JB- Now speaking of Canadian talent, obviously the show Canadian Idol has done something really interesting. It's given people a spotlight who would not normally have one. You're seeing people from towns of maybe 200 people, who now have this national platform.

ZW- Well, the Canadian record business right now is a bit of a disaster, so is the entire record business internationally. And if you look at the rosters of Canadian major labels as the first place to find Canadian talent that's mostly what their gig is. Over the last 20 years I think you'd be hard pressed to find anybody that they signed who blew up internationally without direct involvement right out of the gate of the American label. Some of the Canadian indies have done a bit of a better job. So on that level, they're missing out on all these great kids because they just don't have the desire or the money to invest to develop anybody in the first place to really not doing much.

But above and beyond that we're discovering two different sorts of styles of talent that the labels just don't specialize in. One is the pure singer who doesn't really have a sense of what they want to do musically; they're not necessarily a writer and if they're not, Canada just doesn't have that system except in Quebec. We just have very little history of that. So we're getting a lot of these very pure singers who, historically, there have a been a lot of them who have succeeded in the world, but Canada just doesn't have a system of building those people. So those people we're discovering and some of those are a bit older and a bit younger.

There are all of these kids from the small towns who have no way of getting out. Some of them are very early in their careers; some of them are in the middle. Largely they have not been songwriters and probably that's where their inability to succeed has come from.

But look, Kelly Clarkson would still be waiting tables and be one of the best singing waitresses in Florida if it wasn't for American Idol. We go out to the streets and beat a path to find these kids who are stars, but are not necessarily stars in the way the music business has traditionally built stars, which is just finding singer-songwriters. And we find stars in the old school sort of way that you would've found the Sinatras or any of the other people that were band front people going back in the 30s, 40s and 50s, the Elvises and whoever who are great…We are finding stars in the way that the new media has made an opening for people to find stars between television, the Internet and those other sources.

The singer-songwriter is of less and less significance. It's also of less and less significance if you check the American charts. The vast majority of records that are really selling are songs you see…The Rhianna song co-written by 17 people, and she's a star from the use of new media, from the use of television. We're locking into the same thing as the music industry. You just have to realize, as a result of what Idol has been able to accomplish.

JB- So what ensures the artist's longevity in the industry? So someone like Jenny Gear or Theresa..They were good enough because they had the platform, so what goes wrong? Is it something the artist does or maybe they just don't have it after a certain amount of time? What gives them…

ZW- I think people like that, and I've worked with them for the longest time. They have to identify who their audience is and they also have to identify in their heart what they want to accomplish and also be willing to work with advisors and advocates who can say, "Do you want to sell records or do you want to follow the self indulgence of your own muse?"

Do you want to define yourself for a wide audience, or do you want to define yourself for the limits of what the idiosyncratic or eccentricities of what you're doing are all about? You have to make those decisions. People like Björk, who's a good example, who after she left the Ice Cubes or the Sugar Cubes or whatever, put out a first record as a solo artist and was a new spurt of genius and sold a million copies, and from there on it went a million 500, 200, 100, 50 and went in the toilet because she became more and more wrapped up in her own desire just to do whatever the hell she wanted no matter whether there was an audience or not. And then you're starting to appeal to a smaller and smaller crowd who thinks exactly like you do. That's one way to do it, but sometimes there are other ways to just build the parameters of it into more world-class thinking than what those people are willing to do.

I think Theresa, on her first record radically capitalized on the Idol audience. She even did four songs on the record that she'd actually sung on Idol, so she made an Idol record. I think that was a really smart thing to do.

I think some of the winning Idols should make some of those records. Stop trying to do a record by committee and bringing in a whole bunch of outside writers to make a fake art record, and instead just do the cover songs you sang on the record with maybe one new song. Make a TV record, then if you want to make a real major label record you surround yourself with some of the best talent in the world that money can possibly afford you and you make a really, truly world-class record. Otherwise, you decide like Theresa or somebody, I don't know if her second record blew up, that you know better than everybody else and you write the record yourself and you make it to the level of the talent that you have and therefore it sells to the people who are willing to buy into it. That would be like saying, "I only want to be a star if I can make my own videos and edit them and shoot them myself and put them out", and it's like, "Well, do you know anything about it?" "No, but I believe in my artistry". Well, then when MuchMusic says, "We're not going to play it," then what do you expect? We're not all geniuses of everything, and self indulgence and following your muse is not always the right answer.

JB- Idol is about uniqueness and what sets the individual apart from the rest, so it's interesting to see contestants, let's say Montana. Another one from a previous year, Jenny Gear, is one that sticks out to me. Interesting that they get put through into the top, but I guess.. Is it that they're not popular enough to stay on the show? But they seem to do fine after the show. Why is it that it just doesn't work on Idol for them?

ZW- Jenny Gear hasn't done much after the show, aside from her own little indie thing. Theresa Sokyrka is the only one who, I would say, who is really sort of unusual, if you want, but not radically unusual.

The show is based upon a popular vote. Bob may make the coolest cheeseburger down the road, but McDonald's is going to kick his ass in sales no matter what. We're working off popular numbers and we're on a nine to 90 demographic and certain people vote more than others; that's the nature of the beast. They're going to drop the bottom and the top off of this thing, and eventually, to some extent, the thing that appeals on the widest possible basis is going to be the thing that works. I mean, that's the nature of the Idol reality.

Those people who get through to that level because we as judges identify them as rare and unusual exciting talent and we put them through there and we do everything we can to get people to vote to hopefully help them make the top 10, so that they can get some exposure and we can grow the palate and redefine what the name Canadian Idol means, and also to hopefully redefine what Canadians see themselves. But as much as the newspapers want to write that Stars is an unbelievably brilliant band or Metric is unbelievably genius or one of these other nouveau pseudo cool things are really what's happening, the bottom line is Nickelback sells a lot more f***in' records than anybody else does from the Canadian scene and that's the way it is. The vast majority of people want meat and potatoes. Sushi is great, but it's never going to beat the cheeseburger.

JB- All these food references, well it is the lunch hour!