A Vancouver favourite in the ’80s and ’90s, Barney Bentall and The Legendary Hearts were rocking up a storm until infighting at his record company took him out of the public eye. Now, happily ensconced on Bowen Island, Barney is living the quiet life as a travelling troubadour counterbalancing the push to travel and perform with the pull of home and family.
“I think life is a long journey to the point where you understand your nature and then you accept your nature,” says Barney. “Part of my nature is I love being home, yet I will get restless and want to go on an adventure.”
Those adventures take him across the province in the company of long-time friends Shari Ulrich and Tom Taylor under the moniker BTU or touring BC and Alberta as the Cariboo Express, a Grand Ole Opry style band Barney and his musical mates have pulled together. And then there’s The High Bar Gang, a bluegrass group that gets together more or less on the fly and, of course, his original band, The Legendary Hearts. Barney and the Hearts had their 40th anniversary concert in Vancouver last year.
“We never broke up,” he says. “That’s my band for almost 40 years now and that will always hold that place in my heart. Musically, it’s the centre.
Music unites his family, too.
“Everybody in the family is musical,” says Barney, harkening back to family get togethers. Two of his four adult children play professionally. Older daughter, Jessica, now living in the Kootenays, plays with the group Wild Honey and has released a record.
Younger son Dustin has the highest profile. A songwriter and recording artist in his own right, Dustin and his dad often share the stage together as part of Cariboo Express, originally assembled to raise money for charity. Barney figures they’ve raised about two million dollars over the past 16 years.
“It’s a great collection of musicians,” says Dustin. “It’s the one time of the year we all get to be together. It’s the time of the year that me and Barn get to be on the road for the bulk of November, so it’s quite a special time. We love to play together whenever possible.”
Older son Cody builds houses for a living while Barney’s youngest, Sacha, supplies ethically-raised beef and poultry to the restaurant industry. Sacha and her husband were chosen Outstanding Farmers of BC and the Yukon in 2018. Dustin says Sacha’s the least likely of the four to get up on stage. “She’s a little shy. She has a beautiful voice though and she does surprise everybody once in a while.”
Now that his kids are safely launched, you’d think Barney would sit back and relax, but when it comes to his children and music, he urges caution. Which is surprising considering young Barney disregarded a similar warning from his own parents decades ago.
“I remember thinking to hell with that,” he says. “I mean, if I’m thinking that way then I’m not going to give it everything I’ve got and yet, ironically, I find myself thinking that way when some young person says, ‘I want a career in music’. It’s just so hard these days. It’s a tough business right now. The market is incredibly saturated. You can be an artist putting out records, working, touring a lot, but unless you’re Bruce Springsteen or something, people aren’t going to necessarily know who you are. It’s vicious out there.”
Now that he’s a dad himself, Dustin has complied. He’s built a side business, www.dustleather.com, into a substantial online venture making and selling leather goods to augment his musical career.
“It seems to help with song writing, as well. I find everything I do kind of works together,” he says. Dustin has recorded four albums and tours extensively.
It was a different scene in 1979 when 23-year-old Barney took centre stage. The music industry was decidedly friendlier and not as competitive. He and his long-time friend and writing partner, Gary Fraser, were making music. They thought they’d give it a go. Barney’s parents, however, were not as receptive. They wanted him to go into the family construction and property management business – the Bentall family is a familiar and well-known enterprise in BC – but Barney was insistent. He would pursue music.
“My choice of careers was not exactly popular,” he confesses. “It was completely out of their wheelhouse. It was virtually impossible for my parents to come and see me until I became more successful.” Although he eventually made peace with his father, Barney admits it was tense “coming up through the trenches.”
Unwilling to exploit the Bentall name, he performed under the alias Brandon Wolfe. Six years later, he dropped the pseudonym and hit the stage as Barney Bentall and The Legendary Hearts. They became local favourites but had yet to make the big time. Married at 22, Barney faced the extra pressure of providing for his young family.
“We were working really hard. We had a reputation in the clubs, but we were just scraping by. It was not an easy time. I was desperate. I mean I was really desperate. I was about to quit music and join the family company with my tail between my legs. It’s not what I wanted to do, but you can’t drive your family into the ground.”
He resolved to give it one last try and booked a flight to Toronto, determined to see every record company in town.
“I would have meetings or call people until 5:30 or 6:00 in the evening and then stop. One day, I called Bernie’s [Finklestein] office at 6:30 and he picked up the phone. I just launched into a 15-minute sales pitch until he finally went ‘okay, okay, just stop. Come in tomorrow at 10. I’ll see you.’ That’s not my innate nature but I was so desperate I just kept going.”
His gutsy persistence paid off, and Finklestein signed him to a recording contract with Columbia Records in 1987. In 1989, Barney and The Legendary Hearts won a JUNO award for Best New Group. While under contract to Columbia, Barney and the band released six studio albums and 20 singles. At their peak, they were playing 200 dates a year. But it didn’t last. Internal squabbling among company executives that had nothing to do with Barney soured the relationship.
“It became more of a complicated, toxic environment and it sort of broke my heart because within the rank and file of that company, we were such a beloved band,” says Barney. “It seemed like a good time to step back a bit. My thought process was you’ve got one life; it doesn’t begin and end with music. Maybe there’s other things to learn. I felt it was time to move on.”
He retreated to a 485-hectare cattle ranch he bought with his wife and brother-in-law near Clinton, BC. It was a time to rejuvenate and reflect. And to raise beef cattle.
“If I had had a really good relationship with the record company, I probably wouldn’t have done the cattle ranching thing,” he says, admitting ranching wasn’t the idyllic life he thought it would be. He missed creating music and long-time collaborator Gary Fraser had left the partnership for law school.
“It was just me. I wasn’t trying to write hits and work for the record company. Then my good friend Jim Cuddy said, ‘Can you come out to Toronto and we’ll make a record?’ Blue Rodeo would be the backup band, and I thought, that’s a really good idea. Ranching was not a good career move, but in terms of life, it was great. I have no regrets.”
In 2006, he released a solo album, Gift Horse heralding a swing away from hard rock into a more reflective genre. His subsequent albums were more personal and largely focused on family. The Drifter and The Preacher referred to his father-in-law and his father, respectively.
“I wanted to come back to a place where I was more myself in my music,” says Barney. “That’s a really important part of the puzzle, to be writing what you want to express lyrically. That’s what was kind of missing for me when it was just a rock band. I love the variety. It’s just a version of cross training really. It’s fun. I just enjoy the music I’m doing in all its forms, the whole range.”
Being a member of four distinctive bands will do that. Barney says he’s found a rhythm, performing with his friends and family when he wants to and playing for money when he has to. He credits his wife, Kath, with keeping him on an even keel.
“She’s such a rock-solid person. For a marriage and a family to survive and even thrive through what a career in music throws at you, I think that’s an accomplishment and I really credit her in that department.”
Maintaining that even keel includes his home on Bowen Island, where he swims, snowshoes and mountain bikes, and returning to Clinton, the scene of his self-imposed exile.
“We don’t own the ranching one, but we still have a quarter section,” he says of a small property he retains near the original cattle ranch he once owned. Rural BC remains a place to pause and reflect.
“I still keep my fingers in the dirt. I find that kind of thing relaxes me. I like to be out in the world doing physical things,” he says, and yes, that includes performing.
“Maybe not a hundred dates a year, but I’d like to keep doing it when I’m 80. The stage for me is a very comfortable place to be whereas the stage for a lot of people is absolutely nerve racking. Who knows what will happen next?”
His son, who accompanied Barney on his last record, says he’d like to write a whole album with his dad. “That would be a lot of fun,” says Dustin and acknowledges retirement for Dad isn’t in the cards.
“He doesn’t settle down ever. He loves to work, he loves to tour, he loves to play. He’s quite the machine.”
“I divide my time between Bowen, the road and the ranch,” says Barney. “I’m acutely aware of the dichotomy, but I’m happy the way it’s balanced out. I’ve lived it for so long. I think you get to a point where you start to understand that and ultimately you accept it. I feel like I’m getting close.”
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