William Mullin: Lennoxville’s golden voice
I’m sure many of us would like the chance to go back in time and see the popular band Moonshine fronted by local talented singer William Mullin in action. Mullin has this warm and powerful voice with an extensive range, versatile enough to cover almost anything.
The singer was born in Sherbrooke and was raised on Sanborn Street near Wellington in Sherbrooke, but he has been a resident of Lennoxville for many years now. His father was from Fredericton, NB while is mother came from St.prospere de Beauce. Mullin had two siblings, a brother and a sister.
His brother Eldon played guitar with the band The Hoot Hooters while his nephew, Eldon’s son Curtis is according to Mullin a very talented musician. Music is something that was part of the family genes.
Mullin’s singing voice was exceptional, a God given gift for sure but he was not aware of it as a kid. But somewhere down the road, something was bound to happen to reveal this unknown talent.
“I started liking music at the age of ten. We use to have singing classes at St Patrick’s school, I guess the music teacher liked the way I sang because she sent me to practice with the school choir and bang, I ended up being the solo singer. I found it pretty cool,” he said in an interview from his home.
Back then, St-pat’s had a ‘Green Candle campaign’. This was one of the fundraising activities students did to raise money for their school. As a result of his participation it led the young boy to sing on CHLT-TV, a Sherbrooke television station.
Mullin loved this nerve-wracking experience, but like most teenagers had other interests that kept him busy, so his connection to music came to a halt.
“Time went by and I just stopped singing, got into sports. It wasn’t before I was in my 20s that I started singing again, on a dare, at the Queen’s Hotel downtown Sherbrooke,” explained Mullin.
The Queen’s Hotel was well-known for its many talent shows. Many young people got their first stage experience there, by entering their amateur hour or their popular jam sessions.
“There were bands jamming on a Saturday afternoon and I got up and sang a song with the guys, which led to singing in amateur contests on Wednesday and Friday nights. There was also the Sports club, which is where I met Julo Plourde, an all-time great drummer. He told me that if he started his own band, he wanted me to sing with them,” he said.
The drummer finally formed his band which included Jean Proulx on bass, Luc Lauzon on guitar and would feature William Mullin on lead vocal.
“Around 1978, Plourde gave me a call and that is when I got my chance to sing in a band. Proulx was a great bass player, but sadly Julo and Luc passed away not too long ago. We were just guitar, bass, drums, and me as a singer so we pushed hard on vocals. The name of the band was Moonshine,” Mullin recalled.
To focus on the band members’ ability to provide great harmonies allowed a much better delivery of their cover songs. It was a great idea and they worked hard to build their show on this current trend (three and four-part harmonies). It was the perfect road to success.
At the time there were many excellent and popular vocal groups on the American Country Music Charts and to be able to offer comparable achievement was a definite plus for a local band that wanted to reach a higher level of quality.
“We started doing a lot of Alabama, Exile, Oak Ridge Boys, because we had a very strong three-part harmony and we mixed that with CCR and other good bands and got our first job at Auberge Royale on King east,” he said.
Moonshine had been hired to replace a band for a couple of weeks. This two-week gig turned out to be the chance that would make Moonshine so popular and successful.
“They hired us to fill in for the band they fired, so it gave us two weeks but the problem was we had only 28 songs. We had a lot of special requests. Than bang… we ended up staying at The Auberge seven months in a row, so trust me we learnt about four new songs a week,” he said of all the work involved at the beginning.
After that extended stay, Mullin and the drummer went and booked the band in six different bars which meant work every weekend (two or three nights) for a whole year. Although they invested a lot in their vocals, they didn’t neglect the music part. Every member of the band was an accomplished musician.
They became the most sought-after band in the region and they probably would have been able to play seven days a week if it weren’t so demanding since they all had daytime jobs. Back then of course, bars were very busy and the ‘in place’ to go.
“For the next eleven plus years we played every weekend and stopped only one month. It was a ride and we had fun in the good old days in bars,” Mullin said.
After Moonshine, Mullin was part of another band named Intro with Michel Bedard and his sister Marie Josée, Julo Plourde and Bruno Bergeron and they kept going for years. He didn’t play any instrument, his voice was in itself a well-tuned instrument.
Peers and fans still talk about Moonshine today as they were an outstanding band, very much in demand and appreciated. William Mullin has for his part been seen as Lennoxville’s golden voice and many fans would just love to see him back on a stage, where he belongs.
“For 33 years I sang. I loved it, enjoyed it, the only regret I have is that I never learned to play an instrument. I regret that very much today. My most memorable souvenirs would have to be the Moonshine days, but honestly it was all good. I hung up my vocal chords in 2001. My health wasn’t good and the bar business couldn’t afford to hire big bands anymore. Of all these years there is one thing I would like to say from the heart and it is thank you to all our followers, it was a fun time, today is different. Again, thank you” he concluded.