Tag Archives: singer songwriter

Jack Nolan releases up tempo single Chit Chatter

December 2, 2021 Marshall Cullen

“As I get older I care less and less about chatter, bitchiness. And I know that conditional love is not love at all. I wrote it with a good friend in mind who was copping it from people that claimed to care.” – Jack Nolan

A hidden gem on Jack’s new album, Gabriel. Don’t let the title dissuade you, there’s a great message here in the lyrics. Up-tempo and full band through-out, this one is a foot tapping sing along.

Jack will be performing live at Link N Pin Woy Woy Friday Dec 10

Jack Nolan is a singer songwriter based in Sydney, Australia, who’s s been performing and releasing music and albums since the mid 90’s. Along with a five-album solo catalogue Jack also fronted The Kelly Gang, with Rick Grossman, bassist for The Divinyls and Hoodoo Gurus along with Midnight Oil drummer Rob Hirst and guitar player Martin Rotsey. Their 2004 album Looking for the Sun was critically adored along with their energetic live shows of the time.

Within Nolan’s music, mysterious and shimmering chords unite his sound with that of the Americana genre, once quaintly described as ‘Darlinghurst Country’ uniting elements of folk, country, rock ‘n’ roll and ambient atmospheres fusing Nolan’s passion for intensely charged electric guitar and finger-picked acoustic guitar.

Having caught the Tennessee bug while finishing his 2018 album ‘Our Waverley Star’, Jack returned to Nashville in February 2020 for two weeks of recording and mixing with his friend and multi-instrumentalist Justin Weaver, known best as the Dixie Chicks’ guitarist. After the most intense and enjoyable fortnight possible, Jack headed home in March 2020, a day before a hurricane wiped out Nashville, and less than a week before the world changed forever, if the word Wuhan rings a bell.

And so it is, Jacks latest album, Gabriel, released October 2021, keeps the wheels moving on the meaningful passion of this writer and performer.

Credits:
Written by Jack Nolan
Recorded at ‘Welcome to 1979’ in Nashville TN 2020
Produced by Justin Weaver
Engineered by Chris Mara
Mixed by Chris Mara & Justin Weaver
Mastered by Ryan Smith, Sterling Sound Nashville TN
Jack Nolan – Vocals & guitars
Justin Weaver – Electric Guitars, slide, banjo & backing vocals
Jimmy Paxson – Drums
Chris Autry – Bass

Chai Chatter is OUT NOW Quay Records/MGM.

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Grant Stevens releases single V8 Sandman

November 16, 2021 Marshall Cullen

Irreverence, style, art, honesty, dynamism and the growl of guitars – this is musician and composer Grant Stevens. His metaphor laden lyrics have positioned him as one of the best songwriters in Germany where he has had successes such as “Everlasting Friends” which was used as a television jingle for Holsten Pilsener in Europe, and another of his singles “Sage Ha!” which entered the pop charts in Germany and Europe.

He has recorded several albums and EPs for his bands Nervous Germans, The Soho Jets and Razar, produced by Kit Lambert (producer for The Who).

His music is guitar driven rock with a big dollop of blues and a little twist of country. It’s also melodic with lyrics that reflect his life experiences and engage with the audience. It’s sometimes uplifting and sometimes downright depressing and aggressive, but hey that’s life, reflecting the range of universal human feelings that everybody has at one time or another.

Grant is an Australian artist based in Berlin since the 70’s, giving rise to a musical career full of achievements, as you can find in his Wikipedia profile:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grant_Stevens

After successful tours of Europe and the composition of several musicals of great projection in Germany, Grant presents his new musical album Devil’s Machinery to be released in February 2020.

The first single “V8 Sandman” is a classic blues-rock tune inspired by the memories that many had in the classic Australian 70’s cult wagon of the same name. V8 Sandman brims with energy and life, providing a petrol fuelled boost to your day.

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Daxton Releases New Single Otherside

November 12, 2021 Marshall Cullen

Producing and playing music since his early teens, Daxton’s passion has kept him continually creating new material both for his band and solo career. On stage, Daxton comes across like he was born to play, his unique guitar style blending perfectly with heart-warming vocals.

Daxton has appeared at major festivals including the Sydney Blues & Roots and Tamworth Country Music Festival where he supported artists such as Kasey Chambers and Beccy Cole. He also has had one of his tracks ‘Moody Liz’ featured in the popular American TV series Doll House.

Based in Sydney, Daxton is best described as a blues/rock artist with a twist of pop and rock. He plays slide guitar rock/blues songs with a fresh and innovative sound. The new album ‘Electric Satellite’ is a heavy, rustic blues rock album with psychedelic pop/rock sounds scheduled for release in 2022.

Daxton’s raw and bluesy acoustic guitar and harmonica begin this laid-back mid-tempo blues tune. The drums and bass come in from the chorus to fill out the mix and some subtle guitar riffs add to the hooks. Daxton’s vocal delivery is heartfelt and real, a perfect match to the music.

The song was recorded at home during the recent lockdown. Daxton and his collaborator guitarist Pat Dow, both working in isolation, found a new musician friendly digital recording software system which they both downloaded and were able to swap files back and forwards. The entire album was recorded in this way and just shows how far technology has come as the end result speaks for itself.

Daxton – Otherside is out NOW
Foghorn/MGM

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Halfway Homebuoy Release New Single The River

November 4, 2021 Marshall Cullen

It’s been a strange path for Halfway Homebuoy to finally end up as ‘based’ on the NSW Central Coast, an hour north of Sydney. The band was formed almost 10 years ago on the ski slopes of Switzerland where all of the (then) members were working the season and playing shows at night.

With three Englishmen and one Aussie the band moved out here and were recommended to Foghorn Records where they quickly found a home. As things happen after a few years the visa’s ran out, the Aussie moved back to Europe and the sole remaining member, principal writer and singer, Jack Davison, married an Aussie and stayed here. Unfortunately, he was left without a band.

Not to be deterred, Jack found local musicians, new songs were written, live shows booked, a new album released, the band continued on. With Eps, Albums and live recordings released, airplay on national radio including Triple M the boys were well received from the start.

Now based on the coast and with a new record almost finished the guys are ready to reboot post lockdown into 2022.

All the Homebuoy recordings have been made at Damien Gerard Studios, first in Balmain and now, the new album at the new facility in West Gosford. With Andrew Beck engineering and co-producing, Jack says, “DG’s has always made us sound magical, and the new spot is no exception, not to mention close to home”. The new record features new material, some penned by Jack and others written by the whole band in preparation for the recording session. The new songs continue the bands’ own UK/Euro/Aussie rock style with the additions of extra guitar and keys adding interesting layers. Russell Pilling is the mixing engineer and has just finished these two songs mastered by Andrew Beck – the first taste of the new album.

Song Descriptions
The River
The first single from Halfway Homebuoy for 2021 features a powerful guitar and drum intro along with some Chilli Pepper’s like bass runs. Jack’s power vocals soar over the mix and the solo guitar has some brilliant hooky riffs. An up-tempo rock song, closes out with some strong backing vocals.

Kick Me Out
Acoustic guitar and vocals begin this mid-tempo song that carries till the band kick in with a strong rhythm and guitar bed. The chorus is truly anthemic with backing vocal and keyboard layers intermingling to create a very catchy and memorable tune.

The River is OUT NOW – November 5th via MGM

Streaming:

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Jack Nolan Gabriel album launch Live Show

November 3, 2021 Marshall Cullen

‘The GABRIEL Album Launch’

Book here – Tickets

Friday 12 November,
8pm
The Red Velvet Room
Upstairs at The Coogee Diggers
2 Byron Street Coogee

Support Australian music & musicians

After all these crazy months, we’re finally live again.

Join me and the band at the Red Velvet Room – upstairs at the Coogee Diggers, 2 Byron Street, to release and celebrate the critically acclaimed LP ‘Gabriel’, released earlier this month.

Get your VINYL copy at the show.

Come and support Australian music and check out my great band.

Jack Nolan – Acoustic & electric Guitars

Travis New – Electric Guitars – Andrew Farris INXS, Mi-Sex, Imogen Clark

Andy Horvath – Drums – Casey Donovan, Adam Brand, Boney M, O’Shea, Jack Vidgen, Cyrus, Vanessa Amorosi, Kate DeAraugo, to name a few.

Tim Sampson – Base – Andrew Farris /Christine Anu

Check Out Jack Nolan’s New Website

Gabriel is Jack Nolan’s fifth solo album, and the first album he’s yielded to someone he trusted enough to produce: This is an album that mines its own carefully sculpted acoustic world with a profoundly atmospheric sense of place, and a depth of self-knowledge that speaks of arrival after a lifetime of sometimes hard, sometimes tender experience.

The genesis, Gabriel came to Jack a few years ago, sat at his side on a long desert drive that he wasn’t sure he’d come back from. The title track, in its own unhurried and roundabout way, eventually found itself in Nashville, USA, on an album completed just before COVID-19 wrought its havoc on the world.

Atonement is upfront in titles like The Hopeless Son and Restitution Song. Others — Tomorrow Came, Faster Than the Speed of Change, A Fool Would Follow Me — are deeper stocktakes, songs from life’s rear view mirror. Ghosts of people and places and other, maybe darker things, receding for sure, but too close to ignore.

Produced by Justin Weaver and captured on two-inch tape in the aptly named ‘Welcome to 1979’ Studios by engineer Chris Mara, the assembled band included drummer Jimmy Paxson, bassist Chris Autry, keys player Phil Towns and pedal steel player David Spires who were joined by backup singers Terri Lynn Weaver & Siobhan Maher Kennedy. Justin himself applied the deeply textured lead and electric guitars.

Gabriel, is a record offering up evocative, ethereal stories, perhaps best signalled on the album’s title track, with Nolan singing “Endless lanes /endless cars // In the absence /of stars” reminding us of this new world, turned on its axis in 2020/21.

Video

Gabriel is OUT NOW Oct 8 Quay Records/MGM.
Vinyl LP, CD and Digital

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1500-FOG562 The Jimmy C - Ducking 3000px

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The Jimmy C – New Album – Ducking

October 26, 2021 Marshall Cullen

Created during the longest lockdown in the world –
Melbourne’s irrepressible One Man Band records a full album
“From February to September of this year, with the pandemic still belligerently stomping through the living room like a toddler with a bucket on its head, I managed to use music as a way to “remain indoors” and focus on something that wasn’t terrible news in an attempt to preserve my sanity.

Ducking’ begins and ends with comic ‘bookends’ an almost Las Vegas lounge singer introduction and ‘Gateway Song’ that abruptly gives way to ‘Everything Is OK’ (something we all want to hear). A positive and up-beat acoustic guitar and glockenspiel tune with cheerful whistling that reassuringly squeezes your shoulder and says everything will be ok. Aaaahhh yes … I do hope so.

It’s an eclectic mix of up-beat rock, down-beat moody rock, tongue-in-cheek segues, power pop (and whatever Paranoia Grande is), that moves quickly in spite of the rather long 47-minute total playing time. Song durations range from 27 seconds to the cinematic and sprawling 5:07 of ‘Don’t Forget Me’ which is appropriate because it was actually written for a movie. “The Problem Y” was shot in California a few years ago and is yet to be released. Written & directed by Joe Bizarro with whom I spent 5 years making music for The Brides Of Satan grindhouse indie slasher which is now available to stream and buy.

‘Ducking’ is a fun, light hearted and amusing album in places but gets serious and even a little scary in others – all part of the emotional rollercoaster of the pandemic era. I feel the title sums it all up. We all know what we meant to say when we tried to text ‘Ducking’ but autocorrect had other intentions … our frustration becomes humour and we find that we can still laugh at ourselves. ” –
Jamie Coghill September 23, 2021

As a band I am called The Jimmy C. As a human person I am called Jamie Coghill and am possibly known for (by people with very good memories specifically within the Melbourne pub rock scene) playing drums with The Devilrock Four, Fez Perez and Luxedo – going back more than 20 years now to the very late 90s so to be familiar with me is super niche and you would have to have very good taste!

Sometime around 2005 I decided to make an album of songs I’d recorded on a Tascam 4 track cassette recorder. I’d been experimenting with writing and recording since my teens but until then I hadn’t recorded anything I wanted people to hear.

Over the past 16 years I worked on my song writing, playing and recording techniques and released 7 albums, 4 soundtrack albums (2 for an American web series: The Adventures Of Superseven and The Sandra West Diaries, and one for an American indie grindhouse film: The Brides Of Satan), and a few EPs and singles. I also made a sort of 10 year anniversary live album/video roping in a few friends to play and record my songs live, which lead to the formation of Lava Fangs, a garage power pop punk band with an EP, an album and some singles – we’re very good and you should check us out!

As a one-person band I have found the pandemic era to be quite productive, and a welcome distraction from almost two years of terrible news (I’m writing this the day after the Melbourne earthquake – who saw that coming?!?!). From February 2021 to mid-September I worked on a new collection of songs as well as upgrading my recording setup – still with quite out of date gear but a huge step forward from the stuff I used to record my previous albums!

Comparisons Include
Super Furry Animals, Ween, Queens of the Stone Age, Sloan,

Ducking is out now on Foghorn/MGM.

Videos from the album

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Jack Nolan Releases Album Gabriel

October 8, 2021 Marshall Cullen

In true analog fashion following on from the Tape Based Recording the album is available on LP Vinyl format as well as CD and Digital.

Jack Nolan is a singer songwriter based in Sydney, Australia, who’s been performing and releasing music and albums since the mid 90’s. Along with a five-album solo catalogue Jack also fronted The Kelly Gang, with Rick Grossman, bassist for The Divinyls and Hoodoo Gurus along with Midnight Oil drummer Rob Hirst and guitar player Martin Rotsey. Their 2004 album Looking for the Sun was critically adored along with their energetic live shows of the time.

Within Nolan’s music, mysterious and shimmering chords unite his sound with that of the Americana genre, once quaintly described as ‘Darlinghurst Country’, uniting elements of folk, country, rock ‘n’ roll and ambient atmospheres fusing Nolan’s passion for intensely charged electric guitar and finger-picked acoustic guitar.

And so it is, Jack’s latest album, Gabriel, releasing October 2021, keeps the wheels moving on the meaningful passion of this writer and performer.

Recent Article on Gabriel:

https://beat.com.au/jack-nolans-gabriel-takes-you-from-la-to-death-valley-to-nashville/

Credits:
Written by Jack Nolan
Recorded at ‘Welcome to 1979’ in Nashville TN 2020
Produced by Justin Weaver
Engineered by Chris Mara
Mixed by Chris Mara & Justin Weaver
Mastered by Ryan Smith, Sterling Sound Nashville TN
Jack Nolan – Vocals & guitars
Justin Weaver – Electric Guitars, slide, banjo & backing vocals
Jimmy Paxson – Drums
Chris Autry – Bass

Title Track Video

Gabriel is OUT NOW October 8 Quay Records/MGM.

Stream or Download:

Connect with Jack Nolan:

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CJ Shaw releases new album All Sorts

September 17, 2021 Marshall Cullen

All Sorts is the latest album from ARIA nominated educator and musician CJ Shaw.

Since ‘ANZAC Biscuits’ gained over 30,000 views on social media in 2019, and an ARIA nomination for Music Teacher of the Year, CJ has been busily recording this album. The collection of ten songs affirms Shaw’s position as a creative and dynamic storytelling songwriter for children and adults.

Having spent over twenty years as a songwriter and performer, ‘All Sorts’ draws on the catalogue that Shaw has been performing at folk clubs and festivals. It is an album for the modern eclectic times, containing poignant storytelling, songs of fatherhood, hip-hop, satire and traditional folk. “I wanted an album that could connect people of different ages,” states CJ, “Everyone should be able to enjoy the music”.

Shaw collected some excellent players to help with the recording. The line-up includes: Allyson Newman who brings her emotive arrangement to the song ‘Lonely Road’ and features Canberra Symphony Orchestra players Steven Fitzgerald, Alex Voorhoeve and Timothy Wickham bringing depth and precision to the record.

A collection of the best songs in CJ Shaw’s repertoire, ‘All Sorts’ is brimming with life and vitality, drawing in audiences of all ages. Dubbed the ‘ultimate family album’ for a reason, ‘All Sorts’ is destined to be a family favourite on long car trips in the foreseeable future.

Armed with a guitar and a swag full of harmonicas, singer-songwriter CJ Shaw’s intricate finger-picking, word play and storytelling never fails to captivate his audiences. CJ Shaw’s music is distinctly Australian in style, influenced by Paul Kelly and Slim Dusty. His lyrical storytelling and musicality lends itself to audiences of all ages.

In 2020, CJ Shaw was nominated for an ARIA Award for ‘Music Teacher of the Year’ with Jimmy Barnes as his official ambassador presenting him with the nomination. This prestigious music industry acknowledgement recognised his dynamic and poignant songwriting for primary-aged children. These celebrated songs are woven through his performances and albums, played alongside satirical and storytelling Australiana folk songs.

With over a decade experience touring and performing at music festivals in Australia and Timor-Leste, CJ Shaw is an exciting Canberra musician at the top of his game.

CJ Shaw – All Sorts is out NOW September 17th through Foghorn/MGM

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Jack Nolan releases title track single Gabriel from forthcoming album

September 8, 2021 Marshall Cullen

Gabriel is the title track single from Sydney singer songwriter Jack Nolan’s upcoming 2021 Americana album, Gabriel.

We were on the road, from heaving LA freeways and into Death Valley, a most peculiar place, an unknown place. When your mind is elsewhere, irretrievable, like mine at the time, the valley’s a parallel universe, perdition. We were in the midst of a three-day dream. I fell upon a crossroad, landing eighty-six metres below sea level in the Californian Desert at a place, Badwater Basin, where an androgynous guardian appears, Gabriel, kind, gentle yet hard-lived and furrowed, who gave and left me with hope that all would be well.

“The original version, the demo, had that magic, which I thought about releasing it as it was, having gone into the old Damien Gerrard studio in Sydney, to bang down some ideas. I played everything, guitars, shakers, lead, the vocal and I also sang the harmonies. It worked, but my belief in the song told me to give it the environment it deserved. Arriving in Nashville I briefed producer Justin Weaver, who went about recreating the demo perfectly from the ground up. I still handled the guitars, the lead vocal and all harmonies but was smart enough to hand off the rest to the boys!.’’ Listen for Jimmy Paxson on the trash can drum, swinging around the harmonies and Justin Weavers banjo, that is the optimism and the final outcome.

Jack Nolan is a singer songwriter based in Sydney, Australia, who’s been performing and releasing music and albums since the mid 90’s. Along with a five-album solo catalogue Jack also fronted The Kelly Gang, with Rick Grossman, bassist for The Divinyls and Hoodoo Gurus, along with Midnight Oil drummer Rob Hirst, and guitar player Martin Rotsey. Their 2004 album Looking for the Sun was critically adored along with their energetic live shows of the time.

Scenestr Video Premiere:

Gabriel
The title track single from forthcoming album GABRIEL

Release dates

Single – September 8 – Digital Only (links below)
Album – October 8 – Gabriel LP (Vinyl, CD, Digital)

Gabriel is OUT NOW Quay Records/MGM.

Stream or Download:

Connect with Jack Nolan:

News and Touring

New Reviews and Interviews for Steve Kilbey

September 7, 2021 Marshall Cullen

New album reviews highly lauding this release are still coming in thick and fast weeks after the release.

Theres also some great interview podcasts with Steve talking about the album and of course The Church.

Rhythms writer Ian McFarlane just gave it 4 stars in his album feature and says “Steve Kilbey and his band (The Winged Heels) make life affirming music “

Heres a summary including some great podcasts plus Michael Smith’s review in full below –

STEVE KILBEY& THE WINGED HEELS

THE HALL OF COUNTERFEITS

Foghorn/MGM

It was always obvious that Steve Kilbey is an extraordinarily complex chap, positively bursting with ideas, but over the past 18 months just how “bursting” he is has become manifest by his recording eight albums. Perhaps nine, since The Hall of Counterfeitsis a double-album’s worth, 22 songs, one CD – as diverse a collection as you can imagine. It could be his “White Album”, or would be if Kilbey hadn’t already recorded Remindlessnessback in 1990. He tells us that that double-album was his attempt to take in everything he’d ever been fascinated by, an attempt to “reconcile the whole damn lot with a weird and wild bunch of songs far, far from the mainstream.” Thirty years on, he reckons The Hall of Counterfeits is “my answer to myself” and that “time has enabled me to give voice to those same preoccupations” – from The Beatles to mysticism and beyond. Aiding and abetting him this time around are The Winged Heels – classical guitarist (and more) Gareth Koch, keyboards player Roger Mason and drummer Barton Price, the latter pair once an integral part of The Models, though there’s nothing of that particular “past life” evident in their contributions to this sonic exploration of the multifarious arcane corridors Kilbey’s fertile mind takes us. Just how in tune The Winged Heels are with that mind is evident not only in the whirl of sounds but also in their writing co-credits on ten of the 22 songs here. And it’s all there – Beatles, Floyd, Bowie, the Middle East, the Medieval, the whimsical, the cosmic, psychedelic, pop, classical, myth, magic, obscurantism, the lot! There’s even a sort of boogie in ‘Everything for Sale’!! He might assure us, in ‘Bound in Servitude’, that “emptiness never stops”, but it’s obvious neither does his most extraordinary mind, firing on more cylinders than anyone has a right to still be able to boast 50 years into a creative career. Unmistakeably Kilbey, quite simply, this is every kind of party mixtape you could ever wish – superb.

MICHAEL SMITH

Get The Album

Daxton – Otherside is out NOW Foghorn/MGM

‘The GABRIEL Album Launch’

Book here – Tickets

Friday 12 November, 8pm The Red Velvet Room Upstairs at The Coogee Diggers 2 Byron Street Coogee

Video

Recent Article on Gabriel:

Daxton – Otherside is out NOW
Foghorn/MGM

Friday 12 November,
8pm
The Red Velvet Room
Upstairs at The Coogee Diggers
2 Byron Street Coogee