Journey: Worlds Apart
“History is a funny thing,” keyboardist Gregg Rolie observed during a recent Journey reunion. In Nick DeRiso’s riveting and lively new book about the complicated fifty-year history of Journey entitled Journey: Worlds Apart, Rolie’ role that night went largely unrecognized while singing the song he popularized while in Santana, “Black Magic Woman.” And some attendees likely had no inkling that long before Steve Perry ever stepped foot on stage, Journey was a Santana offshoot. The band meandered for a good five years trying to find its sound in a state of prog rock and jam limbo before cementing its identity behind the soaring voice of Perry.
In the Spring of 1978, I had the chance to interview Journey when they came to New York to headline a bill with Ronnie Montrose and a then relatively unknown opening band called Van Halen. In the interview room, drummer Aynsley Dunbar was paired with Liz Derringer of the Daily News and I sat with the band’s new lead singer Steve Perry. Perry had a likable quality to him but a certain awkwardness in his new role. It was clear he was still learning to be the front man and spokesperson of a long-standing band whose leadership was with its founders Neal Schon and Gregg Rolie. But Journey was changing and eventually Dunbar would be out and Perry assumed the reins of the band and its expansive sound.
Just three years before, guitarist Ron Wood made his debut in the Rolling Stones playing on a flatbed truck rolling down Fifth Avenue to promote their 1975 tour. It was something drummer and jazz aficionado Charlie Watts suggested based on his love of the old jazz bands in uptown Harlem. Wood started his job and quipped in 2010, “After 35 years people think I’m still the new guy.” Wood will be touring next year on the eve of his fiftieth anniversary.
By comparison, Steve Perry, once the “new guy” I met touring behind Infinity, headed Journey for more than a decade but transformed Journey’s nebulous sound into a commercial juggernaut. As author Nick DeRiso writes in his compelling new biography, Journey became a cultural phenomenon with “Don’t Stop Believin’.” Perry’s imprimatur still overshadows everything that preceded and succeeded him and prompted CNN anchor Andy Cohen to say as Journey performed on New Year’s Eve in Times Square, “If it’s not Steve Perry, it doesn’t count! “You get it? It’s not Journey!”
In the new book, DeRiso places Perry in the context of a much larger story and chronology. The book takes the reader through more than fifty years of Journey’s history in sequence as it happened. The book is published by Time Passages which has previously issued two books on the history of the Eagles, Eagles Before The Band and Up Ahead In The Distance. Journey: Worlds Apart details how Journey came to be, prompted by young hotshot guitarist Schon who recruited Rolie to form Journey, originally a concept that evolved out of manager Herbie Herbert’s concept of a conglomeration of San Francisco musicians, the Golden Gate Rhythm Section.
With dense chapters themed around Journey songs and interviews with band insiders, the reader can peruse different points in time at their fingertips. For those of us who grew of age in the early Seventies, DeRiso delves into the pathway albums of Santana that led to Schon and Rolie becoming Journey. Derek & The Dominos’ keyboardist Bobby Whitlock provides great insights into the teen phenomenon Schon who came of age jamming with Eric Clapton and flirted with the idea of joining the Dominos. DeRiso also taps into the vision of Journey’s late manager Herbie Herbert who spawned a whole new business of leasing Journey’s trucks and equipment to other bands and venturing into video production. While detailing the path that Perry made to become Journey’s lead singer, DeRiso charts the path of Robert Fleischman who preceded him (and Steve Augieri and Arnel Pineda who followed.)
While the CBS advertisements for Journey’s albums take you back in time, the book also chronicles the turning point for Journey when Perry joined. As the label’s head of promotion Bob Sherwood notes, “When Journey’s A&R man flew to CBS headquarters in New York City with the nearly completed track of ‘Lights,’ we all knew we had a star lead singer—finally!—and a hit track.”
Journey’s path to success was not without its speed bumps. I was in the audience at JFK Stadium in 1981 when Journey was thoroughly booed after a rousing opening set by George Thorogood & The Destroyers. DeRiso takes you into that period and details the apathy shown by the Stones’ traditionalists but also the emergence of a loyal long-term fan base that emerged for years to come.
The book charts the path that led Babys’ keyboardist Jonathan Cain to become Rolie’s successor. In an amusing vignette, DeRiso tells the story of how Cain missed a bus ride and ended up hanging out with Neal Schon and joining Journey. Cain’s songwriting and sense of melody reshaped Journey’s sound and led to the ascension of power rock ballad that defined the Eighties and yielded such hits as “Faithfully,” “Open Arms” and “Don’t Stop Believin’.” Cain’s own sense of estrangement on the road spurred “Faithfully.” His father encouraged his son to always pursue his dreams and coined the phrase ‘don’t stop believin’. The words stayed in Cain’s notebook for five years before Perry asked him to come up with a new idea one night.
One of the book’s most interesting chapters asks the question “Did Height-Of-Fame Solo Endeavors Doom Journey?” DeRiso probes the events that led to Perry reluctantly making a solo album in response to Schon stepping out of the band. Sadly, the years that Journey didn’t tour led to bassist Ross Valory’s bankruptcy and the sense that Journey withdrew at the apex of its fame.
Journey fans will revel in the story of designers Alton Kelley and Stanley Mouse who created the trademark futuristic artwork for Journey’s covers beginning with Infinity. The book visually displays all of the covers together in a matrix and the book generously features an appendix of sketches of their original designs and concepts.
DeRiso also explores the burden of legacy as Perry left Journey to be replaced by Steve Augeri. These pages detail the immense resistance the fanbase gave to Augeri. The ascension of lead singer Arnel Pineda, who was discovered on YouTube singing in a Philipines cover band, provides a fairy tale story to Journey’s timeline. The issue of father time challenging Journey’s singers to hit the high notes of their youth partly explains why Perry never reunited with his Rock and Roll Hall of Fame mates at the band’s induction and how Pineda faces the same demons as the calendar contiues to turn.
Journey’s fractured relationships play out today in the court of social media as band members air their grievances with each other in strings of combustible threads. As Journey prepares for its 2024 tour, it’s hard not to think of Journey as a group of lawsuits masquerading as a band.
Readers will easily be able to alternate between the deep dive features and stories of the day and the choice nuggets that mark points on the extensive timeline. In the end, the book tells the band’s story with unprecedented depth. Journey: Worlds Apart does a wonderful job of chronicling the events as they happened and providing a cohesive narrative that sums up the band’s complicated history and places it in a larger cultural context. In the end, it tells the story of what made the magic of the music to begin with.
Journey: Worlds Apart is available at Amazon as a paperback and Kindle edition. For more information check here: http://www.amazon.com/Journey-Worlds-Apart-Nick-DeRiso/dp/1734365390/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1702217207&sr=8-1