Two years ago, C.C. Trubiak was shattered.
The death of his father Richard in March 2015 left a void in his life that, at the time, felt like it could never be filled.
Now, Trubiak is about to release his third full-length album of original music, and the fingerprints of his father can be found all over the record.
Trubiak’s latest creation is McBain, an album which celebrates and commemorates the past and future of its maker. Trubiak will officially release the album to the public with a pair of shows at Johnny’s Social Club on Dec. 8 and 9.
“The long and the short of it is that my dad had nicknames for me, my sisters and my brother growing up,” said Trubiak. “That nickname would be something he would just call each of us or put in greeting cards or birthday cards and everything growing up.”
“He used to call me Curt McBain.”
Throughout his childhood and into his adult life, the moniker became a love-filled inside gag for Trubiak and his father – a secret the two of them could share, no matter what.
“I still have a handful of really treasured birthday cards that he would’ve given to me and letters that he wrote once I moved away from home. He always signed them, ‘Love you, Curt McBain.’”
After Richard passed away, Trubiak found those cards and letters and remembered the nickname.
“In the process of trying to grieve and process all of it, I realized that nobody’s ever going to call me that name again. No one’s ever going to sign cards to me that way or ever really know the story behind it, unless I find a way to keep it alive,” he said.
Inspiration found its way through Trubiak’s grief. He wrote a song and called it McBain. That song became two songs, which became three. In the end, it became another record.
The Tiny Army
For the past year, Trubiak has worked tirelessly to bring the story alive once again. In order to realize the vision, Trubiak has gotten by with a little help from his friends – a series of musicians, producers and songwriters he lovingly calls the “Tiny Army Band.”
“I consider them to be a group of people who strengthen me in their musicality,” he said.
The band is a loose coalition of around ten members, each bringing something new and important to the mix.
Craig Bancroft, Erick Bergman, John Bettger, Kevin and Kristen Imrie, Kim Jones, Brent Lethbridge, Faith Krahn, Mark Kolt, Paul Shearer and Trevor Sytnick were all enlisted to help. Sytnick brought his technical expertise to play as the album’s producer, recording the entire album in his own home studio.
“He can also be heard on lots of the tracks, whether it’s on the bass or the guitar or the pedal steel,” said Trubiak.
Bergman features on almost every track on the album. “I’m so grateful for the quality of musicianship that he brought to all of the songs. He just really upped the quality so much,” said Trubiak.
The other members of the group each added vocals, instrumentals and other elements to the album and will be performing the songs live along with Trubiak.
“The musicianship and the work that was put into these recordings was nothing short of amazing and talented,” he said.
“To be honest with you, some days and some moments I am so overjoyed and I can’t believe it. It feels like such a great accomplishment, because of all the months of planning and working steadfast on it. It’s been grueling and sometimes very challenging.”
The Tiny Army doesn’t just include musical collaborators – it includes close confidants and friends. Crystal Brown, the project manager for McBain, and Aileen Martella, an Ottawa-based songwriter and an old friend of Trubiak’s, are included – despite not playing a note on the album. Martella helped co-write more than half of the songs on the album.
“She was really instrumental with helping me with the writing of some of these songs. She has been highly instrumental,” he said of Martella.
Once the album was recorded, the responsibilities began for Trubiak and his cohorts.
“The initial idea was just to record a full album. What it sort of snowballed into was, once you’ve recorded an album, then you need to fundraise for it. Once you fundraise for an album, you need to get it out and to the public,” he said.
To do that, Trubiak has relied on old-fashioned hustle and modern technology. Utilizing a Kickstarter campaign, Trubiak raised nearly $10,000 to help finish the record earlier this year. Friends and allies used word-of-mouth advertising to promote the album. T-shirts featuring the album’s artwork – designed by Trubiak’s friend Catherine Joa – are a common sight around Flin Flon.
For Trubiak, that was part one of the battle — part two begins with live performance and includes promoting the album further.
“Once you get it to the public, you need to promote it and play the songs live and rehearse with a band,” he said.
“Even after that, once the shows are done, I’ll have to send the press kits out to radio stations and share the album beyond just the release. There’s certainly more work to be done after the shows. It becomes a snowball project.”
Album
As far as the album itself goes, Trubiak says the music itself has a relaxed pace that offsets its weighty subject matter.
“I think what they can expect and what I hope they get from it is a really down-home, chill and personal album. I would hope that, after they hear it, they might have a better understanding of who I am, the way I think and the way I feel about certain things, like life, love, loss, joy and pain,” he said.
“I would hope they can relate and enjoy it and get something from it for themselves, whether it’s relatability, the calming sensation music can bring, the feeling of not being alone.”
At no point does Trubiak hope to quit his day job with the Northern Health Region – he feels releasing the album and having people hear his music is enough of a reward.
“I don’t have any false ambitions to quit my career in mental health and go touring around the world. I think I’ll always remain true to my artistic self and work and create and share with the world.”
Trubiak hopes the album itself will encourage some of his Flin Flon friends to follow their dreams and release albums of their own.
“If anything else I really want to come from this, I hope it’s that other artists in the community can take a page from me. If they have songs they’ve written that they want to perform and record, if they want to do a Kickstarter campaign, if they want to work for a year to make it happen, then I want them to feel like it’s possible. Maybe if I can do it, they can do it as well. Some of my friends, I hope they get to do something like this – that would be really cool.”
