bySomethingELSE : a Story of Friends Who Became Brothers in Life & Music…
For us, “keeping prog music alive” is not just a motto. We grew up with this music in the 70s, followed the prog bands of the second wave in the 80s and wrote our own music in that style during the same period. We were striving to modernize that music and add our own twist to it, just like bands like Marillion did. Today, we still want to stay at the forefront of prog as it keeps evolving and we still want to share that passion with prog fans in recordings and on stage.
bySomethingELSE was originally created in the early 80s from the remnants of two other bands composed of high school friends. We shared a passion for progressive rock music that carries on to this day. In the early years, we quickly gathered a following in Quebec City writing and performing long and complex pieces with personal as well as politically and socially engaged lyrics that touched on the hot subjects of the time like the environment, the nuclear threat and more (sadly, a lot of these things are still relevant today).
Sharing influences like Marillion, Peter Gabriel, King Crimson, ELP, Rush, Pink Floyd and a lot more, we worked hard to create our own sound and voice that was more modern and of its time. We were of course also influenced by all the new sounds of the 80s that we incorporated to our music in our own way while evolving our sound through the years and making it more accessible.
From 1987 to 1991, bySomethingELSE went through many personnel changes that also impacted our sound and musical direction. From 1989 onward, the original line-up was no more and the band ceased to exist under the Something ELSE name sometime in 1990.
But fast forward to 2014 when the original line-up got together in its entirety for the first time in the better part of two decades. Paul’s 50th birthday was the occasion and it sparked the official reunion of the original Something ELSE line-up that played prog music through the 80s. This time though, the main driving force was having fun!
Soon after the reunion and starting to re-learn a large part or our old repertoire and even (re)record some of our old songs, we decided to dedicated ourselves to a “side” project we named “Childhood Friends” that is a Marillion Fish era tribute project. We share 38+ years of passion for Marillion’s music that is closely tied to our friendship. We know Marillion fans hunger for it and we’re very pleased to deliver that timeless music to fans now to the best of our abilities.
During the last months of 2024 and the beginning of 2025, we got busy recording our first full album ever. Released on all platforms on May 8th 2025, we’re very proud of the final result which reflects where the band is now.
New original music projects are also ongoing and this new site will help keep both old and new Something ELSE fans informed of our activities.
Thank you for visiting and we hope to see you at one of our concerts in the future!