New York, NY (Top40 Charts/ Shore Fire Media) "I'm very proud Smooth Jazz radio stations have helped break the
Nathan East project and hopefully our format is influencing other genres to pay attention to an artist that defies gravity and labels," said
Sandy Shore, SmoothJazz.com President & Founder. "Nathan East embodies the new paradigm of music on a global level and truly appeals to all popular music enthusiasts, which makes him highly playable on the air, and hugely successful to a wide audience."
Released March 25 on Yamaha Entertainment Group,
Nathan East features contributions from
Eric Clapton ("Can't Find My Way Home"),
Stevie Wonder ("
Overjoyed"),
Michael McDonald ("
Moondance"),
Sara Bareilles ("I Can Let Go Now"), Ray Parker Jr. ("Daft Funk"), Bob James, Chuck Loeb,
David Paich and more.
"I'm thrilled by the global embrace of my first solo album," East said. "It is very much a reflection of the joy I feel when playing music with my friends. This collection of performances is a celebration of the many diverse musical relationships I have developed over the years. I'm extremely happy with the way it turned out!"
SmoothJazz.com
Radio launched in 2000 as the first Internet-only jazz radio station in the world. It features the Top 50 Album Chart, sanctioned by The Gavin Report in 2001. When Gavin closed its doors in 2002, the chart was recognized as the industry's leading Contemporary Jazz airplay chart.
"Everything good that is happening to this exceptional human being, including his residency at the top of our weekly Top 50 Chart, is the universe paying out in full for talent, creativity and integrity," said Shore.
Hailed as "a striking debut ... blinding brilliance" (Bass Player), "bonafide jazz personified" (Smooth Jazz Ride) and "substance over flash" (Premier Guitar),
Nathan East was co-produced by East and Yamaha Entertainment Group Founder & VP Chris Gero and hailed at No. 1 on the Billboard Contemporary Jazz Albums chart.
"I'm ecstatic there's so much excitement around the
Nathan East album," Gero said. "It's been a privilege to work with Nathan and I couldn't be more proud of him and his record-breaking accomplishment."
Nathan East features the first single, "Daft Funk", East's ode to the GRAMMY-winning album he helped record with Daft Punk. The song features legendary session guitarist Ray Parker Jr., and uses a talk box to channel the French funk auteurs.
"When I heard 'Daft Funk' for the first time, my world spun off its axis for a moment," Shore said. "I knew that Nathan had managed to capture something extraordinarily relevant and fun with depth in this song."
The "Daft Funk" (radio version) official video can be seen exclusively until Aug. 11 on the homepage of SmoothJazz.com. The video was filmed in Los Angeles and directed by Asher Levin of The Dot Content.
