By Ian Woolley
Reading the mind of a singer-songwriter…
Perhaps the most prolific and greatest Canadian singer-songwriter of all time, Gordon Lightfoot is an indelible part of the Canadian national spirit. In 2007, he even had his own postage stamp!
Now, with the release of a feature documentary on him, appropriately called ‘If You Could Read My Mind’, we thought it time to delve into the 82-year-old’s mind so we caught up with him in his home city of Toronto.
Born in Orillia, Ontario, in 1938, Gordon defined the folk-pop sound of the 1960s and 70s. He has recorded 21 albums and has five Grammy nominations. His songs have been played on the radio regularly for 50 years. Big hits like Early Morning Rain, If You Could Read My Mind, Carefree Highway, Sundown and The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald to name but a few.
Gordon started singing in a choir at the age of 12, and a few years later wrote his first song while still at school.
Having loved his songs down the years, this song crafter wordsmith was in fine form. His near neighbour was also as well known but we’ll talk about that later.
“It wasn’t until I went to be taught how to write a song properly did I truly develop,” said Gordon. “I was so fortunate that, when I was living in Detroit, I would regularly hang out with Joni (at that time unknown). Many happy memories of me and Tom Rush sitting at her place listening to her strumming and singing these amazing new songs of hers.”
Also in Grossman’s stable was Bob Dylan, and his admiration for him remains strong to this day – and it seems the feeling is mutual. Dylan once said that when he heard a Lightfoot song he wished “it would last forever.” It was Dylan who inducted Lightfoot into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 1986.
In 2015, he started putting together a new feature documentary about his long career and the people he has worked with. Two years in the making, it has only now just gone on cinema release. Gordon explained: “There was so much film shot that a lot of it ended up on the cutting room floor but it was fun to make.”
Gone are the permed hair, lots of ex-wives, and cigarettes, these days, but when he finally gave up drinking in 1982 after his hits had dried up, he was lucky enough to be offered a Las Vegas residency.
“I was one of the first pop stars to get a regular gig there but the MGM Grand owner said after I walked off stage: ‘I loved your show but you’re the first son-of-a-bitch who ever walked on in a pair of blue jeans!’ I guess he expected me to walk on all suited and booted. That’s just not me,” chuckled Gordon.
I had to ask him about the many health scares that have dogged him throughout his long career. In the early 70s, it was Bell’s Palsy that froze part of his face, and in 2002 an abdominal artery in his stomach burst.
Gordon said: “It was a ruptured splenic artery aneurysm which was the official term. I was about to perform a concert in Orillia and was airlifted to the hospital near Ontario where I was in a coma for six weeks. I was –for all purposes – dead. It took 28 pints of blood to get me through, and to celebrate I did have a glass of red wine afterward…only one glass, mind!”
Amazingly, when everybody thought that was the end of his career, he started recording new material in the studio within a year. Yet, despite a minor stroke four years later, Gordon remains upbeat. “As long as I can get out there and earn money for the family, I will keep ongoing. Hell, I’ve even been reported by the press as having died (in 2010).”
For the record, Gordon had to go on a radio station and tell them he was very much alive.” “I did enjoy putting the record straight though” he laughed.
These days, a strict gym routine keeps the creaking bones from ceasing up, and due to the pandemic, he admitted he misses the routine. Alive and doing what he loves best is his ethos indeed.
(photo credit Martha Kehoe and Joan Tosoni)
Last year, his 23rd studio album, Solo was released to wide acclaim and now a new film about his life is hitting the Canadian cinemas, with the US and Europe insight.
Produced, written, and directed by Martha Kehoe and Joan Tosoni, Insight Productions’ feature documentary Gordon Lightfoot: If You Could Read My Mind is an exploration of the career, music, and influence of the legendary Canadian musical icon.
With unprecedented access to the artist, the film takes audiences from high school auditoriums in straight-laced, small-town Ontario, in the 50s, to the coffee houses of Yorkville and Greenwich Village in the 60s, through Lightfoot’s turbulent, substance-fuelled arena shows of the 70s, and finally to the artist in the present day.
The documentary features interviews from many notable voices in the music industry, including Lightfoot peers Ian and Sylvia Tyson, Randy Bachman, and Steve Earle; famous fans Alex Lifeson and Geddy Lee from Rush, Alec Baldwin, Anne Murray, and Sarah McLachlan, as well as behind–the- scenes stories from members of his long-time band.
Following Lightfoot’s evolution from Christian choirboy to troubled troubadour to international star and beloved Canadian icon, Gordon Lightfoot: If You Could Read My Mind is an intimate and emotional examination of the artist’s profound relationship to his music and his Canadian roots.
Now married to his fifth wife Kim Hasse, who is 25 years younger than him, things are good in the mind of Canada’s great storyteller.
“I live in the suburbs of Toronto and I am fortunate that one of music’s talented singers Drake is my neighbour. A fantastic talented performer who I admire a lot,” said Gordon.
It seems Toronto has a new kid in town but Lightfoot isn’t ready yet to pass the baton over. “I’ve been dead a few times, yet I’m still here. Just don’t write me off yet,” he demanded.
Excerpts from an exclusive interview with Ian Woolley which was published in the 2020 September issue of the Beat.