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INSIDE HALTON.com
Campbellville musician, bandmates pay tribute to Gordon Lightfoot
The Gordon Lightfoot Tribute Band, from left, includes Steve Eyers, Campbellville's Jim Jones, John Stinson and Eric Kidd.
Milton Canadian Champion
By Julie Slack
Campbellville’s Jim Jones has met some great guys in his lifetime. And most of them have one thing in common – Gordon Lightfoot.
His tribute band will present The Songs Of Gordon Lightfoot on Friday (Nov. 18) at 8 p.m. at the MinMaxx Hall of the Milton Centre for the Arts.
The Gordon Lightfoot Tribute Band is a celebration of Canadian music featuring John Stinson.
Jones, 54, is really excited to play at such an intimate setting, as they share stories and perform Lightfoot’s hits from the 1966 to 1976 — right in his backyard.
“This venue is a really great fit…the set-up the seating. It’s a perfect spot for it,” he said, adding he likes to see the audience have a chance to get up and dance along to the music.
“Gord’s lyrics and recordings take listeners on a trip down memory lane,” Jones said. “For many, each of his albums represents a chapter in the soundtrack of their own lives.”
The Gordon Lightfoot Tribute Band chose November to begin a stretch of theatrical appearances since it marks 50 years since Lightfoot’s first album was released. It was simply called Lightfoot.
He said Stinson, the tribute band’s lead singer, brings a great deal of talent to ensure Gordon Lightfoot’s music is given its due credit.
“The band and audience will be celebrating Gord’s 78th birthday, which is the day before the Milton performance,” Jones said. “Each of us has been influenced by Lightfoot’s music and the passion comes through in every performance.”
Stinson, who hails from Aurora — also known as “Gord’s country” — plays music full-time. He’s been performing for more than 30 years. He became neighbours with Lightfoot’s lead guitarists of the last five decades.
“Spending time with Red Shea and Terry Clements brought me even closer to understanding the details and nuances of Lightfoot's music,” Stinson said. “To me, Lightfoot's music really does reflect what it means to be Canadian. His lyrics tell stories: his stories, our stories, Canadian stories. They reach out and touch audiences in deep emotional ways."
Jones, meanwhile, plays keyboards and guitar. He met Stinson at an afternoon open mic in Toronto and right away knew he liked him.
“I had to do a second take,” he laughed. “His baritone voice was just like Lightfoot’s from the 1970s.”
“He plays the exact 12-string Gibson guitar, and the Martin six-string that Gordon does,” he said. “Picking a six strong, that was one of my first appeals. This was no campfire strummer.”
He’s been recreating Lightfoot’s music in a full theatre show since 2007.
And you can’t get much more real than having Lighthouse’s nephew on board as the bass guitarist. Steve Eyers is the son of Beverly (nee Lighthouse) Eyers in Orillia; she was Lightfoot’s older sister.
“She caught wind that we were playing at an open mic and came to see us,” Jones said. “She saw that we were playing his music and keeping it alive — and not just the hits.”
Referring to the fact that the band plays numerous tracks that aren’t just the number ones, Jones said his fellow bandmates are true Lightfoot musicians.
“Everything he did was a poetic creation,” Jones said. “I look at him as a composer.”
And as much as the evening’s concert will be about music, Jones said Stinson also likes telling stories.
“John can tell a story for 12 minutes,” he chuckled. “But we play it by ear, based on what we see the audience enjoys.”
He adds that concert-goers should be prepared that the tribute band is based only on sound, not looks.
“We’re not a dress-em-up tribute,” Jones said. “We’re here to share the songs of Gordon Lightfoot.”
But he promises that the songs will be note for note, like the albums, but there’s no drummer, and if anyone does improvisation, it’s him.
Eric Kidd, the lead guitarist plays “mind-blowing guitar,” said Jones, adding that he was a student of Red Shea, who was lead guitar for Lightfoot in his early days.
Clearly, connection to Lightfoot runs deep in this tribute band.
And they manage to capture all this without a drummer.
Jones said he once played on stage at Milton’s Streetfest.
“We played 10 songs, and afterword, a girl comes up to me and says her grandfather was on the Edmund Fitzgerald and she was holding back tears,” he said. “It was very emotional.”
The show, featuring highlights from Lightfoot's 20 studio albums, will be sure to have Lightfoot lovers tapping their toes. They can expect to hear some little-known tracks along with the much-loved ones such as, Rainy Day People, If You Could Read My Mind, and The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.
Lightfoot has 220 recordings on his albums, Jones said, and 210 of them are completely his own.
Tickets cost $30 for adults and $25 for students. They’re available at
www.miltoncentreforthearts.ca or through the box office at (905) 876-5033.
To learn more about the Gordon Lightfoot Tribute Band, go to
www.gordonlightfoottribute.com.
The Gordon Lightfoot Tribute Band, from left, includes Steve Eyers, Campbellville's Jim Jones, John Stinson and Eric Kidd.
Lightfoot tribute band-interview - James Jones
