Graham Smith grants Echoes of Apollo use of his track “Pioneers”
http://www.forallmankind.co.uk/
For All Mankind is the first album release for London based composer, Graham Smith.
“It’s an amazing story on so many levels. You’ve got the sheer scale of the Apollo program with over 400,000 people working on it, you also got many emotional angles like leaving the planet as Americans yet landing on the moon as representatives of the human race or even looking back at the Earth and realising just how beautiful and fragile it is.” says Smith, a London based recording artist and performer.
The musical style of ‘For All Mankind’ is reminiscent of work by Mike Oldfield, Air, Chicane, Orbital with a shades of Jarre and Vangelis thrown into the mix. “For me melody is a crucial part of the music which is what I love about these artists.”, says Smith “I think some electronica lacks that”
‘For All Mankind’ follows the mission from launch to the ticker tape parades that followed the astronauts successful return. “The mission itself has distinct phases to it which lend themselves perfectly to a musical interpretation. Musically, I wanted to create a rollercoaster ride for the listener”.
Tracks from the album have received airplay on BBC Radio. The closing track ‘Parade’ also reached the semi final of the UK songwriting contest.
For more information go to www.forallmankind.co.uk. The album is available to buy now on CDBaby http://cdbaby.com/cd/smithgraham2
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About Graham”
My recording and composing started in earnest in 1989 after meeting top producer Nick Graham (Bros, Let Loose, PJ and Duncan to name but a few). At his studio he showed me sequencing and recording using the Atari 1040.
My first demo tape received some good feedback and I got a commission to do a radio jingle. At around the same time I signed up for a jazz improvisation course which I ended up attending for five years. I gained great knowledge from those classes playing pieces by Weather Report, John Coltrane, Duke Ellington etc. I ended up joining a big band where we played in the South East as opening act for the likes of Kenny Ball.
My recording and composing technique was improving all the time and I started to writing music for lyricists which was great as I quickly had to adapt to different styles of music.
By now I was gigging and depping regularly and the live experience was really enhancing my compositions and production standards. All of these styles were going into my musical melting pot I learnt alot about the importance of taking people on a journey – a kind of roller coaster ride and I wanted to bring that sensation into my compositions.
Then in July 2006 after watching a documentary I came up with the idea of composing a concept album about the Apollo 11 mission. As a composition there are some very distinct phases to the mission which lend themselves to musical movements. With each track I’ve tried to capture a particular moment from the mission. The album, called ‘For All Mankind’ took 9 months to record.
