Interview: Greg Rolie, The Storm

WEATHERING HEIGHTS

"Beau Hill, our producer, said to us that he'd been looking for a band of great musicians who also had the songs to go with it, and that we fitted the bill."

Greg Rolie, keyboard player and chief songwriter with San Francisco's latest AOR sensations THE STORM, is feeling justifiably proud. The five-piece, recently signed to Beau Hill's own Innerscope label, have recorded a debut album, which, along with FOREIGNER's latest opus Unusual Heat, and TYKETTO's Don't Come Easy, should restore your faith in the US soft rock genre.

Ultimately, what gives the band an edge over so much of the competition and has stirred up a great deal of initial interest is the inclusion of no less than three members of pioneering AOR outfit JOURNEY. Greg Rolie quit Journey after the release of Dream After Dream (1980) and prior to the seminal Escape album (1981), which jettisoned the group into the major league.

Bassist Ross Valory lasted until 1983's Frontiers, while drummer Steve Smith played on a couple of tracks on Journey's final album Raised on Radio, before quitting and letting former VAN STEPHENSON and RICK SPRINGFIELD session man Mike Baird step in for the subsequent tour.

And now, some five years after Journey recorded their swan song, Messer's Rolie, Valory, and Smith have returned as 3/5ths of The Storm.

"Initially, Ross formed a band called THE VIEW with vocalist Kevin Chalfant and guitarist Josh Ramos (now in The Storm)," explains Greg, "so you could say that they were the blueprint for The Storm. At the time, Steve was still doing session work and I had recorded a couple of solo albums, which didn't do much, before hooking up with SANTANA again and going out on the road with them for a while. I met Kevin at a San Francisco 49ers game about three years ago, and we talked about writing a song together. Last year we finally got around to doing it and the song was 'Show Me the Way.' At that time I had formed my own music publishing company and was concentrating on writing songs. The last thing I was looking for was a band situation, but this whole thing just fell in our laps!"

A tape of "Show Me the Way" was sent to Herbie Hancock (Journey's old manager), before finding its way into the possession of Jimmy Iovine and Beau Hill, who were at the time looking for new acts for their Innerscope label. Enter the storm!

"Working with Ross and Steve really appealed to me because we knew each other so well. And if Kevin and Josh were good enough for Ross, then they were good enough for me! So that eliminated a lot of that guesswork about who's who and what to expect."

Ultimately, having three ex-members of Journey in the band must have caused some speculation as to whether a full journey reunion may be on the cards.

Greg remains adamant:

"To be honest, there is no way I could see that happening in the near future. That was then and this is now. The chemistry we have between the five of us is great, and I don't see any need to screw that up and go back over old ground. I can't really speak for Ross and Steve, but I'm proud of everything I ever did with Journey, but I actually think this is the best project I've ever been involved with."

One of the most appealing factors of The Storm's sound is the fact that while most of the album is very radio-friendly, there's still enough backbone in the guitar department to ensure that the whole thing doesn't become too polite. With songs such as "Touch and Go" and the tongue-in-cheek "In the Raw" keeping guitarist Josh Ramos in business.

"'In the Raw' is my favourite song on the album," reveals Greg. "One of the things Kevin and I agreed on was that I'd also sing lead vocals just to add a little variety. And 'In the Raw' was one of those songs that I have always wanted to sing. It had a real bluesy feel to it and the subject matter - a girl from Texas walking down the street naked except for her cowboy boots - was ideal for me to sing about. We didn't set out to write something a little more humorous, it just came out that way, and Kevin was leafing through a musician's magazine when he came across an ad for an amplifier which had the slogan 'in the raw,' which we decided straight away should be the title for the song. The radio commentary we used midway through the song was supplied by a DJ called Lobster from Radio KRQR in San Francisco, which we thought made it sound authentic."

Aside from actually signing the band Beau Hill's involvement in the project also seems to have paid off. There's a real edge to the production which certainly does the material justice.

"Beau gave this band the edge," agrees Greg, "and I felt confident that having him produce would make the songs sound as big as they should. Ultimately we have a real stadium sound and we wanted the production to reflect that. I also worked with Bob Marlette" (the American songwriter who also collaborated with former Journey and currently BAD ENGLISH guitarist Neil Shon on his Late Nite solo album). "He helped co-write some of the songs and he programmed the computers and the synthesisers on the album, which left me free to concentrate on the writing. Most of the material was written between Kevin, Bob, and myself, apart from 'Touch and Go,' which was a group effort."

How long has it been since you went out on tour with a band?

"I toured with Santana in 1988, which was nice, it also helped to get me used to that touring situation again. With The Storm, we're planning on giving the album a real push and doing a lot of radio promotion before we start scheduling a tour. We haven't played live yet, but we don't want to go out and do clubs, we don't think it would be the right environment for the music. We'd rather get out there and play the theatres, maybe tour with two or three other acts and keep the ticket prices a little lower and get out and reach as many people as possible. At the end of the day this is a long term commitment, not a one-off project," insists Greg. "We are taking our time and making sure things get done properly."

Whether a British audience will ever have the chance to get acquainted with The Storm is debatable. Bitter experience has taught me that albums like The Storm become cult classics consigned to bargain bins on this side of the Atlantic due to a lack of interest from record companies and the notorious difficulties involved with promoting an AOR band in Britain. In the USA however, it will probably be a different story altogether! Platinum discs at the ready here comes The Storm!

Mark Blake
Riff Raff
October, 1991

Revenge...?

Riff Raff was a legendary rock magazine based in London in the late 1980s and 1990s. Edited by the ultimate music biz insider, Mark Crampton, and employing such talents as Mark Blake, Jerry Ewing, Mike Harris, Paul Smith, Chris Collingwood, Alan McCrorie, Simon Robinson, Lyn Guy, Anna Marx, Nick Douglas, Marion Garden, Peter "Grunty" Grant, Joe "The Crow" Mackett, Billy "The Kluck" Kulke, and, lastest and mostest, the incredible Liddell Brothers, Mark (a.k.a. "El Perro") and Colin (a.k.a. "Der Fly"). Unfortunately, Riff Raff was just too R n' R for its own good. A genuine working class rock mag, written, edited, and translated into 16 European languages in a drug-N-Jack-D-fuelled haze, often on the back of motorbikes, with spell checking by our staff of attentive rock bimbos (chosen purely for their blondeness and big knockers), it soon fell behind more trainspotterly, nerdish, and politically correct publications like Q, Kerrang, Mojo, Metal Hammer, and Horse & Hound. This website is an archive and kind of shrine dedicated to the writing of its greatest writers, some of whom, luckily for the Rock Kosmos, still continue to write about music. This is the REVENGE of Riff Raff...Rock on!