By Katie Ryan
With a name like Broken Ride, you can’t help but wonder how this Canadian band travels from show to show. But they manage to make it, said lead vocalist Graham Furber, noting their band name actually has nothing to do with vehicles.
“It would seem like because all of our vehicles suck and they all decide they want to break down, but it was actually when we were having a rehearsal one time and Darren (Falk), our drummer, smashed his ride cymbal. I mean, that’s the thickest cymbal on your kit, and he split it. I started laughing and said ‘You broke your ride,’ and stewed on that for a couple of seconds and thought Broken Ride would be a cool band name.”
The modern-rock quintet is currently on the road for the month of October and with eight gigs ahead of them on their Wreckless Heart Western Canadian tour, Furber said their new set of wheels does the trick.
“We actually just bought ourselves a 1966 SCI Challenger,” he said. “We thought we were (ready to go) but then it didn’t pass inspection so we had some work done to it. We put a few bucks into her and now she’s road-friendly. We named her too, her name is Miss Santa Monica.”
The tour will see Broken Ride play Lloydminster on Oct. 21 at Phunkin Gruuve, preparing the band for their two-month spring tour in support of their first full-length album Everything Considered, released earlier this year. Since 2009, Furber said the band – Ron Tarrant and Kyle Heese on guitar, Dylan Roberts on bass and Darren Falk on drums – have been working on the album, which follows up their debut EP Out of Control. And with a long list of songs already to their credit, Furber said it was tough to determine which songs ended up on the cutting floor.
“We just tried to pick the best of what we could come up with and fire them off,” he said over the phone from Calgary. “We had to cut like 30 songs and we don’t even know if we’re right. I know we’ll use a bunch of the other ones on albums to come and a whole bunch of the other songs we realize now that we probably will never play again because they just don’t seem good to you the more you write. But with these ones, a lot of them have some good meaning.”
One song in particular hits home for Broken Ride. Inspired by the death of a friend to drinking and driving, Furber said In God’s Hands has become a popular song with audiences.
“It was 2004, I mean this dates a bit back, but he hit head on with a semi. And ever since then we always wanted to write a song for him. That one just floated out,” Furber said. “If you listen to the lyrics, it’s just more or less about losing somebody and whether or not you believe in afterlife or anything like that. People can still relate to the lyrics about how you’ve lost someone and it’s hard to deal with. Everyone has their own way of dealing with it, so it almost brings a sense of peace for some reason.”
Broken Ride’s Friday night show at Phunkin Gruuve will feature a lot of energy and a lot of fun, Furber said.
“It will be a good night for sure,” he said with a laugh.