Our Lady Peace

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"OLP" redirects here. For other uses, see OLP (disambiguation).

Our Lady Peace, colloquially OLP, is a Canadian alternative rock band consisting of Raine Maida (vocals), Duncan Coutts (bass), Jeremy Taggart (drums), and Steve Mazur (guitar). Until 2001, guitarist and founding member Mike Turner was a member of the band. During their career they have sold over 5,000,000 albums worldwide<ref name="sales">"Our Lady Peace Get Well", Rolling Stone, August 1, 2005.</ref>, won four Juno Awards and received twenty nominations, as well as six MuchMusic Awards, including the "People's Choice Award" in 1997, 1998 and 2000. The band has just finished its 'Paranoid Times Tour', which saw them stopping in several North American cities between April and May of 2006. With them was a fifth stage member, Joel Shearer (of the band Pedestrian).

[edit] Band history

Mike Turner placed a "musicians wanted" ad in Toronto-based Now Magazine in 1992. Michael Raine Maida, a criminology student at the University of Toronto, was the first to reply. The two formed a band called As If. The band was short-lived due to the differing priorities of its members. Later, the only two remaining members, Raine and Mike, attended a music seminar where they met Arnold Lanni, the owner of Arnyard Studios.

Mike Turner and Raine Maida soon formed another band with bassist Chris Eacrett. The band refused to do showcases for the handful of labels that were interested in them. The most prominent of these labels was Sony Records. Sony Music Canada president, Rick Camilleri, along with vice-president of A&R Mike Roth and Gary Furniss, director of music publishing, made a visit to their practice space and signed the band, despite the obvious risks. That same day, Jeremy Taggart joined the band.

The original members first recorded a 4-song demo with Arnold Lanni. The strongest song on the demo, "Out of Here", was made into a video (produced, edited, and directed by Sam Siciliano) in 1992 and received airtime on Much Music. The soft-loud alternative technique employed by Turner mixed with the unique voice of Maida was well-received on the local scene.

After a few more demos and strong fanbase support from both Toronto and Montreal, Our Lady Peace was signed to Sony Records and won recognition with their debut album Naveed. Naveed was released in Canada in 1994 and then in the United States in 1995. Following the release of the album, the band toured with fellow Canadian Alanis Morissette in the summer of 1995. The title track, "Naveed" became a hit in Canada, while "Starseed" a hit in both Canada and the United States. "Starseed" would later be featured on the Armageddon film soundtrack. After the release of Naveed, Eacrett left the band. He was replaced with Duncan Coutts. Jamie Edwards, a keyboardist, joined in 1996 and was an unofficial member until 2002.

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 made them internationally famous.

In 1999, the band released another album entitled Happiness...Is Not a Fish That You Can Catch. The album included such hits as "Thief", a song centered around a young girl the band met who had cancer, as well as "One Man Army" and "Is Anybody Home?". The band also played an 11 track setlist at Woodstock.

In 2000, the band released Spiritual Machines, a concept album inspired by Ray Kurzweil's book The Age of Spiritual Machines. Spiritual Machines sold poorly. However, many music critics gave positive reviews for releasing a concept album so early in their career. This album featured the singles "In Repair", "Life" and "Right Behind You (Mafia)". Shortly thereafter, in December 2001, 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". However, its 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 large hit across North America.

On 2 July 2005 the group played at the Canadian Live 8 concert in Barrie. In August, the band released their sixth album, Healthy in Paranoid Times, which included the tracks "Where Are You?", "Angels/Losing/Sleep" and "Will the Future Blame Us". Shortly after recording the album, the band disclosed that during the making of this album, they nearly broke up.<ref name="brokeup">"Our Lady Peace Get Well", Rolling Stone, August 1, 2005.</ref>

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 12 tracks were chosen from 45 written and produced (most of which will almost certainly never see the light of day).

At a November 2005 concert at Massey Hall, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, it was announced that the concert would be filmed for the purpose of creating a DVD.

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 "4AM." A Decade also includes a bonus DVD containing live concert footage and exclusive interviews at the Massey Hall concert. Currently, "Kiss On The Mouth", the first single off A Decade, is on radio stations across Canada.

[edit] Discography

Cover	Date of Release	Title	Soundscan Charts Canada Peak	US Billboard Peak	Canada (CRIA) Certification	USA (RIAA) Certification
Image:Naveed(album).jpg	March 22, 1994 (CAN) March 21, 1995 (USA)	Naveed		~	4x Platinum (400,000)
	January 23, 1997 (CAN)<p>April 2, 1997 (USA)	Clumsy	#1	#76	Diamond (1,000,000)	Platinum (1,000,000)
	September 21, 1999 (CAN)<p>September 28, 1999 (USA)	Happiness...Is Not a Fish That You Can Catch	#1	#69	3x Platinum (300,000)
	December 12, 2000 (CAN)<p>March 13, 2001 (USA)	Spiritual Machines	#5	#81	2x Platinum (200,000)
	June 18, 2002	Gravity	#2	#9	2x Platinum (200,000)	Gold (600,000)
	June 24, 2003 (CAN)<p>July 1, 2003 (USA)	Live	#5	#112
Image:Our lady peace-live dvd.jpg	November 11, 2003 (CAN)<p>August 30, 2005 (USA)	Live [DVD]			2x Platinum (20,000)
	August 30, 2005	Healthy in Paranoid Times	#2	#45	Platinum (100,000)
Image:Our Lady Peace-A Decade.jpg	November 21, 2006 (CAN)<p>November 28, 2006 (USA)	A Decade	#29 (and #24 on iTunes Canada)	N/A	N/A	N/A

[edit] Singles

[edit] Band member timeline

<timeline> ImageSize = width:600 height:auto barincrement:25 PlotArea = left:100 bottom:60 top:0 right:50 Alignbars = justify DateFormat = dd/mm/yyyy Period = from:01/01/1992 till:01/06/2006 TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal format:yyyy

Colors =

 id:official       value:claret     legend:Official
 id:unofficial     value:oceanblue  legend:Unofficial
 id:producer       value:tan1       legend:Producer

Legend = orientation:horizontal position:bottom

ScaleMajor = increment:1 start:1992

PlotData=

 width:20 textcolor:black align:left anchor:from shift:(10,-4)

 bar:Raine Maida text:"lead singer" from:01/01/1992 till:end color:official
 bar:Mike Turner text:"lead guitar" from:01/01/1992 till:12/12/2001 color:official
 bar:Steve Mazur text:"lead guitar" from:15/04/2002 till:end color:official
 bar:Jim Newell text:"percussion" from:01/01/1992 till:01/04/1993 color:unofficial
 bar:Jeremy Taggart text:"percussion" from:01/09/1993 till:end color:official
 bar:Chris Eacrett text:"bass" from:01/01/1992 till:01/09/1995 color:official
 bar:Duncan Coutts text:"bass" from:01/09/1995 till:end color:official
 bar:Jamie Edwards text:"stunt musician" from:01/07/1999 till:01/04/2002 color:unofficial
 bar:Mike Eisenstein text:"stunt musician" from:15/05/2002 till:27/03/2003 color:unofficial
 bar:Joel Shearer text:"guitar" from:01/05/2005 till:end color:unofficial
 bar:Arnold Lanni text:"producer" from:01/09/1992 till:12/12/2000 color:producer
 bar:Bob Rock text:"producer" from:01/11/2001 till:30/08/2005 color:producer

</timeline>

[edit] Trivia

• The band's song "Whatever" is used as the entrance of professional wrestler Chris Benoit.
• Matt Cameron, Pearl Jam's drummer and former member of Soundgarden, is a good friend of Our Lady Peace's drummer, Jeremy Taggart. When Taggart was sidelined with an ankle injury during the recording of Spiritual Machines, Cameron played drums on "Right Behind You (Mafia)" and "Are You Sad?".
• Naveed means "bearer of good news".
• Legendary jazz drummer Elvin Jones played drums on the song "Stealing Babies", featured on the album Happiness...Is Not a Fish That You Can Catch.
• The band has covered many songs, such as "Drive" by The Cars, "Imagine" by John Lennon, "The Needle And The Damage Done" by Neil Young, "Tomorrow Never Knows" and "Dear Prudence" by The Beatles, "Eternal Life" by Jeff Buckley, "With Or Without You" and "All I Want Is You" by U2, "Teardrop" by Massive Attack, as well as many others.
• The band performed at the XVI International AIDS Conference Benefit Concert on August 13th, 2006, which took place at the Rogers Centre, in Toronto, Ontario
• Our Lady Peace were the founders of the Summersault Festival that toured across Canada with a lineup that included the Foo Fighters, A Perfect Circle and The Smashing Pumpkins.
• Sol Fox is the man pictured on the album covers of Naveed, Clumsy, Happiness...Is Not a Fish That You Can Catch, and has reappeared on the band's greatest hits album, A Decade.
• Although Sol Fox was supposed to be on the cover of the Spiritual Machines album, he was too sick to do it. He is however pictured in the artwork of the insert of Spiritual Machines, but not on the album cover itself.

[edit] References

<references/>

[edit] External links

• OurLadyPeace.com (Official Band Page)
• Clumsy Congress (Official Message Board)
• OurLadyPeace.net (Official Fan Club)
• Our Lady Peace on MySpace (Official)
• Official UK Band Page
• OurLadyPeace.cc by Rich & Shelley (Unofficial Fan Page)
• OurLadyPeace.us

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