ARTISTS
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One part Seattle, one part Bay Area and one part Northeast, the group came together in Los Angeles in 2007 and honed their skills playing the local college scene before heading up and down the West Coast, booking, producing, and headlining their own gigs. After recording some demos with Jerry Harrison--a former member of the Talking Heads and Modern Lovers--2AM Club played a now-legendary four-month residency they called "Tiny Porno" at the Derby in L.A., and word quickly spread that it was the place to be: "We wanted to create an environment that wasn't like the typical L.A. promotional circuit," says Sauce. "We wanted something raw, sweaty, dark, and disgusting. It turned into a huge thing."
2AM Club's shows never fail to explode with energy, heightened by the hyperactive musical tango between Tyler and Marc's vocals, and the way that the band--named for a beloved Bay Area bar known for being a welcoming chill spot for a random assortment of locals--honor their moniker by making their shows an all-inclusive, unpretentious good time for all who attend.
"Our idea has always been to try to break down the fourth wall," says Tyler. "A lot of bands play for the audience while the audience just stands there. We wanted a different dynamic. Everybody's in the room and we're all listening to music, we should be experiencing it together. The Tiny Porno shows were crucial because they exploded with that kind of crazy energy."
With a buzz like that, it was only a matter of time before the labels came knocking, and 2AM Club signed with RCA Records in September 2008. Since then, they've relocated to NYC, where they've been sequestered in the studio with seasoned producers Sam Hollander and Dave Katz (Boys Like Girls, Katy Perry, Gym Class Heroes), recording tracks for their debut album. With live crowd-pleasers such as "Flashing Room" (a thumping, ode to sex that's a bit more than casual, featuring soaring 80s-esque synths, sly rock riffs, and a sky-high chorus), "Hurricane" (a seductive slow jam that unspools into panoramic pop), and "Let Me Down Easy" (which sounds like what might happen if Eminem body-slammed New Edition) already in the bag, expect rip-roaring rock riffs, punchy new wave-inflected synths, ass-shaking hip-hop beats, clever wordplay (exhibit a: "she left her cares on the bedpost, next to her lipstick and her Mentos"), and a dash of good old Motown-style soul. In other words, expect a record full of unique and entirely creative cuts that span a vast musical landscape.
While there may be touches of everyone from Prince to Maroon 5 to Justin Timberlake to D'Angelo in their DNA, the interplay between Marc's smooth singing voice and Tyler's effortless staccato flow makes 2AM Club sound completely fresh. They also lay strong emphasis on solid songwriting (an effort that involves the whole band), giving them a lyrical and melodic sophistication that's rarely seen in groups so young. 2AM Club's songs may be predominantly about sex and girls, nights out and lights out, but they're also inventive, intelligent, and shot through with real sentiment because they're written about things that are actually happening in the band member's lives.
"Pop music has been made for so long, a lot of it has obviously become cliché and hackneyed," says Tyler. "We're hoping that if we can make it a little bit smarter, we can take it somewhere new and cool and exciting. It comes down to a bigger idea of love and conflict and greatness and bullshit. I think most people can identify with that, but then on another level it's also just super dumb drunk party music--you can take from it what you will."
"I think we've all always wanted to be saying something with music," adds Marc. "That's why we started out in poetry slams and doing hip-hop. We may be making music that's more pop now, which has this overarching feeling of being catchy and melodic and cheeky, but we're hoping you can listen to it 20 times and still be taking something new away from it on a deeper level."
"In other words," says Matt, "we're hoping the album will be something you can play at a party, but that you'll also want to play after the party when you get home."
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Biography
One of the most accomplished performers of the last decade, Christina Aguilera has sold well over 25 million albums worldwide and cultivated a fan base that crosses generational, racial and gender lines. Now, segueing from the audacious sexuality of her second studio album, Stripped, the chameleon-like performer pays tribute to the music that has inspired her with the August 15th release of Back To Basics (RCA Records).
A modern take on vintage jazz, soul and blues from the 1920s, '30s, '40s and beyond, her third studio album is wildly inventive, whose throwback style creates a sound that's gritty and raw. The album reunites her with producer Linda Perry and offers new collaborations with producers such as DJ Premier. The upbeat first single, "Ain't No Other Man," will be world-premiered on the MTV Movie Awards on June 8 prior to its debut on June 12.
"This is a concept album that follows a bold vision," explains Aguilera. "The touchstones are Billie Holiday, Otis Redding, Etta James and Ella Fitzgerald - what I used to call my 'fun music' when I was a little girl."
The double album, Back To Basics utilizes an orchestra, choir, string quartet and jazz horns, as well as techniques that, according to GQ, "blends a vintage-soul sound with state-of-the-art beatsmanship to form a throwback/hip-hop showcase for her outsize voice." "I Got Trouble" incorporates a scratchy blues feel, while "Candy Man" recalls the tight harmonies of all-girl groups from the '30s and '40s "Save Me From Myself" is an emotionally naked, raw-sounding song dedicated to her husband. "Thank You," dedicated to her fans, features DJ Premier splicing bits of "Genie In A Bottle" with fan voicemail messages. Also sure to appeal to Aguilera fans is the risque song "Nasty Naughty Boy" (which has a '20s burlesque feel) and the sassy club track "Still Dirrty."
Aguilera's backstory is well-known. A native of Staten Island, the pre-teen began performing in local talent shows while growing up in Pennsylvania. In 1992, after appearing on "Star Search,"
She joined the cast of the Disney Channel's "The New Mickey Mouse Club." In 1998 Aguilera's song "Reflection" for Disney's Mulan led to a record deal with RCA and the release of her self-titled debut album in Summer, 1999. The album quickly hit #1 on the strength of its first dance/pop single, "Genie In A Bottle" (which dominated the charts for five weeks) and other chart toppers including "What A Girl Wants." It was a feat she would repeat the following year with Mi Reflejo, the smash Spanish-language version of her debut, followed by her hit holiday release, My Kind Of Christmas.
In 2001 Aguilera joined forces with Pink, Mya and Lil' Kim on the smash "Lady Marmalade" single and video. That eye-popping slice of ear candy kept her front and center in the international spotlight even as she began, slowly and steadily, to lay the groundwork for her second album, Stripped. Released in October 2002, it sealed her status as an international superstar while transforming her previous squeaky-clean image into a fully sexualized woman with lots on her mind. Along with the superheated funk of the album's provocative debut single, "Dirrty," came such standout tracks as "Beautiful," "Can't Hold Us Down" and "Make Over."
Earning her first of three Grammy Awards in 2000 for Best New Artist, her subsequent trophies came in 2001 for "Lady Marmalade" (Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals) and in 2003 for "Beautiful" (Best Female Pop Vocal Performance). Among countless other honors, she is also the recipient of a 2001 Latin Grammy Award for Mi Reflejo (Best Female Pop Vocal Album), a 2000 Billboard Music Award for Female Artist of the Year, and two 2004 Rolling Stone Music Awards (Best Female Performer, Readers' Pick; and Best Tour, Readers' Pick, "Justified and Stripped"). Voted Sexiest Teen Idol in a VH1 poll, Aguilera's beauty and charisma have also led Teen People to list her among its "25 Hottest Stars Under 25" and Maxim to crown her Best International Female Singer (2000), one of the Sexiest Women of the Year (2003) and #1 on their "Hot 100" List (2003).
Today, while devoting the lion's share of her time to recording and touring, the 25-year-old is active in a range of philanthropy. A major contributor to the fight against AIDS, Aguilera has participated in the "What's Going On?" cover project for AIDS Project Los Angeles' Artists Against AIDS. In 2004 she became the new face for MAC cosmetic company and spokesperson for the MAC AIDS Fund. More recently she became involved in awareness campaigns with YouthAIDS and ALDO. She also sponsors and is actively involved in the Women's Center and Shelter of Greater Pittsburgh for battered women and children.
For more information, please visit www.christinaaguilera.com.
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With her fourth album, All I Ever Wanted, Clarkson demonstrates her eagerness to continue branching out, and to push her music in new and unexpected directions. Though she has sold over twenty million records around the world; landed eight singles in the Top Ten; and won Grammys, MTV Video Music Awards, American Music Awards, and even been nominated for a CMA Award, she maintains that she's far more interested in challenging herself than in repeating herself.
Clarkson's enthusiasm is instantly apparent, even infectious, as she races to talk about each of the new songs. "A lot of it has a soulful, '70s rock vibe," she says, "and then some is more club/dance stuff-"'If I Can't Have You' is like the Killers-meets-the Eurythmics." But she also shows her softer, more emotional side with "If No One Will Listen" and her own composition, "Cry," which she says is "basically a country song with pop production, incredibly sad but still strong."
Clarkson points to the album's first single, the unforgettably titled "My Life Would Suck Without You" (produced by pop wizards Dr. Luke and Max Martin and written by the two with Claude Kelly) as an example of her need to personalize and connect with all of her material. "They write great catchy, sassy songs," she says. "But it became a very different song from how it started. We changed the point of view, and other things throughout, because we had to make it more Kelly Clarkson. And Luke and Max love that, because it's a challenge for them to make a song really work for me."
The album's defiant track "I Do Not Hook Up" comes courtesy of Katy Perry. "I've been a fan of hers since before 'I Kissed a Girl,'" says Clarkson. "And when I heard that song, it really felt like something I could have written myself."
She laughs as she describes "I Want You" and its surprising theme. "First, it's not a boy-bashing song, so that's already different for me," she says. "Plus, I wrote it, so that makes it even weirder!"
The range of All I Ever Wanted shouldn't come as a shock, though, considering the wild ride that Texas-born Kelly Clarkson has lived. She was, of course, catapulted into the spotlight in 2002 as the very first American Idol winner. ("Our show was so different from how it is now," she says. "Now there's all this pressure, all these comparisons, but we were just a bunch of kids that wanted to make music-"it was almost like performing in bars for ten people, like I used to.") Her superstardom was secured with Breakaway in 2005. That album sold over ten million copies, spun off five Top Ten hits, and stayed on the charts for two full years.
But the platinum-selling follow-up, 2007's My December, arrived surrounded by widespread rumors and speculation. Clarkson, for one, still doesn't know what the fuss was all about. "Really, it was a very positive experience," she says. "Mostly I learned about how people can twist things-"I've never met one artist that agreed with their label about every single thing, but people made such a big deal out of it. The label saw that I wanted to push the envelope, they let me make the record I wanted to make, and now I can make another one."
So when it came time to choose songs for All I Ever Wanted, Clarkson knew what she was looking for. "Ninety-nine per cent of the time, I'm a lyrics girl," she says. "I like the more melodic, formula stuff because I grew up loving pop music, but most of the time I'm totally about the lyrics and the message of the song.
"I could always sing all of these styles," she continues, "but I think only now am I getting more comfortable with the people I work with, and people are getting more comfortable with me, getting to know me and what I like."
She says that working with producers Sam Watters and Louis Biancaniello on "Whyyouwannabringmedown," which she describes as having "kind of a punk-British Invasion sound," was the album's turning point. "I sang that song through I don't know how many times, just because I was having so much fun," she says. "It was new and it was fresh and it didn’t sound like anything on the radio. And after that, I went to my manager and said that I wanted to make a really fun, feisty album, and just wanted to go all the way with every song."
Clarkson penned about half of the album, but it's hard to pin down her work as representing any single style. "My writing is all over the place," she says. "I do love writing sad, depressing songs-"that's definitely fun for me. But I'm very much a writer of whatever I'm going through, what I see in my life. And I'm 26, so I change every day!"
Mostly, she's excited to get back on the road and take the songs of All I Ever Wanted onto the stage. "Even when I'm recording, I'm always thinking about how I'm going to do a song live, what I'll be able to bring to it. I make records for touring-"it's my favorite part of what I do."
Through the highs and lows, the triumphs and controversies, Kelly Clarkson has retained, even strengthened, her love for all styles of music. With All I Ever Wanted, she's able to fully reveal how far that love extends. "This time, I wanted to show the extremes of what I can do," she says. "That's what keeps me interested, and keeps the audience interested.
"I never want to make just one sound," says Kelly Clarkson. "The worst thing to me is when all the songs on an album sound the same. If you have that choice, why wouldn't you want to bring out all the different sides and colors of your personality?"
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Use any measurement you like - in an era of digitized, customized-shuffling music = wallpaper styling's, Daughtry has almost single-handedly given the genre back its heart, resurrecting an endangered species via the bluesy swagger of "What I Want," and the image-shredding angst of "Feels Like Tonight,"; restoring its nomadic longing for place on "Home," its righteous indignation on "It's Not Over." With signature ache and poise, the North Carolina native blends each hard-won attribute into a rousing mosaic for the ages.The DAUGHTRY album is also forging unprecedentedsales and chart breakthroughs- affirming there is still gold to be mined, thank God, with a rugged voice and passionate songwriting instincts.
Tom Petty once said such a primal connection between a musician on top of his game and his fans can be so strong 'you can actually hurt yourself up there and not know it.' But the kind of 'hurt' Daughtry has put on a famished music landscape is nothing short of astonishing: In just a few months of release, the celebrated disc has leaped more milestones faster and further than any rock debut in recent memory. Anointed as the quickest selling rock debut in Soundscan history, DAUGHTRY became the #1 top selling album in the country not once, but twice, after debuting at #2 in November, 2006, moving upwards of 300,000 copies in the first week alone.
Emboldened by a collection of arena-tempered anthems and hand-crafted gems, Chris formed a band around the foundry of songs that make up DAUGHTRY before any of the accolades rolled in hitting the road almost on instinct eager to share his hardscrabble journey - his emotional diary of sorts with who else but his fans. Secure enough to become a passenger on such a revelatory train ride "You walk through a lot of doors for a moment like this," he says "I'm enjoying every minute," - he has personified the heart and soul of this elusive rock allegory without sacrificing one combustible ion of his authenticity. A trait that has always been his calling card whether writing, singing, performing or bonding with his newly minted band with whom he also shares his success.
Scanning well over a million individual tracks digitally since DAUGHTRY's debut, Chris always knew the secret of his connection with his fans was widening the circle surrounding his music no matter what medium of transfer. Whether he was interpreting other artists material or his own, his razor-sharp instincts told him the right band could take such a bond to even greater heights. "I'm a tough music fan myself. I'm not swayed easily, but one of the things I've always loved about great bands is you feed off of each other's confidence, build on each other's strengths and create an opportunity for something magical to happen every time you go out there," he notes. Daughtry is living proof of that edict, garnering rave reviews on the road, locking down what quickly became 2007's must-see show: 'Daughtry clearly connects with the audience and it would seem to be only the beginning' raved the San Francisco Chronicle.
What a beginning: The double-platinum juggernaut that is Daughtry has hovered in the Top 5 of the Billboard Top 200 Albums since its release, the first album since the 2006 phenomenon High School Musical soundtrack to log more than 9 weeks among the Top 3 albums, and the first rock band to achieve such a streak in the first 15 weeks of release since Creed in 2002. Daughtry is also the first rock band release in nearly 20 years - since Bon Jovi's 1988 classic New Jersey - to hit the top spot after debuting below #1.
Such flirtations with history are even more amazing when you consider how seamlessly Daughtry has engrained itself in the digital domain, pulling in over one million page views per week to their artist site www.daughtryoffical.com, with their album remaining a Top 10 staple on itunes since it's release. The debut single "Its Not Over," has conquered every digital, mobile, radio and video platform imaginable, parking at or near the top of every major music industry metric including #1s on the Adult Top 40 chart, on the Hot AC chart, the Billboard Top Singles chart. The video reigned at the top of VH1's enormously popular Top 20 Countdown show for two months running, as well as garnering most played status on MTV.
"The way it all has unfolded is everything an artist could ever ask for," says Chris. An understatement when you consider the challenges he laid down for himself before approaching the debut effort. "I knew going in that the album, the band, all of it had to start from my own vision. I've always known who I am and what kind of sound I wanted to get across, yet I never wanted to dictate any sort of path."
If it sounds tricky, consider the caliber of writers and musicians he huddled with to craft the creative dimensions of the debut album. Daughtry enlisted a hand-picked cadre of unique and respected rockers who inspired his own song craft, sonic mentors - soon to become peers - who were already part of his own interior experience. Talented collaborators like Brent Smith of Shinedown, Mitch Allan of SR-71, and Hinder producer Brian Howes. Throw in the fact that Chris enjoined each of them in furtive writing sessions while on the road on a previous tour, and you have a recipe for a project that still might have gone down the rabbit hole very quickly. "Looking back now," says Chris, "Sure, it was risky, but I never had the feeling that I was heading creatively somewhere where I shouldn't have been going."
Produced by Howard Benson (My Chemical Romance, All-American Rejects), the album thoroughly mines Daughtry's instinctive ability to get to the essence of a song, tapping into a sixth sense he possesses for delivering accessible music that also manages to remain uncompromising. Whether it's the proven "It's Not Over," or the probing "All These Lives," or another song that takes on a life of its own, the plaintive "Home," (which has found its own home as the contestant elimination theme on this year's 'American Idol'), the Daughtry thread of extending boundaries, not shrinking from them, runs through every verse. "I've never believed a song has to have a rock edge, or be part of one particular genre to be viable," he adds. For "It's Not Over," which he collaborated on with Greg Wattenberg (Five For Fighting), it was the subject matter that moved him. "That idea that you keep doing the same thing thinking you are going to get a different result, still you keep trying."
It's been Chris' own willingness to pivot in the face of expected music industry protocol that has fueled most of his success, the same ethic powering the equally charged band Daughtry. The players: bassist Josh Paul from LA, drummer Joey Barnes from North Carolina, guitarist Brian Craddock from Virginia, and guitarist Josh Steely from San Diego all complement and calibrate the front man, embodying the kind of seasoned give-and- take not usually associated with a new band. Chris knew he had to commit to an intense audition process right from the start, determined to achieve that crucial bond between members. Daughtry zeroed in on the interpersonal chemistry and musical compatibility of the guys who would eventually eat, sleep and breathe DAUGHTRY 24/7.
"The guys have worked out beyond even what I had envisioned. We've even been able to do some acoustic shows together because of the stage considerations, rolling with the punches on the road like a band does, and that's been such a revelation - and so much fun, as well."
As always, Chris brings it back to the audience, whether talking about the live experience or the millions of supporters for DAUGHTRY around the world that have helped carve the unprecedented trail they've blazed as a debut rock band. "It's such a blessing to receive all the great feedback and affection from the fans," he says.
"The online intensity, the way they sing along at our shows, the radio and video support - I don't think the average person understands how crucial it is for a band to know you've got that net underneath you. To start out as a fan with a dream, and then to go from a struggling musician with the same hopes and aspirations as so many others and to be able to fulfill some of those dreams, well, I feel like we're all part of this incredible movement. I'm so aware of what it took to get here. I can't help but appreciate what an honor it is to keep it rolling."
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When this most recent season of "American Idol" began, Cook wasn't on anyone's radar to win the whole thing - including his own. "I like that I 'snuck up' on people," he says. "During those early shows, when there were 24 people, I knew I didn't have to be one of the best, but I didn't want to be one of the worst. So it was fun for me because there wasn't a lot of pressure and I could find my own footing."
Cook won fans with his unique renditions of songs like Lionel Richie's "Hello," Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean" and the Beatles' "Eleanor Rigby." He explains, "When I began, I told vocal coach Debra Byrd I wanted the season to be like a set list, so people would feel like they were at one of my concerts."
Cook's musical journey began early. He grew up watching his father play guitar. But David's first instrument of choice was the violin. "I tried that first because there was a girl in the school orchestra I thought was pretty." When he was in seventh grade, his dad bought him a Fender Stratocaster. "I was bad at it because I never took a lesson. Gradually I got better."
He was exposed to many different genres of music. "My parents had eclectic record collections. My mom liked Kenny Rogers and my dad was more into Boston, Kansas and Dire Straits. The first cassette tape I ever bought was by Kris Kross. I was into Boyz II Men for a while. When I was 13, someone played me the song 'Closer' by Nine Inch Nails and once I got past the audacity of the lyrics, I really enjoyed the song. So I backtracked through rock, which got me to where I am now."
David formed a band in high school with a friend and appeared in three musicals: "West Side Story," "Singin' in the Rain" and "The Music Man." He also loved sports and played baseball throughout high school. Ultimately his love for music brought his attention back to his band. David enrolled at Central Missouri State, changed the name of the band from Redeye to Axiom to Axium and had some local success.
As he was completing his studies, David had to choose between working as a graphic designer in Kansas City or moving to Tulsa to play rhythm guitar and sing backing vocals for a band called the Midwest Kings. "Of course, I moved to Tulsa," he says. That's where he lives today, although home is officially Blue Springs, Missouri. The Cook family relocated there after David was born in Houston on Dec. 20, 1982.
With his friends chipping in financially, David recorded "Analog Heart." The album sold well regionally and won an URBY award from Urban Tulsa Weekly for Best Independent Album. David was in the early stages of recording a second album when his younger brother Andrew asked him to accompany him to Omaha and lend moral support while he tried out for "American Idol." David was reluctant, but his brother and mother did their best to persuade him. He recalls, "At the last minute I decided to do it. Andrew and I were in the same group of four for the first audition and he didn't make the cut. It was very awkward. I turned to him and said, 'Is this something you want me to do? Because if you don't, I won't.' And his response was, 'If you don't, I'll beat your ass.' So it's entirely his and my mother's fault that this happened to me, and I'm very grateful."
We all know how the story went from there. Simon, Randy and Paula sent David to Hollywood, where he made it into the top 24. Then he was in the top 12, the top 10, the top five and the top two, all without ever being in the dreaded "bottom three." Then, on May 21 at the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles, Ryan Seacrest pronounced David Cook the winner of this season of "American Idol."
It's all come with lessons learned, according to Cook. "The whole process has given me a brand-new lease on life in that I am more sure of who I am now that ever before. I've learned that when I'm singing live on stage to embrace that moment and if doesn't work, it's OK, move on."
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Look up British singer/songwriter Imogen Heap on the online music forum Myspace.com and scroll down to the 'Sounds Like' box. Sounds Like No other - reads the pithy, but accurate description.
In fact, truer words have never been written about the hypnotic vex of songs on her stunning second solo album Speak For Yourself. From her earliest memories of improvising at the piano "it was the biggest toy that made the best and most noise" at home, hour after hour in the sleepy village just outside of London where she grew up to the electro-zen-like fugues she hears in her head when riding her bike through the streets of England's most fabled city, the classically trained, techno geekess, Imogen has always preferred a left-of-kilter soundtrack of her own making to any by-the-book-coda of pop music.
The stirring current of songs flowing through Speak For Yourself ripple with an alluring intimacy rarely found in the electro-inspired genre. "That's because, I like to believe I'm genre-less!" quips Imogen "I want for music to stimulate, excite and surprise me all over again" Whether it's the punctuated sounds, and halting breath filled silences in songs such as the angelic "Hide And Seek," or the bouncy "Goodnight And Go," or the subtly drum-tinged "Headlock", or the whispery "The Walk," it's clear Imogen is a slave to nothing but her own muse. Recorded in her East London studio "I've had a not so secret love affair with making music on computers since I was a teenager. Wouldn't it be great if in real life you could "delete" or "duplicate", "save" or "recall"? Or speak in many voices and languages at the pull down of a program?" she says Imogen utilized everything and anything at her disposal, from circuit bent children's toys, to carpet roll inner tubes to the rumbling soothages of passing trains. "There are many moments during the course of making an album where things don't go as planned - mostly gear misbehaving but gear can equally make some great sounds when it's in a mood!" The silver lining to some of these situations became "Hide and Seek" and "Headlock". Forced to use gear that was co-operating though perhaps needed a little dusting off!
An auteur in the truest sense of the word, even Imogen's previous music persona as the female axis with the alt-fave duo Frou Frou (with producer and longtime collaborator Guy Sigsworth playing the man - producer of Madonna, among others) garnered her a drawer full of comparisons to strong-female-solo types. But Imogen's knack for path-finding, revelatory soundscapes off the beaten path mirror her own zig-zag musical journey (she was a solo artist before joining Frou Frou only to fly solo again), as she's now poised for acceptance with a growing contingency of U.S. music fans.
After turning down major record label deals the fearless artist even re-mortgaged her London flat to finance her declaration of independence, but not before making several futile rounds to various financial institutions seeking their possible support "I traipsed my way round every bank but I couldn't get a loan," she says. "I had 10,000 on my credit card and I couldn't pay my bills. It seems banks and musicians don't get along too famously!" but just before despair could stick in its claws, Heap's luck changed. Clocking a "For Sale" sign outside her block of flats was, she says, like a little light bulb going on: "I couldn't help wondering just how much I could sell my flat to myself for."
The flat had almost doubled in price. With nothing to stop her now, Imogen took the cash out of the property and with money to burn purchased lots of sparkly new recording equipment on her 25th Birthday as a present to herself, She then set about making exquisitely personal and aptly titled Speak For Yourself in a burst of experimentation. As if that wasn't enough Heap then set up Megaphonic Records to release her most treasured possession in the UK.
"It was quite liberating, actually," she says. "Probably because I never had an opportunity to do a whole studio album at my own pace before-entirely on my own. So, at first, I was ignoring the piano, just having fun and playing with all my toys. But eventually I got back round to the piano, like on "The Moment I Said It.' Every sound you hear (aside from the strings) stems from the piano, but still I'm chopping things up." That kind of playfulness is a trademark of Imogen's heaping (no pun intended). Her mystical/whimsical harmony leaning over diverging threads of sound and melody, all of it bottlenecking into riveting vignettes that pique the imagination.
Ultimately, it would be due to such enigmatic captures and an often downright sultry vocal presence ('your music is touching to the max' blogs one online fan) combined with her intuitively tweaked musical arsenal - Piano/Vocoder/glitch-friendly samples, strings, harps, bells and drum machines - that would spark American record companies to come calling.
A serendipitous brush-up with the photogenic but angst-filled American TV soap, The O.C., furthered her mystique. The popular teen show, which has gathered an impressive musical resume in the past couple of years, (rumored to receive more than 400 music submissions per week) featured Imogen's glorious "Hide And Seek," on its Season 2 finale this past May (with "Goodnight And Go" being included on the soundtrack Music From The O.C. Mix 4), awakening a potential American fan base to the radiant atmospherics of Heap's repertoire.
"I'm eternally grateful to The O.C. for braving such an off kilter song to feature in that spot. The response to that episode has been amazing," says Imogen. "And I was ecstatic that suddenly, after putting so much of myself into this album and my transition to going solo again, I was going to be exposed to a whole new audience."
The warm reception of the music savvy O.C. audience was indeed immediate. In less than a week "Hide And Seek" moved from virtual obscurity to # 32 on Billboard's Hot 100 Download chart. Many more stateside fans started following her weekly blog on Imogenheap.com (affectionately referring to her as Immi) and set in motion a stream of requests for Imogen's music from other TV shows CSI and Six Feet Under among them - and movies (most recently on the Reese Witherspoon/Mark Ruffalo movie/soundtrack Just Like Heaven, for which Imogen contributed a cover rendition of the classic "Spooky" -once made famous by Dusty Springfield. And in 2004, Actor/Director Zach Braff personally selected the Frou Frou track, "Let Go," to appear on the grammy winning soundtrack to his movie Garden State. "My music lends itself to soundtracks, I think, because it is so layered and orchestrated. They feel and sound right at home on the big screen."
Ever since her mercurial 1998 debut, I Megaphone, and her 2002 Frou Frou collaboration with Sigsworth, the ethereal Details (Island Records), with its acclaimed cult single "Breathe In," Imogen has catalogued her dreamscapes through music. "I can't say I always wanted to be a rock star, but I've always expressed myself through music it's the easiest and most enjoyable way to lose myself. When I'm composing the best way I can describe it is when you know you're really on to something like when you're traveling home on a familiar route and you start to daydream then before you know it you find yourself at your front door searching for your keys and you've no idea how you got there, that's what happens to me when I'm creating on a good day."
Imogen is more than aware that time will be moving quite fast in the next several months. Touring is already scheduled (she's past opened up for diverse artists such as Rufus Wainwright, Coldplay and Norah Jones) and ever increasing notoriety beckons as critics and music fans familiarize themselves with the highly regarded Speak For Yourself, released to much acclaim in England this past July. "I'm interested in how people will categorize the album. Let's face it, everyone draws comparisons I do it myself." When asked to have a go at it, Imogen laughs. "I don't know.. more Donnie Darko than Dirty Dancing, more Absynth than apple juice, more 'where no man has gone before' than 'down the pub', more 'crop circles in the carpet' than 'climb the highest mountain'. I hope more likely that you've never heard anything like it before!"
"The album hosts the broadest spectrum of songs I've ever done. Just when you think it's going in one direction, it goes off down the road in another. I hope it sounds like I've had fun making it, because I did," she pauses for a second. "Very free is how I'd describe it."
"Wade in the sonic joy, Pleasure the wave and synchronize, Sway in the sonic joy" sings a cryptic Imogen. And no wonder. The girl just lives, breathes and loves making music!
9/05
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Stardate: Summer 2006. As these words are being written, Kasabian are jetlagged, but happy. Three days ago, they returned from Mexico City, where a disused supermarket full of saucer-eyed devotees treated them like returning heroes. "They even sang along to the keyboards in Processed Beats," exclaims Serge Pizzorno. And then when we did the new stuff. It was" Pizzorno is rarely lost for words. When he is though, here's Tom Meighan to pick up the baton "legendary. I've never felt a force like it."
Can a record be legendary before it has even come out? You might think you know Kasabian. After all, the dissolute Glimmer Twins of the post-Britpop firmament made no secret of their sources on that eponymous first album. A couple of years after Meighan and Pizzorno met in Leicester, aged 11, it was 1993 and Oasis were making the rock'n'roll dream seem like a goal attainable to a generation of schoolkids. Recorded at the now-mythical farm where they arrived for a party and never got around to leaving, Kasabian's eponymous debut bypassed most critics and connected dramatically with an audience that recognised them as one of their own just as Oasis had done with Meighan and Pizzorno in 1993.
'Kasabian' went double platinum plus in the UK and the band were the undisputed victors of last year's festivals, putting in bristling performances at Coachella, Glastonbury, Reading/Leeds, Lollapalozza and T In The Park. If a debut album is all about showing your influences, this is the point where Kasabian truly show us who they are. The first thing you'll notice about Empire is that no other band in the world could have created it. The confidence is perhaps understandable given the lack of fanfare with which they managed to quickly rise to 700,000 in UK sales and be hallmarked as "show-stealers" by the LA Times. But the scale of its vision though is something else entirely.
Asked a while back to describe the album's eponymous opener, Meighan's instant response was, "Marc Bolan smoking crack with Dr Who." "No other band apart from Radiohead would have the balls to put in a tempo change like that," adds Pizzorno. Under the circumstances, you decide it's impolite to tell him that Radiohead didn't get actually around to it until their third album. This time around the demonic amyl throb of Serge's electronic soundscapes feed into the very core of Kasabian's music. The flood of ideas is unstoppable. Propelled along by handclaps and Ian Matthews' inspired Studio 54 style drum fills, the filthy analogue glambience of Shoot The Runner is inescapable. Last Trip, appropriately, comes on like a postcard from the furthermost outpost of a 4am bender Meighan's brittle, anxious exhortations leading the way over an arrangement which recalls a beefier version of Suicide's primitive electro-pulse. Three songs in and Empire already sounds like an index of rock'n'roll possibilities.
"Did you like the strings?" smiles Meighan, running a hand through his newly acquired facial fur. He's talking about Sunrise, the point at which you realize Kasabian have, well set the controls for the heart of the sun. "It's hard to talk about that song without sounding arrogant. But it sounds royal. Do you know what I mean? Proud." Pizzorno elaborates. "It's just going that extra mile. The point about the strings is that they're not just there to fill out the sound. It's already huge by that point." It's not the first raga rock paean to lysergic love, you tell him, but at the same time it's hard to recall a rock'n'roll song on which Indian strings have deployed so sharply. "They're actually Moroccan ra players," he smiles, "Indian strings? It's been done, mate."
Where to from here? Just as Screamadelica and Dig Your Own Hole key chapters in Kasabian's back pages took you on a journey that was tantamount to an out-of-body experience, nothing can quite prepare you for the direction in which Empire heads. While much of Kasabian was forged in the crucible of an uncertain wider world, Empire is a more personal record. A memoir of two extreme years on the road in which the only constant was the friendships that created the band in the first place. A postcard from an unreal world. Placed right in the middle of it all is Aponea two minutes of misfiring jackhammer beats and febrile babble which, at a stroke turn the cocksure swagger of the previous songs outside in. "Aponea," explains Pizzorno, "is when you lose your breath in your sleep. And you panic." Venturing deeper into (if you will) the K-hole. By My Side and Stuntman are the first songs to suggest that even in the darkest hour, it might just be love that will pull you back. And so halfway through Stuntman, the familiar swagger of yore tentatively returns sleek, metronomic, sexy as fuck, haemorrhaging white noise until, by the end, that's all there is.
When it comes to taking the credit for their music, Kasabian rarely need to be encouraged. In this case though, they're swift to acknowledge the invaluable input of producer Jim Abbiss who, according to Meighan, "was very good at dealing with situations in the studio." Was that necessary? One imagines that when a double act like Meighan and Pizzorno disagree, they must really disagree. "Actually, we bicker," says Meighan, "But it's only ever when we're drunk. You know that Hot Chocolate song, It Started With A Kiss? Well, with us, it ends with a kiss, but starts with a bottle. But Jim kept our heads clear, so that there was no anxiety, like 'what the fuck are we gonna do next?'"
Presumably that explains why the bulk of Empire took just five weeks to record, with Kasabian writing new material right up to the wire. Coming right at the end of a record described by Meighan as "full of heart", British Legion and The Doberman seem to sum up the prevailing spirit, the latter featuring Morricone-esque brass and Chris Edwards' dynamic and hypnotic bass lines. When you've returned from the mellee punching the air to old and new faves like Processed Beats and Shoot The Runner, British Legion might insidiously end up being your favourite Kasabian song. When Pizzorno yes, Pizzorno this time sings, "She brings the light that catches me again" over delicately picked acoustic guitar, it sets off a Mexican wave of goosebumps. The first take is the take you hear. By the time a sparse rhythm ushers in the "we're gonna make it through" coda, it's hard not to anticipate pinky-yellow festival sunsets and 30,000 backing vocalists walking it home.
Pete Paphides
2006
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Kesha never did hear from Prince, but the incident speaks volumes about this 22-year-old newcomer's firecracker personality and determination. "I've always known I wanted to be a performer," she says. "There's video of me at age five, naked and covered in body paint, saying, 'I'm going to be a rock star and there's no way anyone is going to stop me!' It's my calling. If I don't go for it, I'm going to feel like a tool when I'm 50."
Luckily, Kesha won't have to find out what regret feels like. She is currently at work writing and recording her debut album with executive producer Dr. Luke, who has scored No. 1 smashes for Britney Spears, Katy Perry, Kelly Clarkson, Avril Lavigne, and Flo Rida. After falling for her playful half-sung/half-rapped vocal delivery on a rough demo, Luke brought Kesha to RCA Records, which signed her in February 2009. The album -- which will also feature Kesha's collaborations with veteran hitmaker Max Martin (Pink, Kelly Clarkson, Britney Spears) and in-demand songwriter/producer Benny Blanco (Katy Perry, 3OH!3, Spank Rock) -- is shaping up to be an edgy collection of hard-hitting electro-pop songs, made all the more irresistible by their high-octane punk energy and Kesha's irreverent lyrics and attitude. "I want my music to be fun, unapologetic, rowdy, quirky, humorous, and interesting," she says, "but with substance behind it. I'm an emotional person underneath all my fronting. I want people to listen to it and feel like they can relate."
Not surprisingly, the songs showcase Kesha's flair for storytelling, though her choice of subject matter isn't exactly conventional. There's a song about the time Kesha threw up in a closet during a party at Paris Hilton's pad ("Party at a Rich Dude's House"), and one she says is about the time "some dumb bitch fronted like she was my friend but then secretly tried to bring me down" ("Backstabber"), and another about finding out her boyfriend was cheating on her with a famous pop starlet who shall remain nameless ("Kiss & Tell"). Oh, and the one she wrote about beginning to see the universe as a cyclical chain of connected events after meeting a guy in a club ("Chain Reaction," which has been featured on MTV's The Hills).
Kesha credits her love for story-songs to spending her formative years hanging out with veteran songwriters in Nashville. Her mom Pebe, a former punk-rock singer, is a songwriter whose career took off in Music City in the late '70s when a song she co-wrote, called "Old Flames Can't Hold A Candle To You," became a hit for Joe Sun in 1978 and a country chart-topper for Dolly Parton in 1980. But by the time Kesha was born in 1987 (during a party in Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley, Pebe was going through a bad patch, struggling to support Kesha and her older brother through her music. "We were on welfare and food stamps," Kesha says. "One of my first memories is my mom telling me, 'If you want something, just take it.'"
In 1991, Pebe moved the family back to Nashville, where she had landed a new publishing deal. Kesha saw the inside of a lot of recording studios. "I thought everyone grew up in a recording studio," she says. She attended a music school in the Tennessee countryside ("where some of the kids didn't have any shoes," she recalls), took songwriting classes, and fell in love with country music greats Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton, and Patsy Cline. "I'd listen to these beautiful songs and they all told stories," she says. "Bob Dylan's Nashville Skyline is one of my all-time favorite records." From time to time, Pebe let Kesha sing on tracks she was working on. "My mom always told me, 'You have a good voice, practice singing,' so I'd sing everything all the time," Kesha says.
When Kesha was 17, she quit high school, "which was crazy because I was enrolled in an International Baccalaureate program and was going to go to Columbia University and study psychology," she says, "but I wanted to move back to L.A. and pursue my music." That's when she met Dr. Luke. "I had been looking for a female artist with an incredible, distinctive voice who had her own style," Luke says. "Kesha didn't sound like anybody else." Dr. Luke was also working with red-hot hip-hop artist Flo Rida on a track for his second album. One night, Kesha was hanging out with them and the rapper told her he wanted a female voice on a track and asked if she wanted to lay down a vocal. Naturally, she obliged. In February, that track, "Right Round," soared to No. 1, selling more than 636,000 downloads its first week out, and shattering the all-time one-week digital single sales record. (Kesha also contributes her sassy vocal stylings to "Touch Me," another track from Flo Rida's upcoming 2009 album R.O.O.T.S.)
"When I first heard my voice on 'Right Round' on the radio, I started screaming and crying," Kesha says. "I may seem kind of crazy, but behind it all I have my s**t together. I'm working really hard to make this happen and it's nice to see that hard work pay off. I mean, three years ago I was stealing canned vegetables from the dollar store to survive. Now I'm on a No. 1 song, working on my album, and have a little change in my pocket. To be able to take my mom out to dinner is the best feeling in the world."
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Caleb Followill - lead vocals, rhythm guitar
Jared Followill - bass Matthew Followill - lead guitar
Nathan Followill - drums
When Kings of Leon released their third album Because Of The Times in April 2007, Entertainment Weekly called it their "crowning achievement," while Rolling Stone wondered: "How good can the Kings of Leon get? They've already gone further than anybody could have guessed."
Coming as it did on the heels of 2003's rowdy Youth and Young Manhood and 2005's brawny Aha Shake Heartbreak, the expansive Because of The Times was indeed a pivotal and game-changing album. It led the Followills - Tennessee-bred Caleb, Nathan, and Jared, and their cousin Matthew - to astonishing success around the world. In the U.S., the band has sold out New York City's fabled Radio City Music Hall and The Greek Theatre in Hollywood. In the U.K., Kings of Leon headlined this summer's legendary Glastonbury Festival, as well as the Oxygen Festival in Ireland, and sold out their upcoming December show at London's 20,000-seat 02 Arena (where Led Zeppelin held its reunion concert) in less than an hour.
But if critics thought that Because of The Times was the work of a band "at the peak of its powers" (as the Los Angeles Times put it), they may want to reconsider that assessment after hearing Kings of Leon's new album Only By The Night, due from RCA Records on September 23rd. Only By The Night picks up where Because of The Times left off, continuing Kings of Leon's shape-shifting evolution and cementing their status as a world-class rock band.
"After three records and touring for five years straight, we knew what we were capable of," says the band's drummer Nathan, "we just had to put our money where our mouths were. We had to take it to the next level. You always want your next record to be better than your last." Adds frontman and lyricist Caleb: "There's never a time that we'll make a record and won't attempt to do something better than what came before."
With its stunning melodies, ringing guitars, and razor-sharp grooves, Only By The Night delivers on the promise Kings of Leon have shown throughout their career. From the desolate atmospherics of the opening track "Closer" (which Caleb says is about a lovesick vampire) to the emotional intensity of the closing ballad "Cold Desert" ("about a man at the end of his rope who picks himself back up"), Only By The Night is all heart from start to finish.
Album highlights include the insistently chugging first single "Sex on Fire" ("there's always been an element of sex in our music, so I thought I'd just wrap it all up in one song and be done with the sex for the rest of the record," Caleb jokes), the throbbing, propulsive "Crawl" (about relationships of all kinds and taking them for granted), and the sonically sweeping "Use Somebody," which Caleb wrote while feeling lonely on the road. "It's about being far from home." Then there's the soaring uplift of "Manhattan," which is partly about dancing and enjoying life and partly about the struggles of Native Americans. "'Manhattan' is actually a Native American word that means 'island of many hills,'" says Caleb, who adds that his family has Native American blood. Finally there's the driving, forceful "Notion," which finds the singer pushing back against anyone who says anything against anyone in his band.
Caleb's instinct for insularity is not surprising given that the band is made up of family members. The familial vibe extended to the recording process when Kings of Leon returned to Nashville's Blackbird Studio in April 2008 with their long-time producer Angelo Petraglia and Nashville-based producer/engineer Jacquire King, who also mixed Aha Shake Heartbreak. "Angelo keeps it fun and youthful," Nathan says. "He and Jacquire were cool enough to tell us when we really needed to stop playing Wall Ball and get serious, rather than being stern and scaring the shit out of us. It kind of took the pressure off."
Petraglia and King also encouraged the experimental process the Followills first engaged in when making Because Of The Times, giving the band the freedom to explore all of their ideas. "We had the opportunity to really get in there and be more hands-on as far as the production goes," Caleb says. "We wanted to prove ourselves a bit more. We got to kick our heels up, have drinks, and relax while recording." Adds Nathan: "You can tell from the music that we're definitely comfortable."
"To me it sounds like the Kings of Leon are back not only as a band, but as friends," Caleb says. "Every night after recording we'd go to a bar together, hang out and talk about what we were going to do the next day, rather than all of us going to our separate homes. It was really a big family vibe. That's where the title comes from. It's also a reference to a poem by Edgar Allan Poe, and it has five syllables, like all of our album titles."
Caleb had written most of the lyrics and melodies for Only By The Night during some downtime at home recovering from shoulder surgery. "I think the pain pills inspired him a little more than he realized," Nathan says with a laugh. "He would play us a song and we'd say, 'When did you write that?' and he'd say, 'I don't really remember writing it. I just woke up with an empty bottle of wine and my songbook open and these words written down.'" Says Caleb: "Those pills can make you feel so nice. I think a lot of the pretty melodies came from that and from me just opening more."
Another influence could be their experiences playing arenas, not only in support of Because Of The Times, but while opening for U2 in 2005 and Bob Dylan and Pearl Jam in 2006 and 2008. "We definitely wanted the songs to sound good in a 15,000-seat venue, but we also wanted them to have the kind of intimacy that would get the point across at a club show for 300 kids," Nathan says.
Overall, the Followills knew it was time to be honest about their ambitions and prove what they could really do. Caleb, for one, unleashes some of the most righteous, anguished singing he's ever recorded. "I knew it was a risk for me to go in there and really open up and belt the way that I know that I can; the way that I used to when I was younger," he says. "I just hid my singing for so long because I was nervous that people would listen to my lyrics, assume I wasn't intelligent because I'm from Tennessee, and pick me apart, so that's why I sang the way I did. But going into this, I knew these melodies that we were playing were too beautiful for me to fuck it up. I had to go for it."
"Basically we got the point where we realized that we can be known as a band that hit it hard for three records and disappeared, or be a band that was smart enough to realize that not very many bands get to make four records, so let's make the most of this," Nathan says. "Because honestly, we were horrible housepainters and that's what we'd be doing if we weren't doing this!"
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The Best Damn Thing is brimming with gutsy guitar riffs, instantaneously catchy sing-along party-starting choruses, power pop punk, and rebellious rock 'n' roll attitude. It's a marked departure from the darker, more introspective tone of Under My Skin-and on tracks such as the defiant, riotous, kiss-off-to-a-cheating-boyfriend "Everything Back But You," Avril took pleasure in creating scenarios for her lyrics that weren't, as she says, "straight out of my diary." The result is a collection of songs that reveal just how far she's evolved as a songwriter and singer, from the sassy, empowering "I Can Do Better" (one of Avril's personal favorites) to the irrepressible first single "Girlfriend"-which unexpectedly combines a hip-hop beat with beefy power chords, hand-claps, and a chanted girl-group-style chorus with a punk rock twist-to the emotional ballad "Keep Holding On," which she wrote at the request of 20th Century Fox for the studio's fantasy/adventure film Eragon.
As an artist with a keen and well-trained ear for powerful, magnetic pop melodies, Avril was intensely involved in every aspect of The Best Damn Thing's creation: From being fiercely independent while writing her own songs ("I didn't have an A&R guy on this record," she emphasizes. "I knew exactly how I wanted it to sound"), to choosing her producers and musical collaborators, to obsessively going back and tweaking guitar tones and drumbeats in the studio, she worked hard to ensure that it would be her best record yet.
The album features the production skills of Butch Walker (who has also produced The Donnas, American Hi-Fi, and Avril's second album, Under My Skin), Dr. Luke (Pink, Lady Sovereign), Rob Cavallo (Green Day, My Chemical Romance, Goo Goo Dolls), and her husband Deryck Whibley (from Sum 41). The process turned out to be a blast: "I didn't know making a record could be so fun," she says. She was eager to work with her good friend Butch again, as she says, "What's great about Butch is that he's a talented artist as well as being an incredible producer." And about collaborating with Dr. Luke, she adds, "Luke and I had a really good connection and chemistry." The relaxed atmosphere in the studio comes across in the songs themselves-Avril's laughter rings out in "I Can Do Better," and in "Girlfriend" you can hear her, she says, "playing a beer bottle" (by blowing into it) in the last few choruses.
Four of the songs on The Best Damn Thing-"Innocence," "Hot, "One of Those Girls," and "Contagious"-were co-written with Avril's former bandmate Evan Taubenfeld. "Evan is one of my best friends in the world," she says, affectionately. "He's been with me since day one".
Of course, all of the spiky, buoyant energy that drives the album will come to life in the live show that Avril is planning for her tour later this year-she has assembled a new band, and is even bringing along two dancers ("I'm doing choreographed dancing for the first time ever," she grins. "It's going to be such a blast").
A great deal has happened in Avril Lavigne's life since she released her debut album, Let Go, in 2002, when she was 17 years old. That album snagged 8 Grammy nominations and four Juno Awards (including Album of the Year and New Artist of the Year), spawned the anthemic hit singles "Complicated," "Sk8ter Boy," and "I'm With You," and sold more than 16 million copies world-wide. Under My Skin cemented the Napanee, Ontario native's superstardom, entering U.S., Canadian, and U.K. charts at #1, unleashing smash singles "Don't Tell Me" and "My Happy Ending," and collecting three more Juno Awards along the way. In 2006, Avril married Sum 41's Deryck Whibley and branched out into acting, appearing in Richard Linklater's Fast Food Nation and lending her voice to Dreamworks' animated film Over the Hedge.
She may be a bit more sophisticated these days, but she's still peerless, and still fearless. The Best Damn Thing is Avril Lavigne at a new stage in her life; she's passed through the shadows of teen angst and emerged in a spotlight, ready to have fun and rock out and yes, even dance. It is, just as she intended, the best damn thing she's ever done.
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Here you'll also find a bustling funk-tified cover of The Jam's 'Pretty Green' sits alongside thunderous versions of Ryan Adam's 'Amy', and Coldplay's 'God Put A Smile Upon My Face', both bringing crescendo and euphoria to the melancholy from which they were born. Elsewhere he re-constructs a new version of Kanye West's 'Touch The Sky', reuniting it with it's original form, courtesy of Curtis Mayfield's 'Moving On Up', before climaxing into Kings Of Leon's 'Pistols Of Fire', Kasabian's 'LSF' and The Smith's seminal 'Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before' also take a ride on the Ronson soultrain.
You may be familiar perhaps with his version of Radiohead's 'Just' – the re-jigged, recorded and layered with added hip hop beats, soulful progression, funk ballast and vocals courtesy of Alex Greenwald of Phantom Planet that rocked the airwaves and dancefloors around the world and even won praise from the bands Ed O'Brian. 'Just' was a catalyst in the conceptualisation and creation of 'Version', a visionary new album project that see's Mark taking on some of contemporary pop music's big hitters in a similar vein.
Using his own unique re-interpretive style, Mark has set out to demonstrate pop voyeurism and experimentalism are not alien forms. Here his eclectic taste has allowed him to pick and rework songs he has loved in a new, original and refreshing format. 'Version' is a positive, never derivative, journey through the art of the song…with added horns thrown in for good measure.
"With my first album, I had all these people like Mos Def and M.O.P guesting. This time its not about that. Despite the big names, it's about the songs…The songs here are the guest stars. With 'Version' I've taken these songs that I love and turned them into Motown/Stax 70's versions. I keep the utmost respect and appreciation for the original versions of songs I use. It's not like I'm thinking it's a shit song that I can make good, it's more like it's a great song and I'm now going to make it bounce."
Mark released his own massively acclaimed, shamefully ignored and criminally unworked debut solo album 'Here Comes The Fuzz' in 2003 through Elektra right before the label imploded as it was. In the wake of the label/album's demise, it is as a producer where Mark has found his rhythm and sound.
P.T.O Production credits over the past 12 months include tracks on new/forthcoming new albums by Christina Aguilera, Robbie Williams, Lily Allen, Amy Winehouse, GHOSTFACE KILLAH, his Allido protgs Rhymefest & Daniel Merriweather to name but a handful.
His label Allido Records, released 'Blue Collar' EARLIER THIS YEAR, the debut album from Grammy winning Chi-town rap sensation Rhymefest, with Australian wunderkind Daniel Merriweather (That's him killing it on 'Stop Me') to follow in the next 12 months. He is the current face of DKNY (LAST YEAR, PROBABLY NO LONGER RELEVANT) but doesn't talk about that stuff at all. Oh and then there is his live band…a full on funk-soul-hop-pop revue that you need in your life.
Back to the business in hand, 'Version' is the sound of Mark Ronson…A man who's musical vision and verve transcends seasons and genres, where Biggie Smalls can sit on a cloud humming along with Al Green to an old Ryan Adams cut and where Nile Rodgers can jam with Sly And The Family Stone whilst the UK's biggest popstar revisits Baggy for kicks and where music is music. It's a beautiful place that hopefully you'll love visiting again and again.
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Soon, back to Nashville it was, where Landon applied himself to more benign interests such as Algebra and Chemistry and lucky for everyone who has heard his debut RCA album, LP Music - learning to make his own sounds as he began to rifle through the wonders of his dad's record collection.
It was Landon's father, a studio veteran himself, who encouraged Landon's musical curiosity, as Landon recalls 'Ray Stevens being the first CD I ever owned.' Pretty soon Landon was unearthing his own musical breadcrumb trail David Mead and Rufus Wainwright who showed him the beauty of a melody; Bands like Radiohead helping to etch a deeper emotion into his songwriting; Masterworks from groups such as Led Zeppelin and the Beatles imbuing in him both the love of a creative turn of phrase and a knack for writing indelible hooks. And there's no denying the upper register of Harry Nilsson floating around somewhere amid Landon's creations, completing a patchwork topography of the singer/songwriter's musical exoskeleton that pop writer Nick Hornby would be proud of.
Landon also credits his mother for nurturing his poetic side. For the record, she still sends him words of wisdom meant to buoy one's strength on those days where the setbacks seem to outnumber the milestones. 'And' laughs Landon, 'she still cuts my hair.'
With all these threads in hand, Landon Pigg has fastened together his own mercurial outlook on life which he effortlessly and magically captures on his debut album. Yet, he'll also be the first to tell you it does no good to equate all these disparate strands with 'figuring him out.' Those who try to solve him like a puzzle end up confused. He likes to keep his thoughts to himself. Likes to keep even 'himself' guessing. Fortunately, a faithful listen to his new CD reveals he's really not that different from any of us. The songs, which Landon says are 'about things like losing love and finding hope about how life will start to make sense and then stop again,'- reflect an uncanny ability to cobble his own confusion into unforgettable music.
Guided by a host of maverick producers, Dan Brodbeck (Dolores O' Riordan), Paul Ebersold (3 Doors Down), and Clif Magness (Avril Lavigne, The Calling), he fuses his own raw edges into subtle and rollicking pop gems, like the plaintive 'Sailed On,' or the sparse but scrappy 'Last Stop,' which brandishes ripe examples of what can only be described as musical Pigg-speak 'I pick up all the pieces of the chords I didn't use'.
The hint we've been waiting for about solving at least part of the musical puzzle?
'Maybe there is a naivet in my approach,' he says. 'I never had a guitar lesson when I started out. I've always felt that when you don't learn all the rules you're much more inclined to break them with a smile.' Which dovetails nicely into another inclination of his: You might not always get to hear Landon speak his mind but you'll always hear him sing it.
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You've got an image in your head, and it's mistaken. You've heard the name Priestess, and you're juggling impressions. Are they Goths, prancing around the pentangle in their Lugosi capes? I think not. Could this be... Christian rock? God, no. Just another gang of suburban riff-clowns raised on a sallow junk-food diet of hair bands? None of the above. Cue up the Montreal band's debut, Hello Master, and let us demystify. Metal? No... Priestess is Heavy Mettle... And they do inspire devotion.
"It feels like we hit it off with people who wanna hear a heavy rock group with catchy songs," says singer/guitarist Mikey Heppner. And, hello ... master of understatement. Heppner's a bantam dynamo whose unaffected approach is the face of a like-minded band. No stylist, no shtick, no pose without gimmick, they fire maddeningly memorable and crunching hooks out to an audience that travels under no banner.
"Ordinary kids," says Heppner. That sliver of rock fans somewhere between the hard rock, garage and indie tribes - you know, that 70% sliver. Priestess finds a commonality between those nerds, jocks, stoners, loners, party kids and hipsters for whom rock n'roll is somewhere between soundtrack and salvation.
Formed in Montreal in 2003 with a desire to rewire a balls-out '70s rock ethic with classicist songwriting, they defiantly refused to equate heavy music with the Big Downer. "Some bands are gloomy because that's the only way to be cool."
Here's the other way: rejoicing in heaviosity, with the accent on both ends. In their time as rock n'roll redeemers, Priestess has run through everything from the Beatles to prog to punk to Nirvana and back to AC/DC. "One of the hardest things to do is take a major-chord chorus and make it cool and heavy," Heppner says. "AC/DC's You Shook Me All Night Long is in a major-chord - super-happy key. But it's unstoppable and I can listen to it every day... forever."
In the lean and punishing I Am the Night, Color Me Black, in the canyon-sized Talk To Her, the snarling Lay Down and an instant classic called Two Kids, they have already written four chapters in their own new testament.
"There is a level that we... must get to," Heppner says of the band's live show. Anyone who's heard Heppner's opening shout "We are Priestess and we are going to fuck you!" knows what that means. It's no surprise that they caught the attention of Motorhead, opening for them on their last tour ...Lemmy practically wrote the book on fucking the crowd up. Then, three triumphant shows at SXSW '06 capped a "crushingly great" 6 1/2 week tour with fellow crushers Early Man and The Sword that found the band breaking out of major markets into places like Buffalo where ordinary kids who couldn't care less about the Montreal resurgence were moved to seize Heppner from the stage and send him crowd-surfing, mid-solo. They were believers.'
So back to that name: "The minute we tossed it out there, we knew it was perfect."
Why? Think about it. Rather than playing to a herd of headbangers hurling themselves at the stage while their girlfriends cower at tables in the dark corners, Priestess wants to cross the most elemental human divide: gender. "Zeppelin sort of had a mystical pagan allure in the context of heavy, distorted guitars," Heppner says. He finds in that a balance of undeniable masculine heft and feminine melody. "We get a lot of girls in the crowd. That's very important."
It's more than a manifesto. It's a creed--- They are Priestess. The cult starts here.
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Gifted Trio of Ordained Clergymen Won't Give Up Their Day Jobs In Catholic Parishes of Ireland
Debut Album, Produced by Mike Hedges, Is Coming
November 18th On RCA Victor
(NEW YORK) - A vocal trio of three Roman Catholic priests from Ireland is on the brink of creating an international musical sensation as The Priests.
In an April ceremony on the steps of London's historic Westminster Cathedral, the group - comprised of two brothers, Father Eugene O' Hagan and Father Martin O' Hagan, and Father David Delargy - was signed by Sony BMG (UK). Their Priests' debut album is set for US release on RCA Victor Records on November 18, 2008.
The Priests commenced recording May 23 in Dublin and will continue in Belfast and The Vatican in Rome. Their album will include performances in Latin, Spanish, German, Italian, and English of such enduring classics of faith as "Ave Maria," "Panis Angelicus," "Abide With Me," and "O Holy Night." The Priests are working with legendary producer Mike Hedges, well known for his work with U2, The Cure, and - in a foreshadowing of his current assignment - the Manic Street Preachers. The Priests will be accompanied by the Vatican Choir on the recording, arranged and conducted by Pablo Colino the Emeritus Director of Music at St.Peter's Basilica in the Vatican, Rome. A major television special is in the works, as well as an international launch event scheduled for September at St. Patrick's Cathedral in Northern Ireland.
The extraordinary combined talents of Father Eugene O' Hagan (48), his brother, Father Martin O' Hagan (45), and Father David Delargy (44) first were recognized while they attended Queen's University in Belfast and while training for the priesthood at the Irish College in Rome. During the latter period, the three singers were invited personally by the Papal Master of Ceremonies, Monsignor Magee, to sing for the Pope in the sacred liturgy.
Upon their return to Ireland, each of the Priests will continue to tend to the spiritual needs of his parishioners and to the official duties of his church. The Priests' global recording contract exempts each member from undertaking any promotional or recording duties in the event, for instance, of officiating at a wedding or christening of a parishioner. Additionally, the trio has stipulated that a percentage of the proceeds from their record sales will be donated to a charity of their choice.
"We have been inundated with good wishes from our brother priests, from parishioners, and from many friends in the music world," reports Father Eugene O' Hagan in a blog entry at www.thepriests.com.
"It was our intention to make a record for posterity...but imagine what we felt like when Sony BMG popped up out of nowhere and expressed an interest. Fantastic-unbelievable!"
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With his remarkable, rough hewn vocals and evocative, finely etched songs, Ray LaMontagne has, in but a few short years, become the rare artist of whom the world waits with to see what each new work will reveal. Now, on his much anticipated third album, the Maine-based singer and songwriter has crafted a warm and welcoming record which unveils heretofore untapped depths of ingenuity and optimism. Touching upon a range of styles and musical setting spanning pastoral folk, railroad blues, front porch country, and plangent balladry "GOSSIP IN THE GRAIN" proves to be LaMontagne's most creative and emotionally expansive collection to date.
LaMontagne's 2004 debut, "TROUBLE," became one of that year's most acclaimed debuts, spawning an instant classic single in the album's title track. He returned two years later with the stunning "TILL THE SUN TURNS BLACK," a deeply personal work haunted by a complex and compelling melancholy. The album proved both another popular and critical success, debuting in the top 30 on the Billboard 200 and further marking LaMontagne as a major American artist.
After spending 18 long months on the road, LaMontagne returned to Maine and decompressed. He listened to little music, choosing to focus his energies on restoring his new house, once owned by the late Norman Mailer. In early 2008, he began plotting out his next record and before winter's end, was ready to return to work. Where LaMontagne's previous records had been recorded closer to home, this time he opted to cross the Atlantic in order to work alongside his longtime collaborator, producer Ethan Johns at Peter Gabriel's Real World Studios in Box, Wiltshire.
"Ethan came to me last time," LaMontagne says. "I was living in Woodstock and he traveled out there so I could be close to home. He recently moved back to England and he lives about 10 minutes from the studio, so it was only fair that I go to him this time."
LaMontagne's two previous albums were largely solo affairs, with Johns serving as multi-tasking instrumentalist. "GOSSIP IN THE GRAIN" sees him joined by members of his touring band, bassist Jennifer Condos and guitarist Eric Heywood (Johns largely handles drum duties, as touring drummer Jay Bellerose was on the road with Robert Plant & Alison Krauss at the time of the recording). Along with his band members, LaMontagne is also joined on two tracks "A Falling Through" and "I Still Care For You" by singer/songwriter Leona Naess, a friend and artist whose work he has long admired.
"Ethan and I work very well together, one-on-one. I don't know what it is that's going on there, but we can sort of read each other's minds a little bit, so it's really easy for us to work together alone. It's uncluttered. But we've done that. Touring with Jen and Eric has been amazing. They are both incredible people and musicians. I just love the sound we create as a band. It felt like a natural evolution to record this album together.
The sessions concluded in early spring with about 14 tracks recorded, but upon reflection, LaMontagne decided to cull the collection by half. Left with less than a full album's worth of material, he reached into his bag of songs and pulled out three more pieces "Sarah," "Meg White," and the autumnal title track which ultimately went on to define the record's liberated aesthetic and attitude.
While "Winter Birds" and "Gossip In The Grain" retain the sparse atmosphere of his previous record, the album is through and through a shaggier, more loose-limbed collection. Songs like "Henry Nearly Killed Me" and "Hey Me, Hey Mama" have a rambunctious energy and high-spiritedness that show a hitherto undisclosed side of LaMontagne's talent. "Meg White," a rollicking paean to Jack White's drum-beating older sister, lets slip a mischievous wit that the songwriter has previously been loath to reveal on record.
"Well, she does rock," LaMontagne points out. "She deserves a song."
Throughout the record there are recurrent themes of reconnection, of relationships torn down and then reborn, presented with the most sanguine outlook of LaMontagne's career. While some songs, such as the tender "Sarah," feel intensely confessional, others appear to reveal truth through carefully drawn characterizations. As ever, LaMontagne is reticent about delving into the emotional source of his material, preferring to let the work speak for itself.
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Gulf Coast Blues & Impressions A Hurricane Relief Benefit
100% of Winston's Artist Royalties
To Be Donated To Hurricane Relief Organizations
George Winston, best known for his melodic rural folk piano style, has made no secret of the debt his playing owes to the musicians of New Orleans. Gulf Coast Blues & Impressions A Hurricane Relief Benefit was inspired by Winston's desire to support the Gulf Coast after the recent hurricane related devastation. This beautiful and vast region has a mystique all its own and he has been to it many times, from Corpus Christi, to Galveston, to Lake Charles, to New Orleans, to Gulfport/Biloxi/Bay St. Louis, to Mobile, to Pensacola, to Panama City, to the Tampa Bay, to Ft. Myers, to Naples.
Winston cites the pianists of New Orleans as the biggest influences on his own piano playing. He will donate all of his artist royalties from the album to organizations involved in helping those on the Gulf Coast and in New Orleans to rebuild and return organizations such as Common Ground (www.commongroundrelief.org), ACORN (www.acorn.org), and others. He has also donated all the proceeds of his September and October 2005 concerts to the same causes. In unity with the artist, RCA Records will be donating the bulk of its net profits to benefit musicians in the New Orleans area.
Gulf Coast Blues & Impressions features six Winston compositions inspired by the Gulf Coast as well as pieces written by or influenced by six of the greatest New Orleans pianists: Henry Butler, James Booker, Professor Longhair, Dr. John, Allen Toussaint, and Jon Cleary. "Much of my work on the piano is studying the musical languages of the great New Orleans R&B pianists," Winston says. "Especially Professor Longhair, the founder of the New Orleans R&B piano scene in the late 1940s who inspired so many; James Booker, whose language most influences the way I think of playing; and Henry Butler, who is the pianist I have studied the most since 1985. I'm also indebted to New Orleans pianists Dr. John, Jon Cleary, and the eminent composer/pianist Allen Toussaint."
James Booker's Pixie lives up to its title with a treatment that features syncopated phrases in the right hand and Booker's trademark left hand with a moving bass line and partial chords. "James Booker was the first one to take R&B, soul music, the Blues, New Orleans music, and more, to make a solo piano style which encompassed seven different ways of playing," Winston says.
Henry Butler's complex composition The Breaks is full of dramatic chords and flurries. Says Winston: "Henry is the pianist I have been studying the most since I first heard him in 1985. In my view he's taken R&B piano to its pinnacle, and he is the only pianist I know of who plays the deep Blues and R&B and mainstream jazz. You need to see him live to fully experience his music."
Creole Moon, a pensive version of the title tune from Dr. John's 2001 album, is full of emotions that residents of The Crescent City might have felt in the aftermath of the storm.
Winston's own compositions for Gulf Coast Blues & Impressions run the gamut from uptempo to melancholy. New Orleans Shall Rise Again, delivered in a style that is inspired by Allen Toussaint, James Booker, and Dr. John, is an ode to The City and its music, a buoyant salute to the rhythms of jazz, blues, and R&B that also tips its musical hat to Henry Butler, and Ferdinand "Jelly Roll" Morton.
Pixie #3 [Gŏbajie] borrows its form from James Booker's Pixie, but is delivered in a more stately tempo, marked by dancing rippling runs on the high keys. "Gŏbajie was a kitty who loved music," Winston explains. "She would listen attentively to live playing or recordings; whenever the music stopped she would respond by singing."
Stevenson is an emotional piece for a friend lost as a result of the hurricane. Says Winston: "This is dedicated to my dear late friend, New Orleans filmmaker Stevenson J. Palfi (1952-2005), who made the wonderful film Piano Players Rarely Ever Play Together about Professor Longhair, Allen Toussaint, and Isidore "Tuts" Washington."
The centerpiece of Gulf Coast Blues & Impressions is Winston's epic arrangement of When the Saints Go Marching In, one of the oldest traditional New Orleans songs. The arrangement starts at a deliberately ominous tempo inspired by Dr. John, before breaking into the song's familiar celebratory melody and variations inspired by James Booker. The festivities are interrupted when Winston's left hand moves up an octave, inspired by Henry Butler, before returning to the melody. At the end of the tune he breaks into a stride piano section before ending with two hand rolls inspired by the South African pianist Abdullah Ibrahim (aka Dollar Brand).
The album closes gently with Blues for Fess, Beloved, a eulogy for Professor Longhair that leaves each note hanging in the air reverberating, thoughts offered to fallen friends and a region and a city struggling to get back on its feet.
Gulf Coast Blues & Impressions A Hurricane Relief Benefit follows on the heels of Winston's 2001 album Remembrance-A Memorial Benefit, a six song album of piano, guitar, and harmonica solos. All the artist's proceeds from that CD are being donated to benefit those affected by 9/11. He is currently touring to support Gulf Coast Blues & Impressions and working on his next recording, Beloved-The Music of Professor Longhair.
With a tour schedule that includes more than 110 shows a year - solo piano concerts, solo guitar concerts, solo harmonica concerts, and solo piano dances, Winston is driven by a deep rooted realization that his craft is still evolving, and by his desire to bring music to life through live performances, musical interpretation of other composers' works, and the recording and production of albums of many of those who have influenced and inspired him. Constantly traveling, he draws inspiration from the places and people he encounters.
George Winston was born in 1949 and grew up mainly in Montana, and he also spent his later formative years in Mississippi and Florida. His favorite music was instrumental rock and R&B - artists like Floyd Cramer, The Ventures, Booker T & The MG's, the late jazz organist Jimmy Smith, and many more. "I was always an avid listener, especially to instrumental music and especially organists," Winston recalls. "In 1967, when I heard The Doors, I started playing organ. I studied chord structures, music theory, and recordings of organists, especially the great jazz organist Jimmy Smith. In 1971 when I heard the 1920s and 1930s recordings of the great stride pianist Thomas 'Fats' Waller, I switched to solo piano."
"I play three styles: New Orleans R&B piano, and the majority of songs I play are in this style; stride piano, which was the main way of playing that I worked on after hearing Fats Waller and Teddy Wilson; and third, folk piano, the style that I came up with in 1971 which is influenced and inspired by instrumental R&B and rock, North American folk music, and even more by the sounds of the piano itself. Many of the songs on my albums are in this melodic folk style, and it has a rural sensibility, the opposite of the urban sensibility of the R&B piano and the stride piano. My approach is North American and I basically treat the piano as an Afro-American tuned drum, as well as using the natural overtones that the piano has."
In 1972 Winston recorded his first solo piano album Ballads & Blues 1972 for the late guitarist John Fahey's Takoma Records. "I would not be doing anything that I am doing now - solo piano albums, solo instrumental concerts, and recording the great solo Hawaiian Slack Key guitarists on my own label - without John's influence and inspiration," Winston states. "He is certainly the only person in the world who would have recorded a solo piano album of me in 1972." Since 1980 George has released ten more solo piano albums: Autumn (1980), Winter Into Spring (1982), December (1982), Summer (1991), Forest (1994), Linus & Lucy-The Music Of Vince Guaraldi (1996), Plains (1999), Night Divides The Day The Music Of The Doors (2002), Montana-A Love Story (2004), and Gulf Coast Blues & Impressions-A Hurricane Relief Benefit (2006).
In 1984 George also recorded the solo piano soundtrack for the children's story The Velveteen Rabbit with narration by Meryl Streep. In 1988 he recorded the solo piano soundtrack for the Peanuts animation This is America Charlie Brown: The Birth of the Constitution, playing mainly the late Vince Guaraldi's pieces. In 1995 he worked with George Levenson of Informed Democracy on three projects: a solo guitar soundtrack for Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes with narration by Liv Ullmann; and two soundtracks with piano, guitar, and harmonica solos for Pumpkin Circle with narration by Danny Glover, and Bread Comes To Life with narration by Lily Tomlin.
In 1983 Winston founded Dancing Cat Records to record the Masters of the Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar, the finger style guitar tradition unique to the Islands, which began around 1830 (and predated the steel guitar by about sixty years). As of 2006, thirty six titles have been issued in the ongoing Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar Masters Series, recordings that have introduced many of the Slack Key guitarists to a global audience.
George Winston is a Steinway piano artist.
www.georgewinston.com
www.dancingcat.com
www.windham.com
Roger Widynowski
VP, Of Publicity
310-449-2638 rogerw@sonybmg.com
