Campbell Riverite goes from local mascot to Trooper drummer

Campbell Riverite goes from local mascot to Trooper drummer

Published 4:30 pm Thursday, July 2, 2026

Clayton Hill, along with Trooper bandmates Gogo (keyboards), Scott Brown (bass), Steve Crane (guitar) and Paul Laine (vocals/guitar) brought their all for a record Canada Day 2026 crowd at Ostler Park. (Kari Fredheim/Campbell River Mirror)

CRTV Channel 10 often had local musicians perform. Clayton Hill played for the local station several times during his high school years. (Clayton Hill/Contributor)

Clayton Hill drummed for Campbell River’s Big Rock in the 1980s along with brothers David and Steve Hillis. (Clayton Hill/Contributor)

Trooper’s Clayton Hill during his solo at the Campbell River Canada Day 2026 celebrations. (Kari Fredheim/Campbell River Mirror)

“I’ve never played a Trooper song in my life and I’d rather keep it that way.”

That’s what Clayton Hill told a bandmate during a 2006 fill-in gig in Quesnel, moments before floundering his way through the classic rock staple We’re Here for a Good Time (Not a Long Time). Less than a day later, he got a phone call on his Nokia that would change his life, an invitation to audition as the new drummer for Trooper, one of Canada’s most enduring rock bands.

Hill’s path to the drum kit began almost by accident. As a young boy, he broke his leg and spent more than a year recovering while it healed. During that time, someone gave him a set of bongos. He didn’t come from a musical family, he said, but the instinct to play took hold early.

“I didn’t know anything about music,” Hill said. “It’s intuition. I mean, you don’t know why you’re going to grab wooden spoons to hit them on various surfaces.”

The turning point came at a family party, where he found a drum tucked away in a closet and dragged it out to play. Not long after, his family relocated to Lions Bay, then Campbell River.

It was then that his drumming began in earnest.

He credits brothers Dave and Steve Hillis, who played in the band Big Rock, with teaching him the fundamentals. They discovered he was playing his kit backward, unaware there was a correct way to set up for a right-handed player. Hill said he was about 11 or 12 at the time.

“There’s no such thing as a left-handed drummer,” Hill recalled being told, as Steve Hillis rearranged his hi-hats and toms. Eventually, Hill learned to play in a crossover style, a skill Hillis pushed him to develop.

Campbell River became the backdrop for Hill’s earliest performances. He played in local bands throughout his teenage years, including gigs at venues around town and even sang an original song, “My Sweet Julie,” in front of his entire school at Discovery Passage. Hill also spent two summers as the beloved salmon mascot, Mr. Tyee, earning $5 an hour under the costume’s fins. By high school, he said, he knew exactly what he wanted.

“I knew from grade eight, when Big Rock was starting to go, that’s all I want to do,” Hill said. “I just want to be a drummer in the band.”

He went on to play throughout the region and beyond, cutting his teeth in a series of bands before eventually moving to Vancouver to pursue music full time.

Hill’s route to Trooper ran through years of steady work in bands across Western Canada, including a stretch performing a Buddy Holly, Elvis Presley and Roy Orbison tribute show that took him across the country and overseas to the United Kingdom. By his early 30s, he said, the music scene was shifting dramatically and gigs were becoming harder to find.

In the summer of 2006, the day after the show in Quesnel, Randy Bergner, a former bandmate turned Trooper’s tour manager, phoned Hill out of the blue to say the band was searching for a new drummer and had thought of him.

“I said, ‘You have no idea what I just said about 10 hours ago,’” Hill recalled telling Bergner, referring to his botched attempt at playing a Trooper song the night before.

Hill accepted the opportunity and had to quickly learn 26 Trooper songs ahead of his first show in Port Alberni. He said the transition was not without its struggles. He nearly walked away during his own audition after wrestling with an unfamiliar drum kit and a particularly intricate song intro.

“I could not for the life of me get through it,” Hill said of the opening to Baby, Won’t You Please Come Home. Bandmates and founding Trooper members Ra Maguire and Brian “Smitty” Smith talked him through it during a break and he stayed.

This September marks 20 years since Hill joined the band.

Decades later, Hill still returns to Campbell River regularly and the town remains deeply tied to his sense of identity. He said the town’s changes over the years are noticeable, but some familiar landmarks remain, offering a sense of continuity.

On this visit, Hill stopped at favourite spots and chatted with friends. He said revisiting these places has become a ritual whenever his tour schedule brings him back.

Looking back on his career, Hill said he still finds himself drawn to the same instincts that first pulled him toward a drum kit as a kid, a desire to keep playing … and to keep coming home.