 We're doing this on YouTube. Yep, this is on YouTube, my friends. And we are live, live on the metal voice. Kind of taken back there, guys. It was just announced maybe a few hours ago, Miles Goodwin, the founder, a writer, songwriter, the singer, guitarist of the legendary band April Wine, which means a lot to us Canadians, right? Because this was part of our youth growing up, part of our history as Canadians, the music that we heard on the radio, and the shows we saw. And it was part of our team, Team Canada, going off into the rest of the world and having success internationally. So, Stephane Giroux, I know you've had some experiences. I know Perin, you've had some experiences too. So maybe we can just kind of share some music that we love, share some experiences and just celebrate the life of Miles Goodwin of April Wine, which to me, it just broke my heart. It just broke my heart. So what better way to remember is to just to remember the legacy, Stephane? Yeah, the news hit me this afternoon as I was working on tonight's newscast. As you know, I do local news. And so I pulled a few archival stories we did, but it was devastating. April Wine was my first ever rock concert. I was 14 years old. I had to scrape money to pay the $8.50 for the ticket. I'll never forget the date. April 18, 1980. And I think it was the end of the harder, faster tour. Johnny Winter was opening. My tickets were in a nosebleed and I had heard of rock concerts. I had never seen a rock concerts and my friends in school saying, April Wine, Stephane, come on. It's not that you're gonna go see Kiss or something. And I don't care, I'll see. And I was impressed, like truly impressed. I didn't know what to expect. And here's a bunch of very, very high energy rockers playing what at the time was album oriented rock. That's what we called it. They were not necessarily hit makers, although they had quite a few, but this was what you listen on show. And all the Canadian radio stations were playing them all the time. Yeah, sure. They needed to feel their Canadian content. But the truth is they produce excellent music. They broke big only in the late 70s, early 80s, which is unfortunate because they had great albums. The first one came out in, in 19, what, 1971, I think. Yeah, the year I was born. The year I was born. Yeah, there was a very awkward one with this ugly, but ugly cover of the beat, if you remember. But they knew how to craft catchy songs, you know. And the first couple of records didn't do well. They broke up. They rebuilt the band around Miles Goodwin. And then the next thing you know, things are happening. They're, you know, electric jubile, oua tonight. These are staples of Canadian local 70s rock. I think it's too bad that they never made it in the same vein as Rush, which has become timeless. But a pro wine certainly made its impact at a time when rock was going global and Americans and British controlled most of the market. And it was very hard those days for Canadians to, you know, to carver niche on the international music market. You know, I'm just gonna say this album here, I was, I think it was 1981. I probably bought this album with my own money. And I loved how Miles had the Montreal Canadian shirt right in back there, right there. Even though he was born in Halifax, he spent, you know, much, many, many, many decades in Montreal. And, you know, we considered him a Montrealer amongst the other guys too. Some guys came from Ontario, but all in all, everybody home base was in Montreal. And you're right, Stefan, you know, from stand back to the whole world's gone crazy to first glance, what started off as hits on the Canadian national side of things bled into the US, especially with a first glance, you know, roller and harder faster. I like to rock to the nature of the beast, which probably was the peak and the band was on fire. I love this album. Look at this. Is that a beast playing the guitar or what? It's not the number of the beast, it's the nature of the beast. Miles Goodwin, the voice, the tone. The tone, there was no other vocalist who sounded like him. You know, he wasn't yelling, he wasn't screaming, he was melodic, he had a voice, you know, man, this guy can sing. And yeah, you know, for whatever reasons, over time, the band, you know, had different forms, change mutated, but the music, and you could ask somebody in the rest of the world. Oh yeah, I know I like to rock. Oh yeah, I know roller. I know all over town. He, it was one of the first rock, hard rock songwriters to go international and to actually make a living from it. Jimmy, look at the image behind me, right? And I think that greatest hits record is probably over 60 minutes, you know, the over 60 minutes series was like a really big thing at one time. And like, I think pretty much, does everyone in Canada probably have that, you know, compilation in their collection? I think so. And the reason they do, if you look at that collection, like Miles, it would not be too much of a stretch to say that Miles wrote the great Canadian songbook. He really did, because there were a lot of bands that, you know, you know, Brian Too Loud McLeod and the Street Hearts and the Harlequins and a lot of the bands from out west, Loverboy, like there were bands that if you kind of put on their greatest hits, there's like three or four greatest hits and the rest are kind of like, okay, I don't know if they're greatest hits, they're just kind of like good, deep cuts that everybody likes. But like, April, why man, whether you know them or not, you start going on the list and you were just doing it a second ago. You know, you didn't even, you know, tonight's the wonderful night to fall in love, just between you and me, that there's just, and then even, just between me was huge, was massive. And then that hook for Montreal, because they have the one line in French, just everybody loved that. That's defend lost it, defend lost it with that line. I danced to just between you and me at my wedding, because that was like on one of me and Lena's dances at our wedding. And you know how I was introduced to April Wine? I always remind you that I'm a little bit younger than you guys. The first April Wine song I ever heard was Roller. And remember they used to have those K-Tel compilation albums, The Rock Album and Star Flight, and you would see commercials for them on TV. So I remember I had one of those albums and like I put it on and it had like Blondie and this and that and whatever was popular in the day. And Roller was on the song. Hold on, Stephane, we lost your video there. Go ahead, Karen, sorry. We got his... And Roller was on that compilation album and that just, you know, being more of a, someone who was emerging as a metal kid, I'm like, who is this April Wine person? What is this? What's going on? Because that was, Roller was like, it was rock and roll, but it was kind of that Scream Miles does at the end. That was a, that was pretty metal. You know, it was a pretty metal tune. So Roller was the first song I heard and that's when I said, okay, I need to figure out more about this April Wine person. And of course I was like nine years old at the time. And then you figure out that April Wine isn't that person screeching in the song Roller, but is a band. And then you start learning about Miles and Brian Greenway and Jerry Mercer and all these amazing things. And then you named it like the nature of the beast and power play and faster, harder and like just all these amazing, amazing records that I really do think like they didn't just get played on local radio because they were CanCon. They were played on local radio because they were good. And they did get a little bit of traction in the US for a while. And it's a, you know, the US is a big place and there was a lot of stuff to absorb. So, you know, but they had a foothold there. And like a lot of our American friends on the metal voice usually share a story or two about seeing April Wine playing on a bill and the US and how impressed they were. And, you know, so they had some traction going and the crazy thing is like, I wish I could have seen the show that the Stefan did, but so when I really got into the band, they were kind of disappearing. And then I lived their comeback. I remember them playing like three or four nights at the brick in Montreal when they came back. And one thing I remember about that show was Pantera were in Montreal playing either the night before or the night after. And you couldn't get into a certain section of the brick up high because Pantera were there. And from my friends who worked for the promoter at the time, when Pantera found out that April Wine were playing in Montreal when they were, they absolutely wanted to be there because growing up in Texas, and we all know like the history of rock radio in Texas, like they were big into April Wine and they couldn't believe they were gonna get to see some of the April Wine comeback shows. And because I guess I saw April Wine on the way down and then the way up again, you know, I got to see them. And Jimmy and I were talking about this offline. I saw them at like a place called Bourbon Street here in Montreal. Me too. And you would see like Jerry Mercer would show up at the Pioneer Club and play La Grange with the house band. And like, I would see, you know, Miles and Jerry and the guys around all the time. And, you know, then they had that comeback with every night I rock myself to sleep and that famous video. That was from the movie, you know, movie that was in. That was in Fright Night. Fright Night. Just as a parenthesis, I walked away for a second to dig out my copy of The Nature of the Beast and it's signed by all five members. Amazing. Including Miles and it's another one who passed away. Understand. Jim Clench. I think Jim Clench, possibly. No, Jim Clench didn't play on this one. No, no, it's April. Steve Lang who passed away. Yeah, yeah. And I met them. I went backstage. I sneaked backstage a year after that first show when they came back for that tour. I believe Loverboy opened. They played two nights at the forum for this tour. Yes. And I thought at the time, Goodwin was a milk and seeded guy but the rest of the band were like the friendly is. Like I'll never forget how nice Jerry Mercer was and Brian Greenway and all these guys, super, super nice. I met again, Miles a few times after and he was always a gentleman. Maybe I caught him on a bad day but he was always always a gentleman. And on the news and Jimmy, I'm sending you the link right now. A few years ago, I did a story about the fact that Miles Goodwin had his guitar stolen. Yes. And returned. I remember that it was like, you know. Yeah. In the 1970s. So I think it was Jimmy Henman who told me that their truck was en route to a high school dance or something at performance in Ontario. Their equipment truck crashed. The stuff was picked up but in a warehouse until the band was able to recuperate it. And they did. Some casings were broke, were destroyed but most of the stuff survived and they all picked up their instruments and it was that one guitar missing from Miles Goodwin. And he never saw it again and he said he really, really liked it. But then I remember it was a 1962 Gibson melody maker. I wouldn't know but I'm told it's a very good guitar. And so Goodwin got a call a couple of years ago from somebody saying, I think I found your guitar. Crazy. And so it was a guy named Doug in Victoria. Hi Doug. He reached out to Goodwin on Facebook saying, you know, I think I found the instrument. How and what happened to it for 40 years was never cleared but I got to speak to Goodwin like this. He was in Halifax holding his guitar, kissing it. Yep. Just as good as the first time I played it. I just sent you the link Jimmy. Hopefully you'll find a way to embed it in your page because we can do it on Facebook as you know. But yeah, it is a band like this. It's sort of like BTO, but in a different way. BTO captured America. April wine was a lot more than that. They were more subtle than BTO. And to this day, Americans when they think Canadian rock, Rush, BTO, April wine, and all for that quality, crafty guitar playing which is guitar oriented rock. That's kind of what it was. It was my first exposure to, wait, these guys have three guitarists? What? Three guitarists. And you know what's interesting about their music? It was written so well that they all had their parts. Right? They all had their solos. They all had their parts. If you listen to a song like I Like to Rock, listen to the ending. It's so obvious there's three different guitars going on playing the rhythm. But I want to say this, when I spoke to Neil Kay, the famous DJ of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal Movement in the UK, he was the one who sort of brought him along when April wine went to the UK. He sort of helped break them, make them bigger than they were. And if you remember this, Stefan, remember there was a broadcast April wine in London and they played it on probably on CTV or CFCF at the time on national TV or maybe Canadian national TV. It was their sort of little adventure in the UK sort of breaking that market back in these days over here. So there was a good, strong presence in the UK with April wine. The United States, especially with this album, they did break. It went platinum this album. And of course, Canada's always loved them. So, and I know that over time, it's been the rest of the world. This is big news. Like, you know what, when the news broke, we all quickly chatted really quickly and then we went on off our days. But I noticed I was going out and then by the time I got home, the news of his death is actually like, I got an alert on my phone from CTV News. I got an alert on my phone from CBC. So in Canada, this is not like just making music news. This is making mainstream news that Miles Goodwin has passed away. So I think that also speaks to the importance of being a creative genius. And again, you guys touched on it. The guy was kind of a creative genius. And people who are kind of like this can be a little surly, because I've also had a couple of opportunities to meet Miles on the band, Stefan. And it's funny, because I could agree with exactly what you said. I always felt like Miles didn't necessarily want to be the one backstage meetings, shaking hands, kissing babies. And creative people can be kind of difficult like that. I remember meeting them with Breen LeBeouf when Breen LeBeouf was in the band and Breen couldn't be like a nicer guy. But that just seemed like it wasn't for Miles, right? And it's not to say he wasn't a nice person. It's just that sometimes creative people, when they're in their... Well, look at Neil Perk. Look at Neil Perk. He's right away, you know. It's not kind of a reputation, right? It's that kind of a reputation. And I would recommend to anybody, Miles Goodwin put out his autobiography a few years ago. And it's quite a good read. It's an interesting... Amazing. His side of the dynamics of the band, maybe other people in the band might not agree with, but they always say there's three sides to every story. But, and that's his truth is in that book. But it also speaks very candidly about just, being in a rock band and the toll it takes on relationships and substance abuse and his time living in the Bahamas and how we kind of got his creative mojo back, living in the Bahamas. It's a very interesting read. So I would really say to anyone out there, sometimes whether you're a fan or not, it's just interesting to kind of hear about the creative process and the dynamic of bands and just what happens to people over time when they're in a somewhat successful band. So I... That's a good segue. So this is what happened to me. So we were scheduled to interview Miles Goodwin. I go, finally, finally get to interview Miles Goodwin. Talk all we want, setting it up at the publicist, going back and forth, confirm, confirm, confirm. The data's confirmed. Something happened, didn't go out, happened. So we booked another date. I read his biography. I went through all his, the April wine catalog, really prepping myself, really looking forward to it. But whatever happened back then, I don't remember what happened. It just, the interview didn't happen. I was hoping that in the near future I would have interviewed him, but it didn't happen. So that kind of broke my heart. I've always wanted to tap into his brain and sort of have a nice, in-depth interview with Miles, just to really talk about his legacy and his experiences. He broke your heart, Jimmy. He broke my heart. I just wanted that one interview with him. It's one thing to meet the guys. It's another thing to sit down and to really talk to someone. It's also interesting to know that he, for a long time, lived in the Hudson area. And most people of a certain age who did live in Hudson say that he was discreet and low-key in his community. But I do know people whose children hung out with his children in school in Hudson. And he was described as essentially as, what does your dad do? Oh, mine's a doctor. What about yours? Oh, he's a lawyer. What about yours? Oh, he plays music. And he considered his job as a musician and more likely than not a nine to five musician because the guys from April Wine were not exactly known to burn the midnight oil and stuff their face with drugs around their clog. They probably may have done so at a certain age but they were consummate professionals in the sense that the show must go on and you must be ready to hit the stage. And when I got that record autographed more than 40 years ago, I do remember I got it signed as the band was about to go on stage. And they might as well look like a bunch of guys ready to sit down and watch a hockey game because they were focused on their tasks. They were not getting drunk. They were not getting high. They were not fooling around. Says, no, we have this one thing to do and that is to perform and we'll do it well. And when I told you it was my first rock concert, what I thought was incredible was that these were five highly professional musicians taking cues from each other, knowing what was expected of them and they delivered each and every hit they had to the fans at night. Stefan, it's not just Brian Adams and the band. This was a solid band. Even though Miles was the centerpiece and the creative force, let me tell you Jerry Mercer, phenomenal drummer, Brian Greenway, phenomenal singer, writer, as well as a guitarist, right? Gary Moffitt, incredible guitarist who joined in the early years, right? After the first three albums or whatever it was and Lang, what's his name? Robert Lang. Steve Lang. Yeah. An incredible bassist. And even Jimmy Apoor. This was a solid. This was an international caliber band. But, you know, Jim Clench, and then even in latter years, Miles always surrounded himself by great musicians, Richard Lanthier, Brine LaBeurre, like, you know, really high quality musicians were brought into the band and wanted to play a brine. And then, you know, you're talking about shows. I just looked it up. So I saw, I had to look up the date. When they were kind of making somewhat of a comeback, April 1st, 2005, I saw them at the Bell Center in Montreal. It was kind of like celebrating Schoen's anniversary. And it was April Wine, a version of Off and Back with Melté and Desha on vocals who Stefan will probably know, you know, but not our international ones, and Michel Pogliero. So it was such a great Montreal show. April Wine, Off and Back, Michel Pogliero. And that's probably the last time I saw them on a big stage. It was in 2005. And again, you could say all some of these bands when they're past their prime, they lose their chops, they don't know when to give it up. Pristine guys, it's pristine. The band was just so, so good. Just consummate professionals like you're saying. And it doesn't matter what might have been going on behind the scenes or who wasn't getting along with who or whatever. When they stepped on the stage, boom. The number, look at this. These are the accolades, okay? First of all, they sold 10 million albums worldwide. Right? That's a lot. Has Anthrax, I mean, what is it? Anthrax probably sold 10 million albums worldwide. I mean, if you want to think about it, right? They were inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 2010. Goodwin received the East Coast Music Life Achievement Award in 2008 and the SOCAN National Achievement Award in 2002. And it goes on and on and on, you know, all the awards that the bands have had, the singles. I mean, to this day, when you go on, you know, you just play the radio, right? On the classic rock station, I would assume you're always gonna hear one or another April White. Either Sons of the Pioneer, perhaps, just between you and me, perhaps. Ooh, what a night. Just a woman, what was it? No, no, not just a woman. Like a woman, like a song. Like a woman, like a song, I mean. We haven't even talked about rock and roll is a vicious game. Like, that's what you go through there. Rock and roll is a vicious game. Remember, in fact, when... Tonight is a wonderful time to fall in love. I saw one show with April Wine. Might not have been, what was the album they did after Night Nature of the Beast? The Sons of the Pioneer one is called... Had a very... The dog, the dog one, man. Yeah. And Jim Zeller, Montreal, well-known blues man, went on stage and played the harmonica for Rock and Roll is a vicious game. And to this day, I think it's one of their better songs. It was Power Play, by the way. Yeah, Power Play is enough. And when I was, I remember being in... Power Play was probably grade seven or grade six. I don't remember. It was enough is enough if you see Kay, right? Then of course, say hello. Remember, and I like to rock. And you always have that picture of the studio which they recorded, you know, Art of Fire was on there, right? And they recorded, I believe, Power Play there too, or at least parts of it. 20th century Schizoid man, which was a cover, right? Their version is the ultimate version, right? Other bands covered that version the way they did it. Bad Side of the Moon was written by Elton John and Bernie Toppin, if I remember right. And they, that's one of my favorite songs of theirs. You could have been a lady. I don't think we've talked about that. And I think you might've mentioned it. My guilty pleasure, April Wine song, it's almost kind of like hair metal a little bit, is All Over Town. I've just always loved All Over Town. Something about that song. There's such a great, and I like the riff. Da-na-na, da-na-na, da-na-na. Well, we're not gonna even, Nature of the Beast, you know, you could go down, this whole album is great. All Over Town, Sign of the Gypsy Queen, which was actually a cover, right? But they made it the ultimate version. They made it the ultimate version. Just Between You and Me, Wanna Rock, Caught in the Crossfire, Future Tense, right? Crash and Burn, Big City Girls, Bad Boys and One More Time, which is a closer. I even have this guy here, which is a first glance and harder faster. It's sort of like a cool little combination on CDs. Did you remaster it? You know a band is important to my iconic when you can link a song to a certain events and stuff in your life. And just talking about this brought back a memory. So Sign of the Gypsy Queen. So my buddy Rob, whose mother Norma was April Wine's travel agent for many, many years, which is how I've kind of had an opportunity to meet them over the years. We were having a party at my friend Rob's house, who lived around the corner from me. So I just said to my parents, yeah, I'm going over to Rob's, we're gonna watch some movies. Next thing you know, there's 200 people at Rob's house and like people are puking on the neighbor's lawns and having sex and people's backyards. And the neighborhood is going crazy, the police are coming. So Sign of the Gypsy Queen is playing and I'm kind of putting a move on a girl and I'm smoking a joint. And who do I see coming down the stairs on my buddy Rob's house? His parents are out of town. My father. So my father dragged me out of my buddy Rob's house as Sign of the- By the year, by the year, by the year. Pretty much. And he's like, you know, are you doing drugs? What did you have? I'm like, I had two beers and like I had a lot more than two beers but like I will forever in my life link Sign of the Gypsy Queen to getting dragged out of that party that I was around. I don't know why I was so stupid to tell my parents there was a party happening three doors down for me and I'm saying I'm going to Rob's to watch a movie but like there were 200 people there. Like how did I think I was going to get away with that? And like, yeah. I remember my dad dragging me. I remember my dad coming down the stairs. I could picture it. I could picture what he was wearing. I could picture the girl I was talking to. I was picturing the joint I have in my hand and Sign of the Gypsy Queen playing and my dad dragging me out of the party. And forever will be the smack off the head that your father gave you when you were hearing that song. Teenage memories. Animal Grace is the album you're referring to as the fan that you said the Sons of the Pioneer. This could be the right one. It was Animal Grace. And we have to open a little parenthesis. Yes, sir. April Wine Live at the El Mocambo. Yes, yes. That's made the famous club. That's right. They were sharing the bill with another local blues bar band called the Rolling Stones. That's right. Infamous, yes. And so April Wine were of course on the marquee. Supporting another band called the Cockroaches. And April Wine, of course, probably became a very small anecdote in that legendary performance. But they put out a very decent live album out of that show. And more than 40, it took the Rolling Stones more than 40 years to release also their entire show on record. So it must have been a very, very interesting pairing. I don't know if Miles or if Mick and Keith even bothered introducing themselves to it to Miles, but I hope they did because I'm sure they would have found a kindred soul who got it, who wasn't to music as much as they were. He talks about that in his book, if you remember. He does talk about that whole El Mocambo situation or that show in his book. So like Perrin mentioned, just between you and me, the book is, you know, it's a great documentation of his life as well as his life in April Wine. And from the beginning of the little band in Halifax that moved to the big old city in Montreal to make it big. Yeah, the rise, the fall, the impact on everybody. The relationships with everyone in the band, his time in the Bahamas. It's one of those books that actually, you know how you get, you have some of these rock biographies and they're hard to get through. That one was a page turner. It was like a really easy to get through because it was just interesting and you kind of feel like you know the subject almost, you know, you're like, you're gonna feel like he's, you know, he's easy to relate to because he's been through a lot of the things that a lot of us have been through, you know? I think everybody's had a Miles Goodwin sighting in Montreal. You know, we would see him at a bar just drinking in the corner like back in the day now we're talking. So that was pretty cool. Guys, on that note, thank you for jumping on. Thank you for sharing the memories. Miles Goodwin, a Canadian legend, you know? And he will be missed. He will definitely, but his music will live on. And you know what? April Wine's still going strong. Brian Greenway is, he's, you know, playing the music and keeping the legacy alive. So, you know, if you wanna hear some April Wine music you could either put on the albums or go see them live. Guys, it's been a pleasure. We will talk soon. Thanks for having us, guys. Wish it was under better circumstances.