One Chord to Another was a breakthrough hit for the group in 1996
Canadian rock band Sloan is currently touring B.C. to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the group's breakthrough third album, One Chord to Another.
The group hit Nelson Monday night, and by the end of the week, they will have played Penticton, Vancouver, Victoria and Nanaimo.
But before their Monday night show in Nelson, guitarist and vocalist Jay Ferguson spoke with Radio West host Audrey McKinnon about the tour, and what's next for the group.
You've been touring One Chord to Another since the beginning of April. What does it feel like to be playing this throwback?
It feels great! If I had to choose a favourite record from our catalogue, it's definitely this record. Just seeing the looks on people's faces who maybe haven't seen us since this record came out 20 years ago, but they're just so excited and they just have such looks of joy on their faces. And if we're touching a chord, pardon the pun, of nostalgia for anybody, that's awesome.
What makes this album your favourite?
It's a whole series of contexts: the time of our lives, the freedom of not having a big record company breathing down our necks, just knowing we were doing it on our own terms, on our own dime, and it turned out to be one of our most successful records. It was just such an ABC after-school special kind of thing.
And there had been rumours that you guys had broken up by the time this record came out. Is that true?
It wasn't necessarily rumours, it was kind of true. Over time we learned we didn't actually need to call it quits, we just needed to get out of each other's faces for a while. The learning curve was vertical for us when we signed with Geffen and we're thrown out on the road and touring with a rock band for months and months and months and we didn't even know each other as people back then. So we needed to re-acclimatize to rediscovering who we were as individuals and as a group, and it was nice to come back to it within the making of this record.
Let's go back to 1991, when you first started — did you ever think you'd be playing 20-year anniversaries of your albums back then?
No! My god, I remember asking my mother for money so I could buy a drum kit, and saying something like, "Mom, i'm not going to be in a rock band when I'm 30!" And I'm almost 50.
Has Sloan changed in the last 25 years for you?
Totally! We've changed as people, as an entity, it's an organism. The whole travelling circus we are on the road, it's another family. We love one another and we hate one another! But we work well together, and we know what our job is.
You were in Calgary last week. Later this week you'll be in Vancouver. But today, Nelson, population 10,000. Why do you play the smaller cities?
Because they're great! Because people come out to see us! And why not? Having been in the business long enough, there's a rule: the shorter the ceiling, the 'funner' the show. And the more your expectations are lowered, the more you're going to be proven wrong. When you're in a town like Nelson, or Sudbury or Prince George, people will come out and see you, and they'll have a ball.
--taken from: CBC News
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