What first got you hooked on rock 'n' roll? Is there a specific memory a specific song?

It's a combination of things. One of the things that was the most noticeable to me in reflecting on it. It seemed like on Monday, there was no rock 'n' roll. There was Perry Como and Patti Page and the Four Lads or whoever all these people were. And then on Tuesday it was like all of these people had been waiting in the chutes ready to come charging out. Because it didn't happen over a period of many years. Like in 1955 or 1956, all of a sudden, bam, all of these people came at you, and it was like where were they on Monday? On Tuesday they're all here. And there's a list of them, 20 of them that you could name just like that. So this wave of all of these people coming out, this was part of the impact. It made you think, this is not subtle. This is the, this is not something that's one person. There's many, many people that make this up. For me personally, something that just got under my skin that makes, you know, one of, you know, something like this that makes you think I've got to get some of this. Was I heard, I heard several records by Elvis, like everybody did, but there was a song on the B-side of one of his records called "My Baby Left Me" and there's an introduction on it with a base run down, and drums that kind of kick the song in. And there was something about that, that I thought, I need to be able to be a part of something like that. And there was a record by Jimmy Reed that I heard. It was a radio, I grew up in Toronto, and right across the lake, in Buffalo, there was a disk jockey by the name of George Hound Dog Lorenz. And he played, it was the, in that area the largest introduction to blues and rhythm and blues. And he played a record one night called " Ain't That Lovin' You Baby" by Jimmy Reed. And the mood, the groove and the sound of this record was something that made me think this is a home for me. I know this thing from somewhere. And I'm, I'm going to find out where that comes from. And it put me on a mission as a very young kid. I wrote songs when I was 15 years old for Ronnie Hawkins, joined Ronnie Hawkins when I was 16, and went to the fountainhead of rock 'n' roll, the Mississippi Delta when I was 16 years old. And it was largely due to hearing these things. You know something that pushes the button and gives you that fever. It was, uh, it was lots and lots of songs, but those two particular things I could just never get them away from me. They always seemed to be surrounding me. so when I discovered, when I first heard this music when I was like puberty, and I'd already started playing guitar, I was already learning to play guitar coincidentally before rock 'n' roll had blasted on to the scene. And so the guitar that I was learning puberty, and then this wave coming out, it was like I didn't even have a choice in the matter. You know what I mean? It was like a setup. You take this kid, you stick him at these crossroads, he's a goner. That's it; he just doesn't have a choice in the matter anymore. So it made me think I've got, I've got to discover this thing. And Canada seemed so far away from the Mississippi Delta, that I hooked up with this rockabilly band, went to it, just to smell the air, just to feel the rhythm in the air down there. How could so much music come out of this one area, you know, this Memphis-Clarkesdale-West Helena, so many people came out of this like hundred mile radius there. You could list 20 of them just from out there. And I thought why here, why not -- why didn't they come out of Oklahoma? Why didn't they come out of Indiana? You know, it was, it was there. So I had to go to the Mecca.

What were your impressions when you got there?

It lived up to my dreams. It's a, because I had a, a, a great comparison -- coming from where I did I had a great comparison of it. It was far enough away that I, um, I didn't, I couldn't take any of these things for granted. It wasn't something like I know about that stuff, it doesn't, you know, I noticed everything. And every, when I got there, it was like I, I had to focus because everything moved in rhythm. The people seemed to walk in another kind of rhythm. And this Mississippi River was musicality in itself. It went by as just kind of, and these boats going by on it, and the way people talked, and the names of the streets, and the people's names and all of this. Everything had a sound and a rhythm to it just like that music did. And it all made perfect sense to me very quickly. And it was like music in the air, there. You know I mean? You could hear, whether it was actually happening or not you could hear it, you know at night, because it would be very hot and then by the time you'd got outside you could hear somebody playing or singing like from a long distance away, or a harmonica coming from down the river somewhere. And it was so much music. And up North, young people liked the music. Older people were above it all. Down there it didn't have that. This was their music. And to me, like I said, on Monday it wasn't there, and on Tuesday it was. Well, to them it was there on Monday. They say it coming for years. And it was the kind of music that they'd go when they would go out dancing or what everybody would do, this is the kind of music they would listen to. They could see this combinations of music, this music coming down from, talking about the South, the Northern South, coming down from the mountains, this country music, and this black delta music coming up from the South, coming like this and going [makes explosion noise] -- and exploding into this thing that we call whatever, rock 'n' roll, or rhythm and blues or rhythm or soul or something.

When you were writing songs when you were 15, who were you trying to write songs like?

Well, I had a specific job in mind. I was trying to figure out a way to get into this band, Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks. And one day I just heard Ronnie Hawkins say, Um, I need to find some songs for my next record. And I thought, he needs to find some songs? And at that time I was dabbling around with it, just fooling around. I was never really good at copying off records. Some people could listen to a record once and then they could play the thing, or they could work on it and figure it out. I didn't have patience for that. You know, I'd try to figure it out and I'd find something like it, but it would never be the right thing. I'd never have it nailed, and finally I just threw that aside and said, I just have to make up something of my own. I don't have whatever that is to copy very well. So I started doing that on the guitar, and it kind of led to writing songs too. It made you just think well, rather than learning this person's song, I'll just make up something. And you didn't think of it as like I'm composing a song. I thought of making up something so I don't have to learn that. So anyway I heard him talk about needing material. I went off, wrote a couple of songs, came back and said, I've got a couple of songs. And I was 15 years old. He looked at me, like, this is very cute, isn't it? And he listened to the songs, and he said, gee, this isn't bad, and he ended up recording them. So it was all part of my getting from A to B to B to C and eventually becoming part of this world and getting to go to, to Memphis.

So, sort of through the Ronnie Hawkins period and then Levon and the Hawks, Bob Umler has kind of called you a road warrior during that time, someone who's seen a lot of America and gone into a lot of places. Is that what it was like?

It was. It was like -- it -- Thinking about other people that were on the road I could feel out attitudes towards this. A lot of people, it was a means to an end. It's like, oh, jeez, it's 400 miles, we've got to drive there and everything. And to me the getting there meant something too. Because like I was saying, I was looking at signs, I was reading the names of places and all of this, and I don't know why, it just appealed to me. I didn't know that I was storing up stuff for songs that I was going to be writing in the future. And I liked the whole poetry of the thing. The romanticism of it.