TRANSCRIPT

JL - 'Big' John 'T-Bone' Little, interviewee / LR - Lyn Royce, interviewer

JL: After that, and I... after I hit the record, we went on tour after I started to take off. We had a chance to go on American Bandstand, but the guy that run the place, uh, Brody he asked for $65,000, and uh, what's his name, uh, the guy that run the, American Bandstand , anyways, offered $50,000 to put us on. Dick, Dick Clark .

LR: Dick Clark.

JL: He offered us $50,000 to come on there, but he wouldn't take it, you know, was 'Oh no, if I don't get $65,000...' You know? If we'd a had $50,000 we'd a been [difficult to decipher] we'd a been right off the railroad [?]... 'Cause we were [#]57 on the charts. We was really climbing all the time, but then... So after that stopped, they just stopped playin, you know, ye get pulled off. And, uh, Tom Shannon and, uh, from WKBW, he was in on that, and Philip Sedaro, he used to call himself Hernando's Hideaway, and, uh, they were the 2 that formed together, formed Shan and Todd Records [?]. But we got to kind of a... beat out of it, so, but you know... ah, well that's... back in those days payola was big, you know, so you had to pay to play, so... But, anyways, so... And after that I went on a... after I come back from the States, then I went, toured all through Ontario. And I formed a group there when I was recording called Big John and the Hot Toddies. And that's the name that they still know me today. But, up here they don't know me as Big John, they know me as T-Bone. So I had to put Big John / T-Bone together so the people up here would know who I am and then the people down east would know who I am. They say 'Who's [the] name [on] this tune?' 'Well, that's me,' you know, so then I put them both together [coughs] and, uh... And I went all through, around through Quebec, and I learned to speak French. And I played... I got a couple of recordings in French I released and, uh... I never really pushed, but I know if let you put them go, they'll go.