The Awake are a 4 peice alternative/hard rock band founded by guitarist Dave Brinston and bassist Steve Tilley in September of 2006. The two had played together approximately 10 years previous in an original band called Purple Ernest Chapel. They were young then and decided to pursue their education to provide a cushion in the event that the music industry didn't work out. The choice to go to college/university sent Dave and Steve to different locations and forced them to take a hiatus from writing and playing music together until September of 06 as they were both living in St. John's and wanted to pick up where they left off nearly 10 years ago. They started jamming together and writing riffs again which seemed to flow so easily just as it did in the past. Now the duo were ready to seek out an experienced front man to contribute to their music both vocally and lyrically. The first person that came to mind was long time friend Matt Carpenter who Dave and Steve both played with breifly in the past. Matt had everything they wanted from the ability to write compelling lyrics and melodic melodies to his carisma and stage presence on the stage as a front man. Dave called Matt up to see if he'd be interested in joining the band. He accepted and right away the trio got down to business and started to finalize some of the material Dave and Steve had written.
After a couple of months, the trio had completed 3 original songs and felt it was time to get the rest of the band together in which they initially hired guitarist and friend Jon Stacey to play lead/rhythm guitars, sharing the duties with Dave. Glynn Power was then asked to play drums as he's an experienced drummer and friend of Steve's who played with him in a band prior to getting The Awake on the go. With the full line up together, The Awake began rehearsing in April of 2007 and by this time had another 4 or 5 songs written for a total of 8 originals. They learned 3 o 4 covers and prepared to be an opening act for local bands around St. John's for the summer of 2007. The band played a few shows while continuing to write more music. By the end of summer in 2007, The Awake felt it was time to demo the songs they've written over the past year.
In September of 2007, The Awake began recording what was initially supposed to be a 11 demo and was to be recorded in Dave's Basement using the digital recording gear that he had been working with for years previous. Thanks to a local music store and their rental department, the band was able to acquire some higher quality recording gear for a good price and through suggestions decided the "demo" could be something more! By early November 2007, the band decided to scrap the demo idea and re-recorded everything from scratch with better gear to record a full length album. Again this was done at Dave's small home studio. After 3 months of recording in the nights and on weekends, the band finished tracking and Dave began mixing the album. It was his first professinoal recording so he took his time and made sure he did the best he could with what he had to work with, which wasn't much! The next issue was to acquire funding to master, manufacture and promote the album. While Steve focused on writing and submitting funding applications, Matt started to work with our graphic designer at StoneWaterson to have the album artwork completed and Dave continued to use the time he had while the funds were being secured to finish the mixing.
MusicNL came through for The Awake announcing in September 2008 that they will fund the completion of their debut album to titled A Necessary Means. The funding was to help pay for Mastering, Manufacturing and Marketing/Promotion of the album. This was a great surprise and relief for the band as an end was finally in site to get their album complete. They released their debut album independantly on November 28th, 2008 and had a release party at their friends bar Whalen's Pub on December 12th after their initial release party scheduled for November 28th had to be rescheduled due to a car accident that Steve had been in that day.
The Awake has been steadily promoting A Necessary Means since the release date and have showcased at MusicNL's Awards and Showcases in Gander, NL as well they performed another showcase at the East Coast Music Awards in Corner Brook, NL. They've appeared on local television show Out of the Fog performing two of their songs "Eager Beaver" and "Waterline". They've also been featured twice on local classic rock radio station, K-Rock for a radio show called Under the Influence where 4 of the bands songs were aired on the radio.
Currently the band are in the early stages of writing music for their 2nd album which they plan to start demoing in the fall of 2009 with hopes of recording the album in early 2010.
Check out the bands myspace site: http://www.myspace.com/theawakeonline for more information and to keep up to date with shows, new tunes, etc.
To buy their debut album, A Necessary Means, follow this link to purchase it online and have it shipped to you: http://www.indiepool.com/mcar001
Digital versions (mp3) of the songs (and full album) can be bought on most of your favorite sites like Amazon.com, iTunes, CD Baby, etc. For best results, search `The Awake A Necessary Means`.