BIO:
Drew Holcomb and the Neighbors find themselves in the midst of a creative revival of popular music in Nashville, where artists like Kings of Leon, Jack White, Mat Kearney, and a legion of other national acts have re-invented the reputation of Nashville as a hotbed of music beyond the realm of Country. Holcomb and his band have found their own unique niche in this scene, with their 2008 LP, Passenger Seat, and their 2009 EP, Live Forever, both debuting at #2 on the iTunes Singer/Songwriter charts. They’ve also had multiple TV placements on shows like NBC’s Parenthood, Oprah, Army Wives, The Cleaner, and others, proving that Holcomb’s career has stretched far beyond the TN state limits where he was born and raised.
Seven years ago, when Holcomb graduated from college in Knoxville, TN he never expected he would spend his twenties touring the country playing music, but that is exactly what he and his wife Ellie, and his band, the Neighbors, have been doing since coming together in 2006. When not out on the road touring, they have recorded and released three independent albums, selling over 35,000 records all without the help of a record label. Keeping in that same independent vein, over the past half-decade Holcomb & the Neighbors have played over 1,000 tour dates and garnered a massive following in the Southeast club scene all without the assistance of a booking agent, proving the undeniable authenticity of the band’s talent and genuine appeal to the masses.
With so much success happening across the board for Holcomb & the Neighbors, the band knew it was time to return to the studio in 2010 to give their fans the album they’d been wanting to make for years. The anticipation for that new project, Chasing Someday, has been enormous amongst the Neighbors’ ever-growing and intensely loyal fan-base. Drew explains, “Over the past year or so things have really just started to click. We’re reaching that tipping point with our fans, and it really hit me about 8 months ago when we played Austin for the first time on a weeknight and had 300 kids at Stubbs singing every word. It’s been pretty phenomenal to see things building like this.” That enthusiasm spread over into a fan driven fundraising campaign for Chasing Someday earlier this fall which brought in over $15,000 in 6 days, validating the passion and dedication amongst the band’s core fans.
For Chasing Someday Holcomb wrote over 25 songs and a final twelve were selected to be recorded and produced by Andy Hunt at his East Nashville Wide Studios. Hunt is one of Nashville’s young and upcoming producers who learned his craft working for Jacquire King (Kings of Leon, Cold War Kids, Norah Jones) and Dennis Herring (Elvis Costello, Modest Mouse, Counting Crows) during his formative years.
It is difficult to categorize Chasing Someday when its sounds are vast and diverse. The album showcases a songwriter and a band whose influences cover a large swath of the history of popular music; it’s just as easy to hear the influence of Springsteenian earnestness in Holcomb’s hopeful growl on songs like “Fire and Dynamite” and “Miracle”, as it is to hear the persuasion of Motown on pop gems like “Someday” and “Can’t Get Enough of You.”
When audiences hear Holcomb’s songs, there is an emotional attachment and reaction, proven by the epic “Live Forever” which was recently used during an episode of NBC’s Parenthood and sparked a downloading frenzy online. “We want to write songs that have moments of honesty, transcendence, and humanity; so our audience lets the songs into their lives,” Holcomb states, “All of my favorite songs and records that I have spent my life listening to, have helped me to understand the paradoxes of joy and suffering that we all experience. We just want to add to that conversation, and if we can do that, I will consider it a success.”
On Chasing Someday, Holcomb and his Neighbors have found a unique voice, one that definitely has the potential to add to the conversation in a profound and substantial way.
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