September 16, 2014

Blake Mills’ Heigh Ho Released

BLAKE MILLS’ NEW ALBUM
HEIGH HO OUT TODAY ON
VERVE RECORDS / RECORD COLLECTION

HEADLINING U.S. TOUR KICKS OFF TOMORROW

Renowned songwriter, guitarist, and producer Blake Mills’ highly anticipated second album, Heigh Ho, is out today on Verve Records / Record Collection. Blake was profiled by The New York Times this morning, who hailed “he is creating a style all his own, a sound that has little in common with the high-speed, acrobatic flash usually associated with guitar heroes.”

Tomorrow night in Phoenix, AZ Mills will kick off his 13-city headlining U.S. tour. The Heigh Ho band will feature Rob Moose on violin, Stuart Johnson on drums, Tyler Chester on keys and Sebastian Steinberg on bass, among other frequent Mills collaborators. See below for the complete list of tour dates.

Heigh Ho was recorded in Los Angeles at the legendary Ocean Way studios in a room built for Frank Sinatra & used by everyone from Bob Dylan to Ray Charles. The self-produced album references a range of genres without really belonging to any. To that end, Mills asked several of his musical heroes – including Jim Keltner, Don Was, Jon Brion, Benmont Tench, Mike Elizondo, and Fiona Apple (who duets on the bucolic “Seven” and the debut single “Don’t Tell Our Friends About Me”) – to collaborate on what would become Heigh Ho. “The goals for Heigh Ho were songs, sonics, and capturing performance,” Mills said.

Since quietly releasing his debut album, Break Mirrors, Mills’ rise within the industry has been significant. Having most recently produced the highly anticipated sophomore album from Alabama Shakes, Mills has also worked with ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons, Sara Watkins, Conor Oberst, Sky Ferreira, and Fiona Apple, with whom he toured extensively in 2013 and 2014. As a session player and sideman he has worked with Beck, Cass McCombs, Jackson Brown, Lucinda Williams, Andrew Bird and Neil Diamond, among others. Rick Rubin and T Bone Burnett frequently call upon his services as a guitarist, and equally enamored is Eric Clapton who recently told Rolling Stone magazine “Blake Mills is the last guitarist I heard that I thought was phenomenal.”

Heigh Ho Tracklisting

* If I’m Unworthy
* Cry To Laugh
* Just Out Of View
* Seven
* Don’t Tell Our Friends About Me
* Gold Coast Sinkin’
* Silence is Sincerity
* Half Asleep
* Three Weeks In Havana
* Before It Fell
* Shed Your Head
* Curable Disease

Blake Mills U.S. Headlining Tour

9/17 – Musical Instrument Museum – Phoenix, AZ
9/18 – El Rey – Los Angeles, CA
9/19 – The Chapel – San Francisco, CA
9/20 – Sweetwater Music Hall – Mill Valley, CA
9/22 – Mississippi Studios – Portland, OR
9/23 – Columbia City Theatre – Seattle, WA
9/26 – Amsterdam Bat & Hall – St. Paul, MN
9/27 – Space – Evanston, IL
9/28 – Mayne Stage – Chicago, IL
9/30 – The Sinclair – Cambridge, MA
10/1 – (Le) Poisson Rouge – New York, NY
10/6 – The Hamilton – Washington, DC
10/8 – Rough Trade – Brooklyn, NY
10/9 – World Café Live – Philadelphia, PA

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