DAVE BAXTER, GIN WIGMORE & DON MCGLASHAN
GIN WIGMORE
"I grew up as a big fan of Don and The Mutton Birds so I'm excited to be on tour with them. And Avalanche City are so hot right now. It's a great bill. We're on the road for a month in Summer and I can't wait to play in some of New Zealand's most spectacular outdoor settings and drink a few glasses of wine on this legendary tour!"
DON MCGLASHAN - THE MUTTON BIRDS
"I'm looking forward to getting together with the guys. A band is more than just a bunch of musicians. When it really works, there's a magic there which is more than the sum of its parts. That's certainly the way it was with the Mutton Birds, and it's going to be great to take the beast out of the garage again and make the gravel fly."
DAVE BAXTER - AVALANCHE CITY
"I've always wanted to play on the Winery Tour and it's so cool to be playing alongside Gin and The Mutton Birds, they're Kiwi legends. I'm bringing my six piece band with me – it's going to be awesome"
GIN WIGMORE
Spring and Summer are looking decidedly brighter with the news that Gin Wigmore will be releasing her highly anticipated second album Gravel & Wine on November 7 and will then headline the 6th annual Classic Hits Winery Tour 2012. Gravel & Wine is the follow up to Gin’s hugely successful debut, Holy Smoke, which is now nearing 5x Platinum sales. Holy Smoke also saw Gin pick up four Tuis at the 2010 New Zealand Music Awards for Album of the Year, Breakthrough Artist of the Year, Best Pop Album and Highest Selling NZ Album.
ABOUT GIN
Me? Well, my full name is Virginia Claire Wigmore, shortened years back to Ginny, then with a little more innocence lost, dwindled down further to “Gin.”
The music? It all started rattling out of me around 12; can’t say it was all that great, but it seemed to pull a slightly misfit and unclean crowd of around ten folks on a Wednesday night from 8-9pm, so I guess it had some sort of legs. And those legs luckily grew a little bigger, landing me in Sydney where I managed to write a short & sweet E.P, entitled, quite simply, Extended Play, purely because I wasn’t the savviest kid in the music club and never actually knew what “E.P” stood for, so I thought I better clear that up for the other rookie vocab musicians.
After the E.P it was time for me to make an album. I was sceptical of this happening due to my highly un-prolific nature. But with the help of a few good men such as Mike Elizondo and Dan Wilson, I was able to make my very first album, Holy Smoke, a reality and take my first step towards global domination. Global being largely New Zealand, where Holy Smoke took a grip on my homeland for a hearty year of praise, adulation and radio saturation. Being proud as punch with all that success, a U.S deal with Motown, winning gold-coloured awards and free stuff arriving by post regularly, I decided I’d better not throw in the towel on being an “artiste” just yet. So I threw my university application to the real world in the drawer one more time and ventured to the US of A to begin work on Album #2.
The southern states of America held my hand for the first few months of self-discovery. Taking me to church for the first time, with the sermon being casually led by The Reverend Al Green. I asked myself why I hadn’t tried this whole religious thing years ago. But I quickly realized church would probably never live up to that kind of high ever again, so I turned to the all forgiving hard liquor-pouring juke joints of Clarksdale, MS to find the true blood and bones of this record.
I got down to business and started writing furiously. I wore my fingers down to a calloused state writing with every Tom, Dick & Harry from around the world, including a chap named Charlie who plays for a man named Bob, wrestling my emotions and bringing out the raw grit hiding in my tightly guarded sub-conscious. Lucky for me, it all paid off in the way of 11 tip-top songs that have the love of a cowboy, bathe in a little lonesome blues, dance to a touch of rock ‘n’ roll and have the swagger of a woman past midnight.
After much persistence in the form of incessant nagging to my label to get Mr. Butch Walker to produce and Mr. Jake Sinclair to engineer, I found myself in the beachside haven of Santa Monica in the U.S. summer of 2011 with those two fine gentlemen by my side ready to record my second album. After a month of live and loose recording with the Black Widows and Stu Thompson, we managed to uncover my newest album Gravel & Wine…out November 7.
THE MUTTON BIRDS
The Mutton Birds began in New Zealand in 1991, founded by singer and songwriter Don McGlashan, who had earlier fronted Kiwi favourites, Blam Blam Blam and The Front Lawn.
Three years later The Mutton Birds were about as big as it is possible to be in New Zealand. They had released two platinum albums: a self-titled debut and another collection called Salty. They’d scooped music awards, McGlashan had won the APRA Silver Scroll for his song-writing, and they’d become one of the biggest live acts in the country.
In 1995 the band began to get restless. "You're probably better off staying here in New Zealand, don't do anything rash" a local record company exec advised. So they moved to London, England. A year later, the album Nature, a UK compilation of the first two albums, was turning heads over there. The guy who'd told them to stay put said he had "never been so glad to have been proved wrong". Then they went to work.
The astonishing third album, Envy Of Angels, was released in 1996 under the guidance of Hugh Jones (The Bluetones, Dodgy, Echo and the Bunnymen). Despite being written and recorded in the UK, Envy Of Angels was infused with images of the MB's homeland. "Music should taste of somewhere, I think.” McGlashan says.
The critics agreed:
"...The classic purity of the melodies on Envy Of Angels is at times breathtaking ... the lyrics have a literate bent that adds the capacity to bear repeated listening. ...an eloquence and economy and wit that is rarely bettered in song." The Times on Sunday
"Like The Chills, The Triffids, or the Go-Betweens... the Mutton Birds are a glorious, timeless step back to an era when angular, melodic guitar tunes didn't need to sound like the Beatles" Time Out
The band was well-travelled throughout Europe and Canada and after two hard years of slog, Long decided to return to NZ and in 1997 Chris Sheehan (ex Dance Exponents/Starling) stepped in to guitar playing duties.
The Mutton Birds and Virgin Records parted company following the ‘Envy Of Angels’ release. Now back to their indie roots the band released a fourth album in 1999. ‘Rain, Steam & Speed’ was critically acclaimed, but shortly after completion of recording, Gregg also decided to return to NZ with Tony Fisher stepping in as the touring bass player.
Although the band’s live following in the UK was growing steadily, McGlashan decided to return to NZ in early 1999 with his family. The band last played together in 2002.
Ten years on all the members of the band continue to work in music and reunite for one last time for The Classic Hits Winery Tour 2012.
The Mutton Birds are:
Don McGlashan: Lead vocal, rhythm guitar and Euphonium
David Long: Guitars
Ross Burge: Drums
www.donmcglashan.com/MuttonBirds
AVALANCHE CITY
Avalanche City is the brain child of Dave Baxter, a musician whose background stretches across many genres and influences culminating in a sound that is an impressive and eclectic range of various instruments, melodies and harmonies.
The depth and perspective create a dynamic atmosphere that is rich and raw all at once. The epicentre of Avalanche City is Baxter himself who conceives, writes, produces, records and plays every instrument on the debut album ‘Our New Life Above The Ground’.
Fresh from very successful tours of the Japan, Australia, US (Los Angeles & New York) and London playing showcases to rave reviews in May 2011 and a New Zealand nationwide tour, the band is rocking up the charts and winning hearts all over the globe. Signing a World Wide Deal with Warner Music and being released in over 20 Countries, the world is their oyster……
Winner of the coveted APRA “Silver Scroll” Award in September 2011 for Love Love Love ….
Their first single Love Love Love was a smash hit, released on 7th March 2011, it was the highest selling single to debut at #1 on NZ Singles Charts for a NZ band ever (Platinum Sales in it’s debut week), #1 on iTunes, #1 on All Airplay Radio, #1 on Pop Radio, #1 NZ40 Radio, #1 on AC Radio, #1 on Juice TV & #2 on C4 Music TV. Our New Life Above The Ground album was released on 4th April (NZ) and debuted at #4 in the charts.
Although Avalanche City is a solo project, live performances will feature various musicians and instruments from mandolin, ukulele, glockenspiel, to accordion – a full rendition of the album and it’s magic…
www.avalanchecity.com / www.facebook.com/avalanchecity