Alan Palomo is an auteur…. so much so, that the man behind bops like Deadbeat Summer and Polish Girl has actually given a TED talk on the subject. His home recordings inspired a sub-genre he would actively try to distance himself from, because the box it put him in was WAY too small a home for the creativity and ambition seen & heard in his films, albums, and live shows.
I first heard Chelsea Lee’s voice when soundcloud shuffled a random song by an unknown DC band called The Walking Sticks into my headphones. The group had a laid back vibe, production was a little “New Bohemians with a drum machine”, but you could tell the twin brothers that comprised the backing band could play….. and WRITE…. and she could really SING…
I saw The Walking Sticks play a CMJ set to about 10 people, introduced myself, and told them to keep in touch. The music they shared with me was incredible, but it was early and obviously a stepping stone to what they would evolve into. We talked about the bands they admired, who they would want tour with, and the list was way more M83 than Edie Brickell. They were taking some time off to write new songs, and had some thinking to do about what their longer term vision for the group was.
A year later they became SHAED, and were finally clients…. a year after that I heard “Trampoline” playing in a gift shop on a trip to Mumbai and couldn’t believe their music was already reaching fans on the other side of the world. A billion streams later, they had the #1 Alternative Song in the US, and an iHeartRadio award for the remix with Zayn.
At Bowery Ballroom in 2000 I saw a band so heavy that their sound made my tear ducts discharge involuntarily. As their agent a decade later, I was proud to see them donate the grant that accompanied their Polaris prize win to fund music education programs in Quebec prisons… proving GY!BE lives up to their manifesto.
I heard Shura’s voice featured on a song by another artist in 2013, and chased the signing with her manager for nearly 2 years before she had a debut LP of her own. In 2014 a demo of 2Shy was the first song my 1-day old daughter ever heard. By 2016, Nothing’s Real was released to acclaim and she was booking Coachella and criss-crossing North America on tour with M83 and Tegan & Sara.
Traded my Mellow Gold CD to a friend for this album in middle school. Booking the Last Splash 25th Anniversary Tour was such an honor!