For a few glorious years in the 1980s, Ivan Doroschuk and Men Without Hats, his band of bros—fraternal and otherwise—were probably the biggest musical sensation to have ever come out of Montreal. Sure, it might be difficult to fathom now, but at the time these guys were bigger than April Wine, Walter Rossi, Teaze and […]
NOTABLES
What you’ll find here are film reviews and previously published articles about various bands and artists, as well as some of the interviews with public figures that I’ve conducted over the years for a lengthy series of publications. When possible, I’ll be digging through my archives to post the entire text of these interviews, the complete transcriptions, so instead of the 1000 or so words they were originally whittled down in order to address the physical space concerns of print media, many of these highly candid and insightful conversations are now being published in their entirety for the very first time.
Also in this section, given I still have lots of high-profile friends and have either hung or rubbed shoulders with many a celebrity in my time, I’ll soon start posting first person anecdotes about some of the experiences I’ve had with a few of these people; Debbie Harry, Andy Warhol, William Burroughs Jr., The Ramones, Joan Jett, Ian Astbury, Johnny Thunders, Meatloaf, Leslie West, ‘Stuttering’ John Menendez, Keith Richards and Mick Jagger among them.
Checking out Montreal’s Cannabis Cup with American pot guru Ed Rosenthal
It’s 3 p.m. on a cold, gross Saturday afternoon in November and I’m stationed at the World Beat Café/community centre on St-Laurent to wallow in the wonder that is the first-ever Quebec Cannabis Cup. I feel privileged. The cost to attend this gruelling competition is a whopping 200 bucks, but I, as an official hanger-on […]
Interview with Ron Jeremy, Porn Star: Hail to the Hedgehog!
Butt-ugly, overweight and the proud owner of a nine-inch penis, Ron Jeremy is unquestionably one of the leading icons of the porn industry. But he is more—so much more—and is determined that the world learn why. I tracked Jeremy—nicknamed the Hedgehog due to his abundant body hair—down in Las Vegas where he gave up the […]
Talking politics [and more!] with Patti Smith
When I interviewed Patti Smith in the fall of 2007 I’d never met nor spoken with the woman before. We did, however, share a few friends and/or acquaintances in New York who’d all known her fairly well at some point over the last 30 odd years, with the word often coming back to me about […]
Muckraking 101: A chat with fearless Greenpeace activist/big wig Tzeporah Berman
Tzeporah Berman has been one of Canada’s leading environmental activists ever since she coordinated the largest civil disobedience protest in the nation’s history, back in 1993, in the effort to save the virgin forests of B.C.’s Clayoquat Sound from the then systematic clear-cutting practices of the logging industry. Today she’s co-director of Greenpeace International’s Global […]