Skate Punk Memories: Downway

Biography (source: Downway official webpage) :

Downway formed in early 1995 out of the ashes of 2 Calgary based bands, S.P.I and Blind Hate. Dave and Dave were in S.P.I and Ryan and Isaac were in Blind Hate. All of us were only about 17 when Downway formed and as luck would have it, the line up has never changed. Here is a break down of Downway's history:

1995- Downway releases a four song demo tape and begins playing shows in and around Calgary. Local label Hourglass records approached us and asked if were interested in recording a CD. We were told that Hourglass would pay for the whole thing so we went for it. Up to that point we weren't doing anything but playing the odd show and weren't taking this too seriously so it sounded like a good deal. Later that year Downway is as Downway does was released. We played around Alberta and did some shows in Vancouver and BC but that was about it.

1996 - We were starting to get on some decent shows and had the opportunity to play with Lagwagon, Gob, Screw 32, Goober Patrol, Real Mackenzies and some other good bands. We still had never been on tour and very rarely played anywhere more than 8 hours away. Dave Holmes was still in school becoming a physiotherapist and the rest of us were basically just bar rats. I ( dave jr) worked at a local punk rock bar called The Werx and I booked lots of bands and bartended there and all my friends drank for free. We recorded 5 songs for a Calgary split CD with 3 other bands. This spilt cd was called " milk the Cow" and it marked the debut of our good friends , Belvedere.

1997 - Things started to pick up for us. We played with a ton of good bands including Strung Out, Diesel Boy, Goldfinger, Down by Law, H20, Jugheads Revenge and many others. We were the local openers for almost every big show that came through town and I'm sure it bugged the hell outta other local bands but we were starting to get a decent name for ourselves in Calgary. That summer, The infamous Dayglo Abortions asked us to tour Canada with them. So what did we do? We went and bought our first Van and off we went for a month with the craziest band I've ever met to this day. We had never been on tour and had no idea what to expect. Everything went great and the Dayglo's were awesome guys. Our van broke down on the way home and we slept in the parking lot of some mechanic for 3 days but besides that we were stoked. Then in October Diesel Boy asked us to come on tour with them and we went and did a few weeks with them. We were writing the next album during this time and decided on the name "kacknacker" while we were on this tour.

1998 - We released our 2nd Full length album , " kacknacker" and toured with friends like Belvedere, Layaway Plan and played with bands like Face To Face, Good Riddance, Guttermouth, No Motiv, Straight Faced and many others. We released our first music video for the song "jack that tastes like rye" and to our surprise, it was getting decent airplay on Muchmusic ( MTV - Canada). We decided to do another video for " Dyin" and it got some decent airplay as well. About 6 months after the release of "Kacknacker" a small USA label called 206 Records wanted to release it in the USA since we were touring down there. We had gone to California and the West Coast for the first time that summer.

1999 - We were finally in a position to headline a lot of our own shows in Western Canada and we continued to tour in the USA. The videos and touring had really helped us in Canada and "Kacknacker" was getting us new fans in lots of different places. We were asked to play Warped Tour in Vancouver that summer and we continued to tour the West Coast and Canada several times that year. Dave Holmes graduated and became a Physiotherapist part time and the rest of us continued working odd jobs between tours. We had now decided that we were going to try and become a full time band. We started writing for the next album that was to be recorded in early 2000.

2000 - We recorded " Never be Clever Again" in Vancouver and that was released in both Canada and the USA on 206 Records. Our van finally blew up and we had to replace the engine . Things got a little weird around the time the album was recorded. Our van being an expensive thing to replace and some complications with recording the album made being in a band much less fun than we had ever experienced. We decided to stop being babies about everything and to just go on tour and forget about it. We did our first really successful headlining tour across Canada and the Northen USA and when we returned in the fall we were asked to go on tour with Good Riddance and Death By Stereo. Things were looking up. This was our first experience touring with a larger band that really had their shit together. We played some amazing shows on that tour and about a month after we returned we were asked to do an album with Sessions Records, who had releases from AFI, Descendents, Fu Manchu, Missing 23rd , Supersuckers and was run by Joe Clements from Fury 66. All in all, a very good year.

2001 - We made videos for "glory" and " one of us" and began writing for our 4th full length album to be released on SESSIONS. In February we went on tour in Hawaii for 12 days and when we returned we embarked on a Canada/USA tour with The Missing 23rd and Belvedere called The Sessions Tour. Everything went great and when we returned we were invited to play some shows on the 2001 Warped Tour. We did our leg on Warped Tour and drove straight home to begin recording the new album. Russ Rankin ( Good Riddance) produced it and it is slated right now for release on September 21st. Stay Tuned and thanks for reading this far.