The Calling: The Tragic Story of the Band Behind “Wherever You Will Go”, Alex Band, Aaron Kamin

The Calling: The Story Behind the Band Who Wrote the early 2000’s hit ‘Wherever You Will Go’
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Best known for the song “Wherever You Will Go” The Calling would gain notoriety in the early 2000’s,, but the aftermath of their success was filled with legal battles, a kidnapping and a near death experience Let’s explore whatever happened to the Calling in today’s video

Around 1996 or 1997 vocalist Alex Band who was 15 at the time would cross paths with a slightly older musician named Aaron Kamin in LA. Kamin was dating band’s sister. Band had noticed the that Kamin played guitar and they soon started talking about music and possibly collaborating. Initially, Kamin was a little concerned with Band’s age, but things would soon change as Kamin told the dailybruin “My girlfriend said her brother (Alex Band) played guitar, but
he was like 15 so I blew it off,” explains Kamin. “Then, I heard
her brother come down one night after dinner and play his guitar by
himself and sing. I was all ‘Wow!’ I got chills.”
The duo soon spent time together writing songs together able to right new songs in just one rehearsal.. The duo put an ad in an LA magazine called the Recylcer. Kamin would remember one respondee who was a drummer saying “He said he was like 50 years old, used to be a pro drummer, and played with Chuck Berry,”. “I was like ‘OK, cool! Let me call you back. Band would encourage Kamin to let the drummer have a shot. Soon enough Kamin and Band would be playing with a rhythm section whose members were old enough to be there fathers. They would appropriately call themselves Generation Gap. Despite the age difference between it’s members they managed to have a cohesive sound.
It was during this time that Ron Fair who was then the senior vice president of A&R at RCA Records moved next door to Alex Band’s family. Band would tell MTV
“We knew that was our in,” “We drove that guy completely insane, and he finally signed us.”
The pair started bothering the producer’s wife while she spent time in her garden and they would stuff their demo tapes in their Fair’s mailbox until the executive finally gave in and offered to sign the pair in 1999. His condition of signing was contingent upon the pair ditching their drummer and bass player. It wasn’t a difficult decision for the duo and generation gap was done. It’s also important to note that Alex Band’s father Charles Band was the head of a movie studio so his father already had connections in the industry so i wouldn’t doubt that his father may have also had a part to play in his son’s band getting signed.

Before they came up with the monicker the Calling they went by Next Door which was a nod to their neighbourhor Ron Fair. They would eventually settle the name the calling. e they thought it was their mission in life to do music. Even though they were signed to RCA, they struggled to get the attention of label heads who were more focused on promoting bigger acts including Pink and Christina Aguilera. The 2000 film Coyote Ugly would change the band’s fortunes. The calling actually appeared in the film performing their future smash hit single “Wherever you will go.” Keep in mind this was a year before the band released their debut record or even a single.

Wherever you will go was written years before the the Calling signed with RCA and was probably one of the reasons they got signed in addition to annoying their neighbour.. It would be a women named Kathy Nelson, who was the president of film music for The Walt Disney Motion Picture Group,who heard ithe song and wanted it in Coyote Ugly. Kamin would tell IBillboard “Kathy apparently said, ‘That song is a f–king monster. I need it in this movie I’m working on,’” “She wanted to put us in the movie playing the song.”
Band would tell Billboard “Once Coyote Ugly wanted it, the label was like, ‘Oh, this is a hit, “That was absolutely the catalyst — it woke up Ron Fair at RCA to go, ‘Okay, I guess this is good. Let’s make a record.’”

Their debut album Camino Palmero, would be named after the street Alex’s family lived on. By the summer of 2000 they would enlsit a group of session and touring musicians Billy Mohler (bass), Nate Wood (drums) and Sean Woolstenhulme (guitar),to record their debut album. Wherever You Will Go got even more attention when itl was featured heavily in the promotions for the 2001 film Kate and Leopold.

Written by Rock N' Roll True Stories