Nigel Godrich

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Nigel Godrich -- Super Producer

Nigel Godrich — Super Producer

I’ll start from the beginning.

The band Travis showed up just before two. We had finished the live broadcast for the day and I was eating my lunch in the studio. We were just going to record the interview and song live to tape to be broadcast the following day. A whole bunch of them came in, I had no idea who was in the band and who wasn’t. I shook a few hands, then allowed them to settle into the booth while I gobbled down the rest of my microwave dinner. Then I went in to help them set up.

They had wanted a couple of vocal microphones and two direct boxes to plug an acoustic guitar and a bass guitar into. (Direct boxes allow you to plug an instrument directly into a console so you don’t have to mike it). I had those all set up and ready to go. Although the entire band had showed up, only two of them were actually going to sing and play, lead singer Fran Healey and bass guitar player Dougie Payne. Fran asked me if I could mike his acoustic guitar instead of using a direct box. I said sure, that I preferred using a microphone, and had just used the direct box because the bands technical specifications had asked for direct boxes. He called out to somebody to change the tech specs.

“I’ll put an SM57 on it,” I said.

SM57 Microphone

SM57 Microphone

He said, “How ‘bout that AKG 414 you’ve got hanging over the piano?” I said sure and set it up.

In the control room I waited for Fran to finish tuning, then attempted to set levels as they rehearsed a song. Too many people were yapping in the control room and I couldn’t hear a damned thing. I told them all politely but firmly to pipe down. Fran was complaining about something. I turned all the mikes off so I could go into the booth and speak to them privately.

“I couldn’t hear anything, I had to tell everyone out there to shut the hell up,” I told them.

AKG 414 Microphone

AKG 414 Microphone

They laughed and said good on ya.

Fran told me he wanted a bit of reverb on himself and a lot on Dougie. Dougie was supposed to sound kind of ghostly. No problem, I told them, but I was thinking: damn it, all I have is a Rev 5, a reverb unit that dates back to the eighties. I can’t stand the sound of the thing and have been complaining about it since day one, but it would have to do.

Yamaha Rev 5 Digital Reverb

Yamaha Rev 5 Digital Reverb

There was something wrong with the sound of Fran’s guitar… it was distorting. I checked all my levels and the trim and couldn’t see why it was distorting. In fact I’ve never had a guitar distort that I can recall. I decided to swap out the 414 microphone on the theory that maybe it was overloading. This happens sometimes on condenser microphones if they’re getting too much acoustic information, they just can’t handle it. It’s called capsule distortion. At least that’s what I call it. But for a guitar to cause capsule distortion is kind of nutty; it usually happens when vocalists (or actors) are really belting it out.

I usually mike guitars for the show with an SM57 and I’ve had good luck with them. We had Brad Deneen on just the other day and somebody wrote in to compliment me on the sound of his guitar, so I thought I would try it. But when I went into the booth to swap out the microphones, unbeknownst to me somebody followed me in. This fellow spotted a Neuman U-87 and suggested that I try it. Fran introduced him as “our producer.”

U-87 Microphone

U-87 Microphone

Now, the fact that he was a producer didn’t impress me much. Most producers I know, while being perfectly acceptable human beings, don’t know much technically. In fact they often have half-baked technical notions. I told this fellow that I didn’t want try the U-87 (even though it is an awesome microphone) because, like the AKG 414, it was a condenser microphone.

“What’s wrong with that?” he asked.

“We might be getting capsule distortion,” I told him, confident that he wouldn’t know what the hell I was talking about.

“On a guitar?” he said.

This had two immediate consequences. First, I realized that this guy might actually know what he was talking about. Second, I instantly felt like an idiot, because the truth is it was highly unlikely that we were getting capsule distortion from a guitar.

“Okay, I’ll try it,” I told him.

He said, “I don’t mean to get in the way.”

I said, “Not a problem, tell me anything you want. I don’t mind, really.” I still had no idea who he was.

“There you go, butting in, making everyone tense,” Fran said.

“No really, I don’t mind, it’s not a problem,” I said. Which is the truth. I don’t get my back up at all when people pipe in. It makes them feel a part of the process and I could potentially learn something. I don’t have much ego invested in engineering. When it comes to recording music I’m just a meatball engineer. I told the guy as much and invited him to stand behind the console and help me with the mix.

Dougie Payne

Dougie Payne

We tried the song again with the U-87. Fran’s guitar was still distorted, damn it. There were other issues as well; my helpful new friend had me tweak all the levels, and he thought Fran’s lead vocal was peaking out of the mix too much. He wanted more compression on it. This was a problem. I didn’t have separate compression on the various vocals. I am aware that ideally you have access to separate compression on everything but I don’t have that many compressors. It’s a radio studio, not a recording studio, and because we usually have to do things fast I try to keep it simple.

So there wasn’t much I could do about Fran’s lead vocal except try to keep the guitar and bass up. Except the guitar was still distorted. I was starting to feel under the gun. We needed to start the interview. My new friend suggested there was a problem with the strip on the console. I agreed and plugged the guitar into a different strip. It corrected the distortion but I was still wasn’t happy with the sound of the U-87 on the guitar. But we were running late and I had to let it go.

I was starting to regret allowing my new friend to help. Although I am no crackerjack music engineer, when I do a mix on the fly I pretty much have to trust my instincts. He was taking the mix in a different direction than I would have and it wasn’t sitting properly. I have no doubt that if he were sitting at the board he could have made it work. But he wasn’t sitting at the board, I was. I had to forego what I would have done and second guess him. Second guessing rarely makes anything better. Plus I was embarrassed about the distorted guitar and the lack of compression, and a tad tense.

Fran Healy

Fran Healy

In his defense, he had apologized for interfering and I had invited him repeatedly to help. And in his mind I was probably butchering his baby.

Finally we decided the sound we had would have to do and began the interview. Fran and Dougie would play the song at the end of the interview. Halfway through the interview, Jian (our host) asked Fran and Dougie why their superstar producer was tagging along. Only then did I realize that this producer fellow helping me might be someone special in the world of rock music.

They played the song and I wasn’t really happy with the sound. It wasn’t awful but it wasn’t great. I was too embarrassed to even look at the producer. He made a couple of suggestions about levels and I tried to follow them.

“I’m sorry it probably wasn’t as good as you would have liked,” I told him afterward.

He clapped me on the shoulder and shook my hand, and I thought, well at least he’s a decent guy.

Fran and Dougie were decent too… they thanked me sincerely and shook my hand on the way out. I listened to the mix afterward with another engineer and we decided that it wasn’t quite as bad as I’d feared. My Q mates seemed to think it was okay.

Shortly afterward I was standing overlooking the CBC atrium when a friend looked out and said, “Geez, is that Nigel Godrich over there?”

I told him I’d just worked with him and asked him just who the heck this Nigel Godrich fellow was, anyway. And he proceeded to tell me.

And I’m awfully glad I didn’t know ‘til then.

The Story of Q

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This is a repost of a speech I gave to Ryerson students in 2008 about the creation of the CBC Radio show “Q With Jian Ghomeshi”:

Q image #2

How many of you think the CBC is a bank?

I’m told you’re going to make a radio show as a project. You might go on to work in radio. I should tell you right now that when you work in radio you don’t do it for the money – I only make two, three hundred thousand dollars a year. So anyway I’m here to give you some idea how to make a radio show. So I’m going to tell you a few things that might help you make your radio show here, and that also might help you when you’re working in the real world. If I’m really lucky maybe some of it will help you in the rest of your life too.

I think the best way to tell you what I know is to tell you a story. As far as I’m concerned the best way to convey anything is to tell a story. I could stand up here and relate all kinds of facts and figures and all it would do is put you to sleep. It’s true for this speech I’m giving and it’s true for radio. So that’s your first lesson – don’t be boring. You need to grab everyone’s attention! And then you need to keep it.

So the story I’m going to tell you is the story of Q.

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The story of Q is how you make a radio show from the ground up. There might be a tiny bit of dirt in this story, so before I go on I need to know if I can trust you. I might tell you a few things that could get me in trouble. So I need to know who in this room I can NOT trust. Point to them please. Okay those of you who are being pointed at I need you to leave the room.

This time last year I was happy making radio plays. Stuff like this:

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Making radio plays was what I did best. That and lasagna – I make a mean lasagna. Weekday afternoons on CBC Radio One around this time was a show called Freestyle. Traditionally in this time slot CBC Radio One had a listenership of about two hundred and twenty thousand people. It had been this way for years. It didn’t matter what you played in this time slot – you could play 1 K tone and the listenership would stay at two hundred and twenty thousand people. So they put this show on called Freestyle and the listener-ship promptly dropped to one hundred and eighty thousand people. Clearly, forty thousand people preferred tone.

Something needed to be done, and something was. There was a big study, they called it the Arts and Culture study, and based on this research the Powers That Be decided they needed to replace Freestyle with an Arts and Culture show. It would be a national show… a flagship show… they would pour tons of resources into it. It was a Big Deal.

Now as I mentioned I was toiling happily away in radio drama land at this time. But I had also worked on As It Happens, Morningside, Sunday Morning and all kinds of other live national shows. I had also helped create shows such as Nora Young’s Next, Here’s the Thing with Pat Senson, and I’d produced documentaries for the Current and the Arts Tonight. So my boss called me into her office and asked me if I would like to be the engineer for this new Arts and Culture show.

Those of us in the trenches knew that this show was coming down the pike. And no one I knew wanted to work on it. We all thought it would be a disaster. We had heard that Jian Ghomeshi was going to host it. Jian Ghomeshi was supposed to be the devil incarnate. He had been the host of 50 Tracks, a big success, he’d fronted the band Moxy Fruvous once upon a time, he’d hosted television and he’d done a stint on Sounds Like Canada. He had a reputation for being difficult to work with. And I thought, I don’t need that shit.

So I told my boss “No” in no uncertain terms. Well. She went up one side of me and down the other. She tore me a new one. And I wound up being the engineer on the new Arts and Culture show with Jian Ghomeshi.

I was really mad. I started the whole experience extremely upset. And this is lesson number two, folks: you have to be professional. I loved radio drama, that’s all I wanted to do. My boss in her wisdom took me out of something I loved and made me a part of something I wanted no part of. I wasn’t the only one. Of the staff that were selected for the new arts and culture show one promptly quit, one transferred to Winnipeg, at least two didn’t want to be there and they could not find an executive producer who wanted anything to do with the show.

But like I said, you have to be professional. You do not take your feelings out on your colleagues. You do not come to work sullen. There are two kinds of people in this world, those with good attitudes and those with bad attitudes. It’s easy to have a good attitude when things are going your way. The trick is to have a good attitude when things are not going your way. And I am here to tell you that there are people working on that show today who do not know how I felt about being there. I’m not saying you keep it all inside – you tell your wife, you tell your best friend.

But at work you put on your game face, the one with the good attitude.

So eventually they found an Executive Producer willing to take a chance and they filled out the rest of the staff. We had nine people in total to make this new national Arts and Culture show. One recording engineer, one executive producer, one host, three producers, three associate producers. They threw us all into a room in the Skydome, Skybox Three, if I recall, and said: “Make us a radio show.”

We talked. We talked for days. All we knew was that it had to be an arts and culture radio show and that it would be personality driven – Jian Ghomeshi’s personality. But we didn’t know what any of that meant. Low culture? High culture? Both? What is low culture and high culture? What about sports, is that culture? Recreation? Interviews were a given, but how long should they be? Are interviews on the phone okay or should they all be high quality lines? Would we be the arts show of record? What does that even mean? Do we break stories? Do we talk about Paris Hilton? If so, how much? What about Margaret Atwood? Haven’t we all heard enough about Margaret Atwood? How do we open the show? How do we close the show? What do we even call the damn thing?

To help us figure things out we took a bunch of courses. We all had plenty of experience making radio but you never stop learning. We took courses on critical thinking. Things like, do we trust this source? Is this story really news? We took a course on ethics. Things like, when are we in conflict of interest? And we took courses on interviewing. In case we wound up with a guest that sounded like this guy:

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Eventually we got it more or less figured out. High culture AND low culture. High impact guests when possible. Interviews about eight minutes long, longer when warranted. Live music every Friday, maybe more. Ixnay on the Paris Hiltonnay. Lots of energy. Plenty of short, flexible elements so we could mix things up on the fly. We had it all figured out. Everything except for a name.

We’d been racking our brains for weeks trying to come up with a name. It was really important to us that we choose the name as opposed to management. ‘Cause it seemed like the front runner for management was the name Radar, and Radar just didn’t work for us. We needed something better. The problem was the show was so broad that we couldn’t come up with a name that encompassed everything the show was about. And then one day, out of the blue, someone had it:

“Awesometown.”

Yeah, that lasted about five minutes. So we did a pilot with the name Radar and found ourselves getting down to the wire. It was pretty clear that if we didn’t come up with a name ourselves by the end of the week one would be foisted upon us and it would probably be the dreaded Radar. So we hunkered down and for the umpteenth time wrote our top choices on the white board. Names like Studio Q, The Cue, Skybox Three. And, of course, Awesometown. Suddenly looking at the names on the whiteboard the letter Q kind of leapt out at me and I said, what if it were just the letter Q? Jian went for it and nobody really objected so we had a winner. Later I learned that journalist Jesse Wente had suggested the name Q for an Arts show two years earlier so there was a kind of weird synchronicity about it. Of course, some people absolutely hated it, but it was enigmatic, it stood for nothing and everything, and most important, Jian could make rhyming couplets out of it.

A week before we went to air we still didn’t really know whether the show was going to work. I remember tense meetings with the team and Jian. Jian felt like there was too much interference from management; he didn’t feel like he was able to make the show that he wanted to make. There were different sensibilities at work. Jian and the Executive Producer weren’t quite clicking. And there were still a whole bunch of issues that needed to be sorted out that hadn’t even been addressed.

As the engineer, I was responsible for the sound of the show. From the beginning I had been advocating for a theme package. I wanted to hire a composer and a band and get them to write all the music for the show. In drama we hired composers all the time, it was no big deal. This show was supposed to be a big deal so it was a no brainer for me. But for some reason the team balked at the idea. For the pilots we’d been using this music for the opening theme:

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It wasn’t bad. It was basically a loop of the first four bars of the Clash’s Spanish Bombs. But it didn’t have the panache we were looking for. Much more classy to use something written especially for the show. At the last minute the Executive Producer agreed with me and hired Luc Doucet to write a theme. Now, the show debuted on a Monday… and Luc Doucet’s band recorded the theme on the Friday. They recorded it… they didn’t mix it. And they didn’t record it to the proper specifications. We needed an intro, beds, backtime music. On Sunday – Sunday, the day before we debuted — I got a CD with all the raw tracks, unmixed. I was working on something else that day, teaching U of T students about radio drama, and I didn’t even start mixing the theme until seven o’clock that night. By ten o’clock my ears were gone, I could barely tell what I was listening to. I printed out a few versions, emailed them as MP3s to Jian and the executive producer, and went home to bed.

The next morning, the day of the show, the first thing the executive producer said to me was, “We got some remixing to do.” It was two hours before show time. Fortunately my mix was in the ballpark, I just had to swap a couple of guitar parts and create a bed for Jian to speak over and then recut it to the proper length. And this is where some stellar leadership came into play. Rule number three: Go for the gusto. Because I really didn’t think we’d be able to get the theme done in time. I told the executive producer that we should go with the Spanish Bombs theme. But the exec had nerves of steel and he said, no no, we’ll pull this off. I really didn’t think it was possible but he stayed the course and lo and behold we pulled it off. The finished theme sounded like this:

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On your program today, I wanna rock, Dee Snider, the frontman of outrageous 80s metal band Twisted Sister has a new gig. We’ll talk to him about his new TV series “Dead Art” about finding beauty… in cemeteries. And… get happy! (Or not…) North America is home to some of the most contented people on Earth. But is that a good thing? Not according to Eric Wilson. He’s here with his new book “Against Happiness”. Plus, a look at the threat facing Utah’s Spiral Jetty… and its Canadian connection. Six words of love for you… this is Q.”

And they’re still using that theme today.

Just so you know, that opening over the theme is usually pre-taped so that we can make sure Jian hits the post, the guitar at the end. Sometimes it’s not possible to pre-tape it and Jian has to do it live. Nine times out of ten when Jian does it live, he hits the post.

So the show debuted and everything that could go wrong tried to wrong but didn’t. There were many heart stopping moments but it all worked. This is what I took away from that day. Rule number four: Know your studio like the back of your hand. Check it thoroughly before you go to air. Know your patch bay, your wall boxes. Test everything. If you’re going to have phoners test your phones through the board. If you have lines book your lines at least fifteen minutes early so that you can test them long before your guests are supposed to speak. If you’ve got a band, get them in early for a sound check. Make sure you know how to use your timers, your talkbacks. And finally, know what time you’re supposed to go to air. Because on that first day, believe it or not, we didn’t.

Someone – me, probably – should have double-checked all the times of the show. Lo and behold the third hour, part three, started one whole minute earlier than we thought it was supposed to. We were just sitting back enjoying our cigars during the newsbreak when all of a sudden the countdown clock started counting down and we had to scramble to get on the air. We made it, somehow.
When we finished the show that day, the first day, it was clear to everyone that Q was going to work. It wasn’t perfect but it was pretty much there. And this is why I think Q worked on that first day:

Jian Ghomeshi.

I told you before that he was supposed to be the antichrist. He’s not the antichrist. Nor is he Christ. He’s just a guy who happens to be a talented host. He’s got a great voice. He’s got the gift of gab. He has strong opinions and he was determined from the get go to make the show work. I can see why some people on some of his earlier gigs had trouble with him. He’s super keen and he’s a strong personality. You have to be strong to be able to stand up to him. You also have to be right. If you’re clinging to old ways of doing things or you’re just phoning it in, you’re probably not going to get along with Jian Ghomeshi.

Myself, I only ever had one run-in with the man. For the first couple of months we sort of circled one another warily. I was suspicious of him because of what I’d heard. Then one day we had a band in, Stars. Q goes live to Sirius Radio at 12:06. The sound check with Stars was scheduled for 11:00. Stars showed up at 11:30. I didn’t have a whole lot of time to sort them out, and their lead singer was being difficult. Jian showed up at 11:45 full of piss and vinegar wanting to pre-record the opening, like I mentioned before. We didn’t have time. Jian got angry and he let it show. This really pissed me off. I was in it up to my elbows and the last thing I needed was someone making my life more difficult.

I got Stars sorted out.

(Incidentally, although they were late, they weren’t the worst. The worst was Ryan Adams — Ryan, not Bryan. He showed up with a drummer and two guitarists after the show started. I had to really scramble then. And it actually turned out to be one of my favourite recordings:

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But I digress. After the Stars thing I was pissed at Jian and he knew it. The next day he sought me out and we had a little chat. I explained where I was coming from. To his credit he apologized without reservation and ever since then we’ve gotten along fine.

The thing about hosts is that they’re under a lot of pressure, more than anybody else on the show. It doesn’t give them the right to be assholes. It doesn’t give them the right to take their moods out on other people. But it does mean that they have to be looked after. They have to be given the right information at the right time. They have to know that you’re watching their back. One of the reasons that Jian and I got along is because he knew that I was watching his back. A host is all alone out there in front of several hundred thousand if not millions of listeners; the rest of us are anonymous. And when they screw up, it’s their clips that we play to embarrass them in front of Ryerson students:

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So we have to make sure that the hosts don’t find themselves alone; we have to be right there with them, paying attention, watching their backs. As an engineer I never took my eyes and ears off the host if I could help it. If he or she got into trouble I tried to be there to feed them information or go to a tape if need be.

Same with the show’s director. On Q the director is Matt Tunnacliffe. As director Matt also keeps a close eye on Jian. Among other things it’s Matt’s job to make sure everything times out. If an interview goes too long it’s Matt who has to figure out how to fix it. Do we drop an item, do we go to a different item, do we get Jian to wing it? I remember Jian getting lost once or twice. Misplaced a bit of his script or had a brain fade or there was just some miscommunication. When this happens it’s crucial that the people in the control room are paying attention, so they can bail him out. Otherwise it can get pretty ugly pretty fast, and when you’re live you only get one shot at it.

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I wanted to talk about the roles of the others on the show, the associate producers and whatnot, but when I started to write about them it started putting me to sleep. So I’ll spare you, except to say that they’re generally the ones who pitch the ideas, hunt down all the guests, do the research and write all the questions. So the work is crucial but boring to talk about, so I’m not gonna. You’ll have to get one of them in here to talk about it.

Instead let me talk a bit about this:

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Sound design. That clip was one of the first IDs we ever did for the show. The day I was teaching U of T students, the day before we debuted, I got the students to do a bunch of IDs for the show. They gave me tons of raw material. I also hunted down all sorts of interesting clips off the internet. I gave it all to an associate producer on the show, Tori Allen, and she put together three or four great IDs like that one. And you’ll notice she did not use the students getting the IDs right, she used the students getting the IDs wrong. It was brilliant and I don’t mind saying that I learned a lot from Tori… every ID I made for the show after that was with her sensibility in mind.

I don’t think sound design is top of mind for many show producers. For them it’s all about the content. I guess there’s something to be said for content. But for me it’s all about sound design and production… you can have so much fun there. For instance, when we were figuring out the show we talked about how we should open each show. Everybody wanted to do something unique and different. I suggested something like this, which is something producer Alison Moss, Nora Young and I did up for an episode of Next:

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That was a lot of fun to produce but it took an entire day to write, record and mix. So it’s not something you’re going to do every day on a daily show like Q. We settled on an opening monologue that would contain some production elements when we felt up to it.

The next opportunity for some fun production was, as I’ve already mentioned, in the show IDs. Show IDs serve four main purposes. One, they give the host a break during which he or she can figure out where they’re at. Two, they separate the various elements of a show. And three, obviously they identify the show you’re listening to, the network, and whatever other information you want to put in them. But a lot of producers don’t take advantage of the fourth purpose of show IDs, which is to help define the sound of the show you’re listening to:

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That’s me completely taking a page from Tori’s book. It signals that Q is a show not afraid to have a little bit of fun, and that at it’s core it’s a show about creativity. And the sky’s the limit. Whenever we had a musical guest we got them to record a little ID for us. You have to be a little bit bold with your guests. Don’t be afraid to tell them what you need. 99% of the musicians I approached to make an ID all just wanted to talk until I pestered them to pick up their guitar or play the piano. Then when they saw what I was after they got into the spirit of things. And we got a lot of great show IDs that way.

Yet another opportunity for sound design came about when Jian would have long spiels about one thing or another, letters or just something he wanted to talk about. So I began to make loops for him.

Whenever I found a piece of music I thought might be appropriate I’d take as much instrumental as I could out of it and loop it all together, five or six minutes worth. Jian would finish extro-ing an interview (for example), I’d hit the music, let it establish, then Jian would come in and do his thing over it. He’d finish, I’d bring up the music, then fade out and we’d be onto the next thing. Simple but effective.

There’s about eight thousand other issues I could address but I’ll finish with this one. If you take nothing else away from the stuff I’m telling you today, take this away: Know your tools. You can get by without really knowing your tools but you’ll be making your life unnecessarily difficult, and you’ll be limited in what you can accomplish.

We use many digital audio editing platforms at CBC but the main one that most people use is called Dalet. It dates back to about 1998 and it’s soon to be replaced with something called DaletPlus, which itself will be out of date by the time we start using it but that’s another story. Anyway, I used to hate Dalet. My weapon of choice is ProTools, but when I began working on Q I had no choice but to use Dalet. I thought, my God, this is like editing with your elbows.

I soon realized that I would live or die by Dalet, so I resolved to learn it as well as I know Protools. I got myself some training and within three months I knew it inside and out. Now you might think, well that’s all fine and good for you, you’re obviously a technical type. Well let’s just flash back twenty-two years. I’m sixteen years old working at my first radio station, a two hundred and fifty watt daytimer called CJRW in Prince Edward Island. Before I started my shift, I got the DJ working before me to cue up all my items on the reel to reels because I was afraid of it. I was frightened of the scary looking reel-to-reels. I am not by disposition a technical type, I am an artsy. To me gear is a means to an end not an end in itself. But I decided one day – one day here at Ryerson, in fact, working on a second year project – that I would no longer live in fear of the scary looking reel-to-reel machines. I would master the reel-to-reel and any other piece of gear or software that comes along.

But before I say goodbye, let me play you this:

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That’s my favourite ID because the woman trying to say Jian’s name is so charming. Also it tells a story from beginning to end. And the fact that I could play it on the show, basically making fun of Jian Ghomeshi’s name, is proof that Jian doesn’t take himself as seriously as some probably might think.

And that’s all she wrote. As my former professor Jerry Good used to say…

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The Fine Print

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The Fine Print

The Fine Print

In an effort to save some much needed money, my wife decided to cancel her gym membership. The timing was right; the membership was for eighteen months, which ended at the beginning of September. We assumed that it would simply expire. Just to be sure, my wife asked me to check the Mastercard statement online to make sure that no more payments were coming out.

Payments were still coming out.

I got out the contract and noticed a clause we had overlooked. It said that the membership would not expire unless we contacted the gym (which, for the sake of this discussion, I shall simply refer to as BODY BOOMERS).

Fine. We phoned the gym (BODY BOOMERS, in case you were wondering) and they said that we had to stop by and tell them in person. My wife was annoyed, but she agreed. So later that afternoon we stopped by to tell them in person. I waited in the car with the kids while she went into the gym (which, as you might recall, I’ve decided for the purposes of this discussion simply to refer to as BODY BOOMERS.)

About two minutes later my normally quite reasonable wife came storming back to the car in what I believe is technically referred to as an “apoplectic fit.” “You deal with them,” she said, presumably to me as opposed to one of the kids.

So I went in to deal with them. Thinking, we’re gonna get this sorted out right away, and not give a cent more to this… this BODY BOOMERS than we have to. A woman was at the counter talking to this big, hairy looking character, both of them sporting name tags, and they didn’t look especially unfriendly, so I launched right in. “Look, I just want to get this settled right away, what do we have to do, is there some kind a form to fill out? ‘Cause we’d like to sign it right now.”

The woman said, quite reasonably, “There’s no form for your wife to fill out right now. First she has to provide us with two months notice, then she has to make an appointment, then she has to come in, swallow a live wildebeest whole with the entire club looking on, and then, if she’s lucky, and we’re in a really really really good mood, then maybe, MAYBE we’ll stop charging your Mastercard our ridiculously overpriced fees.” (WARNING: the preceding dialogue may have contained some slightly fabricated elements.)

Could YOU swallow one of these whole? Well, could you?

Could YOU swallow one of these whole? Well, could you?

“Look,” I said, in my best Clint Eastwood, which on a good day sounds rather more like a really good Don Knott: “Just give me the damn form.”

“Hey, don’t get upset at us, pal,” the hairy guy said, quite reasonably. “We’re just employees here. And anyway, the whole wildebeest thing is right here in the contract, plain as day.”

“Where?” I asked.

He got out a super duper high falutin’ electron microscope thingie and we took a really good look at the contract. And right there, sure enough, in a perfectly legible font really quite a bit larger than several subatomic particles put together, I spied the offensive clause. No doubt about it, my wife and I were sunk.

“That’s… open to interpretation,” I huffed, and stormed out.

“What if they get collection agencies after us? It could get really nasty,” my wife told me later, after I informed her of my nefarious plan just to cancel the Mastercard and let the chips fall where they may.

“Hmm,” I said, after which I informed her of my revised plan, which consisted mainly of her giving BODY BOOMERS several months notice, making appointments with BODY BOOMERS representatives, and quite possibly swallowing whole a certain kind of antelope hailing from the Serengeti-Mara ecosystem of Tanzania (sometimes known as a “gnu”).

Moral of the story: I’m sure I don’t have to tell you, except to say that it involves fine print and gnus (sometimes known as “Wildebeests”).

The Tunnel

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Light at the End of the Tunnel

Light at the End of the Tunnel

There’s always light at the end of the tunnel.

Always.

Unless there isn’t, of course. In which case you’re probably not in a tunnel, you’re in a cave.

Not a problem. If you’re in a cave and you can’t see light, well, that’s just because you’re facing the wrong direction. You need to turn around.

If you turn around and you still don’t see any light, don’t panic. It’s just night outside, or really, really overcast. Wait a little while until morning comes, or the weather clears up.

If morning never comes, relax. You never were in a cave, or a tunnel; somebody just buried you alive when you weren’t paying attention.

This sounds more serious than it is. If in fact you have been buried alive, simply dig your way out with your bare hands (if you encounter wood, you may need to punch your way out first).

If you dig and dig and dig and dig and dig and still can’t find your way to the light and your seasonal affective disorder is acting up and your Vitamin D deficiency has kicked in and you feel yourself beginning to go stark raving mad…

Relax.

Try the dip.

There was no tunnel, no cave. You’re not a character in a Quentin Tarantino movie. Those were all just annoying little metaphors — mere reflections of reality, if you will. Obliterated now by light. Shining in through my window. I feel it on my back, see it reflected on my computer screen, obscuring what I write.

Stupid light.

Hmm.

Light.

Just outside my office.

I think I’ll go for a walk.

A Dad is Born

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A couple of new Mahoney's in McMaster Hospital

A couple of new Mahoney’s in McMaster Hospital

A little something I post every year on Valentine’s Day, for reasons that will become obvious as you read this (if you haven’t read it before…)

My wife Lynda is at work, seven months pregnant and enjoying if not every minute of it, at least every second or third minute of it. I’m at home, painting the nursery. I’m painting the nursery because our twins are due in just two months, and we’re afraid they might be early – you know, like two weeks early – because they’re twins.

So there I am, painting away, and the phone rings. Too late, I missed it. Then it’s ringing again, but my hands are full of brushes and rollers and it’s just too much trouble to go into the next room and answer the phone, except that…

…the darn thing rings again.

This time I know it’s important, if not an emergency, so I high-tail it to the phone and pick it up just in the nick of time. It’s Lynda. She sounds… well, panicked, her voice all quavery, on the verge of tears. “I think my water broke,” she says, and provides details that are watery, messy, and a little scary.

I’m thinking, nah, not possible, we’re two months early here. Clearly she’s misread the signs.

“What are you doing?” she asks me.

“Painting the nursery.”

“Paint faster,” she says.

I’m off like a blue streak to the pharmacy where Lynda works, ready to bundle her into the car, prepared to make the hospital at something resembling four times the speed of light. When I get there Lynda says, “Hang on. Gotta finish up a couple of prescriptions first.”

Excuse me?

It’s obvious to everyone in the store that something is not quite right. “Nothing serious,” I explain to one woman. “She’s about to give birth, is all.”

Twenty minutes later she’s ready to go. We’re in the car. I start the car and we are outta there…

…or so I think.

“Wait!” says Lynda.

“What? What is it? What’s wrong?”

“I forgot my boots.”

I stop the car, run back into the pharmacy and get Lynda’s boots.

She’s weeping a little on the way to Markham-Stouffville Hospital. “I’m scared, Joe. I’m two months early.”

I’m scared too, but I need to reassure her. I don’t know what to say. Lamely, I say, “Everything’ll be okay,” and take hold of her hand. She accepts the hand — for a bit, then gently places it back on the steering wheel. “Two hands,” she says. “Wouldn’t want to get in an accident now.”

I agree, and make it to the hospital accident free. There, we take the wrong hallway, then figure it out and pass a woman facing the wall, a man gently rubbing her back. A glimpse of the future?
Soon we’re in the birthing room, a cheery nurse catering to Lynda’s every need. We’re in good hands, I think, but soon it becomes clear that Markham-Stowville can’t handle little babies that want to arrive two months early. The closest hospital that can is McMaster, in Hamilton. Two young, hip paramedics arrive and transfer a stoic Lynda onto a rolling stretcher, and take her away. I drive to Hamilton, alone in the dark, in the rain. Knowing that I’ve got the easy part.

Lynda’s just over thirty-one weeks – not a big deal, we’re told. Lynda is given medicine to speed the babys’ lung development up. She’s given other medicine to delay the birth as long as possible. Our spirits are good. We’re lucky Lynda’s thirty-one weeks and not less, like many others that come through this ward. Some babies, we’re told, come as early as twenty weeks. It’s heartbreaking — their chances for survival are not good. At thirty-one weeks, the success rate is close to one hundred percent.

Two days later. It’s Valentine’s Day, and our babies have decided they want out now. Decisions are made. Lynda is moved from a cosy little room with pleasant music to a sterile place of white walls and shiny metal beds. I count eighteen people in the room. The anesthetist has a funny little dog on his stethoscope. Lynda is pumped so full of drugs she can’t talk properly. I worry about her.

Our doctor’s name is Lightheart. Did I mention it was Valentine’s Day? Doctor Lightheart explains the use of forceps to her intern, then promptly demonstrates, deftly delivering Keira. Keira lets out a healthy wail and is whisked away to the level 3 neo-natal intensive care unit where I hope they don’t mix her up with another baby.

Suddenly Erin’s heartbeat drops to half the normal rate. The atmosphere in the room changes instantly. Doctor Lightheart reaches inside Lynda farther than I would have imagined possible. Her hand is poking at Lynda’s belly from inside, like a scene right out of Alien. I didn’t know you could DO that!

Finally, the forceps bring Erin out. She doesn’t cry like Keira did – just a brief, muffled chirp. This is because she’s been fitted with a respirator, but she’s fine. She, too, is whisked away to the intensive care unit.

The room empties.

It’s Valentine’s Day.

And I am the proud father of two.

Sandwich

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Peanut Butter and Banana and Jam Sandwich... Yum!

Peanut Butter and Banana and Jam Sandwich… Yum!


One day my wife says to me, you must be hungry, you haven’t had any supper.

No no, I’m fine, thanks, I tell her. I’ll have a little something later.

You really should eat something now, shouldn’t you? she says.

I’m fine, I insist. It’s good to fast once in awhile, gotta keep that girlish figure.

I’ll tell you what, she says. If I make you a sandwich, will you eat it?

You don’t have to make me sandwich, I tell her.

I want to make you a sandwich, she says. What kind of sandwich do you want?

I don’t really want any kind of sandwich, I tell her.

Okay but if you did want a sandwich, what kind of sandwich would you want?

I tell her that if I did want a sandwich, which I don’t, but if I did, I would want a peanut butter and jam and banana sandwich. My favourite.

I’m going to make you a peanut butter and jam and banana sandwich, she says. I’m going to make it right now.

That’s very kind, I tell her. Thank you.

I go walk the dog. I’m not really very hungry, I think, walking the dog. The last thing I want is a sandwich. But if she makes it I’ll eat it. She’s just looking out for me, I know.

I get back and towel the dog off (it was a cold, wet night). I let him off his leash, take my boots off, enter the kitchen. My wife’s on the phone. I can tell it’s going to be a long call. The peanut butter jar sits on the counter, alongside the jam, a couple of slices of bread and a banana. My wife’s making apologetic motions to me. Motions that say, there’s all the stuff, all you have to do now is make the sandwich.

I don’t want to make the sandwich. I don’t want the sandwich. All I want to do is sit down and watch tv.

I make the sandwich anyway. I eat it. It’s very good. It is, after all, my favourite sandwich in the world.

My wife gets off the phone. Sorry about that, she says. I really was going to make you the sandwich, and then my sister called.

I know, I tell her. I appreciate that.

And I do.

Heather Mallick vs Robert Fulford vs Margaret Atwood vs Joe Mahoney

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Last year I read an article in the Toronto Star by Heather Mallick about Robert Fulford of the National Post writing a critical review of Margaret Atwood’s latest story in the New Yorker, called Stone Mattress. The Atwood story is about a woman who was raped as a teenager by an older boy who gets away with it. This act sends the woman down a bad road in which she gets pregnant, becomes a prostitute, and then marries older men of ill health so that she can help them die prematurely and get their money. Ultimately she meets the man who raped her and exacts her revenge.

Heather Mallick

Heather Mallick

Fulford doesn’t like the story because he thinks it “comes across as a classic man-hating story.” Mallick doesn’t like Fulford’s review because she thinks Atwood is “entitled to fill her fiction with hateful men.” She also didn’t like that Fulford didn’t own up to once having been skewered in an Atwood piece, suggesting that his review of Stone Mattress was simply revenge, as if it’s not possible to dislike a story solely on its own merits, or lack thereof.

Mallick professes to have once adored Bob Fulford, “wisest and cleverest of older male journalists.” Now, she claims that Fulford has stopped regarding life with endless interest and even joy, and turned sour. This seems a harsh assessment based on a single review of Atwood’s story. When I read that line in her article it seemed so disproportionately harsh that I wondered what else must be informing Mallick’s revised opinion of Fulford.

As a reasonably decent man this whole episode struck a nerve. I’m aware that certain women don’t like men, or distrust them, and that because of the actions of some jerks they have good reason to feel this way. I have always tried to conduct myself in a way to give women reason to like men. I have three sisters, a mother, a wife and two daughters and many female friends and colleagues. I like women. I’m good to them. I treat them with respect. So it annoys me when I am confronted with women who think that, as Fulford writes, men are villains except when they are clowns. That’s just a different kind of hatred, and it’s no better than men disrespecting women. Understanding that there are men out there deserving of scorn, just as there are woman deserving of scorn because of hateful attitudes and actions.

Robert Fulford

Robert Fulford

So I am sympathetic to Fulford’s take on Atwood’s story, although Atwood is equally hard on women in Stone Mattress. The female protagonist, essentially a serial killer, is certainly no more sympathetic than the male schmuck she murders. But I’m more sympathetic to Fulford himself than I am to his take on the story because I’d like to know why Mallick has come to dislike him so much. Just disliking Atwood’s story, and not owning up to having been a victim of an earlier Atwood story, just doesn’t seem to justify it.

I once spent four days at Atwood’s house recording a series of interviews for CBC Radio. Surreally for me, the entire four days were spent conversing with Atwood and the rest of the crew in French, which I was in the process of learning at the time, having recently returned from several months of living in Aix-en-Provence, France. Apart from Atwood’s assistant at the time, Sarah Cooper, Atwood and I were the only anglophones. On the third night we all went to a restaurant together where circumstances contrived to place Atwood and myself alone together for about twenty minutes, and we conversed in English for the first time. The whole experience generated a certain camaraderie between us, or at least that was how it felt to me – I’ve met her several times since and she has never indicated that she remembers me. Although I consider this last point worthy of mention, I don’t hold it against her. I’m not sure that I would remember her much either if she were not one of Canada’s most famous authors, mentioned time and again on the CBC and in the rest of our national media. Impossible to forget, in other words.

Margaret Atwood

Margaret Atwood

However, I’ve never forgotten her friendliness at the time. She did not come off to me as the least bit man hating. Her characters and stories are fiction, after all, not necessarily representative of the author’s own mind set. The truth is I haven’t actually read much Atwood, apart from some short stories in a book she gave me on our last day together (Good Bones) and the aforementioned Stone Mattress. And a handful of radio drama adaptations of her work such as The Handmaid’s Tale.

No, if I had one bone to pick with Margaret Atwood it wouldn’t be her stance against men, it would be her stance against science fiction, which she seems to regard as less than worthy. Yes, she writes it from time to time, but when she writes it is isn’t science fiction, it’s something else, something better, “speculative fiction” maybe. I find this attitude inexplicable and insulting, and no I don’t feel that way because she has previously skewered me in her work, at least that I’m aware, not that I would be aware not having read much of her work.

So neither Robert Fulford nor Heather Mallick have done anything to alter my opinion of Margaret Atwood. I’ve never given Robert Fulford much thought but I feel rather sympathetic toward the man now. As for Heather Mallick, whose work I have read from time to time in the Star, and to whom I haven’t given much thought either, I am now unduly curious about her.

Just what the heck does she really have against Robert Fulford?

Santiago El Grande

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Santiago El Grande

Santiago El Grande

The painting on the left is Santiago El Grande, by Salvador Dali.

I love this painting.

I first saw it when I visited a friend in Fredericton twenty-one years ago. She took me to the Beaverbrook Art Gallery and when I first laid eyes on this painting I was blown away. You can see in the photo how big it is, and when I saw it up close I could not get over the at times almost photorealistic detail Dali managed to achieve. It was the first painting of its calibre I had ever seen.

Shortly afterward I travelled to Europe and visited the Louvre and the Musee D’Orsay, and several galleries in Florence Italy, and no painting in any of those places impressed me as much as Santiago El Grande. I bought a print of it and it hangs in my office at home. But the print is so small compared to the original that you can’t really get a sense of the painting’s majesty, or intricate detail.

About four years ago I returned to Fredericton on a business trip. When I learned I would be going to Fredericton I knew that the one thing I had to do was see Santiago El Grande again. I hoped I would have time, and that the Gallery wouldn’t be too far from where I was staying. Turns out my hotel was the Beaverbrook Hotel… right next door to the Gallery! As soon as I checked in and deposited my bags in my room I high-tailed it to the Gallery.

I had forgotten the layout of the Gallery, that you can see Santiago El Grande as soon as you step inside. There was only an hour left until close but I paid my eight bucks and went in. I spent about ten minutes staring at Santiago El Grande. As I approached the painting I overheard the final moment of a conversation another patron was having with a staff member about Dali. Once I finished admiring the painting on my own I approached the staff member and asked if he could tell me a bit about the painting.

“You’ll be sorry you asked,” he told me.

But I was not at all sorry. It took him about fifteen minutes, but afterward I appreciated the painting even more. He pointed out many details that I had overlooked, such as the partial transparency of some of the figures, and how certain elements were foreshortened to give a three dimensional aspect if viewed from the right angle beneath the painting. (The painting was originally supposed to hung high above an altar to permit this perspective).

He explained some of the history of the painting, how it came to be in Fredericton after the Catholic Church of Spain refused Dali’s offer of the painting. They weren’t refusing the painting so much as they were refusing the painter himself. After which Dali claims he had a dream that told him the painting belonged in a relatively obscure art gallery in Canada. And he told me much more.

Don’t pass through Fredericton without treating yourself to a glimpse of this fantastic work of art.

If I ever manage to cobble together some manner of art that’s even a thousandth as accomplished in my lifetime, I’ll be grateful.

A Capital Pee

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(A repost in honour of tomorrow’s anticipated snowstorm)

Snow Train

Snow Train

Warning!

Please be advised that this story contains the word “pee.”

So.

I really had to pee.

There I was trying to get to work early, for the taping of Canadia 2056. I wanted to get there and test the microphones, the console, and still have time to sit in on the read-through. Figured if I left by seven, I could make it in by eight-thirty, with the first cast members arriving at ten.

Snow and freezing rain messed everything up. The damned bus didn’t show up ’til seven-twenty. Then the train was late. Forty-five minutes late. Waiting for it, standing in the freezing rain, it occurred to me:

I really had to pee.

But I couldn’t leave the platform in case the train came. The train was already late and the subsequent train had been cancelled. If I left to pee, I’d miss the train and I might never get to work. If I couldn’t get to work, I wouldn’t be able to record the cast of Canadia 2056. I’d let a lot of people down. The train would come soon, I knew. I’d be able to go to the washroom on the train, or maybe even be able to hold it until I got to Toronto.

The train took its sweet time coming. But it came, and I got on it, and I thought I’d better sit down if I want to get a seat, and sure I had to pee but I could hold it ’til Toronto. Lots of other people got on, we stopped at Ajax, then Pickering, and by then so many people were on the train that we couldn’t take any more. There was no way I could get up from my seat and get to the washroom because there were far too many people in the way.

No problem.

I’d be able to go to the washroom in Toronto.

“Sorry folks, we’re gonna have to wait here on the platform for a while until they figure out what to do with us,” the conductor announced to the train. “It’ll just be a few minutes.”

Tycho Brahe -- Too polite for his own good

Tycho Brahe — Too polite for his own good

Half an hour later the train hadn’t budged an inch, and I began to think of Tycho Brahe. Brahe was a sixteenth century astronomer who, once upon a time, attended a banquet (and famously wore a fake brass nose after losing part of his real nose in a duel). It was considered the height of bad manners to leave the banquet before its conclusion, so Tycho didn’t go anywhere, even though he really had to pee. He stayed the course right up until his bladder exploded, and he died several days later. Some physicians these days think that this sort of thing is impossible, and that Tycho actually died from something else (such as mercury poisoning, though opinions differ). But sitting on that train with my bladder poised to explode, I was fairly certain that not only was that how Tycho Brahe died, it was how I was going to die.

Fortunately the train began to move. I would be spared such an ignominious fate.

Unfortunately, we moved about two hundred yards and then the train stopped again. A frozen switch. No problem: a mere half an hour later and we were on the move again.

By then I was in agony.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have created a world in which we cannot pee when we have to. And it’s just plain wrong. Because you see, everybody has to pee. It’s a natural body function. Why, you yourself have probably peed this very day. You may be returning from a pee (did you wash your hands?) Or you may have to pee right now. If so, I suggest you go and pee. Because it’s really not the sort of thing you want to put off.

Once I had to pee and I thought, I’ll just take the elevator down to the second floor. I’ll be able to pee once I get to the second floor.

Wrong!

Didn’t the elevator get stuck between floors. I was stuck in an elevator in Toronto. Security had to call Wisconsin to Otis Head Office to locate an elevator repairman. Otis Head Office woke up a repairman who lived in Barrie (it was one in the morning). He drove all the way into Toronto and a mere hour and a half later I was able to pee.

And I’m here to tell you that that pee felt good.

And so (for that matter) did the pee I had after being stuck on the train.

Which is, perhaps, why we’ve created this crazy world in which it’s not possible to pee whenever we want to. So that sometimes, after we are required to hold our bladders for interminable lengths of time, when at long last we are finally able to pee, we can appreciate just how unbelievably awesome it feels.

Ahhhhhhh…….

ZZZipp.

John Burk

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A tribute to my friend John Burk, who passed away in October 2009

John Burk

John Burk


Hey John,

My father called me and told me you passed away.

What the hell? You were only forty-eight years old. Forty-eight is way too young to die. And how is it you were forty-eight anyway? My God, we were teenagers just yesterday.

I haven’t seen much of you these last few years and I’m sorry about that. There was a time when we were good friends. We went to High School together, played in the Jazz Band together, and got our first start in professional radio together on the same 250 watt daytimer. And then I moved away and it got hard to stay in touch and now I realize too late what a shame that was.

Lots of memories, though. Like the time you hit me in the head with your trombone when we were playing a concert. You probably don’t remember but I kind of lost my temper because it was the second or third time you hit me in the head. I’m sorry I lost my temper; it’s pretty funny looking back at it now.

And then the time you asked me to work for you after I’d spent the entire day in the hot blazing sun sanding the hull of some rich guy’s sailboat. I really wasn’t up to it but you talked me into it. I was so muddle-headed that night I accidentally swore on air and got suspended for two weeks. Also pretty funny thinking back on it. Thanks a lot for that one.

Another night I was finishing my show and I accidentally identified myself on air as you. “You’re listening to CJRW radio, I’m John Burk,” I said. I have absolutely no idea why I did that, but again, it was pretty darned funny.

You were the disc jockey at my wedding. Thank you for that, sir. And a long standing DJ on CJRW. Probably one of the last men standing on CJRW, long after the first building burned down and the owners were so scarred by the experience that they turned the station country and made it almost fully automated. I remember visiting you in that sad excuse for radio thinking that you were just like Venus Flytrap on that episode of WKRP. But you survived.

You were a good guy, Mr. Burk. I don’t remember you uttering one single word of malice toward anyone, ever. My mother told me how well you looked after your mother when she was ill, visiting her every single day for hours at a time. I sure hope someone did the same for you this last little while ’cause you deserved the same consideration you showed your mother.

If there’s a heaven or the rough equivalent of one I know that you’re in it, John.

Where ever you are, even though it’s gotta be a long ways away, I can still hear your voice as clear as day.