The Early Years...

The Early Years...

It was the early 1980's. I was still short, but skinny, and often wearing embarrassing 80's outfits like pastel green shirts with pastel yellow pants and a pastel pink jacket!!

In high school, I was playing professionally in a weekend "Wedding Singer"-type band, playing at local bars and dances across Southern Ontario.

At this same time, Andrew Horrocks was doing much the same thing in his own weekend wedding band.

I remember having met Andy a few times, as he was friends with my brother Rob. I remember being at a bar in a shit-hole called Delhi Ontario (my apologies to anyone who sees it otherwise!). Andy was playing at the German Hall and I was at the Belgian Hall, just down the street. On one of our breaks, we went over to see Andy's band. They had just taken a break, and I remember asking Andy if he knew how to play "Mood For A Day" by Steve Howe (YES). He proceeded to show me what he had learned, and thus became a time when I began to look up to Andy as a skilled, educated guitar player.

At some point during these years, I found religion, so to speak!! I don't really want to address the spiritual aspect of my life or my time with The Awakening, so I'll just say it like this: When I was young, I became a born-again Christian, and that experience dominated my thought-life for many years. It was what led me to pursue a career in the Christian Music Industry. Would I do it all again? Of course not (!), but it's all part of the journey and rich fabric of the human experience!

So at some point in the early-mid 80's, Andy had formed a band that played Christian Music. He had already graduated from Humber College as a performer and was now enrolled at London's Fanshawe College in a recording engineering course. If I recall, his band was called "The Eclectics" and they mostly played what could be called Christian standards... old Larry Norman songs, etc.

At around this same time, both of our weekend wedding bands were involved in a gig together in Tillsonburg Ontario. Andy was there with his girlfriend Margaret Ellen. (They got married a few years later). Andy has told me the story about how while I was on stage with my band, he had commented to his girlfriend how great it would be to have me sing in his band. The only issue was that Andy wanted to form a Christian Rock band, and at that point, I was probably still "between religions!"

I recall going to an outdoor event somewhere to see The Eclectics perform. It was at this event that I talked to Andy and mentioned that I had just recently become a born-again Christian.

The band at that time had Mike Powell playing drums, and it's possible that keyboards were played by future Awakening manager Glenn Koehler, but I could be wrong about that. Future Awakening bass player Al Powell was the sound man at this gig. I have no idea who actually played bass with the band.

It didn't take too long for Andy to start considering asking me to join his band as a singer, now that he knew I was coming from the same spiritual place.

One of my earliest memories was having Andy come to my house in Woodstock Ontario, while I was still in high school (1985 I assume, or perhaps the summer of 1984). He came over to hear some of my original songs and me, his. This must have been a bit of a blow to Andy. I was a pretty weird kid in high school!!

My musical life in those years was scatological at best. I wrote hundreds of songs as a teenager, but they were all very scattered and ill-conceived. It wasn't my style to self-edit, so most of my material was all over the map. I had my own band at that time called "The Guards Of Zeus" and our greatest achievement was playing at a pig roast somewhere! I was channelling all of my musical desires at that point in my life, so everything was a bit of a mess. Andy on the other hand, was methodical, organized and determined. In all likelihood, Andy thought my stuff was out of control and childish, and I probably thought his stuff was a bit dull and conventional.

But regardless of this, we both had the desire to see where this would take us.

The next step was actually getting together to record something.

I remember going to Andy's mom and dad's house in Innerkip Ontario to record a song called "The Distance." I had recorded myself at home before, and certainly had hours and hours of tapes of me jamming at the piano. But I had never encountered a perfectionist before! My vocal session with Andy took what seemed like an eternity. He never seemed satisfied with what I did, and we just kept doing it over and over again. Nobody in my life, (even my music teachers) had told me to do something again because it wasn't great the first time, so having Andy put me to task was not a lot of fun. Obviously in retrospect, it was one of the best things to ever happen to me. I was now working with someone who wouldn't be fooled by my skill level or by my ability to be the boss. I was always the leader in my musical past and nobody ever told me what or how to play. With Andy, I knew things would be different.

This is where the story gets foggy for me, unfortunately.

At some point, Andy wanted me to meet the band, but it wasn't the same as the band I saw in at the fairgrounds months earlier. His friend from Humber - Glenn Koehler was doing keyboards on his recordings, but was no longer in the band, possibly because Andy had selected me to be his replacement, or perhaps because Glenn wanted to finish his education and get a job that would actually make money for his future!!

Where Mike and Al Powell came into the picture officially is a mystery to me.

All I remember was coming to a band rehearsal at their mom and dad's house in Bright Ontario. Al was on bass and Mike was on drums, and boom.. I was in their band.

I'll have to ask those guys if they remember how this all came together.

But that, my friends, is my side of the story of how The Awakening came to be!

Ian