Tom Freund and Ben Harper record George Harrison song late night at The machine Shop, I played ukulele and we both sang this familiar tune, for free download link: http://bit.ly/JDjiVx or go here:
“In celebration of The Guitar Collection: George Harrison iPad app featuring Ben playing George’s guitars we are pleased to offer, for 24 hours only, a free download of Ben Harper and Tom Freund performing the George Harrison classic “Here the Comes the Sun” live from the Machine Shop. This link will expire Friday, April 27 at 4pm PDT.”
with interviews from Ben Harper, Brett Dennen and Meiko. (Directed by Peter Harding)
Hi, my peops, I have been rather busy focusing on the official release of this album, scheduled for August 16th and I am getting ready to play some festivals and assorted gigs in Switzerland, France and Italy. I wanted you to see this EPK, kind of a video story behind “The Edge Of Venice.” I had some really great musicians/friends lend their kind words and we had a lot of fun filming the interviews and playing songs in our backyards, beaches and alleys. I am truly blessed to be doing what I am doing with such a collection of troops.
Hugs and Cheers,
Tom
Below is the official Press Release that’s goin’ round:
Singer song-writer Tom Freund is pleased to announce the release of his newest album, The Edge of Venice, on August 16 via Surf Road Records. The album is produced by John Alagia (John Mayer, Jason Mraz, Dave Matthews) and features of some of LA’s finest musicians joining Tom in these 9 new songs. “The Edge Of Venice” comes in the wake of his latest EP “Fit To Screen” whose songs have been featured in this seasons “Parenthood” on NBC; and his latest full length “Collapsible Plans” which was produced by his musical cohort Ben Harper and hosted Jackson Browne as a special guest. The song “Collaspible Plans (Sugar) was seen performed live on “Last Call With Carson Daly” in January of 09. Freund will also be touring in the coming months in support of The Edge of Venice. He will be playing in the US September through October, with tours of Europe and Japan in November. Details on tour dates are to be determined. Freund will also be playing European dates with Ben Harper including the Blue Balls Festival in Switzerland on July 28 and Monte Carlo on August 1st. ”I feel that (The Edge) is my most direct album to date,” says Freund. “Direct to the listeners in a sonic sense and transparent to what is going on in my life right now.” The songs cover such topics as endless touring (Lakeshore Drive) and cell phones, or lack thereof (Show Me The Love), relationships (Everything, Lonesome) and even his recent step into parenthood (Daddy’s Song). The nod to Venice comes mostly in the breezy “Wounded Surfer Boy” – about whom Freund shares, “I have seen more than a few in the neighborhood – and the girls that trail after them.” The subtle beauty of “Sweetly Calling My Name” evokes an even further westerly feel with references to Hawaii and a slack key tuning on his guitar with hauntingly beautiful vocal help from LA singer-songwriter friend Meiko. “Firetrucks” is what Freund called the “centerpiece of the record” – written on a moody rainy night in San Francisco when his buddy Brett Dennen gently advised him to “stay in and write!” Freund admits he hasn’t a clue where the album opener “Cruel Cruel World” came from. Freund spent the mid-’90s touring with the indie rock cult faves The Silos and has been releasing solo albums since 1998. The New York Times once noted on Tom, “Every year the mounting landfill of new releases that threatens to bury the working music journalists yields a few unexpected gems, and Tom Freund is one of them.”
I decided to do what I could for the extremely troubling catastrophe that occurred in Japan last month. Here is my version of Zeppelin’s “Thank You” – all proceeds through June to be sent directly to Japan relief efforts (I have many friends over there who have directed me to a very good organization). Updates following soon. Peace, t
Follow This Link: and Thank You!
“If the sun refuse to shine . . .” – This version came about one late night in the making of “Collapsible Plans” – the engineer Danny Kalb and I were waiting for Ben Harper (who produced the album) to return from a meeting and I started to goof around, and of course Danny was rolling. We were all set up for the record, so I added some pump organ immediately after. Glad it’s seeing the light and and I can put it to use as well – for Japan. Hope you enjoy, Cheers T
I wanted to do a video from the new EP “Fit To Screen” – so I chose this song first cause I felt It had a mystical connection to it, and I was in Joshua Tree playing a gig and there was an extraodinary moon out. Then I had the next day to goof off, so I started shooting with this little shotgun HD camera I bought in Japan last year. The house I was staying at felt like it was on the moon with trippy structures and bathtubs in the sand and glass artifacts sticking out of the ground. (Also, notice my dog Emmylou’s cameo, she is from J Tree and knew the terrain very well). I contined the shoot in N Ca before a show near The Golden Gate Bridge and I added a little footage from my NYC trip the following week. I origionally wrote the song for a project that the Getty was doing and they asked me to contribute a song to go with the Renaissance artist Zuccaro’s drawings. I performed it at the Getty event with a few other LA songwriters on a really cool evening. TWas an honor. And so enjoy, t
There’s a really cool movement going on internet wise, it’s music and healing and it’s spreading like wildfire. It all started when the woman’s choral groups of Northern Uganda started singing songs to bring the male soldiers home from a terrible civil war that’s been going on for a long long time. Someone heard this calling and made it their mission as well to bring the soldiers home and aid these women. They started something called the The Voice Project: http://www.voiceproject.org.
The Voice Project people had the choral group perform a Joe Purdy tune in the hope that Joe and then other artists would keep this song torch passing idea going round and round to the US and other countries and their story could be heard and some help could be on it’s way. Light a match for peace!
They asked me to do a song, and I thought about a dear friend of mine Brett Dennen and one of his songs “So Much More” that has meant so much to me over the last couple of years, a real “old soul” type of song from someone 10 years my junior – little (big) punk! Here it is.
Then Brett really dug the concept and he went and did a Citizen Cope song and so on and so on . . . There’s a slew of cool songs on there from Priscilla Ahn to Joseph Arthur to Soko and Andrew Bird, go on check it out and see how some of these viral get-together’s can mean so much for these folks oceans away . . . peace and thanks for listening, t
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