The Tragically Hip recently celebrated four decades of music and friendship since forming the band in Kingston , Ontario, in 1984. The critically acclaimed rock group--consisting of vocalist Gordon Downie who passed away from brain cancer in 2017, guitarist Paul Langlois, guitarist Rob Baker, bassist Gord Sinclair, and drummer Johnny Fay--found success in their native country, going on to be inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame and Canada's Walk of Fame. This past November, The Hip commemorated their 40th anniversary with the release of a boxset of their Diamond-certified debut album, Up To Here , the latest installment of special deluxe packages. Up To Here was originally released September 5, 1989, as The Tragically Hip's first full-length studio album, an introduction that brought them breakthrough success, including two Canadian rock radio #1 singles, 'Blow at High Dough' and 'New Orleans is Sinking.' The album also earned the band a JUNO Award for 'Most Promising Artist' in 1990. Earlier in 2024, they officially dropped a new single, 'Get Back Again,' which fans consider the holy grail of previously unreleased tracks from the band. The track was recorded before the band signed their first major record deal. The song recently reached #1 in Canada, marking their first chart-topping hit in 15 years. If that wasn't enough for fans, they got an even deeper look at the band in a four-part documentary series, The Tragically Hip: No Dress Rehearsal . Downie's brother, documentary filmmaker Mike Downie, directed the film, which premiered in September 2024 at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF). The doc, now available on Prime Video, won the renowned People's Choice Awards in the documentary category at TIFF. The Hip's guitarist, Paul Langlois, and filmmaker Mike Downie joined us virtually to talk about the documentary, celebrating the band's 40th anniversary, and and remembering their friend and brother Gordon Downie.
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00:00Hi, my name is Paul Langlois. I play with the Tragically Hip, and you are watching Life Minute TV.
00:07Canadian rock band Tragically Hip is celebrating their 40th anniversary with the release of a new box set, a documentary, and more.
00:15Guitarist Paul Langlois and filmmaker Mike Downey joined us virtually to tell us all about it.
00:21Mike did our documentary, which is now
00:24unbelievably finished and out there for consumption on Amazon Prime.
00:29You know, that's I would say the biggest thing that has happened because, you know, it tells our life story.
00:35So that makes one feel funny, but fortunately we all really like it. It'd be a nightmare if we didn't.
00:41You know, I think it's really well done. And then we've had a few other, you know, put out a big coffee table book,
00:47which is kind of a companion piece, really. And then we just put it in a box set up to here,
00:51which is our first real record. And there's lots of cool things in it and, you know, unheard
00:58tracks. So, yeah, I mean, we're kind of at the point of
01:02asking each other, are we done for a while? Can we kind of just slip away and let the documentary and the book
01:09tell our story for a little while?
01:19I really wanted to tell the band's story. I had an idea about how to do it.
01:24I've had a chance over the years to do a lot of documentaries and usually it's just a subject that I come upon
01:30and sort of learn as much as I can about it. And this one was obviously so different because it has to do with,
01:37you know, my brother Gord, his, you know, best friends and bandmates and what they did in this country for 35 years.
01:44So it was something that, you know, I guess I've been probably thinking about for a long time.
01:49The subject matter is something that I've just lived with and it's such a great source of pride for me.
01:55Just what Paul and Gord and Robbie and Gord and Johnny, what they all did.
02:01I'm just so proud of on so many levels, you know, as a family member, as a Kingstonian,
02:06to try to tell that story and do it in a way that will, I hope,
02:11engage people that
02:13maybe, you know, didn't know the band or
02:16had kind of, you know, forgotten about how much the band meant to them, like just to try to
02:22tell that story in a way that would engage people. And Paul and the guys let me do it.
02:27You know, like that's a big deal. It was a really big deal for me.
02:30You know, Mike was grilling us. It wasn't just like, oh, and it was all hunky-dory and
02:35obviously, sadly, Gord got sick and died. We had a lot of ups and downs and I would find myself
02:42wondering, is Mike asking me about
02:45only the tough stuff and, you know, giving just softballs to the other guys?
02:49And it was when we started seeing rough cuts, you know, maybe a year, almost a year before
02:55the documentary was finished, that I realized, oh, he was grilling the other guys, too.
02:59You know, just asking about little things, which would be odd for Mike.
03:03But, you know, how do you, how did you feel when Gord started playing guitar?
03:06I just love it because when I watched it, I was just so looking forward to the other guys'
03:11answer to, say, a question like that or a question like Gord wanted to start writing
03:18lyrics, be the only lyric writer from Road Apples, our second record on.
03:21And, you know, and everyone is very honest in it.
03:24And I think it makes a documentary that, you know, Mike was obviously around, not all the
03:30time, but he would probably hear about like little issues that had come up.
03:37So he had that advantage and I think a very honorable goal to make this documentary real.
03:45And it wouldn't be real if it was all just all happy and I don't know, everything went
03:50great for 35 years, never a problem.
03:52And then Gord died.
03:53So it's not like that.
03:54It dives into it's a story.
03:58Brain cancer and was incurable, the worst of the worst memories, which used to be my
04:04forte. And now I can't remember people's names and can't remember lyrics.
04:08What he's planning to do next is nothing short of awe inspiring.
04:12We got together and started to rehearse to write an end to our own story.
04:17But at the premier Toronto Film Festival, I watched half of it.
04:21I was sitting beside you, Mike.
04:23I just, you know, went outside and we were doing pictures and I just thought, I don't
04:29think I can watch three and four.
04:31I don't think I'll be in the right mood for the after party or whatever.
04:35And but eventually I did sit down with Joanne, my wife, and we watched at the cottage.
04:40And it's not an easy watch, but there's lots of love in it and lots of great memories and
04:46so much footage I'd never seen before.
04:48We have meant so much to so many of us, and I don't mean just Canadians, but that's a
05:05big part of it. What a incredible index of songs, what an incredible collection of
05:11material. With 13 studio albums, you know, that's a lot of material to know.
05:17So I really feel for everyone who watches it that they're going to have a chance to kind
05:22of go back in the catalogue, not just to the songs, the hits, the songs they know, but
05:26to the songs they don't know.
05:28In the second half of the career, there's every one of those records and they didn't get
05:32the same recognition as the big ones, the Fully Completely, Trouble at the Hen House and
05:37Phantom Power. But every one of them has these incredible songs on them.
05:47After shows on the road in Canada, America and Europe, probably the most popular question
05:53was, are you guys ever going to put out a Live at the Roxy album?
05:56Because for some reason that bootleg provided, you know, where Gorb kind of went off on
06:03rants, as he did, and we would follow along.
06:05And it was kind of the most famous one called Killer Whale Tank.
06:09I scrubbed the inside of the Killer Whale Tank.
06:13The second most popular question would be, whatever happened to Get Back Again?
06:17That's the song that got to number one.
06:19And, you know, we couldn't really remember that well.
06:21We remembered it.
06:22We tried it for our first record and maybe even our second, but definitely tried it for
06:27up to a year. And it just wasn't the same as the demo we had made with another guy in
06:32Toronto leading up to our first record.
06:35And so we went back and found that and had our sound expert remix it, but more true to
06:41the demo, which was a little more lush.
06:43There's something about it anyway.
06:45So, yeah, it's the last song in the documentary.
06:48It kind of gets the credits going.
06:50And, yeah, we released it as a single and it did really well.
06:53And it's a very personal sort of song.
06:55So it's just nice for us to have it see the light of day and nice that there was a good
07:01reaction to it.
07:11Most times it doesn't feel like four years, but there are times when it does.
07:16As Mike was alluding to, it was a lot and it was complicated.
07:20All the records, albums that we made were marathons and full of tension, you know, because
07:25everyone wants not only their ideas heard, but everyone is very opinionated when you're
07:31creating something and passionate about things.
07:34Yet you've got to compromise all the time.
07:36When we were touring, yeah, it was grueling and we toured a lot over decades.
07:42We were getting along far better because we're not having to write the songs.
07:46We wrote them.
07:47And so all those tensions were gone.
07:49And plus, you're playing in front of a crowd.
07:51You know, you're in Amsterdam or New York City or Toronto or Buffalo, everywhere was
07:56enjoyable to play.
07:57We feel very lucky about it and that we managed to get through it all and remain great friends
08:05and remain lifelong friends.
08:06Like, you know, when you see when I see someone from high school, I just naturally am comfortable
08:11with them because you knew each other when you were young.
08:13And we have a lot of friends like that here just growing up in smallish city, Kingston.
08:18And it's very rewarding.
08:19So add that to the five of us being from the same place and managing to get along and
08:25through getting married and having kids and, you know, the complications of scheduling
08:30because we were on it.
08:31We were very committed.
08:32No, I feel proud about it.
08:36I remember I installed an 8-track player in my mom's 1974 Chevy Impala and I'd come out
08:47to jump in her car, which I treated like my own.
08:50And there would be Gord's feet sticking out the window.
08:53He was lying down in the front seat in the driveway, chunking in the 8-track tapes and
08:58listening to music when he was pretty young.
09:00He probably was 11 or 12 and I was 16, taking off in mom's car.
09:06And I drive around with him sometimes too and let him pick the pick the 8-track to put in.
09:11Yeah, Gord was a fan.
09:13He was a real athlete.
09:14You know, he and Paul were both really good athletes and that was kind of his main thing.
09:19But when we moved into Kingston, because we lived on the outskirts, about 10 miles outside
09:23of town, and Gord, within that first year, he met Paul the first day, high school in
09:29grade 11, and his world just changed.
09:32It just changed.
09:33And next thing I know, I'm coming home and he's not playing 8-tracks because they're
09:38gone, but he's got Elvis Costello's My Name Is True album that he picked up.
09:44Yeah, he had good music.
09:45He had good taste.
09:46And then, you know, he fell in with these guys, first high school band.
09:49They were all serious music fans.
09:52And he just went from there.
09:55Just a singer that would turn heads, who is this guy, and wow, he's such a dancer.
10:02I mean, he became kind of a dancer-slash-actor as the years went on, but he just had to move.
10:09And I think it just was a unique bunch and a tight band with really the best frontman
10:15I've ever seen.
10:16As Paul said, he figured out that he could be somebody to watch, and I think that really
10:20nails it.
10:21In the middle of that riot Couldn't get you off my mind
10:30I'm hoping what's next is not hip things.
10:33I mean, you know, we're very much in touch, and after the obvious fog and individual grieving
10:41of Gord passing away, we weren't in touch.
10:46Like, honestly, maybe we'd have a conference call once every three months, and no one was
10:51into doing anything.
10:52And it just took a long time to get anywhere near the headspace of, hey, we should start
10:57doing things.
10:58And I would credit our manager, Jake Gould, who came back to us after 17 years, and this
11:04was right in COVID.
11:05And so we just started having calls, Zoom calls, and sort of coming back to each other
11:10again and just talking about what to do.
11:13Like these box sets, you know, we've done a few of them, and it takes a lot of work.
11:16I would credit Johnny Faye, our drummer, for doing a whole lot of that work of finding
11:21things in all these labels, all old tapes, two-inch tapes.
11:25But we've done a bunch of stuff since sort of coming back together and played a couple
11:30times with very special circumstances with a friend of ours named Feist, and like for
11:37a Juno's Award thing, and a guy named William Prince.
11:41But they were special occasions, so there's no goal at all to play together.
11:46So four of us could play, and I'm sure it'd be fun, but at the same time, there's something
11:51behind it, I think, that worries me anyway, and maybe others.
11:57Just like, okay, the hip are playing again, and then all of a sudden the business up here
12:00is kind of like, oh yeah, I heard they jammed, you know.
12:03It's just something that we're okay for now not to do that.
12:06So we just did a lot of that stuff, and then all of a sudden, in much bigger news, the
12:12documentary and the book, and now this box set on the 40th anniversary, just feels like
12:18you should wait through the winter and spring to decide or even talk about any new things.
12:24Yeah, I just really wanted to enjoy it.
12:26I've never had an experience like this, and I've never had an experience of like going
12:31to all these different film festivals, and I've sat back and I've enjoyed it.
12:35And I've enjoyed being with the guys in the band.
12:38I've enjoyed doing these things with Paul.
12:41I'll tell you this, my level of respect for everybody in the band has always been really
12:45high, because I've known them since high school.
12:49But it's incredible to go that deep, really, in three years, because we started doing the
12:54talks like this, one-on-one on Zoom during COVID, talking to each member of the band.
13:00And my respect and really admiration for all four of them, it's gone higher.
13:06It's gone up for every one of them.
13:07I'm not just saying that, because Paul's on the line.
13:10You can take Paul off, and I'll tell you exactly the same thing.
13:13But it just has, because I just didn't know everybody's story.
13:18I knew it collectively, and I knew it through Gord as much as I knew.
13:22But I didn't know all the little parts.
13:26And I just got to know everybody a little bit better, just sort of one-on-one, because
13:30that's what we were doing in the pre-interviews and the interviews.
13:33And then since then, as we get together for the different occasions, it's been a great
13:39experience.
13:41And I've also just been very aware of it, thinking, this is unique, and this is special.
13:46And so slow down and take it all in.
13:49To see more of this interview, visit our website, lifeminute.tv.
13:53And don't forget to subscribe to our podcast, Life Minute TV.