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And yet, curiously, the semi-annual blitz of a little band called the Headstones is welcome. They could be Red's house band and I don't think anyone here would mind. The Headstones play tomorrow night at Alberta's Own Rock Weekend 2, a rock festival with dozens of independent hard-rock bands being held near the hamlet of Donalda, 155 km southeast of Edmonton, and promising to be 13 times more interesting than Stage 13. Then the Headstones rock for our men and women in uniform at the CFB's Lamplighter Club on Monday. Then it's off to play the Joint next Thursday.
How, I ask frontman Hugh Dillon, can his band get away with playing in the area so much and never burning out their audience?
"People are not stupid," he says. "We love playing. And when the crowd's great it amps up the performances. Some of our best gigs have been in Alberta, because the crowds are authentic. I know other f---ing bands and they just f---ing whine and they don't even wanna play and blah blah blah, f--- it! I just can't f---ing believe ..."
(So we won't wear out the "f" and "-" keys here, just insert the f-word wherever you think it should fit in the rest of Hugh's spiel.)
"I just can't believe some of these bands got these record deals and are putting out lousy records and getting paid for it, and their gigs are getting worse and worse every year, whereas ours have gotten better. And they don't wanna be on the road, wah, wah. Then quit!"
Talking with Hugh never gets old, either. That's because you can talk about things other than rock 'n' roll - which, let's face it, is fun to listen to but boring to talk about. Drugs are much more interesting. Remember the order of importance: sex and drugs and then rock 'n' roll.
The Headstones had a few lulls in their history, due to drugs, mainly, but the band's as sharp as ever on its latest album, The Oracle of Hi-Fi, sort of a highbrow title for such a street-rock band, but hey, Hugh's granddad was a famous writer who was written about in Time. The live shows remain pretty intense.
"We're just totally focused now," Dillon says. "We know exactly what we're doing. I gotta say, on the other side of that, I've learned to appreciate what I do. I've learned a lot in the last few years - getting out in reality, making movies and quality records and not just being stowed away under a rock drinking vodka and shooting smack."
He laughs, "I'd sit in front of the TV and put everything off, except the dealer. Once you get away from it, and you see that your life has improved, your work is improved; people hire me for movies and pay me well. We could've been dropped by our record company a bunch of times. They knew that if we could get our act together, we're great songwriters. We're really prolific now."
Now we're getting back into rock 'n' roll or, worse, 12-step-program material. Dillon's not going to preach; he says he loves the Bill Hicks routine: "All the burned-out rock stars say, 'kids, don't do drugs.' Just once I'd like to see one of them say, 'You know, kids, I did drugs and I had a great time!' "
Let's change the subject. There's still Hugh's movie career to cover. It's a "hobby" that can pay better than rock 'n' roll, sex and drugs put together. Acting is much like being in a rock band, he says; in fact, "on stage, you're in character whether you think you are or not, playing the role of a rock band."
He feels sorry for the rock stars who know nothing but being a rock star. Dillon at least gets to shed the image now and then. In Hard Core Logo, he starred as a bad-ass rock singer whose self-destructive behaviour leads to his downfall. Well, a better example might be the upcoming Ginger Snaps 3 - filmed in Edmonton - where he plays a 19th-century preacher. It was hard, he says. For one thing, "There was no f---ing profanity!"
He's interested in TV, too. Perhaps he could do a guest judging spot on Canadian Idol. "I'd shoot them. You know that old western thing: Dance! I think I would make it a little more difficult for them to get through the whole process." Let the contestants get a taste of what Hugh went through, eh? Let them go through rehab or something. Rehab reality TV. Imagine the ratings. Or the advertisers.
I digress. The overriding mantra of Hugh Dillon is that an artist must stay focused and busy with several different things in order to stay healthy.
"Sometimes I think the rock 'n' roll thing, if that's all you do, if you don't have any hobbies or you haven't learned to socialize with other people, you're a prisoner of that one character you've created. I've refused to define myself by those kind of parameters. I'd rather define myself as a drug addict. Just be a singer in a band, who cares?"
Well, exactly.