Ed Kowalczyk
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Ed Kowalczyk | |
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Edward Joel Kowalczyk |
| Born | July 16, 1971 |
| Origin | York, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
| Genre(s) | Alternative Rock Post-Grunge Hard Rock |
| Occupation(s) | Singer-Songwriter-Guitarist |
| Instrument(s) | Vocals Guitar |
| Years active | 1980s - Present |
| Label(s) | Radioactive Records Epic Records |
| Website | www.friendsoflive.com |
Edward Joel Kowalczyk (born July 16, 1971) is the lead singer for the band Live. He counts among his influences the speaker Jiddu Krishnamurti and integral thinker Ken Wilber, and his lyrics reflect his mystical and spiritual tendency. He has influenced bands such as Daughtry, Matchbox Twenty and Breaking Benjamin.
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[edit] Live
[edit] Early history
He was born in York, Pennsylvania. Kowalczyk, Taylor, Dahlheimer, and Gracey first came together for a middle-school talent show in the Pennsylvania blue-collar town of York. The group remained together throughout high school, going through a handful of band names (such as First Aid, Club Fungus, Paisley Blues, Action Front, and Body Odor Boys) and new-wave covers before settling on the moniker Public Affection and recording a self-released cassette of originals, The Death of a Dictionary, in 1989. Soon after in 1990, Public Affection released an EP of demos produced by Jay Healy titled Divided Mind, Divided Planet through their Black Coffee mailing list. Frequent trips into New York City to play at CBGB helped net the band a deal with Radioactive Records in 1991. With the new name Live, the band entered the studio with former Talking Heads keyboardist Jerry Harrison that year and began recording the EP Four Songs (1991). The single "Operation Spirit (The Tyranny of Tradition)" went to #9 on the Modern Rock chart, and paved the way for the band's Harrison-produced full-length debut, 1991's Mental Jewelry (#73). The album lyrics, penned by Kowalczyk, were heavily inspired by Indian speaker Jiddu Krishnamurti.
[edit] Mainstream success
Fueled by light touring (including billing at Woodstock '94 and Peter Gabriel's WOMAD tour) and a string of hit singles ("I Alone", "All Over You" and the #1 Modern Rock hits "Selling the Drama" and "Lightning Crashes"), Live's next album, Throwing Copper, gave the band the breakthrough it desired. The steady success of the singles propelled the album to #1 on the Billboard 200 on May 6, 1995, more than a year after the album was released. To date, it is their best-selling album and often most highly regarded album by fans and critics. The band was invited to appear on NBC's Saturday Night Live where they performed their hits "I Alone" and "Selling the Drama."
The momentum continued long enough to help 1997's Secret Samadhi (co-produced by the band and Jay Healy) debut at #1. Deriving its name from a state of Hindu meditation, the album spawned four Modern Rock singles, but failed to match its predecessor's success, with sales topping off at 2 million. The band performed "Lakini's Juice" and "Heropsychodreamer" from this album on Saturday Night Live.
Harrison came back on board as co-producer for 1999's The Distance to Here, which debuted at #4 and featured the hit single "The Dolphin's Cry."
In 2000, Live embarked on a co-headlining tour with alternative rock band Counting Crows. Frequently, Crows' lead singer Adam Duritz joined the stage for Live's performance of "The Dolphin's Cry," and Kowalczyk sang a verse of "Hanginaround" with the Crows.
[edit] Post 9/11
On September 18, 2001, the more experimental V (originally scheduled to be titled Ecstatic Fanatic) was issued to mixed reviews, preceded by "Simple Creed" as the first single. However, with the events of 9/11—which occurred a week before V's release—the melancholic "Overcome" began receiving significant airplay, superseding "Simple Creed" and becoming V's selling point. Live's commercial stock—compounded by their petering radio airplay—had fallen further since The Distance to Here, with V merely reaching #22 at home, and failing to reach gold status. That same year, Live contributed a live performance version of their song "I Alone" to the charity album Live in the X Lounge IV.
"Overcome" was used at the end of the final episode of season 2 of The Shield.
Birds of Pray appeared in May 2003, bolstered by the unexpected success of "Heaven," Live's first U.S. Hot 100-placing single since "The Dolphin's Cry." Reaching #28, Birds of Pray ultimately outsold V, although it too received mixed reviews and failed to reach gold status.
In November 2004, Live released Awake: The Best of Live, a career-spanning compilation that included "We Deal in Dreams," a previously unreleased song from the Throwing Copper sessions, and a cover of Johnny Cash's "I Walk the Line," as well as Birds of Pray's "Run Away," re-imagined with Shelby Lynne on co-lead vocals.
In 2005, Live signed with Sony BMG Music Entertainment's Epic label, and released a new album entitled Songs from Black Mountain in June 2006, preceded by "The River" as lead single. Thus far, the album has achieved much international success and critical acclaim. However, in their native United States of America, it has proven Live's lowest-seller domestically, only reaching #52 before disappearing from the charts.
While Live remains only moderately popular in terms of record sales in the United States, much of their current sales come from places in Europe, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.
[edit] American Idol incident
On season five of American Idol, finalist Chris Daughtry was accused of performing Live's rendition of Johnny Cash's "I Walk the Line" and calling it his own. One week later Daughtry acknowledged it was not his own rendition, even saying Live was one of his favorite bands. In May 2006, Live appeared on The Howard Stern Show and addressed this issue.[1][2]
On May 24, 2006, the band and Chris Daughtry performed "Mystery" on the season finale of American Idol, and on June 7, a new version of "Mystery" was released on the Friends of Live website featuring Chris Daughtry on guest vocals.
[edit] Recent times
On September 14, 2007, the band released their first album since 1989 on their own Action Front Records label, Radiant Sea: A Collection of Bootleg Rarities and Two New Songs, featuring two brand new songs: "Beautiful Invisible" and "Radiant Sea". In March of 2008, LIVE will begin a short tour in promotion of this album, and they plan to play at a few festivals during the summer of 2008.[3]
[edit] Collaboration with other musicians
He has worked with musicians Stuart Davis, Glen Ballard, singer Anouk, Neneh Cherry and the Counting Crows' Adam Duritz. Kowalczyk has also developed a close friendship with British trip-hop pioneer Tricky and the two have worked together with Tricky contributing on Live's fifth studio album V on the song Simple Creed. Kowalczyk was featured in the Tricky song "Evolution Revolution Love," released in the 2001 album "Blowback." This song was prominently featured in an episode of NBC's The West Wing.
In 2008, he appeared in a video with will.i.am from the Black Eyed Peas and many other celebrities, including John Legend, Scarlett Johansson and rapper Nick Cannon, supporting US Presidential candidate Barack Obama. Kowalczyk has also been appearing at various campaign rallies for Obama, with will.i.am.
[edit] Outside of music
He appeared in the David Fincher film adaptation of Fight Club as a waiter. This is his only acting film credit to date.[4]
[edit] Personal life
He currently lives in Ojai, California, with his wife Erin and two daughters, Ana Sophia and Natasha.
[edit] References
- ^ Kaplan, Jason; Thomas Panasci (2006-05-10). The Rundown. HowardStern.com. Retrieved on 2008-01-12. “Following the band’s performance of “Selling the Drama,” Howard brought up an “American Idol” contestant, Chris Daughtry, performed Live’s version of “I Walk the Line” on the show recently, yet the group wasn’t given credit for it. Lead singer Ed replied that Daughtry actually apologized for not acknowledging the band, so he didn't have a problem with it. Ed went on to say that, although making it in the music industry takes more than mere singing ability, he wouldn’t be surprised if Chris ends up becoming successful in the years to come.”
- ^ Mercer, Mark. "Live Performs Live In Howard's Studio. 05/10/06. 9:10am", Howard Stern Show News Archives, Mark's Friggin, 2006-05-10. Retrieved on 2008-01-12. "Howard heard that Ed was a huge fan of American Idol but Ed said he was just joking about that when he did the pre-interview. Howard said that one of the kids on American Idol covered Walk the Line and did Live's arrangement of the song and got credit for it. Ed said he spoke to the guy, Chris Daughtry, and he apologized for it so he's fine with it now."
- ^ http://www.friendsoflive.com/tourdates.php.
- ^ "http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0468567/"
[edit] External links
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