Learning Day: Tears Are Not Enough 🌭

Well i watched that We Are The World documentary bout when all the famous 80s singers saved the world with song and it was pretty good! My personal favorite part was when Bob Dylan didnt seem to know what they meant by “ad lib” and got scared and confused and so alone that he went a lil feral

but he knew what to do, he cried out for help

and Stevie goes to the piano and sings kinda like we all do when were making fun of bob dylan but with real talent and stuff to teach Bob, “Ad-lib means sing like this.”

and then Bob Dylan was happily ever after.

For real I think that’d be a pretty good kids book to teach us Its OK To Need Help Sometimes and its fine we’re not using AI anymore to make fake book covers, i feel pretty good about being able to make this one myself:

But for this article we’re not talkin about that special day in LA, we’re talkin about its kinda winter cousin. Let your eyes drift upwards and northwards on the map, let all your preconceptioned notions about glamour and fame fade and allow for a different, more authentic, more denim-clad version of entertainment superstardom to feel your minds eye. Yes, norther and norther still until you reach a special place called:

Yes it was one day durin my wikipedia wanderins I came across that, in edition to a British and American song what cured African hunger, they also did one in Canada and it was called Tears Are Not Enough by The Northern Lights.

It sorta feels like they knew we might start laughin at this prospect and so they put a starving child in there immediately to head that off and it almost works.

Here is a group photo of The NLs, you may want to apply sunglasses before scrolling down to protect your mortal eyes from the white hot aroara boreales of star power on display:

Yes i know, there was apparently also a pixel famine at the time, but don’t worry we’ll meet our different singin buds as we go, and also you may take a moment to watch it if you like. I viewed it myself and was pretty much blown away and I thought: man i furvently wish there was also a full-length documentary about the makin of this one and guess what the lord DOES answer prayers, in this case he answered it about 40 years before I prayed it which is kinda proof that time is a but a construct of man, Praise Him.

The documentary film is very special because, unlike the Los Angeles one, ALL of the footage was taken contemporanusly, the film was released just a few months after the song. What gives it just a extra good warm Labatt’s flavor is: all of the behind the scenes stuff are fake re-enactments, but its 80s fake re-enactments and really lovely bad filming and acting so its just very enjoyable to watch a canadian promoter do a not very good job of pretendin to yell and holler about how he NEEDS Gordon Lightfoot here tomorrow do you want those kids to die dammit!? Look, the camera crew even made a very artful decision to film it through the window for extra versilimitude:

Ok i fibbed a little bit hes actually shoutin “Anne Murray’s IN, Adams! ANNE MURRAY’S IN!” Which: was she anybody elses Gramma’s very favorite, or just mine? She’s so cute in this she knows the gravitas of the occasion demands full Canadian Glamour so she wears her very nicest large-gem sweatshirt.

Alright so this song project and documentary was both clearly headed up by a specific Canadian Man, a music producer named David Foster who takes up alot of space of the documentary. He shows us that he was pretty much the same as the Quincy Jones and Lionel Richie when they made We Are The World by showing us the footage of when he tied with Lionel Richie for winning a grammy:

Presented by twin siblings Sammy Hagar and holy shit it’s Anne Murray! So Foster there says he was inspired by both “Do They Know Its Christmas” and “We Are the World” and knew that it was crucial for Canada to do something just as important and impactful. wink.

Mr. Foster is very humble as he talks about himself for a long while and tells us he had a tough time sleeping the night before they got all the Canadian Musicians together because he knew if he didnt pull it off: “…kids would die.” He keeps inserting footage of himself really about every 30 secounds (canadian), and he got to eventually be a professional on-TV person.

Here he is pretending the documentary camera crew had the good fortune of capturin him in full John Tesh mode, composing the melody for “Tears are Not Enough” as he drove to work:

Even though he already kinda let on this isnt how it happened:

Its probably too much to pray for another documentary called “Incidentally Elmo’s”

Foster does seem like he is a actual musician and composer but that doesnt mean that his main purpose and true callin in life isnt just bein real good at takin credit for stuff, for example he talks about how it was real important he had the brilliant idea of puttin this sign over the door of the toronto studios where they got all the arctic rock’n’rollers together:

…without ever mentionin that perhaps a certain other superstar charity single recording session did something similar first:

Which yes thats funny how much more charm and personality Quincy Jones’ sign has, look at it, it could be the cover of like a Hall and Oates cassingle all by itself. But Im tryin to not be a hack here and not fall back on any of the “oh canada is so polite” stuff, so it doesn’t help when Foster goes and adds a superfluus ‘’please’’ to his. (Which the polite thing its a myth anyway, you should have seen how annoyed that homeless guy in montreal got when he had to switch to english to tell me where was the CVS.)

And also Foster explains how he was very smart that he knew that when all the singers got there they’d get all excited and giddy about all the famous people and so it was important to have a famine expert lady come in and do a speech sayin “Ok folks we’re having a good time here but dont forget its because KIDS ARE DYING RIGHT NOW CAUSE YOU DIDNT SAVE THEM WITH ENTERTAINMENT YET SO ARE WE GONNA CUT THE GRAB-ASSIN OR WHAT!?”

And yes, Quincy Jones also did that exact same thing first. And it works, doesn’t it? We know how it feels, don’t we, from when it happened to us just a few paragraphs ago? That’s right: pretty bad.

ALSO theres this really weird part in Foster’s wikipedia page:

Well, speaking of stories you might tell the cops if a certain music producer put you on the phone with his lawyer immediately after he hit you with his car, let’s See Some Stars! Here I’ll introduce them to you and just in case some of you are so parochial that you dont know canada very well i’ll pair them with their Souther American counterpart. Here at the most important first line of the song we have:

Alright that seems possibly acquivalent, Im guessin most of us have maybe a few older generation relatives who liked both Lionel Richie and Gordon Lightfoot about the same?

And then of course we know who’s second is:

And you can probably see right away we’re already in trouble because who is that? Ive looked him up like 8 times and i still think his name is Bud Molson. He does sing like a bird though and somehow does a pretty deadly accurate Rodney Dangerfield impersonation.

Alright whos next whos next:

Ok so Tina and Billy of course we love them so and then whoa- is that guy making fun of Canadians!? That is just ignernt and insensitive. You do know who that is actually, he sang the WOR! KIN! FOR! DA! WEE! KEND! song they play on the drive home radio every friday (even though i dont think that feeling of weekend-freedom is actually consistent with the message of the lyrics, but thats fine, I understand its about the energy as opposed to the litral text.) His name is Mike Reno, which is a excellent noir-detective name, and he also does a lot of weird impressions and bits. Actually ALOT of Canadians here seem to have a complicated relationship with there slice of fame and it’s like they need to show that they ain’t too fancy by kinda retreating into doin a dumbass-country-guy bit all the time. Hm.

Yes that is very harmful actually he is settin back his countrymen by decades with that.

Anyway, show me MORE STARS!

These ones its kinda interesting right? Like it’s not crazy to think of Joni Mitchell and Neil Young bein in kinda the same fame range as Huey Lewis and Cindy Lauper? Oh my god I just noticed Geddy Lee’s in that clip! It is a sign of how magical this film is that we dont even have time to talk about how Geddy Lee is in this. Anyway it’s actually the case that both Neil and Joni had NOT been in canada for decades: theres a pretty embarrassing part where Joni tries to show she remembers ANYTHING about the frozen land of her birth and finally says: “The Landscape.” But lets give her some slack:

IF you consider the subject matter, then yes it is.

Neil Young has his moment too:

And then, you knew it was comin. At last: The atom bomb:

Hell yes honestly. But look at this: when I was doing my ansalary research for this one I came across this bit on Bryan’s Wikipedia:

Which I feel like there’s a whole podcast series you could do about that. Like episodes 1-3 are that’s very very interesting if true and episodes 4-6 are about even if it isn’t true how that is still very very interesting that that fact would get into the Wikipedia. In a way that teaches us about the complexities of modern society, I mean.

Anyway, you guys? We did it.

But for MUCH MUCH longer. WAAAAAY longer than patreon will let you make gifs. Just sea after shining sea of pre-Carey-and-Twain famous Canadian Faces. Look how Paul Shaffer beams for you. And even though it took so much work and most of a afternoun (canadian), it really was worth it:

WE HAVE TOUCHDOWN OF HARDY ALBERTA WHEAT ON AFRICAN SOIL!! DEHYDRATED POUTINE IS INBOUND!!

Whew what a humanity miracle. Proving for once and for all that THE DOMINION OF CANADA IS SECOND TO NO COUNTR-

(canadian)

In the name of Jesus Christ Amen.

This article was brought to you by our fine sponsor and Hot Dog Supreme: Neil Schafer, who is to Canada what David Hasselhoff is to Germany. A source of much regret.