Alright, many of you already knew my little secret...and others would have figured it out by the unusual venues I was playing on my tour schedule. Here’s my story:

Back in February (before Tokyo) I was approached by a manager of a cool up and coming band. They were Surplus Sons, and were in the works with many big time players in the music industry (they had a manager, producer, lawyer, agent, publicist and artist/repertoire guy from Sony/BMG), working for famous bands. I thought it would be an experience playing for these guys, being that I was close to finishing a long journey in school.

The guys in the band were great. Super nice, really good players and song writers. They had their heads on straight because they were already part of a previous band with under the Warner label. They were looking to change their sound by adding a keyboard player. It was great to come into a band with direction and music already written...I just had to learn the tunes and add my part. Quickly, the band started churning out new tunes and everyone stepped it up. The management was also really excited and promised big things coming up!

This led to the idea of me not working full-time and turning down many great jobs to accomodate time with the band. I mean...come on...who wouldn’t want to go on a tour around the world playing rock and roll? We recorded some tunes at Sony/BMG studios, which was great because the studio was packed with junos, grammys and platinum records of big acts. We played some incredible shows to packed venues in Toronto, and even had an offer to shoot a video in Vancouver. There were deals with companies, including free Converse shoes and 80% off Fender products. Needless to say, it was pretty cool.

So you may be asking...why just a “short stent”? Well...it’s not as cool as you would imagine. The guys had already invested two years into this band, with very little momentum. Things in the industry take a long time, because record companies see dollars and cents. Since these companies have been losing so much money from declining record sales (i.e. who has actually bought a CD at HMV recently?) they have resorted to finding other ways to cash in on bands. Sony was going to introduce a first-ever management deal, which scared us. We all knew that we’d be signing ourselves into a life long amount of debt (see http://negativland.com/albini.html). We’d be slaves to the industry.

So...with a band that was so great, good looking (haha), with killer music and a great live show...the only way to survive and come out on top was to dis-band. It’s one of those cliches of “sometimes you love something so much you’d even be prepared to let it go”. So there you go. It’s not a sad ending...I think we got ourselves out of a lot of trouble. Plus...I was really just interested in setting an entirely different goal. I know I still have my piano and periodontics ahead of me...I was just keen on working on something new for a while. It’s also cool to say you were a part of a band that was offered a contract from Sony/BMG...and turned it down. I learned a lot about the faceless music industry. Beware kids...sometimes the grass isn’t greener on the other side!

I posted one song on this website. Check the music page http://www.thomasyu.ca/page/music. You can also go to http://www.myspace.com/surplussons to see what all the fuss was about. Warning...this is not Chopin you’re listening to! And to the guys in the band...thanks so much for the opportunity. It was crazy fun, and I wish you all a life of keeping it real...ha! To the rest of you...don’t download music. Seriously...go and support your favorite artists because chances are they probably have serious debt to pay off.