Lawrence Gowan is a multi-talented musician and performer known for his electrifying live shows and soaring vocals. With a career spanning over five decades, his solo hits include A Criminal Mind, Strange Animal, and Moonlight Desires. He continues to perform both as a solo artist and as a member of Styx. Recently we spoke with him about the meaning of success and significance.
You were born in Glasgow. How did your Scottish heritage influence you musically?
It’s funny, I have never actually been asked that in that manner. And that’s a good question because you are making me think about it. I mean, the simple answer is that I still get I kind of choked up when I hear the bagpipes. It’s in my blood, and I never plug my ears – it is a sound that I am still very drawn to. I also believe there was a profound influence growing up in the early 1960s in the Toronto neighbourhood of Scarborough, as most of the parents on our street had either an Irish, Scottish, or English accent at that time. The most profound influence on my career as a child, however, was my mother, who was always singing around the home.
When and why did you become interested in music?
Actually, it was my mom who informed me that a group from Liverpool would be appearing on the Ed Sullivan Show and noted, “That’s not far from Glasgow.” I had seen Ed Sullivan even at that young age, but I thought, well, could it be somebody spinning plates or could it be a little puppet show or something of that nature? And then when they introduced the Beatles, my parents were both excited to see what this big fuss was all about, because my aunts had called my mom and told her what a huge phenomenon they had become very quickly in the U.K. and America. We’d never seen anything like it. Thirty seconds into it, I hear my dad off to the side saying something to the effect of “What the hell is this?” I think a few dads probably said the exact same thing that night. Ironically, he eventually became a huge Beatles fan and used to play their songs on the piano. But at that moment, the jarring moment that it was, I remember 30 seconds into All My Loving and thought – even though I was only 7-years-old at the time – ‘I don’t know what this is, but whatever it is, I want this.’
Many musicians recall that appearance as being a defining moment in their lives.
That was a that was a seismic eruption as far as young people seeing that being a musician could be the most fun and rewarding thing you could ever pursue. And that’s the seed that was planted that night in many musicians that you hear around the world today. Remember, at that time Canadians lived in what might be called a ‘monoculture’ – we only had a small smattering of television and radio stations available to us, so our culture was often influenced, and some might say defined, by what was brought in from other parts of the world. Today, we are very diverse – or perhaps fractured is the right word – in the way that we absorb and assimilate culture. We have more choices available to us than ever before, which has both its good and its not-so-good elements.
After that ‘seismic eruption’, did you even consider another career?
My first priority as a 7-year-old was playing hockey for the Toronto Maple Leafs and I was determined to crush our rivals, the wicked Montreal Canadiens. By the time I was 14, however, it was quite obvious that I was better on the piano than I was on the ice.
Toronto was a real hotbed of new music at that time.
It was a great crossroads of influence because we got all the best of the British groups and all the best of the American musicians. We had a burgeoning Canadian scene also with artists like Gordon Lightfoot, Joni Mitchell, and Neil Young, and The Guess Who, who were the center of my musical universe for a few years.
Those voices are a distinct part of the Canadian identity – something that really only came of age in the last half century
We actually always did have a distinct identity as a country, we just couldn’t define it. You knew what it was, but you couldn’t quite articulate it. While we might still struggle with that sense of identity sometimes – Canada is a very dynamic country in terms of our shifting demographics – it is certainly much stronger today. By way of example, for the past little while I have been out on the road with Styx and we are touring with Loverboy, who are from Vancouver. And the guys in Loverboy and myself, when we see each other, there is this ‘knowing’ of what the Canadian experience is, and how it differs from our neighbors to the south and elsewhere, and how that makes us unique.
The music industry has changed greatly in recent years. What is it like touring these days for you, especially in the U.S.?
I follow the news, and I see what’s going on. However, I also see thousands of people – people in perfect agreement – on their feet each night because they all are bonded by music and a rock ‘n’ roll concert. Even if half the audience are of a completely different political affiliation than the other half, everyone gets along absolutely fine. Music is the ultimate equalizer that way. I’ll broaden those remarks by saying that with Styx, wherever we perform around the world, audiences are very different at the beginning of a show – there’s a distinct difference between an audience in Japan or in England or in Sweden or Mexico or America or Canada. And it’s amazing by the end of the show how alike they all are – the music creates this incredible emotional bond. It is a true testament of its power to bring people together.
To that end, is it more about success or significance at this point in your career?
Significance is really something that others apply to you, and you would have to ask those folks if what I have done has any significance. I’ve had people tell me that they have been profoundly affected by a Gowan song or two over the years. And I always find it amazing to thing that this little thing I made up in my basement had an effect on someone’s life. Today, online influencers certainly have an impact, and I learn all kinds of things from them. However, that also brings about a culture where many people, especially younger people, have an inflated sense of personal importance. Personally, I think that the most significant thing one can probably do these days is to find a way to not disrupt relationships between people.
What do you tell younger people looking to pursue a career in music?
Well, the first thing I tell them is I’m not the best person to be asking for advice, lol. The industry paradigm that existed when I was getting started is gone – the ladder was very defined with specific steps, almost formulaic. Whereas now it is this open map that young people teach me how to navigate. The best thing I can tell a younger musician is to fall in love with music because no matter what happens, it will never let you down. If you fall in love with the music business, however, it will always let you down.
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