Rymes with Orange

Rymes with Orange is a Canadian alternative rock band which formed in 1991 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. This independent band have released four albums: ''Peel'' (1992), ''Trapped in the Machine'' (1994), ''Crash'' (1999) and ''One More Mile'' (2003). They have had three Top 10 singles on Canadian Rock Radio, with sales of over 70,000 units worldwide, and have toured Canada, New Zealand, the U.S. and the U.K., all while maintaining independent status."Get fax machine, see the world". ''Toronto Star'', July 8, 1993.

History

The band that would become Rymes With Orange originated in the late 1980s in Prince George, British Columbia under the name Statue Park. Statue Park included future RWO guitarist Rob Lulic and drummer Alex Dias, along with Sam Moorhouse (bass), and Neil VanderWerf (lead vocals).

Statue Park independently released a cassette only six song EP, ''A Coming of Age'' in 1988. The song “Salvation”, taken from the EP, was put into regular rotation at several radio stations in northern BC. A music video for “Salvation” was also filmed and aired on television program ''The BC Music Project'' hosted by Shari Ulrich.

The band relocated to Metro Vancouver, BC in late 1988, just in time to make its big city debut at Vancouver’s The Railway Club, as part of University of British Columbia’s battle of the bands competition, ''Shindig''. Immediately after the competition, VanderWerf left the band to pursue other projects.

The band changed its name to The Night Watchmen after Scottish singer James Gilmour joined in 1990. Keyboardist Bob D'Eith joined in 1991. The band performed several showcases in Vancouver with Gilmour including a well-received show at The Commodore Ballroom. Gilmour left the band in 1991 and returned to Scotland, joining The Silencers for several years before embarking on a solo career as JJ Gilmour. Moorhouse left the band soon after Gilmour, while Lulic, Dias, and D’Eith forged ahead under the name Rymes With Orange. Various vocalists and bass players entered and exited the line-up before the band locked in with a permanent lead vocalist, UK-born Lyndon Johnson.

A live recording of “Salvation” recorded before Johnson joined the band can be found on ''Vancouver Seeds VI'' (1991), a compilation album of songs featuring the top five finalists of CFOX radio’s Demo-Listen competition, hosted by The Province newspaper’s resident music critic Tom Harrison. Around this time, the band joked in promotional interviews that the apparently missing letter "h" in their name had been donated to the band hHead."Band gets the 'H' out, hits the road". ''Ottawa Citizen'', October 20, 1994.

As The Night Watchmen, the band had a more conventional alternative rock sound, while as Rymes With Orange, their style evolved more towards a Madchester-influenced dance rock alternative rock sound."Engineers attract great lineup for week's final bash". '' Edmonton Journal'', January 14, 1994. In 1992, the band released their first full-length, debut album entitled ''Peel'', co-produced by Bill Buckingham and Rymes With Orange. It spawned the singles "Marvin", "Memory Fade" and a cover of The Small Faces' "Itchycoo Park".

Russell Sholberg, a longtime close friend of the band, played bass on the album but turned down an offer to officially join the band. In early 1992, Nelson Sinclair joined RWO as its official bass player. Not long after the release of ''Peel'', drummer and co-founding member Alex Dias left the band to focus on an acting career and to pursue other musical ventures, such as his current project, ''Beastly Idiots'' (2017). In early 1992, Niko Quintal from Saint-Hyacinthe, Quebec became RWO's new drummer.

''Peel'' was supported by the band's first large-scale cross-Canada tour in June 1993, both on their own and as an opening act for The Blue Shadows, Redd Kross, One Free Fall and Odds.

Also with the band, since their first national tour in June 1993, is musician and longtime friend of Niko's, Steeve Hennessy from Campbellton, New Brunswick. It was the early 1990s, while they were both in a Halifax-based band together, that Niko first met and began playing music with Steeve. When that band decided to relocate to the West coast and call Vancouver its new home, both Niko and Steeve decided to leave the group to pursue new musical adventures. Niko's first project, was with a rocking power trio called ''Free Water'', who released their self-titled debut album that same year, but not long after its release, they decide to call it quits, and that's when Niko joined Rymes With Orange. And for Steeve, he began working in and around Vancouver, as a freelance sound and lighting technician and writing music. It was Niko who recommended to his bandmates in Rymes, that they should hire his friend Steeve, as their sound engineer.

After touring Canada numerous times that first year, D'Eith was forced to choose between a career on the road or a life on the business side of music. He moved back to co-managing the band with manager Peter Karroll, and became a non-touring member of the band, while Steeve moved into his touring position on keyboards and backing vocals, while also adding rhythm guitar to their live sound.

In September 1994, the band released ''Trapped in the Machine'', produced, engineered and mixed by John Webster, and including all six members, Lyndon Johnson, Rob Lulic, Bob D'Eith

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