From the hallowed halls of Hollywood to the anchor desks of network news, celebrities took a beating in 2017 for a variety of misdeeds past and present. Thankfully, the celebrities interviewed in GoBeWeekly were simply here to talk about music, career and the joys of fame. Here are a few of the more memorable quotes:  

“To be honest, we don’t really hold our breath on that one. We’ve always thought that we didn’t really make any innovative new inroads in this thing called rock and roll. I think we did really follow a well-worn path. But we did have good songwriting. You have three or three-and-a-half minutes to create some kind of imagery or memory and project that feeling through music. That’s what each song is really doing. Where do we fit in? If we get nominated down the road that would be wonderful. We’ve received our share of spotlights and #1 records so we’re really happy with our situation.”  AMERICA’S Dewey Bunnell on the band’s chances of making the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

 “We’ve all gone through loss, whether it’s your parents, grandparents, someone you love. Life can bring you joy and sorrow at the same time. It’s amazing to share your common experience with people. When I first started performing that song and people started crying I thought people wouldn’t want to come to my show. But they started coming so they could have a good cry!”   Amy Sky, on the lasting power of  her song “I Will Take Care of You”

 “Well it’s the friendliest place I’ve ever been to and it’s a really great place to live if you’re a musician. Musicians get treated with a level of respect I don’t think they given anywhere else in the world. It’s an affordable city, it’s getting a little less the bigger it gets. You can be doing pretty well and have a pretty good life. You don’t have to be the #1 session guy in town to have a pretty good life here. You can be doing cool music and still have a great life.”  Blackie & The Rodeo Kings’ Colin Linden on the ongoing appeal of living in Nashville

 “I wouldn’t call him a happy guy. I think he had lots to think about. But he had lots of fun, we had lots of fun together.  All of his peers and the great songwriters of his time really liked him and liked to talk to him and hang out with him. I think that meant a lot to him, to be respected by his peers as an artist. As far as his audience went, I went up to him one day and said ‘you shouldn’t complain about your lot because look all these places,  people keep showing up, they’re all full, they understand where you’re music is coming from.’ And he said “CraigyWeggs, I just want millions of teenage girls to like me for one week so I can buy a house.”  ODDS frontman Craig Northey on working with Warren Zevon

 “That was the great thing about Woodstock, the fans, the people that were there, soldiers too with love in their hearts. We got on, we played. Getting out was a problem, but we managed to do that and play our gig the next night in New Jersey. It’ll never happen again. The 25^th anniversary had everything in abundance. They had a riot, they burned the stage down, basically destroyed the place. Just goes to show you that Woodstock, the original Woodstock, the one, the only, was the real thing. Really 3 days of peace love and music, the ultimate success.” CCR’s Doug “Cosmo” Clifford on playing at the original Woodstock Festival

 “I think a lot of people might think ‘oh they don’t care about Canada.’ No. We’ve been trying  to break this country for 21 years now. So of course we care how well we do in Canada. But for some reason, rock or hard rock or the kind of rock and roll we play just doesn’t connect on a bigger scale in Canada like it does in Benelux or Scandinavia or Germanic countries. It’s a shame. I’d love to do three tours in Canada a year. What can you do.” Danko Jones talking success in and outside Canada

 “Tony Lee’s success was because he worked dirty. It’s hard to find someone who works clean. And someone like Mike Mandel has been doing it for so long. I saw him in high-school and he was in his 40s then. The older you get the less able you are to lay a person to the ground you have just hypnotized. The type of show I do works good for me because I’m a big guy. I can take a 300-pound guy and support him as he goes down.”  Hypnotist/magician Danny Zzzz on why he works clean

 “There are some basics things, right? We would move to vegetarianism because most people don’t realize that meat is like 25 percent of the climate picture. As much as I like meat it doesn’t serve us in terms of saving the planet. Slowly we’re going electric but we would move out of using coal, which is what America is not doing for some crazy reason. We all know why.  The green energy market it going to be such a huge economic boom for somebody, whichever country gets there first and invests in it first and is able to really harness and build the technology. That’s where I would move and move fast. Those are the major things. And the simplest things.”  David Usher on what he would do as King to reverse climate change

 “People around me aren’t happy when you get bad reviews, but I’m always up for it. My first record in 1981 I got some really harsh reviews in Canada for it. I remember. I was young, in my early 20s, I had to swallow it. But then I got all these great reviews. And I thought if I’m going to make records that are different than other people I’m going to have to take the bad with the good. And if there is bad and good, then I’m probably making art. If everybody likes it I’m probably just a participant in pop culture, which doesn’t have a lot of sustainability. But if not everyone likes it, and some people vehemently don’t like it, I’m probably making art. Of course if everyone hates it, I’m probably making garbage. I can take a bad review with graciousness.”  Singer/songwriter Fred Eaglesmith on the merits of reviews

 “I wonder sometimes, especially when things are fairly horrible in the world like they are right now, if people are looking for an escape. If you walk into a comedy club and you’re looking for an escape and you’re hit with a wall of Trump jokes and jokes about global warming, it’s like ‘this is the stuff I came to escape from.’ I do a joke where I say I know people come to a comedy club to forget their problems, but you do not come to a comedy club to forget my problems!” Comedian Glenn Foster on doing political humour in the time of Trump

 “I’ll go back to Roger Waters. Now he has the entire Battersea (Power Station) appear over your  head. It’s so much larger than life, it’s really a reflection of how profound that music is. Rock is the biggest musical statement of the last half of the 20^th century. I have to remind myself how weird it is to even think that it wouldn’t be around at this point. I should have seen that. I’m not the only one affected by that. I want it right until my last breath.”  Gowan on the enduring love of classic rock

 “I do remember those shows, around 1995 probably. I remember Trent and I going into The Hideaway. You had to go downstairs. We were walking in and Trent turned to me and said ‘I kinda feel like something is happening, like we’re getting bigger or something.’ That show I did notice it. There was some real excitement around the band. (Hideaway owner) Domenic was really nice to us as well. They treated us great.” Headstones Tim White on gigs at old Hideaway nightclub

 “I’m not in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame nor do I care to be because it’s become just a personal feast for (founder) Jann Wenner and his clique that just inducts people they like that they think deserve to be there. I had more rock and roll hits and was on the rhythm and blues and pop charts. My recording of “Ain’t That A Shame,” the Fats Domino song, went to number eight or nine on the R&B charts after he took it to number one. I was a legitimate rock and roll and rhythm and blues artist, but because I recorded gospel and patriotic and country and other genres Jann and the group that decides don’t consider me a rock and roller. Plus they seem to spread the falsity that when I recorded rhythm and blues songs that I was somehow impeding or taking something from the original artists, which of course is not true. Their records were not getting played on pop radio but my versions and Elvis’ version of their songs actually helped them emerge and become better known. There are people in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame that aren’t even rock and rollers. Brenda Lee was not a rock and roll singer. Johnny Cash was not. Gene Pitney was lot. Even Paul Simon was not, he was uptown New York pop. Being in the Gospel Music Hall of Fame is truly more important to me.”  Rock and roll pioneer Pat Boone on being excluded from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

 “The first time I heard my first solo stuff on the radio it was fantastic, but I had to learn about the business of record companies. Even though you might have a hit you don’t see that money for a long time. My life didn’t change much economically when I had my first hit. But I was definitely on the what to a whole new adventure.” Superstar Vanessa Williams on the limited financial rewards of hit records