GLEN HANSARD with The Frames touring Australia and New Zealand March 2013
Whether he’s busking the streets of Dublin, where he got his start, or at the Hollywood Bowl, Hansard is always earnest and in-the-moment.
Recent live reviews & praise for new album ‘Rhythm and Repose’:
“Glen Hansard is a gifted, emotive frontman who sings as if he must, with a heart on his sleeve that is constantly throbbing.” The New York Times
“The audience is eating out of his hand: it sings along, it screams in ecstasy and gives the singer a standing encore, which, by the closing track ‘Astral Weeks’ alone (Van Morrison cover) is downright deserved.” Lust for life – Live Review 07/12
“The best thing Hansard has done in years and perhaps a signifier of a lengthy solo career.” The Times UK
“The very personal Rhythm and Repose is Hansard’s best work so far”. Rolling Stone
“It’s easy to emotionally connect with Glen Hansard’s music. Leading man of The Swell Season and The Frames, exudes marvelous quality every time he takes the stage” NPR Music
“Hansard’s new album is picture perfect” Irish Independent
For immediate release – Mr Glen Hansard, the captivating Oscar-winning Frames front man and more recently one half of the Swell Season duo, is returning to his enthusiastic Australian fan base for a national tour in March 2013.
Glen Hansard is performing here to celebrate his debut solo release – the acclaimed ‘Rhythm and Repose’ – which is his first album of new material since 2009 release Strict Joy with The Swell Season. Long time fans will also be thrilled to know Glen’s main band, The Frames will be Hansard’s backing group on stage for this tour.
In the last year Hansard has featured in the highly regarded new festival circuit documentary The Swell Season (about the making of ‘Once”), contributed two songs to the global blockbuster film soundtrack, The Hunger Games, a song titled The Gift for the upcoming Disney fantasy film The Odd Life of Timothy Green; and played a number of solo concerts alongside Eddie Vedder to rave reviews. Glen also was able to collaborate with one of his big inspirations – the late Levon Helm from The Band – immortalizing the great man with an unreleased track (“Lucia”) the pair recorded together.
This tour’s special guest is another major attraction: Irish singer Lisa Hannigan. Hannigan was in Australia last as one of the show-stoppers with the tribute concert “Way to Blue: The Songs of Nick Drake”, and gained her initial prominence through a six-year collaboration with Damien Rice. Her first solo album, Sea Sew was nominated for the Mercury Prize in 2008 – while Passenger, her 2011 follow-up has received 4/5 star reviews across the UK.
Glen Hansard is revered as an intense and electric live performer – famous for digging deep and giving everything in concert to rapturous receptions. He is well known for his work for more than two decades with his incendiary band The Frames – but is perhaps now most recognised for The Swell Season – the duo he created with Czech songstress Markéta Irglová. In 2007, The Swell Season took home the Academy Award for Best Original Song for “Falling Slowly” from the Once film-sensation soundtrack.
Following this, the bittersweet romantic musical version of “Once” was the unexpectedly dominant winner at the 66th annual Tony Awards this year, winning the Tony for the best musical, plus 7 other Tony awards.
Now, Hansard’s striking debut album Rhythm and Repose is a result of his last year and a half living and recording in New York City with some of the city’s finest studio musicians including bass Brad Albetta, (Martha Wainwright and Rufus Wainwright) Spanish guitar Javier Mas (Leonard Cohen),and piano player/ producer Thomas Bartlett (Doveman). The album has been impressing critics across the continents – with the New York Daily News describing the record as “Thrilling… tender… his most luscious melodies to date… the magic of Harry
Nilsson (and) the manly scratch of Cat Stevens.” While our own online journal Themusic.com.au, stated that “(As) one of the finest voices in modern music, Glen Hansard’s work is drenched in passion and honesty.”
Don’t miss this opportunity to see the passion and power of Hansard in concert. The New York Times has said of a 2012 live show: “His voice is elastic and strong, a many-timbre instrument, and he uses them all, from a clear tenor to an anguished, grungy roar. He commits himself to every song with a scary intensity, draping the melody almost recklessly over the driving rhythm from his right hand.”
Artists with the emotional conviction of Glen Hansard are rare. Secure your tickets to what is bound to be a moving, energising and enthralling concert!