The Concrete Jangle is the title of my forthcoming album! Side 1 has the 5 songs written by XTC’s Andy Partridge & myself. Side 2 has 5 songs written by me alone. Just got the test pressings of the vinyl – can’t wait for the release in 2024!!
#steveconte#newalbum#theconcretejangle#wickedcool#records#littlesteven#undergroundgarage#andypartridge#xtc#prairieprince#stevievanzandt#littestevensundergroundgarage#wickedcoolrecords
Have at it! https://orcd.co/girlwithnoname
Rock Fiend Magazine says:
“As fans of Steve’s solo career will be aware, one of the joys of listening to him is you never know which Steve is going to turn up next – Garage Steve (“Gypsy Cab”), Americana Steve (“Anytime At All Times”), Power Pop Steve (“Gimme, Gimme, Rockaway”), Punk Steve (covering “Somebody’s Gonna Get Their Head Kicked In Tonight”) or as part of Blues Deluxe’s flawless tribute to the Faces and early Rod Stewart. Regardless of which Steve turns up, quality is guaranteed and today folks it’s time for Seriously Smooth Steve. Playing his street style New York rock and soul, soul is never far away from his music and vocals, but takes front and centre on “Girl With No Name”.
Described by Steve as a song which he’d written in 1984 and resurrected while working with XTC’s Andy Partridge on his new album, he felt it was influenced by the music he was listening to at the time including mid 60’s Beatles, XTC and Diana Ross & The Supremes. Lyrically, the song tells the story of a tongue-tied Steve loving a girl from afar, but being too shy to speak to her – a place where many of us have been and can relate to.
We all know a song in which there is a moment of magic which transports a good song into a great song. Around the 2 mins 30 seconds mark when Steve may have normally been tempted to start heading for home to achieve the 3 minute target, the bridge takes this song into another league, first through the bass line and then through Steve repeatedly and slowly singing “I Cry for Loving”. As he does this the third time, the backing vocals kick in shufflingly singing “I’m So Shy, I’m So Shy, Don’t Know Why, I’m So Shy” while the lead vocal continues above them.
Having reached this high, the song continues with Steve singing freely and improvising over it (and hitting some seriously soulful notes) as the song fades to a close. As a song, the “Girl With No Name” oozes class, deserves to be heard and enjoyed by a much wider audience and has soundtrack potential written all over it. And all the while keeping just enough great guitar in the mix (raw, smooth and chopping) to satisfy those of us who like our music rockier.
No longer content with creating the perfect 3-minute pop song, Steve Conte has delivered the perfect 4-minute pop song and probably the song of his career.”
#wickedcool #records #steveconte #newsingle #rocknroll #soul #powerpop #littlesteven #undergroundgarage
The real deal – the actual printed lyric sheets that were used in the studio when recording Steve’s Bronx Cheer album. Many pages have cross-outs & notes in the margins as they were not only used by Steve, but also by background singers Willie Nile, James Maddock, Nicki Richards & LaJuan Carter-Dent. Signed & personalized by SC.
Below is what is available on Steve’s Bandcamp page – you can request a specific lyric in your order but if that one is gone, you will get one of Steve’s choosing.
Recovery Doll (1 copy, 2 pages)
Wildwood Moon (1 copy, 2 pages)
Guilty (1 copy, 2 pages)
Those Sexy Lies (1 copy, 2 pages)
Liar Like You (1 copy, 2 pages)
Flying (2 copies, 1 page)
The Human Animal (1 copy, 2 pages)
My Degeneration (1 copy, 2 pages)
Dog Days Of Summer (1 copy, 1 page)
Overnight Smash (2 copies, 1 page)
All orders include a FREE download of Steve’s track, So Much For Love (Acoustic Demo) via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
https://steveconte.bandcamp.com/merch/signed-lyric-sheets-from-bronx-cheer-recording-sessions
Everyone’s got a unique story about their musical upbringing, things that “moved” them at certain time periods. I can track mine by school years, each new time period adding new influences to the previous one:
Birth Till School Years – Classical, Sinatra, Swing, My jazz singing mom, Rosemary Conte.
Kindergarten – Motown; Temps, Supremes, Stevie W.
Elementary School – Beatles, Who, Small Faces, Hollies, Stones, Sly, Monkees
Middle School – Chuck Berry, J. Geils Band, Zeppelin, Sabbath, Aerosmith, Bad Co., Hendrix, Philly Soul
High School – Jeff Beck, Todd Rundgren, Steely Dan, Yes
College – Police, Pretenders, XTC, Jazz Fusion guitarists; McLaughlin/ Mahavishnu, Carlton, Morse, Metheny, Scofield, Stern, Martino & Trad Jazz; Wes Montgomery, Charlie Parker, Miles, Monk, Trane
Post-School Years – Replacements, Tom Waits, Morphine, Iggy, Chris Spedding, Humble Pie, Faces, Chris Whitley, Jeff Buckley, old Blues, classic R&B (Stax, etc) and Soul.
Everything I’ve done since then has been informed by that list.
This is not a list of the only stuff I ever liked or listened to, just what I feel informed my writing, singing & playing.
If i could put together the ultimate rock-soul-jazz fusion band it would be songwriting like Lennon/Waits/Westerberg/Partridge with a singer like Paul Rogers/Rod Stewart/Wilson Pickett/Sly Stone & a guitarist like Jeff Beck/Page/Keef/Townsend/ Stern/Scofield. It would NEVER work! And that is why – I’m a marketing nightmare and no major label would ever touch me again… 🙂
So there you have it. No Clapton. No Dolls. No Pistols. If i didn’t list it, it wasn’t an “influence”.
New video: Steve comes to you LIVE from the Wicked Cool Record offices in NYC to play a solo acoustic version of his summer 2023 single, “Fourth Of July”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAfBlYir4us&ab_channel=SteveConteNYC
The record is available on 7” Limited Edition cloudy blue vinyl, downloads and streaming at the following link: https://orcd.co/FOURTHOFJULY
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