There have been countless documentaries and fictional narratives about a promising band on the precipice of success, only for it to fall through their grasp. Some of those movies, such as That Thing You Do! or Rise: The Story Of Augustines, are fantastic. While others, like Rock Star, are abysmal, and a handful are just mediocre. But, what if the band is little known and evidence of their existence is hard to come by?
Such is the case with the subject of Matthew Serrano’s Live From The Space Stage: A HALYX Story, the Disney created band HALYX. Riding off the success of Star Wars, Gary Krisel, a Disney Records producer, struck on the idea to create a futuristic rock band, thus combining that hit franchise with the arena rock stylings of KISS. The hope was that this band could fill a niche at the park, not just with the sci-fi crowd, but with the teenage rock-loving demographic, that was not the theme park’s bread and butter.
“…create a futuristic rock band, thus combining [Star Wars] with the arena rock stylings of KISS.”
The bassist, Roger Freeland, was the pseudo-Chewbacca with a panda-esque face, called a Baharnoth. The keyboardist, Thom Miller, drove onto the stage on a golf cart decked out to appear as a giant robot and its computer. The Waag is an acrobatic frog-like creature performed by Tony Coppola. Drummer Brian Lucas wore a strange, golden (?) hooped costume, and Jeanette Clinger was the backup singer. Guitarist Bruce Gowdy came out in a leather ensemble. But, the backbone of the band was lead singer Lora Mumford, who wore an instantly recognizable red-leather jumper and gold pants.
Other names bandied about for the band included Strike and Starfire, the latter of which made it all the way to concept art designs. However, the origins of the name HALYX seems to have been lost to time. But, with the band assembled, notable composer and producer Mike Post was brought in to help write the tunes. Then in the summer of 1981, in the Tomorrowland section, on the Space Stage, HALYX began playing shows.
"…evident that the filmmakers wish to do justice to the big-little band's history..."
