Jeff's lead single "(Broken) Without You" from the new LP drops on Valentine's Day (February 14th)
The NYC-based rock musician has recruited a who's who of famed rock musician friends for this effort, including Dave Stewart, Earl Slick, Duff McKagan, and members of Paul Weller’s band and Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds
Jeff Slate is known as a world-class frontman and songwriter on the New York City music scene, where his band’s monthly residency in the heart of Chelsea draws sellout crowds and famous guests. But it was a long and winding road to that coveted place as part of New York’s cultural firmament.
Slate came up in the mid-1980s US East Coast post-punk scene, playing CBGBs and other legendary clubs of the day as the singer, guitarist and principal songwriter of the Mindless Thinkers, named by Steve Jones of the Sex Pistols at a drunken aftershow party. By the early '90s, Slate was a solo artist, and made his name after working with The Who’s Pete Townshend, touring with Sheryl Crow and founding the mod-influenced band The Badge. Taking a page from the likes of The Kinks, The Who and the Small Faces, The Badge released three albums of original material, as well as numerous singles, EPs and live releases, before going on hiatus.
Since then, Slate’s solo releases have included famous friends and A-list session players, and his songs have appeared in advertising and films, and on television, including in the hit show Gossip Girl. Slate has toured throughout the US over the past 13 years, sharing the stage with Roger McGuinn, Jeff Tweedy, Willie Nile, Margo Price and Sheryl Crow, as well as headlining the Switchyard Festival at Tulsa’s legendary Cain’s Ballroom, and Tom Petty Weekend in the late artist’s hometown of Gainesville, Florida. He’s even been an all-star counselor at the celebrated Rock and Roll Fantasy Camp!
A regular guest host on SiriusXM, Slate is the co-author of the 2017 book The Authorized Roy Orbison, with the late-legend’s sons, and has written liner notes for albums by Orbison, The Beatles, Bob Dylan, The Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix, among many others. Last year, Slate interviewed Bob Dylan, one of only a handful the icon has given this century.
Jeff’s fourth solo album, The Last Day of Summer, featuring Dave Stewart, Duff McKagan, Earl Slick, members of Paul Weller’s band and Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds, is due May 17th via Schnitzel Records. The photo shoot for the album was done by none other than famed rock photographer Bob Gruen.
The lead single "(Broken) Without You" from the new LP will be released on all DSPs on Valentine's Day (February 14th). Click here to purchase/stream.
Jeff shares some insight into this track, "'(Broken) Without You’ was one of the last songs written for my new album, The Last Day Of Summer. Toward the end of the writing sessions, at my kitchen table, with a pen and paper and an acoustic guitar, very old school, I came up with the repeating verse pattern. It felt very Smiths-y at the time. Jangly and summery and hopeful. But the words that came were quite the opposite, which felt somehow appropriate, actually.
For ages the song had a placeholder name: "Folk." We built on it in the studio, and the musicians -- most especially Earl Slick and Jody Bagley on the keys -- really help lift it from simple, acoustic ballad to something else entirely. Then Todd Morse added his great counterpoint backing vocals, and Ysee did her thing, as only she can do – in French, no less – and it was finished. Well, almost.
At just the right moment, the inimitable Dave Stewart came along and asked, 'What are you working on? Would you like me to take a crack?’ Working from his studio 'on a small island in the Atlantic,' Dave's ethereal flourishes on the guitar and his mix, which only someone who has topped the charts knows just how to achieve, were the icing on the cake."