I Mother Earth Reunites with Edwin. What? Really?

I know… completely crazy!!  So… where to begin with all of this stuff that’s been going on?  I’m just as shocked/excited/confused/pumped as all of you!  So let’s start at the beginning… which was basically 2 weeks ago. Or maybe we go back further (6 months) when the idea and plans to use the 20th anniversary of Scenery and Fish as a theme to finally get playing coast to coast, and do something awesome for our fans.

Our basic concept was to use the entire year to play about 25 shows across all of Canada, release S&F on vinyl, a new digital release of the remixed record, a making of documentary, new music, acoustic versions etc. basically the whole shebang!!! This was shaping up to be the busiest year since the re-onion!  We were really over-the-top-excited about the prospects.

However, behind the scenes, things were getting a bit more challenging schedule wise with all of it. We all have busy lives of course and with Brian now having a full time radio gig, travel schedules were really tight. That, plus his current efforts to chase a personal dream and join a different band,… the live prospects of this year actually becoming a reality became even more difficult. So what to do now?

I was resigned to just believing that there would be no live shows, no big celebration of this record, perhaps not even a goodbye to all of our fans who have invested years and years into this band. (this part was killing me personally the most!)  It was a really sad and pathetic revelation to have, just sitting there in my pajamas, scratching my balls, wondering if this was it for IME.  So I thought my days were best served by getting to work on all of the other things we had already been promising to fans and just try not to sweat it… maybe even get some sleep. Self pity doesn’t fit me very well, and within a couple of days this disappointment and confusion turned into something much more recognizable… motivation! (…to live just a question of where to get love..)

THE MEETING

However, within 3-4 days of Brian’s announcement that he was now focusing more of his attention on another band, an extremely serendipitous and unexpected meeting between myself and Edwin came together through a mutual friend.  I was initially interested as far back as 8 months ago, to have a simple discussion to see if he had any interest in being a part of this ‘Making of the Fish’ doc that I have been thinking about… I just couldn’t get my head around actually hooking up to talk.  Call it laziness, cowardice, indifference… whatever you want. I always had ‘something else to do’ and would ‘get around to it’… and you all know what that means.

As Chris and myself were continually talking about S&F concepts for the past 6 months, we were really getting an understanding from people just how much this record meant to them at one point in their lives… it’s an interesting feeling, to be consistently reminded that we owe a great debt to this time, and this record!  There is no escaping it. We also really started to talk more frequently and easily about the possibilities of getting input from the people around us from that specific time.  It isn’t possible to think about that record without thinking of all the people who helped to make it. Simple. My only problem? I haven’t even crossed paths let alone talked to Edwin in 18 years… I had no idea how would it go… Who is this guy now? (and who am I now for that matter?!)

Read on!