8/8/2019 Baby Bird the new Brit-pop sensation

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Baby Bird the newBrit-Pop sensationBy Chris TrrySTAt'1.'WRITIIR

In 194, Tim Booth and theband James scsed one of Brit-pp's biggcst hits hcrc in thcslllcs with lhc singlc "hid."Jiuncs and thcir sm&sh hil bc-came a favorite on college cam-puses all over the country, Fe-sumably because of its racylyrics about sex - an issue thatis hardly ever off the minds ofcollege students.Since that time, Brit-pop hasflourished here in the states withbands like ldansun (not lvlari-lyn), Oasis, The Verve, Hurri-cane #1, and The Charlatansleading the charge. Surely, ttrcnext !oi)in this cavalcade is theband Baby Bird, a fresh new actthat is starting to make headwayhere in the states.Stephen Jones, the founderand creata of Baby Bird, wasborn in Nottingham, England.His family, however, was quitetransient and by the time Joneswas eight he had completelycircumnavigated the globe,moving ftrom Britain throughthe Suez Canal to New Zealandonly to return to England via thePanama Canal four years later.Jones, much like his parents,does not like to stay in one placeat a time. Jones explains his rea-soning for this type of behavior."I get bored very quickly," hesays. "I want to move on and Ithink that's the same with mu-sic, I want to move from onething to another and get with itvery quickly. I don't stay in oneplace for a long time."

While he was taking resi-

dence in Nottingham, England,Jones had the opportunity to penand rccord over 450 songsrecorded on a four-trackrecorder. Jones likens his four-track rcccrd to a briefcase. inthnl ils grrtrhility llkrwtxl hirrrto llmk to friend's houscs foradequde roorn to record.When Jones fied to shoparound his primitive, self-recorded songs, he was oftenmet with negative criticism.Jones explains, "They saidthings like put a saxophone solohere or change the words hereand yon'll have a big hit." Othercomments of rejection included"you can't rccord on a four-track" and "Go away and put abardtogetha."Despite these disses, Joneswas not to be denied. He man-aged to get himself a a tiny pub-lishing deal, which he channeledinto the fmmation of Baby BirdRecords. Over the course of1995 and 1996, Jones' materialflowed out like an unattendedrunning water fountain.First came the album, Born AMan, followed by Bad Slwve,Fatherlwod, The Happiest ManAlive, and Dying Happy. Withina little over a year and a halfspan, Baby Bird went on to re-lease five records, a feat thatwould undoubtedly sound near-ly impossible !o anyone whomakes music. Then again, Jonesdid have an incessant pool ofbrewing his as he had alreadyrecorded over 450 songs on hisfour-track recorder only twoyears previous. The final inde-pendent project for Jones wasreleased a month prior to Baby

Bird's only stateside perfor-mance - the 1997 CMI MusicFest in New York City - andwas a doubledsc set entitledThe Greatest Hits.It is easy to note that BabyBird's nrusic hls bccn dcscribcdus "krfi," ycl Jorrcs is rulhcr ulr-comfortable with that lcrm. Hcexplains, "The problem withlo-fi is (tlnt) you get a lot ofbanls who try and search outcheap instruments and cheesysounds. I only used ttrcm be-cause that was all tlrc money Ihad" I don't have lo-fi ambi-tions, I want things to get hugeand irresistible."Jones' sound can easily belikened to the crmning of Bmthand somewhat like the melodicnanre of Bono from U2. Jones'musical inspirations and influ-ences arc heavily tied to thegenre of popular rap music;sorne of his favorite rapers in-clude Public Enemy, Eric B. andRakim, and Ice Cube.In the spring of 1997, Jonesdecided to bring his show oAmerica by signing a recordingdeal with Atlantic Records.Contingent with the rccord sign-ing, was the notion that Joneswould have to assemble a full-time band to record with him inthe studio and to also have thatsame supporting band head outonto the road with him for tour-ing purposes.Baby Bird's domestically-re-leased majorJabel debut iscalleA Ugly Beautiful. The al-bum's fint single is called"You're Gorgeous," already atop 5 UK hit In fact" the songended up making a Jones a

household name.He explains, "Everyoneshouts at mc wherever I go.You'rc lhc Corgurus manl Wcdon't know what your band'scallcrl, but you're the Gorgeousman!"The beautiful, luscious trackbegins widt.Jones whisperingthe letlers to "You'r Gorgeous"and then pr,oceeds wi0t spokenword vocals recalling a previotstime with a lady who was, well,gorgeous. The influence ofBmth is highly relevant here,and because of this, "Gorgeous"is unqrrcstionably destined fcsuccess here in the stales."You'rt Gorgeous" has beenin the hands of college pro-grammen for only a number ofweeks, yet it has already beenrecognized as a top 15 collegeradio cut by CMI New MusicReport. Jones has been encour-aged by its early success.He relates, "The grcat thingabout a hit like "You're Gor-geous" is that it will inrroduce alot of people to Ugly Beautifulproving to them that tlte singleis just the tip of an enormouslydiverse iceberg."Without question, BabyBird's next leap toward beautywith 'Gorgeous" will be eitherTop 40 or Altemative-Hil radio.The album opens with anoth-er UK hit in "Goodnight.""Goodnight" seems to highlighta difficulfy Jones had with acertain woman, where every-thing he seemed to do or say,she would always do the oppo-

site."I always blame you, youpush me away," Jones quips,"You want forever I just wanttulay." And you can'i deny asong that talks about how men

" and women have difficulty stay-' ing on the same page, espe*iAiyin a society, today, where get-ting along with others does notseem to garner too much merit.Other uK hits on the newrecord include "Candy Girl,"which is in heavy rotation alongwith "Gorgeous" at WFSE, and"Comershop."

Cunently, Baby Bird is get-ting ready io rctum to the states

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