London singer-songwriter Conil has garnered a rosary of glowing reviews for his raw voice and standout songs he claims were inspired by wandering through the cobble-stoned city streets at night.  Using an array of unusual ethnic instruments on his latest release Strange Part Of The Country, the album evokes an atmospheric road trip through the city’s underbelly.  After a half bottle of Absinthe.  And tossing a bloody hatchet into the Thames.  But in a nice way.

The album was mixed by multi Grammy winner Tchad Blake – the man behind a number of Tom Waits and Pearl Jam records – and double bass came from legendary Danny Thompson (John Martyn, Tim Buckley).

Realizing that heavyweights of this caliber are difficult to get hold of unless you’re from a established record label, Conil emailed them some music under the pseudonym Phil Coltrane – which later became a lyric in ‘Dog Meat Stew’: “changed my name to John Coltrane ‘cos no one took my phone calls”. The plan worked. The quality of the songs impressed them and recording began.

Recorded mainly at night in his isolated home-studio in South London, Conil recalls “Sometimes I would not leave the house for days, experimenting with instruments like the dilruba and sarangi.”

Without a producer overseeing what he was doing, Conil found his sound as he went along. After 12 months of production, Conil took the tunes to Tchad Blake’s country studio where he spent his days working on Tchad’s farm – the Los Angeles native even taught him how to lasso horses. At night they would work in the studio drinking whiskey and raiding the wine cellar.

The record turned out raw and original but at its heart were quality songs and a unique voice.

With 4 star reviews by Q Magazine and support from BBC Radio 2, 6 Music, XFM and NME Radio in the UK, single ‘Years Between’ was released in the US and reached Number 3 in the Mediaguide Alternative Radio Chart. Blues Matters magazine featured Conil as the main front cover story, he supported US singer-songwriter Joseph Arthur on tour and was invited to perform at SXSW and NXNE.

Ever the maverick, at SXSW, Conil put up his trademark ‘One Way’ signs all over Austin – altering the familiar street signs to read ‘Strange Part Of The Country’ and points them to the gig venue.

He will be embarking on a street session tour playing gigs at planned spots coordinated via his website www.conilmusic.com

Each location will be marked by a Banksy-style plaque that reads ‘Strange Part Of The Country’. Previous street sessions have included gigs inside a meat market, next to a nuclear power station and in the middle of a dog track.

Beyond the release of the Strange Part Of The Country full-length album, Conil will be releasing three singles in the US and UK in 2010.

Find out more at:

Main: www.conilmusic.com
MySpace: www.myspace.com/conilmusic
YouTube: www.youtube.com/conilmusic
iTunes: www.itunes.com/conil

Listen to “Strange Part Of The Country” by Conil at MusicZeitgeist.com’s Free Streaming Indie Music Jukebox right now!




---

Think you got what it takes to be MZ’s Artist of the Month?

Submit your act to MusicZeitgeist.com through our SonicBids Gig Listing

Tags: Conil, indie artist, London, London music, NXNE, Pearl Jam, Strange Part of the Country, SXSW, Tchad Blake, Tim Buckley, Tom Waits, UK

When I was a kid, I worked my shit out by skulking down to the basement in my parents’ house and banging away for hours at the piano we inherited from my grandfather.  Every so often I could sense a presence come down the stairs behind me and just settle in while I perambulated across the keyboard.  Eventually people started talking – they said I had something special.  I didn’t care and I wouldn’t have known any different if they hadn’t said anything.  But it took me another ten years to figure out how to begin to capture that essence onto a recording.

Seattle, Washington-based Sage Redman figured it out though – she figured out how to do it at sixteen.  From within a boarding school. She sounds a lot older, but I am not sure what that means; I think I knew a lot more, felt a lot more, understood and saw a lot more when I was her age – before the dregs of life overwhelmed me, like it does so many of us.  So if you didn’t know she is still half a decade from twenty, you probably wouldn’t guess it.  Maybe it is the open-hearted, unfiltered nature that makes her sound so wizened.  Maybe it’s that she cites Benjamin Britten and Daft Punk as influences in the same breath.  At fifteen she opened for Martha Wainwright to critical acclaim.

All this to say – I never thought I would be one of those writers about music that made the distinction about an artist’s capabilities via their age.  I sure resented it when I was a kid.  So I apologize to Sage for being that guy.  But kid, the future will be yours if you can hack the rigors of the road ahead, because you are amazing.  And don’t let them beetles ever get you down.

Here is what Ms. Redman had to say between homework assignments when pressed with MusicZeitgeist.com’s notoriously incisive queries:

MZ: Who?

I’m 16 and when I first sat down to write a chord progression on my old moss green chipped upright piano four years ago, music composition engulfed my life.  I live in Seattle but go to boarding school outside of Boston.  I can’t really talk you through who I am, because I’m only just starting, but I think that my songs do the question more justice than any explanation I can write here.  Music fills a silence, on stage and everyday.  I won’t tell you a funny narrative in the middle of my set because I can’t think of one.  So be ready for the next song.

MZ: What?

I have many memories of how music has influenced me.  There is no anecdote or formula of how it all happened, just bits and pieces of things that lead to other things that lead to the next things. It’s really just a beginning.  Last I remember it was Elvis Presley, then The Beatles, then Coldplay, then Sigur Ros, then Radiohead and here I find myself in somewhat of a new wave stage. My attempts at the Thom Yorke side of life amuse me and I don’t hide the fact that I draw influence from 80’s cheesed up hits, Spacehog’s bass lines and choral music. I got the first four descending notes of a new melody from a Britten Magnificat I’m pretty sure….

The first time I heard Hound Dog, it was blaring from the old phonograph in my best friends living room, late at night, humming the melody that would forever be the base of my early musical knowledge. I didn’t know it at the time but it felt like 1956.  Better yet was waking up still humming it and realizing that Presley and I shared the same birthday. As a six year old, how could I not come back for more?  I have been influenced by different sounds in different eras:  listening to Joe Jackson’s Look Sharp! all the way through and picking Is She Really Going Out With Him as my cover in my first show; spending half my summer inside KEXP radio station; and studying Pink Floyd’s The Wall in seventh grade. We’re talking Edith Piaf to Daft Punk.

MZ: Why?

Growing up in Seattle has no doubt had an affect on my musical roots and point of view.  Pearl Jam’s Ten was practically on a constant repeat for the first years of my life, and I had a childhood obsession with the album paintings on the walls of Tower Records.  I’ve opened at the Triple Door, Chop Suey, and other local venues in Seattle; places I’d drive by and only imagine playing growing up.

MZ: Until When?

From 6 to 16, from 16 on to forever.

MZ: Where?

Music is a water in which you don’t need to surface for air.  I’m in and I’m staying.

Find out more at: http://www.myspace.com/sageredman

Sage Redman’s album “It Is What It Is” is available at CDBaby and most major digital distribution outlets (Amazon, iTunes etc.)

Listen now to “Most Important Things” by Sage Redman at MusicZeitgeist.com

* To see your act in MZ’s Artist Profile, submit to our gig listing at Sonicbids today!
(not all acts are selected)

Tags: benjamin britten, boarding school, chord progression, Coldplay, critical acclaim, daft punk, Joe Jackson, keyboard, Martha Wainwright, music composition, Pearl Jam, Pink Floyd, Radiohead, sage redman, seattle music, seattle washington

Listening to Shudder To Think is a lot like doing trigonometry – you know it all makes sense somehow, but damned if you can figure it out. Full of obtuse angles but wrought with plenty of accessible melodic avenues, their music is one of the more love-it-or-hate-it propositions to have ever wound up on a major label.

Tags: alternative rock, avenues, band reunions, Craig Wedren, El Rey Theatre, Funeral At The Movies, Get Your Goat, Hieronymous Bosch, House Of Leaves, live review, Los Angeles, love, memory lane, music, musiczeitgeist.com, Nathan Larson, november 1, obtuse angles, participant, Pearl Jam, ponies, Pony Express Record, reunions, saturday night, Shudder To Think, STT, Ten Spot, Tool, trip down