To celebrate twenty episodes of “In isolation With” we’re having a look back to the highlights of the first batch of shows. We talk about stress reduction with Timothy Caulfield, how to properly clean your food with Olunike Adeliyi, how to bridge the political gap with Steve Earle and why being an actor is such a grave responsibility with Clarke Peters. And, as if that wasn’t enough, Julie Eng does a mind-blower of a magic trick and Gordon Deppe of The Spoons does a live, solo performance. Even in lockdown, it’s been a wild ride. Come spend some time with us!
Watch the whole thing HERE! Or on CTVnews.ca HERE!
Check out episode nineteen of Richard’s new web series, “In Isolation With…” It’s the talk show where we make a connection without actually making contact! Today, broadcasting directly from Isolation Studios (a.k.a. my home office), we meet a Grammy award winning singer-songwriter, a record producer, author and actor whose song Copperhead Road is still a jukebox favorite thirty-three years after it made him a superstar. Steve Earle Zooms in from his home in Tennessee to talk about how his new album “Ghosts of West Virginia” might bridge the political gap, going to Walmart and how doing yoga helps to center him in these anxious times. Come visit with us! In isolation we are united!
Steve Earle on songwriting from the “In Isolation With” interview: “This job is about empathy. That’s what makes it work. That’s how you’re able to tell really complicated stories in three or four minutes. That’s how you’re able to get ideas across that are unpopular… I have had three people over the years and, keep in mind, not everybody has access to walk up and talk to me, or the opportunity to do that. I’ve had three people come up to me and say something you wrote changed my mind about the death penalty. So, you can’t tell me that music can’t change the world because I have experience of that in my life.”
Watch the whole thing HERE on YouTube and HERE on ctvnews.ca!
Music documentaries often veer into hagiography, looking back with rose coloured glasses at their subject. There are heaps of high praise in “Gordon Lightfoot: If You Could Read My Mind,” a new career retrospective from co-directors Martha Kehoe and Joan Tosoni, but right from the outset it displays an honesty rare in authorized bios.
After a few bars of his chauvinistic ’60s hit “For Lovin’ Me” Lightfoot, watching vintage footage, demands it be shut off. “That’s a very offensive song for a guy to write who was married with a couple of kids,” he says before adding, “I guess I don’t like who I am.”
It’s a startling beginning to a movie that uses his music and a series of celebrity talking heads like Steve Earle, Sarah McLachlan, Geddy Lee, Anne Murray and Alec Baldwin, who helpfully adds, “This was a guy who sang poems,” to tell the story. Traditionally Lightfoot’s enigmatic approach to his biography has left many questions unanswered in the media. That doesn’t change much here, although he seems to have allowed open access to his home and is occasionally candid in the contemporary interviews. “I regret a lot of things,” he says near the end of the film. “I caused emotional trauma in people, particularly some women, the women I was closest to. I feel very, very badly about it.”
“If You Could Read My Mind” doesn’t skip over sensitive biographical points. His relationship with Cathy Evelyn Smith, a woman he loved who was later accused of killing John Belushi and the infidelities that marred his personal life are examined, although with a light touch that respects his privacy.
Supporting the storytelling are interestingly curated images. From rare clips of his early performances on the CBC and on the stages of Yonge Street taverns and Yorkville coffee houses and archival photos of the legendary, star-studded parties he threw at his Rosedale home, to old footage of his parents and behind-the-scenes images of his acting debut in Desperado—“You’ll never win an Oscar,” said co-star Bruce Dern, “but you’re fun to work with.”—the doc offers a comprehensive visual essay of Canadiana, Gordon Lightfoot style.
Ultimately the best documentary of Lightfoot’s storied life is his work, tunes like “Sundown” and “Rainy Day People” that suggest everything he has to say is in his songs. “Your personal experience and your emotional stress,” he says, “finds its way in by way of your unconscious mind over into the mind of reality and translates itself into your lyrics. And you don’t even know that is happening.”
To celebrate twenty episodes of “In isolation With” we’re having a look back to the highlights of the first batch of shows. We talk about stress reduction with Timothy Caulfield, how to properly clean your food with Olunike Adeliyi, how to bridge the political gap with Steve Earle and why being an actor is such a grave responsibility with Clarke Peters. And, as if that wasn’t enough, Julie Eng does a mind-blower of a magic trick and Gordon Deppe of The Spoons does a live, solo performance. Even in lockdown, it’s been a wild ride. Come spend some time with us!
