Posted by taylor blue on March 12, 2010 | No Comments
Lifehouse released their fifth studio album Smoke & Mirrors on March 2nd, and this week it will debut at #6 on the Billboard Top 200 chart with 54,203 sold. This marks the highest chart debut of their ten year career, beating out first week chart position for their 2002 sophomore set “Stanley Climbfall” that debuted at #7. Smoke & Mirrors is also the # 2 digital album in the country and is available for purchase on iTunes.
Lifehouse will kick off a national tour with Daughtry on March 18th. For a full list of tour dates and details visit LifehouseMusic.com.
First single “Halfway Gone” was co-written by Lifehouse lead singer Jason Wade, Kevin Rudolf (“Let It Rock”) and producer Jude Cole (Rocco Deluca, Beth Orton, MoZella) and is currently # 2 at Hot AC radio and # 24 at Top 40. The band performed the track on Regis & Kelly and the Tonight Show with Jay Leno last week and will perform on the Wendy Williams Show March 22nd.
Posted by taylor blue on March 2, 2010 | 16 Comments
Lifehouse’s fifth studio album, Smoke & Mirrors, comes out today. With Smoke & Mirrors lead singer/guitarist Jason Wade, drummer Ricky Woolstenhulme Jr., bassist Bryce Soderberg and newly added guitarist Ben Carey, along with long time producer Jude Cole, have created a set that combines their live sound with great record making. Smoke & Mirrors started out with a mission to capture the live, rock side of the band; a sound they had perfected after three years of solid touring. Songs like “Smoke & Mirrors,” “Wrecking Ball” and “Had Enough” (with guest vocals by Chris Daughtry) have a very raw and stage driven feel to them. However, after living with the early tracks and experimenting with others, a piece of the puzzle seemed to be missing.
Equal to their enthusiasm for the live sound, they also love to make studio records. After all, one of Lifehouse’s greatest achievements is the tens of millions of radio spins garnered over the span of 4 albums, so to create a record solely focusing on the sound from their show felt off balance.A trip back into the studio to experiment in more of a ‘record making’ effort produced tracks like “All In,” “Here Tomorrow Gone Today” and the first single “Halfway Gone” co written by Kevin Rudolf (Let it Rock). Songs sure to be heard on radio for years to come.
Now I have had the album in my hands for the week. And I have listened to it pretty much the whole time. I love that the album has a bit of everything. My favorite songs are “Nerve Damage”, which is the rock that I remember from them and “From Where You Are”, a love song that reminds me of a past song that I love “Everything”. In this album you can tell they were experimenting more. And I think they pulled it off quite nicely. To get your copy of the album in the Standard or Deluxe version go here.
To kick off the album release I have an amazing giveaway, an AUTOGRAPHED Smoke & Mirrors CD/Poster Pack. Here are the rules: The contest is open to residents of the US and Canada (except where prohibited by law) and you must be over the age of 18. You must have a valid email or I can’t contact you to say you have won. I will not use your email for any other reason besides contacting you if you are a winner. Leave all answers in the comments below with your email address. The contest will close next Tuesday, March 9th at midnight.
Here is what you need to do. Leave your name and email below with your favorite Lifehouse song. I can’t wait to see the answers and good luck.
UPDATE: This contest is now closed. Thank you for all your entries and the winner will be contacted through email.
Posted by taylor blue on February 26, 2010 | No Comments
To celebrate the release of their latest album Smoke & Mirrors on Tuesday, March 2nd, Lifehouse will be hosting a special release day concert and CD signing at the Hard Rock Cafe in New York City’s Times Square as part of their March on Stage live music series. Tickets are only $10, and a portion of the proceeds will benefit Musicians on Call, a non-profit organization that brings live and recorded music to patients in healthcare facilities. For more information and to purchase tickets visit Ticketmaster.com. After the release day show, Lifehouse will kick off a nationwide tour with Daughtry and Cavo starting March 18.
For a chance to hear the album before its release, the band is premiering Smoke & Mirrors in full on their official MySpace page this Saturday, February 27th. That same day at 4 pm EST, Lifehouse will host a live chat on UStream.com to provide a track-by-track commentary on their new album, and afterward will answer questions from fans.
Smoke & Mirrors is still available for pre-order through the band’s official website, LifehouseMusic.com, in both standard and deluxe editions. Both versions come with a download of two live tracks, while the deluxe edition includes a second disc with bonus material.
Also see my exclusive interview with Lifehouse here>>>
Posted by taylor blue on February 22, 2010 | 1 Comment
A couple of weeks ago I published the first part of my interview with Jason Wade, the lead singer of Lifehouse. I thought I didn’t get a chance to touch on the new album, Smoke & Mirrors, as much as I wanted so I am bringing you the second part of the interview. Smoke & Mirrors, their fifth studio album, is being released next Tuesday.
Here is the second part of my interview with Jason:
On if music was something he always wanted to do or if it found him: It just kinda happened. In my youth I was really into martial arts and had no musical ability. My mom and my sister were always fairly musical. I know my mom played the 12-string acoustic guitar, I always have memories of her writing songs so I think that was always embedded in me at an early age. Basically, when she lost interest and put the guitar away I started basically borrowing it and she taught me a couple of chords and I just kinda took it from there. I didn’t really know what I was doing, I didn’t have any training, I just started writing these songs. The age of 12 to 18 were really difficult for me because my dad basically just left. And my mom was left to raise us so it was a difficult time and I think that’s how I processed through everything I was going through was writing, it started as poetry and as I grew as a musician I started writing all these songs. One song in particular a song called Trying I wrote when I was 15-16, it was one of my first songs, it’s a song off of our first record.. It just kinda happened naturally out of necessity.
On working with Chris Daughtry on the new album: I wrote a song with [Chris] and Richard Marx he came down to the studio and isn’t featured but he sang some background vocals.
[Chris is] super cool. He’s one of the most down to earth guys out there. That’s why we basically hit it off, he played a show with us in Texas and I guess he was a fan of ours, we had mutual respect for each other and basically started hanging out every time he was in L.A. Working on his record. And then I wrote a song for his record, and while he was in the middle of recording his project he had the idea to bring Richard Marx in and write with the three of us. Once again the chemistry just worked out and the song is called Had Enough and I’m really happy with how it turned out.
Three words describing the new album: Radio friendly, Organic, Exciting…I think there’s a lot of tracks that just kinda jump out of the speakers they just have that feel they have that live energetic organic feel to them.
On the meaning of the album’s name, Smoke & Mirrors: We didn’t want to over think the whole process of coming up with an album title that was going to be taken too serious, I think that Smoke & Mirrors reflects that the two sides of the record, which is half of the songs are a little bit more pop and a little bit catchier the other half is basically what we have done for the last ten years is play live with two guitars, bass and drum. So I feel that this record is really split down the middle between the two different faces of what Lifehouse does.
On if it was easier to record this album the fifth time around: Actually no, it was harder to be honest. I think when you have been doing it for ten years now which we have been basically recording and touring a good ten years you get to a place where you get really comfortable with your sound, with what you do in the studio and you almost kind of …you can get too good at it in a way to where you don’t stretch yourself to try new things. So we were adamant about sonically pushing ourselves in this record we tried out some more electronic sounds, you know some synth basses. Basically, if we had a song and we didn’t feel like the lyric was right we would just start over on it. This record took a good year and a half all along the way it was a lot of fun but it was also very challenging.
On how Jason would like the fans to see the album: When the record comes out people are really going to enjoy it and realize there is something on the record for every body for fans that have enjoyed prior records I don’t think that it’s fair to say that Halfway Gone represents the record in it’s entirety. I am just excited for when the record comes out, people get to hear the whole record.
You can catch Lifehouse on Twitter, Facebook or at their official site. And get their new single, Halfway Gone, here from iTunes.
Tags: Album, Bliss, Chris Daughtry, Exclusive Interviews, Halfway Gone, Hanging By A Moment, Interview, Jason Wade, Jude Cole, Kevin Rudolf, Lifehouse, Release Date, Richard Marx, Smoke & Mirrors
Filed Under: Celebrities, Exclusive Interviews, Music
Posted by taylor blue on February 17, 2010 | 1 Comment
I can’t help that I’m excited about Lifehouse! In anticipation of their fifth studio release, Smoke & Mirrors, Lifehouse is offering an exclusive pre-order bundle on their official website. The bundle includes a deluxe version of their new album along with two bonus tracks, an exclusive Lifehouse t-shirt, and an autographed CD booklet. Act fast, as there are only 500 of these limited-edition bundles available for sale!
Smoke & Mirrors will hit stores on March 2, 2010, while the first single, “Halfway Gone,” is available now on iTunes.
See part one of my exclusive interview with Lifehouse here>>>
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