Hydrovibe
You’ve got to love the story of Hydrovibe that starts in Louisiana with vocalist Heather St. Marie collaborating with guitarist Mat Dauzat to create a sound combining dynamic, guitar-driven rock with powerful vocals. St. Marie and Dauzat move to LA and the very week of their arrival, Mat auditions and is hand-picked by Sharon and Kelly Osbourne to play lead guitar in Kelly’s band, immediately launching a worldwide tour supporting her debut album “SHUT UP” on Sony Records.
While on tour, Dauzat and St. Marie continue writing music via the internet. Upon Mat’s return, they begin recording demos and complete the line up with drummer Philippe Mathys and bass player Eliot Lorango. The four decide to delve into the budding DIY music business model and release their first album independently.
While mixing their debut album “Nothing Left To Lose”, Lion’s Gate/Twisted Pictures notifies the band that their track “Killer Inside” would be featured in the upcoming third installment of the blockbuster SAW film franchise. The band quickly switches gears and releases a 5-song EP (which also features a guest vocal appearance from the film’s star SHAWNEE SMITH).
Then the band’s offered a spot on METAL EDGE Magazine sponsored “Corporate Punishment Tour” with Amity Lane featuring Kevin Palmer and Josh Moates of Trust Company and hit the road. Hydrovibe continues to tour the U.S. heavily for 2 years sharing stages with Static-X, Taproot, Soulfly, Trust Company, Powerman 5000, (Hed) P.E., Black Stone Cherry, Soil, and Drowning Pool.
When the band comes home and revisits the mostly finished album, they quickly decide to re-record to capture the new strength and intensity and to perform the more honed, road-tested versions of the songs. Hydrovibe enters Mad Dog Studios in Burbank, CA with Kevin Lamb to re-track the album. The band also enlists Kevin Churko, (Ozzy Osbourne, In This Moment, Five Finger Death Punch) who takes a break from his work on the new Ozzy album to mix the album’s first single “Fame”.
Hydrovibe kicks off 2010 by signing a deal with Japanese record label SPINNING that will release “Nothing Left To Lose” in Japan -Today!
What’s Next?
Meris
Don’t be distracted by the occasional grandma panty throwing and fake mustaches, the Bay Areas’ Meris is the real deal. The trio just released their new album Abandon All and are touring the west coast with a smart, witty and ironic stage presence unique to the metal scene.
Sean Hugunin, Brad Roberts and Eli Atkinson believe that “creativity is man’s most extraordinary trait” and are committed to exploring the ecstasy, terror, elation and brutal frustration that naturally spawns from it.
One Step Closer
It’s always fun to see the new generation of bands begin their climb through the industry muck. Playing smoke fogged dive bars plastered in peeling, sticker covered walls, while thrashing their hearts to dust on their pawn shop electrics to a crowd of less than a hundred; Wailing in front of friends and family at backyard BBQ gigs; Endlessly updating and checking their myspace pages for feedback and to see how many people bothered to check the latest single. It takes a lot of balls, hope, and talent to make it through years of grassroots gigs and promotions like this. Not many bands, especially young ones, are able to endure it. Some will quickly fizzle and grey like the butt end of a finished cigarette, some will play one gig and become instant sociopaths and go their solo routes, and some will rise through the ashes like scorched phoenixes and taste what it’s like to “make it.”
One Step Closer, a 4-piece band out of Oxford, Pennsylvania, are the future phoenixes that just began their feast. At first glance, you might write them off due to their bushy haired, boy band reject exterior, but don’t get it twisted– these baby faced rookies of rock can flat out play! Led by their lead singer and guitarist, Scott French, whose nasally vocals remind me of a mix between Billy Joe of Green Day and Max Collins of Eve 6, One Step Closer is an emerging Alternative band ready to take that one big step closer to contract and a consistent paycheck. They will get there, because what the band lacks in studio polish, they make up for with their intensity and fantastic instrumentals. When finally placed in the hands of professionals, there is no doubt the potential will morph into payola.
JunkFood
JunkFood’s Bart Harris sang background vocals (along with Miley Cyrus) for Bret Michaels’ song “Nothing To Lose” being released today on iTunes.
Voted best local band by the Washington Post’s readers’ poll, and On the Verge by On Tap Magazine. JunkFood has been tearing up the scene with their 3rd release “Mighty”.
Here’s an in depth look at the band on Washingtonian.com
motae
Oregon’s motae is a four piece latin, jazz, progressive rock band that is pursuing an original sound with sincere resolve. They have drawn members from many backgrounds and ideals under the cause of music for the sake of music.
Tourmaline- Yesterday Always Forgets
Tourmaline is the best kind of good times, really loud, often drunk and propelling their way through the NJ/NY music scene winning over fans one show at a time. The Swindle, produced by Grammy winning producer Joe McGrath and well received, is an impressive, melodic and edgey album. Keep any eye out for their next.
Yesterday Always Forgets:
The Swindle:
Blowing Trees- Goblins
Blowing Trees pack clubs in San Antonio and built a legion of loyal fans that have come to appreciate their intense live performances. With influences ranging from Bob Dylan to Radiohead to Pink Floyd to The Flaming Lips, they avoid imitation and have a knack for blending styles into a unique, cohesive and memorable sound.
Blowing Trees’ self-titled debut album, released by Glassnote Records and produced by Blue October platinum producer David Castell, captures their no-holds-bar eclectic style with a dynamic structure. The Day the World Left Me roars with relevancy and reverberates long after the song is over. California Skies is so visceral that you feel convinced you are driving down the Pacific Coast Highway. Take a sonic Rock tour with Blowing Trees and prepare to go off the beaten path.
Goblins:
Dragonfly Lingo- Circles
This is what happens when a film/music producer hits a dry spell and remembers an idea he once had to marry his passion for music with that of cinema. Dragonfly Lingo’s album, Offscreen, creates a film-music interaction that is very deep, dark, dynamic and catchy.
Circles, inspired by Francis Ford Coppola’s ‘The Conversation’, was nominated for Hollywood Music in Media Awards (HMMA 2009) in the Production/Producer category.
Circles:
Chiwawa- Don’t Wanna Talk
Some call Chiwawa post-modern, post-punk, electro-acoustic hybrid, others call it simply rock or pop. The musicians’ wide musical background delivers a rich and seductive sound with infectious grooves.
Chiwawa’s core is Laurie, the daughter of Hungarian immigrants, and Krassy, born and raised in communist Bulgaria. Within three months of their meeting, Krassy was being deported and Laurie had no choice but to save the band. What started out as a “greencard marriage” blossomed from desperate measures into true love and the couple settled into the Bohemian culture of Montreal, Canada.
Don’t Wanna Talk:
Hip Hop Spotlight: Outasight
Hailing from the concrete slabbed hills spread throughout the Eastern bank of the Hudson River, Outasight is an emcee/vocalist putting a fresh new twist on a Yonkers sound that was once blessed by the lips of a now bronzed Ella Fitz and put to rest at night by Jada’s kiss.
Born Richard Andrew, Outasight is a cool, calm, and collected individual that carries himself with a slight, casual lean like the brick buildings wrapped around Shonnard Terrace. In video interviews, he stands complaisant and poised behind a pair of signature black Ray-Bans, equipped with a slight stoned grin that shows satisfaction with his propulsive young career. Always seen dressed to the nines, his fashion feel mirrors his music in the sense that it’s perpetually polished, perfectly ironed, and has never been worn by any other master of ceremonies.
Originality is the perfect middle name to bridge the gap between the two first names on his birth certificate. Like no one before, Outasight has united soulful-pop croons with breezeless boasts about big city dreams, life, love, and music appreciation. Every album he has released since his 2007 debut ‘Employee of the Year’ has shown immeasurable sonic growth. 2008’s ‘Radio New York‘‘ was the dusty, yet refined, full length record that catapulted his name onto numerous New York City marquees and endless internet posts. An album that showed his innate ability to fuse infectious hooks, melodies, and head rocking raps over jazzy gems from Dante Lewis and D/Will, as well as foreshadowed Outasight’s pop-hop hits to come.
One of 2009’s best mix tapes was the Mick Boogie commissioned, ‘From There to Here: An Album Prequel’, which served as our first glimpse at the bubbling chemistry between him and up and coming producer, 6th Sense; a musical marriage that has already birthed epic compositions such as, “Brand New Day,” “When I Heard the Beat Knock,” and has elevated O’s abilities to another level.
“6th is a great producer.” Outasight told me in a recent e-mail, “What he has really helped with is making the musical landscapes behind what I do so much bigger, broader, and universal. He’s a great musician and together we are influenced by so many different types of music…the chemistry comes natural.” These comments ring loud and true on his latest free LP, ‘Further’, where amongst the guitar plucks, frantic horn stabs, and thundering drums, 6th and Outasight’s serendipitous connection shines brightest.
His new release ‘Further‘ remains an aptly titled LP, as the simple adverb explains exactly where Outasight has taken his music. While grabbing influences from a myriad of genres like: 70’s blues-rock, folk, modern pop, soul, and golden era hip hop, O has proven to new artists that the standard template for constructing a hip hop song has forever changed, the bar has been raised and standards refreshed. Growth and maturity is also accomplished on the free LP, as he toys with various styles, themes, and vocal cadences. He additionally displays surprising versatility as a musician with pristine production choices and contagious song construction.
In only a few short years, we have seen a young musician take his career further than most emcees experience in a lifetime of beats and rhymes. Outasight continues to expand hip hop horizons and expose new slivers of dawn to a genre that has been stuck in the eves of midnight for many years. Soon enough, you might want to borrow the black Ray Ban’s from O’s nose, because there is no doubt that with the release of his upcoming major label debut, ‘From Here to Eternity’, hip hop will be seeing a brand new day.
Brand New Day:
People, Places, Things:
Exclusive:
Click here for more Outasight on BandSoup.com!
Click here to download Outasight’s latest Free LP, Further.
