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Irish
songwriter Andy White was born and grew up in Belfast, Northern
Ireland. His father is a writer and his grandmother a piano
player. Put the clacking of typewriter keys and the sound of piano
music drifting up from the hall together and you just might come
up with a songwriter. Socially political and romantically poetical
from the very start, concerned with the troubles associated with
his time and place, Andy started scribbling lyrics on any piece of
paper he could get his hands on. He wrote his first poem when he
was nine entitled 'Riots' and picked up a guitar aged 13 after
hearing John Lennon singing 'Give Peace A Chance'.
'Religious
Persuasion', his first single, was released on Stiff Records in
1985 and instantly entered the indie charts. Loudly acoustic and
precociously word-filled, "Yer man is brilliant" was the
Melody Maker album review headline as Andy's first solo album
'Rave on Andy White' was released worldwide in 1986. Since then
Andy has recorded five more solo albums, toured the world and won
Ireland's top songwriting award. He has written with Peter Gabriel
and Neil Finn, been produced by John Leckie and Kim Fowley and
toured with Van Morrison and Mary Black.
In 1995, along
with his mates Liam O Maonlai (Hothouse Flowers) and Tim Finn
(Split Enz, Crowded House) he formed ALT. They recorded an album
'Altitude' released on Parlophone and spent the year touring
Australia and New Zealand, Europe and North America. Andy drew
from this collaborative musical experience with his next solo
album 'Teenage', featuring the singles 'Get Back Home' and
'Between A Man And A Woman'. This was followed in 1998 by a 'Best
Of' collection 'andywhite.compilation' which pulled together 12 of
Andy's best known songs and added 2 new recordings. ALT reformed
to play Japan in December of 1998 and Andy spent most of 1999
touring the with the compilation album in Australia, Canada and
WOMAD festivals in Spain, UK and USA.
Between Andy's
performances at WOMAD festivals at Rivermead in England and
Seattle USA, a live recording was made in Real World Studios.
Mixing both musical and spoken word performances, 'Speechless' was
released on the WOMAD Select label in early 2000 and Andy toured
the UK and Ireland with his 'Celtic Ono Band' to celebrate. All of
Andy's albums, plus an internet only rarities and b-sides
collection entitled 'rare' are available via Andy's website at
http://www.andywhite.com
A companion
volume to the recorded albums is 'The Music of What Happens',
Andy's book of collected song lyrics, poems and drawings which is
published in Ireland by Lagan Press. Outside Ireland it is
available exclusively through the website.
Andy's live
schedule for 2000 ended with a 'Songwriter' September tour of the
UK with a Scotsman, Jackie Leven, and an Englishman, Michael
Weston King. Japanese solo dates and European dates with Andy's
band followed, in preparation for the UK and Irish release of a
new studio album recorded in Dublin with Kieran Kennedy producing
and John Leckie mixing.
Musicians
featured include Liam O Maonlai (Hothouse Flowers, ALT), David
Crichton (The Silencers), Robert Malone (David Gray Band), Nick
Seymour (Crowded House), Dave Clarke (Black Velvet Band) and Cathy
White (herself).
Stuart Baillie
summed up a lot of Andy's word-driven peripatetic musical talent
and Celtic soul, writing in Ireland's 'Hot Press' earlier this
year. We'll leave the last words with him:
"So hey,
Andy White, I wrote this column for you. By the time I got back to
Belfast, you were in Dublin, fixing to go to Switzerland to live.
And the last time I saw you in the flesh you were talking about
your peculiar relationship to your hometown. "I love the
place where I grew up," I remember you saying. "But you
don't necessarily have to live there to love it." Ahead of
me, once again. Andy's new live LP is another journey into that
conundrum. Loads of songs about the old place. Sometimes he's high
on hope and then he gets right twisted. Swooning chords, crashing
sentiments and some wit at no extra cost. And listen out, 'cause
Andy's playing my song again. I can feel another compilation tape
coming on."
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