Jim Conrad: Welcome to Conovision, the spirit of storytelling.
I am Jim Conrad, AKA Cono, and on this episode, we are going to get deep into
the broadcasting careers of two very good friends, Terry DiMonte and Jake Edwards.
That's coming up in just a bit, but right now I think it's time for some Word Jazz.
Have you ever heard word jazz?
Invented by a voice actor from Chicago, whose name is Ken Nordine.
Burgundy.
He started his broadcast career in radio in Chicago and then gained quite
a lot of fame for a series of albums he recorded called Word Jazz and as well
an album called Colors, which evolved from a series of advertising spots for a
paint company, all about various colors that you could buy at the paint store.
And the commercials became so popular, they began getting requests
for them at the radio station.
So from the album Colors, this is the story of beige.
Impossible to understand beige unless you stare at him hard.
Stare him right in his wise.
Unless you see beige in the serious beige-ness of being its beige
self, more than anything, beige is careful, insanely so really.
Almost as careful as that shade of yellow that's afraid.
But beige is much stealthier than yellow.
Wants the entire everything to be as safe as yesterday is
now that right now is here.
You know how flamboyant red can be?
Wouldn't last a minute with beige, probably wouldn't
get past beige secretary.
Maybe you've seen her?
Miss Always Light Tan.
Beige even thinks that orange is a little too out there, the way it streaks,
sunrise and set and just the mention of green causes beige to see purple,
which drives them into an absolute rage.
But of course it's only a beige rage.
Not much strength to it.
To be honest, as lily white, the truth is that beige is actually anti color unless
the color is off white, you know, rhymes with alt right, unless the color is beige.
About as average as you can get away with seeing is the gray way,
beige likes to have things being.
Welcome to the Conovision Podcast, the spirit of storytelling,
storytellers ,and stories.
So first, a word about stories.
A story doesn't breathe, but it does have life.
Stories are the vehicle that move metaphor and image into experience,
stories, communicate what is generally ineffable and ultimately inexpressible.
Jake Edwards: Are you high right now?
Seriously?
Jim Conrad: Throwing color into the shadows, and ultimately of all the
devices available to us, stories are the surest way of touching the
human spirit through the human voice.
Jake Edwards: Where's the bowl full of gummies?
I mean, there must be some little side things you're on here.
What is going on here?
Jim Conrad: Uh, the two human voices I have with me today.
Jake Edwards: Was that a demo tape for you?
Jim Conrad: That was a demo.
That was just okay.
Jake Edwards: Good.
Well done.
Jim Conrad: I have two legendary broadcasters, brother Jake
Edwards and Terry DiMonte.
Now, uh, Terry and, uh, Jake are good friends.
They've known each other for quite a while.
Uh, Terry, give me a little thumbnail sketch of, uh, where you were
born and where you were raised.
Terry DiMonte: I am, uh, Quebecer.
I was, uh, born in Montreal.
And, uh, raised in Montreal.
And, uh, my first job in radio was in Manitoba, not in Winnipeg where
I met Jake, but in Churchill, uh, up with the polar bears on Hudson's Bay.
And I moved to Winnipeg in the summer of 78 and met Jake shortly after that.
Jim Conrad: And Jake?
Born and raised in?
Jake Edwards: Moncton to New Brunswick.
Maritimer.
Spent 17, 18 years there and then took off to Boston and became a radio guy.
That's what I did.
Just studied radio and trucked through the country.
And then finally got to Winnipeg and met Terry.
And uh, Terry was telling me his last gig was in Churchill.
I couldn't believe it.
Like, are you kidding?
Like where the polar bears are?
He went, yes.
And he talks about Montreal.
It's really funny because when we were at CITI-FM, we were just starting to ramp up.
I mean 360,000 watts of pure rock and power.
Everything was going great.
And Terry said, well, you know, we been on here for a few months.
I'm gonna take a little trip home.
Well, you're going home going back to Montreal?
Yep.
Gonna go back to Montreal.
Then I met him about 12 days later, he looked like the mummy.
Tell him what happened.
Tell him this story.
You want to get a story?
This story right here.
Jim Conrad: Okay.
Here's our first story.
Jake Edwards: Well, he's wrapped up like a mummy.
There isn't any flesh left on him.
Just a two eyes sticking out.
What happened?
Terry DiMonte: When, when I moved to Winnipeg it was really
my first time away from home.
And when I was hired at CITI-FM in Winnipeg in the summer of 78, it was
literally just getting off the ground.
They didn't have an all night person.
I was, I was terrified.
My start was at the CBC.
And, you know, they were gonna turn me loose into this studio,
uh, to do the all night show.
And I was, you know, terrified of how I was gonna handle
it and how it was gonna go.
And every minute I thought I was gonna get fired.
And I remember Steve Young, uh, drawing a circle on a piece of paper, and he
drew a line at 12 and 6 and 9 and 3.
And he took the pencil and he said, stop here and stop here.
Do the weather here.
Don't forget to say 92 CITI-FM and do whatever the hell you want.
I felt so much pressure.
And then they, they said to me, you gotta go away on a holiday.
So I wanted to go back to Montreal because I miss my friends and family.
I was still only 19.
I went back to Montreal and went out with friends and, um, we began drinking.
Which is quite a surprise at that age.
And I, I was, uh,
Jim Conrad: Invincible.
Terry DiMonte: Oh yeah.
Bulletproof.
In the backseat of a car, uh, driving up a boulevard.
And, uh, there was a car full of girls that pulled up beside us at a red light.
And I thought the perfect way to impress them will be to put my
body out the window, sit on the door sill and wave across the
roof at the car next to us, right?
So I'm sitting on the door sill holding the roof with my hands, and
as the car began to move, I thought, I've seen Burt Reynolds do it.
And I reached across, I pushed off the backseat and reached across the
roof to try and strap myself across the roof while the car was driving.
Because I thought that would be impressive.
Jim Conrad: Very cool.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
Uh, my hands of course didn't reach.
And I grabbed and pushed, and as I pushed, I rolled off the back windshield,
bounced off the trunk, bounced off the boulevard, and rolled into a ditch.
And, um, as the doctor was,
Jim Conrad: That's not funny, but that's funny.
Terry DiMonte: It's, but it is.
It's, it's so incredibly stupid it's funny.
And when the, when the, uh, guys backed up the car to pick me up, I was, of course, I
don't know, and whatever the, you know, I don't know if I was concussed or whatever,
but I was trying to mop up the blood with crumpled up newspaper in the ditch.
And they took me right to the hospital.
And as the doctor was sewing my head up, I still have the gash in my head.
The, the doctor was sewing me up, he said, you're lucky you were drunk.
And I thought to myself, I remember thinking to myself, well, if I wasn't
drunk, I wouldn't have been doing that.
Jim Conrad: This wouldn't have happened in the first place.
Terry DiMonte: But, but he, he did say to me because I was drunk when
I hit the road, I was loose because he said, otherwise you'd be dead.
Jake Edwards: You know, there's an intellectual
property if you think about it.
Because he created the first Jackass.
Right.
If, you know, if you would've had another bunch of buddies going on board.
I mean it's not,
Jim Conrad: If you had video rolling of that it would be priceless.
Terry DiMonte: It's not a great radio story, but I, I, I, I was so, you know,
I was so excited to have a gig and I was so afraid to miss the gig that they
bandaged me up pretty, you know, I had a, a bandage wrapped around my head and my
arm was all bandaged up and in a sling, and my face was all puffy and swollen
and I thought, I have to go to work.
I gotta go to work.
Jim Conrad: Yeah.
Can't missed a gig.
Terry DiMonte: Jake saw me and he was,
Jake Edwards: I lost it.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
He's like, what the fuck?
Jake Edwards: This is the new guy going to afternoon soon.
I'm the morning guy.
Yeah.
So this radio station is going to be,
Terry DiMonte: Yeah, we're in trouble.
Jake Edwards: Unbelievable.
92 CITI-FM.
360,000 watts of power.
Alright, let's come in for the photos.
Here's the head shots.
Look, it's John Merrick, the elephant
man.
Terry DiMonte: In terms, in terms of radio stories though, Jim, it's a good, it's
really a good, uh, place to start because I think, and I'm gonna sound like a douche
bag because I worked there, but I think it was a real unique moment in, in radio.
I know the guys at CFox and Q107 and CHOM all have their own stories, but
CITI-FM changed formats without asking.
Which was a big deal back in those days.
They went from classical to rock, began hiring these people and the people
that ended up working in that place turned out to be, you know, again,
I'm gonna sound like an arsehole, but you know, giants of the business.
Gary Aube.
Magic Christian was his nickname.
Uh, Steve Young.
Steve Warden, Jake Edwards.
Snapper Bob.
Elton John: Randy.
Randy.
Terry DiMonte: Randy.
Yeah.
Randy Renauld, uh, Doc Steen worked there, which legendary broadcaster.
And there was this, you know, this happenstance of all of these young,
wild people that came together.
Jim Conrad: Alchemy.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
Uh, that's the perfect word for it.
And I remember we were stuck in the basement, uh, because the company at
the time that owned the radio station, Moffat, they thought, well, they
wanna turn it into a rock station.
So go, you guys go ahead and play in the basement.
We'll see what happens.
I don't think they expected it to be successful, Jake.
I really don't.
Jake Edwards: No.
And and none of them came down to check out what was going on down there.
Terry DiMonte: No, they didn't.
Jake Edwards: They, they were afraid to come down to the basement.
'Cause there was a lot of crap going on down there.
Jim Conrad: Okay.
What kind of crap as well.
Jake Edwards: Well, I mean, pick your poison.
I mean, seriously, there's an ashtray full of joints.
Terry DiMonte: I, I'll tell you, I'm sure Steve isn't with us anymore.
God rest his soul.
But I'm sure you won't mind.
Jim Conrad: Steve Young.
Terry DiMonte: Steve Young.
Yeah.
Uh, Steve was legendary radio mind, legendary music director.
And I, I had been working the all night show, and I, again, remember, I've only
been in radio for maybe eight months, and he, I would get off the air at 6.
I'd go across the street from Polo Park to McDonald's, have coffee, wait for him to
come in, and at 8 o'clock I would go in.
He was a music director, and I would go into his office and, you know, I'd
wanna learn, I wanted to know about music systems and how it worked and
what I could do and how could I help.
And, you know, at 11 or 12 o'clock he'd say, you gotta go home.
You gotta work tonight.
And he, he got comfortable with me.
And after about a couple of weeks, he came in and he put his coat on the
hook in his office, and he sat behind his desk and he opened the desk drawer
and he put a blowtorch on the desk.
Now remember, I've never, like I was, I was a real goody two shoes kid.
I never, I'd never taken a puff of anything.
I'd never seen anything.
And I thought, I'm just gonna keep my mouth shut.
Yeah.
I'm not sure if he's, you know, maybe he is gonna weld the desk.
I'm not sure what he is up to.
And then he pulled out a couple of knives and they clanked on the desk and
I thought, what the fuck is he doing?
And he looked at me and he said, I haven't had my morning
coffee, so would you like a hit?
And I still didn't know what he meant.
And he put a chunk of hash in between the two knives and he fired
up the blow torch and did the big,
Jim Conrad: Yep.
Terry DiMonte: And then we started to do music and I, and I thought to myself, what
kind of fucking business have I landed in?
But that's, that's the kind of, I tell that story and, and not to tell tales
at a school, but it gives you an idea.
It was Jake, I think you'd agree with this.
It was as close to WKRP as
Jake Edwards: Totally, totally, yeah.
We did, we did quite a few stupid promos like the Helium 500, remember that one?
Where we got the helium tanks in.
I came up with this idea and I thought, let's get these helium tanks
in, and every time we go on the air, we'd have to take a big gulp of air.
And talk about 360,000 watts of pure radial power.
Here's Rush.
And we just kill ourselves laughing, not thinking that ingesting and
inhaling this helium the whole day.
Everybody went around.
So anytime your voice broke back to normal, you could phone in
and they would win something.
So our thing is we wanted to try to go 500, whatever that was, uh, for a whole
day to see without, without breaking.
But, uh, that was hilarious.
And then when they started rolling the tanks in and then it became real
and we were on the air doing that.
Terry DiMonte: But it was, it was the kind of environment
where nothing was off the table.
You know, I listened to radio today and I kind of roll my eyes because back,
back then, everybody's ideas were cool.
There were no bad ideas.
And the crazier the idea, the better.
And Jake and Magic, the program director, and Steve, I think were,
were forever cooking up ways to make the place interesting and fascinating.
'Cause we, we were trying to get noticed, we were like an, an upstart
station that nobody listened to.
And slowly we began to build this audience and it, it turned into,
well it's still there today.
Jake Edwards: Well, and I gotta, you know, back in the day when I flew up to
look at this radio station, Gary Aube, I was on the air in Moncton and Gary Aube
just happened to be driving through New Brunswick looking for talent on the air.
So I happened to be on in the evening and he called up, he said, man, man.
It's Magic Christian.
He said, how are you doing?
I said, really great.
Who, who are you?
He said, I'm just coming from Winnipeg.
We're looking for talent down here.
He said, either you're a fucked up jock from Chicago, or you don't know how
really how good you could be on FM. And I went, well, I've never been to Chicago.
So anyway, I get on a plane, I get on this.
Jim Conrad: He flies you to Winnipeg?
Jake Edwards: Fly to Winnipeg.
And I remember it was my first time in an aircraft ever.
A plane.
27 years old however, I was.
So I'm on the plane and I'm sitting next to Chief Two Rivers.
The guy was, uh, it was like this famous chief from Winnipeg.
And, uh, a Native guy, Indigenous man.
And he said, where you going?
I said, I'm gonna be a I, I'm gonna look at a job in Winnipeg.
And he said, well, he said, uh, things are looking good.
I feel it.
And I went, oh, okay.
Really cool.
So I went, he said, uh, you're going to be good.
I have this feeling that you're gonna be good.
So then he goes to the back of the plane to smoke, whatever.
And I never saw him again.
Who thought?
Jim Conrad: So he was high.
Jake Edwards: He he was high.
Are you high right now?
So, you know, I get out of the, you know, never been to Winnipeg
coming from New Brunswick, which the weather is, you know, it's, it can
be kind of balmy and kind of nice.
And it was the coldest winter on record, 79.
It was so fricking cold.
And then back then you actually walked onto the tarmac.
Jim Conrad: Right.
You got off the plane.
Jake Edwards: And I had a bit of a, a cold going on.
And I remember hitting the minus 42 degrees, uh, that was, it was minus 42.
And as I'm walking down, both nostrils slammed shut.
It was frozen.
I went, where in the fuck am I?
And Magic was out in the, he had the 92 CITI-FM trick truck.
It was running.
And he had these huge sentry speakers in the back with Jimi Hendrix.
He had all this tape stuff going on.
'Cause he's that kind of guy.
He wants to impress you that you're walking into something
you're really gonna love.
But I just kept saying, I said, I
Jim Conrad: You just wanted to get out of the cold into the warm cab of the truck.
Jake Edwards: He had everything planned.
I just went, there's no way I can work here.
This is ridiculous.
So got in the truck, we drove down into the station and they called
the bottom basement Bonzolia.
Remember that, Bonzolia?
Terry DiMonte: That, that was Steve's Steve's nickname for it.
Jake Edwards: Yeah.
So that means that, you know, nobody comes through these doors.
And if you are knighted to come in and be part of the round table, it would be cool.
So once you got down there, I remember Chris McGregor was the midday guy.
Jim Conrad: Yeah.
So it was kinda like a club.
Jake Edwards: It was a club.
Jim Conrad: Club or, or a frat host.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
And the guys, the guys, Steve and Magic that ran it, infused it with
this kind of other worldly insanity.
Like I I, when I came from my interview from Churchill, I was working at the CBC.
So when I went for my interview and I look back on it now and
I think, what was I thinking?
I wore a tie.
And I sat in a chair at the desk and I, you know, was answering
these questions and, you know, your experience and blah, blah, blah.
And they said to me, you know, we listened to your tape and we never
heard a guy who couldn't shut up like that, who could talk for hours, and
we think you're talented and, but you need some work and blah, blah, blah.
And um, when he said, you know, it doesn't pay a lot, but, uh, when can you start?
And I was enthralled.
And as I was saying, well, I think, uh, Steve reached into the
drawer and opened the desk drawer.
And I didn't, I didn't move fast enough.
I didn't know what he was doing, but he leaned over the desk and he grabbed my tie
and he took scissors and he cut it off.
Jim Conrad: A tie cutter.
Ah.
Terry DiMonte: And he said, you won't be needing that fucking thing here.
Said, this is another world.
This ain't the CBC.
So they, they, they infused that place, you know, with the nicknames
and the craziness, and, and they wanted you to buy into the, the fact that,
I remember Gary used to say, Magic used to say, if it's in the hallway.
It's coming outta the speakers.
So we want, you know, we want this madness.
Jim Conrad: So he was encouraging personality radio.
Terry DiMonte: Yes.
Yeah.
Jim Conrad: And he, he was saying, who you are is what I want to hear on the radio.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
And a, he wanted a sense of fun and, you know, we were young and we were
partying and it was rock and roll.
And he wanted all of that in the hallway, in the studio, in the outer offices.
And I think you would agree with this because it was such a little shit
hole, you know, that that studio was tiny and kind of grungy and dirty.
And the office was very small.
Like it was, um, it, it was like a two bedroom apartment.
And it contained the music office, the jock lounge, the studio, and the, the,
the commercial studio we're all in this little tiny space and inside that tiny
space you had to buy into Bonzolia.
Which sounds crazy.
Jake Edwards: Bonzolia to me, I had no idea what the hell it was, but getting
back to Chris McGregor when I walked in there and he goes, he has a joint, he
goes, by the way, you don't come into Bonzolia unless you smoke this joint.
I'm like, well, I just got off a fucking plane.
I'm freezing, I'm frozen.
I'm not feeling well.
So anyway, I'm high as shit.
Then it's upstairs to upper management.
I'm the same, I'm the same, i've got the three piece suit on.
I walk in and, and they just looked at me.
Where the hell do you think you're going?
I don't know.
I'm high right now.
Terry DiMonte: Did you, did you wear a suit?
Jake Edwards: I had a suit.
Terry DiMonte: You had a suit on too.
I didn't know that.
Jake Edwards: Yeah, I had a full suit on and I thought, you know,
you're there, you're dressed to impress trying to make it.
Terry DiMonte: Of course, yeah.
Jake Edwards: You know, not, I'd already decided, in my
mind, I was not gonna work here.
Terry DiMonte: Oh, oh, you had, eh?
Jake Edwards: But when, as soon as I saw the weather, I said, this is ridiculous.
Jim Conrad: I can't, I cannot work in Winnipeg.
Jake Edwards: No.
And then, you know, you get into cars if anybody who's ever went lived in
Winnipeg, and the first thing you notice in the, in the shopping mall, there's
plugs going into cars off the front.
What, what are people plugging cars?
What, what is that all about?
Jim Conrad: Block heaters.
Jake Edwards: Block heaters.
Never saw a block heater in my fricking life.
Jim Conrad: No, no.
Jake Edwards: And uh, and then you get up and drive on square tires,
and then the tires start to warm up.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
And if you had a, I had a Volkswagen.
If you had a 4, you know, if you had a stick, you know, it was like, like, you
know, like you had to really push it, but I, I think you would agree with me.
I fell in love with that town.
I still love that.
Jake Edwards: Oh, I, I did too.
Terry DiMonte: I still love that town.
Jake Edwards: Anybody that ever shit talks Winnipeg, I just go, this is
where I cut my creative funny bone.
Jim Conrad: So earlier we were talking about, uh, content and, uh, performance
and audience and having the audience be as an important component as the content.
Would you say that the community of Winnipeg or the, or any community
that you were a broadcaster in, Montreal, Vancouver, Winnipeg, Calgary,
that community also informs your content and, and makes it better?
Jake Edwards: Well, sure.
I mean, you come up with creative ideas.
Like we had a thing called the beater contest, the Winnipeg Beater contest.
'Cause if you're in Winnipeg, you didn't drive your regular car?
You had to go out and buy a shit box to drive around.
So we had this Winnipeg beater contest.
They would bring in the best beaters and we would drive by new
parking lots with these old beaters.
It was, and at the end, we gave away the ultimate beater.
So the guy that won it, he had a bed, a, a steel bed on the top, as
they called it, the luggage rack.
And, and on the front he had a goose's neck that was from a real
goose that he popped riveted on.
And the things flapping all around as we're driving down the road and on the
back there's a real cow's tail that was severed somehow into the trunk thing.
And I just went,
Jim Conrad: One of the very first hybrid vehicle.
Jake Edwards: Yes.
So I thought, you know, we can't let this guy lose 'cause I think he will kill us.
Terry DiMonte: But you know, to your point, Jim, I, I think one of the things,
Jim Conrad: You're a better broadcaster because most of your broadcasting was
done in Montreal and you're a Montrealer.
And so because of that fact, the community, you knew the community.
The community knew you.
And it made you a better broadcaster.
Terry DiMonte: But you know what, yeah.
I, I, I don't disagree with that, but I learned that in Winnipeg.
Because I remember, again, it was Magic who said to me one day, he said, um,
probably a week after I got there, I was outside the office or outside his
office, and we were talking about, I was telling stories about Montreal, and he
said, Hey, TD, can I tell you something?
And I said, what?
He said, you're, you're not a Montrealer anymore.
He said, you're a Manitoban.
He said, you now live in Winnipeg and your job is to reflect
the city back to the city.
So he said, I want you to go out and get involved.
And I said, do doing what?
He said, do anything.
He said rake lawns, uh, get involved in minor sports, do
something, but learn the city.
When somebody says to you, the St. James Arena, you gotta know where that is.
When somebody says to you, the corner of dada and dada in West Kildonan,
you gotta know where that is.
Jake Edwards: You have to, you gotta know the right names too.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
You have to think like a Winnipeger and you, you're now a Manitoban and I
bought into that hook, line and sinker.
I ended up coaching minor hockey and I ended up, I ended
up really embracing the city.
And when I moved to Calgary, after being in, in, uh, Montreal for years
and years and years, I was out and about and I would drive to neighborhoods.
I would take pictures of schools and write their names down and then go
home and make notes about where those schools were, what communities they were.
So when somebody said to me, you know, Sir Winston Churchill School, I
knew that that was in that community.
You know, like I was trying to become a Calgarian.
I never really had time to become a Calgarian, but that's, I learned
that in Winnipeg, it was much easier in Montreal 'cause I was from there.
You know, I could, I, and I always believed that you, you know,
you paint pictures with words.
That's the way radio works.
So when you talk about, you know, when I say to Jake, Ray and Jerry's,
he knows exactly where that is.
And I know you can see the sign in the red booths in your head that's,
Jake Edwards: I can taste the steak sandwich.
Terry DiMonte: That's the way radio works.
So you have to become part of the community.
And I learned that in Winnipeg at CITI-FM.
Jake Edwards: Well, you know, him giving you that lesson didn't go
as well as the lesson he gave me.
I walked in, I was full of piss and vinegar thinking.
Jim Conrad: So this is Gary, Gary Aube.
Jake Edwards: Gary Aube.
Jim Conrad: And he's just tired you from.
Jake Edwards: Yeah, well, I, I've been on the air for about a year.
Jim Conrad: Oh, okay.
Jake Edwards: And I'm sitting there and I'm pretty, feeling
pretty good about myself.
You know, I'm doing commercials, I'm doing, you know, the pros and stuff.
He's feeling really good about myself.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
He's, he's being modest, which he often is not.
Jake Edwards: No.
Well, anyway, that's true.
You know me.
Terry DiMonte: And, and, but you set the town on fire in, in like a month and,
and people were begging you to do your commercials for them and stuff, and you
were a hit within a month or two, Jake.
Jake Edwards: Well, I, you know, and I kind of felt that that was happening.
And then I walked in the office and Gary said, have a seat.
And I went, oh, great.
Jim Conrad: Close the door behind you.
Jake Edwards: Close the door behind me.
Terry DiMonte: Getting a raise.
Jake Edwards: Yeah, I'm gonna get a raise right now.
So he said, uh, so how you feeling?
I said, I feel pretty good.
I think I'm coming along.
He said, what the fuck is wrong with your voice?
Jim Conrad: Oh, no.
And I went, what?
Because don't forget, I came back from a, you know, shotgun kind of, you know,
AM radio screaming like Wolfman Jack, all those, uh, high octane screaming,
hitting vocals on music and records.
That was my deal.
So when I came into FM, uh, I started introing FM records, which was never done.
It was never done.
They treated FM like you, you have this history about this
rock piece before you play it.
My idea of fun was basically,
Terry DiMonte: Fuck that.
Jim Conrad: Fuck that.
Jake Edwards: Fuck that, yeah.
How I felt about music and how, how, the kind of energy I used to put into
the song and the call letters and then it fired up and it started to work.
'Cause it'd never been heard before.
Nobody's ever done it.
And I got my training in Moncton when I was put on the airways.
I did an AM and FM show.
And then on FM I'd be playing ACDC and just ripping into these
intros, which had never been done.
So I was kind of ready, I had it in my mind, this is what I want to do.
So Gary says, what is, what is, what is going on there?
And I went, what?
And I remember I was so shocked.
And he brought me down to more of a leveling of the voice and a, and
a leveling of that shotgun kind of, jock to bring it down and to
tone the energy down a little bit.
'Cause I never had to look for energy.
It was always there.
And I remember getting in the car and driving home, and
I actually started crying.
I just went, how could he say that to me?
You know?
And I was just shocked.
And then he called me and said, are you okay?
And I said, well, I, I'm, I'm kind of hurt.
I'm really kind of hurt.
And then he said.
Uh, well, how do you, what, what do you think?
What are you gonna do?
And I said, well, I'm gonna give this a shot.
But he was absolutely right.
Terry DiMonte: I forgot about this.
You deserve credit for this because you changed the way FM radio was presented.
Because, um, if you know the song by Black Sabbath called Neon Knights, Neon Knights
has quite an, an, an impressive intro.
And it's pretty frenetic.
And, um, we, of course, Jake was hired.
We didn't know him.
We didn't know who he was, what he did, where he came from, and it,
it might've been your opening day.
But anyway, I was up to hear Jake and um, because I think I was still doing
the only, or maybe I was doing drive.
Anyway, it doesn't matter.
At 6 AM Neon Knights came on and away you went with the intro.
Jake Edwards: This is Brother Jake on 92 CITI-FM, the 360,000
watt power drip star cruiser.
Black Sabbath of Neon Knights.
Come get some.
Oh no.
Terry DiMonte: Jake did an intro over that, that really
belonged on WABC in New York.
Really.
It was that kind of intro, but when I look back on it, you actually
changed the way FM radio was presented because there was this whole, um, uh,
I, what's the word I'm looking for?
There was this reverence about the intro to, you know, uh,
Jim Conrad: You couldn't talk over that.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah, yeah.
You didn't talk over Roundabout because you don't want to talk over
the, you know, the beautiful guitar that, uh, Steve Howe was playing
or whoever, you know what I mean?
It was you and, and Jake was like, no, no.
That's all part of the energy.
But you know what I think he did when he did that to you?
He made you a better storyteller.
He made you a better communicator.
Jake Edwards: Yeah, he did.
Terry DiMonte: Right.
You stopped, you, it, it was
Jim Conrad: Stop talking at the audience.
Terry DiMonte: Well, it, it's, it became less about performative
and more about communicative.
I think.
Or am I full of shit?
Jake Edwards: No, you're not full of shit.
You're not full of shit.
You're one of my best friends.
And what we did back there during that whole thing, uh, when
it started was so incredible.
I remember I used to be the guy that would go out and try to get us stuff, right?
I always try to get us stuff and I said, Terry, what about that old Volkswagen?
What about, isn't it time that we go get a couple of high performance cars?
He went, ah, what, what are you talking about?
So anyway, I got a Corvette and he got a Camaro.
Terry DiMonte: Camaro Z/28.
Jake Edwards: We, we're on these two giant billboards and we're standing over
the hoods of the car, that said, let us drive you home or whatever the thing was.
I'll never forget that that was.
Terry DiMonte: And I, I'm 20.
Or whatever I was, and I would secretly, after my show, I would
go drive to the billboard and park.
I go, holy fuck, I'm on a billboard.
Look at that.
Jim Conrad: Uh, for both of you, when you were growing up in Montreal, growing
up in Moncton, what was the first spark that flipped the switch in your brain
that said, maybe, maybe I can do this, maybe I could become a broadcaster.
Jake Edwards: See, I, you know, when my dad bought me that little 6 transistor,
remember the little leather case?
It was a, had a red top with some gold through it?
It was a 6 transistor, RCA, so my sister and I both got one.
She was 11 and I was 12.
And I remember going to bed at night putting the earphone in
and you know, there's no video games, there's no internet.
That right there with the skip that came across in the evening.
You could pick up stations all the way down the eastern seaboard.
Uh, it, it was amazing the coverage you used to get and immediately when
I heard it I said, I can do this.
I want to do this.
I absolutely want to do this.
And I drove everybody insane.
So I got my father to go out and we got a reel to reel with the microphones.
And I started just going and interviewing and doing crazy voices and recording and
singing, playing radio, and gritting the guitar, uh, and strumming it along and
getting, you know, anybody that came into the room, I would try to interview them.
And then as I got closer and closer, you know, 15, 16, my dad takes me
to the CNR and he said, no, boy.
And he had a Maritime accent, you know?
Hey, bye.
You know, geez, uh, you're gonna be driving an overhead
crane just like your father.
I said, an overhead crane.
I said, there's no way I can pass the eye test because I'm actually
clinically blind in my left eye.
He said, you'll learn the goddamn eye chart.
I know the eye doctor in there.
We're gonna get you in.
I said, there's no fricking way I'm, I don't want to do this, dad.
So he went in and I'm doing the eye chart and the minute and the minute,
I, I thought, I could have pulled this off because I, all I had to do
was memorize the, you know, you'd have enough vision to actually go in
there and I purposely flunked that 'cause I didn't want to go in, and
then he was so disappointed for years.
He, and then when I got into radio, he said, this is, what are you doing?
Why are you doing this?
And then, you know, it just kind of, it just kind of rose up.
And I was ready to hit the airwaves and I just, I'm sounding
like a fricking narcissist now.
Which, you know, part narcissist.
I'm part narcissist.
Terry DiMonte: No, Jake.
Jake Edwards: Yeah, yeah.
Terry DiMonte: No, no, no, no, no.
Come on.
Jake Edwards: Are you sure?
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
No,
Jake Edwards: Look at me.
I look like one.
Terry DiMonte: You're, you're a confident man.
Jake Edwards: But I, you know, I kind of, this is what I wanted
to do and I never looked back.
There was never anything, I played a lot of sports at that point until I got
into radio and then everything stopped.
There was no more sports.
It was all about being on the radio, in the car with my friends, music coming on.
And all I did was intros in the car.
They, I drove them insane.
Jim Conrad: So you played radio until you finally got a gig in radio?
Jake Edwards: Pretty much.
Pretty much.
Jim Conrad: Now, Terry, how about you?
Terry DiMonte: Um, it, my, there's a couple of things.
I, I, when I was 5 or 6, my, my parents bought me a, um, you know, one of those
little plastic tonearm record players.
And they grabbed just, they grabbed a 45 out of the Woolworths
counter, and it happened to be She loves You by the Beatles.
I, I played that record.
My mom said, I played that record 77,000 times a day.
And I remember being a kid, uh, there was a, a girl that lived next door and,
uh, I played with her little brother.
And I remember when the Beatles came on, she would, come on the radio
and she would scream and run into the kitchen and turn up the radio.
And I remember being a kid thinking, that's interesting.
She's, the music coming outta that little box on the counter.
And, and then my grandfather had bought a reel to reel and
I started to play with that.
And I think it's, the way Jake describes the, it's, it's
kind of like you get a bug.
You know, like, it, it just, I was the same way.
It's all I thought about when I was 11, 12.
Jim Conrad: You become obsessed.
Terry DiMonte: I just became obsessed.
I did what Jake did with the earpiece.
And on a cold night, you could get radio stations from Minneapolis.
And I just became obsessed and I just, I couldn't get enough of it.
And I remember the first time I begged a guy that worked at what was called
CFOX in Montreal, before they bought the call letters, I begged and begged and
begged and begged and begged and begged.
A guy, a guy, guy's name was Andy K. And he said, I'm not
allowed to have people in here.
You can come up at midnight for 10 minutes and then you gotta go.
And I remember when he pushed the control room door open, it was, you know, it
was 12:05, he pushed the control room door open and anybody who works in radio
knows what a control room looks like in the dark with that digital yellow
clock with the seconds ticking off and the red and green lights on the board.
And I remember being like, it just, it washed over me.
I thought, this is where I belong.
I have got to figure out how to do this for a living.
Jim Conrad: And what was your first gig?
Terry DiMonte: My very first gig was through sheer luck, was in Churchill.
I, I went to remember the days of television when at the top of the
hour they would come on, an announcer would come on, you would know this,
CBC television Channel six Montreal.
And that's all you would do.
Jim Conrad: A station ID.
Terry DiMonte: Right.
You would sit in the booth for 8 hours and they were looking
for summer relief people.
And I applied.
I, I went and auditioned at the CBC and I didn't get it, but there was a
woman there that said, I, you know, you asked me to be honest with you.
Um, she said, I, I hear something about you that I like and I'm gonna
send your audition tape to Ottawa to a, a division called Northern Service.
I didn't know what that was.
And they called me and off I went.
Jim Conrad: And off you were to the land of polar bears.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
I was just, I, I didn't even know I, I said yes.
I didn't even know where Churchill was.
Like I had to go home.
You know, I, 'cause I was unfamiliar with it.
I thought it, I thought, am I going to Churchill Falls?
No, that's, that's the other end of the country.
Anyway, it just, you know, and off I went.
I just, and, and I got lucky because at CBC in the north, you're doing everything.
You're cutting tape, producing, editing, interviewing, doing sports, doing news
like, you know, the, the population when I got to Churchill was 2,800.
Jim Conrad: Wow.
Jake Edwards: But every small radio station I've ever worked
in, that's what you did.
You had to label the carts.
You had the voice, the carts.
You had to mix the music, you had to put 'em in rotation.
The next guy in the morning show, you had to take all these big huge bundle of
carts that you've stacked for an hour as you're doing 3 minute songs, putting it
on, and then getting into it and go CKCW.
And then he'd go to go to move the cart thing and it falls all over the floor
and you're pissed off just trying.
Terry DiMonte: I, but don't, I, I feel bad that, you know, I'm gonna sound like
an old bastard, but I feel bad that the business has changed so much that that
experience isn't available anymore.
Jake Edwards: Well, it really prepared you to be quick on your feet.
Terry DiMonte: Big time.
Yeah.
Jake Edwards: Quick on your feet to get everything organized.
Jim Conrad: Now, Jake, so your first gig, uh, you played radio and then?
Jake Edwards: Well, when I went to Boston,
Jim Conrad: Then you went to Boston to?
Jake Edwards: Leland Powers.
The School of Acting Journalism TV.
And, uh, had a good time there.
And I had a radio show there, and that was, you know, internal to the school.
So that's the first time, you know, that was just practice.
Then came home and said, well, I'm ready.
Let's get at it.
So, you know, applied.
And by that, you know, then used to send tapes out, air checks out.
So I just said to myself that summer, let's get in a truck.
My buddy next door had a Union Jack painted 67 Chevrolet Van.
We headed up the highway, route 11, and we stopped at every small radio station.
I said, I am not stopping until I get a gig.
Until I get a gig.
Jim Conrad: Wow.
Jake Edwards: And I went up and, uh, I remember meeting this guy
named Neil McMullen and Alan Bear.
And I said, here I am.
I basically, I really want to get this done.
I really want to be on the air and I'm not stopping the minute, minute
I go outta this station, I'm gonna go into Rimouski 'cause I spoke French.
Uh, and I basically was going to give it on my all until
I drove right across Canada.
Terry DiMonte: Do you still have, I, I still have some of my rejection letters.
Do you have any of 'em?
Jake Edwards: I do.
Terry DiMonte: I, I still have some.
Yeah.
Jake Edwards: Yeah.
I thought those are nice.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah, they're really, they're really, really nice.
'Cause you had to, you know, I don't know if you did it, but you had to do
the cassette, put it in an envelope.
Get the copy of broadcaster, find the address.
Jim Conrad: You find the address.
Yeah.
Terry DiMonte: Put the, put the envelope, you know, and, and mail them.
Jake Edwards: And then wait for the mail to come back.
Terry DiMonte: And then wait, and then, you know, 8 outta 10 people didn't
bother, but you know, one or two people would send you a note saying, you suck.
Or, you know, I, I, you know, I think you're not bad, but we
don't have anything for you.
I still have some of those letters.
Jake Edwards: Well, the time,
Terry DiMonte: And those stations are all gone.
Jake Edwards: Yeah.
This little CKBC Bathurst was, uh, a French,
Jim Conrad: So was that the first gig?
Jake Edwards: That's the first gig.
And the reason why they wanted me, I'd go...
and you just go into these tunes and I didn't even know I was just
fucking throwing shit out there in from playing country music.
Eight o'clock the rock thing would come on.
So I'd play rock music and then I believe we used to tap into CBC's,
is it, was it Anne Frum, or uh,
Jim Conrad: Barbara Frum, As It Happens.
Jake Edwards: As It Happens.
So you'd go into a reel to reel thing, and then at the end of that,
you'd rock till one in the morning and then shut the transmitter down.
And we were in a place that was an old, you know, a hundred year old home
that the wind was coming through it.
You could hear it on air, it was cold as shit.
You had blankets, you know, around you in this old shitty station,
but we loved every minute of it.
And my first gig, uh, so I get there and there was this Alan, I think
his name was Alan Whiteside, and he was on the air and he, uh, he quit.
So I get there on a Tuesday and I'm partying and I'm living with
five disc jockeys in one house with flags in the window, and
there's water pipes, there's booze.
Terry DiMonte: I can smell it from here.
Jake Edwards: Oh my.
Oh yeah.
Very nice.
So, uh, I'm sitting around, it's Tuesday and this Alan
Whiteside decides he's gonna quit.
And then the program director called, he said, you're on here in an hour.
I said, no, I'm not.
'Cause I was, I was out of my mind.
At this point, I've been partying for hours, going, I got the gig.
And all of a sudden I'm there.
I tee the record up.
And I, I go to hit, I go to hit the open mic, I go, ah, dang, dang.
And then the next record comes around.
I'm going, ah.
And it took me three tries, three different records, and finally I went on.
And then, uh, it, it worked and then I, I started from there.
Jim Conrad: But, and the rest is history.
Let me ask you this.
How much of a ratio between choice and luck was part of your,
Terry DiMonte: That's a great question.
Jim Conrad: Career.
The ratio of choice to luck, or was it lucky choices?
Jake Edwards: Well, I've always looked at, uh, myself and how most people, first
of all, you have to have some talent.
You've gotta have, be able to take risk.
You can't worry about what's gonna happen on the other end.
And a lot of it is, there is a big percentage of luck.
I'm gonna say a third part of that is luck, because you know, you've got
the talent, you know, you've got the energy, you can do all those things.
But I think the part, a third of it is luck.
It's the lucky break.
It's until you get to a certain plateau where you become a hired gun, and then
the luck thing seems, it's not as, uh, you know, you're not as lucky.
Oh God, I, I, you know, I won out over whoever, uh, you know, I was beaten out
trying to get into this morning show because they were out looking for talent.
So then the luck kind of balances out where it's not as lucky.
But in initially when you go in, I kind of put it in three parts.
Like a lot of, you know, a lot of talent, a lot of energy, wanting
to do it, and then that luck part is slowly came down over time.
Jim Conrad: Yeah.
Um, Terry, um, luck versus choice?
Terry DiMonte: I, I agree with Jake.
Um, I, but what's funny is I agree.
You've gotta have some ability.
You've gotta have some talent.
But what's funny about talent is talent comes with a huge pile of insecurity.
So when you're young you're not sure you're talented.
And you're afraid they're gonna fire you at any second.
And when the boss calls you in, as Jake was saying before,
you think, I'm in trouble.
And then I think it was luck that I ended up in that building in Polo Park with
all these unbelievably talented people.
I think there was a, a real element of luck to me ending up there.
Um, I think I agree with Jake.
I, I took a big risk going to Churchill.
I was shit scared, never been away from home.
And I ended up on the, you know, verge of the Arctic Circle on the coast of
Hudson's Bay, you know, when I got there I thought, oh my God, what have I done?
But then when you, you move along in your career, then you have to be
able to make choices and take risks.
Like when I, I went to show
Jim Conrad: And not be, not be afraid to make a choice.
Terry DiMonte: Exactly.
Yeah.
I, I loved where I was at in Winnipeg when I was in Winnipeg in 84, and I got offered
the morning show at CHUM FM in Montreal.
And I'd never done a morning show before.
I talked to him about it.
I talked to a few people and I said, ah, fuck, I don't know if I can do this.
And Jake, and Magic and a few other people said, of course you can do this.
You'll, you'll figure it out.
And, and then when, as Jake points out, once the ball gets rolling, like when I
ended up in Calgary, they phoned me, you know, and then they were headhunting.
Jake Edwards: Yeah.
And they wanted you.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
And they, they wanted me.
So the, you know, once your career gets going, I, I, I think it's all about choice
and risk and, and understanding where your talents are gonna work and stuff.
But I, I think at the beginning, you, you do need a good chunk of luck.
And I, and that, that third, a third luck, a third talent
and what was the other thing?
Jake Edwards: Energy.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
I, I, I think that's a pretty good theory.
But I, I really, I am so grateful that I literally stumbled into
Polo Park in Winnipeg and CITI-FM.
That set the stage for what was a fairly successful career for me.
Jim Conrad: Now, uh, you both are morning show hosts.
How is that day part and how is that job description in radio
different than all of the others?
What, what are the unique qualities that, that you guys have honed to be
able to say, I'm a morning show guy, you can hire me as your new morning
show man, because I know what to do.
Terry DiMonte: Well, first of all, um, if
Jim Conrad: Getting up early.
Terry DiMonte: Well, yeah, but even more so if you are radio, if you have
the radio bug like Jake and I did, and you got into the business, you knew
if you wanted to be at the top of the game, you had to do the morning show.
You had to get there.
So a lot of us started doing other things, but the morning
show was the pinnacle of the day.
It paid the most, it had the most attention.
So you knew you had to figure out how to get the morning chair.
Jim Conrad: You put your best talent in the morning show.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
And.
I know from, and Jake knows this too, from doing all nights and swing and
afternoons, once you get to the morning show chair, it's a whole different kettle
of fish and you have to make a lot of adjustments and you have to understand
the audience that you're talking to.
You just need a different set of tools in your belt for the morning show.
Jake Edwards: Because i, I believe that, uh, you were probably an evening guy too.
I mean, just the way you lived.
That's what I did.
I was an evening rock jock.
I thought for sure that's what I was going to be.
I had a couple offers to go to New York and Miami and LA.
At that time, I was just, this am thing was a buzz, and that's
what I was honing my craft for and that's what I wanted to be.
And then when I got the morning show gig, I remember when, you know, Gary picked me
up and we went over to the Vicount Gort.
That's where I stayed.
It was a, you know,
Terry DiMonte: It's still there too.
Jake Edwards: It's still there.
And I remember just, he said, you should probably get a nap
and get ready to do the show.
And I went, well, you know, I got lot.
And of course I couldn't sleep the whole night.
I got up in the morning and, you know, went to work.
Uh, I did the first show.
I came home, passed out.
I woke up that afternoon.
The bed was soaked, I was soaked, I was sweated so much.
I had no idea what I was doing, and I thought, this is, this isn't gonna work.
So I had, it took practice to switch my psyche over to morning, but once I got
it, and for the next, you know, 40 years or so, you know, basically getting up
at four o'clock in the morning, uh, you know, having my, I get in, have a bath,
I, you know, read the papers, get myself ready, uh, do the show, get off the
show, write the bits, produce the bits, have them ready to go for the next day.
And anything that changed overnight, you were on it.
Terry DiMonte: Um, yeah, but the other thing that was fun to watch
when Jake was doing the morning show was he just didn't sleep.
He, he just, he was constant.
No, it's true.
You a barrel, barrel of energy.
And when I look back on it, um, I'm, you know, you were lucky to survive.
I mean, just from your motorcycles alone.
You were lucky.
You were lucky to survive.
I went for one motorcycle ride for you, with you,
Jake Edwards: You were on my race bike though.
Terry DiMonte: And, and I, I cried.
Like I, I was so frightened and I screamed so loud from Charles Wood to Polo Park.
I just, I kept like, oh, Jake, stop it.
And, and, and he, you approached your morning show with that.
There were often times where, 'cause I was doing afternoons.
Jim Conrad: Full throttle.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
I was off the air at, at, uh, six or seven and we'd go to a thing and
I, you know, like Andy Frost used to have legendary parties at his place,
um, on a street called Dorchester.
So we would all say we're going over to Dorch.
Jake Edwards: 825.
Dorch.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
For, for a party.
And I would say to Jake at like 10 to 12 Jakey, you gotta work in the morning.
Yeah.
I'll be good.
You'll be fine.
And, and sure enough jump on the motorcycle.
Go.
He'd answer the bell.
So I, I think that at the kind, the style of radio that you did
and, and the, the energy that was required, uh, he was built for it.
'Cause you didn't, you, you must admit back then you didn't need a lot of sleep.
I don't know what it is now.
But you, you, you'd get three, four hours and you were good to go.
Jake Edwards: That's right.
Jim Conrad: Now Jake did, did, did somebody tell you or did you just intuit
yourself, okay, I'm doing a morning show.
I've gotta be funny.
How did that evolve?
Jake Edwards: Well, that's a good question.
Um, because I always considered my, considered myself a
bit of a buffoon anyway.
So it was always about being funny.
Jim Conrad: I wouldn't say that.
Jake Edwards: Like you, you know.
You know.
So, but I always thought that I was at any party, anybody that was around,
um, I would try to make them laugh.
I did that as a kid.
I went all the way through my whole life had to be the center of the
attention for the funny stuff.
My mom was like that.
She was, you know, my mom would be in the, in the kitchen, drop an air biscuit.
Oh, you know where most women will not even say anything.
My grandmother.
My grandmother would drop air biscuits at 85 years old going,
Terry DiMonte: Wait, wait a minute, women fart?
Jake Edwards: Yeah, they do.
Yeah, my sister said, never farted in my life.
Bullshit.
But my grandmother, oh look here, come on over here Jakey.
Here's some sweet biscuits.
And she'd just drop a sweet frap biscuit right in.
I was like, grandmother for Christ's sakes.
What's going on?
And of course, the whole room would've just lose it.
So at an early age, I think that I was prepped.
Jim Conrad: So your family prepped you for
Jake Edwards: Family prepped me to be funny.
So I basically just let myself go on the air.
And when I got comfortable enough to, to do that, uh, that's when things changed.
And I will say, uh, Wayne Yaski, who you know very well.
Uh, Wayne, uh, basically taught me a lot and he was just a funny, funny guy,
but he took me to another point where he would laugh at the cruelty of life.
I was never like that.
I had didn't have the heart to do the crueler type jokes, you
know, with, uh, you know, uh, hey.
Nice haircut.
Excuse me, please remove that bathing cap.
No bathing caps in here.
You know, stuff like that.
It started to happen and I would use that on the air, which I guess made
me kind of a kerney act, really.
Like, you know what I mean?
Terry DiMonte: It's, you're entertaining.
Jake Edwards: It was entertaining, I guess, but I always, uh, I, I really cut
my, my teeth right there in Winnipeg.
I learned a lot.
Winnipeggers are the, are the funniest people.
Look at the music that's come outta Winnipeg.
You know what I mean?
The, uh, because it's so fucking cold.
Winnipeg Symphony, Winnipeg Ballet.
Stuff that is highbrow big time happens in Winnipeg.
Jim Conrad: Let's talk about relationships and music because,
uh, you both love music.
Music was a big part of your shows, your relationship with artists, which,
which musical artists were you inspired by and who really impressed you?
Who did you, who did you become good friends with?
Jake Edwards: Well, the Canadian artists, um, were always at the radio station.
I was at Q104, which is a station you're quite familiar with in Halifax.
Because you're the voice guy there.
Jim Conrad: Q 104 Halifax.
Jake Edwards: But, you know, Honeymoon Suite would pop in, uh,
in Toronto was the Black Crows that came and stayed for a week.
And Mickey, our engineer, went out and said, he said, can you get us some pot?
Mike Mickey said, absolutely.
Came back and laid a pound of pot on the pool table and they
just, they started rolling joints over there for like seven days.
We couldn't get rid of the Black Crows.
Uh, and then, you know, you look at Colin James would come into the radio
station the same way .Colin James would take that del bro guitar and
just play and have a Neuman microphone at the bottom and just playing like
crazy and you'd go, this is so great.
54 40. The Odds, uh, Alice Cooper would come into
town.
First thing he wanted me to do was go play golf.
And I met him in Winnipeg the very first time and he said, you play golf.
I said, I do.
So let's go play.
So every time he came to Winnipeg, him and I would go out and play golf.
And then when we got to Toronto, his then manager.
Said, whatever you do, Jake, do not mention golf, because it
wasn't part of his image, right?
It wasn't part of the image.
So the first thing outta my mouth was, Hey, you still playing golf?
Let's get out.
And the, the manager jumped over the board and tried to strangle me on air, Live.
Terry DiMonte: I forget his name.
He's a legendary guy too, his manager.
And, and we, we were really lucky.
Speaking of luck, we worked in an era where radio mattered to artists.
And, and they, you know that those days are long gone.
And if you said to, I remember when the Police came to town and
you know, there's Stuart Copeland standing at the control room door.
That never would happen today.
And I remember one of the first interviews I did was with Eddie Money.
And Eddie Money was big.
He was a big star in 78, 79, 80.
He was big, and they said, Eddie Money's coming in, you're gonna interview him.
And I was so scared.
And he was so nice.
We had such a good time and we, we just shot it out there and said to
him, Hey, you know, after the gig tonight, we're gonna be at the gig,
but we're having a bash, uh, tonight.
And I laughed and I thought to myself, Eddie Money's not coming
to our stupid party in Winnipeg.
And at like 1230, the doorbell rang and Eddie Money was
standing at the fucking door.
I like those, those
Jim Conrad: 'Cause it was the only thing going on in Winnipeg that night.
Terry DiMonte: Well, yeah, and, and, and that era of radio, as you
remember, Jim ,was footloose and fancy free to quote Rod Stewart.
You know, it was a, it was a time where the guys didn't look at coming
into the radio station as, as, uh, you know, part of their gig.
They looked forward to it.
They had fun with it.
It was, it was a, it was a time that doesn't exist anymore.
Jim Conrad: So, Jake, tell me about you and Jeff Bridges.
Jeff Bridges: Wait, let me, let me explain something to you.
Um, I'm the dude, so that's what you call me, you know, uh, that or, uh,
his dudeness or, uh, duder or, uh, you know, El Dude a Reno, if you're
not into the whole brevity thing.
Terry DiMonte: This, this is good story.
Jake Edwards: Yeah.
This is, uh, a good story.
Well, it is, hope no longer.
Hang on.
Thanks for the, uh, the, uh, libation of Macallan.
Jim Conrad: You're welcome.
Jake Edwards: That's very nice.
Uh, Jeff came into my life through Frenchy at Joe Fortes,
Jim Conrad: Who's a maître d' at one of the local restaurants.
Jake Edwards: So all the rock stars, that's how we met all the actors and
people, uh, came into Joe Fortes.
So he would always manage to set a plate and he would tell, uh, Jeff Bridges,
you gotta meet this guy, Brother Jake.
We got to meet.
We hung out.
And he said, do you think you can get a boat set up?
Frenchy's telling me to get a boat set up.
We'll take Jeff out and basically we'll go out on down to Indian arm, right?
So of course he's the dude.
So we get the boat all organized.
We have the White Russians, if you've ever watched the dude, of
course he loved the white Russians.
We had a couple of bartenders, we had a skipper, we had a 58
sedan bridge, Searight brand new.
And I took the whole morning show team, we all went down and all of a sudden
Jeff's coming around the corner and he comes onto the boat and it was like
we, we've known each other for years.
He was just the most gentle, real, not a movie star kind of guy.
And away we went.
So we're all the way down and uh, just sitting around drinking White Russians.
And he talked about every movie that he's ever done, that we've, that I've
watched, 'cause I've been such a fan.
And it was just like the guy was so real.
Uh, he just, he, he didn't seem like a movie star after a while.
Terry DiMonte: No, it's, it's interesting when that falls away, eh?
It just, like, when you first meet them, you're like, oh, and, and it falls away.
And you, and, and you're talking to like a person.
It's a cool feeling.
Jake Edwards: So at the end of it, we get back and he loves to play guitar.
He's a musician.
Uh, the Academy Award that he won was basically about a
down and out country singer.
And, uh,
Jim Conrad: Crazy Heart.
Jake Edwards: Crazy heart.
Jeff Bridges: I'm Bad Blake.
My tombstone will have my real name on it.
Until then, I'm just going to stay bad.
Jake Edwards: And so he said, uh, you know, so he had the
tunes going on in the background.
I said, who is that?
And he said, oh yeah, we put this together.
This is gonna be for my new movie, Crazy Heart.
And I went, oh, what's that about?
Blah, blah, blah.
He wins the Academy Award and at the end we get back.
I said, look, you want to come up to my place?
And he's, and we just lived right around the corner in Coal Harbor.
So Lori's out at girl's night.
He's at my place at midnight.
And I've got this black hash we're hot knifing,
Jim Conrad: You're, you've got the blow torch, got the hot
same blow torch from 92 CITI-FM.
Jake Edwards: And we're singing our asses off playing and
all of a sudden that was it.
Then his stunt double was there.
Uh, that, that
Jim Conrad: Always have a stunt double.
Always have a stunt,
Jake Edwards: A security guy, stunt double.
And he basically got him out of there and brought him home.
He had a driver and then every time he came back to town,
we would always hang out.
Jim Conrad: So Terry, how about you?
Um, was there a, a musician that you were completely impressed by that you loved?
Terry DiMonte: For me, the big one was Elton John.
I was such a massive Elton John fan when I was a kid.
That that was, that was really a big deal.
And what, what struck me or what's always impressed me is I've met very
few pricks, uh, you know, and, and, and, uh, you know, they say they never
meet your heroes, blah, blah, blah.
Elton John was kind and he was sweet and he was, you know, he is a good
and decent man and, you know, nice to his fans and, you know, there's
a, there's a bunch of people over the years that I've met, you know, uh,
that have left an impression with me.
Um, uh,
Jim Conrad: The late great Miles Goodwyn.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah, yeah.
Miles Goodwyn was, I, it was really, really sad.
Jim Conrad: From April Wine.
Terry DiMonte: I was asked by, uh, the, um, Canadian Walk of Fame to
participate in the ceremonies last fall.
And they asked me to bring on April Wine.
And I, you know, 'cause I was from Montreal and there's a connection
there and I know Brian Greenway and I've known Miles for years.
And, um, we were backstage, you know, and I said to Miles, I said, this is
a really full circle moment for me.
It's kind of weird.
I said, you played my high school carnival, you know, and, and now I'm
here standing backstage talking to you and you're, you know, you're going
into the, this Canadian Walk of Fame, like towards the end of your career.
And I can't believe I'm bringing you on.
It's, he said, well, it's an honor for me, Terry.
And it's, I'm glad you're doing it 'cause you're a Montrealer and blah.
We had this really, really nice conversation.
And one of the things I talked to him about, I said like,
retired, like, how do you retire?
He said, well, you know, I still play, I'm still writing, you know, I love, you
know, I'm gonna golf and I'm gonna do this and I wanna be with my grandkids.
And, and a month later he was gone.
Was really, really sad.
Jake Edwards: Miles Goodwyn, uh, and I had a relationship, uh, at every
radio station I've ever worked at.
Because I would go to the concert and I would be the guy
on stage bringing April Wine on.
Terry DiMonte: Remember those days?
Jake Edwards: Oh God.
God.
So, you know, if I was in Bathurst or New Glasgow or Sydney or Moncton, he would
come into town and we would go golfing.
So I always considered myself a pretty good pal with Miles.
So, short story, long story short, he ended up here and we
played this big Whistler event.
I hadn't seen him in probably 30 years, maybe 25, 30 years.
And I was the MC and I'm bringing him up on stage and, and, and before I
brought him up on stage, I was backstage.
I said, Hey, it's really good to see you again, Miles.
Awesome.
He said, who are you?
I, I said, uh, I'm the guy from New Brunswick.
Uh, your good pal, good pal, Jake.
So, and I remember distinctly, and again, listen, Miles, uh,
you know, and what a guitarist.
Uh, but I remember every one of them the guys I'm meeting, every one of
them, had weapons grade halitosis.
I'm, I'm not just talking about, you know, oh my God, your breath stinks.
This was weapons grade halitosis.
So I, so I go up and then, you know, and I, he said, I, I just
don't remember any, you know?
No.
And I'm up stage.
I said, Miles Goodwyn.
Used to be a really good friend of mine, back here on stage.
And then he's playing, uh, you know, uh, playing one of the songs.
And he looked at me, he went fuckin' Jake.
Jake.
And he, it came in.
So I went, oh, thank God.
I mean, I, you know, it wasn't something,
Terry DiMonte: Well, it's 30 years.
You gotta give him a little bit.
Jake Edwards: I get it.
But that happens.
You know, you talk about, you talk about celebrities.
You think that they're, you are ingrained in their brain, which is totally untrue.
I remember being out with Tom Cochrane.
Jim Conrad: Because you remember the first moment that you met, but
they, they meet a lot of people.
Jake Edwards: Well, Tom
Cochran, myself, Alex Lifeson from Rush, were out
Jake Edwards: playing golf in Toronto was the greatest day of my life.
Now Tom Cochran has remained one of my best friends.
The guy's a match.
He's fantastic.
So Alex Lifeson, then we go do this meet and greet and I'm going, I
can't wait to see him on the air.
You know, I played golf with him and Tom Cochran.
This is going to be awesome.
So I go back, I went, Hey, how you doing, Alex?
Remember that time we played golf?
Tom Cochran, you and I?
No,
no, nothing.
Like zip, nothing.
Hello?
No, no.
I made that three wood shot over.
Check, check.
Alex, check.
Is this on?
Anyway.
Terry DiMonte: I didn't know about you, but I I really never got over that.
I I still haven't got over that.
I, you know, the first time that I realized, um, I was at, uh, the festival
at Gimli, uh, there was, you remember those, those open air festivals in Gimli.
And I was standing near a concession stand and I heard, Hey, DiMonte and I
turned around and it was Tom Cochrane.
To your point, he's such a mansion, he doesn't forget.
And I thought.
Holy shit.
Tom Cochrane knows who I am.
It's a,
Jim Conrad: It gives you something.
Terry DiMonte: I, I don't give a shit what anybody says.
It's a cool thing.
It's like when you go up on a billboard.
I'm sorry.
That's fucking cool.
Jake Edwards: Who's that guy in the Camaro has been there for five
hours looking at his billboard.
Terry DiMonte: No, but you know, it's like when you first, when you first see like
a commercial for your show on television or you, or Tom Cochrane waves at you, you
go, holy shit, how did this happen to me?
Okay, that's fun.
Jim Conrad: Who, now who were the pricks?
And we can name names.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
Jake Edwards: Yeah.
Well, hmm.
Let me think.
Terry DiMonte: The, the nasty, the artist that was
Jake Edwards: Oh, uh, movie stars.
Uh, I was in Toronto waiting for the star of Crocodile Dundee.
Jim Conrad: What's his name?
Jake Edwards: Paul.
Jim Conrad: Crocodile Dundee, Paul, anybody.
Jake Edwards: Paul.
Terry DiMonte: Paul Hogan.
Jake Edwards: Hogan.
Thank you.
Paul.
I got the first name.
So anyway, he's supposed to be in the interview,
Jim Conrad: So Paul, Paul Hogan.
You're supposed to meet him.
Jake Edwards: Yeah.
And he's big star, right?
He said, look at, that's a knife.
This is a knife.
I mean, he, that was a big movie.
So I'm pretty excited to meet him.
I'm going, this guy sounds like a hoot.
So anyway, uh, eight o'clock rolls by no Paul.
8:30, 9:00, 9:30, 10 o'clock, no show.
And I've been promoting him the whole time.
I walk out, he stumbles in onto the elevator.
It's 10:30 and he used to have this commercial for a beer company
and it was the Australian beer.
Jim Conrad: Fosters.
Jake Edwards: Fosters, take a look at the size of this biggin.
And that was, you know, I thought, oh, this is gonna be great.
So he is walking by and I went, you asshole take a look
at the size of this biggin.
And I got in the elevator and I, I just, I, I went down and that was it.
I just.
Terry DiMonte: It's funny that I'm, I'm just thinking while you're, you're
telling that story, you know, you remember like Billy Joel wasn't very nice.
I got to meet him.
He wasn't very nice.
But the circumstances, you, it may have been a night where it
wasn't going well, whatever.
But it's funny, you remember all the good ones.
Like when you asked that question, Jim, I was, I was like, right, you had the
roledex thinking who were the pricks.
But you remember, you know, most of the really, really
most, and most of them are kind.
And I always say it takes the same amount of time to be an asshole
as it does to be nice to people.
Like I, I just don't understand people who don't, you know, who can't just wave
and be kind and shake a hand and move on.
I don't want to have dinner with you.
I just want to tell you I'm a fan and I enjoy your work and move on.
Jim Conrad: Well, particularly if you're working at radio and playing
their songs on your radio station.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
Yeah.
Jim Conrad: You would think that maybe,
Jake Edwards: I don't think you want to come off as a dick.
Terry DiMonte: And one of the, one of the things about, you know, if you're
an artist, at least back in those days, it was probably pretty smart to have the
record company people like you because they were outworking your product.
You know, when I was music director at CITI-FM, the guys used to
come in with a stack of albums.
And they would say, eh, you guys aren't gonna like this.
This is a piece of shit.
This, you guys might like this, these two I really need your help on.
These two, these are good records.
They're
Jake Edwards: Dream Police, cheap trick.
You gotta get that.
Terry DiMonte: Please.
You've gotta play this record.
You know, so those guys are working on the ground level for
you when you, you're an artist.
Jim Conrad: And 'cause they, and because the, the relationship between their
artist and they had been established.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
And, and,
Jim Conrad: And that's how important it is.
Terry DiMonte: Yeah.
And, and if you were the CBS record guy and Robin Zander was nice to you, you
would take Dream Police under your arm and you push the shit out of it for him.
Jake Edwards: Which we did.
Terry DiMonte: Yes.
Which we did.
Jim Conrad: Jake, tell me, uh, you've told me this before, but there is a
classic story of, um, a, wasn't it a Julio Iglesias press conference?
Jake Edwards: Yes, we were in Toronto and Julio Iglesias came in with Rambo's
girlfriend, uh, what was her name?
Brit Ekland?
Jim Conrad: Oh, Brit Ekland.
Terry DiMonte: Bridget Nielson.
Jake Edwards: Bridget Nielson.
Thank you.
Anyway, we're sitting around and Julio Iglesias is there.
And we're all around the table.
And Brit, uh, Bridget Nielson.
Terry DiMonte: Bridget Nielson.
Jake Edwards: Thank you.
Terry DiMonte: Also, you're in your sixties now.
Jake Edwards: Yeah.
And, and all of a sudden her top comes up just at the dinner table.
I'm going, what the hell's going on here?
So then Julio Iglesias comes in and he's basically sitting down
with his 24-year-old girlfriend and he said, I have to go now.
I must go make love.
We're like,
Jim Conrad: And got up and left.
Jake Edwards: And got up and left and that,
Jim Conrad: That's an exit line.
Jake Edwards: I must go make love.
Terry DiMonte: It's like a scene from a movie.
Jake Edwards: Oh my God.
Jim Conrad: That's exit line one of my final questions.
What's the hardest you've ever worked?
Terry DiMonte: For me without a doubt on construction.
I had a,
Jim Conrad: So it wasn't a radio.
Terry DiMonte: One summer, I was working in Toronto for a construction
company, laying patios, you know, from seven in the morning until five
at night with a half hour for lunch.
And I remember thinking to myself, wow, this is good money and I
never want to do this again.
I have such a deep and abiding respect for people who work with their hands
and drive buses and work outside in the bad weather and all of that.
We were the luckiest motherfuckers on the planet to do what we did.
And listen, I worked hard.
I didn't get where I was, I hustled.
I went, you know, as a friend of mine said you would go to
the opening of an envelope.
I was out all the time.
I never said no, I never turned anything down.
I, you know, I visited schools.
I went like, I, like, I worked hard in radio to get where I was, but not, like,
some people work for a living every day.
Jim Conrad: And Jake?
Jake Edwards: Exactly what he said, uh, never worked a day
in my life of being on the air.
Uh, did work really hard.
Tremendous hours.
Sacrificed family, sacrificed a lot of friends by doing that.
Doing Monday night football in the east in Halifax when the game comes on at
nine o'clock and oh my God, there's overtime at 1:30 in the morning and
you'd have to drive in and do the show.
I mean, that, that was hard work, but every time you
went out, you met a listener.
Every time you went out, you met, you know, kissing babies and making friends.
That kind of thing always helped, and it was something that I
loved to do socially anyway.
Terry DiMonte: Well, and I, I don't know about you, but it, this, this went
on until the last day before I was, I was pushed outta CHUM, every single day
when I pushed that control room door open, whether I was hungover or tired or
exhausted or crabby or mad, when I pushed that control room door open and looked at
that chair in that microphone, I thought to myself home, you, you lucky fuck.
I'm home.
Sit down, sit down.
I'm home, sit down and have a good time.
Before we go, Jim, and I just wanna say this, Jake and I came from an era
of radio that is never coming back.
There is never going to be the kind of broadcast programming and radio,
um, that we were involved in, right?
Not, not because we were great anything, but we worked in an era of radio
that was special and, and doesn't exist anymore and isn't coming back.
So kudos to you, chapeau, as they say in Quebec for, um, trying to, trying
to gather some of these stories,
Jim Conrad: Archive these stories.
Terry DiMonte: Archive the stories, and let people know there was a time when
radio was fun, wild entertaining, and wasn't the text question of the day.
That there were, there were wildly talented people before us and a few
after us, but you go all the way back to the days of Raccoon Carney and Doc
Harris and, and up through the end of our careers, that, that's never coming back.
Jim Conrad: Well guys, thank you so much for being part of this.
Jake Edwards: Pleasure, pleasure being here.
Jim Conrad: For being guests and some great stories.
And we're all about storytelling and like I said, I'm detaching from outcome.
Whoever listens, listens.
Terry DiMonte: It's the joy of the podcast.
Nicely done.
Jim Conrad: Thank you.
Hey,
now that was episode number four of Conovision, my very, very special,
special thank you to Brother Jake Edwards and Terry DiMonte for their
amazing stories of radio back in the day, as well as the legendary Ken
Nordine and one of his colors, beige.
More colors to come on upcoming episodes and more stories.
'Cause remember, we are all stories to be told.
I'm Jim Conrad.
Thanks for listening.