Phill Savidge

Phill Savidge has more than twenty years experience and success as a publicist. In 1987, after leaving Nottingham University with a Degree in Philosophy, Phill began his PR career by representing artists as diverse as Stone Roses, Danielle Dax, Gaye Bykers On Acid and the Rhythm Sisters. From 1988 to 1990, he worked as a press officer at Virgin Records where he looked after the PR interests of Roy Orbison, Mary Margaret O’Hara and Gary Moore amongst others. In 1990, Phill left Virgin to join John Best at Best In Press, here managing accounts for Cocteau Twins, Pixies, The Farm, Curve, The Verve and Suede. It was Phill’s huge success with Suede that led to him winning three Music Week PR Awards, thus enabling the company to morph into its legendary Savage & Best incarnation. Savage & Best were largely responsible for the Britpop movement of the mid-to-late1990s and, as well as continuing to represent Suede and Verve (the latter were also managed by Savage & Best for their first two albums), went on to represent Pulp, Menswear, Elastica, The Cranberries, The Fall, Charlatans, Jesus & Mary Chain, Spiritualized, Texas, Tank Girl (the movie), Kula Shaker, Longpigs, JJ72 and Fat Les (Vindaloo) amongst countless others. Savage & Best also founded a record label, Parkway Records, which released records by Powder (fronted by Pearl Lowe) and the all-girl punk outfit Fluffy.

In 1999 Phill dissolved Savage & Best and set up on his own. The following year Phill again represented Damien Hirst (who he had befriended through Fat Les) for his Art Tube project and again for Keith Allen’s Glastonbury Play which featured Damien’s extraordinary stage designs. Phill continued to represent Suede, JJ72 and Keith Allen amongst other artists but also diversified into club PR handling PR accounts for Soho House and Babington House as well as Home in Leicester Square. Around this time he also represented AR Rahman, multi-million selling composer of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Bombay Dreams.

Phill began representing Dave Stewart in 2001, writing sleeve notes to accompany all eight Eurythmics albums and becoming intimately involved in Stewart and Paul Allen’s £100 million Hospital Club project in Covent Garden. Phill set up The Hospital Committee responsible for membership and organised all aspects of PR from building site reports for the FT to extensive Vogue magazine reports on the imminent opening of the Club. He regularly organised PR around high-profile launches in the Club and Gallery and was responsible for advance and follow-up PR in this respect.

In recent years Phill helped launch Silksoundbooks.com (“the greatest books read by the greatest actors” - Bill Nighy, Greta Scaachi etc) and Lyrics By Don Black, a 70th Birthday tribute evening (for the Oscar-winning and five time Ivor Novello Award-winning lyricist Don Black) hosted by Michael Parkinson at the London Palladium. Phill currently represents one of the world’s most distinctive and loved singer-songwriters and guitarists, Chris Rea, punk legends the Stranglers, the UK’s foremost classical composer Michael Nyman, the wonderfully-reformed, bad-meaning-good, boy-to-man chart-botherers East 17, post-punk pioneers Gang Of Four, rock-pop artists James, Blow Monkeys and Barenaked Ladies as well as exciting and idiosyncratic singer/songwriters like Gregory Darling and Gus MacGregor, the imMEnsely exciting rock phenomena that is ME and the ingeniously disingenuous-sounding Red Bullets. 

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ME appear at KOKO at 3pm Sunday May 6th on the Camden Crawl

"The Aussie outfit look set to make a big splash. Drawing equally from the rock histrionics of Muse and the bombastic, operatic pop of Queen, they sound huge, dramatic and unutterably exciting" - Kerrang.
The imMEnsely MEmorable band ME will be appearing at KOKO at 3pm this Sunday on the Camden Crawl. The band have also confirmed the release of Westward Backwards on May 28th on Lizard King plus their appearance at The Great Escape and as support to Xcerts.
Fresh off a hugely successful stint supporting Panic! At The Disco and already heralded by Kerrang! magazine as “essentially Queen if every single member was Freddie Mercury”, everyone's favourite ungooglable band ME, have just completed their support to Twin Atlantic on their UK tour. The band's debut mini-album Another Story High is currently available via i-Tunes whilst the band's next single – the impossibly good steam punk epic Westward Backwards - is due out on May 28th.
The band have also announced that they will be appearing at The Great Escape at Concorde 2 in Brighton on Saturday 12th May, as well supporting The Xcerts on their UK tour throughout May.

Read more: metheband.com | facebook.com/metheband | twitter.com/meband

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STEVE JENKINS - THE FUTURE IS IN THE HISTORY; Britney, Justin and the truth about the music industry - JIVE RECORDS MD STEVE JENKINS publishes his autobiography

There have been so many kiss and tell memoirs about the music business it is refreshing to stumble across an honest autobiography that neglects this artifice and simply focuses on what really goes on behind the scenes in the record industry. Steve Jenkins – The Future Is In The History does exactly that, charting the rise of an obsessive music fan from Walsall who starts out as a club DJ before becoming a regional sales record plugger and finally finding himself running the most successful independent record label in the world.
That label was Jive Records whose artists included Britney Spears, The Backstreet Boys, R Kelly, Nsync, Steps and Justin Timberlake but a list of artists Jenkins has represented or promoted reads like a who’s who of popular culture: Elton John, George Michael, Whitney Houston, Mariah Carey, Tom Jones, The Stone Roses, David Bowie, Genesis, Hall & Oates. Frankie Goes To Hollywood. The list is endless and many owe their stellar status to his brilliance.

Jenkins' own position in pop culture is secure: from a very young age to the present day he has been involved in every aspect of the music business from club dj, to record shop assistant and from radio plugging to sales promotion. This has given him a unique insight into how the music business operates and specifically how it can be manipulated to achieve huge commercial success. Jenkins' promotion company Impulse was the first to realize that Gallup only placed their chart return machines in certain shops and to target those shops accordingly. Jenkins also pioneered innovative promotion techniques such as having his artists meet all the staff at Woolworths head office and selling his artist’s singles for £1.99 in its first week of release: this latter technique ensured Britney Spears “Baby One More Time” sold 250,000 copies in the first three days of release, half a million records in its first week, subsequently topping sixty charts worldwide and staying in the UK charts for an astonishing 82 weeks. Naturally it was the world’s best selling single in 1999, the year that Jive out-majored the majors.

The Future Is In The History is very much the compelling life story of a genuine recording industry pioneer. Jenkins has almost certainly been responsible for more hit records than anyone else in history - 260 gold and platinum discs and counting. So what’s the connection between Esther Rantzen, Britney Spears, John Major and Kylie Minogue? Steve Jenkins - the music industry's best kept secret and a true maverick in every sense of the word. Prepare to be amazed.

The Future Is In The History ISBN: 978 1 907540 53 0

Read more: www.stevejenkinsuk.com

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DR ROBERT RELEASES TWO ALBUMS ON APRIL 23RD

Dr Robert, singer songwriter from The Blow Monkeys is to release not one but two Internet only albums on April 23rd.

‘Flutes and Bones’ is a brand new solo album from Robert.

“Flutes” has been an ongoing project for me for the last eight years or so… every time I got round to finishing it something else came up… a new Blow Monkeys album or an album of duets I did with PP Arnold. Finally its the right time. It’s very much a home-grown project...Its probably the most unique thing I’ve ever done. its basically my impressions of moving to a new country, Spain, with my young family and living in a small mountain community with no electricity and building our own house from scratch… the generosity of the people and shimmering luminous light’

Additionally Robert is releasing an exclusive ‘Dr Robert sings The Blow Monkeys Acoustic' album with brand new stripped down and intimate versions of world famous Blow Monkey songs like ‘Digging Your Scene' and 'It Doesn’t Have To Be This Way'

In a musical journey that has already lasted thirty years and includes collaborations with such luminaries as Curtis Mayfield, Paul Weller, Cheb Khaled and Kym Mazelle to name but a few. Robert shows no sign of slowing down… Indeed “Flutes and Bones” shows every sign of being a career highlight.

The album is exclusively available from the official Dr Robert & The Blow Monkeys facebook page
The single, Coldheart, can be downloaded free here

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THE RED BULLETS - WALKING SOLO APRIL 23RD

The Red Bullets release their new single Walking Solo on Bullet Records via Absolute on April 23rd 2012. The track is about ending a relationship only to find out it’s been ended for you and it’s a sterling example of the band’s fashionable Elton John meets The Feeling melodrama. Other tracks on the band’s fantastic debut album Drama In The Drawing Room are reminiscent of mid-70s era Steve Miller, Billy Joel and even Supertramp.

Walking Solo was written by Pete Edwards and produced by Gavin Monaghan. The band’s debut album Drama In The Drawing Room is due for release in May 2012.

“Let’s go our own way now, but you did it today”

Full details can be found on www.theredbullets.com

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The Red Bullets - Upstairs at The Garage, Highbury, North London on Thu 29th March.

Is it possible to sound like The Feeling and Billy Joel in 2012? Yes it is! The Red Bullets play The Garage in Highbury, North London on Thursday 29th March. On stage at 8pm.

Consider the name: The Red Bullets. Just what were you expecting? Heavy metal? I don’t think so. Imagine, if you will, a sound reminiscent of Elton John fronting The Feeling and a band who owe as much to the fashionable melodrama of mid-70s era Steve Miller and Billy Joel as they do to… well, Supertramp! The band’s debut single East Of Easy (released on Bullet Records via Absolute in March 2012) is as close to a mission statement as you could get: “East of easy, south of simple, west of where I wanna be/We all know the north is way too cold/Meet me in the middle, meet me in the middle/We can have a little paradise of our very own.”

The Red Bullets comprise brothers Pete Edwards (piano, lead vocals) and Mark Edwards (drums, backing vocals) and they formed in Buckingham in 2007. Live and variously on record the band also include former Twang insider Stuart Hartland on guitar and lyricist John Bailey on bass. The latter, along with Pete, is responsible for much of the lyrical content on Drama In The Drawing Room, the band’s debut album due for release later this year, and the writing relationship that Pete and John share is as fluid and engaging as anything this decade will produce. Correspondingly, Drama In The Drawing Room is a revelation: fresh and uncontrived, it has that instant classic feel like something you’ve had knocking around the house for years. It’s the sound of someone hitting the ground running.

The Red Bullets release Drama In The Drawing Room on Bullet Records via Absolute on 7th May 2012.

Full details can be found on www.theredbullets.com

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It's not you, it's ME - on tour with Twin Atlantic throughout April

Fresh off a hugely successful stint supporting Panic! At The Disco and already heralded by Kerrang! magazine as “essentially Queen if every single member was Freddie Mercury”, everyone's favourite ungooglable band, ME, have been announced as main support to Twin Atlantic on their forthcoming tour. The band's debut mini-album Another Story High is currently available via i-Tunes whilst the band's next single Westward Backwards is due in May.

The Twin Atlantic dates run as follows:

09 April 2012    Support Twin Atlantic    Dublin    O2 Academy
10 April 2012    Support Twin Atlantic    Cork    Cyprus Avenue
11 April 2012    Support Twin Atlantic    Derry    The Nerve Centre
12 April 2012    Support Twin Atlantic    Belfast    Mandella Hally
14 April 2012    Support Twin Atlantic    Inverness    Ironworks
15 April 2012    Support Twin Atlantic    Dunfermline    Alhambra Theatre
16 April 2012    Support Twin Atlantic    Manchester    The Ritz
17 April 2012    Support Twin Atlantic    London    KOKO
19 April 2012    Support Twin Atlantic    Cardiff    Solus
20 April 2012    Support Twin Atlantic    Wolverhampton    Wulfrun Hall
21 April 2012    Support Twin Atlantic    Norwich    The Waterfronty
22 April 2012    Support Twin Atlantic    Portsmouth    Wedgewood Rooms

Full details can be found on www.metheband.com

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The Stranglers release Giants on Coursegood Records on March 5th 2012

The world’s most dangerously eccentric band The Stranglers, release their new album Giants on March 5th 2012. Unfortunately, the artwork for Giants which features all four members of the band being hung from the neck on a child’s swing (whilst a child looks on) has generated some controversy and a series of advertisements planned to run in the London Underground were not able to do so as they were considered to be unsuitable. The ads were deemed to be problematic under the UK Code of non-broadcast advertising and likely to generate a large number of complaints. For their part, the Stranglers have reiterated that the artwork is intended as a barbed comment on the lynch-mob mentality of the media. However, it can also be seen as a literal interpretation of the album’s title track which questions whether the world is still capable of producing “giants” anymore. No More Heroes indeed.

Interestingly, in the first ever post watershed use of Outdoor media in Britain, the advertisement can be seen at twenty locations around London on digital screens every minute between 9pm and 5am from this Saturday March 3rd.

Praise for the 'Giants':

“Close to vintage”  UNCUT magazine

“The Stranglers have never sounded so alive.”  4/5 MOJO

“Enough of the old menace to satisfy the faithful.”  Q magazine

“Never have they sounded so urgent. Never have they sounded so dark, never have they sounded so philosophical, melodic, snarling and triumphant.”  9/10 Vive Le Rock!

The Stranglers are currently on a nationwide tour of the UK.:

01 March    Leeds   O2 Academy
02 March    Dunfermline   Alhambra
03 March    Glasgow   O2 Academy
05 March    Liverpool   O2 Academy
06 March    Nottingham   Rock City
08 March    Cambridge   Corn Exchange
09 March    London Roundhouse
10 March    Birmingham   O2 Academy
12 March    Oxford   O2 Academy
13 March    Portsmouth   Pyramids Centre
15 March    Lincoln   Engine Shed
16 March    Brighton   Dome
17 March    Bristol   O2 Academy
19 March    Leamington Spa   Assembly
20 March    Guildford   G-Live
22 March    Newcastle   O2 Academy
23 March    Sheffield   O2 Academy
24 March    Manchester   O2 Academy

Full details can be found on www.stranglers.net

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ME at HMV Next BIg Thing .....

Fresh off their Panic At The Disco tour dates, the imMEnse-sounding ME will be appearing at the HMV Next Big Thing showcase (on stage 8.30 pm) this Friday February 10th. The band will be releasing their mini-album Another Story High on Lizard King Records on March 5th 2012.

Two of ME - or should that be us? - met at a spiritualist nudist festival so it’s hardly surprising that the debut single by ME should be called Naked. Naked is mini rock opera on the grandest of scales and a song that asks whether life, the universe and everything must always be like this. The band cite The Beatles, The Mars Volta and Led Zeppelin as influences but if we threw Danny Elfman, Philip Glass, Rachmaninof and Queen in there you’d start to get scared – so we won’t. Instead we’ll just suggest that ME are one of the most exciting new rock bands to appear this side of the millennium.

ME are Luke Ferris (voice, guitar, piano), Damian Tapley (guitar, voice), Michael Godde (bass, voice) and Spike Rogers (drums, programming). They formed in 2009 in Melbourne, the epicentre of the Australian music scene and a place the band describe as “an outburst of happiness that no one wants to leave!” And why ME? “Because it’s faintly absurd and un-googlable” they suggest and it’s true that there’s something intangible about both the name and the band. “We use drum troupes and orchestras, we love classical music and theatre and showmanship and we like to go places no one has been to before”, explains lead singer Luke.

ME have just completed work on their debut album produced by the legendary Simon ‘Barny’ Barnicott (Kasabian, Arctic Monkeys, Temper Trap.)

“Wake up – our dreams are so much harder than yours.”

Watch their new video here

More details can be found on meband.com, facebook.com/metheband and twitter.com/meband

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CHRIS REA SANTO SPIRITO UK TOUR - MARCH/APRIL 2012

British singer-songwriter and guitar maverick Chris Rea will be touring the UK in March and April. Rea will be playing selections from his thirty year career as well as songs from his latest studio album, the three CD and two DVD set entitled Santo Spirito. Santo Spirito includes a new studio album featuring latest single The Chance Of Love plus Dancing My Blues Away, Never Tie Me Down, Rock & Roll Tonight, Electric Guitar and The Last Open Road. It also featureds two bespoke feature films on DVD, written and directed by Rea himself. The first film is a brutally honest chronicle on bullfighting and features neo-classical & Spanish themed gypsy music whilst the second film follows a man through the city of Florence in his search for the truth. The music to accompany both films is contained on the two accompanying CDs.
The Santo Spirito tour sees Rea reunited with keyboard player and Fender Rhodes Electric pianist Max Middleton best known for his work on Jeff Beck's Blow By Blow and Rea's own On The Beach, The Road To Hell and Dancing With Strangers albums.

The success of The Road To Hell in 1989 and Auberge in 1991 (which both debuted at No.1) firmly cemented Chris Rea's position as one of the country’s finest musicians and songwriters. His rich catalogue includes Fool (If You Think It's Over), On The Beach, Let's Dance, Josephine, Stainsby Girls and I Can Hear Your Heartbeat, Working On It, The Road To Hell (Part 2), Auberge, God’s Great Banana Skin and Julia.

"A maverick imagination at work ... wouldn't it be good if every middle aged rock star were half so full of ideas and verve." - The Mail On Sunday.
“Intriguing career, irresistible playing” - The Sunday Times

UK TOUR DATES:
FRI 16 MARCH     BELFAST, ULSTER HALL
SUN 18 MARCH     DUBLIN, GRAND CANAL THEATRE
TUE 20 MARCH     BOURNEMOUTH, B.I.C.
WED 21 MARCH     OXFORD, NEW THEATRE
THU 22 MARCH     BRIGHTON, CENTRE
SAT 24 MARCH     HARROGATE, INTERNATIONAL CTR
SUN 25 MARCH     MANCHESTER, APOLLO
MON 26 MARCH     SHEFFIELD, CITY HALL
WED 28 MARCH     EDINBURGH, USHER HALL
THU 29 MARCH     GLASGOW, CLYDE HALL
SAT 31 MARCH     NEWCASTLE, ARENA
SUN 1 APRIL     BIRMINGHAM, NIA
MON 2 APRIL     NOTTINGHAM, RCH
WED 4 APRIL     PLYMOUTH, PAVILLIONS
THU 5 APRIL     LONDON, HAMMERSMITH APOLLO

Tickets £35.00 London / £33.50 regionals (subject to booking fee) are available from www.livenation.co.uk

Full details can be found on www.chrisrea.com/tour/

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"One World ..One John" - a new film documenting the career of John Martyn

“One World …One John” is the title of a new film by Lyn and Eleanor McMullan due to be released on DVD on Liason Music (LSM 4014) on April 2nd 2012. The film documents the career of the legendary guitarist and singer John Martyn who the Sunday Times described recently as "an electrifying guitarist and singer whose music blurred the boundaries between folk, jazz, rock and blues". Martyn, who’s magic and genius could be said to have been spread over four decades, was filmed between 1999 and 2001 in Scotland and Ireland and the film captures John and his band at was has been arguably called the height of his performance career.

Originally One World ..One John surfaced on VHS in 2001 as 'Tell Them I'm Somebody Else' but after John's death from pneumonia at the age of 60 in 2009, both the film-makers and John’s estate wanted to create a lasting tribute to John from the amazing amount of unseen and moving footage they had filmed over the years. Subsequently they completely re-edited the original film, replacing half of the material with new unseen footage. The new film includes fifteen performances by John Martyn and his band plus rare unseen performance, interview and rehearsal footage.

Last year saw the release of two critically acclaimed John Martyn releases, Heaven and Earth, the record he completed just before he died, and Johnny Boy Would Love This – A Tribute To John Martyn, an album comprising thirty cover versions of Martyn’s songs recorded by artists such as Beck, Phil Collins, Snow Patrol, David Gray, Paolo Nutini, Morcheeba, Beth Orton and The Cure’s Robert Smith. Phil Collins commented at the time: “John Martyn was completely unique. He had such power, such emotion in his music that he could overwhelm the listener even when it was just him and an acoustic guitar.” Robert Smith concurred suggesting that “Martyn’s beautiful songs were, are and always will be an inspiration and an enchantment.”

Read more about John Martyn here

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HUE AND CRY ANNOUNCE ‘HOT WIRE STRIPPED’ TOUR

Scottish soul-pop pioneers Hue and Cry have announced their ‘Hot Wire in London’ show where they will be performing a special full band gig at the O2 Academy in Islington, London on Saturday, 26th May. The band whose new album Hot Wire - the first new album from brothers Pat and Greg Kane since 2008’s Open Soul - is released on March 19th, will be performing much of their celebrated back catalogue as well as an introductory selection of songs from the new record. Hot Wire itself combines a love of Steely Dan and the solo work of Becker and Fagan with a sprawling template that includes songs reminiscent of Stevie Wonder, Sly and the Family Stone and early New Orleans’ inspired funk. To view the video for Duty To The Debtor, the current single taken from the new album, please click here: http://youtu.be/KarI-9Vpd38

Specifically for the ‘Hot Wire in London’ show, Hue and Cry have announced a unique platinum pass package that provides additional access to a VIP Reception (which will include complimentary bubbly on arrival at the venue) the band's sound-check as well as a Meet & Greet with Pat and Greg Kane, an exclusive intimate piano & vocal acoustic set from the brothers together with complimentary pre-show hospitality and souvenir brochure.
Sat 26 May Islington, London 02 Academy 0844 4772000

Hue and Cry have also revealed details of their ‘Hot Wire Stripped’ Tour that sees them hitting the road to perform several intimate stripped down shows around the country in April and May:

Thu 26 Apr     Blackpool The Sands 01253 625262
Fri 27 Apr     Darwen Library Theatre 01254 706006
Sat 28 Apr     Southampton The Brook 02380 555366
Thu 3 May     Liverpool Eric’s 0151 2369994
Sat 5 May     Durham Gala Theatre 0191 3324041
Fri 11 May     Dublin Vicar Street (+353) 01 775 5800
Sat 12 May     Hayes Beck Theatre 0208 561 8371
Sun 13 May     Gravesend Woodville Halls 01474 337774
Tue 15 May     Wolverhampton Robin 2 01902 401211
Wed 16 May     Milton Keynes The Stables 01908 280800
Thu 17 May     Bournemouth 02 Academy 0844 4772000
Sat 19 May     Porth The Factory 01443 687080

As Scottish as crude oil and football management excellence, Hue and Cry first leapt to prominence in 1987 when their single Labour Of Love (lifted from that year’s Seduced and Abandoned album) hit the No.6 slot. The immensely successful album Remote and further hit singles Violently and Looking For Linda followed before the Top Ten album Stars Crash Down and the release of Open Soul in 2008 further showcased the band’s classic pop-soul sound. The release of Hot Wire firmly cements their position as loveably intellectual hip funkateers.

Hue and Cry area also set to perform at the Hot Wire Weekend on Friday 30th and Saturday 31st March at Glasgow’s 02 ABC, the first of these dates featuring the brothers in an intimate piano and vocal performance, whilst the second date sees the pair lining up as part of their full seven piece band. The weekend will include the Platinum Pass Package providing the ultimate in access and amazing extras.

Full details can be found on www.hueandcry.co.uk

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EAST 17 release Dark Light on FOD Records

Dark Light refers to the colour seen by the eye in perfect darkness. By some strange coincidence it also happens to be the title of the new album by East 17, their first since 1999. The album showcases the band’s new transatlantic rock sound reminiscent of bands like Kings Of Leon and U2 and even artists like Brian Adams and Billy Joel. It’s a brave move and one that’s paid off on a record that’s as catchy as Summer of ’69and as soft rock and big sounding as it gets. As main-man Tony Mortimer suggests “I think everyone is subconsciously inspired by American music and rock ‘n’ roll and this time around we wanted to do something more live with less tricks.” The album has been produced by Bob Rose and Tony Mortimer.

The track-listing for Dark Light runs like this: I Can’t Get You Off My Mind (Crazy), Crazy Fool, Nightlife, Counting Clouds, Break Ur Heart, Friday Night, Kiss Of Winter, Broken Valentine, Where Does Love Go, You Must Be An Angel.

Themes on Dark Light include love, everyday life and relationships: Counting Clouds is an intensely personal song about Mortimer’s wife preparing to go into hospital to have a spinal operation; Crazy Fool is about not being able to express how you feel in a relationship; andBroken Valentine is about a guy who is attracted to a woman who is completely out of his depth. Additionally, Coldwell provides two numbers: the gospel-tinged You Must Be An Angel, a song about a girl who completely changes a man’s life around and Nightlife, a song that describes the perfect East 17 night on the town (clue: it ain’t pretty!) Finally, to firmly cement their place on the naughty step, lead track Can’t Get You Off My Mind (Crazy) is about an insanely debauched after-show party.

East 17 are still one of the most celebrated and successful boy bands of all time - having achieved 18 Top Twenty hits (including House Of Love, Deep and Christmas No.1 Stay Another Day) as well as four Top Ten albums and sales of over twenty million records The band were recently re-united under the auspices of principal songwriter Tony Mortimer who won an Ivor Novello Songwriter Award for Stay Another Day, the song he wrote for his brother Ollie who committed suicide. The current line-up includes original members Tony Mortimer, John Hendy and Terry Caldwell.

Dark Light will be released on FOD Records.

Full details can be found on www.east17official.com

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THE RED BULLETS - EAST OF EASY - MARCH 12TH 2012

Consider the name: The Red Bullets. Just what were you expecting? Heavy metal? I don’t think so. Imagine, if you will, a sound reminiscent of Elton John fronting The Feeling and a band who owe as much to the fashionable melodrama of mid-70s era Steve Miller and Billy Joel as they do to… well, Supertramp! The band were formed in Buckingham in 2007 by brothers Pete and Mark Edwards and often perform as a four-piece featuring Pete on piano and lead vocals, Mark on drums and backing vocals, former Twang insider Stuart Hartland on guitar as well as lyricist and bass player John Bailey.

The Red Bullets release their debut single East Of Easy on Bullet Records via Absolute on March 12th 2012. The song - which is about trying to reconcile an ailing relationship - was co-written by BMI Award winning songwriter and Ivor Novello/Brit Award nominee Jamie Hartman whose previous cohorts include Joss Stone, Will Young and The Wanted amongst others. The track also features George Michael’s guitarist, Graham Kearns, strings arranged by composer Nigel Hopkins and production by Chris Porter.

The Red Bullets’ debut album Drama In The Drawing Room is due for release in May 2012. The band are already receiving significant airplay and are currently lining up a nationwide tour. In the meantime they will be appearing live on the following dates:

15th February - London - Dublin Castle
25th Feb – Wavenden - The Stables Theatre
31st March – Kingsbridge – Coast.

“East of easy, south of simple, west of where I wanna be.”

Get your free download on Facebook

Full details can be found on www.theredbullets.com

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THE STRANGLERS RELEASE ‘GIANTS’ ON MARCH 5TH 2012.

The Stranglers, who are still the UK’s most dangerously eccentric band, release their eagerly awaited new album, ‘Giants’ on 5th March 2012. The record coincides with an extensive European tour, kicking off with eighteen dates in the UK commencing 1st March.

The Stranglers are Jet Black (drums), JJ Burnel (bass and lead vocals), Dave Greenfield (keyboards) and Baz Warne (guitar and lead vocals). Giants features JJ Burnel and Baz Warne on shared vocal duties and boasts those trademark Stranglers bass lines and keyboard runs as well as a waltz (!) and the first instrumental the band have recorded since 1980. The full track listing runs: Another Camden Afternoon, Freedom Is Insane, Giants, Lowlands, Boom Boom, My Fickle Resolve, Time Was Once On My Side, Mercury Rising, Adios, 15 Steps.

In recent years the Stranglers have appeared at Glastonbury, T in the Park, V Festivals, Hyde Park and Isle of Wight in the UK as well as their counterparts across Europe. The band’s UK tour details are as follows:

01 March    Leeds   O2 Academy
02 March    Dunfermline   Alhambra
03 March    Glasgow   O2 Academy
05 March    Liverpool   O2 Academy
06 March    Nottingham   Rock City
08 March    Cambridge   Corn Exchange
09 March    London Roundhouse
10 March    Birmingham   O2 Academy
12 March    Oxford   O2 Academy
13 March    Portsmouth   Pyramids Centre
15 March    Lincoln   Engine Shed
16 March    Brighton   Dome
17 March    Bristol   O2 Academy
19 March    Leamington Spa   Assembly
20 March    Guildford   G-Live
22 March    Newcastle   O2 Academy
23 March    Sheffield   O2 Academy
24 March    Manchester   O2 Academy

Full details can be found on www.stranglers.net

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ME release NAKED on Lizard King Records on March 5th 2012

Two of ME - or should that be us? - met at a spiritualist nudist festival so it’s hardly surprising that the debut single by ME should be called Naked. Naked is mini rock opera on the grandest of scales and a song that asks whether life, the universe and everything must always be like this. The band cite The Beatles, The Mars Volta and Led Zeppelin as influences but if we threw Danny Elfman, Philip Glass, Rachmaninof and Queen in there you’d start to get scared – so we won’t. Instead we’ll just suggest that ME are one of the most exciting new rock bands to appear this side of the millennium.

ME are Luke Ferris (voice, guitar, piano), Damian Tapley (guitar, voice), Michael Godde (bass, voice) and Spike Rogers (drums, programming). They formed in 2009 in Melbourne, the epicentre of the Australian music scene and a place the band describe as “an outburst of happiness that no one wants to leave!” And why ME? “Because it’s faintly absurd and un-googlable” they suggest and it’s true that there’s something intangible about both the name and the band. “We use drum troupes and orchestras, we love classical music and theatre and showmanship and we like to go places no one has been to before”, explains lead singer Luke.

ME have just completed work on their debut album produced by the legendary Simon ‘Barny’ Barnicott (Kasabian, Arctic Monkeys, Temper Trap) and are set to embark on a nationwide tour with Panic! At The Disco, followed by an appearance at the HMV Next Big Thing showcase. The dates run as follows:

25th January 2012    Newcastle O2 Academy
26th January 2012    Leeds O2 Academy
27th January 2012    Manchester 02 Academy
28th January 2012    Glasgow Barrowlands
29th January 2012    Birmingham O2 Academy
31st January 2012    Bristol O2 Academy
1st February 2012    Southampton Guildhall
2nd February 2012    Brixton Academy
10th February 2012    HMV Next Big Thing @ London Barfly

“Wake up – our dreams are so much harder than yours.”

Watch their new video here

Full details & updates can be found on www.meband.com, facebook.com/metheband or twitter.com/meband

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MAMAS GUN RELEASE ‘ONLY ONE’ (FEATURING BEVERLEY KNIGHT) AND PLAY JAZZ CAFE ON JANUARY 20TH 2012

MAMAS GUN are set to release a new single in January 2012. Entitled Only One, the track features Beverley Knight and deals with the subject of ‘soul mates’ and fateful love. It’s been lifted from the band’s second album The Life & Soul released in July 2011.
In 2010 Beverley Knight invited Mamas Gun on tour with her, having previously declared their music to be “something very special”. She has since explained further; “I heard their material and thought ‘this is so brilliant” because obviously the nucleus of the sound is soul but like me it’s got the funk in there and a bit of a rock edge; it had all the elements.”
The writing of Only One itself followed the 2010 tour and was a natural process between both writers, a perfect collaboration between artists who combine classic soul sounds together with a hybrid of several disparate music genres. Additionally, both artists are developing reputations as being amongst the UK’s strongest and most exciting live performers, the energy of which is also reflected in this song.

The Life & Soul (and indeed Only One) was produced by Grammy Award winning production team Martin Terefe and Andreas Olsson (named in the Top Ten best pop producers by Billboard this year and noted for success with artists such as Jason Mraz, Train, James Morrison, KT Tunstall and Jamie Cullum) and is the follow up to the band's debut Routes To Riches, a record that Billboard described as "a kaleidoscope of a record that travels through genres." The album was received well by media worldwide and made a huge impact in Japan where Mamas Gun were heralded as the most played international act in the country.

‘”On The Life & Soul the band have settled more firmly on one sound...to create something more powerful...and highly listenable” The Sunday Times.

Mamas Gun headline The Jazz Cafe in Camden on January 20th 2012.

Full details can be found on www.mamasgun.co.uk

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Michael Nyman releases "MICHAEL NYMAN" on January 23rd 2012

The year 1981 saw the release of Michael Nyman, the first Michael Nyman Band album, a groundbreaking record that presented Nyman’s unique take on minimalism and experimental music and unexpectedly threw in jazz improvisation for good measure. The album has only ever been available on the rarest of long-since deleted vinyl but will be re-released on MN Records on 23rd January as a 30th anniversary retro-look black vinyl CD with a booklet and limited edition poster in a replica gatefold LP-style sleeve.

Michael Nyman was produced by Nyman’s ex-Maidstone Art School student, David Cunningham, who had just founded the Flying Lizards and who went on to produce every Michael Nyman recording for the following ten years. The most significant production is that of ‘M-Work’, the reduced-scale score for Nyman’s collaboration with Bruce McLean and Paul Richards’ performance work ‘The Masterwork/Award-Winning Fish-knife’ of 1979. Much of the remaining music on Michael Nyman is taken from soundtracks for pre-‘Draughtsman’s Contract’ films by Peter Greenaway: such as “Bird Anthem” (from Act Of God, 1981, a documentary about people struck by lightning), "Bird List Song" [from the 3-hour long The Falls, 1979] and “Five Orchestral Pieces, Opus Tree” (from The Tree, 1978). It also includes Nyman’s classic deconstruction of the first 16 bars of the ‘Catalogue Song’ from Mozart’s ‘Don Giovanni’, "In Re Don Giovanni" which was also released at the time as a single on Les Disques du Crepuscule. The most unexpected track on Michael Nyman, however, is the melodically naïve “Waltz in F”, a piece Nyman wrote for art students whilst teaching at Trent Polytechnic in 1977, and which he subsequently commanded two modern jazz improvisers, Evan Parker and Peter Brotzmann, to “destroy” by overdubbing around ten separate tracks which Nyman and Cunningham added in to the Waltz mix.

Michael Nyman is significant for other reasons: as the first Michael Nyman album it represents the ‘crossing point’ between the Campiello Band [the onstage band which Nyman founded to play his arrangements of Venetian gondoliers’ songs in the opening production at the Olivier Theatre in October 1976], with its unique mix of folk, Renaissance and modern instruments and the purely modern instrumentation of the current Michael Nyman Band. And Bird Work is used as the music for the closing sequences of both Man with a Movie Camera and NYman with a Movie Camera and Bird List Song is the model for Nose-List Song and various ‘list songs’ in the new collaboration with Robert Pacitti, On Landguard Point which world premiered, sung by Marie Angel in Felixstowe on 23 September 2011.

Michael Nyman will be released on MN Records on January 23rd 2012.

Full details can be found on www.michaelnyman.com

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EAST 17 release their new single Can’t Get You Off My Mind (Crazy) on FOD Records in February 2012

East 17 are set to unveil the first fruits of their radical new sound in Spring 2012. The band who are still one of the most celebrated and successful boy bands of all time - having achieved 18 Top Twenty hits (including House Of Love, Deep and Christmas No.1 Stay Another Day) as well as four Top Ten albums and sales of over twenty million records – have replaced a previous dance ethic with a transatlantic rock backdrop reminiscent of artists like Billy Idol, Kings Of Leon, U2 and Bon Jovi. Main-man Tony Mortimer suggests “I think everyone is subconsciously inspired by American music and rock ‘n’ roll and this time around we wanted to do something more live with less tricks!”

Can’t Get You Off My Mind (Crazy) is about a gorgeous girl you notice at a hotel where an insanely debauched after-show party is under way. It’s as catchy as hell (think Summer of ’69!) and produced by Tony Mortimer and Bob Rose whilst the video was shot in Rome by legendary video director Lorenzo Vignolo. The band have just completed work on their first new album for over twelve years, a record entitled Dark Light mooted for release on FOD Records in March 2012.

East 17 were recently re-united under the auspices of principal songwriter Tony Mortimer who won an Ivor Novello Songwriter Award for Stay Another Day, the song he wrote for his brother Ollie who committed suicide. The current line-up includes original members Mortimer, John Hendy and Terry Caldwell.

Full details can be found on east17official.com

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Fish Bowl

Cod Stewart - Eelvis Presley - Cliff Pilchard - Spratty Smith - Thelonius Monkfish - Blenny Goodman - Salmon Dave - Macy Crayfish - Squid Viscious - Prawn Ryder - Limpit Bizkit - Sushi Sioux - The Clamberrys - Pike and Tuna Turner - Roenan Keating - Coley Minogue - Eel Young - Carpenters - Buzzcockles - Trout Reznor - Terrence Trout Derby - Marlin Gaye - Freddie and the Breamers - The Subreams - Jarvis Cockles - B Ream with "Things Can Only Get Batter" - Martin - Coley and the Sunshine Band - Eelton John - Carpy Simon - Brill Wyman - Ringo Starfish - Lenny Crabitz - Toni Hallibut - Codley and Creme - Frank Snapper - Sprat Stevens - Skate Bush - Shirley Bassey - Ocean Colour Bream - Linkin Shark - Squid Creole - Black - Shirley Bass - Turin Hakes - Box Recoder - Plaice Domingo - Seahorses - Soft Shell - Brilly Holliday - Codplay - Whitingsnake - The Inspiral Carppets - Salmon and Garfunkel - Cod Dylan - Haddock Street Preachers - Nina Salmone - Sprat Boy Slim - Aeroesmith - Eddie Tadpole Tuna - Fats Dominnow - Fleetwood Mackrel - Kylie Minnowgue - Primal Bream - Coldplaice - Marlin Manson - Eely - Dan - Bob Marlin - Neil Codling - Newt-2 - Pikeal Jackson - Camila Diaz - Paul McCarpney - Salmon Davis Junior - Rick Whaler - Gareth Skates - Puffa Daddy - The Dolphonics - Girs of Summer - Stiff Little Fish Fingers - Gil Scott Hering - Stickleback - Macy Cray - Avril Sardine - Newt Radicals - Hake Williams - Skatespear Sister - Piranharama - Pike and the Mechanics - Sushi Quatro - Tench Reznor - Sprat Benatar - Spratty Smith - Eric Dolphin - Eric Crabton - Shrimple Minds - Shrimply Red - Paul Salmon

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Add you own fish:

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