Swim Deep are a Indie rock band from Birmingham, England. Their debut album Where the Heaven Are We is scheduled for release on July 29, 2013.
Swim Deep formed in 2011 with Austin Williams, Tom ‘Higgy’ Higgins and Wolfgang J Harte and multiple drummers until they eventually recruited Austin’s best friend Zachary Robinson on drums who was originally from the band Cajole Cajole, on the subject of this Austin said “We thought it was a long shot but we’d just lost another drummer so we asked Zach if he wanted to join our band and he said yeah. That was one of the best things that happened, to be honest”.
After a few months Harte announced that he was leaving the band and they played as a three piece for a while until they recruited Cavan McCarthy. In 2012 they signed with Chess Club and released their debut single “King City”. After a UK tour with Spector they went to Brussels to record their debut album with producer Charlie Hugall and they released their second single “Honey” in November, Williams said about this “Since we’ve been signed we’ve met all these new people and we all end up at different parties. I’m really looking forward to making the album. It’s the first album, it can only be made once”.
They have played shows with Splashh, Spector and The Mystery Jets. in 2013 they released their third single “The Sea” which NME said “With this, it feels like Swim Deep are on the cusp of stepping into the big league”. In March they are to release their fourth single “She Changes the Weather” and their debut album Where the Heaven Are We is scheduled to be released July 2013.
Frank Hamilton (born October 4, 1985 in Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire) is an English singer, songwriter and producer currently living in London. He is best known for his debut EP You, Your Cat & Me [2008]. In 2009 his Christmas single became the first song since 1978 to be played twice in a row on BBC Drivetime radio, prompting a featured slot at the o2 arena alongside Stereophonics, Scouting for Girls and The Proclaimers and in 2011 his second EP Words and Nothing More EP went straight in to the top 5 singer/songwriter charts.
In 2012, Hamilton was releasing one song a week. Now, in 2013 he is releasing one blog a week.
Frank Hamilton grew up in St. Ives, Cambridgeshire, the youngest of three children. From an early age he took an interest in music and cites Ritchie Valens and Buddy Holly as his first loves. He was also keen on sports, especially table tennis, and at one point was ranked 8th in England at under 12 level.
After trying and failing at both Trumpet and Drums he bought an electric guitar on his 16th birthday and started writing songs. After finishing school Hamilton moved to Guildford to study guitar at Academy of Contemporary Music. It was here where he swapped his electric guitar for an acoustic, formed a band and started gigging.
That diaeresis hovering over the “o” in 17-year-old Chlöe Howl’s first name isn’t some sort of attention-seeking affectation – that’s how it appears on her birth certificate after her parents got slightly confused and mistakenly added it instead of putting it over the “e”.
Diacritic errors aside though, there’s a lot to love about Howl’s sweary, sparky debut single, No Strings, which bounces along energetically over a synth riff similar to Dizzee Rascal and Calvin Harris’s Dance Wiv Me, but avoids falling into the generic dance-pop vacuum.
Taking a pinch of Lily Allen’s Alright, Still-era youthful exuberance and eye for lyrical detail and bolting it onto a song that tells the sorry tale of a relationship soured by one half’s desire to keep things relaxed (“No more crawling in your bed, fuck your no strings … I hope I have twins”), No Strings stands out from the current pop crowd by actually displaying buckets of personality.
Her lullaby voice isn’t quite as gentle as it first appears however as her heartfelt and honest lyrics shine through you’ll be transported
The only sufferance Darling faces is that it is an E.P and oh so brief. The reality of which is astounding as it serves as a magnificent taste of what’s to come from a musician with much more yet to give.
Darling is the debut E.P from Hampshire-based acoustic musician Aimee Gould, allowing her to introduce her soothingly haunting vocals to the world at large.
Aimee Gould positively oozes talent as her honey-sweet voice melds somewhere between the crystal clear vocals of Ellie Goulding and the sultry, smoky voice of Laura Marling. She takes her eager, genuine voice and compliments it with a series of plucky, subtle guitar tunes that meld into the fabric of the songs. Her E.P is a gentle amble down a country lane as you allow her comforting voice and soft guitar strings to wash over you, a sound capable of putting you completely at ease.
Her lullaby voice carries within it a secret weight however, as the music washes over you and you become acutely aware of the heartfelt and honest lyrics that are presenting themselves to you. Darling is capable of transporting you, even just for fifteen minutes, to somewhere peaceful within your own mind. It’s only downfall is that is an E.P and thus serves as mere taster of what’s to come from this talented musician.
Tegan and Sara Quin were born September 19, 1980 in Calgary, Alberta. They began playing guitar and writing songs at age 15.They initially played as Plunk without a drummer or bass player. In 1997, they used their school’s recording studio to record two demo albums: Who’s in Your Band? and Play Day. In 1998, they won Calgary’s Garage Warz competition, using the studio time they won to record their first professional demo, Yellow tape, which was followed by Orange tape and Red tape.
Two songs from Red tape appeared on their first album, Under Feet Like Ours, which they released independently in 1999 under the name “Sara and Tegan”. They later changed their name to “Tegan and Sara” because it was easier to pronounce and reprinted the album using that name. They also wanted their name to stand out amongst the other ‘Sara’ musicians at the time such as Sarah McLachlan and Sarah Slean. Neil Young’s manager signed them to Young’s Vapor Records label, and they released This Business of Art through Vapor in 2000. They have toured extensively since then.
In 2002, the band released their third album If It Was You. Their fourth album, So Jealous, was released in 2004 and led to wider success. This album was released through both Vapor and Sanctuary. One track on the album, “Walking with a Ghost”, was covered by The White Stripes, who released it on their Walking with a Ghost EP.
Their 2007 album, The Con, was released by Vapor and Sire because Sanctuary chose to no longer release new music in the United States. The album was co-produced by Chris Walla. Jason McGerr of Death Cab for Cutie, Matt Sharp of The Rentals and previously Weezer, Hunter Burgan of AFI, and Kaki King all appear on the album.
On October 27, 2009, Tegan and Sara released their sixth album Sainthood, produced by Chris Walla and Howard Redekopp, as well as a three-volume book set titled ON, IN, AT, which is a collection of stories, essays, journals, and photos of the band on tour in America in the fall of 2008, writing together in New Orleans, and touring Australia. The photographs in the book are by Lindsey Byrnes and Ryan Russell. Sainthood debuted on the Billboard top 200 albums at number 21 selling, 24,000 copies in its first week.While recording Sainthood, Tegan and Sara spent a week writing songs together in New Orleans. The song “Paperback Head” appeared on the album, making it the first song on any Tegan and Sara album that they wrote together.Spin magazine gave Sainthood four out of five stars and wrote, “Tegan and Sara’s music may no longer be the stuff of teens, but its strength remains in how much it feels like two people talking.”
In 2011, they launched 2011: A Merch Odyssey, which saw at least one new item in the official online stores every month, all year long. A live CD/DVD combination package titled Get Along was released on November 15 and contains three films titled ‘States’, ‘India’ and ‘For The Most Part’. Get Along has been nominated in the 2013 Grammy Awards for “Best Long Form Music Video”.
Tegan and Sara started recording their seventh studio album, Heartthrob, on February 20, 2012. Eight songs were produced by Greg Kurstin. Joey Waronker contributed drums to these songs. Two songs were produced by Mike Elizondo, with Victor Indrizzo contributing drums, Josh Lopez contributing guitar and Dave Palmer contributing piano. The last two songs were produced by Justin Meldal-Johnsen. The first single, “Closer”, was released on September 25, 2012. The album was released on January 29, 2013 and debuted on the Billboard top 200 at number 3, the bands highest charting record to date, selling 49,000 copies in its first week. Heartthrob also debuted at number 2 on the Canadian chart, digital downloads chart and also hit number 1 on the rock and alternative album charts.
Harrison Cosmo Krikoryan Jarvis (born September 1, 1989), better known by his stage name Cosmo Jarvis, is an English singer-songwriter and filmmaker. In early 2008 he signed to indie label Wall of Sound and his debut album Humasyouhitch/Sonofabitch was released on 16 November 2009. His first official single “She’s Got You” received airplay on BBC Radio 1 and BBC Radio 2 as well as being amongst NME’s “10 Tracks You Have to Hear This Week”.Stephen Fry called “Gay Pirates”, Jarvis’ fourth single, “wonderful” and put a link to its video on his Twitter feed.Between 2008 and 2010 he performed shows alongside acts including Muse, Gabriella Cilmi, Gym Class Heroes, Panic at the Disco, The Sunshine Underground, Reverend and the Makers and The Holloways.
Cosmo was born in New Jersey, United States to an Armenian-American mother and English father.As a child, he moved to Devon, United Kingdom with his family. In his own words he has stated that he has no affiliation to New Jersey, except that “Kevin Smith was born there and I love his work”. Cosmo first started writing and recording music in his bedroom where he also began making his first films on VHS when he was barely twelve. His storytelling demonstrated an advanced level of sophistication, as was clear from the lengths that he would go to tell his tales; film the television and then film out of the window because that way he knew that he was telling a story.Cosmo released his self-titled debut album aged nineteen, having left education at Ivybridge Community College at sixteen to pursue a career in music and film, instead of choosing to attend a sixth form.
Jarvis confirmed his second album’s title was Is the World Strange or Am I Strange? on his official Facebook page.The first single released from the album is “Gay Pirates”, which was released on January 23, 2011. The single’s music video,which was directed by Cosmo, was a viral hit and was popular among celebrity tweeters such as Stephen Fry and John Barrowman. The song was featured as Record of the Dayand AOL’s Spinner video of the day.Gay Pirates was voted number 85 on the Triple J Hottest 100 of 2011, which aired on Australia day (26 January) 2012. The album itself was given a 8.5/10 rating from Soundblab album reviews.He announced in an interview with TNC that he had begun work on his first feature film called The Naughty Room.The film premièred on BBC Four on the 20/08/12, shortly after the release of Jarvis’ third studio album titled ‘Think Bigger’.Cosmo toured the UK in late 2012 supporting Mad Dog Mcrea for whom he penned the song Waiting on the Hill. Comedy film Hawk(e): The Movie (2013) features several songs by Cosmo Jarvis
Dorset girl Jazz Morley possesses a voice with such natural soulfulness beyond her 23 years of age that it possibly comes as no surprise to learn that her first public performance was the first year infants nativity play! Fast forward to the present day and we find a rich, warm, emotive voice capable of the tiniest whisper of love to the full vent of a woman scorned.
BBC Introducing support came in February 2011 when Jazz took part in the BBC Introducing Musicians’ Masterclass taking place at Abbey Road Studios. BBC3 invited Jazz to contribute to on-line content of the extraordinarily moving documentary ‘Our War’ marking the ten-year anniversary of the war in Afghanistan. Festival invites have also found their way to Jazz with, The Great Escape, Isle of Wight, Greenbelt, Guilfest, Redfest and Wychwood all finding their way into Jazz’s diary. Music Week recognised this growing industry popularity by inviting Jazz to perform at ‘Breakout’ – their monthly showcase night for best new label signings and emerging talent.
Summer 2012 saw Jazz invited to perform both the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games – one of just a handful of independent artists to do so. A nationwide 44-date tour followed in support of her debut single ‘Stories’ produced by Kipper (Grammy and Emmy Award winner) and engineered by Cameron Craig (double Grammy and Brit Award winner) with an orchestrated arrangement of ‘In the Bleak Midwinter’ released as a Christmas single.
Ever keen to play live, meet new audiences and carve out her career in the ‘old fashioned’ way by touring, Jazz heads out on the road again in Spring 2013 on her ‘Love Me Not’ tour.
But despite this attention, Jazz eschews the beckoning bright city lights and fast cars. She’s a girl you’re more likely to find padding about bare foot on the beach, walking through puddles in wellies or driving Barry (her battered but beloved van) to the next gig.
“Haunting vocals, oozing with the pain of heartache and beautifully humble production make Jazz’s records an enthralling listen. A storming live presence leaves no excuse to miss the experience of seeing her live.” Music Week
“With references to Dusty via Duffy, this budding singer is well worth keeping an ear on.” BBC Introducing
“(About ‘Stories’) You can’t get more radio friendly than that particular tune.” Phil Jackson, BBC Introducing:The South
“This is somebody who’s already got all her ducks in a row.” Tom Robinson, BBC Radio 6 Music
“I’m going to leave you with a lovely track from Jazz Morley. It’s the début single from the Dorset singer and I think this is just great!” Jim Gellatly, Amazing Radio
“She produces rich, powerful, emotive tunes that hush the atmosphere ’til everyone’s too scared to breathe in case it breaks the spell.” Polly James, Absolute Radio
The Travelling Band are an alternative folk band from Manchester England. The band members are Adam Gorman (Vocals, Acoustic Guitar, Hammond Organ/Keys, Banjo, Harmonica), Jo Dudderidge (Vocals, Acoustic Guitar, Hammond Organ/Keys, Mandolin, Electric guitar), Steve Mullen (Lead Guitar, Vocals), Chris Spencer (Bass), Nick Vaal (Drums, Percussion).
The Travelling Band formed during a recording project in 2006 in New York City. The band made their first studio album ‘Under The Pavement’ here which was later released in 2008 to receive critical acclaim from the UK media.The album featured as BBC Radio 6 Music ‘Album Of The Day’, BBC Radio 2′s ‘Single Of The Week and had a featured song in the Ian Dury biopic ‘Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll’.
Although the tracking for Under the Pavement was completed in October 2007, the album didn’t appear for another 12 months and was finally issued on their own Sideways Saloon imprint—also the moniker of their Manchester-based, monthly club night. A couple of hand-crafted, cloth-packaged EPs helped to create a local buzz in the run up to the album’s release, while acclaim came from further afield when the band won the Glastonbury Festival 2008 New Talent award.
In 2011 The Travelling Band signed with the Record Label, Cooking Vinyl to release their second studio album ‘Screaming Is Something’, recorded on the Isle of Mull, which received notable reviews.
Swim Deep are a Indie rock band from Birmingham, England. Their debut album Where the Heaven Are We is scheduled for release on July 29, 2013.
