Originally from Windsor Ontario Canada, a border city to Detroit Michigan, I was heavily influenced by Detroit rock’n’roll radio as a youngster. When I was 8yrs old my parents put me into piano lessons, which lasted about 2 years before I regrettably quit. But the piano was always around the house, in fact, my mother graduated at the royal conservatory of music at the 9^th level for classical piano. Over the years my parents bought my brother and I multiple keyboards and drum-sets and whatever other musical gadgets we asked for. But it wasn’t until I was a young teenager that I really started appreciating music, rock’n’roll specifically, and started jamming and recording with the old analog 4-tracks and 8-tracks. We made a lot of noise in the basement for a lot of years.

         During my college years and early career my hobby stayed dormant until I realized playing music was something that I am really passionate about. My brother continued to play in bands and I always had the desire to get back into music as a full time hobby. So I geared back up, and got serious with the keyboards again. Eventually I hooked back up with my brother, who was playing in a heavy blues band at the time (3 piece band named “Draft”) in the Windsor area, and Tim and I have been playing together ever since. Fortunately, now that I live in states and still close to my hometown, my brother and I are able to join forces furthermore with "New Fossils".

        My inspirations come from only a select few rock'n'roll stars. Among them, my favorite keyboard players are Ray Manzerek (The Doors) and Elton John, but I try to pick up any tricks I can learn from multiple keyboardists. The bands I favor most are Led Zeppelin, Van Halen, Pink Floyd and the Rolling Stones. Ok , the typical big time rock bands, but I also dig the new modern bands you hear on the radio nowadays, like Maroon5 and especially Coldplay. In my mp3 collection you'll also find some really old blues like Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf. The blues really has a big influence on my style of play, and blues is probably what I feel most comfortable playing and enjoy most. Its my opinion that most rock songs all have the blues hidden in them some way or another.

        I am a "gear-head" I guess you could say, which is not so uncommon for keyboard players. My gear, which consists of mostly all Yamaha equipment is as follows: I have (3) keyboards and (1) tone module synthesizer in my rack. The main keyboard I use is the Yamaha S08 (88 key), and I usually put my vintage Yamaha DX7 (61 key) on my second tier. These (2) keyboards control, by midi, my most important component the Yamaha Motif synthesizer which is in the rack usually to my left where all the sound is generated. I also have a Yamaha P90 which you will usually see onstage also.

-Greg Gallant