Up on the Airplane

Preface: I was going to write about how the world has seemed to be spiralling down the toilet this week with the allegations coming out of Iraq, the continued blind eye toward the crushing situation in Darfur, and how we are basically setting fire to the Kyoto accord. But then I went on an Indigo Girls kick and they reminded me how we can make the world better.

It was late summer in 1994. I am in the back-seat of my buddy Darryl’s old Audi and we are flying home down the back concessions of Peterborough county. We have just spent a glorious weekend with friends at his cottage. It was one of those defining times when you’re a kid; when you really start to learn what you love about life and what it is that’s going to drive you the rest of the way. The sun is going down; we’re tired a little sunburned but feeling so alive. Then it happened-something that made it more of a divine moment, one I’ll remember to my grave. Someone put in a tape (aaah analog) and these voices came hurtling out of the speakers in multiple part harmony supported by melodic and bright acoustic guitars and percussion I had never heard before. The song was ‘Airplane’ the band Indigo Girls. But the story really doesn’t start here.

It’s September 1990. I’m just a punk kid not yet 14 and I am working at my local vet as an animal attendant-great job, apart from the piles of shit you have to pick up. I remember this one day of work because I was sooooo excited. I had just bought my first ever CD, this new technology that was supposed to blow your mind. But that was secondary to who was on the CD. It was Metallica’s ‘…and Justice for All’. ‘Blackened is the end, never will it end, throwing all who see, into obscurity. Death of mother earth never a rebirth… Blackened.’ Wicked. You see at this point I was a rocker. Loved anything that was glam, big haired and full of shredding guitar. Guns n’ Roses, Motely Crue, Poison, Aerosmith, The Cult (although they were always cooler than the hair bands) but I still loved U2 and got killed for it by my friends-‘pussies!’ they would say. So my daily intake of music for years was full throttle testosterone fuelled fuck-rock. I learned the guitar during these years and my early influences of music was the classic rock that inspired the bands that I was listening to at the time. Joe Perry would always be talking about this Clapton dude, or this Hendrix, or Page guy so I decided to check them out too. Loved it all. Anything that was loud, proud and full of Marshall sustained noise I wanted it. So when ‘Airplane’ came out of that Audi’s speakers you can say I was surprised that something more existed outside of the realm of the rock kingdom that ruled all-and those who didn’t listen were just the great unwashed. That all changed.

Needless to say I was like a kid on drugs. But instead of finding the next hit of acid or tracking down a good hash connection (as much of my friends at the time were doing), I was racing to every music store I could drive to collecting everything the Indigo Girls had committed to tape. I never had so ferociously zeroed in on any other musician or band like I did when I discovered them. Now of course I have to admit there was a girl involved. Oh here it is you say, of course you wanted to get their collection in your head it meant nookie. And I say yes, exactly. This is part of their mystique for me. Like no other music I have listened to they are and continue to be like smells for me, an intensely strong connection to points of my youth and early adult life. I’m not really going to bio IGs or anything you can go to www.indigogirls.com and learn everything. What I would like to impart is what they mean to me.



Swamp Ophelia was really the first album that I truly fell in love with from an artistic standpoint. The complexity of their guitar work and dichotomy of the emotion they impart with the technical control on songs like Power of Two are just legend. The songs that people know from them mainly are Closer to Fine from their second full-length album and Galileo from Rites of Passage. These are great tunes, but b-sides to a lot of their work. There are songs that reach for emotions that emo can’t even define let alone capture-see: Ghost, Blood and Fire, and Romeo and Juliet. There are songs that are more rock than you could ever imagine from a pair that people fashion as a coffee house duo-see: Shame on You, Touch me Fall, Tether, Caramia. And there are songs that are just flat out tragedies that they are not part of the greater pop music conscience-see: Least Complicated, Get out the Map, Joking, Deconstruction, Perfect World, Language or the Kiss, Love Will Come, and Mystery. It is both stunning and saddening that a duo with such a powerful body of work, over 20 years old now are still relatively unknown to the general music listener or seen sometimes as a pair of early nineties has beens. The most infuriating and most likely reasons are there politics and their sexuality. They hail from the southern U.S. and have pretty much pushed hard every no-no button there is. They are openly gay and fight for sexual equality, they have taken on the archaic immigration laws, social justice, the institutional racism that exists in southern politics, judicial and economic systems, they have been a part of Native American movements (you think our aboriginal politics are troubling-the U.S. has all but co-opted and neutered the Native American movement) and they have always been leaders in contributing to environmental issues.

More than anything, the Indigo Girls showed me a faith and spirit in music. There is something more to it then melody, structure, arrangement, chords etc. Greatness is intangible and like most beautiful music it hits you deep and forever. If I had not found them that day in that car I truly believe I would be a different person. They opened the doors to other like minded acts-Spirit of the West, Sarah Mclachlan, Ani Difranco, Stephen Fearing, Blue Rodeo, Great Big Sea, and most importantly the IG influences chiefly Neil Young, Van Morrison, Janis Joplin, Johnny Cash, James Taylor and Joni Mitchell. This music has a connection with the soul that rock sometimes bumps against but rarely spends much time with as it is too primal. Their music sits on an idea for a while, explores it, debates it and gives you their feelings and then they sing it better than anyone out there. I think that if it were not for them I would have stayed closer to the rock that was born out of the late 80’s. Grunge, and the Creed/Stained/Finger 11 style that to me is a little stale, technically brilliant but for me mostly lifeless and disconnected from the roots of rock n’roll-sex-politics-and true creativity. Also the Indigo Girls ideas lit the flame of caring in me about more than just getting the girl, and getting a joe job, reading the Toronto Sun and keeping up with the Leafs. The world is BIG, scary, beautiful and full of brilliance and the more we know the better we are.

The reason I have typed this scrawl is partly because I have been on a kick for a week, but also because I am fucking ecstatic to see a real undercurrent that is bubbling to the mainstream surface of new artists that are coming right out with their music and saying the Indigo Girls are part of their raison detre –Listen to KT Tunstell and James Blunt two acoustic artists that are killing radio right now. IG are a creative force that I hear in Bright Eyes, Guster, Fiest, John Mayer, Ron Sexsmith, Kathleen Edwards, Sarah Harmer, Ryan Adams, Stabilo, Madviolet and Nickel Creek to name just a few. I also hear them in some of our fellow new local artists we have had the pleasure of playing with and checking out, Mandippal Jandu, Melissa Mills and Peter Katz. I am going out on a bit of a limb and saying this will be the year the Indigo Girls are truly discovered and will be the Woodie Guthrie and Johnny Cash of our generation. They have a new album out this year which I know will be killer. Amy Ray just posted some video from their tracking session, a rare glimpse into their recording world.

My writing contributions to The Free Press when you strip back the Tube Screamer and humbuckers is IG roots. I feel proud we are getting closer to our ‘sound’ the real intangible that gives your band life and legs. But I will always answer the question of my number one influences as Amy Ray and Emily Sailers, otherwise known as the Indigo Girls.

Brother Glenn