Mitchell was ‘blindsided’ by honour
Music icon can’t believe he’s got spot in Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame
Kim Mitchell is still wondering what he did to get inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame.
The 69-year-old beloved singer, songwriter, ace guitarist, cofounder of eccentric rock band Max Webster and ex-Q107 radio personality says when he first heard news of the induction — set to occur live on Global Television’s “The Morning Show” last week — he thought it was a mistake.
“You know, you see gold records and platinum records coming,” an incredulous Mitchell said on the phone. “You get a sense that you might win a Juno Award … but this just blindsided me.
“When they set this up, I said, ‘Are you sure? Do you have the right person?’ And when they said, ‘Yeah, and we’re not just inducting a couple of songs, we’re inducting your whole body of work.’ I’m like, ‘What?’
“So I started thinking of other people in there like Joni Mitchell and Leonard Cohen and Gordon Lightfoot — and then, Kim Mitchell? Really? I’m kind of the weird guy over in that part of the room. I always felt like that in the music business: ‘Ok, there’s that’s weird guy playing in that strange band Max Webster.’”
For the record, the Sarniaborn Mitchell has a long list of fan favourites both with his band Max Webster — “Hangover,” “The Party,” “Diamonds Diamonds,” “Paradise Skies,” “Oh, War” — and as a solo artist — “Go for Soda,” “Lager & Ale,” “Patio Lanterns,” “Easy to Tame,” “Rock N’ Roll Duty” and “I Am a Wild Party” — to more than qualify him for the honour.
Throw in 13 studio albums — five with Max Webster and eight of his own that cumulatively sold 1.5 million in Canada — three Juno Awards and being the sole recipient of a Platinum Ticket for drawing more than 100,000 concertgoers, awarded to him by Kingswood Theatre when it was a going concern, and the Kim Mitchell legacy is one of the most lauded and enduring in Canadian rock music.
Mitchell — who calls his westend Toronto home a neighbourhood of “kings, queens and strudel makers” — says his induction as a creator is meaningful.
“A lot of feelings have gone through me,” he says. “I think back decades and decades and, dare I say, 49 years ago: writing your first song.
“You keep your head down and you’re writing and writing and the only time you kind of look up is for inspiration. I always say for songwriters, ‘Keep your eyes open, keep your ears open, keep your heart open. It’s OK to get hurt, this is where your content is coming from.’
“Then you put your head back down and you’re writing tunes again and, once in a while, it’s ‘Wow, there’s gold records. There’s platinum records. The Songwriters Hall of Fame … really?’ It was pretty mind-blowing.”
While Mitchell is tickled pink that his entire catalogue of songs will be inducted, there is a touch of melancholy to mark the occasion: Mitchell’s prime songwriting partner Pye Dubois, the man who wrote the lyrics to the majority of his most well-known material, won’t be there to fete his colleague.
The two had a falling out years ago and to this day Mitchell says it’s a mystery to him why they’re estranged.
“I haven’t heard from Pye in decades,” he says. “I don’t really know what happened or didn’t happen; I just remember getting a note from a lawyer one day saying that he didn’t want any further contact and that was the last I heard from him. I’m not sure what it was that I did or I didn’t do.”
Mitchell said that even Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame officials tried reaching out to Dubois.
“They tried to get a hold of them and there was no reply, so for sure, I’m going to accept this on his behalf … unless he shows up at the last second. But yeah, I’m thankful.”
Mitchell said he admired Dubois’s lyrics because they were hard to pin down.
“What I loved about Pye’s work is … it wasn’t about stories … it was about imagery,” he explained. “He built pictures in your mind and images, and that’s what I loved about his stuff. That’s what I would convey to writers later on — I just want images of a scenario — to put a picture in someone’s mind.”
When the Mitchell-Dubois collaborations came to an abrupt end, the singing-andsongwriting guitarist moved on with others.
But he says he bodes no ill will toward Dubois.
“Whatever reasons Pye had, I hope he’s having a happy life,” said Mitchell. “I think that it’s a shame on one level that whatever was going on didn’t get worked out, because I thought there was a real cool chemistry there as writers.
“Thankfully, I’ve made my way with other writers and I’ve gotten material I’m extremely proud of with guys like Jim Chevalier, who I grew up with; Andy Curran, who was with Coney Hatch, and Craig Baxter, who did the last two records with me. I love the way he throws the English language around on paper.”
Late in 2020, Mitchell released “The Big Fantasize” — his first album in 13 years — on El Mocambo Records.
It was a project he never intended to make.
“I wasn’t going to jump back in the fire anymore,” he says. “These were songs that were remnants that I’d written along the way, more atmospheric stuff. There wasn’t an ‘I Am a Wild Party,’ it was more ‘vibe-y.’ I was touring and just enjoying playing live and thinking, ‘If I don’t make another record, it doesn’t really matter anymore; life is OK.”
“But I had a major heart attack about five years ago and (former Kim Mitchell Band keyboardist and now mega producer) Greg Wells, he stopped in at the house on his way back to L.A.
“We went for a nice walk and he asked me if I was writing. I gave him a USB and a few weeks later I heard from him saying, ‘I love this stuff let’s do an album.’ “So it was his fault,” he laughs. Reflecting on his songwriting career, Mitchell said there was no “secret sauce” in terms of churning out hits.
“We just set out to throw around the 12 notes,” says Mitchell. “That’s all we do and that’s all I’ve been doing; throwing them around on paper and throwing them around on a guitar.
“I think quantity is more important than quality. You need to do a lot of it, keep at it and keep being confident about it.
“This honour is just really, really nice for me, especially in a COVID year where you’re kind of losing your mind a little bit … and then this comes along.”