| NICK PIUNTI – Surprise Box #120Pop Geek Heaven

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Categorized | Music Discovery, The Artist's Stage, The Surprise Box

NICK PIUNTI – Surprise Box #120

Posted on 17 July 2013

“13 in My Head”, the new album from Nick Piunti, continues in the power pop traditions he displayed as singer, songwriter, guitarist in Detroit’s “The Respectables”. Before calling it a day in 2011, The Respectables released two albums (and ep) with songs featured in television and film, and garnered plenty of praise from the power pop community. Far from finished and armed with a batch of new songs, (but for the first time in years,without a band), Nick got together with good friend Ryan Allen ( Destroy This Place, Friendly Foes, Thunderbirds are Now) to share some new tunes and bounce around some ideas. Immediately it was obvious that this was a move in the right direction. With more than enough songs for a new record, it was off to Big Sky Recording with producer Geoff Michael to lay down some guitar tracks to get the ball rolling. At Geoff’s suggestion (one of his many great ideas) Donny Brown (The Verve Pipe) was enlisted as the drummer for his obvious percussion skills, but also for his gift with harmonies and production. What started out as Garageband demos came to life with two (unrehearsed) recording sessions with Donny and Geoff in Ann Arbor. Nick added the guitars, and not one, but three bassists, Chris DuRoss, Todd Holmes (Chris Richards and The Subtractions) and Andy Reed (An American Underdog) completed the basic tracks. Ryan Allen added some great guitar tracks and vocals on 5 of the album’s songs (including the 4 tunes he co-wrote) which added some Detroit indie cred. The ending result is 10 new, power pop, indie rock, get to the point, hook filled songs that came out exactly as Nick intended. Not an easy task, and one that couldn’t have been acheived with out these amazing guys

This song below from the new album, “13 In My Head” is gonna blow you away. It’s pretty much perfect and you pretty much need to hear it, savor it and live with it. It’s that good. I can’t think of a finer song I’ve heard in the last few months that typifies that classic ‘power pop’ sound than “On My Way Out”.

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DOWNLOAD – “On My Way Out” – HERE

(right click and ‘save as’)

BIOGRAPHY:
Hardly a newcomer, Nick’s first musical venture began at the ripe age of 11 with his childhood friends in the band Dwarf. Suprisingly Dwarf grew up together and remained a band until they were 25. Their first single was even recently re-released by New York’s Sing Sing Records. They made their way to L.A. (new name, The Take) as young adults only to find that a midwestern power pop band was not a good match for the “Hair Metal” days in the land of Guns and Roses. Still, it was an amazing learning experience and the band did a lot of writing and recording while living on In ‘n Out Burgers. So a bit weary, but undaunted, Nick moved back to Michigan band-less but with the intention of writing and recording. That continued for several years, a lot of demos, a solo album (on cassette!) a movie placement and some close calls but no record deal. So a bit burned out and not feeling the “grunge” movement, Nick decided to focus on something even bigger than music. Getting married and starting a family took precedence but with the idea that “someday” he would get back into it. A self titled solo album was released in 2002, which then lead to the formation of The Respectables with Joey Gaydos, Donn Deniston, Pete Bankert, and later, Dan Oestrike. The band leaned more in the classic rock traditions of power pop and made quite an impact globally, especially with their 2008 album Sibley Gardens. Two album releases (The Respectables, and Sibley Gardens) and an ep (3), garnered The Respectables music placements in film and television, as well as rave power pop reviews. Although The Respectables called it a day in 2011, Nick had a lot of music left in the tank and went on a writing and demo spree which evolved into 2013’s “13 in My Head”. His most powered up pop to date!