Blue Rodeo are a Canadian institution. Their songs have soundtracked the lives of Canadians for over four decades, and yet their story has never been explored in much detail. With the new documentary, Blue Rodeo: Lost Together, director Dale Heslip has righted that wrong, sitting down with the band and various managers, collaborators and famous fans to tell the story of a band who've more than made it, yet still feel like they have a lot to prove.
Lost Together essentially traces the 40-plus-year relationship that head songwriters Greg Keelor and Jim Cuddy have had, as both friends and bandmates. They perform together in a living room, just the two of them (their acoustic rendition of "Lost Together" makes the eyes brim and the heart explode), laugh at pictures of their younger selves, and discuss their contrasting songwriting approaches and temperaments.
The film thankfully also gives voice to other seminal band members, including founders Bazil Donovan (bass) and Cleave Anderson (drums), as well as second — and long-time — drummer, Glenn Milchem, whose love for thrash and double kick is a pretty surprising revelation. Imagine if Blue Rodeo had recorded some Slayer covers — what a missed opportunity!
Keelor and Cuddy's earliest days as collaborators were spent living in New York City and playing in various bands, none of which made it far. They performed at CBGB, began touring North America, started a criminally under-heard punky new wave band called the Hi-Fi's, and embraced the neo-country movement that started bubbling up in the early '80s. Handsome Ned's "revved-up" sound proved to be a big influence, as did the Queen Street scene in Toronto (remember when it was cool?), and soon, the band were selling out smaller venues and recording early hits like "Try." The Horseshoe, Rivoli and the Cameron House all played an important role in the band's evolution — both as performers and music fans — as did organs and keyboards, thanks to virtuoso Bobby Wiseman. He used drumsticks and oranges on the keys, and all of them were vintage, so it's fine.
While the film often takes the talking head approach, interviewing participants in an oral history mould, the faded photographs and lo-fi footage — including all those MuchMusic interviews — give the film a warm, home-movie vibe that fits the laid-back feel of the band's music. The '80s footage in particular features some topnotch hair and outfit choices (mullets galore!), making the whole film fit like a pair of well-worn jeans, comfortable and tough and more than a little faded.
The film also features footage of a full-band jam commemorating their 40th anniversary. These sparse performance sections resemble Andrew Dominik's Nick Cave films (audience-less concerts with a surprising amount of gravitas), or The Last Waltz, which, let's be honest, every music documentary of this ilk strives to be. These scenes prove less successful than the archival material — bordering on unnecessary, even derivative, especially since the footage is sporadic and the performances are truncated.
We've already been treated to the aforementioned living room jam, and while it's great to see Cuddy hit the high note in "Try," additional time could have been spent on more revealing elements: the band's early years, their various musical experiments and explorations, and their countless attempts at breaking through internationally. These go under-explored, and the band are rarely asked more pressing questions about their legacy, even though they seem very capable of handling them.
The film features anecdotes aplenty throughout, including the writing of the "sing-songy" titular hit, "Lost Together," and while music docs often want to focus on dark or salacious material, with Blue Rodeo, it's often limited to medical scares and inner-band turmoil. The Tonight Show proved contentious, as did their exhausting touring schedule, and shockingly they never broke through in the States (fuck 'em). Although this may sound quaint, even boring, it shows that a music doc — and the band explored therein — doesn't have to be rooted in scandal or sensationalism to be successful.
Many of their '80s and '90s albums are also explored in detail, including the loose, live-off-the-floor magic of Five Days in July, and a number of interviews with other musicians and actors sing the band's praises, including Tegan and Sara, Eric McCormack (who says they are the "sound of Canada") and frequent collaborator Sarah McLachlan.
Although Blue Rodeo can feel like a relic of the past — something your parents listen(ed) to, an adult-contemporary pastiche of retro sounds and references — nothing could be further from the truth, and Lost Together may actually help alter that perception. These guys were pretty damn cool: Wiseman brought an avant-garde edge, including his semi-destruction of various pianos, into the fray; the band's forays into jazzy improvisation and stoner-blues are celebrated, and rightfully so; and those melodies. From the outset, Blue Rodeo just seemed to know how to write a catchy, twangy song, and many of these tracks are fucking aces.
Thankfully, the band would never embrace hyperbolic markers such as "geniuses," and the film doesn't paint them as such. In fact, it shows them as hardworking songwriters and performers, sometimes curt with one another but always fraternal. Keelor even calls some of his own songs "clunkers." That's real and honest, and those moments give the film an authenticity and attitude that's often missing from more hagiographic examinations of musicians and bands.
At 88 minutes, the film cuts a quick pace, painting an intimate portrait of one of Canada's most beloved bands. It's a brisk, nostalgic — but never resigned — look at a perpetually underrated Canadian institution. Even as elder statesmen of the Canadian music landscape, their gratitude and pride are apparent and well-deserved.
At one point, Milchem gets very emotional talking about the band. He's not the only one. To be lost, together, doing what we love with the people we love, is a luxury few are afforded. We should all be so lucky.