HELIX Frontman Brian Vollmer Looks Back On Band's 40 Year Career - "People Were Writing Us Off Before We Had Our First Album Out"
October 10, 2014, 10 years ago
Helix frontman Brian Vollmer recently spoke with James Reaney at IFPress.com about the band's 40 year career. An excerpt from the interview is available below:
At some point this year, Helix turned 40 — and ace frontman, raconteur and positive thinker Brian Vollmer is in a mood to celebrate.
“People were writing us off before we had our first album out,” Vollmer said cheerfully in a wide-ranging survey of things Helix past, present and future.
The London Music Hall of Fame band is off to Europe this month, touring such places as Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, Finland and Norway. Write that off, suckers.
So, yay, Europe and, yay, for life after 40 being on the Helix radar. Still, the voyage getting to 40 has its foggy moments.
“It was kind of a blur,” Vollmer, of London, said as exact details about Helix’s first decade faded in and out of metal myth.
“I don’t remember the date. But I remember where the first date was — it was at Listowel high school,” Vollmer, 59, said.
A Listowel secondary school grad and top choral singer back in the day, Kitchener-born Vollmer was soon helming the first Helix lineups. Based in Kitchener, its home on the road then was the bar circuit. At the old Ridout in London, the broken glass mounted on the floor as covers rocked off the stand.
The lessons of 1974 and the countless gigs in the early days are worth a listen.
“To love music first and foremost and just to keep pressing forward. There’s no set manual for success in the rock and roll business. You just have to keep trying,” he said of advice he’d offer to someone starting out.
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Helix recently announced their European tour schedule for October. Vollmer checked in with the following update:
"My stomach is full of butterflies getting ready to leave for Europe. Got all my paperwork together, my clothes packed, my schedule figured out. Dave Carboso is coming along to film the entire thing and hopefully we'll put out the whole adventure on a DVD in the new year. We begin the tour with four promotional dates in Germany with a Swiss date added in on the second day. Then it's off to Sweden, Finland, and Norway for the second week of dates. Woo-hoo!"Dates are as follows:
October
11 - Paunchy Cats - Lichtenfels, Germany
12 - Rockfabrik - Nürnberg, Germany
15 - Rock Cafe St. Pauli - Hamburg, Germany
17 - Backstage Rockbar @ Livingroom - Sandviken, Sweden
18 - Scandic Swania - Trollhättan, Sweden
19 - Rockbåten M/S - Helsingborg, Sweden
21 - On the Rocks - Helsinki, Finland
22 - Harry B. James - Stockholm, Sweden
23 - Ritz - Örebro, Sweden
24 - Denim & Leather - Jönköping, Sweden
25 - Gjerdrum Kulturhus - Gjerdrum, Norway
For information and updates on Helix go to this location. Check out the band's new Facebook page here.
