Anne Soldaat & Yorick van Norden - Unsung Heroes (2018) (Emitt Rhodes,Badfinger,Gene Clark,Big Star)

Hello all!

Just a quick heads-up to share that today the 'Unsung Heroes' record Anne Soldaat and I made was released to streaming and downloading services worldwide. The record contains our interpretations of songs by people we consider to be unsung heroes, like Emitt Rhodes, Pete Ham, Biff Rose, Gene Clark, Dennis Wilson, Lee Mavers, Adrian Borland and Chris Bell.

The album can be listened to on Spotify, Tidal, Apple Music, Deezer, iTunes and Google Play through this link:
Unsung Heroes by Anne Soldaat

Anne Soldaat & Yorick van Norden - Unsung Heroes

01 Don't Make Promises (Tim Hardin) (3:26)
02 Timeless Melody (Lee Mavers) (2:48)
03 Silent Air (Adrian Borland) (3:58)
04 Day After Day (Pete Ham) (3:17)
05 Gentle People (Biff Rose) (2:48)
06 I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better (Gene Clark) (2:28)
07 Medley: Meant for You (Brian Wilson & Mike Love) / Be Still (Dennis Wilson & Stephen Kalinich) (1:59)
08 Time Will Show the Wiser (Emitt Rhodes) (2:51)
09 Alone and Forsaken (Hank Williams) (2:23)
10 Christine's Tune (Devil in Disguise) (Gram Parsons & Chris Hillman) (2:37)
11 The Ballad of El Goodo (Chris Bell & Alex Chilton) (3:58)
12 I Come and Stand at Every Door (Nazim Hikmet & James Waters) (3:37)

total playing time: 36:10

 

This is the original press release:

On Saturday April 21, the album Unsung Heroes by Anne Soldaat (Daryll-Ann, Jason Falkner) & Yorick van Norden will be released in a limited edition as a Record Store Day item in the Netherlands by Excelsior Recordings. The CD can be ordered online exclusively through www.unsung-heroes.nl.

On the record, the duo honors artists who do not deserve to be forgotten.
"Heroes like Gene Clark, Gram Parsons, Biff Rose, Badfinger and Dennis Wilson are often overlooked as a result of the canonization of pop music history", says Yorick van Norden.

Anne Soldaat: "Of course we could also have chosen to record '13 Smashes from the Sixties'. Pick the low-hanging fruit - so to speak. But none of that. We're too much archaeologists and missionaries at the same time. Add an innate sympathy for the musical underdog whose oeuvre - no matter how small or buried under a layer of dust - has stood the test of time and needs to be heard. Those artists are our 'Unsung Heroes' and they deserve not to be forgotten."

Over the past two years, the two traveled extensively throughout the Netherlands with their eponymous music performance. "Several times we were asked afterwards whether the performance was also available on CD, so that people could listen to the songs at home again", says Yorick. "At first we thought that was a stupid idea, because we had selected these songs on the basis of our love for the enormous expressiveness and magic of the original recordings. But as the tour progressed and people kept asking, we realized that some songs actually had very little in common with the original performances. They had started leading their own lives. "

Together with bass player Danny van Tiggele (Mister and Mississippi) and drummer Kees Schaper (Tim Knol, Clean Pete and Bent Van Looy), the album was recorded in SSE Noord, Amsterdam last month. Anne Soldaat and Yorick van Norden produced the album in collaboration with Frans Hagenaars.

Unsung Heroes will be available as a CD from Saturday 21 April and from Friday 11 May as a download and stream.
The CD can be ordered online exclusively via www.unsung-heroes.nl.

 

Thank you for this amazing and fun release!

 

Thanks for your kind words!

 

Since some of you have shown an interest in this record or have even ordered the CD through the web store of Anne and me, you may find it interesting to know that coming Friday my second solo album will be released. The record is called The Jester, named after my famous namesake: Yorick the court jester in Shakespeare's Hamlet. The album appears as a CD and LP / CD combi, of which the first run is pressed in a limited edition of 500 copies on red / gold vinyl. Today a review of the record appeared in the Netherlands' leading music magazine OOR, which called the Jester 'the perfect pop record' and 'a heart-and-soul masterpiece'. Unfortunately, it's in Dutch:


I have been working on the album with great pleasure for the last couple of years and am looking forward to sharing the results! If you are interested in the album, it will be available from Dutch record stores from coming Friday, but also (optionally signed) via www.yorickvannorden.com.

With kind regards,

Yorick

 

Found this at Concerto Records while stopping through Amsterdam recently. Didn't realize Anne Soldaat had another project coming so soon after last solo album so it was a nice surprise. The duo does a great job on these songs, taking a few of them just far enough away to not be a slavish copy but also keeping the whole album a strong listen from start-to-finish. (These aren't free-jazz versions). Really glad to have found it.