Jim Cuddy bringing new tour to the Yates Centre

By Al Beeber - Lethbridge Herald on October 29, 2024.

photo by Christopher Gentile Veteran Canadian musician Jim Cuddy is set to perform at the Yates on Nov. 4

LETHBRIDGE HERALDabeeber@lethbridgeherald.com

When Jim Cuddy performs at the Yates Centre on Nov. 4, one song the veteran roots musician plays could touch audiences in a special way. Just as the subject matter touched its creator.

“Impossible” from Cuddy’s latest solo album “All the World Fades Away” was written for Jill Daum, whose husband John Mann of the band Spirit of the West died in 2019 at the age of 57 from early on-set Alzheimer’s Disease.

Mann had beaten colo-rectal cancer in 2011 just a few short years before Alzheimers took him from his wife and son who has battled mental health issues, living on the street at one point in time.

The song is one which will surely hush the audience when Cuddy, who still records and tours with Blue Rodeo, hits the first notes.

Cuddy knew Mann well; Blue Rodeo and Spirit of the West had the same record company and Mann taught him about the art of collecting wine.

And in a phone interview recently, Cuddy reminisced about how he shared his own collection with Mann and bandmate Geoffrey Kelly the night before they signed a new record deal with Warner, a night in which they finished off every bottle in Cuddy’s collection.

On his website, Cuddy writes about that tune: “A parent is only as happy as their least happy child. I ran the song past Jill, who asked her son, who then wrote me a letter saying he understood it was about the undying love a parent has for their child. That was all the endorsement I needed. I have played that song a lot and it’s remarkable who comes and talks to me about it afterwards. You just never know who is struggling with these issues.”

“We’d been with John a little bit and sort of seen signs of it, we just thought tired, forgetful, whatever. It was a very painful decline for Jill, just watching John go through it was very sad,” he said last week before heading overseas.

Cuddy has known all of Spirit of The West members for a long time. Cuddy along with Mann and Kelly were wine aficionados and the latter two taught him a lot about how to collect the spirit.

“I used to collect a couple of bottles whenever I travelled,” he recalled.”They were a very important part of my education about wine cellaring,” he laughed when talking about that night outside at his home.

But that tribute track to Mann’s family is just one of many standouts on the new album which took three years to finish thanks to COVID and Cuddy’s own commitments to Blue Rodeo.

He started writing for the new record about a year into the pandemic and then began working on it with the band, taking one person at a time into the recording studio and got about two-thirds of the way through before Greg Keelor called and said they should use the time to make another Blue Rodeo record.

So Cuddy put his own album on temporary hiatus and began working on new Blue Rodeo material which included an album and tour.

In the summer of 2023, Cuddy and his long-time band reunited to finish the album with co-producers Tim Vesely and Colin Crips.

“The songs really sat on the shelf, we didn’t really learn them until we had to go back and learn them all for the record release and now we’re touring so now they’re all up to scratch,” said Cuddy.

“So much of what we did in the initial stages was pretty good and stood the test of time,” he added.

Cuddy’s solo band “is an amazing band,” he says, and when touring they do the few Blue Rodeo tunes on the playlist quite differently.

“There’s a lot of talent,” he said of his band which Cuddy has worked with for 28 years.

The band is like a family and his own family is present on the tour with son Devin being the opener. A second son, Sam Polley, is also a musician.

Soon to be 69, Cuddy still loves playing live for audiences. But the travel can get tiring, especially this year with two tours happening side by side, said Cuddy, who is hoping this winter to take time off with his wife.

“I selfishly try to keep family close,” said Cuddy.

Having Devin on tour is great exposure for the younger Cuddy, he said.

“It’s difficult for a younger musician these days, things are very expensive…to go on a bus and come out west, he alway does well… I think it’s been great for both my sons.”

Occasionally, Cuddy and sons do family band work, as well.

“I have now quite an extensive menu of options,” he laughed.

And on tour, Cuddy does a lot of wine shopping at couple of stores in Calgary, Ontario which doesn’t have quite the same selection as this province. And he points out that Alberta doesn’t have a sales tax.

Cuddy first became known to audiences through his work with Blue Rodeo which he formed with longtime friend Greg Keelor, keyboardist Bob Wiseman, bassist Donovan and Cleave Anderson on drums after he and Keelor had attempted success with a band called the Hi-Fis in the early 1980s.

Over the decades, the band has released 16 studio albums while as a solo artist Cuddy has released six.

At the 1999 Juno Awards, he was named best male vocalist and also won the best adult alternative award for his record “The Light That Guides You Home.”

In 2013, he and Keelor were named Officers of the Order of Canada and this year they were inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame.

Cuddy from Oct. 17-24 is performing on a Provence river cruise in France then on Oct. 26 hits the stage at the Burton Cummings Theatre in Winnipeg for a show before heading west to Saskatoon, Regina, Calgary, Red Deer and then Lethbridge. After stops in Banff and Edmonton, tour goes to venues in B.C. then back to his home province of Ontario.