When rock 'n' roll legend Randy Bachman comes to Prince George this week, he will bring another even larger music figure with him, at least in spirit.
Bachman is excited to show the world a brand new album he's been working on for years, in a recoding sense, and decades in an incorporeal sense. By George By Bachman is a tribute album to immense guitar personage George Harrison, one of The Beatles and one of the Traveling Wilburys but also inducted in to the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame for his solo work. He was always overshadowed in popular culture by fronting Beatles John Lennon and Paul McCartney, but Harrison's influence on the band was definitive, he was ranked by Rolling Stone Magazine as No. 11 on their list of 100 greatest guitar players of all time.
Harrison wrote comparatively few songs for The Beatles compared to the Lennon-McCartney torrent, but those he did compose include Taxman, Something, Here Comes The Sun, While My Guitar Gently Weeps, and other seminal songs of the 1960s.
All the songs on Bachman's new album are remakes of those Harrison hits, but revamped and reimagined for modern times. He also penned his own called Between Two Mountains which Bachman believes to be "one of the best songs I've ever written" because it was a concentrated ode to the great guitar muse. He even calls it co-written by Harrison because it came to him "in the middle of the night" while he felt an overwhelming sensation of "the spirit of George Harrison in the room."
Unlike most mere music mortals, the ones who listen to it on radios and stereos, as opposed to the ones who conjure it and compose it, Bachman has actually had Harrison's ear. He and Harrison conversed once about working together.
"I called him once. It was really weird," Bachman recounted to The Citizen. "I left The Guess Who in 1970 and I didn't know what to do. I'd been playing in a band, then, for 11 years so every night at 8 or 9 o'clock your body starts kicking in with its adrenaline and you get this musical itch to go and play. I was walking around the house and going down to the basement with headphones on and playing for three hours a night. My wife said 'you'd better start another band.' And I got a call from Ritchie York who was the publicist for The Guess Who at the time; he was also the publicist for The Beatles. He told me 'I know you're in between bands and haven't got anything going yet.'"
The Beatles had also called it quits that year. York gave Bachman the phone number for Harrison who was also contemplating the formation of his own next band.
The ex-Beatle was living at his Friar Park estate in London at the time. Bachman timed the call so the time zones would work for both of them, but he was scared of the long distance phone bill he was about to invite upon his broke budget.
"A beautiful voice answered the phone who I imagined was Patty Boyd (Harrison was married to the supermodel from 1966-77), I say 'I'm blah-blah-blah from Winnipeg, Manitoba, and the first thing she says is 'is this where Winnie The Pooh is from?' Yes, he is, there's a display at the Assiniboine Park Zoo. She says 'well, he's out in the garden, hold on,' and she set down the phone and as I'm waiting I'm counting the minutes. The garden to them is the outdoors, the yard, and his yard is 30 acres, you know, and he's somewhere out there. What is this gonna cost me?"
Finally, Harrison comes to the phone and Bachman said it was worth the wait the second he introduced himself with that signature voice.
"I tell him who I am and the first thing he says to me is 'you're calling from Winnipeg? Is that where Winnie The Pooh is from?'"
They talked awhile about music. Harrison told Bachman he'd caught The Guess Who segment on the British TV show Top Of The Pops so he was aware of his work.
Harrison also knew that Bachman was a confirmed non-user of drugs and alcohol. That's what cost the Canadian the job. Harrison explained that he was living what we now know to be the rock 'n' roll lifestyle of that era, freely using mind-bending substances. Harrison wasn't inclined to have a "straight arrow" in his mix. The call ended with a mutual exchange of sincere best wishes as they each pursued their future projects.
"That was my one moment with George Harrison, but a pleasant one," he said.
It's just the sort of anecdote that would fit into one of Bachman's episodes of Randy's Vinyl Tap. The weekly CBC Radio show is him telling stories as only a longtime music star can, the behind-the-scenes knowledge that can only be uttered by those who have been there and done that.
Bachman got the show when his fellow Winnipeger Danny Finkleman announced he was retiring from spinning his Finkleman's 45s (the title of the show) each Saturday night. Bachman discussed the retirement with some CBC people who essentially realized they were talking to a great replacement host who hadn't realized it himself, yet. After a highly successful 10-show test, he was asked to 35 shows per year. No one was more surprised than Bachman himself.
"Are you kidding me? A real J-O-B? My father would be so proud," said Bachman, describing his reaction to the CBC offer. Bachman's father, by the way, used to needle the young aspiring guitarist by saying helpful motivational things like "you can't work at nothing all day," which has become one of the most famous lyric lines in Canadian rock history when Bachman's next band after The Guess Who - a unit called Bachman Turner Overdrive or BTO - had a major hit with Takin' Care of Business (and many others).
So now, Bachman is a respected senior statesman of Canadian music. He takes the position seriously. His main advice is, don't be afraid to approach other musicians of any stature for mentorship because whether you've sold a million records or none, the playing of the instrument makes you equals.
Also, focus on the instrument. Players of music have a skill few others do, that's a gift, so don't disrespect it with personal distractions like booze and drugs. Focus, practice, and share.
One of those up-and-comers who struck a particularly impressive impression with Bachman is this region's folk-blues queen Rachelle Van Zanten of Francois Lake. Like he did with George Harrison, he put in a recent call to Van Zanten pitching her the idea of joining one of his new bands. He will be renewing his offer in person this weekend, he hopes.
"She said she's out there on the ranch raising her kids, so I invited her to the show and I hope she makes it there," he said.
The show is the Cariboo Rocks The North festival going on at Exhibition Park Friday through Sunday. Bachman is one of the headliners along with acts like Kim Mitchell, Prism, Little River Band, 54-40, Honeymoon Suite, and many more.
