Old Enough to Forget

Bruce Cockburn is an artists' artist. One whose conviction and seriousness seem overwhelming and to be honest a little intimidating. He always seemed like a guy who had a sense of humour but kept it in a shoe box one the shelf in his closet lest he use it and undermine his own sense of purpose. As a teenager my first exposure to him was when he hit it big with "Wondering Where the Lions Are" a song that is intricately structured. I saw him perform the song on Saturday Night Live, and I remember thinking, "Wow, he's on T.V." followed closely by "Man, I can't stand that song." It was true, it was right up there as a tweofer along with Gordon Lightfoot's "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" as songs I could appreciate the grandeur and scope of, but couldn't stand. Then there'd be other songs, and for whatever reason I never forgot his appearance on The Alan Hamel Show (that later devolved into The Alan Thicke Show, and would ...