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Blue Rodeo to kick off cross-Canada tour in Thunder Bay

For the second time, Blue Rodeo will start a cross-Canada tour in Thunder Bay on Jan. 11.
Blue Rodeo
Canadian rockers, Blue Rodeo, are set to kick off their cross-Canada tour in Thunder Bay on Jan. 11 in support of their newest album, 1,000 Arms.

THUNDER BAY - The legendary Canadian rock band, Blue Rodeo, are getting set for another cross country tour, and for the second time, they will be setting the stage for the rest of the country in Thunder Bay.

“It worked out really well last time,” said Blue Rodeo vocalist and guitarist, Jim Cuddy, in an interview with the Thunder Bay Source. “It’s a very comfortable and friendly place to start.”

Blue Rodeo will be kicking off their 50-date Canadian tour at the Thunder Bay Community Auditorium on Jan. 11. The latest winter tour is in support of their 14th studio album, 1,000 Arms.

With Thunder Bay audiences always being so friendly and accommodating, Cuddy said it’s a great place to start, even if all the kinks of the newest tour haven’t been worked out yet.

“There is added pressure, but we don’t really realize it for a couple shows in,” Cuddy said. “We think we’re ready but then we wonder what just happened. At the first show, you are still at the idea stage. You have to have a place that will be friendly enough and accepting enough if you make a mistake in a song.”

“It’s fun to see the first show, because you are not going to see a well-oiled machine,” Cuddy added.

Blue Rodeo have been touring and making music for the last 30 years. In that time, they have won countless Juno Awards, been inducted in the Canadian Music Hall of Fame, received a star on  Canada’s Walk of Fame, and have been named to the Order of Canada.

Despite such longevity and performing for decades, Cuddy said every show is like walking out on stage for the first time.

“We still get the nervous energy,” he said. “It’s an enjoyable thing to do. We do love playing music. We love having a new record to work into the night. We always feel like we’re a slightly new band every two years when we do this.”

Blue Rodeo’s latest release, 1,000 Arms, is a bit of a throwback to the band’s earlier work. Tim Vesely of the Rheostatic’s co-produced and engineered the album and Cuddy said working with Vesely, who helped him on a Christmas album, provided a very calming presence in the studio.

“He’s a really good musician and he really understands music,” Cuddy said. “He was just a great collaborator and he seemed like the perfect guy to do the record. We are a fussy bunch.”

Vesely listened to Blue Rodeo’s earlier works and suggested Cuddy and Greg Keelor should sing together like they used to do, something that caught Cuddy and the rest of the band by surprise.

“We didn’t initially understand,” Cuddy said. “We didn’t used to stack vocals, we would just sing, the two of us.”

In 1,000 Arms, Cuddy and Keelor are once again singing together instead of stacking vocals in the studio. Cuddy said going back to their roots really suits the new album.

“It felt familiar and yet it felt fresh,” he said. “I think it really gave a good character to the record. When it’s just the two of us singing, it’s more about energy. The call and response has more energy to it and so does the duet. And these are more energetic songs.”

Cuddy added that fans familiar with their entire musical catalogue will definitely recognize the character of their first couple of records in 1,000 Arms, which is something the band didn’t even realize was missing from more recent work.

“It didn’t occur to us that we left that behind until we started to examine it,” Cuddy said. “We just felt like we always sang together, we just sang together in a very different way.”

Musically, 1,000 Arms feels upbeat and energetic, though lyrically it deals with some heavy subject matter, but according to Cuddy, the band never set out to work on this new album with that in mind.

“We don’t notice that,” he said. “I never consciously set out to write up lyrics or down lyrics, I just write what’s on my mind and try to write the appropriate music.  It’s not just sped up sorrow. There’s some anger in the songs, there’s some pushback in the songs, there’s some sarcasm in the songs and I think that goes with the energy of the songs.”

The 1,000 Arms Tour kicks off in Thunder Bay on Wednesday, Jan. 11 at 8 p.m. at the Thunder Bay Community Auditorium. Cuddy said fans can expect to hear an eclectic mix of old and new songs. And even if it isn’t quite a well-oiled machine the first night out, you know the band is working just as hard and playing with just as much passion at the start of the tour, as they will be at the end. 

“We work hard to put out good material,” Cuddy said. “We really do. We take our obligation very seriously to be good musicians, to play all our shows at the highest level, and put out the best records we can.”



Doug Diaczuk

About the Author: Doug Diaczuk

Doug Diaczuk is a reporter and award-winning author from Thunder Bay. He has a master’s degree in English from Lakehead University
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