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NEW! Exclusive preview of Lee Mead's new album
Lee talks to his record label - Fascination - about his forthcoming debut album, and you can be the first to hear clips from the new CD, released on November 19th - and view a sneak preview of the video for the single "Gonna Make You A Star"
Lee grew up in Southend-on-Sea, Essex - a mere 20 miles, as the seagull flies, from Chelmsford, site of the V Festival. It was his visits to V as a 16- and 17-year-old that did it. He was already a music nut thanks to childhood visits to local productions of stage shows like “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” – more of which in a minute – but at V his eyes were opened to bands like the Stereophonics, and all of the energy of their live performance made a big impression. This album, 10 years and a lifetime later, is the result. That’s the short version of how you’ve come to be holding “Lee Mead” in your hands. There’s more to it, but the most pertinent thing is that this is the album Lee wanted to make. “I’m really proud of it,” he says. It’s not cheesy pop – it’s got a quirky feel. You could put it on to chill out at home, but you could also put it on in the car and play it really loud.” As a matter of fact, he’s not wrong. “Lee Mead” has arrived at just the right time, as the nights are drawing in and the spirit is craving something warm and uplifting. “Exactly,” he agrees. “There’s a real energy to some of the tracks.” If this doesn’t make up for it getting dark at five in the afternoon, nothing will. The surprise is that it was recorded while Lee was working six days a week at his other job. And this is where Joseph and aforesaid Dreamcoat come into it. Since July, he’s played the lead role in the West End production of “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat,” after winning the part over 10,000 other hopefuls on the talent-search programme “Any Dream Will Do.” Before that, he’d spent five years pursuing a stage career (immediately prior to “Joseph” he’d been first understudy in “The Phantom of the Opera”), but “Joseph” was the one that made his name outside Southend. Still mildly gobsmacked months later, he explains: “’Joseph’ was the first show I ever saw, at the Cliffs Pavilion Theatre in Southend, when I was a kid, so when I found out about the auditions I had to go for it.” He won on a Saturday, recorded a video and a single on Sunday and went into rehearsals on Monday. Since the show opened – to very good reviews, most of which singled out his voice and, er, legs for special praise (the legs are bare for a good bit of the proceedings, which see the Biblical character Joseph sold into slavery by his brothers and subsequently saved by Egypt’s pharaoh) – he’s done eight shows a week. When he made the album, he simply squeezed in seven hours of recording per day, five days a week, then went off to the theatre and played Joseph every night. As you do. “I’ve been doing 18-hour days. I was recording from ten in the morning till five in the afternoon, then going into the show at six pm. And when I got home, I was practising songs. So I’m very proud of myself - it shows how dedicated I am to the quality of the album.” He’s very clear on this point: the album isn’t some Joseph bolt-on; it’s what he’s wanted to do since he was at school. “I just want to do good music. The attention I’ve been getting as Joseph is very flattering but I do find it a little embarrassing, because I was the shy guy, and even now, I don’t believe in the ‘image’.” Aptly, the first single from “Lee Mead” (which, by the way, was produced by Graham Stack, of Enrique Iglesias, Ronan Keating and Rod Stewart fame) will be a cover of David Essex’s chart-topping 1974 single “Gonna Make You a Star” – Essex, of course, having also got his start on the West End stage before becoming one of the decade’s definitive pop idols. “I hadn’t heard it before, so I went on YouTube and saw him doing it in 1975 and loved it. I’ve modernised it a bit, with a funk-rock feel.” Another highlight is Lee’s brooding version of the Rolling Stones’ “Paint it Black.” It was one of the songs he performed in the closing weeks of “Any Dream Will Do,” and became a kind of cult classic. “Every other letter I get has asked, ‘Lee, are you going to release “Paint it Black”?’ When I first sang it, because it’s a very dark song I was worried about how it would come across on Saturday-night TV, but it really hit people. I’ve put my own stamp on it.” He’s also put a Meadesque imprint on a tune gifted to him by Gary Barlow. The Take That frontman was blown away with Lee after seeing him in “Joseph” and offered him a brand-new track, “When I Need You the Most.” It’s an emotional ballad, and in the hands of other artists could have become an over-egged showcase, but Lee delivers it simply and directly. The sunny love song “You and Me” is equally uncluttered, and a similar lack of superfluous adornment underpins the album as a whole. Look out for, in particular, “Stronger,” an acoustic reworking of the Sugarbabes classic. “The integrity of the music is important to me,” he says, and this is a subject that fires him up. “Some people will grab anything for money or fame, but I need integrity and honesty. There’s a live band on the album, which is important to me, to have that live feel. There’s no computerised sounds, no fake strings – we had a 25-piece string section that was recorded in a big church. I attended the band sessions – a lot of singers don’t, but it was important for me to have that input. We didn’t cut any corners.” You heard it from the man himself. Looking for a winter warmer? “Lee Mead” is here. Lee Mead releases his self titled, debut album on Fascination through Polydor on November 19th with his single, ‘Gonna Make You A Star’ to follow on December 3rd. Lee will be performing and signing copies of his debut album on Monday 19th November at 1.00pm at HMV, 150 Oxford Street, London W1
Watch clip of the "Gonna Make You A Star" video Listen to -
Thursday 25th October 2007
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