Photo courtesy of Dana Gorab

Back in 2019, Otherworldly Entity was lucky enough to open for the legendary nu metal band, Cold, at Buffalo Iron Works in Buffalo, NY. It was such an amazing experience because we didn't just play the show and do our opener thing.

We loaded into the venue about five hours before the doors opened, so we had a lot of time to kill. I lived in Buffalo for about 10 years, and even though I had moved away by this point, I still had a lot of friends around, so we invited a couple to the venue to hang out with us. We ended up spending a large chunk of the day sitting around with Sam, Lindsay, Jon, Nick and Scooter, better known as Cold. It was such an amazing, eye-opening and surreal experience. But why?

For this, we need to rewind back to 2001. I had just started dating a girl named Meg, and it was the day of her birthday party. We were both 14 years old; I had just started playing in my first band the same month, and I invited my friend Phil over to help us set up for the birthday party. The day before, I purchased Cold's 13 Ways to Bleed On Stage album, so while we were setting up, we put the CD in. By the time we made it to track four, “End of the World”, I was absolutely in love with what I was hearing. There was a darkness to it; a genuine humanity, the raw emotion coming out of those speakers spoke to me. I turned to Meg and Phil and said, "Some day, I will play with Cold." Phil said, "I think your band needs to get better." I said, "I don't care if it takes 20 years, it'll happen."

In 2008, I married Meg. In 2011, Phil lost his battle with depression and took his own life. In 2017, Meg and I went through a difficult divorce, and I ended up surviving a serious suicide attempt as a result. By the time 2019 had rolled around, I had lost these two people that shared in that decisive moment with me in 2001, and to some extent, I felt like I had lost myself, too. Two of my closest friends for over a decade, and my own sense of self. But here I was, 18 years later, sitting in lawn chairs behind Buffalo Iron Works, smoking cigarettes, having drinks, warming up to share a stage with these legends.

We killed our set, we really brought the energy. We even covered System of a Down's "Spiders", an homage to Cold's spider logo. When Cold took the stage, I went nuts. That is, until I heard "End of the World". My world had ended multiple times since that day in 2001. But here I was, in the most epic of circumstances. I had to go backstage and just relax for a while.

After the show, when the fans had all left, Scooter came up to me and gave me a hug. He said that he saw my story of my divorce, my suicide attempt and my unlikely survival. He said, "I'm glad you're here." I said, "I wouldn't miss it for the world." He said, "No...I'm glad you're HERE." I knew what he meant. He didn't need to say more. That day changed my life - it started a new chapter in my life, and a new push in the future of Otherworldly Entity.

When Biff Swenson and Dana Yurcisin met in high school, they were far from instant friends. Swenson won the girl they were both pining for, and the dislike was palpable. It started to dissipate as they both attended the same college to study film, despite an awkward encounter where Swenson and said girl showed up in Yurcisin’s dorm room.

Trying to differentiate between Will Wood the artist and Will Wood the human has been a thought-provoking journey.

Wood has been fairly open about his comfortability in the spotlight and the highs and lows of his mental wellbeing. He has spoken about his bipolar disorder diagnosis, his struggles with addiction and has worked alongside various mental health charities.

“I don’t know if my public openness made as much of a difference as just being honest with myself has,” he said.

Being honest with himself has brought him to a difficult decision: His latest album, In Case I Die, will be his final release.

It started with an album he was planning on naming In Case I Die, because “I was considering dying and wanted to say some stuff before I left, but then I changed the name on a sorta bipolar upswing.” That album ended up being called “In case I make it,” and while it went in a different direction than originally intended, it didn’t end up telling the story he thought it would.

“I told that story while I was still on it, and now some people think it’s my ‘I feel better now’ album instead of my ‘goodbye cruel world’ one. It gave people the impression that the experimenting in genre I’ve done throughout my career could be tied to changes in my mental health, and that my latest record being mostly softer was me finally healthy instead of me at the most depressed I’ve ever been, and just a weird sort of meta-commentary on my older work through the lens that says mental illness sounds like evil jazz and wellness sounds like acoustic guitar. Really bums me out on a lot of levels. So I wanted to sort of reiterate some of the thoughts and feelings from the songs in a more stripped down and kind of aggressively direct way. Present something that included the songs from throughout my career that I feel represent the most, with a focus on those ‘goodbye cruel world’ songs so I could really say what I would want to say if I were to die. I’m not going to die though. I’m really excited for what my life might become.”

In Case I Die is comprised of 20 songs, performed live in venues across the country. Wood said that the biggest challenge was returning to the stage for the first time since venues shut down due to the pandemic. Not only was that intimidating, but he was also performing to a larger, brand-new audience that found him after a viral hit online.

“The first of the two tours we recorded was especially difficult because of this,” Wood said. “People came expecting a rock ‘n’ roll drag show instead of anti-folk and standup with a dramatic element and so I had to sort of re-learn how to do what I do, and fast. Once I learned to handle the hecklers, made the parents leave their kids at home (sorry kiddos, had to be done; too many of you were too disruptive, and honestly my show’s not age-appropriate) and really figure out what it was my audience and I had in common (which I think turned out to be something deep and essential), it was incredibly rewarding.”

He is not afraid to admit that the urge to write songs has been turned off for quite some time. Thinking about “Will Wood” as a project instead of an identity has been helpful, but he knows he will need some time to work out his “inner songwriter” identity.

He believes that he needs to put up a boundary between his work self and his real self; reconnect with important people in his life, travel without a gig being the destination, change the subject if his career as a performer is brought up.

“It’s hard to set a dream aside for a while, because it’s hard to come to terms with the fact that your dream is never going to be as you dreamt it; that maybe you made unnecessary personal sacrifices or had been naïve,” he said. “I’m not saying I think I made a bad choice or that I regret it all, but I’ve had to ask myself some tough questions and answer them honestly to come to the conclusion that happiness isn’t in an audience, on a stage or even in your proudest creative work; it’s at home. We all know happiness comes from within or whatever, but it’s such a bitch to learn it firsthand, because all you want to do is keep pursuing it the fun way, even if it’s ultimately a waste.”

Wood hopes that listeners find something in the live album that helps them feel less alone, and maybe a little more human. That has been an important part of healing for him, and he’s happy to say that music has helped him heal. But for now, he wants to find Will Wood the human again.

Photo courtesy of Dana Gorab

It began with a movie. A British movie that was released in 1990 starring Martin and Gary Kemp as East London gangsters, titled The Krays. As a child I was obsessed with this movie. I was 9 when I first saw it; 9 years old and I’m watching the true story of the Kray brothers causing carnage all over East London. Martin Kemp as Reggie, and Gary Kemp as the slightly more sociopathic Ronnie.

It was during this period that I discovered that my new favourite east enders were the bassist and guitarist from the 1980s, new romantic powerhouse unit, otherwise known as Spandau Ballet. So, after successfully completing a full decade of existence, my parents decided to take me to see my new favourite band as a birthday present.

Now this is where my now 10-year-old mind got a little confused. I believed I was going to see Spandau Ballet. I did not know that Spandau Ballet didn’t exist as they once did. I was also unaware that Martin and Gary Kemp were the actors/musicians who played the characters of the Krays in a movie. I believed they were them, if that makes sense? So I genuinely believed that I was going to actually see the real Ronnie and Reggie Kray playing in my new favourite band.

Instead I ended up going to see Tony Hadley perform with some original members of Spandau, but not Martin and Gary… and definitely not Ronnie and Reggie.

I was sold a lie by my parents. I felt betrayed.

“Where’s Ronnie and Reggie?” I would inevitably ask. My mum laughed.

“Martin and Gary you mean?”

“Who?” I replied.

It was during the show that my mum explained to me that Ronnie and Reggie Kray, although they were real people, were not the people in the movie. They were merely portrayed in the movie by actors, who also happened to be in Spandau Ballet, but were no longer in the band. I was utterly disappointed.

It was pretty much instant. I lost all interest in what was going on in front of me. I looked down at the greatest hits CD I’d brought along with the hope of meeting the Krays and getting them to sign it, and felt deflated. I leafed through the inside cover looking for some hard evidence that my mum was wrong, but instead I found the exact opposite. Written evidence that she was telling the truth. How could I have been so blind?!?! Reggie was in prison and Ronnie died in prison. The mathematics of them ever being able to form a 1980s, new romantic powerhouse unit was impossible.

Although quite upset, I decided to try to enjoy the rest of the show. To my surprise, I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was back-to-back hits, from “Lifeline” to “Gold”, from “Chant No.1” to “Through the Barricades”. It was awesome. I’d almost forgotten that my two favourite east-end gangsters were not here. I even enjoyed it so much I still wanted to get my CD signed, so I begged my parents to let us stay a little longer with the hope of meeting Tony Hadley, the charmingly charismatic frontman of my favourite band. After about an hour of loitering, I got lucky. There he was: Tony Hadley. The only man to ever fight with the Kray twins and live to tell the tale.

Now was my moment. I plucked up the courage, felt my marker pen in my pocket and shuffled over to say hi. I can’t remember what I exactly said to him at the time, but I do remember him shouting, “Here’s a little geeza,” at me. I held out my CD and marker pen with enthusiasm. He reached out his hand to take them from me and then abruptly paused.

“Naaaah sorry mate, I can’t touch that.” He exclaimed tapping his finger on the pictures of Martin and Gary Kemp on the front. “That’s naffin’ to do with me mate. I could get sued.”

He then chuckled, turned his back and left the venue, leaving me stood there with my pen, my CD, my parents and a single tear trickling down my 10-year-old cheek… I hoped the Krays would get him.

That was the time I cried at a Spandau Ballet show.

Photo courtesy of Jessica Paige Photography

Music was a part of my world before I was even born. It runs through me.

My grandpa was a fantastic country musician, playing in a band in the early 1970s. That music gene was passed down to my dad and my aunts, who are incredible singers and players. I remember countless evenings, curled up by the campfire while they played the nights away.

I grew up surrounded by music, and I just blossomed right into it. I was always singing and dancing as a child, and really connected with music from a young age. I started piano lessons at the age of 6, and I used to make up these whole musicals and elaborate concerts that I would make my relatives sit and watch. It was mostly me just improvising lyrics on the spot!

I always wanted to be a “star” and had this huge sense of confidence. It wasn’t until I started tuning into pop and modern music culture that I realized it was my true desire to make music in a professional way.

A huge turning point happened when I was about 12 years old and Taylor Swift came onto the scene. I was enamoured. I wanted to do that so bad… to write my own songs and play them. I convinced my dad to teach me the basic chords on guitar, and I completely dedicated myself to it. I started posting cover videos on YouTube, and writing my own songs on guitar and piano. Then I joined choir, band, vocal jazz, and basically immersed myself into all music outlets.

These experiences brought me to where I am today…

I truly believe I was born to make music.

Graphic created by Lucas Seidel Design

Gather 'round the open fire for Chimneyside Chats - a monthly feature with holiday stories from our favorite artists. See what's in their stockings this year as they reminisce on Christmas memories, share their favorite recipe and more! Here's what GRLwood founder Rej Forester had to say:

Graphic created by Lucas Seidel Design

Graphic created by Lucas Seidel Design

If you’re looking for a holiday hit, this appetizer will leave your guests counting down the days until next year’s gathering!

Graphic created by Lucas Seidel Design

Christmas time is one of the most special times of year. Family, close friends, delicious treats and holiday happiness! For me, when I think back on this time of year, I’m reminded of one of my core memories that helped me discover my love of singing.

Growing up, I had attended a fine arts school, and was always a dancer. For my eighth grade December recital, I decided to make the jump from dance to singing. Singing was new and strange at first, but on this night I was not only nervous but ecstatic to perform.

For this moment – my very first live singing performance – I had written one of my first songs, titled “Christmas Without You”. As soon as I sat at my piano and started to sing, I was addicted.

From there, I played the same song at the Christmas tree lighting in my hometown of Abbotsford, British Columbia. Each time I sang it, I would fall in love all over again with singing for people. All these years later, I still get the feels at every live show.

So now, this time of year not only reminds me of the Christmas magic, but also the start of my musical journey.