This week's guest is Jason Rushforth, who shares his journey through the world of live music. From the magnetic pull of The Beatles, courtesy of his British father, to the electrifying vibes of his first Motley Crue concert, Jason's stories are a testament to the lifelong magic of music. As he takes us through his early days of musical discovery, prepare to be transported back to your own formative years of concert-going and album-spinning. And our journey doesn't stop at rock-n-roll; we venture into the evolving world of country music, as well. So tune in for a rollercoaster ride of musical memories and the sheer joy of seeing live music, this week on the Rock-N-Roll Show Podcast!
This week's guest is Jason Rushforth, who shares his journey through the world of live music. From the magnetic pull of The Beatles, courtesy of his British father, to the electrifying vibes of his first Motley Crue concert, Jason's stories are a testament to the lifelong magic of music. As he takes us through his early days of musical discovery, prepare to be transported back to your own formative years of concert-going and album-spinning. And our journey doesn't stop at rock-n-roll; we venture into the evolving world of country music, as well. So tune in for a rollercoaster ride of musical memories and the sheer joy of seeing live music, this week on the Rock-N-Roll Show Podcast!
Welcome to the Rock-N- Roll Show P podcast. We're here to share the magic of experiencing live music together with strangers and with friends, and to get to know our guests a little bit better through their concert experience. I'm your host, Alex Gadd, and I started this podcast to recapture the fun of talking about music with friends sitting around a fire pit after dinner. Finding out what band someone likes and what shows they've been to allows us to get to know and understand one another better. And hey, I just love swapping stories about shows we've seen over the years. Today, I'm excited to welcome Jason Rushforth to the podcast. Jason is our second international guest on the show. Hailing from the great white north of Canada, he's built an impressive 25 plus year career in software sales and, in fact, he was my boss at my last job. We had a good four year run together and what I learned is that he's a huge music fan. I can't wait to hear all about his concert memories. Have you hear about them too? So, Jason, thanks for joining us Awesome.
Jason Rushforth:Alex, Thank you and greetings from the great white North living outside of Toronto, Canada. I love the topic of music and having the conversation today. I know you and I over the years have had spatterings of conversation, good stories, and I'm excited to be here today. Thanks for having me.
Alex Gadd:Let's just start off with how music came into your life. I know you started off when you were a kid. You were an athlete first and foremost. How did music permeate your life? I know you started off when you were a kid. You were an athlete first and foremost, but how did music permeate your existence If?
Jason Rushforth:I didn't play hockey, which is like a rite of passage up here in Canada. I would have loved to have been a guitar player or a drummer or do something else, but I never. That never manifested that way. Music came into my life at a very young age. Right, I lived in a house where my father, being british, always had music playing in the house. Discovered the beatles at a very young age because we had the red album, which is like their greatest hits, I believe one of the two.
Alex Gadd:Yeah, they had two greatest hits records the blue and the red the blue and the red it was.
Jason Rushforth:I think help was on the red one. If I'm not mistaken, it was like the second record track, number one maybe and I, when I first heard that song, played it over and over again. In my sister's bedroom she had a record player. I put it on, I'd spin it, I'd listen to it and I'd just keep playing it over and over. I'd put it on, I'd spin it, I'd listen to it and I'd just keep playing it over and over.
Jason Rushforth:And I started to realize that music was something that motivated me, it moved me, it had impact on my life and I started listening to a lot more music at a very young age where other kids didn't really care. I was like going home listening to music. I always had music playing in my. Do you remember those yellow Sony walk-ins? You put your tape in? I had one of those and I would listen to it every day, walk into school and it became a big part of my life. And when you think about playing hockey or any sport and getting pumped up, I would go in the dressing room and always have a headset on, always listening to music that moved me and got me motivated for whatever the, the game is, or whatever I was doing did you have a favorite first band at some point?
Alex Gadd:usually we latch on to a band early on.
Jason Rushforth:For me it was kiss yeah it was just it was in grade one, my brother being a metalhead you know he I was dressed as a clown. My mom would do his makeup and my brother did my face like Gene Simmons from Kiss, and I would listen to Kiss Alive 1 over and over again. I remember goosebumps I would get when Detroit Rock City would play and it was like my first real band that I was like, oh, I love these guys. It obviously transitions over the years. Kiss was top of the block for me when I first heard them.
Alex Gadd:Yeah, me too. Exactly the same. I had a kid bring the rock and roll over album into second grade classes, show and tell, and he played. The first song was I want. You starts off with a slow intro and then it gets super aggressive and my head almost exploded and I was like this is what I want to get, whatever that is, I want that feeling, that's right, that's heavily into a'm heavily into it Playing with my street hockey sticks, playing air guitar.
Jason Rushforth:you know, yeah, I love that.
Alex Gadd:Yeah, so how did that transition into your first concert? When did you see your first concert?
Jason Rushforth:My first real concert I was in grade seven, maybe Growing up. My brother went to every single concert. My mom said I could never go Too much drinking and drugs and all the things that go with it. My first real concert was Motley Crue girls, girls, girls tour in Maple Leaf Gardens and I was fairly young and it was fairly provocative back in the day. And then Motley Crue from part of my life was everything. I had motley crew posters everywhere. I wore motley crew t-shirts. I thought I'm absolutely gonna be tommy lee when I grow up.
Alex Gadd:Clearly I look nothing like him he doesn't look anything like him anymore either, so that's no, he doesn't getting old. So motley crew, who opened for motley crew do you?
Jason Rushforth:remember it may have been poison. I went, my brother said look you gotta. I sat with him while he drank beers because I was quite young to be drinking beer and he's usually the opening act. You don't worry about jay, you go in for the headline. And so I sat with him at a bar. He drank beer. I went into the concert.
Alex Gadd:Do you remember what the best part of that show or the most outrageous part of that show was? Because, for your first concert-going experience, I imagine that sensory overload seeing that Tommy Lee always has really spectacular.
Jason Rushforth:And I walked out of there and I said I want to be a drummer, I don't want to be a lead singer, I don't want to play guitar, I want to be a drummer. Other than the half naked girls at the back of the stage doing background vocal, tommy Lee had a drum kit that went in circles. It was on this. It was like a ball, yeah, like a hamster ball and he was playing this drum solo upside and I was like. I turned to my brother and I said is this what? Every drum solo? It's like I've never seen anything like it ever. His one in doctor feel good tour was also really amazing, but that was like sensory overload for me. I was like, oh my god, I know every song. I love motley crew. There's pyrotechnics and laser lights everywhere, but drum solo was something I'll never forget I am.
Alex Gadd:I imagine it was. That's incredible. Now at this point, you're early in high school, I guess yeah I'm at that point, I'm like grade seven, I think okay yeah so there's an interesting dynamic with canadian rock fans in that you know all the american acts, but then there are a ton of canadian acts that never crossed over for every brian adams and lover boy there's a tragically hip, or a max webster that never translated to america, did you?
Jason Rushforth:have a favorite local band oh my, like we were tragically hip. Like I love rush, but rush trans like rush was international, they were massive neil young international. But the hip you. If I think about my youth in high school and every kid coming in when you first had cd players in the car, it was like road apple tragically hip, full blast and none of us could understand why they never transitioned to the us they play dan akroyd had them on saturday night live that was one of the best saturday night live music performances ever.
Jason Rushforth:It is my honor to introduce to america my friends that tragically and and you could go see them in a bar with 20 other people in North Carolina when they would tour. Yet they would sell out four nights in a row at Maple Leaf Gardens or wherever they were playing. They were iconic to the country. Gord Downie, the lead singer, passed away three or four years ago and when they played their last concert in Kingston, which is where they're from, just outside of east of Toronto by two hours driving, tickets were selling for like $23,000. I was looking to go. They played in a little Junior A hockey arena.
Jason Rushforth:The prime minister of the country was there and every single person I know we had everybody. This is my backyard right. I have a bar over there somewhere and big screen TV. We had it set up and there's hundreds of people and everybody watched. They aired the concert live and his brain was going right. I don't know if you know this. And they had to print. In the corporate world, when you do a PowerPoint presentation at an event, they have what are they called? There's a name for the monitor and they play the words you're supposed to be saying oh teleprompter yeah, yeah, teleprompter, there's a new name for it.
Jason Rushforth:I forget what it's called, but he had a teleprompter in front of him because he didn't know the lyrics to all of his songs right, and he went out and gave like the most amazing concert ever. I wish I was there live. Obviously, 23 000 bucks is a lot pay to see him, but the hip was and are one of the most iconic Canadian bands that never were. They are loved and revered in this country. They've won a plethora of awards. They've been recognized by the government and yet, one hour south of here in Buffalo, no one's ever heard of them.
Alex Gadd:Sure, in Burlington, vermont, where I went to college, I was a DJ at a rock station and they caught on in Burlington and we had them out on Lake Champlain on a ferry that went between Burlington, vermont, and Plattsburgh, new York.
Jason Rushforth:We had them play for contest winners.
Alex Gadd:They played one of the best shows I've ever seen on a ferry for maybe 100 people, maybe maybe 50 people, and they were incredible. They were incredible and I went on to see them in New York. I saw them in Montreal.
Alex Gadd:I saw them again in Burlington a couple of years later, and I too never could figure out how they weren't translating. Their songs were fantastic. They were very canadian in subject matter, but they also translated far beyond that. And then I watched that final concert live on an internet stream and cried like I was crying oh, people were crying.
Jason Rushforth:People were crying. First we'd climb the tree and then we'd go and talk or sit silently and listen to our thoughts. The birds, as a song today, casting their golden light. This is our life and I have been made with a brand new heart and I've been strong enough. You are an epicentrist. You are an epicentrist.
Alex Gadd:You are an epicentrist. It was incredible and he was so cool. He was dressed in all like blue, lame with a big hat and a feather in his hat. So yes, that is the biggest shame is that the tragically hip in my mind for canadian music didn't translate. Because, rush, yeah, lover boy, brian adams, neil young, there were joni mitchell. Tons of people did cross over and somehow they just never did. They never did. Did you ever see them live?
Jason Rushforth:oh, I, I have a good story to tell. And yes, I've seen them. I'm canadian. I've seen them a hundred times live, whether it's at canada day celebrations or whatever.
Jason Rushforth:So I worked with a guy who played in the band and they were really not a great band, but they were a bunch of old dads played in the band and the guitarist of that band was the accountant for the Tragically Hip. So I'm not dating my wife at the time. This is the 90s and he says you should come watch us play. It was like 40 minutes from my house. I drive to the bar, I walk in. There's not a human being in the bar and the guy that sits next to me with his wife is Gord Downie in. There's not human being in the bar and the guy that sits next to me with his wife is Gord Downie, the lead singer of the Tragically Hip. With his wife we had a conversation. He went to watch his accountant play for an hour. It was pretty cool.
Jason Rushforth:But yeah, I think the most memorable was Maple Leaf Gardens Again, dating myself. Tragically hip album. Was it fully, completely? I believe they opened for Rush on the Roll the Bones tour how, how iconic Canadiana you absolutely get and Rush didn't cut the hip short and the hip played a full set as if they were headlining. And then Rush played their full set and it was off the chart.
Alex Gadd:People going nuts. I would go nuts. That would be the greatest double bill, and for Rush to give the hip. That credit and that freedom and that respect to play their full set is really cool. How many shows do you think you've seen overall, Jay?
Jason Rushforth:Round number 250. Probably.
Alex Gadd:And how far have you traveled? What's the concert that took you the longest to get to?
Jason Rushforth:so it's hard to answer that question. I've seen con in California. I've seen I've not seen conference in Europe that I can think of for work. This whole thing that happens that people don't recognize is that all of these artists perform privately, and so I've seen tons of private venues with Foo Fighters, red Hot Chili Peppers, bands like that, a lot of them in California. I've seen Aerosmith and Motley Crue in Chicago at the amphitheater I don't even remember the name of the amphitheater. Now, for the most part I'm seeing concerts in kind of the Toronto, new York upstate, new York, chicago, where I go a lot, florida, california, but like never, nothing crazy. I never, never, never traveled that far to see a concert. How about you?
Alex Gadd:Yeah, I've never left North America. I've never seen a concert anywhere else. I've been in Europe a ton and I almost saw Springsteen and Billy Joel two days in a row a couple of years ago at in Hyde Park in London. But the timing the timing didn't work out so I didn't go. But yeah, I've been. I've seen shows in Atlanta, minneapolis, austin, texas. I saw Pearl Jam last year before our customer event. So yeah, just traveling. But rarely do I travel for a concert. I try to see a concert while I'm traveling for work, as you mentioned.
Jason Rushforth:That's it. That's exactly it.
Alex Gadd:Yeah. So of all those concerts, do you have a favorite? Is there a way to put a finger on the most amazing concert you ever saw? Or a couple of them? What would they be?
Jason Rushforth:I think of concerts like this, right, sometimes the sound is shitty, the vocals are bad, but there's such a high energy in the stadium that the people singing, the people you're with the fun and energy you bring to the concert returns itself and you walk in and go. That was unbelievable. And then you bring to the concert returns itself and you walk in and go. That was unbelievable. And then you read the newspaper the next day and some critics like that was the worst concert I've ever seen. And here's the reasons why I think every concert and every artist I've watched perform, you take something different out of it. I've seen the Rolling Stones, I think. You just recently saw an unbelievable concert. Was it my favorite? No, I think my favorite concerts are the ones I had the lowest expectation going in and the highest feeling coming, the most excited feeling going.
Jason Rushforth:Katy Perry. I took my kids to see her in Chicago. We bought tickets. It was a destination concert and my wife and I we had to split up because I have four kids, so my four kids sat a few rows back. I was in second row floor. I'm like it's Katy Perry, what can you expect? It was one of those mind-blowing concerts. I was like that was was unbelievable. It was a performance people were seeing. It was a lot of fun. It was lots of props and stuff happening, but undeniably going to the metallica black album tour back-to-back nights was at a scale and something I've never seen in my life. So I'm not answering your question because I don't know if I have an answer.
Alex Gadd:No, you're answering it. The right way is that there's not one answer no, there isn't. Yeah, for some people they have one thing that stood out like beyond, but for most people again, when you've seen 250 shows, you have all kinds of experiences that are unique and special in their own way.
Jason Rushforth:Yep, Good, bad and all sorts of things in between.
Alex Gadd:Have you ever discovered a band only by going to see the show and perhaps catching the opening act, not knowing who they were, and then been blown away by them?
Jason Rushforth:I was a mega Pantera fan and I became a Pantera fan only because I went to go. There were at the fourth Coliseum in the Toronto exhibition. They have this building that's now been repurposed for junior and junior hockey and it was filled with dirt on the ground and they would tranche horses around for the Canadian National Exhibition. And Pantera was the opening act for Skid Row. And I was also partially Canadian Sebastian Bach and I saw Pantera and I was like phew. I had no expectation. So I will never forget. I went home on the GO train that night. I said to my brother brother, we have this Pantera vulgar display of power. I put it on. It was like three in the morning, we were drinking beer and we played a full blast and I was like, oh my gosh, one of my all-time favorite bands. I don't listen to them that much now, but as a kid that was a band that I picked up by watching an opening arc.
Alex Gadd:I love those stories. For me it was. I went to see scorpions and bon jovi opened and I had no idea who bon jovi was.
Jason Rushforth:No idea in and out of love.
Alex Gadd:Yeah, it was, yeah, it was still runaway, I think or run away and out of love by them, but the second album, but no idea who they were. I was there to see the Scorpions got in and happened to catch the opening act and was blown away. So finding those gem bands, and then, like you said, with Pantera and Bon Jovi is a similar thing. They blow up and become massive headliners unto themselves.
Jason Rushforth:Oh it's, amazing, yeah, it's amazing?
Alex Gadd:Yeah, it really is. I love those things. Do you have a favorite type of venue? Do you like going to arenas, clubs, theaters, amphitheaters, stadiums? Is there a?
Jason Rushforth:thing that you like more than others or not as much as others Depends on what kind of music. But you're going to go see Elton John or the Stone, you're going to see them in a mega like a football stadium or a baseball stadium, sometimes open air, sometimes it's a dome and I don't find the concert that intimate. I like more intimate venues. So I love scotia bank center back in the day, maple leaf gardens to go see concerts because you know there's not a bad seat in the house, right, sound is usually pretty good and you're you're closer to the artist If you're in the top note leads of the Rolling Stones concert you're watching a monitor. So I like indoor for the most part. I like to be close to the stage and I like it to be as small as possible.
Alex Gadd:Yeah, I feel very similar as you grow with a musician and an artist. If they get more successful, you don't have a choice anymore. You have to go see it in an arena or a stadium, and so I've seen the majority of my concerts at Madison Square Garden and in arenas. But that's because of the bands that I seek out. I do like going to clubs and theaters. Theater is really the perfect midpoint for me where clubs you really is hit and miss. If they're in a theater, you already know what kind of performer they are and they're just still on the up or on the downside. Have you done a lot of festivals any?
Jason Rushforth:yes, okay, I had done festivals, not like lilith fair, but like I've done run by another canadian, sarah mclaughlin no, she's, she's very talented.
Jason Rushforth:So there was something called Edgefest up at Barry Molson Park about an hour north of Toronto, usually a couple day venue with at that time alternative bands like Soundguard or Nine Inch Nails, and then we used to always have Canada Day celebrations at the same venue. So I've seen some acts like Crazy Enough at Canada Day and I watched Van Halen headline on Canada Day at Wollson Park. But I have been to festivals. I'm getting way too old to go now, like my kids are talking about. There's a famous event called Boots and Heart country venue up here in Torontoonto or north of toronto. It's four days of sleeping in mud and I'm too old for that. I always say to my kids I'd rather spend money, fly on a plane, go see the artists that I want to see and sleep in uh, in my hotel room.
Alex Gadd:I'm with you 100 I've. Actually, the only festival I ever saw was another roadside attraction which was a tragically hip festival in Montreal back in 90. I think it was 93. And that was amazing. And that's the only festival I've ever gone to, because I don't like all the dirt and walking around and having to fight your way into front of one thing and then you're not in position to see the next act or too too much for me but.
Alex Gadd:I understand their value. My brother, in fact, is works for a production company that produces only rock festivals and music, oh wow. So he's always saying you got to come with, and I always say I don't know if I could get in through a side door, if I could go through a side door, be close to the stage, watch the act that I want to see.
Jason Rushforth:I would go, but I not. I'm not plugging it through the mud and sleeping in the now.
Alex Gadd:With you there. So you mentioned kiss alive as being foundational for you in terms of getting hip to music. I think that it's interesting and I'd love your take on this. Our generation before MTV, especially, had no way of knowing what our bands that we loved actually sounded like or looked like live. Because we got their record. We heard what they sounded like in the studio. The only way to get that was to get a live record, and live records serve two purposes, right, because you also get a greatest hits record out of it and you get to hear how they sound. Were there other live albums that you really locked into as a kid? Oh my god, that's a great question. Alive is already one of the foundational ones in all of rock hits alive.
Jason Rushforth:If you said live album right now, name them, I'd be like it's alive one it's alive. What would be the first two? I was. I love music but I never really found myself when I want to buy the live album. I don't know why, because probably I had their music already. Motley crew live I had a couple, but nothing that jumps off a page. Do you have a?
Alex Gadd:favorite concert venue? Is it Maple Leaf Gardens? Is it a small?
Jason Rushforth:place. Maple Leaf Gardens closed right and it's been repurposed as, like, a food distribution center, something like that I would say. Scotiabank Arena in Toronto is one of the best venues for concerts in the area. Tickets are closed. It's intimate. It's a good place to watch music. The acoustics in there are good.
Alex Gadd:You mentioned earlier that you had branched out into other types of music. I know you've gotten to see country music shows as well. Tell me how that transition took place and what that's like.
Jason Rushforth:So, growing up in the 90s, I loathe country music, the twang. I never got into it. I had a roommate in university who loved country music and I'm like, oh please, I can't listen to it. Country music in 2024 is very different than it was in the 90s, even early 2000s, and I say this to my kids all the time.
Jason Rushforth:You listen to some of the newest artists and I was listening to this artist called Hardy. My kids are going to go see him next week. I'm debating if I go see him. My kids are going to go see him next week. I'm debating if I go see him. And I heard him on Octane, sirius XM. Octane is like the heavy of heavy metal channel and what I realized, country music pivots to country rap. Let's call it soul country or authentic country.
Jason Rushforth:I don't listen to that very much. You've got the pop genre and then you've got guys like Hardy heavy metal, jason Aldean, hard rock, kane Brown kind of rap-ish style, or Morgan Wallen, almost on that fringe of rap of rap. And so I took my kids, my family, to Luke Holmes at Scotiabank and it was awesome. It was awesome, it was a great concert. It wasn't about pyrotechnics and set changes and shit like that. It was a guy, guitar, people singing in unison and I started listening to it around that point a couple years ago and I find myself liking country music Not all, but I like a lot of country music, a lot more than I used to Recognizing. If I said, like go put on the song Sold Out by Hardy, go listen to that.
Alex Gadd:After this podcast and you tell me what genre of music it is You're going to say, you know you'll say that hard rock but when you the artist, is country so confusing yeah, it's interesting, I think you hit it right on the head is that country has become so pervasive that country branches into every type of music and it's no longer its own type, it's a whole genre of music that has lots of different branches. And I caught on with Zach Brown band and Jason Aldean has some really rock and roll songs. Eric Church is another one that he made. He plays songs that sound like rock and roll to me, with a country tint to it, for sure. Have you seen other country concerts since Luke Cohn? I saw Luke Cohn, I've seen, I've seen, I've seen, I've seen, I've seen, I've seen like rock and roll to me, with a country tint to it, for sure. Have you seen other country concerts since luke cole?
Jason Rushforth:I saw luke home. I've seen luke bryan. I was front row for luke bryan with my wife. My kids were up in the lawn and the amphitheater watching the same venue. It was a party, luke bryan. It's like going to a house party and some dude's drinking beer, slamming the guitar. It was fun. It was simple, but it was a party. It was a good time. Yeah, that's fun.
Alex Gadd:It's fun to go out and just have fun with 20,000 or 12,000 other people.
Jason Rushforth:Everyone's drinking beers. It's not an angry concert, it's just people having fun, no attitude.
Jason Rushforth:I'm always like, oh, I'd go see him again. I'd go see luke combs again. My kids just turned 19, they go to school in the us, so I bought him tickets to luke combs in the highmark stadium in buffalo, at orchard park, whatever it's called now I sure don't even remember where the bills play. Yeah, and they're like it was unbelievable. There's good performers in the country scene. But my very first country concert was I was at a fundraiser in minnesota. Do you mind if I tell you this story quickly?
Alex Gadd:oh, I want to hear these stories. This is why we're.
Jason Rushforth:This is what the podcast is all about okay, I'm gonna step back and tell you the whole story, because the whole story is nuts. So one of my customers in the past life was a hearing aid manufacturer in Minnesota. So part of the contract was we had to make a financial contribution to their fundraising event. So we made the financial contribution and the CIO called me and says you have to get a ticket for the actual grand event and four tickets for the house part. And I said, okay, so I buy an airline ticket, I fly to Minnesota, I invite several people that work with me that know the customer, invite several people that work with me that know the customer. Well, I said to my wife I have zero expectation around what this is, but we'll drink some champagne, we'll have some fun, appreciate coming.
Jason Rushforth:My expectations as we talked about Alex were like rock bottom. I remember I was taking a limo to the house party with a guy named Pierre and his wife and my wife and I said Cole, we drove past the football stadium in Minnesota and I'm like, oh my God, you choose 360 Tour playing tonight. Let's go, let's talk to the CEO. It's going to be a boring ass party and we'll go see you too. They're like, yeah, that sounds like an idea. So we'll get tickets. We might be a bit late, but let's just go figure that out.
Jason Rushforth:We get to this house party, alec, they had to put us in a van with tarp on the van so we could not see where we were going. We pull up and you would love this. We pull up to this driveway. There is this mansion, and I'm talking massive and we walk up the driveway we're greeted by this guy and I'm like said to my wife, I've never seen Grey Goose sponsor a house party before. This is odd. So I go downstairs to get some sandwich and a beer and I'm like, oh my god, this guy has like 500 personally autographed guitars from every artist you've ever desired have a guitar. And in the middle of this room was the red piano from elton john, bequeathed to the CEO, signed by Elton John, on the top of the red piano, and I would think how this guy's in the music like big time. Once again, zero expectation.
Jason Rushforth:I walked up and I go to use the washroom and I'm like, excuse me, and it was Miley Cyrus who was blocking the door to the bathroom in this house party. I used the restroom. My wife goes you've got to come see this. You're not going to believe it. I'm like what's that? She's like? Kevin Costner and his band are playing the full two sets tonight in the garage of this house party and they had this tarp up the town park and the they had this tarp up. And then we met gary bucey, mini me, the minnesota vikings, the twins. There was celebrities wall to wall in this place and it was a really fun night. And I remember miley cyrus. She's dancing around and they're pouring her straight vodka into this glass and her protectors are like hiding the glass and she's like spitting through a straw.
Jason Rushforth:Wait, the next night we go to this gala event and the gala event had a concert and the concert was garth brooks and it was unbelievable. I didn't like Berk Brooks. He played seven songs on this acoustic guitar and then holds it up and says who wants to buy this guitar? How much do you think the guitar sold? For $10,000. I think that's what I would have said, but I'm among the millionaires, the mega millionaires. Somebody bought it for like $285,000. He signed it, handed it to the lady and then that money went to the charity.
Jason Rushforth:The surprise of the night, miley Cyrus. I actually talked to her in an after party and I said I am shocked at how good she played Landslide. She was playing like not the Hannah Montana, but she was super talented. This is really good she played. Every rose has its thorn by poison. It was one of these venues where I was just like that was really good and meatloaf true story. I'm walking and I said something about the dashboard light. He grabbed my face and kissed me on the lip meatloaf at this event. But my first real country exposure was garth brooke, this private event that we were at.
Alex Gadd:It was unbelievable what an incredible experience yeah, it was pretty cool yeah, garth brooks really ushered in that era of country crossover to rock and roll and pop music because he loved billy joel and he loved all of the rock musicians and if you listen closely you can hear that influence in their music, especially country artists on the other side of that.
Alex Gadd:Have you ever seen a band where you said you know what I'm so disappointed. I never want to see them again? Morrissey, yeah, he makes it hard. He makes it hard to like him it wasn't my genre music.
Jason Rushforth:Somebody said you want to come with me. I went to the concert. I was like oh my god, but and you're going to fall out of your chair with what I say. Next, I'm a huge Eagle fan. I went to see the Eagles at the Canadian National Exhibition and I was so underwhelmed I sat there. There were people falling asleep in the stand. They stood, they played, the sound was shitty and I remember because RoboCop came out on stage. I'm not sure why, but robocop the, the movie it was a movie as a movie.
Jason Rushforth:Peter weller was a star he's yeah. So robocop came on stage at one point but I was like this concert could be so amazing and it just what. It fell flat and I was like, oh, never again will I pay that kind of money to go see the egos it's interesting.
Alex Gadd:You say that because I saw them for the first time last fall and don henley actually scolded the audience and told everyone to stay seated that's not why you're gonna come through shocking.
Alex Gadd:I was so disappointed in the whole thing and they played all the mellow songs and very few of the upbeat songs. Yeah, by then glenn fry had already died, but still they're playing their songs. They have enough musicians. Play the good one. They played all the slow ones, which were good, but it was also underwhelming and for the money, not really worth it. I agree 100%. How about guest appearances? One of the things that I'm really interested in is hearing stories about you're going to see Neil Young and some other big rock star just shows up to sing a song. Has that ever? Have you ever had an experience like that?
Jason Rushforth:It has but the one and there wasn't. Like a total shocker. I saw Neil Young, soundgarden and Pearl Jam play, because that time Pearl Jam coming up grunges on the scene, somebody decided it was probably a PR person, that Neil Young was the original king of grunge and so when he played Keep On Rockin' in the free world, it was him. Eddie Madder, I think Cornell also came and sang it with them. It's a rockin' tune, but it was just like the three artists came together to play the song. It was unbelievable.
Alex Gadd:I only have a couple other questions, and they're really focused on your bucket list items. Is there a band out there today that you haven't seen, that you really are dying to see?
Jason Rushforth:so yes, of course there is, you must have. I'm curious what's your bucket list?
Alex Gadd:before I answer, of the bands that are still around. I've never seen ACDC. I love ACDC in an unhealthy way and I have never seen them and it's such a shame. So if they come around, they're in Europe right now. They haven't announced North American dates. If they do, I will be there. That's the one for me right now. And then it was Kiss. But I almost went to their last show, which was december 2nd I think, at madison square garden, and I just couldn't bring myself to do it, because I love kiss from the 70s and it's so different now it's cheesy now, yeah, not bring myself to.
Alex Gadd:I didn't want to ruin the love that I had for them back. My answer now is ACDC, so now I'll turn it back to you.
Jason Rushforth:So I did see ACDC at the Skydome Razor's Edge tour, oh great. And when they introed with Thunderstruck they always end with for those about to rock fire, canons go off. Everybody was slamming their seats and the whole stadium. I have goosebumps. What? Yeah, how. It was like the concrete was moving because everyone was going and slamming the seats, like people were breaking the seats in the stadium. Yeah, it was a pretty impressive performance for me. I really want to see Slipknot. It's a hard, the hard concert to go to. I'm an old guy walking in a very different world of who the audience is.
Alex Gadd:Yeah, aggressive crowd.
Jason Rushforth:It's an aggressive crowd and Corey Taylor, who's the lead singer of Slipknot, is also also the lead singer of a band called Stone Sour and he also has his own music, CMFT. Corey Mother F-ing Taylor.
Alex Gadd:Right, which is like normal rock, like hard-edged rock and roll.
Jason Rushforth:When they tour. A lot of times Stone Sour open for Slipknot. I'd love to go see that, but I don't know if I'm a Mosh guy, so I'm on the edge there. Uh, I've seen the Stones. I've seen a lot of big bands. There's no one right now that other than Slipknot that I'm like. I'd love to go see Metallica again, but I've seen them a bunch of times.
Jason Rushforth:I do have a Metallica story. So I played junior hockey growing up. I stopped playing hockey and I'm in a men's league and I show up to a game and 11 o'clock at night and I'm pulling my Dodge Omni four speed manual transmission and I pull up and there is a Porsche 911 beside a Porsche 911, beside a Porsche 911. And these guys are smoking weed before they go to play hockey. And I go in the dressing room and I'm like immediately, these guys are what? What do you think? They're drug dealers, that's what you think. Right, and I walk in, I send it to one guy I said I got to ask what do you do for work?
Jason Rushforth:You're driving like the hundred thousand dollars plus, or you're smoking weed, you got taps everywhere and you got this long hair. And he goes oh, I'm a pyrotechnic engineer. I did the kiss alive tour. I'm working on Metallica right now and he was like an engineer that designed how the pot go off and so on and so forth. The other guy was a guy named andy curran and he was in a band called pony hatch another canadian artist you may never have heard of. He had a song called monkey bars. Andy curran was a staple in can music. He was signed by Sony Music and so I played hockey with these guys. The guy that did the pyrotechnics invited me VIP to a Metallica concert that only aired, I think, six or ten shows because they had to retract. People were leaving the stadium thinking that the stadium was catching fire and basically what happened was headfield in montreal opening for guns and roses oh yeah stood on a pot.
Jason Rushforth:What happened?
Alex Gadd:boom lit up his arm I go to this venue.
Jason Rushforth:I'm with the guy who does the pyrotechnics in hamilton and I'm like literally on the rail. It's Metallica, two stages in this hockey arena. They play the concert. It's loud as hell, it's amazing. And at the end of it they've been playing like master, a puppet or something and all of a sudden he goes no, and these pots start going off all over the stage. What do you think they mimicked? They mimicked that there was a problem on the stage, like Montreal. The guy in the boom falls to the stage and crashes and pots are going off everywhere and people were leaving running to the door. They thought the show was blowing up. It was amazing because they came back out and they turned on each 100-watt light bulb over their head and their encore. But yeah, so the guy that did that played hockey with me, but it's like this random thing. I meet this guy and he's the Metallica pyrotechnic guy. It's pretty cool, but I would love to see certain bands again, especially as they're getting older, but right now Slipknot's the only band.
Alex Gadd:Okay, let's figure out when that's happening. Aren't they going on tours?
Jason Rushforth:They are. They're playing in Toronto in August Once again. My balancing act is I could go. I don't want to sit in the back, and if I sit in the front you know it's an aggressive concert.
Alex Gadd:Maybe you sit on the side in the front, so you're not on the floor, perhaps? Oh, yeah, yeah, um, I have a band for you, just since we're talking about this. There's a band, a local band in Connecticut here called the Zambonis, and they write original music about hockey. It's the songs are rock and roll songs about life, but they use hockey as a theme in the metaphors you would love it and I've interviewed the guy on the podcast who is one of the main guys, this guy, dave schneider, who is so smart and so interesting, and they are great.
Alex Gadd:the zambonis check them out. And how about venues? Or is there a venue that you've never been to, that you, in your mind, you're going to go to see a live music show before you die? Madison square garden.
Jason Rushforth:You come down and I'll take you. We'll go to a concert together. I'd love to go there.
Alex Gadd:Oh, we'll do it. That's the place I've seen the most shows and I love it is like the mother church of rock and roll.
Jason Rushforth:Yeah, I have a tip. I have a tip for your viewers, by the way. Can?
Jason Rushforth:I tell you my trick. How do you buy cheap concert tickets without getting scammed? So somebody once told me that it doesn't happen. For every show you have to be prepared never to get a ticket. But and I did this, for luke holmes was playing back-to-back nights in toronto. I was prepared to go the second night. I'd already bought my kids tickets and I was like I think I want to go to this concert.
Jason Rushforth:He went on stage around nine o'clock at night. At 9 10 ticket master released 2 000 tickets because a dude walks around the stadium with an ipad and says we didn't sell this. Walk right beside the stage because we didn't know how it would all configure. And they released ticket during the venue Boom, boom. So I had third row right beside Luke home on the side. Had I bought those tickets one section over or seeds the day before, I would have probably paid 1500 bucks a seat I and the price on the ticket was like 200 bucks. I paid $80 the night before and so my kids are like dad, can you do that again? I did it again for another Luke Holmes concert. So if you're patient and you want to get a good deal and you know the artists playing back-to-back nights or the day of the concert, when set the stage, they will launch a block of new tickets and if you're on ticketmaster you can usually get them, and you can get them less than face value.
Alex Gadd:That is a great tip. I love it.
Jason Rushforth:I'm gonna try it immediately pick any random concert. Alex, it's friday, there's probably a concert sunday or saturday at madison square garden, but perhaps just follow the ticket prices, wait for that artist to go on, go to ticket masters, watch them release the seed. Not every venue, not every concert, but like when I saw elton john last year, the year before they launched a boatload of tickets after they set up the stage that makes sense.
Alex Gadd:It makes perfect sense what you're saying. I never thought about it like that before, but that's great, thank you. Yeah, all right. So my last question is simply this what do you think for you keeps you going back to live music? What is it about live music? That really is something that I know you well enough to know that you'll be going to live music until you can. About live music that really is something that I know you well enough to know that you'll be going to live music until you can't walk anymore, and then maybe still be going to live music I love the party, I love to have beers being part of like large social gatherings, but I love the energy, like I.
Jason Rushforth:There's nothing better than looking at your arm and seeing those goosebumps come out, because even waiting for that song and the rendition of that song was such and people are singing. It's just you like energy and being around people. If you love music, then for me it's I love it. I can't describe it. I love going to live music, even shitty live music. I like I'm going tonight to a restaurant that has this guy who plays guitar and I love him on guitar.
Jason Rushforth:I'm not gonna get goosebumps but it's music you never know yeah, you never know, but music's important and it's a big part of my life. But I am also the guy, alex, that like when I get in the car, my music is like at 11, like final tap. It's always loud windows down, usually a little obnoxious, and I'm the guy that rolls down the street that way. But I love going to live music and the energy it brings and the fun you can have me too, jay.
Alex Gadd:Thank you so much. This has been great. I appreciate time, I appreciate you sharing some of your stories with us, and I look forward to seeing you soon, one way or the other, but maybe at Madison Square Garden.
Jason Rushforth:Thanks, Alex, that was awesome. Thanks for having me.
Alex Gadd:Cheers bud And that's it for today's conversation. Thank you very much for joining us. We'll be back next Tuesday and if you like what you heard today, we'd appreciate it if you would like and subscribe or follow to make sure you get notified about every new episode. And please tell your friends. Additionally, we want to know what you think, so please leave us a comment. We'll try to respond to every one of them. The Rock-N- Roll Show podcast is a World Highway Media production. I'm your host, A alex Gadd, and until next time, remember that life is short, so get those concert tickets.