Never missing a beat No easing the tempo for versatile rocker plugged into North American music scene By: David Sanderson Posted: 1:26 PM CST Saturday, Dec. 27, 2025

The late James Brown was commonly referred to as the “Hardest Working Man in Show Business,” but a Winnipeg-born musician has been giving the legendary soul artist a run for that title.

On New Year’s Eve, Canadian rock band Toque, featuring Brent Fitz on bass guitar and vocals, will perform live at the Club Regent Event Centre. Early the next morning, Fitz, who is originally from St. James, will board a flight to Las Vegas, where he and his wife Chrissy, a native of Edmonton, have lived since the early 2000s. There he will make final preparations for Ikons of Rock, a tribute show he’s co-producing that will begin a residency at Las Vegas’s Hard Rock Café on Jan. 8.

The multi-instrumentalist returns to Winnipeg in February to play drums with Streetheart, for that group’s Feb. 13 concert, again at the Club Regent Event Centre. Following that, Fitz will enter into rehearsals with Triumph. The Canadian Music Hall of Fame inductees recently enlisted his services on keyboards for their much-anticipated 50th anniversary North American tour, which kicks off April 22, in Sault Ste. Marie, Ont. All of that and he just helped wrap up a new album by Slash of Guns N’ Roses fame — with whom he’s worked on-and-off since 2010 — which is due in stores sometime in the new year.

Sure, it sounds like a hectic schedule, except he’s always enjoyed staying busy, says Fitz, seated in a Portage Avenue coffee shop during a recent visit to the city to check up on his 86-year-old father Mervyn, and to perform with Streetheart at a private event held at the RBC Convention Centre.

“Just to warn you, though, this thing will probably go off at least once in the next hour, either from my dad or from my partners in Vegas,” Fitz says, nodding toward his phone, which contains contact information for the likes of Alice Cooper and Kiss founder Gene Simmons. (In 2009, Fitz appeared in two episodes of the latter legend’s TV show, Gene Simmons Family Jewels.)

“But yeah, I got my first job at the age of seven delivering newspapers — and a second job when I was nine or 10, selling popcorn at Blue Bomber games — and I haven’t really stopped working since.”

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Fitz grew up on Bellavista Crescent. His parents regularly invited the “whole street” over for weekend parties, when they would spin records and dance the night away, says the long-haired 55-year-old, sporting sunglasses, a dark T-shirt emblazoned with a “Fitz” logo across the chest and an insulated black leather jacket, which he laughingly calls his winter parka.

“My parents were certainly musical people — my mom, who passed away two years ago, and dad also sang in the choir at church — and that definitely rubbed off on me and my sister Brenda, who also became a professional musician,” he continues, guessing he was five years old when his parents signed him up for piano lessons at a studio on Cavalier Drive, close to where they lived.

The Bay City Rollers’ Rock n’ Roll Love Letter, released in 1976, may have been the first album he personally owned, but it was Love Gun by Kiss, which came out in June 1977, that proved to be more pivotal. He and his best friend Brad Smith would mimic their newfound heroes by playing air guitar and spitting up fake blood, much to the amusement of his parents, who would pay a nickel each to witness the seven-year-olds’ shenanigans.

By the age of eight Fitz had taken up drums, albeit a “crappy” set his dad purchased for him that boasted images of the Muppets on the skins. It wasn’t until he signed up for formal lessons two years later that he received a “real” Yamaha kit, the receipt for which he’s kept all these years.

“Now I was living music all day long, running home from school and immediately putting on my headphones to play along to Rush and Cheap Trick,” he says.

Fitz was such a quick study on his new instrument that at age 14 he was hired to teach at Drums Unlimited, formerly on Main Street. That led to an opportunity to join a bar band called New Alliance, whose other members were all in their early 20s. As often as five nights a week, his dad dropped him off at whatever club the group was booked at. Because he was underage, he was forced to hide offstage until it was time to perform, often well past midnight.

“We did mostly covers — the Cars, Bryan Adams — and dressed like Duran Duran. Lots of times I went to school the next morning with my eyeliner still on, cause I’d woken up too late to take a shower,” he chuckles.

After graduating from John Taylor Collegiate in 1988, he was recruited by another group, Seventh Heaven. He spent the next two years in that band, playing dates from Thunder Bay to Vancouver. During that time, he became close friends with guitarist Scot Gaines, who was originally from Los Angeles.

Following the demise of Seventh Heaven in 1990, Fitz joined former Streetheart vocalist Kenny Shields, who had embarked on a solo career a few years earlier, before reforming Streetheart in the early 2000s. In 1991, during a break in the band’s schedule, Fitz travelled to Los Angeles with two buddies. As luck would have it, he bumped into Gaines on his second day there. That led to him staying in California longer than he’d intended, after Gaines invited him to crash at his place. Gaines was well-connected and he was soon introducing Fitz, now a bass player, too, to industry-types who willingly paid him under the table to do session work.

“I wanted to do things the right way, of course, and eventually came home to apply for a (work) visa,” he says. “At some point, though, I started to question my decision and told Kenny I intended to stay (in Winnipeg), after all. I can still picture him saying, ‘Brent, I want you to quit the band. I believe in you and I know you’re going to be a success down there.’ The next week I sold everything I owned and moved to L.A.”

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One opportunity led to another for Fitz in California, including recording music for TV sit-coms. His first big break occurred in 1997 when he became involved with Union, a hard-rocking outfit that included John Corabi (ex- of Mötley Crüe) on vocals, Bruce Kulick (formerly of Kiss) on guitar and James Hunting, who’d played with David Lee Roth, on bass. Union recorded three albums between 1997 and 2000, before disbanding.

In 2001 Fitz was tapped to play drums for Vince Neil, Mötley Crüe’s original lead vocalist, on his international tour. Neil was a Las Vegas resident and as their association continued, Fitz made the decision to move to Sin City, as well.

“It wasn’t like I was aiming to play with Barry Manilow or anything,” Fitz says with a wink. “It’s more like I was due for a change and at the end of the day, L.A. was only a 40-minute flight away for whatever session work came my way.” That was, when he wasn’t on the road with Neil, Canadian outfit Theory of a Deadman, who he joined in 2005, or, commencing in 2006, Alice Cooper.

Fitz was in the midst of a tour with Slash in 2012 when he was tasked with assembling a band for an event being held in Toronto in conjunction with that year’s Grey Cup festivities. Given the scenario, he thought it would be appropriate to focus entirely on classic Canadian tunes, favourites of his by Trooper, Honeymoon Suite, Loverboy… the list went on and on. He enlisted three pals — Todd Kerns, Shane Gaalaas and Cory Churko — and the unnamed troupe created such a stir that they were invited to perform again in 2013, in the days leading up to the Juno Awards ceremony in Regina.

“I don’t think it was until we did a charity event at the Palomino in Winnipeg that we finally called ourselves Toque, in honour of Bob and Doug McKenzie (of SCTV fame),” says Fitz, who, on Dec. 31, will handle bass and vocals at the group’s casino show. “We don’t play that often but when we do it’s a complete gas. It’s four guys from the Prairies in the fun band none of us ever had.”

Fitz is pleased to report that his Vegas abode includes a room entirely devoted to his hometown. Among his prized possessions are a pair of seats from the old Winnipeg Arena, where, at 10 years old, he first saw Van Halen. He has a painting of Garbage Hill, done by a local artist, as well as shelves of records by cherished Winnipeg groups such as Harlequin and the Pumps. (The day before our interview, he became excited when he spotted a near-mint condition copy of Dusty Shoes by the cult band Next, at a local record store.)

“Now that my dad’s on his own I try to get back as often as I can,” he says. “I get that I’ve spent most of my working life in the States but this is still home, and I look forward to visiting, every chance I get.”

Plus, even though he’s been around the globe once or twice, he still hasn’t found a better hamburger than the one at George’s Burgers and Subs on Ness Avenue, in his old neck of the woods. Just thinking about it makes him want to go grab something to eat, he says, slipping on his gloves.

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