"Sober punk replaces past excess"
The September 19, 1995 Globe & Mail features an article on Jr. by Chris Dafoe, based on an interview that took place a few months ago. When the last tour was cancelled as a result of Dove's broken wrist, the article was postponed. The day that Jr. played Barrymore's in Ottawa (September 14), a Globe & Mail photographer shot three rolls of film of band photos. Check your local library to see the final result (one photo) of the marathon photo shoot and the full text of the article. You can also get the full article, text only, from the Globe and Mail's InfoGlobe online service. The article is copyrighted by the Globe and Mail, so only excerpts are provided here for now.
SUCCESS in rock and roll can be measured in many ways. For the Rolling Stones, it's grossing $70-million on a world tour. For most Canadian bands, it's landing a hit south of the border. For Mike MacDonald of Jr. Gone Wild, however, success lies in the smaller, simpler pleasures and perks. Perks such as free coffee at Rose Bowl Pizza, the Edmonton restaurant that serves as Jr.'s unofficial home base. Or being able to keep up payments on his guitar and support himself with his music. Or not having to subsist on a diet of Kraft Dinner anymore.After 12 years with Edmonton's longest-running punk band and after two years of sobriety following a decade of excess, MacDonald isn't exactly what the record industry would describe as a success story. And after five albums he hasn't landed a mainstream hit, though the band is a perennial college radio favourite. Holding court in the back of the Rose Bowl with long-time Jr. bassist Dave Baker (better known as Dove) and Wes Borg of comedy group Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie (the Trolls and Jr. Gone Wild have collaborated on several shows), MacDonald looks as much like an aging mall rat as a rock star. He's skinny and pale, and his long black hair hangs limply to his shoulders.
But as he recalls the long and colourful history of Jr. Gone Wild, you can hear the pride in his voice, if only for the fact that he's made it this far and that he's still at it. Last spring, Jr. released its fifth album, Simple Little Wish, long after most of the rest of Edmonton's punk class of 1979 had gone straight, gone east or gone crazy.
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"There were about 50 people putting on hall gigs," he said of the city's early punk scene, which also produced such talents as Moe Berg (of the Pursuit of Happiness) and, tangentially, k. d. lang.
"The city did its best to quash any development. Cops would shut down our gigs, and any of us guys who were stupid enough to walk down Jasper Avenue in spiky hair got harassed or beat up."
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"I'm sure if we moved to Toronto we'd be farther up the ladder, but we wouldn't be Jr. Gone Wild," he said. "We're products of our environment. It wouldn't be the same people in the band and we wouldn't sound the same. And I'd probably be addicted to heroin by now. I'm not kidding."
As it was, MacDonald just drank - a lot. Two years ago he stopped - a transition that inspired The Guy Who Came in from the Cold, the lead track of the new album, the band's third for Edmonton's Stony Plain Records. The song swings between confessions of past excess and a celebration of redemption, and may be one of the most quietly poignant and honest things MacDonald has ever written.
"I don't want to limit it to drinking," he said of the song. "It's more about a turning point in anyone's life. When you go through a great change there's always some kind of transition between when the change happens and when you get used to it.
"The song is about that transition, about looking back over the line to where you were and where you've got to go. I'm 31, and even if I wasn't an alcoholic, it's time for me to start applying what I've learned. It's time to accept the aging process."
MacDonald admits that some people aren't too comfortable with the idea of punk rockers growing up.
"I don't want to tell you a sob story, but it's hard to be in a band called Jr. Gone Wild and be 31 years old and a recovering alcoholic and all that stuff.
"There's a few people out there - and I feel sorry for them - that are let down by this change. They need the stupid, obnoxious, drunk Jr. Gone Wild. They want the tragic-figure starving-artist guy. Well, that was great when I was in my twenties, but looking back I'm embarrassed by 50 per cent of the stuff I've said and done, and I don't remember the other 50 per cent."
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[I]t seems unlikely that the band, which once entitled a record Too Dumb To Quit, is going to hang it up any time soon.
"When the time comes, we'll know," MacDonald said. "I just want to present a nice happy ending - nobody dying of a heroin overdose or anything. I just hope we keep going until we get a good death."
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