Jon Brooks was originally a Hammond organ player and leader of The Norge Union in the Toronto area. In 1993, The Norge Union recorded ‘Bulldozer’ and shared the stage with The Pariahs, The Phantoms, Days Of You, The Bourbon Tabernacle Choir, and The Headstones, which led to Brooks playing organ on The Headstones first album.
When The Norge Union disbanded in 1995, Brooks moved to Krakow, Poland. Brooks travelled and played solo shows throughout Poland, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine, Hungary, and Belarus. In 1996, he hitchhiked throughout Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina the former Yugoslavia recently devastated by civil wars and ethnic cleansing. The experience inspired 1997s The Latest Great Embarrassment, recorded in Strumiani, Poland with producer, Jurek Piastowski, a well-known name in the esteemed Polish jazz scene. The independent EP garnered critical plaudits and Brooks continued to establish himself as a subtle writer of literate story songs with a social conscience.
At the end of 2005 Brooks released his first CD, ‘No Mean City’, produced by New Zealand native and Irish music multi-instrumentalist, Pat Simmonds. ‘No Mean City’ bears full witness and indictment to what Brooks saw as the modern urban disaster as seen through Toronto’s example.
On May 3, 2007, Brooks released ‘Ours And The Shepherds’, a collection of songs examining Canadas war experience. From WWI with a new musical translation of In Flanders Fields, Brooks moves through the 20th century up to the recent peacekeeping missions of Kigali; Rwanda; Bosnia; Somalia; and Kabul, Afghanistan to advance the prophetic vision of Ours And The Shepherds. The CD’s title is taken from a Dorothy Day quote: “Whose fault is it? Ours and the shepherds.”
Brooks is also a published essayist. His contribution of ‘Two Story Town’ to ‘Barry Callaghan – Essays on His Works’, was released on July 14, 2007 with the likes of Margaret Atwood, William Kennedy, Patrick Lane, Joyce Carol Oates, Noah Richler and others.
Brooks will be recording his next cd, ‘Moth Nor Rust’, at the end of 2007. Joey has always been a musician first, since starting to fiddle with the guitar @ age 17… He used to be obsessed with shredding on the electric guitar in his basement throughout his teens… at 18 years old, he was exposed to his first Indie Showcase in Hamilton @ the X-Club, participating were Hayden, Weeping Tile, hHead and GORP, which opened his eyes to music outside of the mainstream… He went to Fanshawe College for the Music Industry Arts Program, in the fall of 1996, where he was taught the art of recording/producing by many fantastic professors, including celebrated Producer Jack Richardson… After 1st year of MIA, Joey joined Golden Lake Diner (Sonic Unyon)… Golden Lake Diner was 3 out of 4 members from the band Gorp (Sonic Unyon)… GORP parted ways with singer CA Smith, who then in turn created The One Man Band Singing Sensation MAYOR McCA… Joey was only on 1 released song by Golden Lake Diner, and that was for the Sonic Unyon “NOW WE ARE FIVE” CD compilation… Golden Lake Diner played shows with Tristan Psionic, Danko Jones, Sianspheric, The Rheostatics, etc.. GLD broke up in the fall of 1998… Joey created MELODICY after that point, with some demos being made @ Catherine North Studios , in Hamilton, ON … The band was great, but everyone had other ideas of what they really wanted to be apart of, so they parted ways… After the demise of 2 line-ups, Joey moved to BC for a short time, and then Calgary for 1 year to retreat upon a different music scene… He then recorded a solo album on a 4-track in a small room he rented while in Calgary, where he dedicated the whole album to his previous girlfriend… Before moving back to Ontario, Joey toured the province of BC for 4 months between June-Sept of 2000, playing festivals, and shows all over the province… He found a dog at a show he roadied at as a one off favour to a band called Orchid Highway, and after not finding the owner, the dog jumped in the van and the both of them lived the scooby doo lifestyle, solving mysteries and entertaining people all over BC… After his last show in Cranbrook, BC, where he played the Annual Street Festival, his van was hit on his way back to Calgary, which put him out of work for 1 year… He then reformed Melodicy, with former bassist Sean Thomson, (Ex-GORP) in London, ON… Sean & Joey toured the West Coast as a folk/rock/ electronica duo for 2 months in the summer of 2001… They created 3 albums together, where they produced only 200 copies of each… these CDs were specifically made as Christmas presents that they gave away to friends, family and fans in 1998, 2001 and 2002… Joey was then approached by 3 different musical projects about how to get a tour started, and it got him thinking that he could help musicians everywhere, since he has been booking shows for years with all the people he has ever played with… Spherical Productions was then created to help bands tour and play as many shows as possible, and this all started in the Spring of 2002… Balls Falls, (Coqi Records) were the first band put on tour through Spherical, and after finding success from this venture, Spherical Productions became a full force booking agency… Joey then toured again with Eddie Warren to the East Coast in late summer of 2002, where they played as far as Sydney, NS, and then back to London, ON… As a one-man machine, Joey has booked over 50 tours to date, and 100’s of shows throughout Canada, here is a list of the acts SP has represented… In August 2005, Joey toured the West Coast as a 4th time touring parts of Canada since 2000, but this time, with the amazing D Trevlon… This tour happened in the summer of 2005 in support of their new albums… Joey just took a break from exclusively booking any London venues, and started focusing more on building Spherical Productions, as well as his own musical career. In the summer of 2006, Joey toured with one of Canada’s best solo performers Wax Mannequin throughout Canada, while doing PR for all of the artists he represents along the way… Joey recently moved back to his hometown of Hamilton, ON, and has helped reform his old band Golden Lake Diner, who are planning on releasing a new album in early summer of 2007, and will be touring in support of this album for 2 months this summer across Canada.