet. So you're gonna have to catch up, Mike, because we have so many already posted. Okay. Oh, I

1:55:51

totally Yeah.

1:55:52

For those of you who would like to be a part of the show, I've set up a phone line. So the number to call if you'd like to be a part of the show is 833-972-7272. If you missed it, I'll give it to you again. But in terms of calling him listen, you can call in and share stories you can suggest who I should interview next, maybe maybe you met one of the onair people when we were touring across the country with Mike Campbell. You can reach me on my social platforms like Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, I'm everywhere, kind of live online. So again, Mike Campbell, thank you so much for spending this time with me and for filling me up with all your stories. And for those of you listening, I will see you hopefully next week with another episode of reinvention of the vj, you're still living a life filled with music meaning, and many reinventions.

1:56:47

Thanks for listening. Follow Erica Ehm reinvention of the vj podcast Subscribe and follow more episodes. Click to reinvention of the bj.com podcast produced in collaboration with Steve Anthony productions editing and coordination the flower Communications Inc. Copyright 2020

Transcribed by https://otter.ai