Local mental health worker to release EP

By Chris Jones/The Oshawa Express

An Oshawa resident is about to drop his first EP this fall after finding his love of music again on YouTube.

Daniel Raymond, a local mental health professional, has released a number of songs over the last few months on his self-titled YouTube channel. Since then, he has rediscovered a passion he’d long thought lost, and has begun working on his first EP, all in his 50s.

He says there were four things which inspired him to get back into music, beginning with the death of Tragically Hip frontman Gord Downie.

“I used to play music in the Oshawa music scene, I was in a band that was called Mitchell’s Corner that was previously Easy Access… in the early 90’s,” he explains.

However, he eventually moved on and music stopped being as much of a priority when he started working and life got in the way.

However, when Downie died in 2017, something changed in Raymond.

“I was very moved by the fact that when he knew he was dying, he knew that music was what he wanted to do. It put me in tune with the fact life is short,” he says, adding Downie’s death planted the seed telling him he wanted to play again.

He then recalls he began playing with some friends he has in town who he had known for a long time, and has a special bond with.

“So, when my wife turned 40, I had a surprise party for her at Berry Hill Café… and was like, ‘Oh, maybe we should play music,’” he says.

He then performed a set with his friend Mike Minnie, and he loved it.

“It was so nice to play music again,” he says, adding they went by the name Folksy and Raymond.

This was two years ago, and after their performance at his wife’s birthday, they began performing locally.

They would then book a local show two or three times a year, and give all of the proceeds to Feed the Need in Durham.

However, sometimes he needed a reminder of why he was playing, because “who wants to see two 50-year-old white guys playing their songs?”

“It’s so easy to talk yourself out of it by saying this is an irrelevant, silly, self-indulgent thing,” he says. “But to attach it to a fundraiser… gave me more motivation to do it. It didn’t feel so silly and self-indulgent.”

However, when COVID-19 hit, Raymond says he’d had a show planned in May, but was forced to cancel.

“I so look forward to doing them. I just missed doing music, so I started doing these videos just to keep myself occupied,” he says. “Playing music and doing that had become part of what I did everyday, and I missed doing it.”

So, he then made his first video, titled “Quarantine Sessions #1: small song.”

“I liked it, and then I said I want to involve my kids [Charlotte and Simon] in it, because I’m taping it,” he says, adding he would normally involve his wife as well, but she lost her hearing in one ear, making it more difficult for her to play.

In the videos, he builds in messages asking people to donate to Feed the Need or healthcare workers. His intent is to carry on the spirit of his live performances prior to COVID-19.

“This isn’t just for my ego… it’s also to remind people of how we can give and how we can help out,” he says.

He says his work as a teacher at Durham College also helps, as he now has programs available to help him put together videos.

Raymond says when they played their initial shows, he played music from the 90’s, emphasizing how much he was inspired by Downie.

“My musical heart was in that 90’s Canadian music scene,” he says, adding he likes folk-based lyrical music, such as Bob Dylan.

Raymond’s EP, “Soft,” will consist of six tracks, and he says right now they’re in the process of mixing, and he believes it will be released in the late fall.

He says there will be a limited run of hard copies, as he notes many people have gone digital, so he will be offering it on Spotify as well.

Raymond plans on continuing his YouTube channel, and says it’s been a nice escape for him.

His videos can be found at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLqzyRq-ZtL0A4352jTsNvw.