CHARLIE WINSTON – New Album \u2018Running Still\u2019 Out 28 January 2013 on Real World Records<\/p>\n
UK press reaction to Charlie\u2019s 2009 album, \u2018Hobo\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cimmaculately crafted\u201d \u2013 Q
\n”If Chris Martin ditched Coldplay and took to the road with a more rootsy outfit, he might come up with something like Hobo” – Daily Express
\n\u201cThe Chaplin look complements a quirky, bluesy musical style\u201d \u2013 The Telegraph
\n\u201cA worthy contender for la petite sensation de 2010 in the UK\u201d \u2013 The Guardian
\n\u201cCharlie Winston is set to be very big indeed\u201d \u2013 Record Collector
\n”Lyrically, vocally and musically compelling”\u2026.\u201cFull flavoured, deep and rich in quality\u201d – Maverick
\n\u201cwe predict great things for this album \u2013 and Charlie\u201d \u2013 Stylist
\n\u201cWhat took us so long to catch on?\u201d \u2013 Star Magazine
\n\u201cIt would be a loss for us if Winston were to be consigned to the list of artists who only cracked it abroad\u2026\u201d – BBC online<\/p>\n
Following up the breakthrough of his 2009 album, \u2018Hobo\u2019, a No. 1 success in Europe and Canada, \u2018Running Still\u2019 finds Charlie Winston and his richly talented band in collaboration with producer Tony Berg (Aimee Mann, Michael Penn) to reach new emotional and sonic colours. <\/p>\n
\u201cMy sole objective on the album was to be able to engage people\u2019s feet first and slowly rise to the mind,\u201d he says. \u201cSo by the time they get absorbed in the lyrics, they\u2019re fully engaged but realize there\u2019s something more going on.\u201d<\/p>\n
Opener \u2018Hello Alone\u2019 makes for an inviting call, a shared solitude, if you will, that\u2019s at the root of the art experience. But the next song, \u2018Speak to Me\u2019, makes it clear that no one should limit Winston in terms of expectations, the all-vocal beat-boxed tour de force showing one of his many facets, with more to come. The snappy \u2018Happiness\u2019 offers soulful yearning, \u2018She Went Quietly\u2019 is a searching piano ballad (inspired by a heart-wrenching tale of separation involving his great aunt and, to lesser though crucial extent, the movie Million Dollar Baby). \u2018Until You\u2019re Satisfied\u2019 is \u201880s-referencing pop-funk celebrating Winston\u2019s Prince fandom. \u2018Lift Me Gently\u2019 is a stand out track for Peter Gabriel \u2013 \u201cAn amazing song, and possibly the best Charlie has ever written\u2026.\u201d. \u2018Wild Ones\u2019 is charging blues-rock, \u2018Rockin\u2019 in the Suburbs\u2019 is all vibrant energy \u2026 and that\u2019s just part of the picture. Not a surprise given that Winston also, with natural ease, refers to such diverse inspirations as Nick Cave, Steve Reich and Jacques Brel (and T.S. Eliot, Wim Wenders and Ingmar Bergman, for that matter) in discussing the album.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s near impossible for me to write in one style only,\u201d says singer\/songwriter Charlie Winston. \u201cAnd today in my generation of songwriting, there\u2019s a bit of a lack for me. People have forgotten the power of song, since the technology swept through, and how it carries. Coming from parents who are songwriters, that\u2019s my No. 1 thing, really.\u201d<\/p>\n
That latter reference would be to the \u201860s English folk duo Jeff and Julie. And arguably, Running Still – Winston\u2019s third, following Hobo and his 2006 debut Make Way – is the album to which his whole life has been leading. Winston was raised by his parents in their small East Anglia hotel, which he describes as \u201cFawlty Towers, but with a family\u201d — with two bars and a ballroom, hosting a constant stream of musical, theatrical and comedy performers. He says he was the \u201ccheerful\u201d one of the four children, responding to his father\u2019s coercion to entertain.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe bribed me to learn how to juggle and ride unicycles and all that at eight years old!\u201d he says. \u201cMy brothers Tom and Jo had their own band, so I was watching them do their thing. At 10 years old both my sister and I got piano lessons and my musical world started to be developed.\u201d<\/p>\n
Charlie\u2019s teenage dream was to be an actor, but music pulled at him. His first band, when he was 15, had a brass section for which he got into writing parts. A love for all sorts of jazz intensified – complementing what had been a pre-teen obsession with hip-hop, through which he learned to beat-box, as heard on \u201cSpeak to Me\u201d, \u201cWild Ones\u201d and \u201cHello Alone\u201d.<\/p>\n