Paul Menel (former IQ vocalist) - UK,EU gigs

It seems Paul Menel (vocalist with IQ on the Nomzamo and Are You Sitting Comfortably? albums) is making a return to music. 

He has a gig lined up at the Peel in Kingston, UK on 29th Jan, and further dates on the continent.  Apparently he will be performing material from his two albums with IQ, as well as new material from a forthcoming album, "Three Sides to Every Story".

The gig dates are:-

Jan 29th, The Peel, Kingston - UK.

Feb 10th, Das Rind, Russelheim - Germany
Feb 11th, Bechtolsheimerhof, Wurzburg - Germany
Feb 12th, Cultuurpodium Boerderij, Zoetermeer - Netherlands
Feb 13th, Spirit of 66, Verviers - Belgium.

I know a lot of IQ fans found the Paul Menel albums too commercial sounding for their taste - but there were still some great songs on them (IMHO) and so I was planning to go to the Peel and have a listen - particularly as John Jowitt will apparently be playing bass!    There are links to a myspace page (with excerpts from the new album) and a facebook page below:-

http://www.myspace.com/paulmenel

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Paul-Menel/123117397706360

I really like Are You Sitting Comfortably.Talented wordsmith. I am very interested in his album.

Does anyone know the release date?
I don't see it listed anywhere.

Yes it looks like Jowitt left IQ to join him for this project.Also John Mitchell(ARENA,FROST etc) will be the guitar man.

NEWS FROM PAUL MENEL
For Immediate use
18 January 2010

There are 'Three Sides To Every Story':
Former iQ vocalist Paul Menel announces 5 date European mini tour
in support of new solo album project

Paul Menel, the former lead singer of Britain's foremost progressive rock band iQ, is launching his solo career with a new and as yet unsigned solo album 'Three Sides To Every Story' plus a five date European mini tour visiting the UK, Belgium, The Netherlands and Germany.

With iQ, Paul enjoyed a good deal of success, playing to huge audiences at festivals in Germany and Switzerland and supporting Foreigner, Starship, T'pau, Ronnie Wood and Jethro Tull.  With iQ he supported Mike and the Mechanics on their Living Years tour. He has also enjoyed commercial success with radio hits in Germany and had the dubious honour of 'Record of the Week' on Philip Schofield and Janice Long's BBC Radio One shows.

Never one to rest on his laurels and even though the band was at the height of its success, Paul felt disillusioned at the direction the follow up album was taking so he left "to write songs, get a little life experience and grow a family!"

This almost bohemian attitude paid dividends when Yorkshire-born Paul moved out of London and settled in the Midlands.

 Quite by chance he met Ian Diment who remarked on a small silver earring Paul was wearing: “It was a tiny treble clef that one of my sons had bought me.  Ian asked if I was a musician to which I replied that I had been in a previous life!  He said he played keyboards so I took a couple of my new songs round to his place. There was an instant spark between us.”

The nucleus of a strong creative partnership was formed. A couple of home demos fell upon the ears of top producer Gavin Monaghan whose credentials include Robert Plant, Peter Gabriel, The Editors and Ocean Colour Scene and he immediately offered to produce and engineer the album.

Over the last few months they have been putting the finishing touches to this, their first album 'Three Sides To Every Story,' from which a taster single ‘Twenty One’ was issued in August last year.

Paul has put together an incredible band to tour the music, featuring John Jowitt on bass (whose credentials include Frost*, iQ and arK) Steve Harris on guitar (co-member of arK) and introducing Ian Diment (keyboards) Bill Devey (drums) and Mat Taylor (saxophone and flute.)

"Given my heritage with iQ, we'll be playing a set which will be 75% from my time with them, from 'Nomzamo' and 'Are You Sitting Comfortably,' and also introducing some of the new tracks.  This is the most fun I've ever had in a band.  I could tell you a few things about some of the other musicians I've played with.......  But that's another story!”

Make sure you don't miss the next part of the story

Notes to Editors:

Photos & interviews with Paul available. 
For details and for Press & Media information, contact: Marc Catchpole e: [email protected]      T: 07753 821525

Spring 2011 Mini Tour Dates:

Paul Menel will be touring in early 2011, with a band comprising Ian Diment (keys), John Jowitt (bass), Steve Harris (guitar), Bill Devey (drums) and Mat Taylor (sax & flute).  Current dates include:

• Jan 29 - Paul Menel Band The Peel, Kingston Upon Thames, London, United Kingdom
• Feb 10 - Paul Menel Band Das Rind, Ruesselsheim, Germany
• Feb 11 - Paul Menel Band B-hof, Wuerzburg, Germany
• Feb 12 - Paul Menel Band Boerderij, Zoetermeer, Netherlands
• Feb 13 - Paul Menel Band Spirit of 66, Verviers, Belgium

Follow Paul Menel on the internet:

MySpace: www.myspace.com/paulmenel where excerpts from the tracks on the new album can be found.

Facebook: www.facebook.com/pages/Paul-Menel/123117397706360

Twitter: follow Paul on Twitter as he & the band prepare for the upcoming gigs: @PaulMenel

Paul Menel Band – mini bio’s

Paul Menel (songwriter, vocals, 6 & 12 string guitars)

Paul Menel is an English singer-songwriter best known as the former lead singer of progressive rock band iQ, from late 1985 through to 1990. He wrote the lyrics, co-wrote the music, and sang lead vocals on iQ’s 4th and 5th studio albums  - ‘Nomzamo’ (1987) and ‘Are You Sitting Comfortably?’ (1989), both albums which proved to be some of iQs most commercially successful albums and remain highly regarded by iQ fans worldwide.

Ian Diment (co-songwriter, keyboards)

Ian Diment is Paul’s co-writer and keyboard player.  Blessed with perfect pitch, he blames this on complications at birth, which led to an early relationship with the piano as part of his therapy.  He went on to train as a classical pianist and puts his complete recovery down to that.

Ian studied popular music at college, and was involved with the music industry for several years during this time. However a paid job came along and his musical days were numbered. Having always regretted not continuing within the industry, in 2006, a chance meeting with Paul Menel led to a discover of a mutual love of music.

After hearing some of the songs Paul had written / recorded since leaving IQ (quite a body of work!). their affinity grew into writing new songs over the last couple of years which they recorded at the Magic Garden Studios with legendary producer Gavin Monaghan.

John Jowitt (bass)

Bass player John Jowitt first met Paul Menel in 1989 when his then band arK supported iQ on their British tour following the release of ‘Are You Sitting Comfortably’.  John then went on to join iQ in 1991, and has subsequently played live and recorded with Arena (featuring Mick Pointer, Clive Nolan and John Mitchell), Frost* (Jem Godfrey), Jadis, John Wetton, Peter Banks and Mystery (featuring Benoit David of YES). He’s been awarded Best Bass Player 14 times by the Classic Rock Society in the UK.

Steve Harris – Guitars/ Guitar synth

Steve has been playing music as long as he can remember - he sang in choirs (until his voice shattered) and played half the instruments in a brass band in various local orchestras before he hit his teens and realised what he really wanted was a red guitar made out of a fireplace and a long curly perm.  Santa duly obliged with a red guitar the very next Christmas - and shortly afterwards, Steve had an epiphany after trudging back from Halesowen through a sudden snow fall clutching what turned out to be a slightly warped copy of 'Going for the One' by Yes. Suddenly, everything made sense...

But Steve was never satisfied with just the guitar: he just couldn't get all the music in his head out of the strings and worried that he should have wished for a cape and a MiniMoog instead.  He experimented with acoustic guitars, vast pedalboards, heavy valve amplifiers turned up to 11 and eBows, but all to no avail until a nameless shop assistant pressed a silver Roland G707 Guitar Synthesiser Controller into Steve's grubby hands and suddenly everything made sense again.  A few months later his brother Andrew asked him to audition for Damascus and not long after that, Damascus renamed themselves ARK.

After arK split Steve kept himself busy playing lead guitar for a Rush-tinged three piece power trio, Red and a fabulous blues singer Patti Heart, firstly with ex Ark drummer Paul Rogers and latterly with her husband/guitarist/bass player Richard Cooper.  Then in late 2009, John said that he'd met with Pete and a few weeks later he found himself in a rehearsal room with old friends and arK was reborn, shortly to sporn the critically acclaimed album ‘Wild Untamed Imaginings’

Bill Devey (drums)

With an Uncle who played guitar in the backing band that supported Frank Sinatra on his trips back to the old country, a Mother who sang opera at La Scala in Milan, and numerous cousins who are all exceptional musicians, it was a foregone conclusion that Bill would be involved in music somehow. It’s in his DNA - it’s a passion.  A late developer, he took up bass, guitar, vocals and piano at the age of 10, but it was the drums and percussion that became his calling.

Now, 30 years on, Bill has been lucky to have played with some incredible musicians (including Nick Tart – Lead Singer with Diamond Head, Robin George, and Fred Skidmore, founder member of Dexy’s Midnight Runners), all of whom have added to his experience and given him the tools to thoroughly enjoy what he does. However, he considers it a continual learning curve, and relishes each time he sits behind his kit, because that’s where he’s at home. Influences are just too many and varied to mention, from Zappa to Bluegrass, Jazz to Trance. For Bill there is no right or wrong with music. It’s simply an expression, an art. And something he’s always grateful for.

Mat Taylor (sax & flute)

Mat is a sax, flute and bass player, arranger, and teacher.  His recording credits include Scott Matthews, Ocean Colour Scene, Editors and The Twang, and Mat has toured with Pato Banton, Cantaloop and Scott Matthews, among many others.  He also produces for commercial T.V. and spends much of his free time messing around in his project studio.

Ends/.

Edited by Sgt Rutter - January 23 2011 at 06:07

Mellotron Storm wrote: Yes it looks like Jowitt left IQ to join him for this project.Also John Mitchell(ARENA,FROST etc) will be the guitar man.

Sadly genuine scheduling contacts mean John Mitchell cant make it now, so his shoes are being ably filled by Jowitt's bandee from arK - Steve Harris. & from what i hear rehearsals are going a storm. These should be gigs not to miss! 

Setlist for the Peel gig was a mixture of Paul's new material and the songs he did with IQ as follows:-

No Love Lost
Drive On
Under Your Wing
War Heroes
The Nurse
Still Life
Sold on You
Twenty One
Saddled With Me
Nothing at All
Little Gorgeous Fool
Colourflow
Common Ground
Walk in My Shoes
Human Nature

Encore - Promises/Sold On You

I believe the encore was meant to be just Promises, but they had some problems with the backing track they used for the intro, so they did Sold on You again as well.

I think the set list for the gigs in Germany/Holland/Belgium may be slightly different - on the facebook page it says they are rehearsing some more of the songs Paul did with IQ, including Nomzamo.  Paul also mentions they are looking at doing some more dates later this year.