Life of Riley

LIFE OF RILEY

As precocious pre-teens, Cassidy Campbell and younger brother, Brice turned to the piano and drums as an outlet for their creative energies; a lively precursor to what lay in their not too distant future.

A couple of years later, joined by their childhood friend Barry Ochsner, they formed their first band, with Cassidy on keys, Brice on drums and Barry playing the guitar and singing lead. They performed together for the next several years around the Houston, Texas area.

When Cassidy left town to travel and perform around the world with the Continental Singers, Brice and Barry put their music on hold; Brice learned to surf while Barry learned the ins and outs of stage production; sound, and multi-media.

In 1994, with a newly formed band called Moriah, the reunited brothers, sans Barry, left for California to perform a couple of gigs. For this incarnation, Cassidy and Brice jumped to the front of the stage, getting out from behind their keyboards and drums. Post-performance, the band AND entourage dallied on the beaches of California for a couple of weeks, and while pondering their next steps, a local fan started booking them. From the end of August to December ’94, Moriah performed 86 shows to as many as 18,000 screaming fans at the San Jose arena.

The brothers had found their calling, performing live was their means of communication. And it didn’t matter if it was 15 people at a neighborhood coffee shop or thousands in sold-out arenas, the energy and passion was exactly the same. The band make-up was pretty liquid, players came and went; whether you were in or out, or what fork the band took next, was all about feel, but the core unit of Cassidy and Brice remained intact. For the next couple of years, the band logged over 250,000 miles performing to upwards of half a million acolytes. And as serendipity would have it, it was at one of their sold-out afternoon gigs…a 13 year-old Joel Killingsworth vowed that THIS was the band he would like to play with.

Moriah recorded a demo, which lead to a full album for Pamplin Records in 1998. Their debut CD and strong live performances got them plenty of notoriety throughout the Midwest & Southwest. It was an auspicious beginning, and brought them to the attention of noted Memphis producer, Skidd Mills.

A year later, Skidd tracked the brothers Campbell down, and enticed them to Memphis. There, they formed Crazy Rain Productions with Skidd, writing and producing two Top 10 songs for artists for the CCM market. With Skidd they perfected their studio craft and concentrated on writing. Putting another unit together in Memphis brought two new members into the fold when brothers Joel and Paul Killingsworth from Missouri became their newest members.

The EP they recorded with Mills brought them multiple major label offers, but pen never made it to paper because as Cassidy explains, “It just didn’t feel right.”

Well, it feels right now. Barry is back where he belongs, Paul produces in a studio in Houston, and Joel got his wish as the fourth member of Life of Riley.

Life of Riley has recorded Days Away From Life, their first CD for Kikstart Records and is currently playing in their home state of Texas, warming up the new material for a wider tour. Although Cassidy often starts the lyrics, every word and note is a group decision. And as Cassidy concludes, “The road is where we come alive. We aren’t concerned about making music ‘to fit’ anymore. We believe in music and the power it has to lift someone, make someone feel and be thought provoking. We write what we want and we perform to communicate.?
“Everything we’ve collectively experienced has been brought together in Life of Riley—it’s not about the individual songs, or the gigs, or the bus rides or the studio, or the fans—it’s the whole thing AND we don’t want to do it without each other. ‘The Life of Riley’ usually means the easy life. Well, ours may not exactly be easy—but it’s good—and it’s ours.”