#Ivor Novello award-winning songwriter
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In March 2022, Ben Howard was sat in his garden when he found himself unable to think clearly, form sentences or speak for almost an hour. A month later, after the same thing happened again, the Ivor Novello Award-winning singer-songwriter learned he’d suffered two TIAs (transient ischemic attacks - known as mini-strokes). “It was out of the blue,” says the 35 year-old. “It was a confusing time.”
That June, after a month of inconclusive hospital tests Howard and his band returned to Le Manoir de Léon recording studio in south-west France, where they’d previously worked on his acclaimed third album ‘Noonday Dream’.
“We went in and put down ten songs in ten days, then spent the rest of the year tinkering with them”. The record was produced by Bullion, known for his work on Westerman’s ‘Your Hero Is Not Dead’ and Orlando Weeks ‘Hop Up’. Howard says, “We worked through the heatwave, the air conditioning broke, after what had happened I was so tired in the afternoons that I slept a lot. We just played solidly and slept, they was no time for retrospection”.
The result is ‘Is It’, a lush, sonically splintered album which captures Howard working through those moments of seismic shift. “I found it impossible not to dwell on the absurdity of it, that with one tiny clot, one can lose all faculties. It really ate into the writing of the record”.
The songs range from the peaceful quotidian Days of Lantana, to cut up samples and driven beats of Walking Backwards, the formers’ pitched and warped Linda Thompson chorus reminiscent of Malcolm Mclaren´s ‘Madame Butterfly’.
Moonraker, a song about climbing in the Guadarrama mountains touches on the meditational, while in the cyclical Richmond Avenue Howard talks of shared childhood moments with his father.
There are colourful, left-field production choices throughout- a staple of Bullion - but with a twist
“We really bonded over records in the studio” he says. “Nathan has an incredible ear and catalogue of sampled beats and rhythms which quickly became the bedrock…There were contributing factors also. Our mainstay drummer Kyle lives in Seattle and as we made the record on the fly we just leaned into drum-machine world, and really left almost all of that side of things up to Nathan.”
“We also did a session at Real World Studios and put most of the record through an echoplex”.
That session featured additional instrumentation from Raven Bush (violin, viola) and Mick Mcgoldrick (flute, Eileen pipes) as well as Howards mainstay band of Mickey Smith (Bass, guitars, percussion) R.D. Thomas (synths, keys, harmonium) and Nat Wason (guitars).
“It’s actually mostly a guitar record, but there are some nice additions. We bought an old harmonium at the beginning of the trip which made its way onto most tracks. I was very much stuck in stuttered delay and synth led guitar patterns. Mick McGoldrick came in to play on Richmond Ave and straight away played Liam O´Flynn lines from the Mark Knopfler record ‘Cal’ which is a long favourite of mine and a big connection to my Dad who had it on tape. That was a beautiful moment, perhaps one of my favourites moments in the studio ever.”
“It was a refreshing way to record, unweighted by the past”
The change is evident on ‘Is It’ - an album which represents a further creative evolution from an artist known for never repeating himself throughout his already-storied career.
¨I was so aware of the overwhelming information coming from everything, almost like my brain couldn’t filter what was happening and had to start again. So we just pushed forward, lyrically it seems obvious to me in parts, It’s about sitting there wondering what the hell is going on.”
Yet with each listen it feels like more than that. A characteristically onion-layered record which rankles like a series of questions, or a series of vignettes throughout Howard´s life, perhaps best distilled in the whirling chorus on ´Spirit´.
‘What’s mine anyway?
My feelings seem to be arranged.
What´s mine anyway?
Spirit? Is it?´
‘Is It’ stands quite starkly on it’s own, buoyed by the circumstances of its creation. “Just to be playing music in the studio felt like a real privilege and a luxury,” says Howard. “It was probably the best studio session we’ve ever had.
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Release: July 21, 1997
Lyrics:
Didn't they say that I would make a mistake
Didn't they say you were gonna be trouble
People told me you were too much to take
I could see it, I didn't wanna know
I'll let you in and you let me down
You messed me up and you turned my life around
Left me feeling I had nowhere to go
I was alone, how was I to know that
You will be there when I needed somebody
You will be there, the only one could help me
I had a picture of you in my mind
Never knew it could be so wrong
Why'd it take me so long just to find
The friend that was there all along?
Who'd believe that after all we've been through
I'd be able to put my trust in you?
Goes to show you can't forgive and forget
Looking back, I have no regrets 'cause
You will be there when I needed somebody
You will be there, the only one to help me
I had a picture of you in my mind
Never knew it could be so wrong
Why'd it take me so long just to find
The friend that was there all along?
You will be there when I needed somebody
You will be there, the only one to help me
I had a picture of you in my mind
Never knew it could be so wrong
Why'd it take me so long just to find
The friend that was there all along?
Had a picture of you in my mind
Never knew it could be so wrong
Why'd it take me so long just to find
The friend that was there all along?
Songwriter:
Had a picture of you in my mind (all along)
Never knew it could be so wrong (all along)
Why'd it take me so long just to find (why'd it take me so long just to find?)
The friend that was there all along? (Why'd it take me so long just to find?)
Ronan Keating / Eliot Kennedy / Paul Wilson / Andy Watkins
SongFacts:
"Picture of You" is a song by Irish boy band Boyzone, released as the first single from their third studio album Where We Belong (1998). Written by frontman Ronan Keating, Eliot Kennedy and producers Absolute, the song reached number 2 in both Ireland and the United Kingdom. The song served as the main theme for the film Bean: The Ultimate Disaster Movie, which starred Rowan Atkinson as his character The band appeared on both the single cover and the music video. Its appearance in the film enabled the song to win the Ivor Novello Award for Best Original Song for a Film or Program at the 1998 ceremony.
Larry Flick of Billboard wrote, "This videogenic boy band continues its quest to capture the hearts of teens across the U.S. with a sweet creation that borrows heavily from the vintage Motown sound of the Temptations and the Four Tops." Unfortunately, her vocals aren't nearly as soulful, even if her harmonies are perfect. Still, there should certainly be more than a handful of kid-friendly Top 40 stations that will find this track useful. Additionally, Polydor would be well-advised to woo the mature ears of AC radio listeners, who will add a nostalgic touch to this 'picture.' A reviewer from Music Week gave it four out of five, describing it as a 'catchy pop/soul Song".
#new#new music#my chaos radio#Boyzone#Picture of you#music#spotify#youtube#music video#youtube video#good music#hit of the day#video of the day#90s#90s music#90s style#90s video#90s charts#1997#pop#rock#contemporary r&b#movie soundtrack#lyrics#songfacts#1180
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Victoria Canal Supports Hozier in Halifax
Singer-songwriter – VICTORIA CANAL – is set to support Hozier at his forthcoming UK shows this June and July.
With tickets on sale now, the tour will include a huge outdoor gig at London’s Alexandra Palace Park as well as shows in Newcastle, Halifax, Manchester, Cardiff, Bournemouth and Birmingham.
The shows also follow Victoria Canal’s recent Ivor Novello Rising Star win, with the award…
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The British pop star challenged record labels to pay songwriters a living wage as she picked up a prize.
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TT84 website is no longer live - but it has been preserved by the Wayback Machine.
Spring 1984;
“ I was looking for a job and then I found a job, and heaven knows I’m miserable now…”
Robin’s dreams of escaping his small Yorkshire mining village come to an abrupt end when he is kicked out of Art College for smoking dope.
Dorian returns to the Nottinghamshire mining village he ran away from when he was sixteen years old, disillusioned with life in London as a cage dancer.
Both are reluctantly sent down the pit.
They meet at ‘Tropical Heatwave Night’ and a romantic friendship blossoms until Robin is lured away by Dorian’s equally enchanting sister Marion. When the strike erupts they find themselves on opposite sides of a fierce political divide.
The Yorkshire miners strike and the key events are played out on the picket lines, working men’s clubs, and slag-heap strewn wastelands of the north.
But the Nottinghamshire miners – seduced by the rise of consumer culture and dreams of Spanish Timeshare villas, reject the call to strike.
The day-glo world of the Duran Duran video collides with the monotone graininess of the bitterest industrial dispute of the 20th Century as Two Tribes go to war.
TWITTER Tweets by @TT84_
© TWO TRIBES 2012-2013.
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WRITERS/ EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS
Russell Senior (L)
Ivor Novello Award-winning songwriter and musician with Pulp (1982-97 & 2011), radical activist during the miners’ strike. Has song writing credits in Trainspotting (1996) and The Full Monty (1997).
Ralph Razor (R)
DJ/ promoter/ nightclub impresario. Founder of Razor Stiletto in Sheffield, London, Dublin (2003-9) and Space Cabaret in Berlin & London (2009-11).
TWITTER Tweets by @TT84_
© TWO TRIBES 2012-2013.
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Two Tribes, The Miners' Strike Musical is a play with music, being written by Sheffield's own Ralph Razor and Pulp's violinist, Russell Senior. The subject is the bitter 1984/85 miners' strike in Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire, UK, and its use as a political weapon to break the power of the most powerful working mens' union. This timelapse is some of the offcuts from the behind-the-scenes shooting of a promo for the production, showing their office in The Workstation, Sheffield, UK.
http://tt84.co.uk http://showroomworkstation.org.uk [Links now defunct]
The tt84 twitter feed is still active on the official twitter site.
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Ozzy Osbourne - Patient Number 9
Release Date: 9 Sep 2022
Ozzy Osbourne released his 13th solo studio album 'Patient Number 9' earlier this month. It's the Grammy-winning singer and songwriter’s first release since his critically acclaimed chart-topping 2020 album 'Ordinary Man'. The new album is heavy, it’s hard-hitting, it’s historic. In fact, it��s everything you’d expect from Ozzy and maybe more.
Working with producer Andrew Watt for the second time, OZZY welcomed a dynamic A-list supporting cast. The record boasts guitarists Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, Mike McCready of Pearl Jam, and longstanding righthand man and six-string beast Zakk Wylde who plays on the majority of the tracks.
For the bulk of the album, Chad Smith of Red Hot Chili Peppers held down drums, while the late Taylor Hawkins of Foo Fighters made an appearance. Old friend and one-time Ozzy band member Robert Trujillo of Metallica plays bass on most of the album’s tracks, with Duff McKagan of Guns N’ Roses and Chris Chaney of Jane’s Addiction supplying bass on a few songs.
For the first time ever, Black Sabbath co-founder, guitarist, and riff-lord Tony Iommi appears on an Ozzy solo album. Ozzy says, "It was really great working with Tony. He’s the riff master. No one can touch him in that respect. I only wish we had these songs for Black Sabbath’s 13 album."
Ozzy Osbourne hass sold over 100 million records,and is one of a handful of artists who has had top ten albums in last six decades. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a co-founder of Black Sabbath, won three Grammy Awards, and earned the Ivor Novello Award for Lifetime Achievement from the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers, and Authors.
Ozzy says, "I was vaccinated and boosted, and I still caught Covid in the end. My last album (Ordinary Man) was released just a few weeks before the pandemic started, and I was just about getting ready to go into the studio to work on this new one when the world shut down. It’s no secret that the last four years have been very difficult for me but making this album took my mind off of my problems."
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June 8th
1963 - Phil Spector
The Crystals' 'Da Doo Ron Ron' peaked at No.3 on the US singles chart. Produced by Phil Spector, who used a multi-track recording system to build the song layer upon layer to achieve a result that become known as a "wall of sound". Backing musicians include Glen Campbell on guitar, Leon Russell on piano, Hal Blain on drums and Nino Tempo on sax.
1967 - Procol Harum
Procol Harum were at No.1 on the UK singles chart with 'A Whiter Shade Of Pale' the group's only UK No.1. In 2004 the song was named the most played record of the past 70 years. More than 900 recorded versions by other artists are known.
1967 - The Beatles
The Beatles Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band went to No.1 in the UK. Costing £25,000 ($42,500) to produce the album was recorded over 700 hours of studio time. It was also the first album to print the lyrics on the sleeve. The album spent 27 weeks at No.1 on the UK chart.
1969 - Brian Jones
Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Charlie Watts visited Brian Jones at his home in Cotchford Farm to discuss his future in the group. The Stones later issued a press statement saying that Brian was leaving The Rolling Stones.
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1970 - Deep Purple
Deep Purple had their van and equipment impounded by East German police while on an European tour, after mistakenly driving too close to the border.
1974 - Bill Wyman
Bill Wyman became the first Rolling Stone to release a solo album with Monkey Grip, (it peaked at No.39 in the UK and No.99 in the US). The album featured guest appearances by, Dr John, Leon Russell and Lowell George.
1974 - David Bowie
David Bowie started a four-week run at the top of the UK charts with his third No.1 album 'Diamond Dogs'. The cover art features Bowie as a striking half-man, half-dog grotesque painted by Belgian artist Guy Peellaert. It was controversial as the full painting clearly showed the hybrid's genitalia. Very few copies of this original cover made their way into circulation at the time of the album's release.
1974 - Dolly Parton
Dolly Parton was at No.1 on the US country chart with 'I Will Always Love You'. Elvis Presley indicated that he wanted to cover the song. Parton was interested until Presley's manager, Colonel Tom Parker, told her that it was standard procedure for the songwriter to sign over half of the publishing rights to any song Elvis recorded. Parton refused. 'I Will Always Love You' later became a worldwide No.1 hit for Whitney Houston in 1992 when featured in The Bodyguard.
1974 - Paul McCartney
Paul McCartney and Wings went to No.1 on the US singles chart with 'Band On The Run'. 'George Harrison unwittingly contributed the first line of one part of the song: "If we ever get out of here" when he said it during one of the many Beatles' business meetings.
his video on www.youtube.com</a>, or enable JavaScript if it is disabled in your browser.</div></div>
1985 - Tears For Fears
Tears For Fears started a two-week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with 'Everybody Wants To Rule The World', the group's first US No.1. In 1986, the song won Best Single at the Brit Awards. Band member and co-writer Roland Orzabal argued that the song deserved to win the Ivor Novello International Hit of the Year award, claiming that the winner, '19' by Paul Hardcastle - was not an actual song, but only a "dialogue collage."
2002 - Paul McCartney
Months of secrecy surrounding Paul McCartney's wedding plans were blown when John Leslie the owner of the 17th century Castle Leslie in Co Monaghan, let slip to reporters that Sir Paul had booked the Castle for the wedding.
2003 - Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin were at No.1 on the US album chart with their triple live album How The West Was Won, the band's seventh US No.1 album. The performances were from the band's 1972 tour of the United States, recorded at the LA Forum on 25 June 1972 and Long Beach Arena on 27 June 1972.
2008 - Chuck Berry
Rolling Stone magazine published a list of the Top 50 guitar songs of all time. No.5 was 'Brown Sugar' by The Rolling Stones, No.4 , ‘You Really Got Me’ by The Kinks, No.3, ‘Crossroads’, by Cream, No.2 ‘Purple Haze’, by Jimi Hendrix and No.1 ‘Johnny B Goode’, Chuck Berry.
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Sam Fender wins first Ivor Novello Award for Seventeen Going Under
https://echoingwalls.com/blog/sam-fender-wins-first-ivor-novello-award-for-seventeen-going-under/
Sam Fender wins first Ivor Novello Award for Seventeen Going Under
Sam Fender picks up his first Ivor Novello award as Dave is named songwriter of the year at Ivor Novello awards and Ed Sheeran, Shakira and Little Simz also win big….
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Former One Direction star Harry Styles and Kid Harpoon lead the nominations for this year’s Ivor Novello Awards.
The pair, who have co-written on multiple tracks, have notched up three nominations in two categories at the awards, which recognise creative musical achievement in songwriting and composition.
The Grammy and Brit award-winning song Watermelon Sugar and Adore You, part-written by Styles and Harpoon, are both nominated for PRS for Music Most Performed Work.
Musician Styles and Harpoon are also nominated in the Songwriter of the Year category which this year features five nominees, including AJTracey, Celeste and Jamie Hartman, Kamille and MNEK.
The awards, which represent peer recognition in the music community, are honouring new talent with 70% of nominees being recognised for the first time.
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Massive Attack’s Daddy G and his guest, Massive Attack’s 3D, multiple BMI Award-winning singer/songwriter Damon Albarn, and BMI’s Brandon Bakshi enjoy the 2009 Ivor Novello Awards ceremony, held May 21 at the Grosvenor House in London.
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Philip David Charles Collins was born on January 30, 1951. He is an English drummer, singer, songwriter, and record producer, best known as the drummer/singer of the rock band Genesis and for his solo career. Between 1982 and 1990, Collins scored three UK and seven US number-one singles in his solo career. When his work with Genesis, his work with other artists, as well as his solo career is totalled, he had more US Top 40 singles than any other artist during the 1980s. His most successful singles from the period include "In the Air Tonight", "Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now)", "One More Night", "Sussudio", "Take Me Home", "Two Hearts", "A Groovy Kind of Love" (featured in the film Buster), "I Wish It Would Rain Down", and "Another Day in Paradise".
Born and raised in west London, Collins played drums from the age of five and completed drama school training, which secured him various roles as a child actor. He then pursued a music career, joining Genesis in 1970 as their drummer and becoming lead singer in 1975 following the departure of Peter Gabriel. Collins began a solo career in the 1980s, initially inspired by his marital breakdown and love of soul music, releasing a series of successful albums, including Face Value (1981), No Jacket Required (1985), and ...But Seriously (1989). Collins became "one of the most successful pop and adult contemporary singers of the '80s and beyond". He also became known for a distinctive gated reverb drum sound on many of his recordings. In 1996, Collins left Genesis to focus on solo work; this included writing songs for Disney’s Tarzan (1999) for which he received an Oscar for Best Original Song for “You'll Be in My Heart”. He rejoined Genesis for their Turn It On Again Tour in 2007. Following a five-year retirement to focus on his family life, Collins released an autobiography in 2016 and completed his Not Dead Yet Tour in 2019.
Collins's discography includes eight studio albums that have sold 33.5 million certified units in the US and an estimated 150 million worldwide, making him one of the world's best-selling artists. He is one of only three recording artists, along with Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson, who have sold over 100 million records worldwide both as solo artists and separately as principal members of a band. He has won eight Grammy Awards, six Brit Awards (winning Best British Male Artist three times), two Golden Globe Awards, one Academy Award, and a Disney Legend Award. He was awarded six Ivor Novello Awards from the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors, including the International Achievement Award. He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1999, and was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2003 and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Genesis in 2010. He has also been recognised by music publications with induction into the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame in 2012, and the Classic Drummer Hall of Fame in 2013.
Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at http://justforbooks.tumblr.com
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So Jamie Hartman won Songwriter of the Year with Celeste! Now his fee will rocket and 🐀 won't be able to afford him anymore!
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Scott Matthews Announces Yorkshire Dates
New Scott Matthews single, My Selfless Moon, is the first to be taken from his forthcoming album, Restless Lullabies, in which the Ivor Novello award-winning songwriter has boldly reincarnated the songs of its electronic predecessor, New Skin, with an equally audacious offering of the purist acoustic soundscape that has long been coveted by fans.
My Selfless Moon is a haunting, mesmeric…
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Running Up That Hill could win an Ivor Novello songwriting award, 37 years after its first release.
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Happy 64th Birthday Brian Alexander "B. A." Robertson, born September 12th 1956.
Robertson was born and raised in Glasgow attending the former Allan Glen's School, Glasgow,[and the Royal Scottish Academy of Music & Drama. He recorded his first album "Wringing Applause", for Ardent Records in 1973. It enjoyed modest critical acclaim, and a nomination in Down Beat Magazine's year end poll. He made four further albums, but had little commercial success.
During these years, he combined his career as an artist in a writing and production partnership with bassist Herbie Flowers. BA wrote and produced with Herbie, and worked with an eclectic crowd, including Lionel Bart, Joe Brown, Jim Cregan, Ray Cooper, Micky Dolenz, Gillian Gregory, Georg Kajanus, Harry Nilsson, Phil Pickett, Annie Ross, Sandie Shaw, and Chris Spedding.
He made his first television appearance with Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel (1976), played piano on the B side of "Come Up And See Me Make Me Smile".
Before finding fame in his own right B A teamed up with guitarist Terry Britten and wrote over 20 worldwide hits, the pick of them for Cliff Richard, the songs Carrie and Wired for Sound, the latter was nominated Ivor Novello Song of the Year in 1981.
It was around the same time his singing career took off. He enjoyed chart success in Europe, with six hit singles as an artist. The first, "Bang Bang", achieved sales over 1 million, the last Flight 19, in 1982, a #1 in Iceland! This track inspired a ground breaking music video directed by Brian Grant. BA was nominated Ivor Novello Songwriter of the Year 1980, UK Male Vocalist, Daily Mirror Rock & Pop Awards 1980, JVC Scottish Musician of the Year 1982. He recorded with Maggie Bell in 1982, Frida from Abba, 83, and Lulu in 84.
As well as appearing in concert, he also featured on radio and television. Was a frequent guest broadcaster for the BBC, from 1980 to 1985. Hosted his own music series "BA In Music". In 1986 he was commissioned to compose the music for The Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh. He has written more than 30 themes, songs, and scores, for film, television and special events. These include "The Other Side of The World" by Chaka Khan for the motion picture "White Nights", music for one of the UK's longest running talk shows "Wogan", and "We Have A Dream" for Scotland's World Cup Football Squad of 1982.
Throughout the 80's and 90's he continued to write and work in the studio with another diverse group, including Sam Brown, Roger Daltrey, Lonnie Donegan, Dave Edmunds, Bernard Edwards, Peter Frampton, Alan Gorrie, John Jarvis, Maz + Kilgore, Joe Sample, Helena Springs, and Andy Taylor (Duran Duran).
He met Genesis guitarist Mike Rutherford in 1985, and began a second long term writing collaboration. He introduced Paul Carrack to the embryo Mike & The Mechanics. As writer and musician, he featured on six of their studio albums. Wrote their first hit single "Silent Running", Billboard's number 1 Rock Song of 1986, and the international success, "The Living Years". This most celebrated of his lyrics written when his father died twelve weeks before the birth of his son.
At the 1990 Grammy Awards, "The Living Years" had four nominations, including Song of the Year. BA was pipped for the statuettes by good friend Arif Mardin and "The Wind Beneath My Wings". In London, at The Ivor Novellos, 'The Living Years' topped 1991 Grammy winner "Another Day in Paradise" for Best Song.
He was invited to set up offices at The Walt Disney Studio, by Michael Eisner, and Jeffrey Katzenburg. BA moved with his family to Los Angeles.
He remained a feature on the lot for over three years. Was Creator, and Producer of Grammy nominated, multi-platinum, music video, "Simply Mad About The Mouse". Artists include Harry Connick Jnr., LL Cool J., Billy Joel, and Bobby McFerrin.
1991 saw "Silent Running" and "The Living Years", awarded "MillionAir" status by BMI, for more than one million broadcast performances in the US. "Silent Running" has now reached almost three million plays, and 'The Living Years' over four.
From 1993 through 1995, he put together, "With Your Hand on My Heart" for Patti LaBelle and Michael Crawford. Michael's album had a double Grammy nomination and world wide sales of more than 2 million. Wrote music for "Baywatch", the world's most popular television show and collaborated on a musical with Burt Bacharach, for me it shows his class.
He continued to work with Mike & The Mechanics, had six songs in the "Beggar On A Beach of Gold" project including the title song, and another six on their, multi-platinum CD, "Hits". He worked as writer, and musical associate to Phil Ramone on the stage production "EFX”, at the MGM Grand Las Vegas. The opening song "Somewhere in Time”, a collaboration with John Barry.
For the past 20 years or so Robertson has lived in Ireland, continually working on various projects he is still in high demand, Over the years, B A has accumulated more than 70 silver, gold, and platinum record awards. He lives with his wife, designer Karen Manners, they have two adult children.
I've chosen this song because it is my favourite Scottish World goal offering, remember, if you are old enough, four years previously, Andy Cameron proclaimed, We're Going to WIN the world Cup, by the time 1982 came B A Robertson knew that it was a dream. Oh I must add, the last World Cup Scotland was in 1998, and the much more realistic song was by Del Amitri, and calle Don't come home too soon, which as always we did, failing to get beyond the first stages yet again
No matter what .John Gordon Sinclair is superb here.............
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DANCE WITH ME TONIGHT
Writers: Olly Murs, Claude Kelly, Steve Robson
Producer: Steve Robson
Album: In Case You Didn't Know
Release Date: 20/11/2011
B-Side: 'Baby Blue Eyes' (Writers: Olly Murs, Paddy Byrne / Producer: Paddy Byrne)
Chart Positions: #1 (UK), #1 (Scotland), #2 (Ireland), #7 (Hungary), #20 (Belgium), #62 (Australia), #65 (Austria)
Sales: 810k+ (UK, Platinum)
Nominations: 'Most Performed Work', Ivor Novello Awards 2013
It's hard to know where to start when you discuss what is by all accounts a 'career' record for an artist. You know the ones we're talking about here: that one song above all their others which they're synonymous with, even ten or twenty years later. It’s also true to say, that a ‘career’ record usually emanates from quite humble beginnings.
Olly headed back to work with Claude Kelly and Steve Robson for the second album in 2011. After all, they had delivered his previous album’s biggest hit and number one, so it only made sense to go mining for a bit more pop gold from them. With a year under his belt, he was learning that being a single male in the public eye – especially in music – and being out on the road and enjoying all the trappings that came with it (particularly where female admirers were concerned) wasn’t without its downsides.
With social media on the rise, Olly has said that he often found the common response to ‘Do you fancy meeting up some time babe?’ to a prospective new beau he happened upon in a night spot/discotheque was always ‘Just add me on Facebook’ or ‘Send me a DM on Twitter’. Hardly the stuff great romance is made of. As someone with a view on the old school way of doing things, it’s not hard to see why Olly was frustrated.
This frustration came out in a writing session with Claude and Steve, when he came in to the studio one day and announced to them that he wanted to write a ‘really old, classic song about seeing a really fit girl on a night out’ and wooing her via the medium of singing and dancefloor magic. And thus ‘Dance With Me Tonight’ was born.
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Like all the best pop songs, it sounds like about twenty of them in one sitting: a bit of ‘It’s Not Unusual’ here, a bit of ‘Love Machine’ and ‘Smiley Faces’ there. Claude even gave it an authentically old school, New Orleans soul bar touch by doing the spoken word intro of ‘Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve got a special treat for you tonight’. It was a thrilling mix of pop, doo-wop and 60s styled soul with one eye on dancefloors the land over. Its video also pandered to Olly’s playful cheeky side, as he rounded up a gang of party loving friends to woo a prospective beau with a (later revealed to be illegal) street party.
And Olly was confident that once it had been recorded, he not only had a hit on his hands, but that the direction of his second album – now to be titled as ‘In Case You Didn’t Know’ after another of his compositions with Claude and Steve – had been informed. However, when released ahead of the album in mid-November 2011, ‘Dance With Me Tonight’ had a much slower start than his first single off the album had.
You see, Rihanna (with Calvin Harris) had been seeing off all comers to the number one spot for well over a month with her colossal hit single ‘We Found Love’. High profile new singles from JLS, One Direction, The Wanted, Pixie Lott and The Saturdays had all been released in its wake and failed to knock her off the top. ‘Dance With Me Tonight’ looked as if it was going to be joining them when it debuted at #2, despite leading the way midweek. But this was reckoned on without Olly’s second homecoming performance on The X Factor stage, where he debuted its first live performance the very same night it entered the UK chart.
Sony Music had heard a month or so beforehand from Disney that puppet legends The Muppets were set to release a new feature film called, appropriately enough, The Muppets – first in North America for the Thanksgiving market, and then in the UK and Europe the following February. Jim Henson’s fuzzy and furry creations were still a much loved if conspicuously absent entity (at that point anyway) in the UK, and with a new movie came big new promotion opportunities.
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Just about any big showbiz name you can think of from the last four decades has worked with them, so Olly knew it was an opportunity he couldn’t miss out on. Fozzie Bear, Animal, Stadler and Waldorf, and an army of singing penguins and chickens – oh, and crucially, Miss Piggy – hopped over to the UK to join him for his first performance of ‘Dance With Me Tonight’, with a specially re-recorded studio version for the performance making it onto the UK version of The Muppets soundtrack the following year.
Olly and The Muppets proved a winning combination, and the subsequent buzz around it was the most there had been around a result show guest performance in years. So much so that, in a national newspaper’s end of series poll, it was voted as the guest performance of that year’s X Factor. The week the ‘In Case You Didn’t Know’ album headed chart bound, the single held its #2 berth whilst a charity single by that year’s X Factor finalists debuted at the top.
But as airplay grew and ‘Dance With Me Tonight’ started to fill floors the land over, the momentum was enough to ensure that it climbed to the number one spot in the UK on its third week, becoming his third chart topper. With over 200,000 sales to its name already by that point, it had sold more copies than any other single that year before hitting number one. It then went onto shift well over another half a million copies by the time it finished its twenty-week run inside the chart, confirming it as by far and away the biggest seller of his career.
And, as if to prove that good things often come from a place of frustration, the single found itself nominated for a prestigious Ivor Novello award for songwriting 18 months later, in the ‘Most Performed Work’ category at the 2013 ceremony, further cementing Olly’s credentials as an artist, performer and songwriter. Not bad for a song written from being tired of finding love on social media.
OTHER THOUGHTS
Songwriter and producer Paddy Byrne, who can count Olly’s labelmate Paloma Faith, as well as Will Young and Gabrielle amongst his list of previous credits, helped out on ‘Baby Blue Eyes’, a twinkly, sparkly number with a soaring chorus that is almost impossible to find on streaming services these days, meaning those who still have the download of the single bundle on a hard drive somewhere – or the CD single released over a year later in December 2012 for the German market – have something of a fan rarity on their hands.
#Olly Murs#Olly Murs Daily#OM Daily#omdaily10#reviews#2011#Dance With Me Tonight#The Muppets#In Case You Didn't Know#10th Anniversary
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