Jeff Waters

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Jeff Waters : biography

February 13, 1966 –

Career with Annihilator

Waters formed the band Annihilator in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada in 1984. He wrote and recorded the song "Annihilator" (not to be confused with their 1994 song of the same name) with singer Big John Bates. This original version of Annihilator was released on the special edition of the 2005 album, Schizo Deluxe.

Waters has frequently changed Annihilator’s line-up over the years. During the early era of the band, his goal was to produce a stable line-up. However, members left for a multitude of reasons such as family issues, substance abuse and work commitments. Due to these rapid line-up changes, Waters has taken on the role of bass player, engineer, producer and writer as well as guitar player. After some time, Waters began to embrace the idea of working with many other musicians, and has recruited permanent vocalist Dave Padden as well as a revolving touring line-up. Jeff Waters has performed lead vocals for three of the band’s studio albums and on the songs "Holding On" from 2004’s All for You, "Too Far Gone" from the 2005 album Schizo Deluxe and "Operation Annihilation" from 2007’s Metal.

Annihilator has been touring prominently Europe and Asia since 1989. Despite not touring and receiving virtually no press or label interest in Canada and the USA, Annihilator has become one of the biggest selling Canadian Metal band of all-time, yet the majority of their sales have been generated from Asia and Europe. Most of Annihilator’s discography is hard to find in the band’s home country of Canada. Waters has been quoted as saying: "I live a few blocks from the Ottawa Citizen newspaper. One day, a few years ago (2005) I contacted the Entertainment editor by email and introduced myself, gave him links to our web site and info, and asked if he might spare a few minutes to talk with me about the band, as I live a few minutes walking from his office. He told me to mail him a CD and he would consider reviewing it. He didn’t. It actually made me a bit sad, as I have been waving the flag for Canadian metal and Canadian music for over 21 years abroad and also have sold more than any other metal band from this fine land. Yet I could not even get a review or interview with our nation’s capital newspaper, when local artists with no deal and no CD releases, were actually getting full page or front page stories. The last thing I needed was coverage in Ottawa but I thought, out of principle, I should try. Shot down in flames! Ha!"

Early life

Water’s father was in the military and his mother was a teacher. His family had houses in Ottawa and Camp Borden, Ontario as well as London, England. He took some classical and jazz guitar lessons at a young age.