Two Old Flames

Glenn Fournier was an English-language country singer from Québec who recorded his own songs alongside material by Jesse Winchester, J. K. Gulley and the Nashville writers he admired. Working independently, he released a single, a cassette and a compact disc, and in 1992 his voice reached country radio programmers across Canada.

One of Fournier’s surviving recordings is ‘Two Old Flames’, issued on Ambience Records (AR-GF23127). The song came from J. K. Gulley, a Toronto-born guitarist who had played in Billie Jo Spears’ and Freddie Hart’s Nashville bands before returning to Canada, where the Canadian Country Music Association named him its Rising Star in 1986. Ted Gerow produced the record, and World Records pressed it with stereo and mono versions and it was released in 1988.

Fournier also issued a self-titled, single-sided cassette of seven songs that included ‘Two Old Flames’. He wrote ‘Busted Love’ and ‘(She) Called the Last Waltz’ with Rae Aston, and Gulley supplied a second song, ‘I’ll Give You Love’. Two more, ‘Sweet Lovin’ Daddy’ and ‘Eulalie’, came from Jesse Winchester. The tape closed with ‘Almost Persuaded’, the Billy Sherrill and Glenn Sutton ballad that David Houston took to number one in 1966.

Winchester, a Louisiana-raised songwriter, had settled in Montréal in 1967 and lived in Québec for more than three decades. Fournier returned to his catalogue in the early 1990s with ‘Oh What a Thrill’, a song James House had introduced on his 1989 debut album and the Mavericks would turn into a hit in 1994. Fournier’s version went out on Countrypak 7, one of the RDR compilation discs that delivered new Canadian country tracks to radio stations.

By March 1992 the track was picking up good airplay. RPM’s country column, describing Fournier as “40-something young,” reported that he was making news in his home province and pointed to CIQC, Montréal’s new English-language country station, as an opening for local acts such as Fournier and Norm Brunet. CIQC was the former CFCF, Canada’s oldest radio station, which had switched to country as Country 600 in 1991. The format lasted only until 1993, when the station turned to talk radio.

His most substantial release is From the Board Room to the Bar Room, a nine-song compact disc issued in Canada on the Miko label (Miko 271).

-Robert Williston

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