By Ian Cobb

e-KNOW

In the early to mid 1990s, five Columbia Valley residents with diverse musical and personal backgrounds came together under a common banner – a colourful banner called Missing Peace.

Originally called The Dharma Bums, the band changed names when they learned that moniker was taken.

The band quickly became one of the most popular rockin’ outfits in the Kootenays.

In 1996 they released their first album (CD) Past Tense, which neatly showcased the original talents of Ian Borenheim (bass, vocals), Shane Hagen (vocals, guitar), Niels Kunze (rhythm guitar, vocals), Cory Price (lead guitar, vocals) and David Shaw (drums, vocals), who was later replaced by Christopher Howse.

Over the next half a decade Missing Peace established a strong and devoted following in B.C., Alberta and the nearby US states, touring steadily.

Of course, Columbia Valley residents with a love of good music were lucky enough to see the band on a semi-regular basis, whether perched aloft over the bar at the Farside Inn, on the stage at Raffles (now Copper City Saloon), packed together in the Whitehouse Hotel, ski-hill-side at Panorama or in the basement or garage of Niels’ and Ian’s Fairmont home.

Fairmont was a rock n roll hub of the East Kootenay in the mid to late 1990s, with several local bands, including Finnegan, capturing attention. Down at Riverside Golf Course’s former Sportsman’s Lounge, the ‘deacon’ of valley musicians, John Cronin, led a hugely popular jam night every Tuesday, providing another stage for the local musicians to jam and get to know one another.

Missing Peace band members and other valley musicians, artists and media teamed up at that time, along with Fairmont Hot Springs Resort, to present the Mountain Music & Arts Festival. Three successful festivals were held at the resort’s ski hill base, culminating with a command performance by Spirit of the West. The festivals lured many local acts, as well as Kimberley’s The Honeymans, a band that rivalled Missing Peace for capturing peoples’ attention.

Many of those same musicians gathered at Fairmont’s Hoodoos Bar & Grill Sunday night (Mother’s Day) for a Missing Peace reunion.

The evening was a veritable hug-fest as it was the first gathering of all band members and their many friends in eight years, some traveling in from the coast.

Joining Missing Peace on stage for several songs was “guitar god” Russ Brent (New Moon), another of the valley’s more popular and skilled musicians. Dave Shaw came down from Spillimacheen for a few songs and Finnegan’s Rory Sinclair (guitar, vocals) and Mike Orr (bass, vocals), along with Bill Rainbow (drums) and Missing Peace’s Cory Sinclair laid down a rollicking chest-thumping mini-set.

The evening was also a launch of Missing Peace’s long-anticipated second album – Second Thoughts – a 16-year labour of love by Kunze, who is also author of three books.

The 14 tracks on the CD were recorded in and around 1999/2000, with one recorded at a show in Whitehorse, Yukon in 2001.

Remixing and remastering include the talents of Russ Brent, Bill Rainbow, Dave Shaw and Kunze and Price.

Many of the tunes performed Sunday evening are included on the new CD.

Despite only having two evenings prior to practice, the show was perfectly reflective of Missing Peace as a band – original as well as forward thinking and moving.

Doc would have been pleased.

Lead image: From left, Christopher Howse, Cory Price, Niels Kunze, Ian Borenheim, Russ Brent and Shane Hagen. Ian Cobb/e-KNOW photo

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