This Hicktown Rocks

              Norwood Ontario population 1300 (Okay it's more like 5000 but the sign which hasn't been changed in like 20 years says 1300). A town this small obviously gets the name "Hick town". We have one set of traffic lights, everyone knows everything about everyone and there's no Tim Horton's coffee shop! The Timmies is in the next Hick town over which is a 10 minute drive.
               But despite Norwood being a hick town that not many have heard of I'd like to let everyone know our little hick town produced 3 amazing rock bands. All 3 are known, all 3 are awesome and all 3 have roots in Norwood.

Three Days Grace: 

Three Days Grace not only makes great music they are very down to Earth People. Nothing pisses me off more than a celebrity who walks around like they are all "That". These boys come home. Brad Walst the Base player has a son who goes to the public school. Everyone knows them, talks to them as if they were just regular hometown boys and the best part is they act like they are right at home in this little hick town. They threw a benifit concert at the Community Center back in 2008 to help raise funds for the new community center. "My Darkest Days" Opened for them that night. "My Darkest Days" Is the other band that has Norwood roots and they have also become a successful band.
          Brad Walst, Adam Gontier and Neil Sanderson all have Norwood roots. The band was called Groundswell back in 1992 but they broke up. They then got back together, recruited Barry Stock as a guitarist and became Three Days Grace in 1997. Their first single was "I Hate Everything about you." they now have multiple hit songs. "Pain" "Never too late" "Just like you" just to name a few.

My Darkest Days:

My Darkest Days was founded by Matt Walst who is from Norwood and is the brother of Brad Walst the Bassist of Three Days Grace. Chad Kroeger (Nickleback) Heard them and  signed them to his record lable. Their first single hit was "Porn Star Dancing" after they were signed. Now that's the only Single they have so far that went national (They play some of their older songs on the radio in this area). This band is new on the scene but they are good and they are hopefully going to produce some more rocking music.
Check out "Porn Star Dancing" thier first Hit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2Fnet0y9Ts


Art Of Dying:
While this band was not established here in Norwood They do have a Norwood local as their Bassist. Cale Gontier. He's the cousin of Adam Gontier. Cale is also a bassist for Thronley. He was also Three Days Grace's Guitar Technician. So  adding Thornley to the list that technically makes 4 bands that have Norwood talent. Art of Dying plays songs locally at the Legion, Thornley and My Darkest Days have also played many gigs at our Legion. They can't seem to stay away from our Legion!The Legion is the only place in town that serves alcohol after 9pm so I don't really blame them.

 I reccomend checking Art Of Dying if you have not heard of them. They are a hard rock group, they sound great and have all around awesome music. I went through all their songs on youtube and I happened to liked them all."You Don't Know me"    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4NVrUSvTbI  Is a pretty good song. Click the link and check it out.

I'd go through how these 3 (plus more) bands are connected but I'm too lazy to do the reasearch to tell you which band members switched bands or started new ones or whatever. All I can say is Norwood is definately the roots of Three Days Grace and has produced talents in My Darkest Days as well as Thornley and Art Of Dying. Norwood doesn't have any other known bands of other genres (That I am aware of) But it's still good to know that Norwood produces good Rock stars and not Justin Biebers :D
   Oh and for those who still don't know where the hell Norwood is, it's located East of Peterborough Ontario right before Havelock Ontario (Home of the biggest red neck country music convention in Canada...the Havelock Country Jambouree).  You drive right up Highway 7 and it'll go right through Norwood. But people don't stop here because Havelock has the Tim Horton's and we do not. But We have great Rock Stars so HA! Screw you Havelock Ontario!