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Leaving the Rheostatics after 30 years was an experience Dave Bidini describes as like molting an old layer of skin.
"It's essential to keep it fresh for an artist to survive," Bidini, 46, says. "I've had a few moltings over my career, but leaving the Rheostatics was, by far, the biggest.
"The year before we split was traumatic. The band was in a state of emotional collapse. The only time we really functioned was when we were on stage, so when we played our final gig, at Massey Hall in 2007, it was a liberating and terrifying experience."
Good reason, too. The Rheostatics had been, after all, a benchmark other aspiring Canadian indie bands measured themselves by.
Once over his separation anxiety, the fedora-wearing Bidini was surprisingly eager to get back in the studio with new bandmates -- drummer Don Kerr, guitarist Pail Linklater and bassist Doug Friesen -- to record his first solo album, The Land is Wild.
It was a CD the hockey-loving Bidini launched with a "Hoser's March" parade through downtown Toronto on June 6 that ended with a concert at the Horseshoe Tavern, just like a latter day Stompin' Tom Connors.
There's something proudly patriotic about Bidini's album, a 12-song collection of oddly folksy songs that feel like conversations you might overhear at a Tim Hortons.
While popular with the literary and indie artist crowd, Bidini's slanted view of the Canadian psyche has a harder time penetrating a mainstream audience.
For example, the night before our interview, the band played a gig in a Hamilton for an audience of 60.
"It's like we're starting over," he says. "We can't take anything for granted. We'll play small gigs because at this point we measure success one fan at a time."
Still, he resigned a long time ago to value creative originality and integrity over industry success.
"There isn't a week goes by when I don't see the ghost of some band we used to play with," he says. "Each gig I play is a victory to survival.
"Playing rock 'n' roll isn't easy. I remember seeing The Ramones singing Blitzkrieg Bop for about the 50,000th time and you could tell they were sick to death of it because Joey barely pronounced a word. I don't want to get to that point."
In the meantime, Bidini's penning a book about soccer and looking at producing a series of films for the 2010 World Cup.