The Music Network - Beautiful Sync - 02/05/12
May 2, 2012 11:07:03 GMT 10
Post by Spud on May 2, 2012 11:07:03 GMT 10
Damien Leith: Beautiful Sync
02 May 2012
by Nathan Jolly
Damien Leith found himself in an interesting position when overseas sales of his 2007 debut studio album Where We Land suddenly starting spiking over the Christmas break. Although the situation was certainly not unwelcome, it wasn’t completely ideal – Leith had, after all, unleashed three studio albums since then, with recording of his fourth well under way at the time. All this interest stemmed from an international Estée Lauder campaign, which featured his track Beautiful (co-written with Alex Lloyd) – a new recording of which appears on his new album Now & Then.
“We never released it, it was never a single,” Leith explains of the song’s sudden rise. “Once Estée Lauder came on board, people got in touch from everywhere, looking for the song. Somebody put up an old version [on YouTube] and I think overnight we got forty-thousand hits, so we felt like this was a good time to put it out,” he laughs.
Although the song has never been released as a single, it was always one of Leith’s flagship tunes: he tells TMN he has performed it at every show he has played. Although a co-write with Lloyd, Leith claims its genesis stretched back even prior to this: “I’ve been playing that for years – even before Alex and I got together, it’s a song I’d been working on. So I had a version in the past, even before the one we originally recorded. So it’s always been there – in a way it’s a pity we hadn’t released it ‘til now, it’s just the time was wrong.”
The timing certainly seems right for Leith at the moment. With his last record Roy– a collection of Orbison covers which showcases his impressive range–having sold Platinum, Leith is set to launch his career on the international stage, with a new album containing both his own compositions, and a handful of tracks written (or originally performed) by the members of the Travelling Wilburys. Despite the obvious disconnect between composers, the album flows seamlessly, with Leith joking about being asked when he wrote the Jeff Lynne-penned Can’t Get It Out Of My Head.
“I wanted to get back to [showcasing] myself as a writer, but at the same time we kinda wanted to make a smooth transition from Roy. It worked out better for me anyway: the covers on there I know very well, they continue where we left off with Roy, as Roy [Orbsion] was with the Travelling Wilburys. It’s a nice move. I’ve always been inspired by those writers, I can’t write as well obviously, but it’s a similar sort of style. It melded really nicely. It was actually quite an easy one to record. Some albums you labour over for ages, but it was a pretty easy-going recording.”
In keeping with both his past sound and that of the Wilburys, Leith shied away from digital recording techniques and effects, laying down three songs in Nashville (“Those guys are, you know...they’re ‘cats’,” he marvels. “These guys literally just sit down and nail it first time.”) with the rest of the album recorded back in Australia, in a relatively live studio setting. “I wanted to get down to a real live sound. This album, especially, is very live. I play a lot on it, too, which I wanted to do. That was really important to me. I really didn’t want anything digital at all. Nothing against digital,” he quickly adds, “but I love that warmth you get from a live sound. Roy set it in motion. That was very live and got back to what I like doing and how I like playing. I’m happiest with just a guitar, and a bit of piano. It was very old school, and I love that.”
With international interest, Now & Then is to be released in several territories, with Leith jetting over to America and the UK in the next few months for quick-stop promotional visits. Even with this continent- hopping, Leith is unlikely to be as busy as he was in 2011: promoting a new record, starring in New Idea Test Kitchen, as well as stepping out of his comfort zone for Dancing With The Stars. Despite appearing on the television more often than Rebecca Gibney last year, Leith insists he didn’t court the small screen.
“I like it. I’m not going after it though,” he adds. “The offer came, I had the gap, we had an album coming out, so that was a consideration, but also I just figured ‘what the hell?’ It worked out well, surprisingly. I thought I was going to bomb. It was so hard, I’ve never done anything as hard in my life. I liked it a lot, but geez, it was so hard. The hours of dancing and training - my body was wrecked from it.”
Although Leith is scaling back his television commitments this year, he is also aware of the power of the medium – after all he has a commercial to thank for his international success. “The Estée Lauder thing is for the next couple of years, so lots of people are going to hear Beautiful, and it’ll get more awareness. Even with the sales [of the debut record], it was all coming from America and back in the UK, which is great,” he enthuses. “It was a real surprise. It came out of the blue.”
www.themusicnetwork.com/music-features/artists/2012/05/02/damien-leith-beautiful-sync/
02 May 2012
by Nathan Jolly
Damien Leith found himself in an interesting position when overseas sales of his 2007 debut studio album Where We Land suddenly starting spiking over the Christmas break. Although the situation was certainly not unwelcome, it wasn’t completely ideal – Leith had, after all, unleashed three studio albums since then, with recording of his fourth well under way at the time. All this interest stemmed from an international Estée Lauder campaign, which featured his track Beautiful (co-written with Alex Lloyd) – a new recording of which appears on his new album Now & Then.
“We never released it, it was never a single,” Leith explains of the song’s sudden rise. “Once Estée Lauder came on board, people got in touch from everywhere, looking for the song. Somebody put up an old version [on YouTube] and I think overnight we got forty-thousand hits, so we felt like this was a good time to put it out,” he laughs.
Although the song has never been released as a single, it was always one of Leith’s flagship tunes: he tells TMN he has performed it at every show he has played. Although a co-write with Lloyd, Leith claims its genesis stretched back even prior to this: “I’ve been playing that for years – even before Alex and I got together, it’s a song I’d been working on. So I had a version in the past, even before the one we originally recorded. So it’s always been there – in a way it’s a pity we hadn’t released it ‘til now, it’s just the time was wrong.”
The timing certainly seems right for Leith at the moment. With his last record Roy– a collection of Orbison covers which showcases his impressive range–having sold Platinum, Leith is set to launch his career on the international stage, with a new album containing both his own compositions, and a handful of tracks written (or originally performed) by the members of the Travelling Wilburys. Despite the obvious disconnect between composers, the album flows seamlessly, with Leith joking about being asked when he wrote the Jeff Lynne-penned Can’t Get It Out Of My Head.
“I wanted to get back to [showcasing] myself as a writer, but at the same time we kinda wanted to make a smooth transition from Roy. It worked out better for me anyway: the covers on there I know very well, they continue where we left off with Roy, as Roy [Orbsion] was with the Travelling Wilburys. It’s a nice move. I’ve always been inspired by those writers, I can’t write as well obviously, but it’s a similar sort of style. It melded really nicely. It was actually quite an easy one to record. Some albums you labour over for ages, but it was a pretty easy-going recording.”
In keeping with both his past sound and that of the Wilburys, Leith shied away from digital recording techniques and effects, laying down three songs in Nashville (“Those guys are, you know...they’re ‘cats’,” he marvels. “These guys literally just sit down and nail it first time.”) with the rest of the album recorded back in Australia, in a relatively live studio setting. “I wanted to get down to a real live sound. This album, especially, is very live. I play a lot on it, too, which I wanted to do. That was really important to me. I really didn’t want anything digital at all. Nothing against digital,” he quickly adds, “but I love that warmth you get from a live sound. Roy set it in motion. That was very live and got back to what I like doing and how I like playing. I’m happiest with just a guitar, and a bit of piano. It was very old school, and I love that.”
With international interest, Now & Then is to be released in several territories, with Leith jetting over to America and the UK in the next few months for quick-stop promotional visits. Even with this continent- hopping, Leith is unlikely to be as busy as he was in 2011: promoting a new record, starring in New Idea Test Kitchen, as well as stepping out of his comfort zone for Dancing With The Stars. Despite appearing on the television more often than Rebecca Gibney last year, Leith insists he didn’t court the small screen.
“I like it. I’m not going after it though,” he adds. “The offer came, I had the gap, we had an album coming out, so that was a consideration, but also I just figured ‘what the hell?’ It worked out well, surprisingly. I thought I was going to bomb. It was so hard, I’ve never done anything as hard in my life. I liked it a lot, but geez, it was so hard. The hours of dancing and training - my body was wrecked from it.”
Although Leith is scaling back his television commitments this year, he is also aware of the power of the medium – after all he has a commercial to thank for his international success. “The Estée Lauder thing is for the next couple of years, so lots of people are going to hear Beautiful, and it’ll get more awareness. Even with the sales [of the debut record], it was all coming from America and back in the UK, which is great,” he enthuses. “It was a real surprise. It came out of the blue.”
www.themusicnetwork.com/music-features/artists/2012/05/02/damien-leith-beautiful-sync/
Thanks Spud
all heard the original version. 
it goes off in UK and US! 
aka @just_Leithal on Twitter 
To me, Damien = artistic integrity 
