Welcome to the first in our new series of musician and band profiles! These will be monthly articles sharing the stories and backgrounds of the people making the music we cover here at Blast Toronto.

– Lawrence, Contributing Editor

oceans of us are a bit of an anomaly. My hope is to give you an understanding of where this band is coming from and how they can fit into your musical catalog.

First, the name, oceans of us came from the guitarist’s mom, Stuart, who finished all her written letters with Oceans of Love. This certainly does not sound Metal enough for a band, but after about 45 seconds of deliberation, oceans of us ended up on the table and the name was born.

Before they became a three-piece band, they had a female lead singer and the band considered calling themselves, “Waiting on Dee”. They really were waiting on Dee to see if she would join the band. Since that didn’t happen the vocal arrangement quickly changed and now all three members take turns singing various parts of the songs. Each member tends to sing about their personal truths and realities.

This leads us to what is the purpose of the band. Their messages are about peace, love and being authentic with their audience. Mental health is a strong part of our message. Their way of composing is very unique with the strange twists and turns. There compositions really stray away from the traditional way of popular music. In my opinion it has a sort of musical collage element to it. Plenty of cut and paste moments that oddly work well together. Some of their material doesn’t seem to blend in a normal way, so how do they create that. As it turns out, if one member can’t seem to finish off a thought, then another member comes in and just adds their creative idea and you can begin to stitch together this Frankenstein Monster.

A lot of our songs are about mental health issue and being broken. We all carry that, and our hope is that is resonates with the audience. At the beginning we wanted to be a straight up Metal band that was edgy. Then someone would bring in something that wasn’t metal at all and we needed it to fit with what we were doing. So, we dropped the idea of being a pure Metal band and focused on what we wanted to say. This style reminds me of a band like Faith No More, where you can have a screaming Metal song and next up could be a touching ballad.

We touched on each member and their influences. So, we started with Stuart. Who influenced you?

I love Tool, Led Zeppelin, Metallica, and Iron Maiden and Classical music. There has to be energy to the riff to get you moving or it just doesn’t work.

Next, we moved to Ron. The only reason I wanted to play an instrument was the solo on Living on a Prayer by Bon Jovi. My parents grew up listening to Abba and anything pop. I really like that music, but once I got to Canada, I heard Kill ‘Em All by Metallica, I wanted to find out more. I love Lamb of God and Black Dalia Murders.

With Ryan, going up there was no escape for me when it came to metal…thanks Dad. My favourite bands that stuck with me started off with Nu Metal like Disturbed, Avenged Sevenfold and I found Metalcore.  I would discipline myself by picking out drumming parts that were bat shit crazy hard and chop at it piece by piece.

Originally Ryan was the Bass player. Stuart explains that he met Ryan after he blew two tires after a Tool concert and ended up at his shop. Four months later Covid showed up and I told him that I get to stay home and learn how to play guitar. Ryan joined him to practice some music together, but he didn’t have a drum kit, but he did own a bass guitar. Ron came over one day with an electronic drum kit for Ryan to play and within seconds of playing, they knew they had a drummer for the band and Ron is now the bass player.

Now let’s jump ahead to today. oceans of us are ready to release some new music to the world. They will be putting this on a CD that they will be selling at their shows. This will be happening within a month. We will start with 1000 Cd’s and see how that goes. As far as the digital side is concerned, we will be releasing our music as singles.

This part seems perfectly normal for any band to do, but oceans of us are doing something so unusual that they are ready to be a lasting band in Ontario. Even though they have just finished their first record, they have been working on their second album and are almost done that. But here is the kicker. They have a conceptual idea that will run through five recordings. This is a band that has a lot of ambition and drive. I am not going to explain the concept yet. You are going to have to ask them yourself at one of their shows.

In fact, the show I just witnessed tonight had two new songs in the set list and that included the last song. In fact, the band loves this song so much; they can only see it as their final song of their set. They even take it one step further. The guitar solo in this song will be played differently each time, to keep the song fresh and alive. So, the reality is, if you a person that like to see music stretched in new directions, this is a band you will want to check out. They have an ambitious way of playing and presenting music, that you will not see every day.

If you want to hear their new single, they are playing:

Oct 2 at the Union in Kitchener

Oct 12 at the Casbah in Hamilton

Oct 26 at a Food drive in Cambridge- Contact the band to find out where to drop off the food.

Nov 09 at the Union in Kitchener

Find out more about this band at Facebook