ClumsyMonkey.net

Our Lady Peace

Our Lady Peace

Our Lady Peace

Current Members

Past Members

Past Support

Formation and debut

Mike Turner placed a "musicians wanted" ad in Toronto-based Now Magazine in 1992. Michael Maida, a criminology student at the University of Toronto, was the first to reply. The two formed a band called As If with Jim Newell playing drums and a friend of Mike Turner's, Paul Martin, playing bass. Having played a number of gigs in Oshawa with sets containing a mix of original and cover material, Turner's friend departed and the band placed a "musicians wanted" ad for a replacement bass player. Chris Eacrett, a business student at Ryerson University, replied and was accepted after the audition. During that time, Turner and Maida attended a music seminar where they met songwriter and producer Arnold Lanni, the owner of Arnyard Studios. The band, with Lanni, commenced writing new material and recorded some material under the As If name.

To better reflect the new musical direction, the name of the band was changed to Our Lady Peace, and with encouragement from Arnold and his management team, they performed some gigs in Eastern Ontario and Montreal with the assistance of D.J. Williams (a Ridley College alumnus and classmate of Michael Maida, also a Ridley College alumnus), in conjunction with The Tea Party. During this time, Maida began using the name Raine to reduce the confusion of having two Mikes in the band. An independent video of the song "Out of Here" was also created during this time period by Sam Siciliano, a Ryerson University film student and friend of Mike Turner, who produced, edited, and directed the video. The video was aired on MuchMusic on their Indie show.

After returning to Arnyard Studios to continue writing and recording material, Jim Newell departed the band. Writing and recording continued with session drummer John Bouvette. With Coalition Management (Rob Lanni and Eric Lawrence) representing the band, and temporary drummer Jody Wilson, short showcases were arranged with Warner Canada, EMI Canada, and Sony Music Canada. Sony Music Canada head of A&R, Richard Zuckerman, liked what he heard and along with Sony president, Rick Camilleri, Mike Roth and Gary Furniss (both with Sony Music Publishing), saw the potential of the producer, the band, and band management, and made an offer. The band commenced writing additional material for a first album, as well placed a "musicians wanted" ad for a drummer. Jeremy Taggart answered the ad, and on the strength of his potential, the producer and band asked that he join the band.

After additional material was written and recorded, with the continued assistance of John Bouvette on several tracks and guitarist Phil X contributing a solo on "Denied," Our Lady Peace released its debut album Naveed in 1994 on Sony Records. The record was later picked up and released in the United States in 1995. Following the release of the album, the band toured with fellow Canadian acts I Mother Earth and 54-40. Touring continued on into 1996 with time spent touring with Canadian Alanis Morissette. The title track, "Naveed," became a hit in Canada, while "Starseed" became a hit in both Canada and the United States. "Starseed" would later be featured on the Armageddon film soundtrack. After touring as the opening act for Van Halen through the summer of 1995, and as the band began writing material for their follow-up album, Chris Eacrett and the band parted ways due to musical differences. Rob Coutts (a Ridley College alumni and classmate of Raine Maida) joined the band as Duncan Coutts on bass.

Success

Their second album, Clumsy, was released in 1997. It features the hit songs "Superman's Dead," "4AM," "Automatic Flowers," and the title track "Clumsy." It is widely considered the group's best effort. It established Our Lady Peace as a leading band in the Canadian rock scene, and provided them with an international presence.

In 1999, the band released their third album, entitled Happiness...Is Not a Fish That You Can Catch. The album included such hits as "Thief," a song about a young girl, named Mina Kim, the band met who had cancer, as well as "One Man Army" and "Is Anybody Home?" Jamie Edwards, a multi-instrumentalist, was brought in on the sessions for Happiness... in 1999 and remained an unofficial member until 2001 when he was asked to officially join the band to finish the album Gravity. Shortly after the completion of the record Jamie chose to leave the band, returning briefly to stand in for Mike Eisenstein during the Canadian tour of Gravity.

2000 - 2008

In 2000, the band released Spiritual Machines, a concept album inspired by Ray Kurzweil's book The Age of Spiritual Machines. Spiritual Machines sold below expectations. This album featured the singles "In Repair," "Life" (which found a soundtrack listing for the Canadian sports comedy film Men with Brooms) and "Right Behind You (Mafia)." In December 2001, after commencing work with producer Bob Rock, Mike Turner left the band citing creative differences. According to the band members the separation was amicable. Turner later joined Fair Ground. In April of 2002, Steve Mazur was announced as the new guitarist for the band.

Some critics contended that in the early 2000s the band's new music changed, adopting an increasingly mainstream sound and softening the music considerably. Some critics of the band's fifth album, Gravity, called it "overproduced" and "too mainstream." Despite such criticism, the album's chart-topping first single, "Somewhere Out There," became the band's biggest international hit to date. The second single released off the album was "Innocent." "Made of Steel" was also a hit across North America.

On 2 July 2005 the group played at the Canadian Live 8 concert in Barrie, Ontario. In August, the band released their sixth album, Healthy in Paranoid Times, which included the tracks "Angels/Losing/Sleep," "Will the Future Blame Us," and "Where Are You?" Shortly after recording the album, the band disclosed that during the making of the album, they nearly broke up. However, the band has also said that they were really proud of the album. According to Rolling Stone, it took 1165 days to create it, and its twelve tracks were chosen from forty-five that the band had written and produced.

The band added a fifth stage member, Joel Shearer (of the band Pedestrian), for the Paranoid Times tour, which saw them stopping in several North American cities between April and May of 2006.

On November 21, 2006 (November 28, 2006 in USA), their greatest hits compilation entitled A Decade was released. There are two new songs on the album, "Kiss On The Mouth" and "Better Than Here;" Steve Mazur wrote in a blog on the band's fan club that the new songs on the disc are two unreleased songs from the Healthy in Paranoid Times sessions. The collection also includes the Top 10 tracks: "Where Are You," "Clumsy," "In Repair," "Somewhere Out There," "Innocent," "Thief," "Naveed," "Starseed" and "4 A.M." A Decade also includes a bonus DVD containing live concert footage and exclusive interviews at the Massey Hall concert. The single "Kiss On The Mouth," the first off A Decade, has received play on radio stations across Canada.

2009 - 2014

The band's seventh studio album, "Burn Burn", was released on July 21, 2009. The album was produced by Raine and co-produced by the other members, and mixed by Andrew Scheps. Scheps has mixed albums for Pedestrian, Jay-Z, Linkin Park, and Johnny Cash. The first single, "All You Did Was Save My Life", debuted on May 25, 2009. OLP had previously recorded a video for "The Right Stuff." The video was created by Teqtonik, the same group who created Raine's video for "Sex, Love, and Honey." The video was scrapped as the first single, in favor of "All You Did Was Save My Life." "Burn Burn" is available online through iTunes and other digital retailers, and 2 hard copies are available, in standard and deluxe editions. The deluxe edition include 2 bonus tracks, "Time Bomb" and "The Right Stuff." It also includes a bonus DVD of the band performing several songs live in the studio at Raine's home, as well as the music video for "All You Did.." and the scrapped video for "The Right Stuff." The band has updated their longtime fan site, OurLadyPeace.net with song clips, album art, and other multimedia surrounding the album. OLP enlisted the help of longtime fan and friend Rich Misener and Creative End to develop a multimedia rich and interactive site. The band is currently on tour in North America. Their second single, "The End Is Where We Begin", began receiving airplay on radio in October 2009, along with a music video. The third single from the album, "Dreamland", received limited airplay on radio in April 2010, along with an unofficial video on YouTube.

Guitarist Steve Mazur had an opportunity to see Devo perform one of their albums cover to cover in Los Angeles in 2009, and proposed the idea for OLP to do the same to the rest of the group. The idea was originally conceived for the band to play all 7 albums across 7 nights in Toronto. However, the band decided the logistics wouldn't work out, and with the help of online polls, narrowed the choices down to 2 fan favorites: 1997's "Clumsy", and 2000's "Spiritual Machines." The band would play each album on back to back nights in most cities across Canada, or "Clumsy" only on select dates. The tour would contain only 2 dates in the US. The show would contain 2 sets. The first being the album of the night in its entirety. The second set would be a collection of hits and favorites from the other studio albums. The band began rehearsing the albums across their touring break in late 2009, and in March 2010 took to the road. The band recorded audio at every show on the tour, and had 3 dates in Vancouver professionally filmed for a potential DVD.

Following the album tour, the band took a few weeks off, as Raine prepared his second solo album. The band would converge back on their Toronto and Los Angeles rehearsal spaces to begin work on their next album. The band would continue touring across the Summer of 2010, playing various festivals across Canada. In between, the band would continue to meet sporadically and write and record tracks for album 8.

In 2011 the band continued writing and recording new material, and for the first time ever allowed fans to watch the recording process unfold live online. OLP also brought in multi-talented producer and studio expert, Jason Lader, to help produce the album and push the band to be their best. Information on the recording sessions can be found here. OLP continued their Summer festival tour tradition, playing a variety of shows across Canada at popular events, including the Calgary Stampede. "The Wolf" made it's live debut at a free concert in Niagara Falls, NY , and other summer festivals with positive fan reaction. In the fall of 2011 the band released a promotional track for the Occupy Wall Street movement called "Fight The Good Fight." The song and video was met with much backlash from many casual fans, not for lyrical or musical content, but for support of the movement. In December 2011 the band released the first official single from their new album, a track titled "Heavyweight", debuting it live at a New Year's Eve performance in Niagara Falls, ON, live on national television.

Possession of the domain ourladypeace.com was taken over by the band, from Sony, in the summer of 2011. The site was copied from ourladypeace.net, assuming the role as the primary site for pictures, video, concert dates. Prior to the release of Heavyweight, OurLadyPeace.com was revamped and introduced as the new primary site for the band. Ourladypeace.net web designer Rich, indicated that .net would become something new, and a separate, distinct destination for fans.

In April 2012, the band released it's 8th studio album, "Curve", with a warm reception from fans. The album featured 10 tracks, and was highlighted by singles "Heavyweight", and "As Fast As You Can". The cover for the album featured Canadian boxing legend, George Chuvalo, on the cover. Mr. Chuvalo loaned his voice for excerpts on the closing track "Mettle". "As Fast As You Can" would be featured throughout late fall and early winter as a lead out song on ESPN College Football broadcasts. "Curve" brought back many fan-favorite elements to OLP's sound. Most notably layered audio tracks, a more spirited vocal performance, and lyrics that were not as straight forward as the previous 3 albums. The album featured commanding guitar work by Steve Mazur, shining on tracks like "Heavyweight", "If This Is It", and "Find Our Way". It also introduced 2 songs that were not typical to the OLP sound, "Will Someday Change", and "Mettle". To date, those two songs, and "Window Seat" are the only songs not played in concert.

The band embarked on the Urban Grind Tour in April 2012, playing smaller venues across Canada, as well as a few select dates in the US. A second leg of the tour took the band through some of it's staple cities in the northern US, and continued to play festival dates through the summer and fall, including a stop for 2 nights in London, England. OLP was joined on stage by female keyboardist, Robin Hatch, in 2012. One criticism of live shows had been "carbon copy" setlists. For the Urban Grind tours, OLP pulled several songs out that hadn't been played in some time. "The Birdman", "All My Friends", "Blister", "Bring Back The Sun", and "Not Enough" made their way into the setlist throughout the spring. Mid-concert, there was always an acoustic song played, featuring Steve and Raine. Acoustic versions of "Thief", "Julia", "Blister", and "Picture" (with Robin on keys), all found new life in 2012.

2014 - 2017

In early 2014 plans began for a tour to celebrate the band's 20th anniversary. The tour would visit venues across Canada, and feature a "town hall" platform where the band would field any questions from the audience. It was also rumored that former guitarist Mike Turner was invited to join the band on the tour. In March 2014 both OLP and Jeremy Taggart announced his seemingly amicable departure from the band, thus scrapping all plans for a 20th anniversary tour. Taggart, who had became a regular guest on several podcasts and radio shows across southern Ontario, eventually partnered with comedian Jonathan Torrens to create the popular Taggart and Torrens podcast.

In July 2014 Raine, Steve, and Duncan returned to the recording studio, along with producer Mike Elizondo, and drummer Jason Boesel (Rilo Kiley) to record a song called "Won't Turn Back." The song was released on digital platforms in July 2014. OLP would play a handful of shows in 2014, with Robin Hatch returning on keys and backing vocals, and bringing along studio and touring drummer Jason Pierce (Neverending White Lights, Paramore, Treble Charger). The band covered Lana Del Ray's "Summertime Sadness" which would remain a setlist staple on most shows until late 2016.

2017-Present

After tours with I Mother Earth, Collective Soul, and Guns N' Roses, OLP returned to the studio with now official drummer Jason Pierce, and Curve producer Jason Lader, to begin working on new music. In the summer of 2017 Raine announced that the new music would be released as 2 separate EP's, Somethingness Volumes 1 and 2. Each EP was said to have 3-5 songs each. "Drop Me In The Water", which had debuted on the fall 2016 tour with I Mother Earth, was selected as the first single. The EP would see it's first release on music site PledgeMusic.ca, with a variety of "kickstarter" styled options for purchase along with a digital version of the EP's, and an option to purchase it on vinyl. After pressure from fans, an option to purchase a CD version of the EP's was added. In August 2017, Volume 1 was released with tracks "Drop Me In The Water", "Hiding Place For Hearts", "Falling Into Place", and "Nice To Meet You" as the 4 tracks selected for the EP.

In October 2017 the band announced they would do a cross country US tour celebrating the 20th anniversary of Clumsy. The tour kicked off in Clifton Park, NY and the original format for the shows was to be similar to 2010's "An Evening With" tour. After 3 shows the format was updated to simply having a Clumsy-heavy setlist. New songs "Head Down", and "Ballad Of A Poet" would debut on the tour, along with a reworked cover of Post Malone's "Congratulations". In early 2018 it was announced that OLP would do a cross-Canada tour along with Matthew Good.