Outside of the very top strata of melodic hard rock acts there are few more popular and enduring names than Harem Scarem.
Formed in Toronto, Canada by singer and guitarist Harry Hess and lead guitarist Pete Lesperance way back in 1987, they have since sold more than a million records worldwide. For reasons for that we’ll get into, the band didn’t become as big or famous as the elite stadium-conquering American bands that preceded them – Foreigner, Journey, Toto, Boston, Survivor, Styx – but over the course of almost 40 years and 16 studio albums they have carved a career founded upon a different type of success.
In late April this year, Harem Scarem played a packed-out show at The Underworld in London. From start to finish and in sweltering conditions (the air conditioning was broken) lyrics of songs including Hard To Love, Slowly Slipping Away, If There Was A Time and Sentimental Blvd were sung back at them at top volume by 500 word-perfect disciples who had travelled from far and wide to be there. It was an extremely moving spectacle.
Listen to a record like Mood Swings, Harem Scarem’s second album, from 1993, and it’s difficult to rationalise that this band didn’t become huge. Then again, all of their achievements were accomplished the hard way. Early momentum had brought the band a major-label contract with the Canadian arm of Warner Brothers which lasted 11 years, but in certain regards it proved more of a curse than a blessing.
“We always had a good relationship with the label, but not only did Warner not release any of our albums in the United States or the UK, nobody ever put a string of dates together for us in America,” Harry Hess explains.
When it’s suggested that such a scenario is mind-boggling, Hess smiles and nods in agreement. “For a band like us, that’s ridiculous,” he says. “We were doing well in Asia and pockets of Europe, but there are so many rock fans in America… and even now we don’t play there. We’ll do Monsters Of Rock cruises and strange one-offs when they’re offered, but nothing that would allow us to build something.
“Had somebody told us when we were in our thirties that we needed to get in a van and drive across America to build our name, it’s something we’d have considered doing – of course we would. But nobody ever did.
“You sign that deal at nineteen, and by the time you’re thirty the best years of your career are gone,” he continues. “That’s not to say there’s no runway for what comes later on, but as we all know, rock music is a young man’s game.”
Timing also played a part: Mood Swings was released just as Nirvana lit the fuse on the grunge explosion.
“It didn’t help that we sounded and looked like a band from the eighties, which of course we were,” Hess says. “In some ways you could say it’s a miracle that we even had a career at all.”
So extreme was the witch hunt that took place during the grunge era, and afterwards, that during the 90s the band changed their name from Harem Scarem to Rubber in a bid to distance themselves from a style of music that had become terminally unfashionable.
“At that point we were a little bit lost,” Hess admits. “It was kind of poison to look and sound the way we did, and we were willing to consider a change.”
Harem Scarem’s heads were turned when an A&R executive informed them that he had played a track to a radio station without revealing who it was by, and they loved it. With a shake of his head, Hess says: “But when he revealed who the song was by, they replied: ‘No, we won’t be playing that.’ And a light bulb went on in our heads: ‘Holy shit, that’s what this is about – perception.’ Radio doesn’t want a hair band from the eighties, they’re chasing the next big thing. So we went along with the record company’s idea for the last two albums of our spell with them. And in retrospect, it caused even more confusion.”
Given the group’s longevity, it’s odd to think that the Underworld show was their first in London, although previously they had appeared at specialist melodic rock events like Firefest and The Gods Of AOR. If Harem Scarem have found their level in packed, adoring, sweaty clubs, then Hess is more than comfortable with that.
“At this point in our lives we are thrilled that so many people would turn up on a Monday night and make the show such a memorable experience,” he insists. “I don’t go down the rabbit hole at night thinking that fate treated us badly, not at all.
“Had we been around in the mid-eighties when Def Leppard were doing what they were doing then, things might have turned out differently. But I know I’m a lucky motherfucker to still be making music for a living, when so many talented people are destined to never get anywhere.”
Harem Scarem continue to make new music, and their latest album Chasing Euphoria was released a few months back. Reviewers still routinely compare them to the aforementioned Def Leppard, although once again Hess is pragmatic.
“That doesn’t bother me at all. Especially on our first record, I have tried to rip off Def Leppard – I admit it,” he says with a grin. “They hit me at a time I was getting into writing and production, and for me those albums they made with Mutt Lange were the best rock records that I could possibly imagine.
"To this day, the Def Leppard aesthetic is what great rock should sound like. It should be singable, with a great chorus and guitar solo, and sonically be larger-than-life. I wanted our band to be like that – and I still do.”
Chasing Euphoria is out now via Frontiers.
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