Andrew Bird acoustic Session @la Route du Rock

Concert information

We didn't realize what we were getting into when Andrew Bird walked out of his dressing room at Route du Rock. Then he sat down, grabbed his gear & guitar and knocked our socks off! We instantly understood the meaning of "fiat lux et facta est lux" (Let there be light! and then there was light). His riffs are full of life, his voice whispers sweet lyrics in your ear, we fly over the fort of St Pere (route du rock) accompanied by one of the greatest songwriters of today. We're still there!

Artist

Andrew Bird

Andrew Bird (born July 11, 1973) is an American musician, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. He was born in Chicago and currently splits his time between Chicago and a farm near the town of Elizabeth in northwest Illinois. He is musically proficient at the violin, whistling, guitar, mandolin, and glockenspiel. more>>>

Label

Bella Union

Bella Union is an independent record label that was started up by Simon Raymonde and Robin Guthrie in 1997.
After releasing records with 4AD for a large part of their career, Cocteau Twins decided to take a step towards independence and started up the Bella Union record label, through which they could release their own work as well as any collaborative efforts. The band split up not long after, but instead of letting the newly formed label go under, Robin Guthrie, Cocteau Twins' founder and lead guitarist and Simon Raymonde, the band's bassist since 1984, decided to take charge of it. One of the earliest bands to sign on was the Australian trio Dirty Three, who continue to release under Bella Union to this day. Other early signees include Françoiz Breut and The Czars. The label fosters bands from a variety of musical genres and is notable for the amount of freedom given to its artists. Since 2000, when Guthrie moved to France to concentrate on his own music and Raymonde took the reins at Bella Union, the label has signed more artists like Laura Veirs, Lift To Experience, Explosions In The Sky etc. In 2006 the label had a memorable year with Midlake, The Dears, Howling Bells, and Fionn Regan all having great success, and in 2007 as the 10th anniversary celebrations saw them host two nights at the Royal Festival Hall, with special guests Paul Weller, Romeo and Tom from Editors, the year was capped off by Fionn Regan being nominated for a Mercury Prize Best Album Of The Year. In 2008 and 2009, with the phenomenal success of their discovery of Fleet Foxes, which remained in the chart for 100 weeks consecutively, and was the biggest selling independent album of the year, gave the label their first Platinum selling disc, the label showed that not only could it DISCOVER wonderful new talent, it could also match the majors in terms of reach. Over half a million sales to date and counting...
With subsequent releases from Beach House, Department of Eagles, Lone Wolf, Our Broken Garden, Fleet Foxes, The Acorn, Abe Vigoda, J. Tillman, Peter Broderick, The Kissaway Trail, Pearly Gate Music, John Grant, Lawrence Arabia, Low Anthem, Laura Veirs and Mountain Man the future is very bright for this unique artist-run label. Label founder Simon Raymonde is also in demand as a producer, mixing Fionn Regan's Mercury-nominated debut, and the seminal Lift to Exerience album, the first two Duke Spirit albums, Stephanie Dosen's A Lily For The Spectre, and the forthcoming album by Lucas Renney, ex-Golden Virgins singer, featuring members of Midlake and Stephanie Dosen's band.
The label won the 2010 Independent Record Company Of The Year at the Music Week Awards. Previous winners XL Recordings, Rough Trade Records, Domino Records, Ministry of Sound.
In 2010, Bella Union have begun to enter the USA market, a result of a new partnership deal with the Yep Roc Label Group who will act as the label's background team in North America. New releases from The Acorn, Lawrence Arabia, Midlake, John Grant (with Midlake), Heidi Spencer and the Rare Birds, Lone Wolf will all be released in 2010 in USA on Bella Union through Redeye Distribution.

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Fat Possum Records

Fat Possum Records is an American independent record label based in Oxford, Mississippi and is a sister label of Epitaph Records. At first Fat Possum focused almost entirely on recording hitherto unknown Mississippi blues artists (typically from Oxford or Holly Springs, Mississippi). Recently, Fat Possum has signed younger rock acts to its roster. The label has been featured in a New Yorker article, a piece on NPR, and a 2004 documentary, You See Me Laughin.
Founded by Matthew Johnson and Peter Redvers-Lee in 1992, the label initially specialised in discovering blues players from the North Mississippi region, many of whom had never recorded before. At Fat Possum's behest some artists, particularly R. L. Burnside, released both standard blues albums and more "techno" albums, done in the style that would later be made famous by Moby's album Play. This led to a fair amount of controversy among blues purists, a group in which Johnson was largely uninterested.
Many of the early artists for Fat Possum were picked with the aid of New York Times music critic Robert Palmer, who also produced a number of records for the label.
Although their releases were critically acclaimed, particularly Junior Kimbrough's album All Night Long, which received 4 stars from Rolling Stone and the loud approval of Iggy Pop, Fat Possum was perennially strapped for cash. Word of mouth and artist compilations, such as Not the Same Old Blues Crap 3 (with a cover illustration by Joe Sacco) and All Men Are Liars, gradually pulled Fat Possum out of the red, even if only for brief periods of time. Unfortunately, a legal fight with Capricorn Records, who were to be their distribution, drained Fat Possum's funds and left a number of projects on the shelf.
R. L. Burnside proved early on to be the label's biggest money maker. Having toured with The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, he and Jon Spencer's band teamed up to record, in a single afternoon, the record A Ass Pocket of Whiskey, which further helped Burnside and Fat Possum gain wider recognition. A remix of an R. L. Burnside song was also featured prominently on The Sopranos.
With time, many of the label's artists have died. Asie Payton, King Ernest, and Charles Caldwell died before their records could be released. Junior Kimbrough died in 1998. R.L. Burnside died in 2005.
As the label has developed, it has begun to broaden its base of artists and sign a range of younger bands such as the Heartless Bastards, Deadboy & the Elephantmen, AA Bondy, The Black Keys and Andrew Bird. It has also begun to release more archival records, such as George Mitchell's 1967 recordings of Furry Lewis, Mississippi Joe Callicott, R.L. Burnside, Townes Van Zandt, and others, with covers designed by Chip Kidd.
The label also took a step in recent years to start releasing music from the new lo-fi rock trend, and released music from artists like Wavves and Crocodiles.

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Venue

Route du Rock

Un des rendez-vous indie-rock de l'été. La Route du Rock est un festival organisé depuis 1991. Il se déroule en Bretagne au Fort Saint-Père à Chateauneuf d'Ile-en-Vilaine ainsi que sur la plage du Sillon et au Palais du Grand Large à Saint-Malo, durant la semaine du 15 août. à€ partir de 2006, La Route du Rock connaît deux éditions par an avec une Collection d'Hiver en février et une Collection d'été en août.

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