Rheostatics - History - Later Years

Later Years

On August 31, 1997 the group performed a live session for the last episode of Nightlines, a music show on CBC Radio Two. Performances from this session were released on 1998's The Nightlines Sessions.

In 1999, the band released The Story of Harmelodia, an album based on a children's story written by Bidini. The album, which featured the band's songs interspersed with narration by Bidini's wife, Janet Morassutti, detailed the adventures of Dot and Bug, two children from the land of Harmelodia who fell through a hole into the land of Popopolis. The album was packaged with a book featuring Tielli's illustrated text of Bidini's story. Hearn and the band's frequent producer, Michael Phillip Wojewoda, contributed significantly to the recording and are listed as members of the band.

In 2001, Rheostatics released Night of the Shooting Stars on Perimeter Records. Though Kerr plays on the album, it was announced prior to its release that he would be departing from the band. The reasons given were his desire to focus on his work at Gas Station Recording Studios in Toronto, as well as his role in Ron Sexsmith's group. Kerr was replaced by Wojewoda.

In late 2001, the band revived their tradition of a week's club residency, formerly known as "Green Sprouts Music Week", and played 11 straight evenings at Toronto's Horseshoe Tavern. Performances from these shows were included on their sole DVD release, 2003's Maple Serum: Rheostatics Live at the Horseshoe Tavern. The event was dubbed the "Fall Nationals" and was repeated for the next three years. Performances from the 2004 Fall Nationals make up the album Calling Out the Chords, Vol. 1, released in 2005.

Their tenth and final studio album, 2067, was released in the fall of 2004. Their final studio release was an eponymous, digital-format track of the song "Pornography", released in late 2004. Both were put out by True North Records.

Two live albums followed in 2005, The Whale Music Concert, 1992 and the aforementioned Calling Out the Chords, Vol. 1, the latter being released in digital format only.

On March 30th of 2012, the fifth anniversary of the group's final show at Massey Hall, a live album, Green Sprouts Music Week 1993 was released. The album is a distillation and resequencing of material drawn from the band's first Green Sprouts Music Week, held from April 12 to 18, 1993 at Ultrasound Showbar in Toronto. Two singles, live versions of "Record Body Count" and "Woodstuck", were released in digital format and also sent to radio stations.