I'm very pleased to see Rick Beato featuring Big Wreck's Ian Thornley on his YouTube channel. The word 'underrated' is bandied around a lot but the breadth of talent and musical knowledge Thornley possesses as a songwriter, vocalist and guitarist is immense. He's a Canadian rock treasure, but as he reveals to Beato, he really works hard at it and his live warmup sounds borderline punishing.
His vocal prep alone is two hours before each show – an hour less than his friend and Alter Bridge singer/guitarist Myles Kennedy but still significant. Indeed it was meeting Kennedy in the late '90s that seemed to inspire Thornley to step up his warmup game – and start using in-ear monitors.
