• Tyrone Wells & Matt Duke -4/28
• 8:00pm

Tickets for this show may still be available-- please call 212-608-0555 ext. 472 Wednesday, April 27th between 11am and 5 p.m. to inquire.

Join us for another spellbinding show with the incredibly talented Tyrone Wells. Wells last graced the City Winery stage back in November when he played an intimate acoustic show with a couple of special guests. This latest show is a welcome return for WA native, and a great opportunity if you missed out on tickets for his last sold out show.

ABOUT TYRONE WELLS

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 Tyrone Wells has delivered an epic pop/rock album with his second major label effort, Remain. Pursuing a more collaborative process and having added a more lush production to his singer- songwriter roots, the new album proves to be a great showcase for his powerful and emotional voice.

The Spokane, WA native’s desire to ‘open up the process’ found him traveling to London to work with a circle of songwriters/musicians who aligned with Wells’ musical direction. “Half of the album was done in London and the other half completed here in the states,” says Wells. “I didn’t know what kind of record I was going to make before I got to London, but something just seemed to click while I was there that really defined what I wanted to do with this album.” Invoking a cathartic creative process from the very beginning for Remain, the songwriter penned an astounding 60 songs for the record.

Tyrone worked with songwriter/producer Martin Terefe (Jason Mraz, KT Tunstall, James Morrison) and Iain Archer (UK indie artist and Snow Patrol co-writer) in the UK, and Tim Myers (formerly of OneRepublic), David Hodges (formerly of Evanescence) and Matt Scannell (Vertical Horizon) in the U.S. Creating a work that manages to be more guitar-edged than previous Wells’ efforts - but still unabashedly soul-baring - he appreciated huddling with collaborators like Terefe, who - like Wells - is a big believer in trusting one’s instincts. “We had great chemistry together.” “Losing Ground,” one of a handful of production/songwriting collaborations between Wells and Terefe, was written and demoed in less than 3 hours during their first writing session together.

The buzz surrounding Wells’ inspiring wealth of songs has also landed song placements in films and TV shows. To date Tyrone has had significant placements including “One Tree Hill,” “Everyone’s Hero,” “Rescue Me,” “Ghost Whisperer,” “Numbers,” “Criminal Minds,” “Army Wives,” “What About Brian,” “The 50 Greatest Moments at Madison Square ,Garden” and the “Rails & Ties” trailer.

"...WELLS demonstrates he has the ability to write memorable hooks.” - Los Angeles Times

“WELLS can belt lyrics and perform in the demonstrative manner of a vintage r&b or rock artist.” - Nashville City Paper

“Tyrone WELLS has a great voice. We better keep an ear on this guy. He’s talented and interesting, plus, he’s bald, which means he has soul for days” - Popmatters.com

“Ultimately, WELLS is a performer whose easygoing stage presence, honesty and vocal prowess can only be truly appreciated by seeing him perform live. While his new album may be the key to achieving mainstream success, his live shows are the key to captivating new fans.” - Daily Trojan USC

ABOUT MATT DUKE

We’ve all heard the old song about the hip bone being connected to the leg bone, but what about the heart-strings and the grey matter? That connection is harder to make – but it’s one that Matt Duke manages to forge with the whip-smart, emotive songs on his second Ryko album, One Day Die – an album which touches on the darkness implicit in that title and uses it as a springboard to redemption and rebirth.

 “You could look at the title and think, ‘wow, that’s dark,’ but it’s not meant to be morbid, it’s meant to raise questions about how to cope, how to get past the darkness,” says the 25-year-old South Jersey native, who grants that he went to his own dark place last year after suffering a hand injury that was serious enough to jeopardize his ability to play guitar again.

”As strange as it sounds, that was a blessing in disguise,” explains Duke, “because it was something of an enforced break that made me reconsider everything. When I started again, I found myself taking a completely fresh approach – one where I was willing to just experiment with no reservations.”

With the help of producer Jason Finkel, Matt accelerated his healing process and dug deep to craft 11 songs. The pensive songwriter began to expand his horizons both sonically – evidence the doomy, string-laced opener “MLT” and the ethereal “Lay,” which brings to mind the delicate tension of the late Jeff Buckley – and in the incisive wordplay he works so effortlessly.

Duke’s impressionistic lyrics – delivered in a pure tenor that cuts straight to the bone -- shine bright, particularly throughout the edgy “Kangaroo Court” and on the guitar-driven “Needle and Thread,” in which Duke assumes the role of the troubadour yearning to find “open arms at the bar for the prodigal son that often goes astray.”

Such quests make up the heart and soul of One Day Die – an album which finds Duke asking questions of himself and which grabs listeners by the lapels and shakes them into a similar frame of mind. He literally puts them on the therapist’s couch for the roiling “Psycho-Babble,” and then reminds them – in the unflaggingly beautiful “Shangri-La” – “I know Shangri-La is somewhere near/ I’ve seen it, I’ve been there.”

That paradise aside, Duke has been to a lot of places since he began his musical career. Writing and performing around South Jersey and Philadelphia while in high school helped him win the respect of soon-to-be-collaborators like Marshall Crenshaw, Suzzy Roche and Dylan sideman David Mansfield.

Barely past his 18th birthday, Matt recorded a demo that caught the attention of Mad Dragon Records, a label run by students at Philly’s Drexel University. Mad Dragon released Matt’s critically-acclaimed debut album, Winter Child, paving the way for his signing to Ryko, which spawned the well-received Kingdom Underground, produced by Marshall Altman.

 “Those records were definitely a part of who I was at the time when I made them,” says Duke. “But [One Day Die] really is me. Every character, every narrative is me in a lot of ways. With Jason’s help, I realized that it’s a good thing to get carried away. I got carried away a lot here.”