The Philip Lewin Interview
When and where were you born? What was your childhood like growing up? When did you first begin to fall in love with music, more specifically the guitar? Was this something that was relevant around your household growing up?
1949 in Cortland, New York. I think I had learning disabilities and problems with the traditional education model. Generally, I was well cared for by a loving liberal, middle class family, in a small town. I was bullied to the point where, between the bullying and educational failure, I was given the opportunity to go away to school. My mother played show tunes on the piano and accordion and sang. My father listened to classical LPs. I started piano lessons at age six and was not supposed to touch a guitar as it was going to be my older sister’s instrument. She gave me secret guitar lessons. My main instrument is actually the piano. Music was central.
What would you and your friends do for fun growing up? Who were some of your earliest influences in your more formative years? When and where did you see your first show and when did it dawn on you that you wanted to be a musician yourself? When and where did you play your very first show and what was that experience like?
There were a few local kids on the same street and we were always playing games outside. A couple of friendly contact with children of my parents friends. My family. My piano teacher who calmly let me wander musically from the scores! Outside of school concerts, I never went to a rock concert until university. First concert – The Doors! It never dawned on me that I wanted to be a musician. I always was a musician. I was writing for the piano when I started lessons. In Junior high I wrote rhythmic poetry that I latter realized were like song lyrics. I chose to write music and record before seriously attempting to play live for anyone else. A friend at the university got me out of the closet to play in small groups. Playing an album release party in a bar in 1976 with the musicians who recorded with me on Diamond Love, my second LP, was my first concert. I was quite terrorized by playing live for many years. I eventually learned not to care and just play for myself in front of people, although live concerts are rare. I have been more interested in recording.
What ultimately inspired you to pursue a career in music as a singer-songwriter? You released your legendary debut LP “Am I Really Here All Alone?” in ‘75. Tell me about writing and recording this album and what that experience was like.
I never considered it a career. I certainly am not much of a singer. I am a strong song-writer and a good producer/arranger of my own material. I had a lot of songs. A friend had a decent tape recorder and I used sound on sound/sound with sound to first do a single track of rhythm guitar and vocal with an overdub of lead guitar. Because of how the tape machine put the mixed second track slightly delayed from the original, I used the original track as a “pre-echo/double track” in a final mix. “Touch”, the one piano tune was recorded on a funky old piano I had bought for $50. I took the tape to a record pressing plant along with 300 hand produced jackets where I glued a small poster on a white jacket. On a whim, I signed and numbered the first 100 like an art print. I did the art for the LP center, based on a house with gargoyles at the corner of Gothic Avenue in Toronto. I did send out copies to the local industry, but after one guy invited me to his office to, “play the product”, I realized the record was not “product” and never went back to the industry. I allowed Big Pink Korea to do CDs of “Am I Really Here All Alone?” and “Diamond Love” in Asia and Tompkins Square to do a remix on “Am I Really Here All Alone?” for their release in all formats in 2017. They did an amazing job cleaning up a very muddy original mix from the original tape. I have been trying to get the tape back from them ever since without success. Many of the songs are lyrically quite personal. Some were attempts to push myself beyond my own experience.
How did the deal with Gargoyle Records come about and would you mind giving some background to songs such as “Time is Passing”, “Unusual Day”, and “Back Home to You”? That following year you followed up with your sophomore album “Diamond Love and Other Realities”. This record is different in many ways and has a full band to help bring the music to life. How did you go about recruiting musicians like Wyatt McDonald, Ray Mizzoni and Brian Gauci?
No deal. I am Gargoyle Records. I am adverse to giving anyone any control of my music, or books. The deal with Tompkins Square had some benefits, but also some negative republishing rights, which may eventually be a legal thing. “Time is Passing” starts as a study of a friend, but goes into fantasy. “Unusual Day” reflect the progression of a relationship. “Back Home to You” has no basis in reality. I wanted to write a train song, but not another “City of New Orleans”. I had finished and recorded “Am I Here All Alone?” (herein AIRHAA) by 1973. It just took time and money to make the LP. I was already writing “Diamond Love and Other Realities” in 1974 and 1975. I had given a friend a copy of AIRHAA who also lived on Gothic Avenue. He played it for a house mate, Brian Gauci, telling Brian that he knew I was going to make a second album. Brian knocked on my door and offered to play guitar. My intent was to play keyboard. We started rehearsing the songs and Brian, who is an amazing guitarist, said we needed a bass player. He brought in the equally amazing Wyatt MacDonald. Then he said we needed a drummer and first brought in Ray. We recorded one track at a studio in Ryerson University, but Ray got a job in Las Vegas. Manny Hillier became the drummer for the rest of the album. Last, was the addition of Toni Hoyland, who I met through my girlfriend at the time, sharing vocals. I was lucky in that all five musicians easily got what I wanted and made influential contributions to the sound.
After ‘76 there was a great space of time till you released the 2012 album “In Twilight’s Quiet Hour”. May I ask what was going on both in life and in your career in music during that time?
I actually started a follow up album in 1979 entitled "Real Classic" with Brian and bassist Oolie Bonnet, another of Brian’s large group of great musical friends. We recorded a quick demo, but I ran out of money so it was shelved. The music ended up as a rough mixed on a deteriorating cassette, sitting in a drawer. In 1979 my now wife Janice and I began our relationship. A house and kids followed, so there was less time and money for recording. I eventually decided the great playing by Brian and Oolie was more important than problemic technical issues and spent a lot of time finishing the album a few years ago, at which time drums were added. Some of the drumming was done by mixing engineer Sol Noguera and the rest by my son, Andrew Lewin, who wasn’t even born when the original recording were made! Musically, for that quarter century I continued to write songs. My wife and I had (have?) a cover band and we played locally. This band made a live CD. Seventeen songs recorded in 75 minutes in our studio/garage. I put a few of the tracks on YouTube on my page. Janice is a real singer and you can hear her covers ranging from Leonard Cohen’s “First We Take Manhattan” to Big Brother’s “Piece of My Heart”. A lot of my original music is on YouTube, but not posted by me.
What have you been up to in more recent years? Is there anything else you would like to further share with the readers?
I’ve played one concert in Toronto a few years ago at the invitation of musical friends who had a club booked and generously wanted me to share the night. I also played a couple of concerts in Brooklyn, New York. One was set up by Jacob Gorchov who has a great label with a lot of interesting, quality music called “Palto Flats”. The other was the premiere of an ongoing series of must hear concerts called “Voices in the Heights”. It turned out that the first concert was recorded multi-track – HD, so it became an LP. The album has me on piano and guitar, New York’s Jeremy Aaron, who I have known since he was a bump in his mother and played with since he was six on violin, and Janice on backing vocals. Somewhere on line is a long interview including live playing on radio WFMU (Woof Moo!) I also wrote and published three Oz novels on my own Nikidik Press label. Oz novels, if you didn’t guess, are sequels to “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” and other books in the series. “The Witch Queen of Oz” is sold out and only available from resellers at ridiculous prices. But, “The Master Crafters of Oz” and “The Spellcasters of Oz” are available. Go see the movie “Skin” by Oscar winning director Guy Nattiv and starring Jaime Bell. It is now available as pay-per-view. My performance and song “Watercolours” is used as an under-theme (my description) in the movie. Listen to my song “Ghosts” about residential schools on YouTube. Buy my music and books!
