GWNtertainment #28 by Jaimie Vernon

Lots of new music this week as post-summer tuneage is in full swing. Just ask Drake who now occupies half of the Top10 on the Billboard magazine charts. It’s also drawn battle lines between old pop music fans and new because Drake’s positioning on the charts breaks a handful of records previously set by The Beatles. Vitriol has been flying around social media dismissing Drake and his accomplishments. GWN celebrates any Canadian artist who has managed to raise the ire of a generation of music lovers who refuse to acknowledge that time has passed, and that a new generation also makes music that people love. We are here three times a month extolling the virtues of those new artists and that new music. Other music exists in the same universe as The Beatles…resistance is fertile.

MUSIC IS DYING 2 – LIFE’S WHAT YOU MAKE IT by Jaimie Vernon

The very first live gig I ever played was 40 years ago this month – September 19, 1980 – with a band called The Swindle (we’d switch drummers and become SWindleD a year later). We were a bunch of barely passable punk rockers from Scarborough who were too young to play clubs. What does one do when you’re underage and need to get your rock on?

JAIMIE VERNON – BULLSOGRAPHY: Sneak Peek #1

With my ‘True Tales From a Cemetery Cop’  being released October 3 I’ve finally returned to finish writing the book I promised a year ago – the history of Bullseye Records of Canada.

JAIMIE VERNON – TO PRESERVE AND PROTECT

Long before I considered myself a profession record label weasel I worked in a government bunker as a data librarian. My job title was Records Management Assistant and my duties included archiving government documents, maps, tax records and all matter of ephemera – including name tags from VIPs who visited City Hall and ribbon cutting scissors from shopping mall openings attended by our politicians.

JAIMIE VERNON – TAKIN’ CARE OF BACHMAN (PART 2)

excerpted from the forthcoming book ‘Bullsography: The Bullseye Records Story 1985-2010’

JAIMIE VERNON – 29 WITH A BULLET

A major anniversary passed surreptitiously on April 20th. It was the 29^th anniversary of my long-suffering record label Bullseye Records. Normally I’d have shouted from the rooftops and run some kind of anniversary commemoration on Facebook or with musicians I know or privately, silently weeping, into my morning orange juice. But, I actually forgot about it.

So far removed am I from the music world now, and my own legacy, and exhausted from the grind that is my paycheck shackles that it slipped under my radar.

Jaimie Vernon: K-TEL HELL: MUSICAL TEAM-UPS WE’D LIKE TO SEE

With the advent of celebrity musical team-ups to help sell more downloads in this unpredictable business we now find ourselves in, I thought maybe we could do this for all lapsed and flagging music artists past and present. Here, for your bemusement, is a wish list of team-ups for the musically twisted compiled by yours truly and partner in crime Terry Lusk. Enjoy