Live from Saskatoon
Plus 20% off new merch, and bad advice for those in an anxiety spiral in TK Maxx
Sunday night at The Bassment, Saksatoon. Blair Dunlop and I are perusing the many artist signatures that decorate the walls, occasionally squinting a little or tilting our heads to the side trying to make out the name of a friend, peer or hero among the rest.
We are invited to add a mark of our own and sit there for a few minutes wondering what an appropriate amount of space to take up would be that made clear we understood we weren’t as big as The Brothers Landreth, but were surely the equal of some random band whose name we couldn’t quite read. Once again the Sharpie proved why it is in the bag, case and pocket of every right-minded touring artist in the world. Biros just don’t have the weight for situations like this, and the people who used pencils may as well not have bothered. Come on people, these are the basics.
We’d been erroneously billed as Jake Dunlop and Blair Morley, which seemed strangely fitting what with the increasing convergence of our artist personas over the course of these dates. The long solo sets we’d prepared for the first gig had morphed into long sets performed together. We were revelling in the chance to play on someone else’s songs for once, and in the thrill of our own songs being taken in new and unpredictable directions.
Thanks to Grant, the in-house sound engineer that night, we have actually have a recording of what went down. Take a bow Grant wherever you are.
To be honest it didn’t feel like a standout show at the time. But listening back I think it captures all of the natural, fun, musical connection I felt performing with Blair. Here are a couple of songs from the set, chosen at random to make me look vaguely good.
Chained By Design - Blair Dunlop
Asking For A Friend - by me
The full 50 minute live recording
Is available to my paid subscribers. You can join their ranks here:
*NEWSLETTER EXCLUSIVE*
A few random tour highlights
Our (magnificent artist) friend Mia Kelly recounting how a fan had recently described her as ‘like a Canadian Joni Mitchell’
Being endlessly told how stunning the drive from BC to Canmore is, then doing it in total darkness
Somehow clinging onto my minutecryptic.com streak, usually by remembering at 11:56pm
Billie Zizi returning my wallet after I left it in Medicine Hat the day before she played there. I hung out with her and her band in Edmonton. They are all excellent. Her new album has been No.1 for two weeks now on Alberta radio. You can listen to it here.
Drinking beer and sharing stories about the challenges of depicting giant robotic steam-powered otters with the very fine people who twice staged my old musical at the Edmonton Fringe Festival.
Forgetting a line in a song and having it called back at me by a guy in the audience who drove 7 hours to see me play. Sorry mate.
Realising part way through So I Had This Dream that 1) The next verse of the song was about the perils of burning oil and 2) that I was singing it in Alberta, AKA The Oil Province. Not such a terrible thing I think, especially to a room of folkies, but would have been nice to realise before the song started. It’s a little like turning up in Texas and singing a song against freedom and the keeping of livestock. Except with Canadians, so actually not much like that at all.
In an unusual turn of events I’ve actually written more about the tour on social media than I have here. I could overly rehash the same content here, believe me I would, but perhaps I’d better instead invite you to check out posts like this if you haven’t already.
Or this video blog from the other fella
A word on Blair
I left the tour with a new appreciation for him. His voice is A list, his guitar playing was delightful, his songs rarely left my head. He was engaged, professional and thoughtful. He was infectiously passionate about random Canadian singer-songwriters I’d not heard of. And he was absolutely excellent company which is very useful when you’re spending basically 24/7 with someone.
So if you like what you hear, do check him out at https://blairdunlop.com.
Take in a show, listen to a record, surprise him at a petrol station. We’re talking about doing more together in future, but nothing confirmed yet.
20% off these top quality new Tea Towels
A new addition to the merch table in Canada were these Some Things Are Like Other Things Tea Towels, featuring the album cover artwork of Lynn Hatzius.
Made from 100% organic unbleached cotton, with a hanging loop and care label.
They are listed at £15, but you folks can get 20% off by using this exclusive newsletter discount code: tea20
Gift a subscription this Christmas
Scrambling around TK Maxx1 in an anxious frenzy one evening soon, you might reach a point of having rejected every single other possible gift idea in the world. At the limit of your wits, and with no other options left, you might take the desperate step of gifting them a paid subscription to this newsletter.
It would give them access to things like demos of my new songs as I write them and the full set from Saskatoon.
Full disclaimer, the benefits have been known to ebb as well as flow. It can be feast. It can be famine. It can be a delicious but slightly disappointing portion at a friend’s dinner party where they inexplicably made enough for only a little bit each like that was normal and you feel too embarrassed to ask them for toast or something, so you absolutely smash half a loaf when you get home later.
That said, and with about as many disclaimers as possible, here is the link to do that. Obviously it’s a big help to me too, so Happy Christmas me.
That’s more than enough from me, but not so much so that I’ll go back and delete anything.
Take care, be good, love jake
Or indeed its relation TJ Maxx for our American readers
Strangely enough I was thinking about Otteron yesterday (let's be honest, I think about them everyday)