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When

Occurs on Sunday October 14 2018

Approximate running time: 1 hour and 40 minutes

Venue

Oneglia Auditorium
68 Main Street
Torrington CT 06790

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Blues Traveler

Blues Traveler Band Pic

John Popper lead vocals, harmonica), Chan Kinchla (guitar), Tad Kinchla (bass), Brendan Hill (drums), and Ben Wilson (keyboard) -- have a proven reputation for their improvisational live shows and tireless touring. With a total of twelve studio albums -- four gold, three platinum and one six-times platinum -- they have sold more than 10 million combined units worldwide, and played over 2,000 live shows in front of more than 30 million people. Their hit "Run-Around" is the longest-charting radio single in Billboard history, and earned them a Grammy for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals.

The group's most recent release, Blow Up The Moon, was its first collaborative album. Keeping an open-minded perspective on making music, the unique and successful process enlisted a range of artists across the musical spectrum, representing country, pop, reggae and hip-hop.

Keyboardist Ben Wilson says, “Time to load up the gear and get the BT party bus rolling! We are pumped to be back on the road and rocking out for all the BT fans out there!"

About Blues Traveler:

Blues Traveler emerged in the late '80s and are best known for their improvisational live shows and tireless touring, and their breakthrough, multi-platinum selling album four, which earned them a GRAMMY for Best Rock Performance and features hit singles "Run-Around" and "Hook". Throughout their career the band has released 20 full-length albums with their most recent, Blow Up the Moon, being a collaborative effort featuring a range of artists across the musical spectrum, representing country, pop, reggae and hip-hop. Throughout their extensive career, Blues Traveler has earned a massive fanbase of dedicated and loyal followers and continues to do so with each performance.

Blues Traveler Online/Socials:


"We were going through some changes as far as our infrastructure goes," admits Popper. "We parted ways with two different managers. No preparations had really been made, and it seemed like it might be too late to make new music. Between taking meetings, we were by ourselves writing in the garage every day of this Nashville house. That was pretty cool, because we felt like a garage band again. There was a spirit of survival. We had something to celebrate, so we really came together as a band."

"Matt put it all on turbo boost, because he's one of the finest producers we've ever worked with, period," adds Popper. "He can bring out any sound he wants. He got takes out of me that I couldn't ever get out of myself, and I've tried. However, he also let me be me. It's one of the best production experiences we've ever had. It was an unexpected musical education."



Hurry Up & Hang Around tracklisting:

  1. Accelerated Nation
  2. She Becomes My Way
  3. The Touch She Has
  4. When You Fall Down
  5. The Wolf Is Bumpin'
  6. Daddy Went A Giggin'
  7. Tangle Of Our Dreaming
  8. More Than Truth
  9. Prayer Upon The Wind
  10. Miss Olympus
  11. Phone Call From Leavenworth
  12. Ode From The Aspect

All ticket purchases include a pre-order Hurry Up & Hang Around through the band's webstore and receive a download of the new single "Accelerated Nation."






Animal Years Logo

Mike McFadden: Vocals, Guitar
Anthony Saladino: Bass
Anthony Spinnato: Drums

"We borrowed the name from a Josh Ritter album," Animal Years singer-songwriter-guitarist Mike McFadden says of his band's moniker. "Originally, we just liked the way the phrase sounded. But the more we thought about it, the more it meant to us, and we started saying things like 'Live your life in animal years.' If you knew that you'd only be around for a few years, you'd do things differently. That's how we try to operate as a band; we try to go for it every day, like we're gonna die tomorrow."

Band Photo

That level of urgency resonates throughout Far From Home, Animal Years' first eOne release. The five-song EP -- produced by Ryan Hadlock, renowned for his work with the Lumineers, Brandi Carlile and Vance Joy -- offers a consistently compelling distillation of the Brooklyn-by-way-of-Baltimore trio's irresistibly anthemic, unfailingly uplifting songcraft, which ranges from the fist-pumping infectiousness of "Caroline" to the introspective warmth of "Friends" to the bittersweet buoyancy of "Home (I Was Born)." McFadden's catchy, emotionally direct songwriting is matched by the band's exuberant performances, which combine McFadden's openhearted vocals and surging acoustic guitars with the punchy rhythmic kick of bassist Anthony Saladino and drummer Anthony Spinnato.

"Someone once described us in a review as 'singer-songwriter music with the amps turned up,'" McFadden notes. "The emphasis is on the songs and the songwriting, but we're definitely a rock band. Even if I'm playing an acoustic guitar, I'm playing it through an amp with the distortion on. We're always gonna be louder than the other bands on the bill."

Far From Home's memorable compositions and high-energy performances make it clear why Animal Years has already earned a fiercely loyal grass-roots fan base. Without the benefit of a mainstream record label, the band has built its audience the old-fashioned way: through dogged roadwork, winning over one fan at a time.

"When we moved to New York, we hit the city really hard, and things just grew organically," McFadden explains. "We naturally evolved from small clubs to bigger ones, and from small tours to bigger tours, with more people coming out each time. Everything has happened really organically, through us just being ourselves and trying to be as honest as we can."

The thee bandmates and producer Hadlock recorded Far From Home in the remote environs of Applehead Studios in Woodstock, NY, far from the band's normal urban surroundings.

"We really wanted to isolate ourselves in a place with no distractions other than making the record," McFadden explains. "So we all went up to Woodstock and worked in this great studio in a rebuilt barn. We've been demoing stuff for years, but this is the first time the three of us had made a record together. Ryan was really great to work with, and I think that he really brought out the best in us. It was great recording out there in the middle of nowhere; we'd record 12 hours a day, and then all hang out at night."

Far From Home showcases McFadden's knack for writing forthright songs that cut to the chase, lyrically and melodically. "On this EP, I wanted to write things that everyone can relate to," he asserts. "Sometimes lyrics can be open to interpretation, but for the most part I want people to know exactly what I'm talking about. All of these songs were written on the road, so a lot of the themes are about being away from home and missing people, and not taking people for granted.

"We had four songs that we really liked for the EP, but we knew that we needed one more that would really grab people's attention," he continues. "I was driving back from North Carolina, right at the end of a tour, and I wrote 'Caroline' in the car. Within ten minutes, I had pulled over to the side of the road and recorded the whole thing into my phone. A couple of days later, we made a rough demo, and everybody who heard it said 'Yeah, that's the one.' It's the song that got the attention of our record label, and now it's the first single from the EP."

Band Photo 2The unpretentious attitude and hard-driving work ethic that define Animal Years were established early on, when Mike McFadden first began writing and performing his own songs in his mid-teens, releasing his first studio CD under his own name while still in high school in Baltimore. That inaugural effort won a good deal of attention, and even gained some local radio play. A second CD, released when McFadden was 18, was even better received by fans and local radio programmers, and soon his songs were being picked up for use in commercials from such advertisers as Coca-Cola and Pennzoil.

"That was the driver for me to think about quitting my job in Baltimore and going to New York to start Animal Years," McFadden recalls. "Before I moved to New York, I did another solo album, The Sun Will Rise. At that point, Anthony the bass player suggested that we find a drummer and make it into a band, so we rebranded the CD as an Animal Years release.

"It became a real band really quickly," McFadden reports. "When we started the band, we were all working jobs to raise money to make it happen, so we could afford to go on the road and into the studio. The guys started taking an equal part of the work, and everybody started contributing. It took some getting used to, but it was good not being alone and not having to do everything myself. The songwriting is still the same, because that's still me, but everyone's invested in this partnership and we're all getting something out of it."

Animal Years' timely relocation to New York proved to be a crucial turning point for the band. "The music scene in Baltimore is really big and varied, but I never felt like we ever really fit in there," says McFadden. "When we got to New York, we felt a lot more at home and got a much better reception. In New York, there're more people, there're more opportunities, there're more venues. You can play a few nights a week and still never run out of places to play."

Having already established themselves in their adopted hometown and having won a legion of new friends and fans on the road, Animal Years plan to continue doing what they do best: making music and touching people.

"We're planning on hitting the road super-hard," McFadden affirms. "We're definitely willing to put in the work, and make it happen by any means necessary. That's the only way you can do it these days. There are so many other people who are working as hard as you are, so you just have to work twice as hard."


Animal Years Online/Socials:



Digital download fulfillment will be completed by an authorized agent of Blues Traveler.
Patron contact information will be shared with the agent for the limited purpose of digital download fulfillment.

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