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Singer-songwriter Maren Ord has been writing and recording with Guess Who guitarist and solo artist Randy Bachman. Her new management is shopping the demo to record companies, along with an electronic press kit.
"I'm really excited about this next album. I have enough songs for the next record. I really think that it will be a hit, if I have anything to do with it," laughs Ord, who is no longer signed to either the label or management side of Vancouver's Nettwerk Productions.
Gary McDonald, former head of radio and club promotion at Nettwerk Productions, who left to start his own company, Frontside Productions, started managing her earlier this year. "We had worked quite closely together," says Ord. "He would always tour with me. He's brilliant."
After recording her demo, Ord spent two days in Vancouver shooting an EPK (a press kit on video), which features interview footage, music videos from her 2001 Nettwerk debut, "Waiting," as well as some of the new material.
The Edmonton native, who is of the Mormon faith, recently moved back to Calgary after spending the past year living and performing in Utah. "Waiting" was originally issued regionally in America in November 2000, on Salt Lake City Mormon label, Highway Records.
The eighth of 10 children, Ord, now 22, got her start in the music business touring with her family's band, the Ord Family Singers, before embarking on a solo career at age 16. In 1999, she won a talent search on Edmonton's Power 92 station, and later was invited to perform a couple of dates on Sarah McLachlan's female concert fest Lilith Fair.
Before her teens had ended, Ord had signed a publishing deal with Sony/ATV Music, and record deals with Nettwerk in Canada and Capitol for the rest of the world. That's when she piqued the interest of Bachman, before he had even heard any music.
"I read about her about two years ago, that she was this great voice and has been singing since she was really young, and from a musical family, and that she had been signed by Terry McBride and Nettwerk, and I thought, 'Wow, 'I'd love to work with her,'" Bachman recounts.
"I've got daughters her age. I've got eight kids so I can write for any age. I'm still involved with my kids' music because they come and play me this, 'Listen to this dad.' 'Take me to this concert.' So I'm with kids in the mid teens to early 30s."
But Bachman didn't contact Ord at that time. The impetus came from a member of Tonos, a song pitching website formed by David Foster and Carole Bayer Sager, through which one can submit songs for certain artists. Bachman was short-listed for a few, such as Baha Men and Faith Hill, and received congratulatory emails from other Tonos members. One recommended he connect with Ord.
"'You're of the same thought, the same religion. You have the same kind of gift from God - you're making music' - and he gave me her email," Bachman recounts of the Finland-based American whose name escapes him. "So I emailed (Maren) and her mom, and her mother knew who I was and we connected with them," says Bachman.
"My daughter was graduating BYU (Brigham Young University) in April. I went down to Utah and had another daughter getting married, who's also at BYU, and I met Maren down there. Her manager sent me her CD, but it missed me in the mail by the time I left, so I never heard anything from her. I had only heard of her reputation."
He describes the first meeting as nothing short of "incredible," yielding several songs in a matter of days, all co-writes with Ord, his wife, Denise McCann, and himself. "So we met with her cold and she came with an acoustic," Bachman recounts. "I said, 'Sing me something. Sing me the last song you wrote' and she just let it blast, like she was onstage. There were no inhibitions.
"Some (artists) would go, 'Oh, I have a sore throat or my guitar's out of tune or this isn't very good,' you know, start making excuses. She just blew me and Denise off our chairs. We were sitting in the hotel and then she played me another song and we went, 'Wow, this is great.' Gave her a few ideas and the songs just poured out."
Says Ord, "There's something wonderful about putting together two songwriters, one who has extensive experience like Randy and one who's just starting out but has ideas. There are some songs that I don't think I could have written on my own if he hadn't have helped me with certain ideas and certain feels."
Bachman was particularly excited about a song that they originally called "My Girlfriend's Boyfriend," but has since been retitled "Pretty Boy."
"She came a few minutes late," relates Bachman, "and was apologizing all over the place and said, 'You know, I've got this girlfriend and her boyfriend's giving her trouble. And I said, 'There's a song title.' And she said, 'what?' And I said, 'My Girlfriend's Boyfriend.' So we wrote this song."
Bachman sings a line -- "'My girlfriend's boyfriend's not too hot' -- whatever it is. And in the end, when they break up, she's advising her girlfriend - 'This guy's no good for you,' - but she really wants the boy. 'So now my girlfriend's boyfriend is all mine,' he sings again. "That's the last payoff line. It's a really cute song, early Beatlesque. She really delivers a powerful vocal. It's really aggressive punk rock.
"I was amazed," he adds. "I even got her CD and listened to it and it's kind of gentle (and) mild, (but) she's playing me stuff by Dashboard Confessional, so I go get that CD and go get Evanescence, which I absolutely love."
Bachman and McCann invited Ord and her family to come and stay in their guesthouse on Salt Spring Island in B.C., where he could record the songs with her at his home studio, and write some others.
Ord, her mother, and two of her sisters, spent six days there in August. They cut "Life Is A Train" and "Pretty Boy" from the Utah writing sessions, plus two new ones, "Not Today" and "Hiding Place."
"It would probably be considered a rough demo, but it's really tight," says Ord. "He played electric guitar and bass. We did have a drummer for a couple of songs, but it was after I left. I would love for (Randy) to produce the album."
Last week, while performing in Utah, Ord also recorded a Christian hymn, "Abide With Me," for an independent film by Halestorm Entertainment, entitled The Work & The Stories.
She plans to continue playing as much as possible and continues to write.