{"id":203,"date":"2023-06-02T04:28:51","date_gmt":"2023-06-02T04:28:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lesstroudmusic.com\/music-videos-copy\/"},"modified":"2023-08-14T08:53:38","modified_gmt":"2023-08-14T08:53:38","slug":"albums","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/lesstroudmusic.com\/albums\/","title":{"rendered":"Albums"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Albums<\/h1>\n\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n
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Mother Earth<\/h2>\n
Relased in 2019<\/div>\n

I wish there were a more eloquent and effortless way to explain how this album came to be. As of this writing I have been working on the\u00a0Mother Earth<\/em>\u00a0project for over 12 years. \u00a0It\u2019s been a labor of love, a significant part of my life and something I\u2019m very proud of.<\/p>\n

The detailed stories of how this album came together will be told in the interviews and conversations that I look forward to sharing with you, but until then, let me start with this\u2026.The power of music and its ability to affect change is undeniable.<\/p>\n

With that in mind I wanted to celebrate nature through my songs and the. videos I would create for them. The common theme of this project is respecting and understanding how nature is a part of our lives in the world that we all share.<\/p>\n

Some songs, “Artic Mistress” for example, celebrate nature but others like “One Giant Farm” and “Life on Earth” have a call to action.\u00a0The messages are powerful (I hope) and on occasion may make you uncomfortable, but they need to be told, especially now.<\/p>\n

Slash lent his name and talent to “One Giant Farm” because of the message.\u00a0 In the video for the song it shows the horrific images of shark finning and the slaughter of dolphins and whales that is still happening in the oceans today. \u00a0It was important to him as a lover of wildlife that the graphic reality be shown, not a candy-coated version of the events. <\/p>\n

I\u2019m not na\u00efve. I know that single handed I don\u2019t possess the influence to change the world but I\u2019m doing what I can artistically at least. \u00a0We must start somewhere, do something, and if a single person is influenced by these songs and does something to make the beleaguered natural world a better place, then I\u2019ve accomplished a small part of my mission.<\/p>\n

Mother Earth was recorded and created by everyone involved with the promise to celebrate and protect our natural world. I hope you get up and go outside into a natural space somewhere. Find the place you can go to seek solace and be healed by the energy of the natural world. Take a walk with Mother Earth and breathe deep. Then go back into civilization ready to fight for her.<\/p>\n

Proceeds of this album, such as they are, will go towards environmental organizations such as The Dolphin Project, Sea Shepherd, the WWF and the IFAW.<\/p>\n See Lyrics ↓<\/a>\n <\/div>\n \u00a0 \u00a0

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Embers (EP)<\/h2>\n
2020<\/div>\n

Most albums recorded have what the artists call \u201cthrow away songs\u201d. The songs seemed like a good creative idea at the time, but in the end they either just didn\u2019t fit in with the final tracks of the album or they weren\u2019t good enough.<\/p>\n

For me, as a song writer, this is always heartbreaking. It\u2019s hard to put many hours into a piece of art only to decide later\u2026..nah! With these four songs on Embers<\/em>, my feeling was not so much \u201cnah\u201d as it was more a matter of them not quite fitting in with another album project I was working on at the time: Mother Earth<\/em>.<\/p>\n

This EP is really just for me and the players. For \u201cWasting\u201d, I actually kept the sound of Eddie Vedder in my head, as the voice I would\u2019ve loved to have heard singing this tune. \u201cBetter\u201d was a chance to show how I think harmonica can really blend well with horns on some straight ahead rock.<\/p>\n

The version of \u201cWhen It\u2019s Gone\u2019 is actually the penultimate version before Mike Clink asked if he could take the song and start from scratch. I had to release it though because of the incredible orchestration by Chris Carmichael.<\/p>\n

And \u201cLies\u201d. Well, that\u2019s a whole other story. Bryan Potvin, Ian Auger and I had a lot of fun putting this together, most of it being the brainchild of Bryan\u2019s. He wanted to go with a dark set of lyrics but he doesn\u2019t have the hutzpah that I do when it comes to being dark and I know to this day he was ok with the line \u201cYou\u2019re so full of it\u201d but he hates the line \u201cTake your little trip and fuck off by yourself\u201d he\u2019s just such a loving and caring person he cringed every time I sang that line. A line that I, of course, being the vulgar one, love leaving in.<\/p>\n <\/div>\n \u00a0 \u00a0

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Bittern Lake<\/h2>\n
2018<\/div>\n

On his fifth full-length album, Bittern Lake,<\/em>Les Stroud, the Canadian singer- songwriter issues an urgent call for environmental preservation with a collection of powerful original songs and classic covers, produced by the legendary Mike Clink (Guns \u2019N Roses, Beth Hart, Metallica).<\/p>\n

Recorded at his home in Huntsville, Ontario, on the shore of its name sake\u2028 lake, Bittern Lake represents Stroud\u2019s favorite way of making music: \u201cLive off the floor, no overdubs, everybody in one room, all at one time. The musicians I bring along, they just fall in love with the process.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those musicians on Bittern Lake include members of Stroud\u2019s long time backing band, the Campfire Kings, as well as singer-songwriters Oh Susanna and Justin Rutledge, ace session drummer Tony Braunagel (Bonnie Raitt, Taj Mahal) and Cuban-Canadian guitar wizard Elmer Ferrer.<\/p>\n

Bittern Lake announces its subject matter with a pair of gritty covers. \u201cDeath in the Wilderness,\u201d a little-known track by renowned guitarist and songwriter J.J. Cale (author of Eric Clapton\u2019s classics \u201cCocaine\u201d and \u201cAfter Midnight\u201d), mourns the loss of the Earth\u2019s last wild spaces over a smoldering blues-rock groove with hard-hitting lyrics: \u201cGod save this planet now\/We\u2019ve got to help somehow\/We\u2019ve let it happen way too long.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following that comes one of the album\u2019s biggest surprises: a version of Joni Mitchell\u2019s \u201cBig Yellow Taxi\u201d that strips away the original\u2019s catchy chorus and sunny acoustic guitars in favor of a sparse, bluesy arrangement featuring little more than a dusty slide guitar and Stroud\u2019s own scorching harmonica licks. \u201cI even changed the lyrics of the last verse \u2014 sacrilege!\u201d Stroud notes. But to his delight (and relief), when he sent Mitchell his version, \u201cShe loved it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Elsewhere on Bittern Lake, Stroud displays considerable songwriting chops of his own. \u201cSnowshoes and Solitude\u201d could be described as Northern blues, as Stroud meditates on escaping to \u201ca world of wind and water\u201d above the Arctic Circle, where he\u2019s alone with the caribou and the aurora borealis. \u201cHow Long\u201d is a wakeup call disguised as a plaintive folk ballad, wondering if it\u2019s too late for humanity to realize \u201ctime\u2019s no longer on our side.\u201d On the mid-tempo rocker \u201cAny Minute Now,\u201d Stroud strikes a more hopeful note, singing, \u201cAny minute now, my dreams will all come true\/There\u2019ll be an end to this waste\/And I\u2019ll finally lose this blue\u201d before Elmer Ferrer\u2019s guitar streaks across the song\u2019s bluesy chords like a sunset painting the autumn sky.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I was 14 and started writing, the first guy I ever showed my stuff to was Noel Golden. Three years ago, we started recording together. It was kind of bizarre,\u201d Stroud marvels. Through Golden, Stroud met producer Mike Clink, who was sufficiently impressed with Stroud\u2019s skills as a songwriter to sign on for the project and travel from Los Angeles to Ontario to oversee the Bittern Lake recording sessions.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn order for me to get involved with an artist, I have to love the music,\u201d says Clink. \u201cI\u2019m really happy with how the record turned out. It\u2019s a great introduction to what Les is all about.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bittern Lake also features covers of fellow Canadian singer-songwriter Bruce Cockburn\u2019s cautionary tale \u201cIf a Tree Falls\u201d and a blistering version of Ben Harper\u2019s \u201cExcuse Me Mister,\u201d as well as an intimate, gather-round-the-campfire version of the theme song from Stroud\u2019s all-time favorite film, Jeremiah Johnson. (\u201cI\u2019ll still watch that once or twice a year,\u201d he says.)<\/p>\n

And because Stroud loves to collaborate, he passes the mic twice \u2014 once to Suzanne Ungerleider, who records under the name Oh Susanna, with whom he duets on the heartbreaking \u201cPoison,\u201d and once to Toronto singer-songwriter Justin Rutledge, who ends the album on a graceful note with the country-tinged \u201cGoodbye July.\u201d Bittern Lake is the first of two albums Stroud recorded with Clink at the producer\u2019s helm.<\/p>\n See Lyrics ↓<\/a>\n <\/div>\n \u00a0 \u00a0

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Barn Sessions III – Off The Grid<\/h2>\n
2012<\/div>\n

Here we go my friends. This is number 3 of my bi-annual \u201cBarn Sessions\u201d recording project. That wonderful week I make happen every two years when I recruit a group of very talented musicians and bunch them together in one room side by each, charged with the task of performing a bunch of my tunes.<\/p>\n

It’s a wonderful, marvelous, joyful amazing opportunity that I will continue to take advantage of as long as the universe I have created for myself agrees with it. So what\u2019s the big deal? Well, ninety-nine percent of modern musicians and songwriters don’t record this way anymore. Instead we sit in front of our little laptops, with Pro Tools, Cubase or Logic Audio launched and record and re record until we think something is perfect. We fix the tuning of the singers. We \u2018comp\u2019 the best take together until it sounds just right. And we can alter it any way we want until we decide to share our creative endeavor with the world.<\/p>\n

I shudder to think what performances would never have happened if we had had this technology thirty years earlier. David Bowie\u2019s vocal performance on \u201cHero\u2019s\u201d wouldn’t exist. Nor would the energy on Bruce Springsteen\u2019s \u201cBorn To Run\u201d. Nor would a thousand other musical classics we know and love and still listen to. So this Barn Session lll is just me, as a singer songwriter, playing my roots-acoustic tunes with some very talented musicians, hoping we all get it right at least once, so I can share it with the public.<\/p>\n

Indeed, there are a few songs we did that didn’t make the cut. There always are. But these ones that did, I am proud to say, come completely imperfect, full of flaws and missed moments, slightly out of tune vocals, little guitar slips and missed percussion hits. But who cares? These are real recordings, made in my barn, with real musicians, playing for real. For you; the listener. As with so much that I do in my work as an artist \u2013 I strive to keep things as real as it gets.<\/p>\n

Existing on this album is the original version of \u201cOne Giant Farm\u201d, a song which would show up again on the Mother Earth album with Slash taking over the duties of lead guitar. However, I was always and also very partial to the wonderful \u201cHotel Californiaesque\u201d playing that Ian Auger and Peter Cliche put together for this tune in this acoustic rendition with its original lyrics.<\/p>\n

\u201cFar Away Gone\u201d must be one of those creations you call a \u201csleeper\u201d because I often get it requested when I play live. So, it must\u2019ve struck a chord with a few people so to speak and that thrills me to no end. For live concerts however one of my favourite songs to cut loose on is \u201cThe Cost\u201d which is a kind of Johnny Cash droning country thing.<\/p>\n

This whole album lyrically was a time of transition for me. Romantic that is \u2013 some songs are the breakup that was happening and some were the new romantic involvement and where I was heading.<\/p>\n See Lyrics ↓<\/a>\n <\/div>\n \u00a0 \u00a0

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Wonderful Things: Barn Sessions I & II<\/h2>\n
Relased in 2011<\/div>\n

On this album is the greatest capturing of back-up singers I have ever achieved during these wonderful rustic settings for recoding music. Mitch Seekins, Suzie Ungerleider, Kelly Adams and Kevin Kloss stood to the side of the band and crouched under the low roof of the barn in front of a couple mics and sang their hearts out to most of the songs from these sessions. They can be heard at their lush best in \u201cNever Intended\u201d.<\/p>\n

This album is actually a collection of recordings done \u201cin the barn\u2019 (literally \u2013 it was a barn) with the first sessions taking place in, I think, 2010 and the second set of sessions in 2012. If you want to see some of the story of the first sessions, they are part of the documentary film I made called Off The Grid. Not only that, but I also threw on the final mix for this album the song \u201cI Am Canadian\u201d which I had recorded at some point with the Northern Pikes, but then we kept it off the EP we put together called \u201cLong Walk Home\u201d for some reason. Like the next album I would record \u201clive off the floor\u201d (\u201cOff The Grid\u201d), this is a fine selection of roots-acoustic tracks played by talented and skilled acoustic
\nmusicians.<\/p>\n

One big thrill for me was finally getting to do a duet with the extremely talented Oh Suzanna as she was called at the time (now Suzie Ungerleider): Another Glass Of Wine, which then doubled in thrill when she allowed me to cut her song \u201cRiver Blue\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWonderful Things\u201d were lyrics Kelly Adams emailed to me one day and for some reason they struck a chord, so to speak, and the song just flowed out as I sat in my bed one night. They are beautiful and powerful lyrics that touch your soul.<\/p>\n See Lyrics ↓<\/a>\n <\/div>\n \u00a0 \u00a0

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Long Walk Home (EP)<\/h2>\n
2007<\/div>\n

I was never shy to take advantage of the celebrity that becoming Survivorman afforded me when it meant I could meet my childhood heroes or other artists I admired. Such was the case when Bryan Potvin of The Northern Pikes contacted me out of the blue one day just to say he was a fan of the show and thus we struck up a friendship. That friendship would then become an artistic one when he discovered that I was a folky, singer songwriter with ambitions beyond my current place. All of that led to he and I hooking up with his old bandmates from his band The Northern Pikes to record an EP.<\/p>\n

It was wonderful for me because unlike my debut CD it meant that I had one band in one place working on my tunes. I brought Peter Cliche into the foray as I had been using him on everything I had done thus far (and would have Peter record for me on many more tracks in the following years).<\/p>\n

Like \u201cClouds\u201d from my debut CD, I felt that the song \u201cLong Walk Home\u201d was indicative of where I believe my writing could go. I felt it was sophisticated enough to take seriously. In those days I had been putting lyrics to musical pieces by a writer named Jim Milne (RIP).<\/p>\n

As such I am intensely proud of the song \u201cStorm Winds\u201d. Only the lyrics and melody are mine but I wish that song had more exposure that it has been afforded thus far. On this album too, was my first chance to really blast my harmonica and show some chops and a sound indicative of where I wanted to go with that instrument, in the song \u201cSteady Job\u201d which began on Jay Semko\u2019s solid bass playing.<\/p>\n See Lyrics ↓<\/a>\n <\/div>\n \u00a0 \u00a0

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Les Stroud<\/h2>\n
2000<\/div>\n

Well, it\u2019s a long story but after more than ten years away from writing music I found myself staring at an acoustic guitar in a house in Yellowknife NWT in Canada\u2019s Arctic. I picked up the guitar and out came \u201cRide On\u201d And I never looked back.<\/p>\n

I started writing again and performing again and as soon as stepped on stage I realized just how much I had missed it all. Music. Creating. Recording. Performing.<\/p>\n

Fast forward to living in Temagami, Ontario and befriending Ian Auger and I found myself in his studio crafting many folky and roots-rock songs. As simple as these tunes are you could certainly see where I was about to go with my artistic side; the celebration of nature through my music.<\/p>\n

This was years before Survivorman would happen for me as a career so I certainly came by my artistic leaning honestly. I still feel that to this day, \u201cClouds\u201d is one of the most beautiful songs I have ever written, adorned as it was by Peter Cliche\u2019s unique violin and his dreamy playing. The roots-acoustic-blues sound would (and I suppose will) follow me around for the rest of my song writing life.<\/p>\n See Lyrics ↓<\/a>\n <\/div>\n \u00a0 \u00a0

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