CREDIT: PHOTO COURTESY OF GRANT TAYLOR
The Salads will be returning to The Out Back Shack for New Music Night on April 4.

This Friday's edition of New Music Night is going to be a show to remember as veterans The Salads make their return to campus, in performance at The Out Back Shack with openers Mr. Tasty and The Riot Street Band.

The Salads formed in Newmarket, Ontario in the early ‘90s; a difficult scene in which to nurture a band. In Grade 7 at the time, guitarist Dave Ziemba and bassist Chuck Dailey formed the band with drummer Grant Taylor, and the group would undergo several configurations for their first few years, including the addition of front man Darren “Mista D” Dumas in 1999.

The band fought for every opportunity they could, finding success early in the new millennium thanks in part to the strength of their self-produced 2003 album Fold A To B — the record produced the singles “Get Loose” and “The Roth Kung Fu,” making a commercial impact in Canada and beyond. However, the musical climate was just beginning to change, and the band found itself among the first of a new generation left on the wayside by an industry floundering in the wake of the digital revolution.

“All of our showcases for major labels went great, but we kept being offered development deals,” recalled bassist Dailey. “This wasn't what we were looking for — we were presenting labels with a fully produced, finished product, complete with two videos funded and finished.”

It was a discouraging point to begin, but underlined the idea that the band would have to be their own driving force in order to see their vision realized the way they intended. Already responsible for producing their music and comfortable in their DIY roles, the band promoted themselves to great effect, and their accomplishments at the time are a testament to their determination.

Most recently, the band released Music Every Day in 2012, a return to the spirit that inspired them when they first began as teenagers. According to Dailey, their latest album reflects an outlook in the band that they hadn't seen in years, filtering out the struggles and influence of the industry and placing the focus back on the music.

“Fold A to B was written when life was a party and was written very collectively, we had no idea we had a hit on our hands,” he explained. “[With Music Every Day] we wanted to get back to having fun making music and that's it. Music saves us. This album was so full of laughs as we were making it — life is better now, our relationships as brothers are better now, but business is much slower.”

As an added bonus, the event falls on Dailey's birthday — the band is already excited about the potential that the night has to offer. “We plan to tear the roof off,” he laughed.

Given the gift of hindsight and experience, his main advice for bands going through the grind mightn't surprise you: put each other first; maintain the relationships within. “Don't water down your ideas for anyone,” he stressed. “Share ideas. Respect each other's ideas. Learn together, have fun together.”

For more on The Salads, visit thesalads.com or follow along on Twitter @thesalads. This Friday's edition of New Music Night is a free event, all ages with student ID 19-plus without and starts at 9 p.m. in The Out Back Shack.