John McLachlan - McLachlan Sings Lightfoot (2018)

This somewhat eclectic collection of songs is drawn from Gordon Lightfoot’s vast repertoire. Many are well-known, and some a little obscure, yet, they are all gems in their own way. I’ve been a fan of Lightfoot’s music since I heard the live recording of “The Canadian Railroad Trilogy” which grade four student teacher, Miss Dolan, played for our class as she taught Canadian history. As chance would have it, my dad owned the recording of it and I have fond memories of sitting on the floor in my bedroom, dropping, then lifting, then dropping the needle on the record as he helped me transcribe the lyrics. I then memorized the song, and would pretend I was playing the guitar as I sang along to the recording. I was hooked!

When I was 12 years old my mother gave me five dollars one weekend and said: “you can either buy something with it, or go out for lunch.” I chose to buy the brand new album, Don Quixote, which ended up playing a key role in my becoming a musician. I asked for the sheet-music book of it for my 13th birthday even though I didn’t play guitar yet. I loved following along with the hand-written lead sheets. In a few years, when I did start to play, it was the chord instructions that were my first introduction to the guitar. I still have that book, and cherish it very much.

I attended my first Lightfoot concert in 1973 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre in Vancouver when he performed just with bassist, Rick Haynes, and his new lead guitarist, Terry Clements. I was mesmerized by this simple trio holding a huge theatre in its thrall for an evening. Since then I’ve attended more than 30 of his concerts, including a highlight evening at Massey Hall in Toronto in 1999 where I had been given a front-row centre seat, and got to visit him on the afternoon of the show as he was writing out his set list in the dressing room and the band was convening backstage.

This album was recorded “live” over four days in the Barn Studio on Hornby Island, in the sense that we didn’t go back to dub things later, or add other parts. We played it like Lightfoot’s early trio did. We discovered an even deeper level of honesty in the songs by doing them with just vocal, rhythm guitar, lead guitar/mandolin, and acoustic bass. It’s kind of an “old-fashioned” way of recording where every little thing isn’t touched up and fixed, but, instead, you get to hear three musicians play music they love, together. It’s real.

Each of us had very emotional moments recording some songs—memories were triggered, or new little avenues into the songs showed themselves. It was a magical four days, recording 14 songs.

The songs I’ve chosen are a small selection of ones that have meant a lot to me over the last 50 years. I hope the less familiar titles will be new little discoveries for you.

We perform many in a similar style to the originals, but we’ve also gone in some new directions with a few such as: “The Watchman’s Gone,” “Sundown,” and “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.” For the latter two, which are so well-known, it seemed appropriate to approach them a little differently.

How fortunate we all are to have such wonderful songs to play and sing.



Track List:
01 - Go Go Round (00:02:18)
02 - Looking at the Rain (00:03:24)
03 - Early Morning Rain (00:03:33)
04 - The Watchman’s Gone (00:03:10)
05 - If You Could Read My Mind (00:03:27)
06 - Ten Degrees and Getting Colder (00:02:38)
07 - The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald (00:04:45)
08 - Mountains and Marian (00:03:18)
09 - Sundown (00:03:56)
10 - Crossroads (00:03:21)
11 - Steel Rail Blues (00:02:42)
12 - Canadian Railroad Trilogy (00:06:49)
13 - Bells of the Evening (00:03:21)
14 - Christian Island (00:03:06)

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