Oh Canada! The tour is over. St. John's was the final resting place for the BLAM tour of Canada with a, well, more mature crowd (I mean that in the best possible way, like people say BLAM is a more mature album - actually it hurts no matter how you slice it, doesn't it?), and a whole lot of drinking, though Halifax with its official end-of-tour party which raged, karaoke-soaked, until 5:30 am, is the winner of this tour's least mature evening.

Oh people! Most surprising were the crowds in Victoria (two nights!),Sault Ste Marie (packed and excited), Toronto (rocking and possibly our biggest ever at home), Halifax (our biggest yet there - all is forgiven for Hello City, apparently), and the winner is Ottawa. Ottawa was once a mighty place for BNL, back with the old BNL Fun Day at Landsdowne Park in 1992, and the week we spent at the NAC and the Congress Centre back on the Gordon tour. Over time, however, the audiences became more infuriatingly polite. They sat and consumed the shows, clapping softly, and not really participating. This time, however, was truly amazing. Maybe we stepped up the energy, knowing we'd had some tough crowds in the past, maybe it was the stellar set list, but I'm fully willing to put the blame on an awesome crowd who came to have a great time, and got what they wanted. Cheers, nation's capital!

Oh emotions running wild! It was a hugely successful tour, and the whole Barenaked Planet eco-thing was a real success once again, though bio-diesel seems to be almost impossible to find in Western Canada, we made some big changes to the way we tour with regards to the environment. It was also kind of nice to get some press again, after being off the radar for awhile. Between the green initiatives and the best show reviews of our career, I didn't actually cringe as I opened the paper in each town.

What else can I say? It was a pleasure to cross our country and reconnect with it in a way I hadn't in a while. I'm proud to say I'm Canadian, and happy to have met so many interesting and warm people. Still, it's nice to be home.

At tonight's show you threw a big banner onstage that said "The Flag".  Thanks for that, sorry we didn't play it.  I took it offstage between encores and wrote on it "rant disregard for our fans", but you seemed confused by it.  You need to connect to the words you already wrote so it reads "The Flagrant disregard for our fans."  Sorry.

I'm not sure I slept at all on the way up here from New York.  It was a bumpy ride and my bunk is a mess with books and ipod and headphones and bottled water and blackberry.  I think I slept from the time we parked at 11am until 1:30 this afternoon, which is actually 12:30 Eastern, as we lost an hour to the ether as we moved into Atlantic time.  Damn, I feel good. 
It's really cold here in Saint John.  That's Saint John, NB, not St. John's NFLD.  The "Saint" helps to differentiate itself as does the lack of possessive.  Either way it's god damned cold.  From -32 C in Winnipeg to snow in Toronto to rain in NYC and back to freezing Canada.  Welcome home, boys.

Letterman turned out pretty well, I thought.  I think the song had good energy, and we were relatively in tune, and the mix was very good for a tv mix, and Kevin didn’t freak out - I think we did him proud.  I wonder if anyone outside of your loyal blog readers saw it after two extra bullshit commercial breaks! 

Went with Jono to Gramercy Tavern for dinner.  They have a new chef, and it was fine, but not exactly up to the soul-stirring magic of its heyday.  The slow-poached bacon with savoy cabbage and caraway was great, and the old standby of tapioca with passionfruit and coconut was as great as always.  Then, we got on the bus and watched the sadly underwhelming For Your Consideration.  I do always get a kick out of Ricky Gervais' shit-eating grin, and Don Lake's movie critic admission  that "I've seen a LOT of movies, and I've loved them all" was great.  Best, however, was Eugene Levy spraying his feet. "I can't believe you had that in your purse" he says. 

The Ottawa show was great, so, of course, guess what happened?  The recording rig crashed!  Our man Paul Forgues is busy doing some surgery, trying to recover the definitive Powder Blue...  in the meantime, we had to refund the wristband holders, and even Robin's board tape crashed.  The show was oddly cursed.  I think it's because Ottawa is usually so staid, and Wednesday night they rocked so hard, technology did not know how to keep up.  I'll keep you abreast of the progress.

Greetings from our nation's capital (I had to look up how to spell that, after being so influenced by staring at the Capitol Records logo as Beatles records spun on the turntable as a child). Tonight we're doing a runner, which is what we call shows when we walk right off the stage onto the bus and start driving. Though many fancypants rockers do this regularly, we only do it when we're in a big hurry, and we still get excited about it, like we're impersonating Rod Stewart or Evanescence. We're doing a runner because we're driving down to NYC for the David Letterman show. We're on it tomorrow (Thursday, to avoid any miscommunication or late rss-feed issues), and we're singing Sound Of Your Voice. If we screw it up, Kev's going to be pissed. Hope you watch it.

This man cannot be trusted with a camera.  I bring one with me on tour, and always forget to put it in my coat pocket.  In Montreal today, it is snowing like a bastard, and everyone is bundled up to the eyes.  I should have taken pictures.  But my camera is back here, warm and dry, in my hotel room.     
They’re tearing up the Main; big, deep holes are being pulled out of the middle of Boulevard St-Laurent, and sidewalks have been replaced with floppy, slippery sheets of plywood.  A man driving a bobcat was clearing the snow from what little sidewalk is left.  He was driving quickly up the busy boulevard, and I stepped into a doorway to let him pass.  We made eye contact, exchanged nods, and he sped up the street, smelling strongly of pot.
I stopped into a Dollarama where they were playing the Pointer Sisters’ “Slow Hand” over the P.A.  I bought new laces for my winter boots, proud that I’d actually acted preemptively, rather than in a panic after they’d broken.  My laces are stripped down to threads at the third eyelet, so I knew they’d break anytime.  Still, I felt remarkably like an adult.   
I trudged up the hill and finally reached my destination, Schwartz’s Deli, there since 1928 (though the menu says they’ve been smoking their meat the same way daily since 1930, so I’m curious about the two interim years).  Though it’s a Montreal institution, nothing makes you feel like a chump like a lineup outside in the snow.  You look around the lineup, and realize they are all tourists like you, or they’re anglo-Montreal exiles living in Edmonton, Toronto, Washington DC.  You gaze across the street at the Main Deli, with its faux-Hebrew lettering, and it’s $4.75 smoked meat sandwich, which many foodies, out of spite, contrarianism or truth, have declared equally as good as Schwartz’s. 
To hell with it, I said, I came to Schwartz’s for a smoked meat sandwich; I’m staying.  Not all that much later, I was seated at the counter with my sandwich (I ordered it fat, which was deliciously decadent, and thoroughly unnecessary – a medium would have sufficed), French fries that were surprisingly decent, and a pickle.  After one bite of the sandwich, I knew why I’d made the trek and withstood the Soviet-style lineup in the snow.  Fantastic.  At least as good as Katz’s, though Schwartz’s is even more of a dump, this was one of the great delights of the culinary arts, right here in my own country!  My country includes smoked meat.  In fact, a food-loving friend from New York, who shall remain nameless for his own protection, once told me that he doesn’t even bother with New York deli, so spoiled he was by this sandwich.  I was in and out in twenty minutes, and was thoroughly satisfied.  Back in the lineup, I had somehow misled myself into believing I was some kind of food writer or Jim Leff or something, and that I owed myself the experience of going across the street to the Main, and buying some of their smoked meat to take back to the room for later comparison.  Obviously I was out of my mind, because the last thing I wanted to do, as I trudged back down to my hotel, was to even look at any more smoke meat.  I skipped the blind taste-test.
I do need to go back sometime soon, though. I watched one of the guys grill some rye bread and some vursht for the girl behind the counter to eat while she rang up people’s cheques.  I want that.  And, they also apparently make their own smoked duck and goose.
Speaking of duck and goose, I’m meeting an old high school friend at Au Pied de Cochon, one of Montreal’s hottest restaurants, who specialize in porky, ducky, goosey, gamey Quebec food – what Timothy Taylor in his book Stanley Park (one of the <a href= http://www.cbc.ca/canadareads/>Canada Reads</a> selections) calls “rubber boot food”.  How am I supposed to find room for all that?  Reminds me of what my friend Jono once said when asked, “where IS the Carnegie Deli?”  “Practice, practice!”

So T-Bar Tuesday came and went, not with a bang, but with a whimper.  A chafed, grouchy whimper.  After telling the world about our great new tradition, we were uncomfortable by 5pm.  Ed, MISTER T-Bar tuesday, threw his g-string into the trashcan the moment we got into the dressing room after the show.  It was a fine idea at the time, but now it's a brilliant mistake.
Thank God tomorrow isn't Fishnet Friday.
Today is London, Ontario, and tomorrow is Toronto, the ACC - two of the biggest shows of the tour.  I think Toronto, somewhere in the vicinity of 13,000 people, will actually be our biggest night of the whole BLAM/BLAMen tour, and being the hometown, it's always nerve-wracking.  It's not that we get nervous, but this audience has seen us grow up, and there's lots of friends and family and media, and, as exciting as it will be, I look forward to a good sleep in my rack en route to Sault Ste Marie afterward!
ps - does everybody know that Barenaked Ladies Are Men is actually available in the stores right now?  It came out last week & it's the 2nd half of BLAM, and I like it a lot.  Now go and get it.
Please?

Welcome to the debut of T-Bar Tuesdays.  The brainchild of our sound engineer, Robin Billinton, the high-concept idea is that the entire band and crew wear thong underwear every Tuesday for the whole day.  This way, when out crew comes a-rolling of the buses in the morning and they start moving cases around, when they bend over, the locals can see the t-backs in their full glory.  Now you know if you see my high kicks appearing somewhat constricted. 
Funny, but when it comes down to it, I spend enough time feeling like I need to pull my underwear out of my ass.  I can't imagine electing to feel this way.  Except on Tuesdays.

Thanks to all of you for your notes and comments you've sent since finding out about our buddy Joe Self's accident. It's heartwarming to see how many people have as big a place in their hearts for Joe as we do. He's meant a lot to a whole lot of us. Some friends of ours and of Joe's have put up a website where you can post your good wishes and also make a donation to help offset Joe's medical bills, which will likely be sizeable. Go to www.joeselfhelp.com and whatever you can give, be it money or get well wishes, will be greatly appreciated. And thanks to Mace, Thales, Michelle and Keri for setting up the site.

Last night’s show in Calgary was really, really great. A great crowd, the setlist was god, and my voice was nearly back up to 100%.  Apart from the really obvious loss on the cruise (which was from a cold more than from anything else), when I have voice issues, it’s more about the loss of control of an instrument I usually know intimately – sometimes a not just disappears or wobbles when you least expect it!  Thanks for all of the suggestions – so many of you are health pros or fellow singers, but it was most entertaining to see the varied range of suggestions:  Lemon. No lemon. Honey.  No honey.  Hot drinks.  Warm drinks.  Gargle, etc.  I’ve chosen to ignore you all and just chug biodiesel.  We had all this extra laying around, see, and it seems to have worked.
Also thanks for your condolences on the Junos.  Of course we know it’s just an awards show and that awards are meaningless and blah blah blah, but you know that’s all bullshit when you win them.  We’ve been luck to win a bunch of Junos over the years (and to host them as well), and when they call your name and you’re up on the podium, they sure don’t feel meaningless.  Of course we’re thankful for all of you out there, who love and get what we do – but we’d be lying if we said it wasn’t nice to be recognized by our industry for our contribution.  Musicians usually talk too much like politicians or hockey players when it comes to stuff like this.
Lastly, I want to tell you about our great friend, Joe Self.  Many of you will remember Joe as the friendly, Texan security guard we brought out with us on several tours.  He’s been at home in Austin, working as part of the production crew on the tv show Friday Night Lights for the past little while.  A few days ago, he was driving to work on his motorcycle, stopped at an intersection, and was hit by a tractor-trailer who didn’t see him waiting there.  Joe was thrown from his bike and was rushed to the hospital.  It didn’t look good for a while, there.  He had severe spinal injuries, his face was smashed, and he was in a coma.  Now, however, the news seems to be getting better every day.  He has responded well to spinal surgery, woken from the coma, is responding to instructions, and is beginning to move his arms and legs.  He’s still in very serious condition, and we’re all thinking of him.  If you’re the praying type, now’s a good time.  In the coming days we will figure out how you can send him your good wishes if you so wish (I think a website is being constructed), and we’ll let you know as we find out.  We love you, Joe.

Well, I think the rest did me good.  I spent my day off doing dick all.  I walked around Whyte Ave. in Edmonton a bit, looked in some bookshops (I asked the girl at the hotel front desk if there were any bookstores around.  She scratched her head and then directed me to some antiquarian places to the left of the hotel.  After wandering for an hour, I realized there was a huge Chapters on the right-hand side... I guess she forgot).  I bought a salad and ate it in my room, read, watched George Strombo do a terrible S.Page impersonation on the Hour (imitation the finest form!) and had a bath. 
In my mind, I was going to spend my day off Connecting With Western Canada.  Oh well, I guess that's what Sunday in Regina is for.
Voice was at 85% last night, and should be even better tonight.  The crowd was into 'er in Edmonton, and will be even bigger tonight in Calgary, so all is looking up.
Congratulations to Tomi Swick on his Juno nomination... I remember what that's like.  No bitterness here, though.  I'm sure there are lots of Canadian artists out there playing arenas and selling hundreds of thousands of copies of their latest album who didn't get nominated, right?

After six days straight (including the taping of an Easter radio special in Vancouver), we finally get a day off here in chilly Edmonton. My voice is hanging by a thread, so I've holed up in my hotel room and am pledging to speak as little as possible today. The singing doesn't hurt, but talking seems to take an undue amount of energy. Maybe I need to take some lessons. Maybe it's just God telling me to shut the frak up. Finished reading Geoff Emerick's "Here, There and Everywhere", his account of working as the Beatles' recording engineer. It featured very few revelations, some vague revisionism, and a general tone that sneered "most of them were jerks, including George Martin, and only Paul was talented". What a waste of time. Apart from going back to try to find the hidden swear word in "Hey Jude", it left me pretty cold. Juno nominations came out today. Guess what? We're not nominated! Not that I'm surprised. I suspect we won't get another until we start suing our fans and insisting on DRM on all of our music, which, with Steve Jobs' article published today, seems a more and more distant reality. Jobs' letter today is great news for the industry in general. I've always assumed that DRM was a condition set by the record labels, not by Apple, and that Apple conceded only as a way to get the labels to sell their music through iTunes. Interoperability will drive iPod sales, and also music sales. This is what we at the Canadian Music Creators Coaltions (CMCC) have been pushing, and I'm glad to see Apple make a push for a DRM-free world, as Jobs suggests here: The third alternative is to abolish DRMs entirely. Imagine a world where every online store sells DRM-free music encoded in open licensable formats. In such a world, any player can play music purchased from any store, and any store can sell music which is playable on all players. This is clearly the best alternative for consumers, and Apple would embrace it in a heartbeat. If the big four music companies would license Apple their music without the requirement that it be protected with a DRM, we would switch to selling only DRM-free music on our iTunes store. Every iPod ever made will play this DRM-free music.