LEMON CELLOBy Nicky Baldrian
LEMON CELLO
By
Nicky Baldrian
If your a fan of
power pop bands like Marevlous 3, Neve, Nine Days, Cheap Trick,
Enuff Z'Nuff etc then please check out a killer new band who go
under the moniker of LEMON CELLO. The bands new disc has been
co-produced by Nightranger guitarist Jeff Watson and features
superb bouncy songs with catchy hooks and superb vocal harmonies
from English born singer Stewart Batchelor, such as on the killer
'Front' , this song has a great chorus that I just can't shake
out my head, also hot is the track 'Someone Else's Day', the
guitar playing is very sharp and this song is a cross between
Marvelous 3 and Nightranger, again Stewart's vocals are very
sharp and this song is just killer. The sensational 'Richochet'
is another great song that is very pop orientated, once again the
addictive chorus is hard to ignore, another great song on this
eight track cd is 'Weatherman' the melody here is great and
manages to cross Nightranger with The Foo Fighters and Marvelous
3 and is a brillant power pop number that could serve the band a
hit single.
Lemon Cello came into being when English vocalist Stewart
Batchelor and guitarist Robin Warren met whilst jamming with some
friends in Sacramento, CA, 'That was in the winter of 1989' says
Robin, ' Neither of us were into the band much but we connected
with each other, and soon after that began recording some
originals tunes together.' In the early nineties Stewart moved
back to Manchester and Robin moved over to Los Angeles where he
ventured into music publishing.
After a while the band had interest again, and signed a
development deal with Robin's publisher, of which they lured
Stewart back to LA, The guys then went into the studio and cut
more demos and began shopping their music to the labels - Robin
continues ' As we scrambled to get the band together, things just
never materialized so we decided to move back up to Northern
California, where we knew a lot more musicians and we felt the
music scene was more condusive to our interests.'
Shortly afterwards drummer Jimmy Rehn and bassist Mark
"Gibby" Gibson joined the band, 'we called ourselves
"The Biggs"' he laughs 'We played all over the West
Coast and built up a huge following, and began to record our
first album, titled "Popsicle Baby", which was released
in November of '94'
Then in the fall of 1996 the band were spotted in a club by
Nightranger producer/guitarist Jeff Watson, 'Jeff partnered us
with his manager, Bruce Cohn, a Bay Area heavyweight who has
managed the likes of The Doobie Brothers, Ambrosia, Night Ranger,
Dakota Wildflowers, and others.' adds Robin.
In early 1997 the band went in and recorded five new songs with
Jeff producing and Mark Needham (Cake, Chris Isaak) engineering,
and Stewart and Robin co-producing. 'Four of these tracks are on
the Lemon Cello CD. We continued to play all over including
several shows at the famed Roxy in LA'.
The band were eventually burnt out 'We became disenchanted with
the business and our management, and we broke up in the summer of
'97. About a year later, Stewart and I decided to write and
record some more tracks together on our own under the name of
Lemon Cello, so we self-produced "Diamond Eyes",
"Steam Radio"," Someone Else's Day", and
"Chin Strap", all of which appear on the new CD, which
was only released regionally. We continue to record and are
putting the band back together to play live, and work together
creatively on a regular basis, despite being in other bands'
concludes Robin.
My conclusion is that this cd proves that Lemon Cello are a
really good band and deserve to become more famous, along with
Marvelous 3 etc Lemon Cello are are a fresh an exciting band that
I hope gain a secure record deal. and world wide following, the
potential is there, the rest my friends is up to you, if you
would like to contact the band email them at: lemocell@lodinet.com or visit them at http://www.mp3.com or http://www.listen.com or http://www.lemoncellorecords.com