One Night Band Evolves

10/08/08 5:26pm

by Steve McLean (CHARTattack)

The One Night Band formed in 2003 with the goal of playing only a single show. But things went so well that they kept on going, and have now played more than 300 gigs across North America and will head to Europe for the first time in November.

But the band you see now, and the one you hear on their new Hit & Run follow-up to their Way Back Home debut, aren't exactly what you might expect. There have been significant lineup changes, the former sextet are now a quartet, organ has taken over from saxophone as a primary instrument, and they've introduced more soul and garage rock elements to their ska and reggae-based music.

"After two years of intense touring, some people in the band got tired of being broke all the time and being on the road all the time," says lead singer/guitarist Alex Giguere. "So when we got back from a tour last November, our bass player and the two sax players quit the band.

"We had to rethink the way we'd write songs for the new record. A friend of ours from Toronto came to Montreal, and we got together to write some new songs. That's when we got into trying new stuff and mixing in some of our other influences. I think these hard times turned into something really positive for the band. More than ever, we've gone through all of this together and there's more unity than ever. I think we found our own sound and this new record represents it."

Hit & Run was produced by guitarist Brian Dixon of The Aggrolites, a Los Angeles "dirty reggae" band who One Night Band have opened for several times. Dixon has also engineered albums by such like-minded acts as The Slackers, Hepcat and Tim Armstrong — all favourites of The One Night Band — so it was a good fit.

"We wanted to have an old-school record done in an old-school way, and that's what Brian is good at," explains Giguere.

Some of the 15 songs on the Stomp Records-released Hit & Run sound similar to The Aggrolites, but Giguere says The One Night Band don't want to be seen as a Canadian version of the group. While comparisons to The Aggrolites or The Slackers are going to be inevitable because there aren't a lot of groups playing old-school ska and reggae at a high level these days, the material on the excellent new album stands on its own and shows real growth.

Nowhere is this more noticeable than in the songwriting. Giguere is a francophone who only learned English six years ago, but he writes everything in his new language. He admits that he received help with some lyrics from Montreal ska veteran Mitch Girio, who produced Way Back Home, but feels that the new songs take on more universal themes than earlier works.

"This record talks a lot about being on the road and how hard it can be sometimes to have friends that let you down, like with our lineup changes. But when you get to travel and meet new people and play with new bands, you feel different points of view, and it helps us grow as people and as musicians. Hit & Run is all about that."

You can see for yourself what Hit & Run is all about at these shows:

Oct. 9 Montreal, QC @ Café Campus w/Keepin 6
Oct. 10 Ottawa, ON @ The New Bayou w/Keepin 6 and Fleeba
Oct. 11 Toronto, ON @ Kathedral w/Keepin 6 and Staylefish
Oct. 17 Milton, ON @ Charley Fitzwhiskey's Tap & Eatery w/Keepin 6
Oct. 18 Guelph, ON @ The Shadow w/Keepin 6
Oct. 24 Ste-Therese, QC @ CEGEP Lionel-Groulx w/RDC
Oct. 25 Quebec City, QC @ Le Casbah w/The Hunters and Skopitones
Oct. 26 Kingston, ON @ Time To Laugh Comedy Club w/Tea For The Voyage
Oct. 30 Victoria, BC @ Upstairs Cabaret w/The Kiltlifters, Brave New Waves and The Easy Brothers
Oct. 31 Nanaimo, BC @ The Coffee Vault
Nov. 1 Vancouver, BC @ Pat's Pub