This interview was the second one LIGHTHOUSE did on Toronto radio Q107's "Rock Report". This was done in 1995 just prior to the release of their new CD "Song Of The Ages".

This interview featured Skip Prokop, Ralph Cole, and Paul Hoffert.

Enjoy!

DJ: This weekend, Saturday night at the RPM Warehouse it's the Q107 Rock Awards, and being inducted in to The Hall Of Fame is this band - Lighthouse!

Q: Gentlemen, how are? Paul Hoffert, Ralph Cole, and on the phone - Skip Prokop. Where are you Skip?

SP: Where am I? Guess!! Ha ha. No, I'm actually in Burlington because we'll be rehearsing out here tomorrow.

Q: So, the obvious question - how does it feel to be inducted in to a Hall Of Fame?

PH: Well, it feels good. It's supposed to feel old right!? (laughs) My idol for the Hall Of Fame is Neil Young, who keeps getting inducted into Hall Of Fames everytime he does another album, and keeps getting better and better. So that's what at we're trying to do. The name of the game is the rhythm section, but we have a new singer and I think Danny Clancy has really invigorated us unbelievably with not only his fantastic voice, but I think a different kinda ...

Q: Yeah! So there's a whole lot of new stuff happening, but let's take it back just for a minute because obviously this commemorates an achievement over a long period of time. Take us back to the very beginning of this band - did it turn out the way you thought it was going to? I mean, did you have that kind of a sound, that plan envisioned?

RC: I think it went totally different to how we ever intended it. It sort of took a 'round a bout root' to get to where we were.

Q: Because you made such a distinct mark with what you did musically, and I always wondered if you really had sat down before hand and said "this is where we want to take it" and it actually turned out the way you thought it would?

PH: In some ways yes, and in some ways Ralph is right. I think Skip's idea when he told me originally when we were on a flight back from New York and Skip was playing with The Paupers and they were gonna break up and he gonna go to Janis Joplin, and I had an off-Broadway musical running, and we ended up sitting next to each other, and Skip said "big band, jazz horns, symphonic strings, rock n roll rhythm section - you help me, and we'll do it together!" . ha ha

Q: Skip - Is that the story?

SP: That's the God's honest truth! I remember standing outside the Electric Circuit talking on the phone, saying "I got this great idea.", because at that time of course, there was so many bands who went in and recorded and then went out on the road, but they recorded with like 50 pieces, they went out on the road and they played concerts, and people went "that doesn't sound like the band! Where's the strings? Where's the horns?". So, I said to Paul "could you conceive of a band having a big band with like strings and brass and everything, so that when we record and go on tour we actually sound like we do on record!?"

Q: Radical notion!

SP: Yeah, I mean - maybe it sounds a little weird now, but at the time it was like "Holy mackerel! It sounds fantastic." And of course with Paul's background in orchestral music and movie themes and that, and my background in coming from drum cores - where really the music of the time in drum cores was all thematic. It was all the Broadway musicals, it was like this huge sound I kept hearing in my head. And Ralph, his mutual agreement was "we all must be nuts!" - you know. Ha ha

Q: What was the reaction like early on?

SP: It was phenomenal!

Q: Was it automatic!?

SP: It was absolutely incredible! The first concert we played was at The Rock Pile, and at that time I was part of "Super-Session" with Mike Bloomfield and Al Kooper, and the whole idea was that Lighthouse was going to debut in Toronto at The Rock Pile and we would open for Super-Session, and just by agreement I would play with Lighthouse and then I would play with Super-Session, and of course Mike Bloomfield was busy getting into (you know) his "distraction" and didn't show up, and nobody showed up from Super-Session, and I'll let Paul and Ralph tell you about that concert. It was the most outrageous thing. We were prepared to play about a half an hour, and nobody showed up except Lighthouse, and 1500 people in The Rock Pile, and we were playing like 3 hours! Ha ha.

PH: 3 hours - 9 tunes! Ha ha ha.

RC: A lot of jamming went on in between.

PH: That helped I guess for the band. That helped build our reputation as a band with a lot of solos. (laughs)

SP: And a lot of stamina!

Q: Tell us what's happening these days, because there's a whole new kind of thing happening with Lighthouse in 1995.

PH: Well, when we got together again. We did a reunion about 10 years ago, and when we got together that time we said "One shot. We'll do Ontario Place (Toronto), and that's it". We all said that we had a good time, but we all sort of said that because we only planned to do the one weekend. So everybody went off and back to their own thing, and felt kind of empty. So this time, I think Ralph, Skip, and myself, basically said "If we get together - it's not just a one-shot. We want to keep it together - whether it's part-time or full-time, or whatever, it's gotta be a regular thing that we do because the chemistry was there". And as we all found out you can play with a lot of other people, there's a lot of great things, we all l played with good musicians and did good things, but there was something special about the chemistry of working with each other that we wanted to keep going.

Q: So there's new material. Tell us a little about that new material.

RC: Well, I guess half the show we do now is new material, because we really felt that we come back and we play a lot of people are gonna say "Here they are resting on their dinosaur routine" - which was never our intention because that doesn't interest us at all - we don't want to be The Platters! As a matter of fact we actually talked about it and said when we got back together that "If the chemistry, the magical part of the playing of the band together, if we didn't feel it was there - then we would not bother doing it". So it was very important that the chemistry was there, and the energy was there, and all those kinds of things. So right now 50% of the show is all new material.

Q: And a new recording!?

SP: In line with the material, it's very interesting with having Danny. Ralph had used Danny on several national commercials, and I at one point had a band - "The Skip Prokop Band" went out and played all over the place, you know - bars and that kind of stuff, and used Danny as our lead singer. And I actually found Danny singing in a church in this little town up north around Kirkfield, Ontario - up near the Trent Canal system. And Marge, my wife said "If you ever put a new band together and don't use this guy - you're crazy!" And it was kind of neat because when we got to the point where Bob could no longer perform with the band everybody said "Well what are we going to do?" and I said "Well I think we should call Danny Clancy!" And Ralph, who had used him on a very professional level said "Hey - he's great!" So we called Danny, and then the interesting thing is that Doug Moore - our new bass player and myself, started writing. We've actually had 2 writing spells a year ago from January to May, where we've got tons of material, and we actually wrote with Danny in mind because Danny is kind of a cross between Michael Boltin and Daryl Hall. He's a real good pop singer, a real good r & b feel singer.

Q: I hope he has better hair than Michael Boltin! (laughs)

SP: So all the material we wrote was a total departure from anything we've ever done.

Q: Skip you mentioned Bob there, and I've heard a couple people around town talking about Bob McBride, and you mentioned about Bob basically not being able to make it to some of the shows, and some problems that have been well documented recently. Is Bob going to be a part of the Hall Of Fame induction? Is he going to be recognize for his work with the band? I know it's kind of an awkward point, because he's definitely been on some hard times recently, but how does that stand?

PH : It's actually not awkward at all. What we're doing is recognizing, and Brenda (Hoffert) has a whole list, people who have really contributed to Lighthouse in really major ways over the years. A couple of them, unfortunately are no longer with us - Keith Jollimore who wrote the charts for "One Fine Morning" , and Don Dinova who was a viola player, and so on. And of course, Bob will be acknowledged along with a number of other people who really contributed.

Q: So Saturday at the Rock Awards you're going to be performing and it's going to be the new version of Lighthouse!?

PH: Oh definitely! It's the new Lighthouse that'll be performing, and we'll be doing our new album of material, as well as our old hits. So that's where it's at.

Q: We're going to play some new Lighthouse now, and I guess you're aiming for a summer release!?

PH: June 15 is the take-off date we're planning for.

Q: OK, but we've got 5 tunes as a promotional thing on CD, which I guess some fans got, right!?

PH: The fans who came to see us on the Festival Tour this summer, when we did the Jazz Festival, The Festival Of Friends, and everything - if they bought a T-shirt we gave them these 5 tunes for nothing, and asked them to send us some comments - which they all did and was really much appreciated. And it gave us the confidence to go on because they all said "great stuff - we want more".

Q: And the song we're gonna hear is called "You're Gone".

(Thanks. Song played).