Alan Doyle kicks off CelticFest
Great Big Sea frontman brings solo tour to Vancouver celebration
CelticFest, alan Doyle
When: 8 p.m.
Where: The Vogue
Tickets and info: $35, northerntickets.com, celticfestvancouver.com
From the opening phone greeting of “How’s you and your crowd?” it’s clear you are talking to a Newfoundlander.
And in this case, the Newfoundlander in question is one of that area’s favourite b’ys — musician, actor and author Alan Doyle.
Doyle is best known for his two decades as one of the lead singers of the much-beloved rock/folk outfit Great Big Sea.
Right now though, Doyle is a solo act who has been busy touring in support of his second solo album So Let’s Go, that dropped in January.
He’s also just coming off a book tour for Where I Belong, a memoir about growing up in Newfoundland and Labrador and particularly the tiny fishing village of Petty Harbour.
Doyle lands here in Vancouver to kick off the 11th annual CelticFest Friday at the Vogue Theatre.
“There seems to be interest in my little journey away from the mother ship,” said Doyle about life away from Great Big Sea, which he says is on hiatus (The other lead singer, Sean McCann, left the band at the end of 2013).
Doyle says fans ask him often about the state of GBS and he’s happy to talk about the band that brought him and his mates to the attention of a much wider world.
“Ideally, we will be back together in the not-so-distant future,” added Doyle, as he chatted over the telephone from the back of a tour bus parked on a Montreal street.
“It was easily the biggest blessing in my life and I am grateful for it.”
But right now GBS is adrift and Doyle is busy sailing his own ship around the country.
“It’s a wonderful adventure. It’s wonderful to try and re-imagine it all,” said Doyle, who has had a wee bit of an acting career (most notably Robin Hood and Winter’s Tale) on the side, thanks to his pal Russell Crowe, whom Doyle has made music with as well.
“You spend your life in a band and after a short while or a long while you know how you fit in it. And as soon as you fit somewhere you don’t want to change the shape of it. If you change the shape, then it doesn’t fit anymore. But when you go do a solo record you can be any shape, because you don’t have to fit anything.
“So you go make the record, then fit things in around that. So it was incredibly liberating to do stuff with no endgame in mind. It was great fun to do. You can make it be whatever it wants to be.”
While the writing and recording of the new record was a good time, Doyle freely admits heading out without GBS and the machinery and mileage of that band was an experience that took some getting used to.
“There’s terror and energy,” said Doyle.
“Of course you are going out on the stage and you don’t have the two decades of catalogue necessarily all the time. We are doing a bunch of songs from Great Big Sea, but still you don’t have that same army. It’s a little bit more of a walk in the woods by yourself.”
But luckily for Doyle the GBS fans are a loyal bunch, especially the ones who hail from GBS’s stomping grounds.
“I have always, and so has Great Big Sea, benefited greatly from the diaspora of Newfoundlanders and Labradorers around the country, and even internationally,” said Doyle.
“It just thrills me that you can be a drawing card for your people in some other faraway place.”
And when you come from Petty Harbour, everywhere is a faraway place, so a little familiarity serves a fellow well.
To hear Doyle talk about his memoir and life growing up in Petty Harbour check out The DGP with Dana Gee podcast at blogs.theprovince.com/tag/podcasts