Mike Rutherford

Wed
01
Mar

MIKE + THE MECHANICS Release New Single From Upcoming Album ‘Let Me Fly’

Tuesday, April 4, 2017
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE New York, NY (February 28, 2017) – Mike Rutherford has much to smile about right now, and his upcoming album Let Me Fly distills everything that’s right about Mike + The Mechanics: the songwriting, the life-affirming uplift and the undercurrent of quirk. The album is out April 4 via BMG.

Let Me Fly overflows with the sense of joy that has defined the band’s entire existence and, as ever, there’s a host of characters, not all of them upstanding citizens, such as the hapless philanderer of "Don’t Know What Came Over Me," the first single to be taken from the album - now available for download and streaming.

Explains chief Mechanic, Mike Rutherford: “Here’s this guy who’s happily married, loves his lady and everything’s wonderful. Then, one night, he goes AWOL and loses everything by having a one night-stand. It was a moment of madness and he’s beyond remorseful. Was he forgiven? The song just leaves him hanging. And no, it’s not autobiographical!”
2017 sees Mike + The Mechanics toast 32 years in business, and alongside their eighth album and major UK tour, they will be special guests this summer at Phil Collins’ massive June Hyde Park gig as part of the British Summer Time Festival.

Let Me Fly began to take off as the band toured 2011’s The Road, the first album featuring the current line-up: Rutherford himself (guitar/bass), Luke Juby (keyboards), Gary Wallis (drums), Anthony Drennan (guitar), plus vocalists Andrew Roachford and Tim Howar.

“The Mechanics hadn’t played live much, so we started to do what I’d done 40 years ago and build a name.  We did Euro festivals, UK tours and small places and, yes, I really did wonder at my age if it was OK to be at Portsmouth Guildhall, but we got to be a great live band. The chemistry works because we’re all very different people, who’re fun and quirky - if there were any personality problems I couldn’t deal with that, I really couldn’t. We needed new songs though.”

Mike’s friend Brian Rawling, producer of David Bowie, Tina Turner, Cher’s "Believe" and the Mike + The Mechanics’ hit "Now That You’ve Gone" played the role of Let Me Fly’s sounding board. Rawling introduced Mike to former Johnny Hates Jazz singer Clark Datchler and, in December 2015 a new songwriting partnership was born.

“We sat down together and from day one it worked. Clark’s a proper writer and he brought something new. I’d send him lines and he’d bring them to life. We never had a slow day.”

Along the way, Mike also collaborated with old friend Fraser T. Smith (Kano, Kaiser Chiefs, Adele, Sam Smith) and Ed Drewett (One Direction, Professor Green), while both Mechanics singers collaborated too. Big studios were out. Instead, Mike and one of the singers would make a demo which would be passed around for the others to embellish and layer by layer, the songs evolved into something special. “You don’t go into studios any more: doing it this way feels like you’re working on the good bits all the time, but the songs really have to deliver.”

The results pleased even the chief Mechanic himself. “The Road didn’t move anyone’s world as we made it just after we’d met. We’ve learned to play together now. For me, it’s about proving I can write a good song, but the older you get, the less you let yourself off with ’it’s not bad’, the less you pretend and the tougher you are on yourself. The hardest part of the whole process is staying relevant, but anyone who says success doesn’t matter is a liar: what you really want is people to like it. Then you feel it’s all been worth it. It’s as simple as that. Oh and my wife loves it, more than she’s loved an album of mine for a while! Trust me, that’s a really good sign.”

Tour Dates
02/27 Victoria Hall, Hanley
02/28 G Live, Guildford
03/01 Colston Hall, Bristol
03/03 Pavilions, Plymouth
03/04 St David’s Hall, Cardiff
03/05 New Theatre, Oxford
03/07 Hexagon, Reading
03/08 Corn Exchange, Cambridge
03/09 Regent Theatre, Ipswich
03/11 Cliffs Pavillion, Southend
03/13 Dome, Brighton
03/15 Bridgewater Hall, Manchester
03/17 Concert Hall, Perth
03/18 His Majesty’s , Aberdeen
03/19 Festival Hall, Edinburgh
03/21 Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow
03/22 City Hall, Sheffield
03/24 Pavilion, Bournemouth
03/25 Guildhall, Portsmouth
03/26 Royal Albert Hall, London
03/28 City Hall, Salisbury

CLICK HERE for tickets!
 
Official Tracklist
01. Let Me Fly
02. Are You Ready
03. Wonder
04. The Best Is Yet To Come
05. Save The World
06. High Life
07. Don’t Know What Came Over Me **
08. The Letter
09. Not Out Of Love
10. Love Left Over
11. I’ll Be There For You
12. Save My Soul

 
 
Wed
29
Oct

GENESIS 'Sum Of The Parts' Documentary Out On DVD January 13

Artist: 
Wednesday, October 29, 2014
Categories: 
News Feed
 
GENESIS
 
OFFICIAL CAREER-SPANNING DOCUMENTARY SUM OF THE PARTS TO BE RELEASED ON JANUARY 13 ON EAGLE VISION
 
New York, NY (October 28, 2014)—After more than 300 million album sales, the current rediscovery of the hugely successful and influential Genesis continues with the DVD and Blu-ray release of an official career-spanning documentary Sum of the Parts which will be released on January 13, 2015 on Eagle Vision.
 
Featuring contributions from key members past and present Tony Banks, Phil Collins, Peter Gabriel, Steve Hackett, Mike Rutherford and Anthony Phillips, as well as a wealth of archive performance footage of the band’s biggest tracks and fan favorites, this first official study of the band’s history commences with their formation at Charterhouse in 1967 and reunites the band for the first time in many years.
 
Produced by Eagle Rock Film Productions and directed by John Edginton, the film recounts an extraordinary musical story, exploring the band’s song writing as well as emotional highs and lows, alongside previously unseen archive material and rare performance footage from across their entire career.
 
Sum of the Parts explores the dynamic between the band members that have enabled them to survive numerous line-up changes alongside solo careers outside of the band.
 
The remarkable story encompasses their visionary influence as the leading lights of progressive rock with landmark albums such as Foxtrot, Selling England By The Pound and The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway; the huge crossover success of the Eighties and Nineties which saw them hit the upper reaches of the singles charts with era-defining hits such as “Turn It On Again,” “Invisible Touch,” “No Son of Mine,” and “I Can’t Dance”; and through to their 2007 Turn It On Again comeback tour which included a show in front of 500,000 people at Rome’s Circo Massimo.
 
Sum of the Parts contains the BBC’s Together and Apart documentary, which aired on October 4. It adds more than 30 minutes of previously unseen footage, and represents the perfect DVD and Blu-ray companion to the 3CD anthology R-Kive which was released by Warner Music Group / Rhino on September 30.
 
“We’re the only band, I think, that have managed the solo thing and the band thing for quite a few years side-by-side, and made it a plus rather than a problem,” says Mike Rutherford. Peter Gabriel concurs: “I think when we got it right we had something that none of us could do on our own. And there were different musical histories merging together in a powerful way.”
 
Tony Smith, Genesis Manager: “It’s fascinating to see the breadth, diversity and worldwide success of the songs and compositions that have come from this one group of people, in this truly unique film”
 
In terms of what they’ve done together, and what they’ve done apart, there’s never been a band like Genesis. It’s a captivating story, told here from the beginning for the first time.
 
 
Eagle Rock Entertainment is the largest producer and distributor of music programming for DVD, Blu-Ray, TV and Digital Media in the world.  Eagle works directly alongside talent to produce top quality, High Definition programs, both concerts and documentaries, including The Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, The Who, Queen, The Doors, Jeff Beck, Peter Gabriel, Paul McCartney, Ozzy Osbourne, Genesis, Alice Cooper, Eric Clapton and Aerosmith. Eagle is a Grammy Award winning company and has received over 40 multi-platinum, over 80 platinum and over 144 gold discs, worldwide.  Eagle Rock Entertainment has offices in London, New York, Paris and Hamburg.
 
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