WWhen I was six or seven and living in Vancouver, I found War Child out in the front garden while playing guns. I didn’t know what album was at the time because the cover was destroyed, but all the same, I went upstairs, took the album out of the sleeve, and listened to Bungle in the Jungle on the Mickey Mouse record player about a million times. It might have been the jungle sounds that got me, but whatever the case, it is one of the first instances that I can remember just sitting down and listening to music.

WGoing on eight, my family returned to Montreal to live. Here, my older brother Mike had built up a pretty good record collection and had taken to locking us younger brothers up in his room for listening sessions. I still don’t know if it was necessarily the want to impart greatness of music to us or what, but it was all for the best considering that we then took to sneaking into his room for listening sessions of our own at a time when he’d kill us if caught handling his albums.

WA lot of my musical tastes developed then. Eighties music was exactly what it was and I thought that most of it was pretty bad compared to The Beatles and some of the classic Elton John and David Bowie that I had already come to enjoy. Thanks brother.

WIt came as quite the surprise when come grade eleven, my graduating year in Montreal, our family moved to the country to stay.
At Massey Vanier High School, down in Cowansville, Quebec, I became the lead singer in my first real band. Beyond played some of the most bombastic music you have ever heard. If anything at all, it had to be “Rock’n’Roll” and I’d have to say that we were bigger than most all the other bands operating in and around the area at that time.
WBeyond hit the city for college and disbanded some years later and I floated around on bicycles, trains, and jiggers of every sort before joining two of my brothers up in Ottawa for the next band.

WIn retrospect, the Bedlam Locomotive years seem much more positive than they felt at the time. I had picked up the bass guitar by then and grabbed a lot of experience playing in a trio. Original music also took the fore while this hadn’t really been the case in Beyond. Although the marriage of styles and attitudes was at times difficult, we did manage to accomplish things that I’m proud of. We released a CD called “Gramps” with respect to my grandfather, and played shows at both the Corel Center in Ottawa and Maple Leaf Gardens down in Toronto before I ran for the hills.

WSo it happened that I found myself not in the hills at all but back in Montreal again. At this point, two things happened. Firstly, I hooked up musically with two of my best friends from the country; and secondly, brother Chris who had sung, written, and played guitar with Bedlam Locomotive up in Ottawa, decided to return to Montreal as well. These people were the first contents of the well. After undergoing some distillation, we became The Wells one can hear today. Naze on drums, Chris on guitar, and myself on bass.

WFor my part, I feel some sort of distillation happening every day of playing in the band. It seems to me that the spirits involved are getting a little stronger, and while keeping us all in flux, somehow, at the same time we’re reminded that we’re getting finer and that it’s worthwhile.
Also, to conclude, I think my brother Chris and I are pretty fine guys anyways, and Naze might be even finer.

Thanks for listening.

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