Early sketches of a band 

Jean-François and Denis formed their first band together and played mainly cover songs of Rush. They struggled through years of personnel changes, trying to find the right people until they met Mark McKee and formed what would become Blue Line, a classic rock band. Mark had a lot of club experience and from the start he became a mentor to the others. They did a lot of clubs for two years gaining valuable live experiences. Then Mark left for Vancouver and they needed another singer. They changed their musical repertoire, adapting to the "grunge" style of Pearl Jam, Stone Temple Pilot, etc. They mixed in some heavy rock classics, and changed the name to Final Project, symbolizing the fact that this would have to be the last club band project.

When they began having trouble with their drummer, Denis thought of his younger brother Yves, who had been playing drums for five or six years, as a replacement. After just a couple of weeks of practices together they started getting gigs. They still played covers for another year until they had reached their saturation point. They wanted to play original music!

Not knowing what would come of their efforts, they started to play with Darren, a keyboardist who originally played with Yves. Having to exchange ideas with Darren inspired some to learn more about the technical side of music and this new combination of band members produced immediately a progressive sound that they all loved! The only piece missing was the singer.

One day Darren answered an ad for a keyboard player and ended up getting a job playing with a progressive tribute band. They all lent a hand to ensure the success of this effort. However, due to poor management, what was supposed to be a big production folded up after playing one single tribute show. All was not lost; one good thing came out of the experience as Ben, the singer of the debunked tribute band, came on to be the singer of our newly created prog tribute band named Awake. However, he was not terribly involved in the creative process and didn't want to invest more time in the band.

Thankfully destiny was working for the band and every thing worked out as, one day, while rehearsing they met Jocelyn, another one of the original prog tribute band member. He came over to listen to us play and when he played for them a demo tape of an original song he wrote, the band thought, "We may have found our missing link".

First recording

So Ben left and in came Jocelyn; Darren our keyboardist, for personal reasons, soon departed which left four of them: Jean-François, Denis, Yves and Jocelyn. The music really started to develop and for the first time the band was good enough to be compared to any professional band out there. To form a really "tight" band, musically speaking, they decided to practice doing shows mixing cover songs with two or three original songs until they felt ready to assume the next big step: Record a first album.

While composing new material the sound of the band matured through experimentations and a wall of sound soon began to take shape. Each band member took his place and understood his role.

Wanting to maintain the integrity of their music, they all decided to produce their own album.

However, realizing the benefits of having a keyboardist's point of view, when it comes to orchestration, the band decided to hire Francis, a former guitarist student of Jocelyn who became a keyboard player. Including Francis in the line up came naturally as most of the material for the album was already composed. But Francis skills for arrangements proved to be a major contribution to the overall statement the songs would make.

Jean-Francois soon became much more involved in the recording and production of the album; along with a good friend of ours, Andy Cherna, who provided in his home studio, the engineering skills and production experience needed. The recording sessions were to last all of the summer of 2000 and the mixing of the recorded tracks took place in the autumn.

Conservation Of Mass was launched on April 7th 2001 , in Montreal. Already, we had many great reactions from the media, and we prepared all summer for a series of shows, including participation at the 2002 Baja Prog Festival.

And then they were four

In the summer of 2002, Jocelyn, the lead singer, announced that he was pursuing his musician career on a different path. This brought the production of the second album to a screeching halt. The departure, however strange, was made without bad feelings; the proof being that members of Hamadryad contributed to some of Jocelyn's solo projects.

Once the initial shock subsided and time passed, in which the four remaining members took the time to take in the announcement; they all agreed that replacing Jocelyn immediately was not the way to go. So they started from scratch trying to find a new sound for the band.  

What was supposed to be work sessions, where they would try to rework the existing songs, became, unexpectedly and unconsciously, writing sessions. Jean-François, who already sang one song on the first album, and a few covers live, took the lead singer role and everyone came up with bundles of new ideas.

These writing sessions where put on hiatus in the fall of 2002 due to the necessity to play a few shows in Montreal . For these, "old" songs had to be reworked and remodeled to the new outfit. The shows confirmed that as a quartet Hamadryad was as strong as before and fans where supportive and anxious to hear the new material.

Hard at work

Now in the fall of 2003, the new album is still in the works, every week sees new ideas being added to songs in progress and new tunes are blossoming. Even though the pressure is on to play live, the accent is on creating their second contribution.

The new "sound" is not far from what Hamadryad's fans are used to, without being the same. It's a strange and magical feeling to hear these new songs, for you recognize some part of it while others are brand new.

The new web site is also being worked on. This new Hamadryad's site will provide many audio and video samples and information on the band and it's four members.