Ian Thomas brings 50 years of songs to N.B. theatres

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A half-century after he won a Juno Award for most promising male artist, Ian Thomas says he still loves writing and performing songs on stage for audiences across Canada.

“I’m still loving the creative process and playing with a full band again,” Thomas said in telephone interview with Brunswick News. He will bring his “Not Gone Yet!” tour to Moncton’s Capitol Theatre on April 19, the Imperial Theatre in Saint John April 29 and the Fredericton Playhouse on April 30. He’ll also perform shows in Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island this month.

Thomas, originally from Hamilton, Ont., is best known for his 1973 hit “Painted Ladies,” which won him a Juno Award, a record contract and a gig opening for April Wine. His other hits include “Pilot” and “Hold On”, which was covered by Santana in 1982.

Other Ian Thomas songs made famous include “The Runner” by Manfred Mann’s Earth Band, “Right Before Your Eyes” by America, and “To Comfort You” by Bette Miler. Thomas also wrote the theme song for the film “Strange Brew,” starring his brother, Dave (Hoser) Thomas. He’s written the music for 22 movies, played the part of Dougie Franklin on the Red Green Show and was recognized by SOCAN for the National Achievement Award for Songwriting.

Last April, at age 73, he decided to put a new band together and take the show on the road again.

“It was pretty humbling to realize that people remembered these songs and so many said ‘I didn’t know that was your song,'” he said.

Thomas was one of the Canadian composers who benefitted from the federal government’s “Can-con” regulations that have forced radio stations to include a percentage of Canadian-produce records on their playlist rotation. Those rules helped performers like Anne Murray, Gordon Lightfoot and many others get their songs on the radio, which sometimes led to the Billboard charts.

For this tour, Thomas has a full band with keyboards, guitar, bass, drums and himself playing guitar.

“I’ve been pretty true to the original arrangements of those songs, so we’re doing a cross-section of 50 years of my recordings, from ‘Painted Ladies’ to a new song from an album that is coming out in May.”

While “Painted Ladies” has become a popular cover tune, Thomas says he’s very proud of “The Runner,” which became a theme song for a Terry Fox documentary. And Anne Murray recorded one called “Good Again,” which is about recovering from the loss of a loved one.

“It’s a heavy process that a lot of us face. It’s about learning to love in absence after the luxury of loving in presence, and that’s an education most of us would love to indefinitely postpone but you have to learn how to do it, how to maintain love after the person is gone, because it just backs up and it’ll swamp you otherwise,” he said.

Thomas has also performed fundraisers for his son, Jake, who was seriously injured in a waterskiing accident in 2017. One of the fundraisers included Dave Thomas, Martin Short, Paul Shaffer and others from the SCTV days in Toronto.

Thomas says there are pros and cons to touring from town to town.

“The driving is the most tedious part of it all, but when you show up for sound check on the afternoon of the show, that’s when the fun starts,” he said. “The guys who I’m playing with are some of my best friends from the last 30 or 40 years. The dinners before the shows are somewhat ceremonial. And when you realize your songs have been on the soundtrack of people’s lives, what an honour that is. It’s a bit like gathering around a campfire and singing songs we all know. That is such a privilege for me.”

Thomas says the ongoing changes to music production and sales in the digital age have made it increasingly difficult for songwriters and artists to earn a living. He feels that music videos played on TV stations like MTV and MuchMusic devalued the creators of the product because they were forced to give up their hard work for free airplay, in the hope that the free promotion would help drive sales of records and concert tickets.

“Where we are today, I feel for the up and coming artists. There are a lot of good ones out there, but if they don’t have a smash hit on the first song, they’re dead. My record company stood with me for six albums when I wrote what I felt like. After 20 albums, it’s been a joyful ride for me and I know that joyful ride is just not there for today’s artists who are better than I am, and that makes me sad.”

He encouraged young writers and performers to carry on with their passion for creativity.

“If you are passionate about making music, make it at whatever level you can, and if it is really good, it will find its own way. If you do it because you love it, you will always do it. The problems come when you strap the horses of industry to the creative process and you end up serving the industry rather than the creative process.”

Ian Thomas Maritime Tour:

Ian Thomas and his band will perform at the following venues in New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island in April. Tickets are available through the venues.

• April 19: Moncton, Capitol Theatre.

• April 20 – Charlottetown, Confederation Centre of the Arts.

• April 21 – Summerside, Harbourfront Theatre.

• April 23 – Sydney, Highland Arts Theatre.

• April 26- Liverpool, Astor Theatre.

• April 27 – Halifax, Rebecca Cohn Auditorium.

• April 28 – New Glasgow, Pictou County Wellness Centre.

• April 29 – Saint John Imperial Theatre.

• April 30- Fredericton Playhouse.