Posted on: July 9, 2011 Posted by: James McQuiston Comments: 0

New musical collaboration AM & Shawn Lee are announcing tour dates supporting Thievery Corporation. Their debut single, “Dark Into Light” will be released on July 19 on ESL with their LP Celestial Electric to follow on Sept. 6.

AM & Shawn Lee’s fortuitous cyberspace partnership began generating advance buzz several months ago when they previewed their new songs live at the SXSW Music and Media Conference in March 2011. The following month, they celebrated Record Store Day by releasing a limited-edition gold-vinyl 12-inch single on Ubiquity Records.

The collaboration of the AM & Shawn Lee musical project started after AM heard Lee’s music on the radio in Los Angeles. After reaching out to Lee, the two became quick friends, sharing a similar love for vintage grooves and ’60s and ’70s soundtrack music. The pair decided to record together after AM played guitar on a few of Lee’s Ping Pong Orchestra shows (including KCRW’s “Morning Becomes Eclectic”) in the summer of 2010. Lee, armed with a four-track and other vintage tape machines in his London studio, started sending AM drum and percussion beats in December. In Los Angeles, AM wrote and recorded songs over the grooves, adding guitars, Casio synths, vocals and occasional bass. Lee added more instrumentation such as bass, keys, guitars, glockenspiel and other assorted instruments and they emailed back and forth until each was happy with the mix.

They each documented their process through photos, emails and videos and they will be posting a series of “Building The Track” videos that document the behind the scenes recording process in London and Los Angeles, as they get closer to the release date for their debut album Celestial Electric on September 6. The first behind the scenes video is for their debut single “Dark Into Light” see: http://youtu.be/k5C58Ch523U

AM & SHAWN LEE

Sept 07 House of Blues San Diego, CA *

Sept 08 House of Blues San Diego, CA *

Sept 09 The Greek Los Angeles, CA *

Sept 10 Cosmopolitan Las Vegas, NV *

Sept 16 Fox Theater Oakland, CA *

* = w/ Thievery Corporation

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