SONG: (4am)

Live, coast to coast, it's the Transparent Humans Radio Hour with Our Lady Peace. One hour of new music and conversation. Now here's your host John Stewart.

John: Welcome, we are sitting here in a luxurious bunker in the red light district downtown Toronto. Here's the band. Raine Maida, Mike Turner, Jeremy Taggart and Duncan Coutts. How're you feeling? I know there's a lot of pressure about putting out the sophomore album (Clumsy), since it's been received so well critically and economically I should say, is that a little pressure off you guys?

Raine: We tried to really take the pressure off us and we started to record the record in Toronto, or just started writing for it in Toronto and I think there was that pressure so we tried to negate that and went up north to a cottage and just got away from Much Music and MTV and our record company and our management and everybody and went to write up north and just really isolated ourselves up there and that made it a lot easier so I think that was the biggest pressure change that we did and it was really positive for us and for the making of the record.

John: When you came down from the country, did you guys know this was the album you wanted to put out, you know, it's still Our Lady Peace, but a little bit of a departure from Naveed?

Raine: Is it?

Someone: Just a bit.

John: Yeah, well it's different songs. I think? Isn't it? Let me get the first one! Yeah, reading a lot of the reviews, they talk a lot about the 'evolution' of OLP.

Mike: I don't think it was anything unnatural. I mean , we played about half a dozen shows when we signed the record deal originally. And then we went out and made the album and then we went out and did, like, 500 shows. It changed us a little. We were scared.

John: Well, you travelled with Van Halen! That'll scar anybody.

Mike: It was an experience, so it was a different band that went to make the second record. I think it just sounds like the same band three years down the line.

SONG: (Clumsy)

John: A lot of people are talking about they're on the Internet with you guys. Is there a site that they can get a hold of you guys?

Mike: Yeah, actually we have our own domain. It's Ourladypeace.com. We're really involved in the design and the look and the content of the site.

John: You'll answer?

Mike: Yeah.

John: You'll answer all your e-mails and things?

Mike: Well, there's like 300 e-mails on my laptop right now.

John: So Mike, are you the computer wiz of the group?

Mike: I'm the geek.

Jeremy: Computer guy.

John: Computer guy, Jeremy? That's what you refer to him as? We got a phone call from Pickering. Where's that? Mike's pointing towards the door. We've got Daniel.

Daniel: Hello. I was wondering what are the band's influences and what bands specifically do they listen to right now?

Raine: I think each other. A lot. I mean when you live in a tour bus with each other for 2 years, it's close quarters and you tend to just feed off each other. We try to write a lot on the road. In terms of what we're listening to write now, I think it's pretty consistent. Like, Tool, the new Tool record's amazing.

Someone: Soul Coughing

John: Now, Duncan, you joined the band for this album. Have you brought another influence into the group? Is there some sort of hazing that Duncan had to go through?

Duncan: You'll have to ask those guys about it. I guess I have a different maybe bass playing style than... the other guy did and I play a couple of other instruments as well, so...

Raine: Yeah, he added a whole new dynamic especially in ...

Jeremy: All angles

Raine: yeah, just even the philosophical sense, about how we view feel music, he's much more in tune with the way the three of us do it. I think his bass playing as well, when you have just a three piece band, basically, it's good to have a bass player that's very melodic and that's something Duncan is.

Jeremy: We're breathing now as a unit.

Mike: We've got that whole organic band thing happening.

John: That comes from living in the same bus, isn't it? Where does the eastern influence come from?

Mike: Jeremy�s dad. I would hesitate to say that we have an eastern influence because I think it's a little vain to say that just because you like some of the sounds and there might be just a hint of that in what we do to say , yeah I'm deeply influenced by Indian Rajas and stuff, it�s like, I don't have enough knowledge about it to claim that. If there's something we like the sound of whether it be eastern or country and western, it's something we'll adopt.

John: This phone call is from Calgary.

Caller: How come you guys didn't include the song Trapeze on your CD?

Raine: It'll get out there one day. It'll be like a b-side or something. It just didn't seem to fit with the other 11 songs, it seemed to be kinda like the sore thumb. I mean it's something we still like, it's just a matter of finding the right situation for it.

John: And that was something that generated a lot of response cuz a lot of questions coming in were about Trapeze apparently.

Duncan: Yeah, we played it live a lot for about 6 months, so I think that generated a lot of people wondering what happening because they see a Trapeze on the cover and they go 'I remember that at the live shows', so...

SONG: (Carnival)

John: Here's a little information that even you fellows might not know yet. They just told me the album's gone platinum. Congratulations.

OLP: Really, wow, sure, that's fabulous.

John: Let's go to Ryan in the audience.

Ryan: I was just wondering, which do you prefer: Do you guys like playing in a venue like Edgefest 96 or the Warehouse.

Duncan: I think it's generally across the board. As long as everybody seems to be having an interaction towards the band, it doesn't matter if it's 100 or 20000.

Raine: That's sounds really selfish but it is selfish. We really play for ourselves and when we get on stage it depends if we're all vibing on each other. It's whatever's happening on stage that makes it a great show. So whether it's in front of 800 people or 30000, it's not a big deal to us.

John: Do you remember the first song? It all happened pretty quickly. You guys played 8 or 10 times and then suddenly went on the road. And you had guys like Plant and Page calling you up to play with you. Was that an intimidating situation? Do you guys remember being thrown into that?

Raine: I remember when we got the call we were playing at a club in Boston and our road manager comes in and says 'this is what happened. Everyone's heard the song and wants you to play like the next week'. That whole week no one really talked about it and then we're doing sound check and I think they're both standing on stage watching us. That was when we realized that...

Jeremy: He was dancing behind me. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry I tell ya.

John: Never seen Jimmy Page dance.

Raine: I've seen him drool.

SONG (LIVE): (Car Crash)

Melanie (from Montreal): I was wondering when I can see you in Montreal?

OLP: Summer time for sure.

Raine: We're trying to plan or initially set up kinda a festival going across the country and we'll be a big part of that and some bands that are friends of ours. It should be fun. Probably end of June.

John: So end of June you'll be back out and going all across the country and you'll probably hit Montreal on the way. Can you give any names of the bands that'll be out there? Is it gonna be you know just the guys you've toured with before?

Raine: I Mother Earth probably. They're good friends of ours so we'll take them along.

John: You toured them early on in your career.

Jeremy: Sure did.

Raine: That was the first tour we did when we were quite pathetic.

Annette (from Winnipeg): Raine, where do you get your inspirations to write a song? Are they from personal experiences?

Raine: To write a song? Yeah, a lot of personal experiences, but I think lyrically I try to twist things. I don't think my problems are that unique that I have to talk about them so I try to generalize things so I think everyone can take away something personal or something of their own from the lyrics.

John: Do you think this album, the song writing was more personal whereas the last one was more spiritual?

Raine: Yeah, I don't know if it's the confidence or if it's the maturity but there's just something that allowed me to give more of myself for whatever reason.

John: Is that difficult to do, I know it's difficult to kinda open yourself up when you're performing live and when you first start out it's hard to write how you really feel. Do you feel like you've gotten more to the core of yourself through your song writing?

Raine: I think I realize that when I'm singing things, I actually get a nervous feeling inside. Not because of performing, but because of having to say things that are so real and true to myself and there are certain individuals in my life that are close to me that are ... you know, I guess I get kinda scared that they're gonna hear it and take it the wrong way or misinterpret what I'm saying because things are that open that I think people could...it's so introspective that I�d hate...you know there's a song about my father that I wrote and I don't even think he's heard it yet, so that's something that still weighs on my shoulders.

John: I always find that if you write something about someone you know, even if they hear it or they see it, they're not quite sure it's about them and they go 'Yeah, i know someone just like that'. But they actually won't understand that that someone is me.

Raine: Hopefully.

Mike: I'm not sure. When you say my father, I'm not too sure that he knows many people who go by that relationship.

John: On the internet, what's your favourite site?

OLP: Mike?

Mike: To be honest I don't really spend that much time on the web. Because it's not really an organized thing, it's more something you stumble on. I found some really cool sites and I never found my way back. But for the most part, I spend my time getting the e-mail, checking out newsgroups. There's some technical stuff, like for guitars.

John: Do you ever check out other musicians on the web?

Mike: All the time.

SONG: (Let me down)

John: Bonnie from the audience.

Bonnie: Hi, for all of you, music is obviously a passion, what are some of the other things that are interests. For example, I heard , Superman's Dead is sort of based on Ni Chi's philosophies. I was wondering if that has something to do with some of your interests.

Raine: I'll go with that. That makes me sound pretty intelligent.

John: What about you interests? Does music take up a lot of your time?

Raine: Pretty much. The last four years has been music and that's all.

Mike: It's funny because before , we'd all hold whatever job would keep us in order to do this, and spend all of our spare time doing it and now this is what keeps us doing this so we became really one dimensional, this is everything.

Raine: I think along the way, we've tried to affiliate ourselves ,or make contacts with things we admire and people we admire and there's a fellow in Vancouver named Kelly Lastman which started a media foundation which publishes a monthly magazine called Ad-busters, a kind of anti-media thing. So we've made arrangements to use different commercials, like cutting down the likes of Calvin Klein and things like that and those stereotypes that kinda infiltrate the tv nonstop so we plan to show his videos and his commercials that he's done.

John: How did you get hooked up with this guy? Is there somebody that you met while you were touring or something you've always had an interest in?

Mike: Actually, no. It's just something kinda cool .You spot him, wasn't it Raine?

Raine: Yeah, I heard about him. I think I saw the commercial . I saw them on CNN, it hang around for about a week and then it got pulled. It was a copy of an Obsession ad and it was a really sexy picture of a small (anorexic) woman's back and it gradually moved up her back and it pans out and you see that she's throwing up over a toilet. It strikes a chord. He's a really interesting man that we hope to work with in the future.

Glen (from Chicago): I was wondering when the album�s coming out in the states?

Raine: Beginning April.

John: You guys were out with Van Halen in the moments before the grand split of Sammy Haggar. You learn a little something about band dynamics by being out with them?

Mike: Well in order to have a band dynamic, you have to hang out with the other guys in the band. Sammy just sort of showed up in his limo, did the show, checked out his market research, and left.

Raine: He tried to kick us off the tour. Or kick me, at least.

Ken (Winnipeg): Where's your favorite place to play?

Duncan: That varies. It's not the place, it's the crowd obviously. Sometimes it's magical , sometimes it's horrible. It basically changes week to week.

Raine: We've had great shows in Montreal. We've had awful shows in New York, and then great shows in New York. Toronto is always amazing to us so...there's many of them.

Duncan: Winnipeg is cool too.

John: What's it like in Europe?

Jeremy: We wouldn't know.

Mike: We're going to but we've never been, so...

Duncan: Something tells us not to go to Europe. It pokes a stick in Raine's back and have to stop.

Mike: Every time in the past, we were touring for Naveed, we'd get tours set up, almost all through the Van Halen tour. Our road manager actually gave us tickets from Denver to Sidney, Australia. Then Raine's like, "oh, my back". There goes that month of touring.

Raine: It was a little more than 'oh, my back'.

Jeremy: It was more like "oh, ahn, ohn!"

John: How're you feeling now, Raine?

Raine: I feel great.

John: Have you had to tone down the physicality in your performances because of that?

Raine: No, I just started doing a little bit of yoga and just taking care of myself so, and I play a lot more guitar, so it keeps me stable.

John: Yeah, from diving around and jumping into the audience. We're going to have to wrap it up here with a live tune, Superman's dead.

Raine: I wanted to thank Mr. Taggart tonight for being with us playing tabla. It's amazing, Jeremy's dad, thanks.

SONG (LIVE): (Superman's dead)

The End