One of rock’s true enigmas, skilled oddballs Max Webster never quite took off outside their native Canada. Years after it all came to a sad ending, their legacy lives on through frontman Kim Mitchell.
"They’ve come over the water from Canada… Max Webster Band!” That was Radio 1 DJ Peter Powell introducing the Websters on Top Of The Pops in May 1979. Like many watching at home, Powell clearly didn’t have a clue who this deliciously odd band were, and might conceivably have thought – erroneously – that one of them was actually named Max.
Led by flamboyantly dressed singer/guitarist Kim Mitchell, and big on unique, often surreal lyrics written by poet and honorary band member Pye Dubois, Max Webster had somehow hit No.43 in the UK singles chart with Paradise Skies. A breezy, virtuosic single from their fourth album A Million Vacations, it was a beguiling gatecrasher on a TV show which that night also featured ABBA and Art Garfunkel. The backdrop to the Websters’ chartgrazing coup was their ongoing UK support tour with long-term pals Rush, then out promoting their sixth studio album, Hemispheres.
Chatting to Max Webster’s Kim Mitchell today, Classic Rock reminds him of the flexi-disc samplers of his band’s music that were placed on seats when they played at Glasgow Apollo that year, and of that heady time when, for just a moment, it seemed that the Websters, sometimes described by Mitchell as “Rush’s little brother band”, might storm the UK.
“Yeah, it was a beautiful experience”, he says. “Top Of The Pops needed a British master of Paradise Skies for legal reasons, so we had to go into Abbey Road to re-record it through the night, then lip-sync to that version. Abbey Road! Can you imagine?”
Mitchell is talking at his home in Toronto. A framed drawing of Frank Zappa sits on the wall behind his left shoulder. Amiable and attentive, he’s happy to wander wherever our chat leads. As he adjusts his black baseball cap and settles in to answer our questions, a thought occurs to him:
“Can I say something about that Apollo show?” he asks. “I was a huge fan of the Sensational Alex Harvey Band, and I’d mentioned it before we got to Glasgow. After we played, there was a knock on our dressing-room door, and this little old guy walked in and said: ‘Hi, I’m Les Harvey, Alex’s dad.’ We grabbed some beers and I talked to him for about an hour. It was such an honour.”
Born in Sarnia, Ontario, Mitchell g
