TORONTO - The 1989 Juno Awards provided a marquee moment for Blue Rodeo.

That was the year the Toronto band won its first three Junos, including trophies for group of the year and single of the year. Their four-times platinum debut "Outskirts" was being celebrated and they were roughly a week from delivering their followup, "Diamond Mine," which would go on to be certified platinum three times.

Yet despite Blue Rodeo's success, the band was still relegated to provide backing support for a live performance by the Band. And the members of the Band weren't sure they needed the help.

"That was a totally strange experience," Blue Rodeo frontman Jim Cuddy said during a recent interview in Toronto. "(Organizers) said, 'We've got something very special for you. The Band wants to play with you, and they're very keen on playing with you.'

"And we were like, wow, really? The Band? This was great. Imagine that! And then when we went to rehearsal, Robbie Robertson walked in. He had no idea that anybody else was going to be there. He said, 'There's a lot of Indians here. We just need a drummer."'

"It was a very entertainment-industry moment for us, where people say a lot of things that aren't true, and a lot of people are lavishing you with praise when they've never even heard of you."

It's an archival anecdote dug up by "Music From Far and Wide: Celebrating 40 Years of the Juno Awards," a new book on the venerable awards show that hits stores this week with a foreward from Cuddy.

With the 40th annual Junos show scheduled for Toronto in March, "Music From Far and Wide" diligently delves into the Junos' history, tracking its transition from an industry-only non-televised reception for roughly 250 people (back when it was the Gold Leaf Awards in 1970) into the glittering arena spectacle of today.

Of course, the book also recounts memorable moments from Junos past -- remember Ronnie Hawkins inadvertently tearing a hole in his tuxedo pants onstage in 1981, or Tina Turner performing a duet with Bryan Adams in 1985 (the same year k.d. lang accepted an award wearing a wedding dress), or k-os declaring that the 2007 show was "propaganda" before smashing his guitar?

The book also revels in the high cheese factor of the older shows and the many questionable fashion choices made along the way, particularly in the '70s and '80s.

"That was the time when anybody who was a musician looked ridiculous dressed up," Cuddy said. "Murray McLauchlan doesn't look normal -- he looks like he's dressed up for a Halloween party. Or Dan Hill in a blue tux."

Cuddy's own involvement with the show has grown since backing the Band in '89. He sits on the Junos board and, whether nominated or not, he makes the annual trip to host the Juno Cup, which pits Canadian musicians against retired pro hockey players.

He says it's not a coincidence that the show's growth has coincided with the blossoming of the Canadian music scene.

"I think you have to have this porthole of trying to get the whole country to look at the same thing at the same time," he said. "The Junos' struggles to become a credible show is part of the struggle of music lovers to say: 'This is our own music, and I love it, and it's not any less than the rest of the world.'

"So I think yeah, it's reflective of the same thing."

Sifting through his own Juno memories, Cuddy recalls spending time with bands like Finger 11 and Nickelback that he otherwise might not have met and "babysitting" starstruck, hard-partying retired NHLers to ensure they made it to the Juno Cup in one piece.

And then there was Blue Rodeo's role in, um, lifting the spirits of the other nominees.

"We used to be sort of the go-to pot dressing room, you know?" Cuddy remembers with a laugh. "Because especially around our 'Five Days in July' experience, there was a lot of pot smoked -- not by me, by the way, I never was an indulger.

"So we'd hear this knock on the door and someone would come in and say: 'Hey, what are you guys doing?'

"It'd be someone we kind of knew but didn't really know. He just decided to come by and say hello!"

12:11ET 09-11-10