Phoenix

This week’s artist comes all the way from France. You know that place with all the good cheese and bread? Apparently they produce some pretty good music as well with the Paris based band Phoenix. Now I realize they have been around for a little while and they just won this little award called a Grammy but I still felt they were worth featuring. I first heard their album It’s Never Been Like That, which was released in 2006, when I purchased it on Amazon’s daily deal. Since then I can't seem to get enough of their music.

Phoenix is made up of four band mates, vocalist Thomas Mars, bassist Deck d'Arcy, guitarist Christian Mazzalai and his older brother Laurent Brancowitz also on guitar. The band comes from a suburb of Versailles and got their start by playing bars and pubs. If anyone out there has pursued a career in music you know that playing to a room full of drunks is sort of a right of passage that everyone should have to go through.

The band released their first album in 2000 followed by three others until their current release, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, which earned them their Grammy award this past January for Best Alternative Album. Lead singer Thomas Mars has a child with his partner, film director Sofia Coppola which caused a three year break before releasing the Grammy winning album. What a little time off will do, eh?

They are current touring through Australia and Europe but will be making their way to the U.S. in April for Coachella and Bonnaroo festival as well as about a dozen other shows through out the nation before heading back to Europe.

Hope you enjoyed this weeks feature. For some of you this may be stretching your musical tastes--as I have mention before is my goal. I’d love to hear what all of you think. Have a wonderful week!

http://www.wearephoenix.com/

http://www.myspace.com/wearephoenix