Amy Winehouse - Frank (2003)

"You Sent Me Flying" by Amy Winehouse


Ms. Dynamite worked closely with several producers in getting her debut album ready, one of them being Hip Hop DJ and songwriter Salaam Remi. He helped give several hit singles their R&B tastes until he stumbled upon a creative partnership with jazz chanteuse Amy Winehouse.

Amy was a stand out performer in her teens and garnered the music industry's attention at the age of 18 in the newly minted millennium. Not only did her talents spark a bidding war as a non-pop performer amongst major labels, but they also sparked her management (a managing company headed by Simon Fuller, creator of the Idol franchise) to keep her a company secret as they began to build her image and the tracks to her debut. Universal won Amy's publishing rights and released her debut single "Stronger Than Me" in the waning days of 2003. The single performed poorly, hitting the wrong side of the UK Top 40. In fact, the three other singles from her debut, released throughout 2004, performed no better than 57 on the UK charts. The success of her debut, however, bolstered her under-performing singles. Frank, released at the end of 2003, peaked at #3 after a slow start in the UK and performed just as well in other countries. The album would earn itself a triple platinum sales figure.

Critically, Frank met with critical acclaim. Amy's sincere talent and unique qualities followed the populist trend against label-fabricated singers and boy/girl groups. Critics fell in love with her voice, her songwriting, and her look. All of these elements took cues from her female predecessors (Sarah Vaughan, Dinah Washington, Ronnie Spector, Erykah Badu, and even Ms. Dynamite), but she effortlessly transcended these influences falling somewhere in between them all but standing just as tall as the rest. Her critical acclaim led to music prizes such as the Ivor Novello for songwriting, BRIT Awards for popularity (basically), and a shortlisting for the 2004 Mercury Prize. Frank played a strong debut from a talented singer and set off a promising start to what would become a tragic career.

Here is the discography surrounding Amy Winehouse's debut album:

Stronger Than Me (2003 single)
Frank
Take the Box (2004 single)
In My Box (2004 single)
Sessions@AOL (2004 Live EP)
Pumps (2004 single)



If you have any ideas for where the tour should go next, please give a shout. I'm open to whatever as long as the artists are historically related in some way and go in an artist's chronological order.

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Ms. Dynamite - A Little Deeper (2002)

"Krazy Krush" by Ms. Dynamite


The Streets hit both a wave of critical and commercial popularity that resulted in its shortlisting for the 2002 Mercury Prize (an award given to the "best" album from the UK and Ireland). That particular year's award is notable for the number of debut album's nominated. The Bees, The Coral, and The Electric Soft Parade were a few of the bands celebrated, but the award went to A Little Deeper, the debut album of British hip-hob/R&B artist Ms. Dynamite.

Ms. Dynamite started as a featured artist working with British garage acts DJ Sticky and So Solid Crew in 2001. This didn't last long as her talents quickly attracted the notice of Polydor Records. As soon as 2002, she released three singles (with two in the UK Top 10 and all three in the Top 20) and her debut album (which peaked at 10, going platinum).

The album features tight production and carefully mixes in Dynamite's hard raps with her smooth R&B vocals. There is a sociopolitical and feminist consciousness to her lyrics. She raps about growing up in British ghettos, refraining from abusing drugs, and breaking off bad relationships with abusive others (no matter the situation). She drops single lines about African blood diamonds and lightly touches on racist attitudes, but she does tone down the politics on her softer songs. The album, essentially, begins with urgent messages and calls to action and moves inward to more personal songs. It starts hard and fast and ends softly. A Little Deeper garnered favorable reviews with its greatest praise coming in the form of the Mercury Prize.

Here is the discography surrounding Ms. Dynamite's debut album:

It Takes More (2002 single)
A Little Deeper
Dy-Na-Mi-Tee (2002 single)
Put Him Out (2002 single)

"Dy-Na-Mi-Tee" by Ms. Dynamite


If you have any ideas for where the tour should go next, please give a shout. I'm open to whatever as long as the artists are historically related in some way and go in an artist's chronological order.

Pass the Headphones!!

The Streets - Original Pirate Material (2002)

"Turn the Page" by The Streets


The Earlies might have had the benefit of their own record label but distribution rights were held by a larger label group. A subsidiary of Warner Music Group and founded by Nick Worthington, 679 Recordings dealt with the promotion and release of both UK and American artists (or both such as The Earlies) throughout England. Started in 2001, the label jolted out of the gate with the release of the platinum-selling record Original Pirate Material by The Streets in 2002.

Mike Skinner is The Streets, a moniker for his musical output since 1994. There have been musicians he's collaborated with such as the mysterious Johnny Drum Machine and rapper Kevin Mark Trail, but the output is creatively and personally his. He's a rapper from UK's garage movement: simple garage beats, simple samples, and raps with all the imagery of English youth. With a typical rapper's bravado, he boasts in his lyrics about how far he's pushing the UK hip hop scene forward with only a limited palette and a bedroom studio. In fact, he spends the first four songs of his debut promoting exactly how tall his album stands next to those of his peers. The rest of the songs are stories.

The Streets's debut single came out in late 2001 peaking at #18 on the UK charts. A good start, he followed his success up with three more singles in 2002. None charted higher than his first, but none charted lower than #30. Amidst the singles came his debut album Original Pirate Material. It opened to critical acclaim and eventually found itself amongst the "best" albums of the decade. Critics fawned over the album's garage mixes, production value, and embarrassingly honest and humorous raps about English club life, love life, and drug life. There can be a lot said about how "English" The Streets music is. The same has been said about The Kinks, The Jam, and Blur: all English bands that had trouble hitting a chord with American audiences because their subject matter is entirely foreign. Still, Mike Skinner's songs are deeply personal and are imbued with a pathos that refuses to take itself too seriously and a positivity that makes Skinner and the listener "push things forward".

Here is the discography surrounding The Streets's debut album:

Has It Come to this? (2001 single)
Let's Push Things Forward (2002 single)
Original Pirate Material
Weak Become Heroes (2002 single)
Don't Mug Yourself (2002 single)
All Got Our Runnins (2003 EP)

"Don't Mug Yourself" by The Streets


"Stay Positive" by The Streets


If you have any ideas for where the tour should go next, please give a shout. I'm open to whatever as long as the artists are historically related in some way and go in an artist's chronological order.

Pass the Headphones!!

The Earlies - These Were The Earlies (2004)

"Wayward Song" by The Earlies


When John Mark Lapham shopped around Micah P. Hinson's demos in the US and England, he'd also shop around the work of his own band The Earlies.

The Earlies started recording songs together in the late 90s and eventually released their debut album, a collection of early EPs, These Were The Earlies in 2004. 2004 also marked the first time the band could say they were all together in the same room. The strange case of The Earlies had two of its members, JM Lapham (drums, effects, loops) and Brandon Carr (guitar, vocals), living in Texas and the other two members, Giles Hatton (sequencer, effects) and Christian Madden (multi-instrumentalist) living in England. They met through their previous independent projects; Lapham's Autio and Giles Hatton's Atomic Clock both released work on the short-lived Beatnik Records. This small connection was enough to foster an Atlantic-bridging relationship that would spawn music, basically, via pen-palling.

The Earlies found a UK record deal with 679 Recordings and moved the outfit to England. They'd get a US record deal in 2006 with Secretly Canadian (label for previous artist David Vandervelde). The Earlies music on their debut is when electronic music meets progressive rock. They record the instruments drunk, or at least slightly tipsy, in order to give the performances a looser feel. Sober, they work on the production, layering all of the different musical elements. The lyrics are simple and delivered in a half-singing voice by Brandon Carr. When the group brings harmonies into the mix, the vocals take on a mantric quality. The Earlies, however, are at their best when the vocals, and music in general, are at their most minimal. Like in the beautiful "Slow Man's Dream" and "Wayward Song", the use of only a slowly building, ambient electronic composition and a woodwind or two shows that The Earlies make beautiful and ambitious music even on a limited palette.

Here is the discography surrounding The Earlies's debut album:

King (1999 single by Autio)
Bullgoose Loony (1999 single by Atomic Clock)
25 Easy Pieces (2002 single)
Song for #3 (2002 single)
The First Sound of The Earlies - A Recollection of Early Tracks (2003 download)
Wayward Song (2003 EP)
These Were The Earlies
Morning Wonder (2004 single)
The Earlies in The Devil's Country (2004 EP)
Bring It Back Again (2005 single)
I've Been Waiting (2005 single by Sara Lowes and The Earlies)

"Morning Wonder" by The Earlies


If you have any ideas for where the tour should go next, please give a shout. I'm open to whatever as long as the artists are historically related in some way and go in an artist's chronological order.

Pass the Headphones!!