...We wound up in Toronto mid-December with two sold-out dates at Maple Leaf Gardens. The whole tour had been a vibe but it was over. All that remained were the memories and a pile of tape. We set about over the next couple of weeks to determine exactly how good a recorder of memories our set- up had been. Any gig is only partly to do with music. For us, performing live has never been an exact science, something where you can just turn on a switch. As Gord has often said, "we reflect the mood of the day" when we perform. That means that everything, the weather, the crowd, what you ate, whatever, can and will come into play. Even if we could simply 'flip the switch' on stage, it's not like you can capture the whole experience on tape. All that's there are the notes that were played and sang. Right?

For years we had recorded every performance. First on cassette, then on DAT, improving the quality as the technology became available. We played often and were continually working on new material. Live recording became, and still is, a necessary part of the song writing process; capturing works in progress as they evolve or little pieces of improvisation which we'd later develop into songs. Not to sound too narcissistic, but when we weren't playing we'd spend the long hours on the road listening to ourselves. Where this has really paid off is in the new material we've written. Along with keying in on new ideas, all the listening confirmed something we already knew, that every show is different. Each night has a life of its own. There's an intangible element to any live musical performance, a mix of magic and electricity that can make the difference between a good night out and the greatest night of your life. We have never played the same set twice, mostly for our own sake. Boredom is death for music and the more routine a live performance gets, the more boring it can become for the band and the audience. We have always guarded against this. You have to believe that every night is special, so you make it so. Throw in a new idea here, jam a little there and wham, something magical can happen. We've been doing things that way for ten years now. We have a mountain of live material to prove it...

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