Supertramp Founding Member & King Crimson Songwriter Richard Palmer-James Releases Debut Solo Album “Takeaway” OUT NOW!
London, UK – Supertramp founding member & King Crimson songwriter Richard Palmer-James has released his debut solo album “Takeaway”! An English songwriter & guitarist, Richard is best known for having written lyrics to several songs by the progressive rock group King Crimson in the early 1970s.
Says Richard, “Having spent the last few decades writing words for other people to sing, and thus being obliged to comply with the ambitions and sensibilities of others, I wanted to present a collection of songs that are uncompromisingly my own.
“I’ve been trying them out in club and pub appearances as a singer/songwriter, and they seem to work, but I’m very curious to see what sort of reaction this album production, which was realised with the indispensable help of a few talented colleagues from the Munich music scene, might elicit.
“The recordings differ stylistically from most of the stuff I worked on as a hired hand – probably because I enjoy playing acoustic instruments and writing pieces which involve storytelling.”
Richard Palmer-James got his start in the music business playing in various Bournemouth bands: The Corvettes, The Palmer-James Group (formed with Alec James), Tetrad, and Ginger Man, all of which also included John Wetton on bass and vocals. He was a founding member of Supertramp; he played guitar, sang vocals and wrote the lyrics for their self-titled debut album under the name Richard Palmer and co-wrote the lyrics of the song “Goldrush”, a song written during his days in the band and finally recorded on their 2002 album “Slow Motion”.
Richard wrote lyrics for three of King Crimson’s albums: “Larks’ Tongues in Aspic”, “Starless and Bible Black”, and “Red”. He did not participate in any of King Crimson’s recordings, but worked with John Wetton and David Cross after Robert Fripp disbanded the group in 1974.
Richard has lived in Munich since the early 1970s. He worked in Munich on the composition and production of music for films and TV until his activities as a lyricist – for such diverse acts as King Crimson, La Bionda, Mireille Mathieu and Haddaway, among others – took priority, resulting in over 400 published titles. In the 90’s, however, he returned to playing guitar regularly, and with the help of the resonator guitar and mandolin began to rediscover in blues and folk music the sources of his
musical inspiration.
In 1978 Richard was visited by John Wetton and W.J. Hutcheson, who were his bandmates in Tetrad, and they recorded as “Jack-Knife” an album with the German drummer Curt Cress in 10 days called “I Wish You Would”. He also wrote the English lyrics for the Italo Disco inventors La Bionda.
In 1997 he released a CD with former bandmate John Wetton under the title “Monkey Business”, a compilation of unreleased material including some songs that were recorded for the first time in studio, like a King Crimson tune called “Doctor Diamond”. In 2015 “I Wish You Would” and “Monkey Business” were released together as a twofer and that continues to be available via this link: http://geni.us/OVtK2P
Today Richard makes his living mainly as a lyricist and performing on guitar live. In support of his new album, Richard Palmer-James will be playing showcase concerts in the UK and Germany.
Prog Legends Stick Men Feat. King Crimson Members New Album “Prog Noir” Available For Pre-Order
Berlin, Germany – Much to the excitement of music aficionados worldwide, prog legends Stick Men will be releasing their new album “Prog Noir” on October 21, 2016. It is now available for pre-order as a single disc edition and a super deluxe box set, which contains an additional bonus CD with exclusive material, a double vinyl version of the album, a t-shirt and poster. The band, featuring members of King Crimson, has also released a new lyric video for the track, The Tempest’ A departure from their previous efforts, “Prog Noir” includes song oriented material, featuring vocals on several tracks.
Says Tony Levin, “The album is somewhere between being the best of our current compositions, and having a unifying concept overall. Part way through the our recording process, the ‘Prog Noir’ title, lyrics and idea came up – it sort of shone a dark, noir light on what had come before, and it influenced what came after (including some ‘noir’ instrumental interludes that will be part of the box set version.) For me that’s a good way to go – I like a concept involved with an album sometimes, but I don’t feel it needs to encompass every piece.”
Stick Men is a progressive rock band created by musicians with extensive experience playing together. Pat Mastelotto and Tony Levin are the rhythm section of the legendary band King Crimson. Mastelotto is in demand all over the world as the premier drummer for progressive rock. Levin plays in Crimson, with Peter Gabriel, and has recorded with John Lennon, David Bowie, Pink Floyd and others. Markus Reuter is a renowned composer/guitarist who designed and plays his own unique touch style guitar.
Tony Levin and Pat Mastelotto, the powerhouse bass and drums of the group King Crimson for more than 2 decades, bring that tradition to all their playing. Levin plays the Chapman Stick, from which the band takes it’s name. Having bass and guitar strings, the Chapman Stick functions at times like two instruments. Markus Reuter plays his 8-string touch guitar – again covering much more ground than a guitar or a bass. And Mastelotto’s drumming encompasses not just the acoustic kit, but a unique electronic setup too, allowing him to add loops, samples, percussion, and more.
The result; audiences are fascinated by watching just three musicians onstage perform their unique compositions as well as wild improvisations and some cover versions of songs by King Crimson, Mike Oldfield, etc.
Before “Prog Noir”, Stick Men have released 4 studio CDs (Soup, Absalom, DEEP, Open) as well as two live albums.
Says Markus, “What’s unusual about ‘Prog Noir’ is that we spent years composing it. Usually we get the ideas and quickly turn them into an album or start playing them in on the road. The imperative of a band like ours, that’s out on the road touring a lot of the time, is to have new material each year. But this time the idea was to really refine the material, reject all but the best (indeed, there are some very nice pieces that didn’t make the cut) and create a really special album that might define our band in terms of where our journey has taken us.”
Stick Men is:
Tony Levin – Born in Boston, Tony Levin started out in classical music, playing bass in the Rochester Philharmonic. Then moving into jazz and rock, he has had a notable career, recording with John Lennon, Pink Floyd, Peter Gabriel, Yes, David Bowie, Alice Cooper, and many more. He has also released 5 solo CDs and three books. In addition to touring with Stick Men, he is currently a member of King Crimson, of the Peter Gabriel Band, and of the Levin Brothers jazz band. His popular website, tonylevin.com, featured one of the web’s first blogs, and has over 4 million visits.
Pat Mastelotto – Very rarely does a drummer go on to forge the most successful career on the demise of their former hit band. Phil Collins and Dave Grohl have managed it, so too has Pat Mastelotto, a self taught drummer from Northern California, who has also been involved with pushing the envelope of electronic drumming. Pat has spent a lifetime jumping genres from pop, to prog, to electronica to world music with – among others – Mr. Mister, XTC, David Sylvian, The Rembrandts, Kimmo Pohjonen, and for the last 20 years with King Crimson.
Markus Reuter – Markus is a composer, guitarist, and producer. Initially trained as a pianist, he subsequently studied Robert Fripp’s Guitar Craft and learned to play the Chapman Stick, later moving onto the U8 Touch Guitar. Reuter has released many solo recordings and worked extensively with other musicians. He is one of the core members of the experimental band Centrozoon, is half of the duo Tuner (with Pat Mastelotto) and was also a member of Europa String Choir. Reuter has collaborated with Ian Boddy, Robert Rich, No-Man singer Tim Bowness, and many others.
In support of “Prog Noir” Stick Men will tour Europe in October 2016, then again in January/February 2017 in the U.S. and Canada. Says Markus, “We love covering a lot of territories, so the future after those booked shows will involve our heading to S. America, Japan, and more places. Yes, we’ll have some videos to offer of the new material – hard to describe those now because we’re in the process of making them.”
“Prog Noir” is available in pre-sale in 3 formats:
Signed Limited Edition Combo Package – Deluxe Box Set (2LP/2CD/Poster) with T-Shirt; Regular CD and Download (WAV, FLAC, ALAC and/or MP3-320 formats)
SIGNED LIMITED EDITION COMBO PACKAGE DELUXE BOX SET (2LP/2CD/POSTER) + T-SHIRT
The combo package includes:
• 2LP 180 grams gatefold (the LP has a, 11 minute bonus tracks on the Side B of the second LP, which is not included in the regular CD package)
• 2CD special edition of the new album, Digipack. (Disk One is the regular 10 track album. Disk Two contains 8 bonus tracks.)
• Full color poster of the album artwork (17×22 inches)
• Full color T-Shirt (front only). Available in Navy Blue and Black.
ALL BOX SETS WILL BE SIGNED BY ALL 3 BAND MEMBERS (Tony, Pat & Markus).
All orders will be shipped in the late October.
Pre-orders are $140 USD / 120 EUR plus shipping.
Those who contribute $200 USD / 190 EUR or more, will have their names included in credits inside of the box set.
This special box set includes digital pre-order of “Prog Noir”. Fans will get 4 tracks now (streaming via the free Bandcamp app and also available as a high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more), plus the complete album the moment it’s released.
SINGLE CD, REGULAR EDITION of “Prog Noir” (10 tracks) can be pre-ordered for $17 USD / 15 Euros plus shipping
DOWNLOAD of “Prog Noir” (10 tracks in WAV, FLAC, ALAC and/or MP3-320 formats) can be pre-ordered for $10 US / 8 EUR
Glass Onyon PR 