CASTLEGAR NEWS, June 15, 1980

ROYAL ALBERT

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| Nightwing —hometown

band goes for broke

“Nightwing? They're great. They opened

me up. They were my first band and my

best band. I wish them all the best.
They're not just a great band, they’re a
great bunch of guys. I couldn't say a

thing against any one of them.”
—Will Kahn, manager of Will's Cabaret

“Girl, you've really got
me now...”

“Try it again, only slide
half a tone this time.”

“Girl, you've really got
me now...”

“Sounds good. Let's do
the whole thing.”

This time the vocalists
and guitars are joined by the
beat of the drum and Night-
wing, a local five-man band,
runs through the entire piece
during a rehearsal at Resker
Hail in Robson.

The band has been prac-
tising more than usual lately
and for good reason. On July
1 the entire group, as well as
wives and soundman, will be
moving to Vancouver in an
attempt to make a go of it on
the road. 3

For Jack Hamelin, Kevin
Wilson, Les Krauss, Ron
Vandergaag and Lonnie Pow-
ell the decision was not an
easy one to make. The move
involves quitting jobs, giving
up homes and uprooting fam-
ilies.

And that is only the be-
ginning. The future holds
financial risks and the task of
making Nightwing a name
that will be ized.

“We're taking it serious-
ly though. It's not like we're
single and without responsi-
bilities. Some of us have
wives and we have respon-
sibilities to them,” Kevin
said.

Not too far down the
road the responsibilities will
include children. Jack and his
wife Patty expect their first
child in August, and Kevin
and wife Diane will become

parents at the end of Dec-
ember.

“We'll have to’ change
our name to the Partridge
Family,” one member of the
group jokes.

“It’s good that our wives
will be along,” Kevin adds.
“We won't be slouchy in our
playing becatse its our liveli-
hood. OiiF Tatiiiliés are an in-
centive, a force behind us.
There's a lot at stake here.”

“We haven't forgotten
about that” Jack adds.

“I think we're all (the

wives} really excited about .

moving to Vancouver. We're
pensive and nervous too, but
mostly excited,” Eleanor
Vandergaag said.

- Doc, sound-man for
Nightwing says the first year
on the road will be the real
test for the group, as it is for
any band.

“If we can survive that
++." Doe adds.

“Besides you can't sit
back and say I wish I had
done it.”

“You never regret the
things you do, you regret the
things you don't do,” Ron
said.

The band’s beginnings
go back two years when
Jack, Ron and Les began
getting together to jam.

“We started for fun, but
our ideas got bigger,” Ron
said.

With the addition of a
drummer and a lead-guitar-
ist, the band felt they- were
ready to perform publically.
Their first shows were put on
“free or really cheap.”

“One night we played at

a hall and by the time we
payed for the rent all that
was left was $16. That was
when no-one knew us.”

That has changed.
Nightwing has packed local
bars and cabarets (Will's
cabaret at the Marlane Hotel
and the bar at the Hi Arrow)
to capacity. The band has
performed throughout the
Okanagan valley.

Just as Castlegar people
have supported Nightwing
the band is a big fan of
Castlegar audiences.

“They're great, fantastic
audiences. It’s great playing
here. This is a really good
rock ‘n roll town.”

Rock ‘n roll is the band’s
specialty. “We play mostly
top 40 AM rock,” Doe said.

The band’s talents lie not
only in performing others’
musie. They have written
several of their own pieces
that have been well received.

“One song we do —

— is our own. I
think people remember it
after they hear it. We have a
lot of requests for it.”

Individual hopes for the
band vary with each mem-
ber, but success as a band is
number one with all of them.

Cutting our own record,
making it as studio perfor-
mers and staying in Van-
couver are some of the
dreams. Some are bigger yet.

“Doing concert backup.”

“Ya sure. For Super-
tramp.”

“Never mind backup.
Headliners.”

The band will be trav-
elling throughout British Col-
umbia for the summer. Even-
tually they would like todo a
Canadian tour.

“Even overseas,” Kevin

“Ya sure. Go to Iran,”
another jokes.

,Even with big plans for
the future the band members
remember their not so big
beginnings which included a
few bad moments.

“We were playing at
Will's Cabaret once and Lon-
nie was counting one, two,
three, four and this girl on
the dance floor started count-
ing even faster. The song was
Message in a Bottle, and it
threw us right off. We cut if
off after the first note and

ted agai

The band says they have
never suffered the embar-
rassment of having to cut off
in the middle of a song. But
they did have an entire audi-
ence walk out on them once.

“We were playing at the
Pontiae Cup at Red Moun-
tain. The audience had been
eating dinner and after that
they cut the liquor off right
away. Anyhow we announced
the last song of the set but
they must've thought we
meant the last song period.
The entire audience left.
There wasn't a soul left,”
Lonnie said.

“We didn't know what to
do. It wasn't our music they
didn’t like, it was a mis-
understanding. And I think
coaches were hauling every-
one off because they had to
ski the next morning.”

“It was good and bad.
We only played for an hour
and were paid for the whole

night. But we had spent six
hours setting up too.

Other bad moments
came strictly from nerves.

“One of the first times
we played, our first song was
a Valdy piece that had a lot of
finger-picking in it. I was
shaking so bad I could hardly
play it. I was really nervous.”
Kevin said.

“I don’t know about the
rest, but even now I get
pretty nervous,” he added.

Although audiences gen-
erally treat them well” we
always get a few hecklers
who don't like us, but you
have to expect that.” ~

“And we have a lot of
trouble with women grab-
bling us too,” they joke.

One of the biggest bas-
sles the band faced was
finding practice time. All five
of them worked shifts at
Celgar or Cominco and it was
tough finding a time when
they could all get together to
P ¥
“Practising when we're
missing someone doesn't
work.”

They were fortunate
however in being able to use
Resker Hall. “We have to pay
for it, but its really reason-
able.” :

They add that other
strokes of luck were some of
the people who helped them
out.

“Like Will from the
cabaret and Jon Jarrett from
Jarrett’s sound of Music in
Nelson and Mike Kelly who
designed our lego.”

[zayq One last

per Ae FS

erformance in Castle:
road." They have a one-wee!

r then Nightwing will “hit the
engagement at Devil's Den

before the move to Vancouver. From left to right are Ron Van-
dergaag, Kevin Wilson, Jack Hamelin, Lonnie Powell, soun-
dman - Doc and Les Krauss.

The group figures they
own about $35,000 worth of
equipment. Some of it is
owned co-operatively by the
band while the rest is per-
sonal equipment such as gui-
tars.

Paying for some of the
equipment became a problem
when Will's Cabaret closed
down a couple of weeks ago.

“We were booked to play
there for two weeks and we
were counting on that to pay
the bills. We owed about
$8,500 for equipment.”

Even with such setbacks
the group doesn't get dis-
couraged and follows a basic
philosophy.

“We never play if we're
high or loaded. We don’t play
as well if we are and audi-
ences can tell. We enjoy
performing just as much
when we're straight,” Kevin
said.

“We want to entertain
and do it well. As enter-
tainers our priorities are the

“people we play for,” Jack
said.

The boys in the band

To some it may seem almost uncanny that a place as
relatively small as Castlegar can host such a wealth of talent

as exists in Nightwing.

Yet it does. And not only are the individuals talented,

each possesses skills in more than one dimension of music.

Jack Hamelin, one of the three original members of the
band (which included Les Krauss and Ron Vandergaag, says
he came to Castlegar from Ottawa three years ago “chasing a
gir.” Now married to Patty (not the girl he followed here)
Jack will soon be a father.

At 27, Jack is accomplished on the accoustic and electric
guitar, saxophone, harmonica as well as lead and background
vorals.

Ron Vandergaag, 26, came to Castlegar from the coast
seven years ago looking for work. :

Ron, since married to Eleanor, plays bass guitar and

Outside i include ph hy, reading and
various outdoor sports.

Kevin Wilson, 23, has spent nearly all his life in Castlegar
although he was born in Edmonton. Lead guitar and
background vocals are his musical specialties.

Otherwise Kevin enjoys sports — he formerly played
junior hockey — and enjoys frisbee, his early ‘60's corvette
and pool. Kevin and wife Diane will be parents in December.

Les Krauss, 28, moved from Medicine Hat, Alberta seven
years ago. He plays lead and rhythm guitar and sings
lead-vocals.

Les says he never really had any formal music training,
but picked it up on his own.

When not practicing or performing, Les enjoys tennis,
skiing and hockey.

Lonnie Powell, who was born in Castlegar, is the newest
member of the group, having been with them only two
months. He plays drums and percussion and eventually will be
doing background vocals. -

The band has two off-stage technicians working for them.
Since they aquired their new lighting system in October
Eleanor Vandergaag has been handling that department.

Perhaps one of the most: interesting peresonalities
associated with the group is Doc — sound man for the group.

Doe, who is identifiable by his top-hat and glasses, joined
the band about a year ago when the group he was working for
split up.

Doe, 28, is interested in photography, beach sports Gran
Marnier, hot-rodding and “anything from Columbia.”

“We're always trying to
learn new stuff. It broadens

our musical y;
Jack added.

And they all agree that
the group whose music they
most like to play is their own.

The group does ot anti-
cipate too many problems in
getting along once they are

travelling . together on. the.

road.

“After all, we're pretty
mature, We're not 18 still.
When we do have problems
we talk things out. Anything
is usually resolved right
away,” Lonnie said.

Having families along
will help in that they will
each have a life apart from
the band.

“Sure, we'll have our
private lives during the day
and be rock stars at night.”

In more than any other
way the group's determin-
ation to succeed shows when
they are practising. Vocals
are rehearsed repeatedly.

Lonnie who sits those
sessions out comments, “This
part is really important. The
audience can hear when
we're off. It takes a lot of
time but it’s worth it.

Les struggles to reach a
note in Foreigner’s song
Double Vision. Finally they
master the harmony and try
it again.

“There's a lot of talent
up there,” Lonnie adds.

The band opts to run
through Led Zepplin’s Stair-
way to Heaven a couple of
times, although they’ve al-
ready been practising for
several hours.

“And they're climbing a
stairway to heaven...”

Stories and Photos
by
Terry Gilbert