Home For a Rest with Vince Ditrich
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Hello and welcome to the Jan Arden podcast. Okay, I sound really sexy because I've got a cold. What are you wearing? I did not sign up for this. And then I blow my nose. Adam is away. Sarah Burke and I are here to entertain you.

And it's good to see you, Sarah, as always. Yeah, you too. You had a busy week. So you just got back. It's nice to be home. You were doing something kind of special. We did. We filmed the Jan Show Christmas special. Very fun. Great, great special guests, Brian Adams and Michael Buble. Thank you very much. Two of the world's greatest, biggest, most handsomest stars. And they are going to be on the Christmas special. I think they call that a radio tease. You dropped us just a little bit.

Everyone's always so secretive. Like don't put stuff up on social media. Don't say who the guests are. And I'm of the frame of mind, like tell people, yeah, it's two and a half months away, but tell people what's coming. As a matter of fact, let's invite them. Let's invite them on the show. I would love that. I will get working on that. You know what? You never know if you catch Brian on the right day.

He might show up. He was fantastic on the show and he is so busy. So he's flying around in private jets. He landed in Calgary, came running over to us at the National Music Center where we were filming some of the stuff.

Did his thing. We got him out of there in 90 minutes. And then he got in that plane again and flew to Toronto. What a life. Yeah. He's in the middle of a tour. And Michael, I say he's making a special appearance. I'm not going to tell you how he appears, but he is also in the middle of a cross Canada tour. So, but just to be fair,

We all have the same manager. So I do have connections of begging, please, please let him come on the show. At the time of this recording, Bublé was in town last night here in Toronto. Seeing it all over my social media and I had extreme FOMO because I do an evening show, but he was apparently wearing a Leafs jersey for a minute or two.

Oh, I don't know if that's a good idea for his Vancouver fans. Okay, hockey is just starting. No one judge me. Hockey is just starting, correct? You're correct. This week was popped off for the regular season. All right. Well, the Blue Jays just kind of petered out, I know. They were going, they were a wild card pick. Listen to me. Listen to my lingo. They were a wild card pick to be in the playoffs, right? Yeah.

Yeah, it was a three-game series. They lost two of three, and that was it. Yeah, my dad has season tickets, so I've been very lucky to go sit behind first base and watch Vladdy do his thing. But it was quite embarrassing, the walk of shame out of the stadium on Saturday because we gave up a huge lead. Like, we were up 7-1 on the Mariners, and we're just going to wrap up the Blue Jays conversation right there because I'm still in mourning. Sports is...

There's always got to be a loser. There's got to be a loser. Yeah. Trust me. I know because I've been nominated for 21 Juno awards and I've lost 12 times. What a great analogy though. But I've only lost 12 times. Thank you. Um, so yeah, I did that, but now I'm back and there's things that I do want to talk about. I wanted to ask you, Sarah, if you are, we've just gone through Thanksgiving and I had a couple of friends who,

That got into all out brawls. Like my one friend, I shall not name her, got up and left her. I said, why did you do that? Can you just like take a time out, go into the yard, have a half a glass of wine or whatever it is that you people are doing. And cause I don't drink and, and just sit down again. She goes, no, I can't, I can't handle what my dad was talking about. We have completely polarized. She said something about,

Alberta's new premier that was just elected in the middle of nowhere because Jason Kenney stepped down, yada, yada, yada. I don't even want to give her any airtime, but I guess they, he likes her. He's a farmer and he's in rural Alberta and he wants a change and whatever. But yeah, so that's a fight. How do you avoid this stuff? I don't know.

All my family's dead. I mean, yeah, that might maybe make it easier right now. But over the pandemic specifically, I noticed that people got more touchy, I think is the word, touchy about certain subjects. And without getting too far into the, you know, vaccination, anti-vaccination thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

There was a time even where, you know, my mom and dad were disagreeing about things. And part of that also, I would say, is because, you know, what we've been dealing with over the last two years, it's like, it's new, right? Everyone's figuring it out as we go, including the officials. So for sure, your opinions can change, right? As you get more information about it. I think mom and dad are on the same page now, but there was definitely a point where like, you know, me and my sister were like, oh, everybody's fighting about this.

Thanksgiving this year was mostly just crying about the Blue Jays. But yes, over the last two years, touchy. It's been touchy. But what do people do? Like, how do you, I just, my friend was like, Jan, there's just no way. I'm not, I'm almost 60 years old. I'm not going to sit there and have this guy that's been quite domineering all her life, which I get.

And she was at her parents' house. She goes, you know, my parents are in their eighties. I don't want to make a scene, but she goes, I cannot sit like I did in my twenties, my thirties, my forties and my fifties and listen to stuff that I'm so, it's so polarizing for me that I just had to leave. So now there's still stuff going on. Now she's fighting with her brother.

Because he's like, you know, the kids didn't know why you left. And I really feel for her, but I had no advice. It's almost like the agreed to disagree thing. And that's come up even with me and my sister. When we realize that we're, you know, kind of in a cycle that's going nowhere, we'll just throw that out. Like, okay, we're going to have to agree to disagree here. Because at the end of the day, you want to remind the person you love them.

But you have boundaries. It's like that's the game right now for everyone, I think, especially with like mental health. You have to have boundaries for yourself, but find a way to respect other boundaries. It's a hard dance. Well, the only thing I thought about afterwards, Sarah, was my mom's Alzheimer's taught me some incredible lessons about mental

Always agreeing or always like mom would ask me the same thing over and over and over again And then sometimes when she's told stories there was a lot of incorrect stuff Bob and your dad they drove to love of line they went and they owned that building and I know none of its it's all kind of made up in her mind in Alzheimer's and early days I was like mom they did not own that building like it's no there's no way that you and dad could have driven to and that was me because I was an idiot and I was scared and

And so I was always in correction mode. So what I wanted to say to my friend is that, look, your parents are what, 83 and 86 years old or so. They're way up there. Just you don't have to comment, but you don't have to agree. You can just sit and eat your Brussels sprouts. Yeah. It's really hard to talk when you have 10 Brussels sprouts in your mouth. But Alzheimer's did teach me that. It's just like, I don't have to be right.

And I don't know if she wanted to be right or if she just wanted to go, you're out of your mind. You know, that's not good for this province, blah, blah, blah. But now the whole family's in a flux and the mom is hurt. Well, I don't understand that. She was kind of caught in the crosshairs, right? As somebody always is. So the kids were caught in the crossfires because they don't know what they're talking about.

And the mom who now has to be with the dad after everybody leaves and she's doing dishes and she's left with the aftershocks of an argument with, you know, your adult children. Yeah, that's where...

That's where it's maybe not even always about the people involved in the argument. Like you said, the mom is now heartbroken, right? So it's thinking about like, okay, in the bigger picture here, how can we leave this where not everyone is in this high stress situation, even if not everyone gets their way? I don't know how you win with that, but every holiday. So now we've got Christmas coming up. No one argues at Halloween.

You don't hear about Halloween arguments because you know why? There's no drinking or a meal involved. There's drinking. There's just not a gathering that involves you like staring at your family. There's not 14 people around a table. Oh, let's open another bottle of wine or maybe we should bring the brandy out, which is never a good idea. But Halloween seems to be pretty good. So it's pretty safe. Maybe they will have their problem solved.

By the time we hit the Christmas holidays, I'm going away for Christmas. I'm going to London. I'm not going to be here. I'm still debating whether I'm going to put up my tree. I probably will because it's fun just to look at all the decorations every year and I'm not getting any younger. You got to enjoy. I'm getting on the plane. I'm making a mess of the carbon footprint again. And I'm going to go to London to see my friend Nigel. And we're going to wander the hills.

The other thing I wanted to talk to you about before Vince Dietrich gets here to talk about his wonderful books is doing stuff alone. And I wanted to talk to you about this because I had put up a post on my Instagram where

Sunday, I was by myself. I don't know what day you all celebrated Thanksgiving on last weekend because it was a long weekend. Some people did their dinner Monday. Some people did it Saturday. Well, on Sunday, I was like, I'm on my own. Sometimes, you know, Thanksgiving can be really small but mighty and there's nowhere else I'd rather be. It was me and the dog. The comments I got

I'm so sorry to hear that you're alone. I'm so sorry that, you know, that you couldn't find a friend's giving. And I'm like reading this stuff and I'm going, Oh my God, no, no, no. Hey, I don't feel very good. It was just like, I, I'm so perfectly happy. People have such an opposition to being on your own and to not be partnered up like Thanksgiving. It's weird. So what are your thoughts on that?

I feel what you just said so hard. Okay. So yes, I'm in a relationship, but we've talked about this. My guy lives two hours away. Okay. So he came for the Jays game. We had our, you know, our Thanksgiving one day of the four day long weekend together. You had sex in the bleachers. We're not that couple. But before the Jays game, no.

But, you know, we had a discussion because he just moved for a new job. We've both been on the go a lot. And it was like, hey, are you good if I head back to London and we're not together for the rest of the weekend? Both of us were like, I'm so glad you said that. Yes. Like we both just needed a little personal recovery, catch up on our things around the house time.

For him, build the furniture. For me, laundry, get the house in order. And you know what I did? I hung out with the dog. That's exactly what I did. Okay. Well, I think that's wonderful. But I'm still always perplexed, I guess is the word, by people's response to someone being on their own. And I know that there are absolutely exceptions to this. And I'm not making light of that at all. I know there's people who...

Need the invite, need friends giving. Absolutely. And they don't want to be by themselves. And I totally understand that. I think I was very fortunate in how I was brought up in a rural community. We didn't have malls we could run to. So I spent a lot of time on my own or playing outside with the neighbor kids. But I just got very used to it. Sarah, I want to ask you about something. It's like very important to me that I get your answer.

And I'm hoping that you'll answer me when we come back right after this break. Well, hello and welcome to the Jan Arden podcast. If I sound extra sexy today, it's because I got a cold after five years. I got a cold. I'm here with Sarah Burke today. Adam is out. He's doing something fun somewhere. Is he on a holiday? I think he's on vacation with his fam. If I got it right. Sure. Sure. Adam, go on vacation.

He deserves it. He's been working a lot. So yeah, it's just us gals today, Jan. Let's take some calls. No, we don't take calls. What I was going to ask you, what about things like going to dinner by yourself, Sarah, or going to a movie on your own? Are you good with things like that? Or what's your comfort level? That's one thing I will say that has sort of like changed, right? Like I used to be like, oh, you know, am I a loser if I'm not hanging out with people? And I used to be very concerned with that. Now it's like, I'm so...

at ease in that quiet space by myself. Like I've learned to love it. Touring, you're by yourself a lot. People think that you're around people all the time, but you're not. You're traveling a different schedule than the crew, the band. They all do their thing. Everyone's in their rooms. You basically see them on stage at night. And then when you leave and you're not with them again until two hours the next day, that's how our band is. Everybody just needs, they're away from their family already, but they just need their space. It's not like, oh yeah, let's all go bowling. No,

on our day off. It doesn't, no. Movies. I think I've gone to a movie by myself only once and it's not that I have any issues with it. I just, it's not something I think about doing often. Dinner by myself. Okay. One of my favorite things, because I've done a lot of traveling for like freelance work. For example, I'm in Victoria for World Juniors. I'm the in-game host and

I don't know, a soul there. And one of my best nights, I was sitting at the bar alone, ended up meeting some local people. I didn't mean to meet them, but all of a sudden they're telling me about like the local spots we need to go. We went and had pierogies together and I ended up hanging out with them like three other times during my time there. So I love a wild solo adventure. See, a lot of people would never do that in a million years. I love it. I think the phone has made it easier for people to do things

to go for lunch, to go to a coffee. Like I'll see people in coffee shops constantly, whether it's students, whether it's, you know, people writing letters. And I do love seeing that they're sitting, they have their coffee. I don't know how much the coffee shops love it. You know, people that sit there for three hours to use free internet, but as long as they buy some coffee, I have more and more, I've seen people doing things that

Yeah. There's girlfriends chatting in the corner or, you know, some students together, but more often than not, next time you go into a coffee shop, look around, you'll find three or four tables when people are just there on their own. And I love seeing that. Uh, my friend, my road manager, Chris has done some epic solo traveling. I would draw the line on that. There's nothing in my body. Like I can fly and go see Nigel on my own. I will get on the plane

get into my little seat, you know, and fly over there. He's picking me up at the airport with my luggage. And then I make him take my luggage. But as far as me just going, oh, let's go to Morocco. Or I couldn't go to Maui by myself. I couldn't go to Vegas by myself. I have no interest.

And some people love it. My friend does it every year. She goes somewhere away from her husband and kids by herself. She's not having sex with anybody. She's not hooking up. It's not Shirley Valentine. She's not unhappy. She's just going on these trips. Nope. You know, the only trip that I've thought about going on solo, because I think I'm sort of on the same page as you for most of that,

would be the idea of like a relaxation or retreat type of trip. I don't think I would want to go do like the backpacking alone. I would want to be with someone for that kind of thing. But yeah, like,

especially with freelance work, sometimes your pile is really high and then you just need a break from everything. And I'm bad at removing myself from the computer unless I'm in a different environment. I can't even imagine a weekend. This same friend, my road manager, he'll go into the Kananaskis. He'll take his dog and he'll go to Emerald Lake and go for...

a couple of nights, just him and the dog. And no, he'll say, I don't have my phone. He says, I have my phone, but I'm not looking at it. There's no reception there anyway. Um, he's like, they don't have wifi in the rooms. I'm like, well, what is this thing that you say to me just now? They don't have wifi in the rooms. I might like it. I'm going to one Friday. So if you need me, you need to contact me while I'm barreling down the highway. Cause then you can't get me till Sunday. I don't know. I admire that. And I do like being by myself. I can be by myself.

I mean, I'm by myself out here so much of the time anyway, but not a trip. And I go to movies by myself all the time, Sarah. Oh, what was your last one you saw? It was a little while ago. It was a few months ago. Poppy and I were on tour. So it would have been June, the end of June. What the hell did I see? I feel like it was one of the Mar-Vell series. It was something action-packed. And if I think of it, I'll tell you. But anyway, the whole moral to this story is

Do not a take a small dog to a movie and especially don't take them. If you're in one of those 3d, uh, seats that move around and spray air at you and, and vibrate. So I think the seat was like, well, it's like 20 bucks to sit in those D box weird seats while we lasted, uh,

10 minutes into the movie. Soon as that first thing went, Poppy just was started barking and people are like, you have a dog in here. Anyway, I removed myself very rapidly. I apologize to the other three people that were in the theater. It wasn't like it was the old days where the only seat you could get was the one directly staring up at a 50 foot screen. There was no one in there.

Are you allowed though to bring dogs to the movies? I didn't know that. Oh, you snuck puppy in. Well, he was in his little bag. He was small. We were tired and we thought, oh, we'll just go get one of those special D box seats. And 10 minutes in all hell broke loose with a seat was moving around. It was vibrating. There was air thing shooting up at us.

What the hell movie was it? But you know what? I've been talking about this Elvis movie for months, for months now. You've seen it. I loved it. I haven't seen it yet. So this is one that I'm like, maybe I need to go. He dies in the end. Don't tell me.

I'm kidding. I'm kidding. The Titanic. Well, it sinks in the end. Listen, we've got a great guest today coming up. His name is Vince Dietrich and he was the fantastic drummer for Spirit of the West. And I've worked with him before. He is now a brilliant author. He's got a couple of books out. We're going to talk about that and Spirit of the West and the music business and health and little bits and you're not going to want to miss it. So don't go away. Sarah and I are going to be right back.

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Welcome back to the Jan Arden podcast. As promised, the very talented Vince Dietrich is with us. He's in his home office, Nanus Bay. If you could see what Sarah and I are looking at right now, which is Vince looking very, very distinguished. Hi, Vince. Good morning. And you have a beautiful background of gorgeous. It looks like you're in like a rainforest. I am indeed my own private rainforest. Yeah. For an Ontario girl. I need to know where. Yes, I was just going to you read my mind, Sarah.

Nanus Bay is mid-Vancouver Island, so not far from Nanaimo, if that means anything to your viewers. It does. It's about two hours north of Victoria. How long have you been there? Since dinosaurs roamed the earth. I think I moved here in 92. I was in Vancouver being a musician, you know, doing my musician. And then I moved over here and got married. My wife came with a house.

I was very convenient because I'm a drummer, right? So you got to find a woman who has a house. Now, Vince, you have worked on one of my records that I really loved. You are, nobody could have done what you did. And Bob Rock was just like, the only guy that I know that can do this, what you want on this song is Vince Dietrich. Wow. And you came in and you nailed it. It was such a fun day. It was so great to see you.

I don't think we'd ever really had a chance to talk before. And of course, in the Canadian music business, the industry is so small that we're, I think we're all aware of each other and we're kind of crisscrossing the country. And, you know, somebody moves out of Vancouver out of the Orpheum Theater and then, oh, Spirit of the West was here last night. And then, you know, as you make your way across the country, you realize that you're missing people by a day or a couple of days. And I just, I have such fond memories of

crisscrossing in the 90s and seeing you guys. I have to talk about music a little bit. I'm so sorry. We're definitely going to get to your amazing books, but I want people to know kind of what your background is and sort of, I think, what has informed your writing from my point of view because I

Your writing is very musical, if I may be so bold. But anyway, Spirit of the West, you guys took freaking off in the 80s and really took the world by storm. And it had to have been a very weird time. It was an exciting time. I mean, like you, I'm in Alberta and I was born in Alberta. So, you know, and we're of a similar age. So most of my...

nonsense in the books comes from those early days performing in Alberta, which were like maximum security saloons, really. A lot of fist fighting and a lot of ashtrays being thrown at the drummer who's wearing spandex for some strange unknown reason. Are you wearing spandex under there right now? I don't, but I am in my pajama pants. I'm not standing up. I love you.

I call them my soft pants. That's my wife's terminology. It's time to soften, dear. Yeah. But it was exciting. But it was the trajectory that we all kind of dream about. And I think when it starts happening, it is a very...

unpredictable time. You don't know what's coming at you. You're being torn in many, many different directions. And I know that you guys were in Europe for quite a while doing writing and recording over there. And I have to say, like many, many thousands and thousands of other Canadians, I love the documentary with you guys and speaking about John Mann and, of course, his very, I want to say, tumultuous and heartbreaking and brave, courageous character.

uh voyage with alzheimer's early onset alzheimer's that you guys all went through with him it was uh it was really difficult and it was very mysterious at first because uh i mean well you know well how it is when you travel with a group of musicians you have esp for each other and um

I particularly can read moods from a long distance away and go, Oh, that guy's having a bad day. We've been on the bus too long. I'm just going to leave right now and let him be alone. And I could read John so well. And I knew, I knew when something was not right with his recollections and his behaviors. And I thought, Oh man, he he's under a lot of stress, I think. And, and it took us years to realize that he was having clinical changes in his brain and his,

It was affecting everything in his life, not just lyrics for the show that night. It was a big, big deal, but it took a while. Yeah, having gone through it with my mom, it's a different journey for everybody for sure, but I certainly can...

sympathize with all of you guys. Because with my mom, it was so weird and mysterious, like you said, that first few years where I'm like, I don't know what is going on, but it's the personality changes. It wasn't just the recollection. That in and of itself is an issue on its own. But it is that the DNA literally that starts affecting people's brains. But I certainly don't want to dwell on that. I loved your music. So many of us are such...

will be fans of spirit of the west and your amazing drumming vince and i know musicians it was such an integral beautiful part of the sound you guys created and you know you were just talking about being a drummer i'll tell you what drummers do not get the credit they deserve because they shape they form they inform they are the energy they are the propulsion i'll tell you what you can't

Pull a train without the engine. And as far as I'm concerned, and I'll always feel this way, drummers are the heart and soul of everything you do. And they certainly have been in my music over the years. So thanks for that. And now we're moving on. Thank you. Thank you for saying that. Oh my gosh, Vince, you're, you're just exceptional. Um, did you like doing the videos? I have to ask.

The videos I found to be very unsatisfying. But these are the old days videos. Yes, I know. Film. Camera crews and lighting and they'd say things like, I'd say, well, what would you like us to do in this section? Because everybody else was just standing around going, why aren't we being paid attention to here?

And one of the directors said, oh, just do whatever it is that you do. And then I turned into that Vince. The only one in spirit who would yell at people, that was me. Well, it worked for you. It worked for you guys. Videos were always strange things to do. Anyway, moving on. And I want to talk about your books as much as we can in the next little few minutes here. Vince, you have become a really...

cool, very talented author. I have read both your books. Yes, you have. And I have been lucky enough to be able to supply you with little blurbs, you know, telling people, read the damn book. Tell me about how this started. The Licker Vicker and the Vickers Nickers.

are the two books that you have out right now that are available for you people to buy right now. So go wherever you go to buy these books. Tell me about how this started. Well, I've been writing since I was a little boy, actually, since elementary school. I always wanted to write a book. But of course, you get into the music business and then it's all consuming and you just do that. But I found opportunities to write promotional stuff, biographies, website material, and

Short stories, poetry, just anything. I was always jotting for my entire life. And then when the band was forced to retire because, you know, John's health and my health, too, actually, I nearly croaked. I went, well, I've got to do something creative or I'm going to literally crawl out of my skin. So I started just writing a book for fun. And it was based on.

just a riff, a family riff that we had, I think at a Thanksgiving dinner some years ago, five or six years ago. And my family were all talking about some sort of Andy from Mayberry kind of scenario about our small town. And I went, you know, there might be something to this if I turn it on its head and make it

musician humor with the gallows humor that I like so well and the absurdness and all the things that I enjoy the most, which is just turning regular life completely inside out and backwards. And it did sort of, it caught, you know, it got traction and I managed to find a book deal. I do not know how that happened. I just, I cannot tell you. There's no one way of doing it.

So your protagonist, tell me about him and tell me about how you put this guy together. It's reality, but it's not reality. And it's fantasy, but it's not fantasy. And it's magical and it's not magical. So I'm just going to hand it to you of how you chose to form that world. And like I said, your protagonist, your main fella, right?

Give us the synopsis. Well, I'll tell you about the character first. Tony Vicar, he's a failed rock star. He's past his due date. He still holds on to the dream. I know a thousand guys like this. They have the same hairdo they had in grade 11. They wear the same pants. They're listening to the same tunes. They're sometimes in their 50s or 60s. They have some sort of pickup band. They're

playing sweet home Alberta and, you know, just, and that's him. He, but he's a dreamer and he's got so much more inside him than he's ever plumbed before. And a series of adventures happen that sort of begin with his giving aid and comfort at the scene of a fatal car crash. So one of the, one of the people in the car crash dies and,

And for all intents and purposes, he appears to have brought another dead person back to life. And once that report gets out, he becomes famous, world famous. And then people, of course, give him undue credit for everything. That's the encapsulation of Tony Vicar, who is opinionated and cranky and stupid and brilliant and oblivious and razor sharp.

like all of us. When we come back, we're going to talk to Vince about what the similarities are or the differences are between playing music and writing books. Don't go away. You're listening to the Jan Arden podcast. I'm here with Sarah Burke. We'll be right back. Welcome back to the Jan Arden podcast. Vince Dietrich is with us. He's in his home office. What part of the writing interests you the most? Is it, um,

Can you compare it at all to music, Vince? Is there any part of it that's similar or this? Well, unfortunately, everything is like music to me because, you know, I see everything through the lens of music and that's my understanding. So, yes. And so I like to have themes and I like to have, you know, counter themes and I like to have bass parts for structure. And I like, you know, the little flute parts at the top and,

I see it all like an arrangement out on the page for sure. And you need to have that balance. You see it. As I see music, I hear the book. It's a synesthesia of some sort, I guess. I don't know. But I just like it to have that same sort of satisfactory journey that a good song has. When you hit that chorus and you go, that's what you want in the book. But at the same time, I wrote the first book specifically for

to be as visual as possible so that it could be easily adapted to television. Because the initial idea was a television show. And my good buddy, Pete McCormick, the filmmaker, advised me that if you want to keep your idea, you got to write the book and own the intellectual property. So that's what I did. I can really see that as a limited series. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Yeah, and I have made an agreement with Sugar Skull Films, and we're going to be attempting to develop this into... Oh, that's exciting. It is. It is very exciting. And Annie Kidd-Wolfe is the main person at Sugar Skull Films, and she's also a musician in a previous life, probably still. So are you going to be Tony Vince? Come on, you can do it. No, no, no. You're a little too old. No, no, I might be. I might...

I might be a styrofoam rock from Star Trek over in the corner or something like that. Oh, stop it. No, no. You'll be yelling at everyone. Like you told us, you're going to be yelling at everyone. I only yell when people just push me aside like I'm a dust bunny or something. What was it like finally being published? Because like you said, this was a childhood thing.

This was part of what you did as a young guy growing up. And I'm sure being on the road really put pen to paper of all the experiences you had with spirit out there traveling the world. Did you journal quite a bit? And then, but like I said, just finally getting this book published, you weren't 25. You were well on your way to being a fully developed human being. Well, I don't know if that's ever going to happen, but. Okay. I take it all back.

I was in my mid-50s, the first one. Well, what am I now? I'm 59. It felt like when that first book, they sent out promo books in advance of the actual release, and I got one copy by Courier, and it came sitting on the little bench by my front door, and I kind of held it and like, whoo, whoo, whoo.

This is amazing. You know, that feeling. It is amazing. It's a really cool feeling. I mean, it doesn't stay with you the same way it would have. Like when I used to write away to NASA installations to get autographs from astronauts and things like that. It was a similar feeling, but because I'm older now, it didn't last quite as long. Did you ever get an autograph from an astronaut?

Oh, I've got tons of them. Tons of them. Really? Super nerd. Well, it seems a little odd that you, the nerd, would go into rock and roll drumming. Oh, I was born into it, Bojan. Born into it. My dad was a musician and his dad was a musician. A drummer? Or just... My dad was a military bandmaster in the town where I grew up that I will not mention. And it was just one of those things. I've got

It was as natural as some kids going into hockey, you know, because their dads play hockey. No, I totally get that. I didn't come from a musical family. So people are always like, how the hell did you end up in music? But there was really, I mean, my grandmother played piano. That was about it. And my dad sang when he was drunk. Does that count? Yeah, it does actually. Oh, okay. All right. Well, you're such a, you're such a language focused person. You're a great storyteller. You, in fact, if I may say,

You know how experienced I am. It's like 55 years in music business for me now. I have never seen anyone with better storytelling ability or patter than you. Anywhere in the world. Take a bow. Yes. Thank you very much. Playing in the bars, you know, you talk about stuff kind of developing because of, you know, your young history.

But we only knew like 10 cover songs playing way up north. And the guys would say to me, just talk. It's a survival mechanism, actually. It really was. It was your second book written during the pandemic, Vince? No, I staggered through it. In fact, I think I started before the pandemic. And then the second draft took me a really long time because the pandemic kind of screwed with my head, to be perfectly honest. I found it difficult to get into that humorous mood again.

At first, at least. After a while, I turned the pandemic into a black humor moment, but it took me a while. I was really upset and worried for the world. I just didn't know where things were going to go because it was dark there in those first few months. It really was. As you'll recall.

Yeah, you and I are pretty lucky because we lived in places where we could look out at the trees and not be surrounded by, you know, people in a condo building that was 40 floors high. So I felt very fortunate all the time. And it's no wonder the mental health, just the wheels fell off that bus. I think it's going to take us a long time to get caught up. People are still really struggling. Yeah.

Well, these books are extremely funny. The Liquor Vicar and The Vicar's Knickers. If you want something really different and really compelling and very character driven, and it'll just make you think and laugh and it'll make you think of your family and your friends. And congratulations on this monumental task. And I can't wait to see the third one. And I can't wait to see where you get on the development of the TV series for the first one.

So if there's anything I can ever do, if you have a mute nun, I don't think you did because I read the book. There's no mute nun in the first book. Oh, no. Believe me, this has crossed my mind already. Let me know. But thanks for coming on the Jan Arden podcast. I didn't even let Sarah ask you one single thing. Maybe I should. Sarah, do you have anything that you want to ask Vince? The one thing I was going to ask is if someone specific in your life inspired one of the characters in a really –

like pointed way. Yes. Several of them have. And then most of the main character are compilations of, of other people that I've known, but there are a couple of characters that are based. Give us the most obvious one. Oh, she's digging.

Yeah, this is something that nobody's asked me this before. Surprisingly, actually. She's good. The centenarian, Frankie Hall is her name. Hilarious. She's based on my mother-in-law and much of the dialogue is a direct adaptation of her saucy speech. She was an amazing woman who lived almost to 100 and she

She had everybody, except for me, terrified. I don't know why everybody was so terrified of her. I would just give it to her back. Don't you think that so much literature is inspired by mother-in-laws? I feel like this is a common thread. They're amazing creatures. Sometimes they can be ferocious. They're pretty amazing people. That's why I never got married. Well, even everybody loves Raymond. I'm thinking about the, you know... Oh, Doris Roberts, yeah. Yeah! Anyway...

That was something I was thinking about. Listen, we're going to put links to your books and the info there in the episode notes if anyone wants to check it out. Then we can put it on the World Wide Web, Vince. What's that? I could talk to Vince for a long, long time. I'm sure he's got so many road stories. Hey, Sarah. I mean, just listening to. He's got me wanting to A, write a book and start a band. So here we are. It's a good thing.

It's the truth. It's the truth. I really have. I've read both these books and I can't explain how interesting they are and how funny they are and so unexpected. You will not guess what's happening. You can check all the info that you'd like to read about these books on, is it the show notes? Yeah, yeah. We'll have everything in there. We're going to have everything in there. Thank you so much. Great to see you, Sarah Burke. And wherever you are, Adam, we're thinking about you.

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