Fire & Grace

It seems people often have differing recollections of important events. Everyone has their perspective or a different point of view. Sometimes it's hard, even for trained eyes and ears to trace the roots of relationships or find the source of a fire. If you were a serious musical archaeologist or perhaps simply a curious person with a shovel, and you were in San Francisco's fog shrouded North Beach area, specifically on Columbus Ave. in the late-80s you would have been digging through the ash and sifting through the rubble of Bill Graham's venue known as Wolfgang's after the big fire. If you were lucky you might have found crucial evidence, tattered threads or charred clues hinting to the origin of Alliance. It was at Wolfgang's that long time Sammy Hagar drummer David Lauser and a bandmate, both recently set adrift from the positions they had graced for years until Hagar jumped to join Van Halen, came to see the Robert Berry Band perform. It seems Lauser, along with guitarist Gary Pihl and Gamma / Night Ranger keyboardist Alan 'Fitz' Fitzgerald were searching for an allusive missing piece for a new project they were plotting. There was a spark for sure. But would it become a flame or a smouldering match?