We had the pleasure of talking to Lance Eckensweiler of The Ending To This Story, asking some questions, getting to know the man and the band. Here is what he had to say:
1) What's your name and role in the band?
Lance Eckensweiler - Singer, guitarist, drummer, bassist, songwriter, manager etc. I have been the only member in this band since day 1 so I pretty much have to fill all the roles.
2) What made you want to pick up a guitar? Start writing your own music?
My dad has always been the biggest influence for me getting into music. He is a drummer and has been playing in bands for longer than I have been alive. I don’t know what exactly made me want to play guitar to be honest. All I know is that on my 8th birthday I got my first guitar. It was a white 6 string electric Yamaha. Like most people the first song I learned was Smoke On The Water by Deep Purple. It was a friend of my dads who taught me. Once I knew how to do a power chord (Which felt like the only chord I needed to know at the time) I started to write. I had a passion for it. I didn’t really want to learn other peoples songs. I think for me it was easier to just write my own songs then to practice someone else’s. I developed a love for song writing and have been doing it ever since.
3) You are from Port Elgin, what is the music scene like there?
My first year in high school (2003) there was a huge music scene. It consisted of mostly the older grades but there were still a few bands in my grade as well. It was mostly punk and rock. I was in a band called Falling Souls at the time. We put on our first show near the end of the year and had around 8 bands playing. We had around 200 people out to the event. In a town of roughly 6000 people this was a huge success. It would turn out that this would be the greatest success we would see. As the years went on the scene seemed to die out as the older generations moved away. Less and less people would show up to events and there were less and less bands in our high school. It wasn’t until approx. 3 years ago that a new scene seemed to develop. It seemed to be more folk and indie pop focussed. It was good to see, unfortunately a lot of those kids have now moved away for school and the scene doesn’t seem as strong any more. In short there is a scene there, it’s just not a huge one.
4) Why did you pick The Ending To This Story? What does it mean? It is a reference to being the opposite of The Neverending Story?
I am not sure how I came up with the name, I came up with it circa 2006 when I decided I wanted to do an acoustic side project in high school. I think sonically I really liked the sound of it and I liked that it was different from your typical band name. It may be long but I feel it stands out as unique. It is not reference to being the opposite of The Neverending Story although the name of my band often gets confused with that movie title. A lot of people seem to associate the name with death but I don’t like to think of it as the end of life. To me, the end to any story is the most important part and it also means the beginning of a new one. It is when everything is wrapped up and it can make you either love or hate a story. I like that the name is fairly is ambiguous and can mean different things to different people.
5) If you were to describe The Ending To This Story, what would you tell them?
I would tell them that it is an emotionally driven acoustic rock band.
6) How do you feel you’ve progressed from your first album to this one?
I feel I have matured. Not only lyrically but musically as well. I still love all the older songs that I have written but lately I have written some of my favourite songs I have ever composed and I am always trying to push myself to do better.
7) You are going full band, why did you decide the need to do this?
I was, I felt it was the next necessary step. A lot of the songs I write are portrayed best with a full band. Unfortunately I have yet to find the right members. While searching though I kept working on myself as an artist. I started working a lot more with my loop station and working on ways that I would be able to perform my originals without backing tracks or a full band. I am at a place now where I am happy performing on my own. Eventually down the road I will be looking for a band again but at the moment I will be staying solo.
8) Your parents seem to support you with your music, how important is that?
I feel it is extremely important. I couldn’t imagine doing this without the support from both of them.
9) You did a music video for the song Oh Winter, why did you choose that song and whats the story behind the video?
I just loved the song and I felt that it had the most impact out of all the songs on the album despite it being the slowest song on the EP. A buddy of mine Nathan Cartwright and I decided to do a music video project together and I had just finished recording Oh Winter. The video essentially portrays a girl in her early 20’s who is addicted to heroin. It starts off with her using the drug and nodding off. When she comes out of her high state she then is on the hunt for another fix. She ends up going to her drug dealers house, buys more heroin, goes back to her apartment and ends up overdosing and passing away on the floor. When I was writing the screen play for this video I had this idea to show her as a child. I felt that the innocence and happiness of the childhood footage and the dark seedy reality of what she has grown to become was just extremely sad. Emily who was the actress in this video gathered up a bunch of footage of her as a child which we were able to use in the video which I felt gave it more authenticity rather than staging her childhood with a younger actress.
10) Which bands from around the local scene would you suggest to someone looking for new music?
There are a ton but here are a few I can think of off the top of my head:
JJ and the pillars
Harvestingpeace
Redambergreen
Sumo Cyco
Something You Whisper
Conducted Aug 7th, 2015
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