Yes, Canada does have a professional football league, and this is Canada's Superbowl of sorts). For the benefit of those living outside Canada, that's the Canadian Football League's championship game. This year marked the 100th Grey Cup and it was played in Toronto.
But I digress. This story isn't about football. It's about a Canadian legend.
So anyway, when Gordon Lightfoot performed as part of the game's entertainment, some of the younger fans wondered who this Gordon Lightfoot guy was. Tweets went out from the game - but not about what the Biebs was singing, who was also part of the entertainment. Admittedly, Justin Bieber is a Canadian icon of sorts, but not the kind of superstar that the venerable Gordon Lightfoot represents.
Gordon has been part of the Canadian landscape for decades, and still performs regularly, including his annual concerts at Toronto's Massey Hall.
Sure, he may have aged a few years (a few of us may have too), but you know what? This man can sing, and he hasn't lost his status - or his voice!
Indeed Gordon is (not was) an icon - he's a legend - and holds that place in Canadian musical history at the very least.
But the thing is, they don't teach Lightfoot in our schools. They should though. Maybe Lightfoot101 and beyond for those who wish to specialize? A lot can be learned from listening to what Gordon Lightfoot has to tell us in his music. Yeah but in all honesty, I knew little about my parents' music and absolutely nothing about the favourites of those who were a generation beyond.
Still, all this uproar concerning the music of this extraordinary singer-songwriter got me to thinking about him some more. Actually, Lightfoot deserves the title of icon, as long as you add the word active in front of the title. That title, just by the way, is one that I think is overly used, but for Gordon? Of course it is a good one.
1967 - Black Day in July by Gordon Lightfoot
I first heard Gordon Lightfoot shortly after the 1967 racially motivated riots which crippled the city of Detroit in the summer of 1967. At the time, I was a kid growing up in the suburbs of the city, out of harm's way, but near enough to take very close notice.For me, a kid who knew nothing of the problems which lead to the rage that spilled over in the Motor City, Gordon Lightfoot, a Canadian, drew the picture which gave me my best grasp of the situation in his track called Black Day In July. To my way of thinking, every word has a place in our collective social consciousness.
Black Day in July
1967 - Does Your Mother Know
When I bought the album, Did She Mention My Name, which featured Black Day in July, I learned that Lightfoot also wrote and sang of situations that lived on a more personal level. The song Does Your Mother Know is about someone who is young, perhaps too young to have left home to be on her own. As a guy, I could relate to the words as well. Like the subject of the song, I had left home recently, probably too young to have done so.Does Your Mother Know
The Singles, Hits and More
Lightfoot has enjoyed hit singles as well, big hits, not just rarities that we no longer hear. The list includes If You Could Read My Mind, Sundown, Carefree Highway, Rainy Day People and The Wreck of the Edmond Fitzgerald. In Canada, the country that I call home these days, the list is quite a bit longer. These songs are all well worth checking out. But my purpose here is to offer some insight into Gordon's career that may well be unfamiliar to those living in the United States and other countries outside Canada.1974 - Circle of Steel
Finally though, while mulling over the question of what to feature in my admittedly brief glimpse of someone whose career has spanned nearly 5 decades, I wondered if I could include anything that Lightfoot had written or recorded that might be considered seasonal. I did come up with one that I hadn't heard until listening to an anthology called Gord's Gold. It originally was released on his Sundown album in 1974, and it is not a typical Christmas song, in that it deals with they type of person who tends to be virtually forgotten during the holidays.1974 - Circle of Steel
What you've read here amounts to nothing more than a few words leading up to a couple of Lightfoot songs that have touched me in one way or the other. There are many more of those to be sure. But perhaps the ones that I've shared will serve to encourage you to look around and see what else you can learn and what else you can listen to from the huge collection of music given to us by a true Canadian legend, Gordon Lightfoot.
Till next time, that's another Classic Track LookBack at rock history. Speaking of rock history, you can follow me at @MaindogSound and find all of my #rockhistory tweets in all of their Storified glory by visiting last week's tweets today and heir rockin' music links right here.
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