A Remembrance of Gordon Lightfoot

 
 

Listener Chatter: Gordon Lightfoot

Greetings, Gabfest listeners.

Today [May 3, 2023], I'd like to follow up on John's chatter from last week, where he delved into the realm of the wizards who live among us – musicians. Sadly, Monday [May 1, 2023] saw the loss of one of those great Warlocks. For those of you listening [reading] right now and who have never heard of Gordon Lightfoot, go ask your dad. And if he doesn’t know, seek out that one Canadian friend you have and ask their dad. They will surely know and they’ll be ready to tell.

Through his career, Gordon released over 20 albums beginning with the self-titled ‘Lightfoot’ in 1966. His lyrics often carried a mythical quality, encapsulating love, loss, and the beauty of the world. Still, when I hear his lyrics, I am transported back to another era, another place in my life.

If you could read my mind love what a tale my thoughts could tell

Just like an old time movie bout a ghost from a wishing well

My dad often proclaimed Lightfoot as one of his favorite artists, second only to the Moody Blues – wizards in their own right. Among my earliest memories of music is watching the shimmering spin of our copper-toned LP player as Gordon's words danced round and round in my head. There was never one thing that drew my Dad to Gordon. Gordon grew up in Ontario with parents of Scottish descent. My Dad also has classic Scots-Irish American roots, tracing one ancestor all the way back to the Fortune, the 2nd English ship to arrive after the Mayflower. Maybe there’s a through-line there.

Long before the white man, and long before the wheel

grew a green dark forest, to silent to be real

It's been over a decade since my dad passed away from cancer, but Gordon's music is still with me.

How I wish your heart could see.

How mine just aches and breaks all day.

Come on home and take away

This ribbon of darkness over me

A few years ago, shortly before being diagnosed with a cancer of my own, I took a road trip with my mom from her snowbird home in Tucson back to our home in Chicago. We began the journey by driving along the same stretch of highway between Phoenix and Flagstaff that inspired Gordon's 1974 chart-topping hit, "Carefree Highway."

I guess it must be wanderlust or trying to get free

From the good old faithful feeling we once knew

Carefree highway

Let me slip away

Slip away on you

Gordon continued to tour until the end of his life. About 5 years back, I saw him perform live for the first time in a small town 50 miles north of Chicago, Waukegan IL. A classic Lightfoot tour stop if there ever was one. The town, swept away by the industrious great lakes shipping trade of decades passed, still managed to turn out over 500 audience members. Though his voice had slowed to a shadow of his heyday, only able to belt out a small handful of the classics, his jovial traveling showman heart shined through his physical age. Halfway through the set, he turned to the audience and proclaimed, ‘I just can’t help but smile every time I come here, hell it's in the name Wagukeeeeeeeegan, holding a grin on the long ‘E’. 

He was just a road musician, to the taverns he would go

Singin’ songs about the ramblin’, the lovin’ girls and gamblin

How the world fell on his shoulders

Back in Boulder I don’t know

I’m almost past the cancer now, through early detection, advances in medicine and a bit of luck I left behind only a single testicle. As my now sixteen month old daughter begins to discover the music in her life, I am curious, will she find the same affinity for this smiling warlock as I gained from my Dad. With the ever present rise of AI, pulling and twisting words from the deep insides of the web, one has to ponder, will a day come where there are no original lyrics left? I believe there’s a Union currently fighting over that very question.

For they looked in the future and what did they see?

They saw an iron road runnin' from the sea to the sea

Bringin' the goods to a young growin' land

All up from the seaboards and into their hands

In the early days of Chat GPT, an old work buddy sent me the response to the following prompt: "Write a shorter version of Gordon Lightfoot's eight-minute song, 'The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.'" The result was a near alien-like creation, maintaining the great warlock's rhythm, but leaving a sense of wonder to be desired, as the rhymes felt a little out of place, definitely comical.

All 29 souls on board were lost
Their memory and story we must accost.

That last one was twisted from the robots

I encourage all of you to enter this new creative world as Gordon probably would. With an appreciation for the beautiful, a long ‘E’ smile, and an openness to whatever comes next.

Whether remembered or reimagined, Gordon, your legend will truly live on.

 

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