Diamonds in the Rough 07.19.09: Our Lady Peace

Posted by Leo Rivera on 07.19.2009

These alternative rock pioneers never say die!!

Nickelback, Three Days Grace, Theory of a Deadman, Finger Eleven and Evans Blue, all of these hard rocking bands have one thing in common, they are Canadian! And whether a lot of people like to admit it or not (especially in Nicelback's case) they have all carved their niche into the American hard rock scene. These bands, while not American, have all become a part of American popular culture, they have successfully crossed over borders to become household names everywhere from Toronto, Canada to Topeka, Kansas. Without a doubt, sheer talent can be attributed to the international success of these bands, and they have all put in their hard work, but if this was 15 years ago, they would have to work twice as hard and dream even harder. While we usually associate Canadian rock with bands like Nickelback, back in 1994, the Canadian brand of Alternative and Hard Rock was non-existent, that is until Our Lady Peace arrived!

You know it is a shame that (generally speaking) when looking back at history, those who pave the way and break down the initial door and open the floodgates are often the ones that are forgotten. Such is the case for Our Lady Peace. Here is a band that helped define not only Canadian but American Alternative Rock music during the very crucial post grunge era. They influenced a new wave (for lack of a better term) of Alternative Rockers like: Live, Tonic, Third Eye Blind, Matchbox Twenty, Lifehouse and Finger Eleven to name a few. This is the story of the band that helped transition rock into a modern era, after Flannel Shirts were out of Stock and a blond haired blue eyed rebel known as Kurt Cobian put a shotgun through his skull killing himself and taking the heart and soul of grunge with him. This is the story of one of the few guiding lights during a dark and uncertain period in rock history. This is the story of Our Lady Peace.



Our Lady Peace originally formed in Toronto, Ontario, Canada back in 1992 by guitarist Mike Turner under the name As If. He recruited singer Mike Maida (who later changed his name to Raine Maida so as not to confuse anyone with two Mikes in the band) through a "musicians wanted" ad in Now Magazine and then asked friends to fill in on drums and bass. Looking to sharpen their craft, Maida and Turner attended a music seminar in Toronto where they met songwriter and producer Arnold Lanni. Arnold while young was a production wiz who happened to own a studio (Arnyard Studios) in Toronto. Mike and Raine quickly formed a musical bond and friendship with Lanni that would last for nearly a decade and would prove to be crucial as far as their careers were concerned.

As they delved deeper into their musical studies, the sound of their music began to take a shape of its own as they matured, their outlook changed and thus the band changed their name from the sophomoric As If to the more meaningful and curious Our Lady Peace. Maida and Turners' passion for music was rivaled only by their ambition and sheer determination to become a driving force in the often dormant Canadian Alternative Rock scene. They developed a do it yourself work ethic and tapped friend and Ryerson University film student Sam Siciliano to direct, edit and produce a video for the song "Out of Here" The video helped the new band gain some much needed media attention as Much Music (Canada's version of MTV at the time) feature the video on their Indy show.

After completing their video, Our Lady Peace returned to Arnyhard Studios with Arnold Lanni at the helm as the band completed what would be their debut album. Creatively, the band and Lanni seemed to be firing on all cylinders and were poised to take Canada by storm but there was one major element missing they were without a record label and thus no one to help distribute their music to the masses. That would soon change when the band signed Coalition Management to represent them in obtaining a record deal.

Signing Coalition Management would prove to be a pivotal turning point for the band, as the management team quickly put the wheels in motion and lined up a crucial set of music industry showcases. Warner Bros. Canada, EMI Canada and Sony Music Canada where all invited to witness Canada's rise of alternative rock, in person. Sony liked what they heard and saw potential in not only Our Lady Peace but in their management team and in their ace producer Arnold Lanni. This marked one of the first times that a producer and an artist raised up the ranks together (another one being Rick Rubin and Run DMC). The band then hired a full time drummer in 17-year old prodigy Jeremy Taggart and put the finishing touches on their debut album Naveed.



Naveed was released in Canada in November 1994 and as record sales steadily climbed Sony America signed the band and released the album in the U.S. in early 1995. If you heard Naveed in 1995, then you heard post-grunge alternative rock at its very best! Our Lady Peace sounded refreshingly original with bombastic and complex guitar rhythms that were compounded and accentuated by Raine Maida's erratic yet soulful howl. With Naveed Our Lady Peace helped set the tone for what alternative rock music would become throughout the remainder of the 1990's. Other bands that helped carry the rock banner during this time include: Live, Bush and Oasis. While Naveed at times showed sounds of grunge seep through the music ("The Birdman" and "Starseed"), it was crystal clear to see that Our Lady Peace where hell bent on carving out their own brand of rock, as proven by the amazing title track. The song "Naveed" would become a blueprint for how alternative rock hits should be written, soon you would here bands like Third Eye Blind, Train, Everclear and most recently bands like 3 Doors Down writing songs and hits to that same formula. If you don't believe me, please check the song out for yourself and tell me if it does not sound remotely familiar.

As the album picked up steam the band toured Canada with fellow cannucks Mother Earth, 54-40 and Alanis Morisette (back when she used to rock harder than some dudes). The success of Naveed and the subsequent world tour shot Our Lady Peace into international stardom and one of the foremost bands in rocks new movement.



They returned to Arnold Lanni's studio in 1996 to record their follow-up record titled Clumsy. The album was a huge hit with college radio through the U.S. and featured the hits "Superman's Dead", "4 am", "Automatic Flowers" and "Carnival." The album was quickly certified platinum. Thoughts on this album vary as many fans and critics consider it to be their best album yet, but there is also a group of fans who think this is their worst outing, as Raine Maida's voice they says sounds "nasally." Regardless, the album sold a ton (being certified Diamond in Canada by 2001!) and solidified Our Lady Peace of Canada's rock heap.



\Our Lady Peace was quickly becoming Canada's version of Janes Addiction as far as alternative music was concerned and on the strength of their massive popularity, launched a summer touring festival (in 1998) in the vein of Lollapalooza, titled the Summersault Festival. The lineup for the year 2000 event featured no less than: The Foo Fighters, A Perfect Circle and Smashing Pumpkins, with Our Lady Peace headlining.



In 1999, they released their third album titled Happiness…Is Not a Fish That You Can Catch. This was arguably their most focused and driven album to date and kicks off with the triumphant anthem "One Man Army" which rocks as hard as anything the band ever released. "One Man Army" was actually my introduction to Our Lady Peace as I recall dj'ing for my college radio station Ithaca's 92 WICB and playing this song that was on the program sheet and being completely blown away, being that this was in 2003, I immediately felt stupid for missing out on such a vital time period in rocks history. Needless to say I caught up quickly and was not disappointed. Other standout tracks on the album include the hit single "Is Anybody Home?", "Lying Awake" and "Thief." The highlight of the Happiness tour cycle was playing a raucous set at Woodstock 1999.

At the apex of the bands commercial success, Our Lady Peace decided to take a departure musically and make a concept album. In 2000, Our Lady Peace released Spiritual Machines a concept album that was inspired by Ray Kurzweils book "The Age of the Spiritual Machines." During the time of the recording drummer Jeremy Taggart was sidelined with an ankle injury and Pearl Jams' (and former Soundgarden) drummer Matt Cameron was tapped to play drums on "Right Behind You (Mafia) and "Are You Sad?" Unfortunately the album was less commercially appealing and successful than the previous albums and thus Our Lady Peace lost some steam in the midst in another change in rock music's landscape as Nu-Metal was beginning to peak and anything that was not a rap/rock hybrid or featured crunchy distorted guitars was viewed as passé.



Following the fallout of Spiritual Machines founding guitarist Mike Turner left the band due to "creative differences." With their founding guitarist departing from the band and the rise of Nu-Metal, Our Lady Peace knew that they had to shift gears and adapt their style if they wanted to hang with the new breed of rock. They also parted ways with long time producer Arnold Lanni and called in heavyweight producer Bob Rock to help polish their sound and make them acceptable to the mainstream again. As many of you know Bob Rock for better or worse (cough, cough, Metallica, cough) is notorious for taking already established bands and turning their mainstream appeal x 10. Add in the fact that Bob is Canadian, and this decision seemed natural. With Steve Mazur taking Turners place in guitars, the band commenced recording with Bob in 2001.

Gravity was released in 2002 to mixed reviews. Many long time fans were turned off by Our Lady Peace's sudden penchant for writing mainstream rock. Our Lady Peace, at one time the darlings of alternative rock, were blamed along with Bob Rock for helping the band "Sell Out", just like Metallica diehard fans had done a decade earlier when Bob produced their Black album. But on the flip side, much like with Metallica's Black album, it is hard to argue the quality of the songs on gravity, ready-made for radio rock tracks that sound sleek but very good as well, in spite of what critics and long time fans may say. It is also worth noting that Maida's signature falsetto voice is pretty absent throughout the album, which is not entirely a bad thing. The album also sold well and brought the band back into the limelight, the hit single "Somewhere out There" was all over VH1 and radio in 2002-2003 and became the bands biggest international hit to date. Other songs like: "Innocent", "Not Enough" and "Made of Steel" were also hits. But unfortunately, despite the bands regained success, the fans were not the only ones disagreeing with the bands new direction as drummer Jeremy Taggart, left the band in 2002, stating that he was turned off by the bands new mainstream sound.



Nevertheless, the band chugged a long releasing A Live album compilation in June 2003. And then In August 2005, Our Lady Peace released their sixth album curiously titled Healthy in Paranoid Times. The album unfortunately highlighted everything that was wrong with the band. At one time the epitome of alternative rock music, in later years Our Lady Peace had become a shell of their former self, their focus had turned to writing hit songs to assure that they would still be signed by a major label as opposed to just writing music for the love of music like in the past. Raine Maida in a later interview admitted to this by stating "The record was total excess, total bullshit in the sense of, we finally succumbed to a label: making us record that many songs, trying to find the right singles for American radio and MTV." In turns out that Healthy in Paranoid Times took over 1,000 days to record with the band going through as many as 45 songs before the record label felt they had recorded a hit. Needless to say, the band almost broke up during this process.

Luckily Our Lady Peace decided to stay together and instead looked to their critically acclaimed past as inspiration for the future. They released their greatest hits album titled Decades in November 2006. Two news songs "Kiss On The Mouth" and "Better Than Here" were featured on the album. And most recently in March of 2009 Sony Records released a second compilation titled The Very Best of Our Lady Peace.

After taking a hiatus in 2007 so that Raine Maida can release his solo album and the band can take a much needed breather, Our Lady Peace has returned! They have completed their seventh studio album titled Burn, Burn an album that Raine says will be "huge" and a "return to a proper rock album again reminiscent of Naveed just more mature." Burn, Burn hits stores and I-tunes this Tuesday July 21st. If this is indeed the case then old school fans have something to look forward to again and new fans be prepared to get rocked. Because after over a decade in the music industry, one thing is for sure many come and go but Our Lady Peace will never die!