Peter Bradley Adams was formerly one half of the duo, Eastmountainsouth, signed by Robbie Robertson (of The Band) to DreamWorks Records in 2002. Peter co-produced their debut album with Mitchell Froom, and the duo toured extensively opening for Lucinda Williams, Tracy Chapman, and performed their final show at the Hollywood Bowl opening for Lyle Lovett and Shelby Lynn.
Since then, Adams has released three solo records: "Gather Up", "Leavetaking", and his most recent, "Traces", in October 2009 on Sarathan Records.
Peter's music has appeared in 40+ films and television shows including recent placements in CBS' “The Mentalist” , CW’s “One Tree Hill”, ABC’s “Brothers and Sisters” as well as the Miramax Film, film “Everbody’s Fine” starring Robert De Niro
"Adams is fast developing as a songwriter who both inspires and questions" - Nic Harcourt / Los Angeles Times Magazine - Jan 2010
XM Satellite Radio’s “The Loft” named him “Notable New Artist of The Year” in 2006.
And the The Wall Street Journal named Peter in November of 2008 one of the “21st-century writers whose songs are worth exploring.”
Peter Bradley Adams, World United Music, The Minstral Show, Mishara, Independent, music, videos, artists, bands, groups, alternative, folk, country, easy listening, mp3, CD, DVD
Phil Common has shared stages with Chris Barron of the Spin Doctors and Sony Record's David Poe. His songs have taken numerous mentions and awards in national and international songwriting contests. This growing talent is one to see.
Born and raised in Manhattan, NYC. What time he wasn't playing ball in the streets was spent mostly on stage. Already performing for audiences at 8 years old Phil soon ended up playing at New York's famous CBGB club on a regular basis as well as working on the amazing sound board there. Later he relocated to Chicago where he put Commonhaus together. With this unique hard edge pop band in place, major label interest was quick to follow including Sony records and EMI.
Now back in his home town, Phil is playing and recording his solo works, he released his third independent record, Island, in July of 2011. Now available everywhere!
"It's all too easy to forget the piece you are of all of us." -phil common
Press:
“::SIGH:: It’s like a universal law of the college experience, your heart is gonna get broken sooner or later, and if you’re like me it will probably be more than once, or twice…or three times. ::DOUBLE SIGH:: But I’ve got you covered. Get a box of tissues, put on some Phil Common, and have a good cry. It’s cool guys, your roommate won’t think any different of you… ” Josh the Intern - OurStage.com
“Anyone who’s ever described themselves as a singer-songwriter has written their fair share of melodramatic love songs. But let’s be honest, these songs are often drenched in sappy lyrics and often sound the same. So what’s a hopeless romantic to do? They can start by listening to Phil...” Sam Coren - OurStage.com
“Phil is a ethereal creative force, one that leaves a lasting imprint on all that it touches. Intellectually, his mind and curiosity are infinite. Musically, he is a wizard who's soul is steeped in compassion and humanity.” - Patricia S., Municipal Bond Specialist, LaSalle Financial services, - Internet
I have always loved to sing. The process of putting music together, the feeling of creating a melodic sound. The reason for my name ''Midnight Songstress' is simply because as a child I would often crawl out of the covers at night and sit on the side of the bed watching the moon through my window. I soon would find myself singing to myself. Making up words and melodies. I really never thought I would share those songs with anyone as I am a very private person emotionally. I saw those moments with the moon as my own. As I became an adult I found it increasingly hard to express it in the normal way. Talking. Writing. Even drawing which is another love of mine. So I decided to do the one thing I knew worked. Writing songs by the moonlight. Other songs are written simply because they popped into my head. So there will be a lot of variety there. I can only hope that you find something here that connects you to it. Anything that hits a chord inside and makes it so you leave feeling something. That is my wish.
In an era when manufactured pop is thought to be the height of creative ambition, the singer/songwriter is considered something of an anachronism. Once in a while, however, you stumble across an artist who makes you remember why you liked music in the first place. Enter Gus MacGregor and an artist worth becoming evangelical about. Enter Gus MacGregor and an artist worth becoming evangelical about. Born in Blackpool and signed to the Toronto-based FOD Records, MacGregor initially found success on a London stage starring as Buddy in The Buddy Holly Story. An Olivier Award nomination swiftly followed – for Best Actor In A Musical – but so did self-doubt and a desire to get arrested for busking on the tube. I think singing in the street is much harder than playing to a packed theatre or concert hall. I think every performer should do it from time to time. It keeps your feet on the ground and exposes your weaknesses. Indeed, MacGregor has said “I think singing in the street is much harder than playing to a packed theatre or concert hall. I think every performer should do it from time to time. It keeps your feet on the ground and exposes your weaknesses in a way that a warm, comfortable auditorium can not.” Of course, this would only warrant a doodle on the street map of pop unless Gus MacGregor wasn’t such a hugely gifted talent – but he is and it won’t be. With a voice like melting butter, MacGregor comes across like a young Paul Simon (yes he’s that good) whilst Gus Macgregor – the eponymous debut album produced by the legendary Bob Rose (Roy Orbison, George Harrison) – has an instant, classic feel, like something you’ve had knocking around the house for years. It’s enough to make you weak.
As a child MacGregor was exposed to Irish, Scottish and English folk music, as well as the American folk artists of the 60's and 70's. “My dad had some sea shanties, a blue boxed Beatles set and a lot of Joan Baez and Jackson Brown”, he says. music recorded by working people who weren’t interested in a career. Indeed it was a mixed musical education as MacGregor grew up to love blues and country and, subsequently, early Alan Lomax recordings or “music recorded by working people who weren’t interested in a career.” Tellingly, he noticed a parallel between Scottish music about whalers and the 40s and 50s Lomax recordings of the deep south. Paradoxically, his elder sisters taught him to play classical guitar and by the age of eleven he was playing guitar in his bedroom in lieu of schoolwork. Four years later MacGregor was playing gigs at the Sun Inn in Blackpool and then, at the age of 22, “Buddy Holly The Musical came to town. The cast used to come into the club I played in,” he recalls. “The guy who was playing Buddy was about to leave and he suggested I should try out for the part.” MacGregor had no preconceptions about being an actor but as his father had just died and he felt like nothing really mattered he decided to head down to London and audition. To his amazement he got the part. Overnight his life changed.
For nearly a decade MacGregor used to get up and clean his teeth whilst singing ‘Every day it’s a-gettin’ closer/Goin’ faster than a roller coaster.’ Each night he’d sing for three hours, then, more often than not, have dinner with Lucie Arnaz or some other Hollywood/West End heavyweight. And each night he’d go to bed wondering when he was going to be found out. The sensation lasted even until the night of the Olivier Awards when MacGregor thought himself “an imposter, surrounded by proper actors.” But he loved Buddy Holly. “His songs were a landscape to people’s lives,” he says now. “And his music was in your face and charged with sexual innuendo!” MacGregor even identified with him – after all he was a singer/songwriter who didn’t fit in – but after eight years he knew he had to move on. MacGregor met a girl – a ballet dancer called Jenny who was to become his wife – and moved to Switzerland.
"I was like an old hobo. My diary was just filled with confirmation numbers for trains and planes and buses. I would travel anywhere for a gig, play a folk club in Bournemouth then spend seven hours on a coach to Nottingham.”
Some of you might be thinking - so where did it all go right? But you’d be wrong. MacGregor took to busking, sleeping on airport floors and train and bus platforms. Indeed he says of this period in his life: "I was like an old hobo. My diary was just filled with confirmation numbers for trains and planes and buses. I would travel anywhere for a gig, play a folk club in Bournemouth then spend seven hours on a coach to Nottingham.” He loved busking, noting that when he played one of his songs in the street he could tell whether it was any good or not. He was playing a George Harrison song on the street in Bern one day when a guy who’d been watching him pulled out a police badge and he was booked for not having a license.
Somehow MacGregor’s musings found their way to Universal Music who suggested he co-write with Judy Tzuke (he did and they produced several songs together) and a new-found confidence enabled him to write and record an album (for FOD) that would end up being his eponymous debut. The record is astonishing for several reasons, not least because you wouldn’t expect someone to step off a West End stage and produce a record so thrillingly thought provoking. MacGregor reveals that, as a teenager he was given three records that he still owns to this day – Terry Reid’s Seed Of Memory, Jackson Browne’s Late For The Sky and The Paul Simon Songbook and the latter’s influence is apparent on the album’s second track, Crown Of Thorns, which offers the line “if I offered you some wine for forgiveness, would you lay down your crown of thorns?” (Of Simon, he says, “I love his turn of phrase and his use of melody which doesn’t fight the natural melody of speech.”) The song is about the possibility of reconciliation with an old flame and MacGregor admits that it specifically concerns someone he was unfaithful to. “I think I slightly crave her forgiveness even now,” he says. “The song is about wanting to be a better person than I am but it also wonders what life would have been like if the relationship had worked and whether we look back and glorify the past.”
Reconciliation is a common theme on Gus MacGregor but then again so is ..what if? I Once Imagined Us concerns a relationship that is inevitably going to fail but it also asks whether life was really like that or whether you just imagined it. MacGregor remembers taking his girlfriend out in his first car and the sentiments are relayed in heartbreaking detail when he sings: "Now this old Vauxhall has seen better days/ But the radio still works quite well/ And if I tune it just enough/ Between the static and the engine buzz/I can still imagine us." It’s a realistic song but hardly bleaker than the Roy Orbison-tinged For Better Or For Worse” which appears to be about whether it is possible to survive a relationship at all – “Love’s a thing you do you know, it’s never been a thing that you can say.” Here, it’s interesting to note that MacGregor seems to be writing about a relationship of the future and then imagining looking back on that relationship’s demise ….
Elsewhere Gus MacGregor remains enigmatic. The magnificent Under The Sun (featuring the delicious line “We follow our happy noses”) suggests that contentment can be found by sharing your life with someone else; the panoramic Lifeline, reminiscent of The Eagles’ finer moments, is a painting of a struggling relationship where two lovers put their oldest jeans on and head for the nearest bar - whilst angels save them before they “hit the ground”; Rings Around The Moon (which cleverly employs numerical imagery throughout) is about spending time apart from the person you love - and the transience of happiness; My Two Feet is about, ahem, keeping your feet on the floor and not taking things too seriously; and Sarah touches on a common malaise, wondering whether we can ever really know the other person we are living with.
Three tracks on Gus MacGregor are specifically about childhood and growing up: the Dylan-esque Rain To Rainbows (a song worth clinging to) features turns of phrase MacGregor wishes his father had said to him and which he would love to say to the son he’s yet to have - “When you see no ships only hardships /May the sun turn the rain to rainbows in your sky/ May the wind dry the tears from your eyes”; the evocative Before The Unions Fell transports us back to an era that coincided (in MacGregor’s case) with a miner’s strike and getting into trouble; and best of all is Swallows And Amazons. The Arthur Ransome book (in which children sail, fish and make camp on an island in the Lake District) of the same name transfixed and touched MacGregor as a child and even now he envies these children and their imaginary world. Typically, the song is tinged with the sadness of a relationship ending before a family can enjoy such frivolity.
Gus MacGregor closes with I Bet You Wished You Listened To Me Now, an acapella vignette that suggests that it is better to listen to people than in it is to suppress their voices. It was partly inspired by the speeches of Nelson Mandela - MacGregor and producer Rose discussed setting the piece to music before deciding that its cold, stark message should be heard in absentia. It’s an entirely appropriate comment on the value of the freedom of speech and a fitting coda to an extraordinary record, one that will sit proudly in any collection for many years to come. And for us, and more importantly for MacGregor himself, it’s been worth the wait. Or as the man himself says on Lifeline:
It’s hard enough to convey your thoughts and emotions lyrically, and it’s a trying task to remain compelling as an instrumental band. Maneli Jamal is both a solo act as well as an instrumental guitar player, yet he manages to play with conviction that transcends words and obvious melodies.
It’s very hard to talk about Maneli Jamal the guitarist without first elaborating on Maneli Jamal the person. The man has had an interesting past to say the least, and though he’s only in his early 20s, his experiences could fill up a number of notebooks with song lyrics.
Born in Iran and raised in Germany, Jamal moved to the States in his adolescence, immigrating to Minnesota before relocating to Austin, Texas until his late teens. At this time, his family was issued a deportation letter by the immigration office, and they were forced to claim refuge in Canada within thirty days of receiving the notice.
Taking literally only what they could fit in their hands, Jamal and his family arrived in Toronto after establishing their lives in Austin. It was at this time that Maneli got an acoustic guitar from his father, which has scarcely left his hands since.
“I carried it on the plane, and everywhere I went, I had it”, Jamal recalls. “For half a year, we only had what we had in our hands, and I had that cheap acoustic guitar in my hands with no case. Going through something like that, as a teenager especially, you need an outlet that can take you away from life and zone you out. That's what the acoustic guitar did for me.”
Jamal had played in punk and metal bands throughout his teens, so he was no stranger to the six-string. However, the acoustic guitar held new secrets for him to discover, and thus began his exploration of the virtuosic style he’s since mastered. Utilizing a mix of classical, flamenco and percussive playing, Jamal composes unique movements which are far outside the realm of traditional songwriting.
“I'm more into letting the music flow as opposed to having a songwriter’s structure, like a traditional pop song would have,” he explains. “I'm trying to gear it more towards how a classical player would create music, which rarely has a structure like that.”
“When I came [to Toronto], I was very into classical playing, but after a while I got tired of practicing and trying to master a technique. I got out of that whole thing and tried to master melody and rhythm as opposed to trying to master the technicality of things. I'm not a fluid player, but that's what I think makes music art, that imperfect playing.”
He admits that his style is hard to explain to listeners who haven't seen or heard him before, but instead of only listening to his songs, he insists that those interested go see him perform live to get the full effect of the music.
“You may think it’s not that accessible, and it’s kind of not, but when you see it, it becomes more of a visual experience as opposed to a listening experience, Jamal concludes. “I usually describe it as percussive, melodic, and rhythmic. That’s very vague. I don't really know how to say it. Just watch me play a song, and maybe you can figure out what to call it.”
Maneli has just released his latest CD "The Lamaj Movement" in May 2012, released under Candyrat Records. It's a concept album where every song takes the listener on a part of his history growing up. A homage to his family's nomadic journey around the world
In a current music industry that is being more and more divided between “pop” and “indie” rock, TELOGRAPH arrives to bridge the gap. The self-proclaimed Cinematic Popsters have come a long way in the past few years. Now two EPs deep, they have created a soundtrack to their own world and a clear musical vision for the future.
TELOGRAPH’s second EP, Telograph EP, was released in January of 2008. The record was produced by Chris Keup and Stewart Myers (Jason Mraz, Rachel Yamagata, Lifehouse), and is best described by its use of driving guitars, powerful vocals, and atmospheric production. Influenced by 90’s British rock bands, as well as modern indie rockers, Telograph EP was well received by the media and was described as 'Impeccably arranged and confidently played,' by the Washington Post.
Since the release of the band’s first EP in January 2007, the band has gone on to tour and perform with national acts including Gomez, Longwave, O.A.R., Robbers on High Street, Augustana, and 1990s, at some of the largest venues on the east coast. In every city, TELOGRAPH continues to receive warm receptions, proving their ability to cross genre boundaries while enchanting listeners with their sound.
Never slowing down creatively, new material is already in the works, and the group plans to continue touring as hard as possible to get the word out. TELOGRAPH wants to be the biggest band in the world, and given the momentum thus far, they just might be in store for something big.
"...the kind of local band that's so great it should be famous, but isn't yet." - Washington Post Express, October 2006
"This is a band to pay attention to and follow with rabid fascination." - Smother Magazine, February 2007
"Grandiose, Brit-style pop rockers..." -Washingtonian Magazine, March 2007
"Impeccably arranged and confidently played, Telograph's material balances grand gestures with propulsive energy and an astute sense of space: The music sounds big but never overstuffed." - Washington Post, February 2007
Matt Woods is caught in a melting pot of early millennium pop and modern Americana with a splash of southern roots. His acoustic rock, yet very laid-back sound stirs from the influences of Dave Matthews, Tom Petty, and the Counting Crows.
Matt, 26, is from the most southern region of Alabama in the city of Dothan, but now resides in Nashville. He made his start in high school playing various private parties and events. Venturing off to college at Auburn in 2001, he worked the local scene around the area playing smoky bars, fraternity parties, and small venues.
“I actually really miss those days. Inebriated college kids somehow give you the confidence that you need at that age when you’re on stage in front of a crowd.”
Slowly the out of town gigs were piling up, providing a new vessel of marketability. In 2004, producers sparked interest in the budding musician and he left Auburn for the “Music City” to take the next step.
“It wasn’t that I was intentional about making a career out of it, but music made me happy…and at the time, I was able to financially support myself through music, so I stuck with it. You’d do the same thing.”
In December 2004, Woods released his first studio album “Something Surreal.” The album wasn’t pushed hard until the end of 2006, and the acoustic version of the record became the double ammunition that it needed to market. Oxygen network’s “The Bad Girls’ Club” picked up the single “Misconception” for an episode, launching a national taste of Matt’s music. His southeastern college tours in the 2006 seasons were a success, branching out to Louisiana, Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina, and gaining more regional exposure.
Woods is very active in his music career. He is currently writing new material for the next full-length album. No date is set for the release, but he hints to possibly sometime in the summer of 2010.
Everyone needs to see some sweat, but there's a fault with where we think we need to see it, due to this hard-wired Protestant work ethic that's still trying to cool things down. It's got us thinking we have to see you sweat before we'll believe you really mean it. But what about divination? What about gliding with the gift? What about finding the faith to believe some people are just tapped conduits channeling this stuff out with Jedi-Mind-Trick ease? This is where Don Devore's deftness is so dope it can have the affect of arching back around the curve of things toward being a disability. 'Cause really, how can you believe this guy isn't behind the scenes sweating it out like the rest of us? I mean, maybe he is, but if so, he does it like the savvy gentleman that doesn't really exist in this age outside of Graham Greene novels; which is to say, if he does it at all, he does it in classy secrecy.
The first time I met Don I played a Thanksgiving Day party he threw at some three-story town house in Central Philly. "Hey man, come down and play a party," was all I got from him first. Upon arrival I found a massive spread with cranberry sauce, stuffing, savory pies from ye olden tymes, weird beers brewed according to Ben Franklin's own personal recipes, a decent p.a. in the living room, a packed house, and not an exclamation point on Don's face. For all I knew, this was just how this guy lived it (except when he mumbled under his breath, "I actually prefer Thomas Jefferson's brewing methods"). Nothing about Don gave the impression that this night was any different than any other; nor that there was even a finger lifted to make it happen; nor that any worlds involving the spectrum of things between oxycodone and lawn croquet (or both together) would seem discordant to either nun or non. No, the dude just channels it and you follow. Always has. I've seen him play in Ink and Dagger with make-up on his face in front of 700 sweaty kids in an industrial suburb of Detroit. I didn't flinch. I've called him up to jam, only to find out he's in Melbourne recording a Souls She Said album for the week. I didn't ask. I've arrived at parties on the Lower East Side at like 11 am to find Don both bartending and DJing whenever he felt moved in either direction. I just accepted the drinks and danced. And whether there are or are not sacks of money following this guy around seems beside the point. Like a proper diviner, it appears like he's operating aside from even that tectonic.
Part of this particular brand of divining is a Gertrude Stein-like craft at curating the ever movable feast -- and that goes for not just Don but everyone in this band. In fact, it was Mickey Madden from L.A.'s Maroon Five that first envisioned how this puzzle should congeal. One might think Mickey’s already being busy with music non-stop would render the dude spent, but it doesn't work like that. When more is really on it always makes more, and if only the goodtimes weren't so fast that we could actually remember how they happened, I'd ask Mickey which cocktail lit the lightbulb that said, "Don, tonight we do not go to that party, we jam with Josh instead", Josh being Joshua Grubb of Austin’s Vietnam. So add to that trio of puppeteers the hard-to-catch wandering myths (that somehow got caught) of Ryan Rapsys from Chicago's Euphone and Dale Jiminez from Philly's Need New Body, and so begins the writing of "Strategies For Apprehension", on both coasts, in studios ranging from the sun soaked Sunset Sound studio number 2 (already made famous many times over by the likes of the Doors, the Beach Boys, and Zep, etc.) to Earl Greyhound's rat-infested Dumbo basement studio in the dead of winter. All the while the studio doors remained perpetually open with a collage of helpful hands and ears that might look like puke if you put all those colors together on one canvas at the same time (I'm sorry did I say punk, I meant puke)-- you just have to accept that these things happen casually, don't ask how, I tried. You stop asking when Don tells you he hooked the track up with Kool Keith at a chance encounter at Sundance when Kool Keith was transitioning between his Black Elvis and Black Warhol stages. Word dude, word.
Anyhow, it's also beside the point for Historics -- and this is where this sort of channeling bends all the way over the curve to a disability. Historics are not Rasputin-like augurs working to bed the queen and topple the empire (I mean, maybe that too, but first), they just wanna make perfect sounds and when the bliss is this guided no one will or can say no to the pursuit thereof. But listen, now I'm just looking to write this bio for reasons that may be obvious to you and me -- to convince people that they must, must, go forth and seek "Strategies For Apprehension" -- but this is not so obvious to Don. When I tried getting out of him what I deemed to be the proper info I intended to use to pique your interest, he instead took me through the entire album track by track describing where aerosol spray cans were used in place of a hi-hats, or how fat fingers hit heavily on a floor tom with a blown out mic sound like thunder, or why at some points it's necessary to run to Radio Shack and just buy the cheapest mic you can find. Dude, girls don't care about that stuff. There's a cover of Queen's "She Makes Me (Stormtrooper in Stilettos)" on this album along with a cover of Sub Society's "A Lot Less" and they flow with the spectrum of pure Historics surrounding them like they were always just there, you don't ask how. You just sweat it 'cause it seems like it always was, like these songs were already here and just needed to be tapped. There's sweat here yeah; it's yours though, not Historics'.
Members:
It was ..Mickey Madden.. from L.A.'s ..Maroon Five.. that first envisioned how this puzzle should congeal. If I had to ask somebody, I'd ask Mickey which cocktail lit the light bulb that said, "Don, tonight we don't go to that party, we jam with Josh instead." .... Josh being ..Joshua Grubb.. of Austin’s ..VietNam... And it was hardly long before the enlistment of ..Don Devore.., a savvy gentleman with class in the style of Graham Greene novels (I've arrived at parties on the Lower East Side at like 11 am to find Don both bartending and DJing whenever he felt moved in either direction). Add to that puppeteers like ..Ryan Rapsys.. from Chicago's ..Euphone.. and ..Dale Jiminez.. from Philly's ..Need New Body.., record an album, on both coasts, in studios ranging from the sun soaked ..Sunset Sound Studio Number 2.. (made famous by the likes of the Doors, the Beach Boys, and Zep, etc.) to more sordid locales like ..Earl Greyhound's.. rat-infested Dumbo basement studio in the dead of winter, and with a stew like that in mind, you stop asking when Don tells you the band's hooked up a on track with ..Kool Keith... Word dude, word. .... ..Historics.. are not Rasputin - like augurs working to bed the queen and topple the empire; the bliss is this guided, no one will or can say no to the pursuit thereof.
