The Road Home

Sonance was a punk rock band from Jasper, Alberta, the mountain town at the centre of Jasper National Park, about four hours west of Edmonton. The lineup was Simon on lead vocals, Lee on guitar and vocals, Tommy on bass and Jamie on drums. The band's one album credits its members by first name only, and their surnames have not yet surfaced.

In December 2006, the four musicians recorded at Night Deposit Studios in Calgary. Jason Maure co-produced the sessions with the band and engineered them alongside Endre Lukacsy, and friends Jay, Christy and Jessica came in to shout gang vocals. The result was The Road Home, eight originals credited to the whole band: 'The Road Home', 'Perfect Lies', 'Suckerpunch', 'Lost Cause', 'Lessons', 'The Dark', 'Loaded' and 'No More'. The songs deal in frustration, betrayal and the struggle to find a way forward. Sonance released the CD themselves in 2007, with cover art by Dylan and layout by Mitch Mistake and Fabes.

The booklet's thank-you list reads like a map of the town that backed them: the Jasper Legion, the Jasper Artists Guild, the Athabasca Hotel, the Jasper Booster newspaper and the people pushing for a Jasper skatepark, alongside the Edmonton punk bands Sonance had shared stages with.

Word travelled down the Yellowhead Highway. In 2008 Edmonton's Vue Weekly launched its Vue Wave podcast, and the very first episode introduced listeners to Sonance as punk rockers from Jasper, in company with Darrek Anderson, The Secretaries, Toy Singers and Winnipeg's Romi Mayes. The band toured with the Edmonton punk group Civilization Days, and Tommy later moved to the city and joined them, trading his bass for a guitar.

The name stayed with the town. In February 2025, as Jasper rebuilt after the wildfire that tore through it the previous summer, The Jasper Local named Sonance among the local acts featured on the new Rocky Mountain Live directory, calling them power punkers. Whether that marked a reunion or simply a reputation that outlasted the band is not yet known.

-Robert Williston