A new story from WTOP 24 Hour News

Automatic TRANSCRIPT

This legendary artist, WTO entertainment reporter Jason fraley, hi ya J Frey. Oops. Well, that's not him. I guess we may have just lost him for a moment. Let's try to reconnect with Jason in just a moment, but of course, Sean has most famous song, was this one. The maritime sailors cathedral yeah, about the SS Edmund Fitzgerald sinking on Lake Superior back in 1975, that song both was praised highly for its delving into a piece of history that wasn't all that well known and also derided for it being 6 minutes long, but still it ended up being his biggest hit ever. Well, let's talk about that with our own entertainment editor Jason Frehley, hiya Jeffrey. Hey, how's it going? Good. So you interviewed lightfoot just last summer in what was one of his final interviews. What was your impression of him? Yeah, he was coming to play Capital One hall in Tyson's corner, Virginia, and then in my neck of the Woods in the Weinberg center in Frederick Maryland. And I remembered at the end of the interview, he said, you know, he was planning to keep touring, but was actually feeling tired himself. He said that. And he said, one of these days I'll get with 21st century doesn't use Internet, no cell phone, but you know, he said he has been on emphysema, oxygen tank recently. That one kind of hit me hard and I know I'm not really in the demo of a Gordon Lightfoot. You would think, but my grandfather literally played his greatest hits every time I got in the car. So I'm probably heard the Edmond Fitzgerald probably 5000 times. You mentioned the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald and we just played a little bit of a clip of it just to previously before he came on. Was that his Magnum Opus? I mean, I think so. He read about it in the newspaper the next day, he said, and he said he didn't think much of it, but then a week later he read about it again in newsweek and said, man, they're only giving this like half a column in this. I want to do these people justice, the victims that die. And there's just so many chilling turns of phrases in that, you know, like, does anyone know where the love of God goes when the waves turn the minutes to hours? That one always gives me. Gives me goosebumps, and I just love how the song verse after verse. Yeah, it was long. I heard you mocking it in the intro, but I love how it builds and builds. You know, it's like when supper time came the old cook came on deck saying fellows is too rough to feed you, and then it's 7 p.m. the hatchway games in and fell as it's been good to know ya. The song moves along and builds and builds. And I think he even went back and changed some lyrics in recent years to kind of make it as accurate as possible over the years. It's an epic song. Hey, Jay Frey, thanks so much. Appreciate it. Thanks. WTO entertainment reporter Jason Frey Lee, you can hear his full interview with Gordon Lightfoot on the WTO podcast beyond the fame with Jason fraley

Coming up next