Maybe they never made it as wise men, or couldn't cut it as poor men stealing, but the but they certainly made it in the music business.
Retired Duncan teacher Brian Millar remembers offering up his two-cents of advice before brothers Chad and Mike Kroeger and friend Ryan Peake formed Nickelback in 1995 in Hanna, Alta.
Millar, who is originally from Medicine Hat, was a fellow dreamer himself, and had aspirations of being an actor at an early age. At the time he had a great admiration for Vosco Call who had studied in New York, and was considered one of the founding fathers of performing arts. Millar, however, studied at Utah State University where he graduated in 1971 with a double minor in psychology and education, as well as a double minor in acting. He's helped shape minds in classrooms all throughout B.C. and Alberta, including at Queen Margaret's School in Duncan, before teaching in Shanghai, China.
But it was during his nine year stint at Hanna High School, where he was both a counsellor, and a non-academic English teacher, that he taught the boys who would later become known as Nickelback.
Since the Canadian rock band's inception in 1995 it has always been Chad Kroeger on lead guitar and vocals, his brother Mike on bass, and Ryan Peake on back-up vocals, keyboard and rhythm guitar. The band went through several drummer changes for the first decade before Daniel Adair joined the group in 1995. Mike and Ryan were both in Millar's Career and Life Management class, which he recalls covered everything from sex education and budgeting to getting into university and career paths. Millar remembers having the most conversations with Ryan, who along with Chad and Mike, went under the band name The Village Idiots.
"They were all good-natured guys, I never had any trouble with them," said Millar. "Mike and Ryan were slacker boys back then, and I could relate. Until Grade 12, I would aim for 51 per cent in everything, and that's where they were at. I don't know if Chad was in the academic program, or if he was just an enigma because I hardly remember him at all."
Millar, who is also an artist, said he believes it is important to have a back up plan. During the mid-1980s, Millar said Hanna High was full of its share of those with pipe dreams, from the bull-riding cowboys who hoped to make it to the Calgary Stampede to aspiring athletes who were shooting to score a spot with a professional league.
"Rockers were third on the social hierarchy," said Millar. "I remember there was a day I was giving them the gears about their grades, encouraging them to do better, and it was Ryan who said Millar, we don't need to have a backup plan, we're gonna be rock stars — he wasn't bragging, or having a big ego trip he was serious."
"I'm gonna trade this life for fortune and fame, I'd even cut my hair and change my name" are a few of the lyrics from Nickelback's hit 'Rockstar', which the band released in 2005 after Adair joined the group. Millar said he has always enjoyed their music and thinks they get a bad rap. His two favourites are 'Rockstar' and 'Burn It to the Ground'.
"That's exactly what they were about, they wanted the fast cars, and the good rock star life," said Millar.
Before burning it to the ground the boys were building themselves from the ground up. Millar remembers Ryan urging him to drop by what he thinks was probably their first paid gig in Hanna inside the huge tavern at Grey Goose Inn, not long before heading west to Vancouver. The night of their gig, Millar happened to be in the inn's betting theatre with the superintendent of schools when he heard and saw the boys rocking out to a packed house of at least 200 people for the first time.
Millar said music was the one thing that the boys worked hard at, starting off as a cover band, then getting to collaborate with names such as Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top, who contributed to the band's 2005 album All the Right Reasons. Another reason the band got off to a successful start in Vancouver, Millar believes, is due to another one of their peers who was also their acting manager. He had headed to Van City the year prior to pursue a recording studio program that unfortunately over promised and under delivered. The silver lining, he made contacts with other musicians, which helped the guys get their foot in the door.
"I think he was the landing point," said Millar. "He introduced them to the people he knew, and it just took off from there."
Since achieving the fame that may have seemed like a 'Far Away' pipe dream while attending Hanna, Millar saw them for the second time playing a packed BC Place in Vancouver around 10 years ago.
"They were great, and the place was rocking," said Millar. "I have always liked Chad's whisky and cigarette voice, I think he has the perfect voice for rock and roll."
While Millar won't be at their sold out Lake Cowichan concert at the Laketown Amphitheatre on Aug. 9 as the they share the stage with The Glorious Sons and the Sam Roberts Band, he is certainly proud of how far they have come, and truly believes that their success didn't come from dumb luck, but from them sticking to their guns.
"Seeing how far they've come makes me feel really good for them," said Millar. "When it came to Ryan there was never a trace of doubt, he simply said Millar, we are going to be rock stars — and that happening, well you know the odds."
