STG Presents The National, Beyond Celtic, Hey Marseilles, Keb Mo

Seattle Theatre Group (STG) announces the following concerts going on sale this week.

7" RECORD RELEASE SHOW!
Hey Marseilles
Special Guest: Bryan John Appleby
Date: Saturday, November 12, 2011 @ 9:00pm
Venue: The Neptune (1303 NE 45th St)
Price: $12.00 in advance, $14.00 day of show, not including applicable fees
Seating: General Admission (All Ages / Bar w/ ID)
On Sale: Friday, September 16th @ 10am
Ticketing Information: Available online at Tickets.com, in person at the Paramount Theatre box office (M-F 10am-6pm), 24-hour kiosks located outside the Paramount & Moore Theatres, charge by phone at (877) 784-4849, or online at STGPresents.org.

Seattle's Hey Marseilles will release a new 7-inch on Tuesday, November 15th. Elegy (Onto Entertainment) will be the band's first offering since their album To Travels & Trunks debuted nationally in June of last year. The band will tour behind the release on the West Coast after previewing the album at New York City's famed CMJ Music Conference. "These new songs reflect our maturation as musicians and people. A lot has changed since we started playing together five years ago, both for us personally and in the world at large," explains lead singer and guitarist, Matt Bishop. "'Elegy' is a song about two people wanting to leave everything behind for a life less complicated, and that sentiment represents all of these new songs pretty well. This new record is a testament to change and the importance of community as an anchor in our lives." Hey Marseilles's unconventional and innovative recording process is part of what makes them unique in the Northwest music scene. While parts of the new songs were recorded at Bear Creek and Avast Studios in Seattle, many were tracked in natural spaces like a tunnel in Golden Gardens State Park, a SoDo warehouse, and various church sanctuaries. The Elegy EP is just a preview for Hey Marseilles' forthcoming full-length, set for an early 2012 release. "As we hit the road to support the 7", the final touches will be on the full length. It's an exciting time," says Bishop. "We're looking forward to gettting back out there with new music to share." Elegy was mixed by Martin Feveyear at Jupiter Studios and engineered by Hey Marseilles.

TWO NIGHTS AT THE NEPTUNE!
The National
Special Guests: Local Natives & Wye Oak
Date: November 30 & December 1, 2011 @ 8:00pm
Venue: The Neptune (1303 NE 45th St)
Price: $49.50 not including applicable fees
Seating: General Admission (All Ages / Bar w/ ID)
On Sale: Saturday, September 17th @ 10am
Ticketing Information: Available online at Tickets.com, in person at the Paramount Theatre box office (M-F 10am-6pm), 24-hour kiosks located outside the Paramount & Moore Theatres, charge by phone at (877) 784-4849, or online at STGPresents.org.

Formed in 1999, the Ohio-raised, Brooklyn-based band, The National, consists of vocalist Matt Berninger fronting two pairs of brothers: Aaron (guitar, bass, piano) and Bryce Dessner (guitar), and Scott (bass, guitar) and Bryan Devendorf (drums). Their first full-lengths, The National and Sad Songs For Dirty Lovers, and a crucial mini-album, Cherry Tree, preceded their signing to Beggars Banquet in 2004. Alligator (2005), included underground anthem "Mr. November," and raised their profile as the National grew into an incendiary live band. Boxer (2007), featuring songs like "Fake Empire", "Mistaken For Strangers" and "Start A War," sold over three times as many copies as its predecessor and saw them transformed from underground stars into an indie rock institution: they began the album cycle opening for the Arcade Fire and with guest appearance on major television shows such as the Late Show with David Letterman. By the time their busy season in support of Boxer came to a close they had become a headline attraction in their own right - REM picked them as a crucial part of a US arena tour; and the Barack Obama campaign turned "Fake Empire" into an unstated anthem for his presidential run, using it in the soundtrack to the promotional video Signs Of Hope And Change, and as background music during his victory rally in Chicago's Grant Park. As the first decade of the 21st century came to a close both Boxer and Alligator made countless "album of the decade" lists and their members began to occupy a still larger cultural footprint. In the period between Boxer and High Violet, Aaron and Bryce produced 2009's Dark Was The Night, a 31-track album to benefit the Red Hot Organization. Featuring contributions from Arcade Fire, Bon Iver, Grizzly Bear, Yeasayer, and many others, the record has raised close to $1,000,000 for numerous AIDS-related charities, including an emergenCy Grant of $150,000 to Haiti's Partners In Health after that country's calamitous earthquake. A related Radio City Music Hall concert quickly sold out and found The National performing alongside David Byrne, Dirty Projectors, Feist, and Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings. Next the Brooklyn Academy Of Music commissioned the brothers to write and perform a 70-minute through-composed song cycle at the Howard Gilman Opera House, accompanying a film by visual artist Matthew Ritchie. The piece - titled The Long Count - was performed by a bespoke orchestra and sung by Matt Berninger, Kim and Kelley Deal (Breeders, Pixies) and Shara Worden (My Brightest Diamond). Anticipation for The National's next move has grown to a fever pitch.

Keb' Mo':
Home for the Holidays
Date: Saturday, December 3, 2011 @ 8:00pm
Venue: The Neptune (1303 NE 45th St)
Price: $38.50 not including applicable fees
Seating: General Admission Seated (21 & Over)
On Sale: Friday, September 16th @ 10am
Ticketing Information: Available online at Tickets.com, in person at the Paramount Theatre box office (M-F 10am-6pm), 24-hour kiosks located outside the Paramount & Moore Theatres, charge by phone at (877) 784-4849, or online at STGPresents.org.

The Reflection is the first new studio album by Keb Mo since Suitcase in 2006. These twelve songs are the product of an important period of personal and professional growth for the artist formerly known as Kevin Moore. In that time, he started a new family; moved from Los Angeles to Nashville; built a state-of-the-art home studio, and founded his own label, Yolabelle International, distributed by Ryko and the Warner Music Group. Keb Mo is a three-time Grammy Award winner for Best Contemporary Blues Album; and a key figure in the acclaimed 2003 PBS series Martin Scorsese Presents The Blues. But The Reflection is not, in essence, a blues album. In sound and spirit, it's closer to the work of African-American "folk soul" singer/songwriters like Bill Withers, Bobby Womack, and Terry Callier. "I worked on this record for the better part of two years," says Keb. "It took me some time as this was an educational process for me and my engineer John Schirmer. I didn't want to let it go until I had something that I was proud to share with the public. It's the culmination of all of my influences throughout my career." Through all the changes of the past several years, Keb Mo found time to play a couple of hundred shows on several continents. He composed and recorded music for the acclaimed TNT series "Memphis Beat," starring Jason Lee and Alfre Woodward. And he wrote some of the best songs of his career for The Reflection - material strong enough to attract such notable guests as country music superstar Vince Gill ("My Baby's Tellin' Lies"), nouveau-soul chanteuse India.Arie ("Crush On You"), saxophonist Dave Koz ("One Of These Nights"), and veteran session guitarist David T. Walker ("All The Way," "The Reflection," "The Whole Enchilada").

More Articles by This Author...