The Storm is one of those overlooked groups that nobody has heard of, yet they constitute an important part of Journey’s history by means of association. Indeed, The Storm can be said to be the third successor to Journey (the second being Bad English). In order to understand how all of these bands are interconnected, one needs to be familiar with the members.
A founding member of both Santana and Journey, Gregg Rollie left the latter band in the early 80’s, citing musical differences with the direction the band was moving in. Now on his own for the first time in his musical career, he waited until the late 80’s, watching Journey rise to superstardom before a seeming break up after the Raised On Radio tour. He had his own idea to resurrect the spirit of Journey in the form of The Storm, deciding to write songs inspired by his years sharing the vocal lead with Perry. To do this, he recruited Journey’s drummer Steve Smith, as well as their bassist, Ross Valory. He then hired guitarist Josh Ramos, who listed Journey guitarist Neil Schon as one of his inspirations, and recruited tenor singer Kevin Chalfant, who had previously sang with radio rockers 707, scoring a #12 hit album with them.
Signed onto Interscope Records in 1990, the group began putting together their first album, the self-titled debut. It was released in 1991 and immediately grabbed radio attention with hits “I’ve Got A Lot To Learn About Love” and “Show Me The Way” respectively, earning the band an award for having the most added songs to radio play during this period. They went on tour supporting the likes of Brian Adams and Eddie Money for a time, but despite how promising things seemed for the band, things where not to last.
The Storm essentially became victims of Rock’s decline in the face of Rap. Disregarding the band’s successes, they were dropped from their label before they could release their second album, as Interscope Records had moved away from their AOR sound in favor of mainstreaming the urban beats that where becoming popular during the late 90’s. The Storm’s debut album quickly went out of print. In 1993, their second album, Eye Of The Storm was released under-the-radar by a different label, but by then the thunder had gone out of their sails and it received little to no attention before also going out of print.
Not ones to let this get them down, they began to seriously consider replacing Journey. For a brief period of time, this was practically so, with Kevin Chalfant replacing Steve Perry on tour for a number of shows. However, this was also short lived, as Steve Perry expressed interest in getting the “quintessential” lineup back together for the Trial By Fire reunion in 1996. Left in the lurch, the remaining members of The Storm went their own separate ways.
Today, Kevin Chalfant is involved in his own projects, including his own record label, Clique Records. Gregg Rollie and Josh Ramos both went on to form other bands and record solo projects. Despite their two albums being out of print for close to a decade, bassist Ross Valory has arranged very well priced re-issues through his website,
www.rossvalory.com.