LOS ANGELES (Luck Media & Marketing) - Folks down in South Florida may be hunkering down now that it's hurricane season again, but over the past few years, they've been more in tune with another force of nature that's been rockin' heavy an average of three nights a week at local, tourist-friendly hotspots from Palm Beach To The Keys: Gigi DeNisco.
Playing in a variety of musical settings (solo, duo, trio, full band), the fiery, classic rock influenced singer/songwriter has become a regional institution with her SRO performances (over 150 a year at last count) at clubs like Tobacco Road in Miami, The Island Grill and The Lor-e-lei (Islamorada, in The Keys) and Toucan's in Hollywood Beach. This past May, Gigi and her band played at the world famous Sunfest in West Palm Beach, opening the main stage show for Michael Bolton; the fest's lineup over the four day weekend included Bruce Hornsby, Duncan Sheik and Lynyrd Skynyrd.
It's been a long time coming, but DeNisco-who has long mixed hard hitting original material in with covers of pop songs she grew up with-is breaking the barriers and finally getting her music out beyond her beloved home state. "Before We Start," the heartfelt mid-tempo rocker and first single from her new indie disc Too Close For Comfort, was released this past spring and peaked at No 11 on FMQB's Adult Contemporary chart, receiving loads of airplay everywhere from Maryland, Iowa and Kentucky to Bermuda and Maui.
The rollicking follow-up single, "Pony Ride," was released to radio in August and was the second most added song on that same chart its first week out; on the chart measuring nationwide spins, it rose the next week from 168 to 53 and the third week, Charted at No 39!
While DeNisco put out two previous, well-received independent discs, On My Way and Winds of a Dream, she believes that Too Close For Comfort-which she co-produced with her longtime guitarist Jimi Fiano, who also plays keyboards and mandolin-is her breakthrough project and most fully realized collection to date. "It's got that Mellencamp polish but it's rough like a rock album should be," she says. "From playing all these gigs over the years, I've seen that there are a lot of people out there who want to hear a classic rock sound, but one that's not coming from a dead person or a group that broke up! The major labels are missing the boat big time on this huge market, and it just so happens that that's the kind of music I like."
"A lot of these songs are tunes that I've been doing live for a long time, but I had some tough experiences with record labels in the past which made me ambivalent about recording them," DeNisco adds. "But Jimi kept bugging me about getting back in the studio, and it was an incredible experience working with him and Damian Mazuar, the owner and engineer of Soundmixers Recording Studio in Hollywood. They've both got great ears and perfect pitch, and really gave me a lot of leeway to figure out the best approach to each song."
"As a live performer," she says, "I'm best at singing heavy for four or five hours, but here I had the best of both worlds, and an opportunity to grow. I've always been a good live singer, but never captured anything as emotional as this in the studio before doing this project with Jimi. Too Close For Comfort has some of the best tracks I've ever done."
The success of "Pony Ride" is especially gratifying to DeNisco because it was the one song she didn't already have when she first got into the studio. She says, "My manager Jeanne Towne was just trying to encourage me one day when we first met and said, 'This is good stuff, Let's just get on the pony and ride.' It was great to just take those words and run on pure inspiration."
As DeNisco, who has been writing songs since she was 15, explains it, each song has a unique story behind it. She was at a hotel in Nashville when she come up with the flat-pick styled riff for Too Close For Comfort's first single "Before We Start. "I'm a closet bluegrass player at heart, and the intro reflects that," she says. "Then I built the song around the intro. It's about knowing better, letting your guard down and how everything changes after you fall in love."
The provocatively titled "Worse Than Worst Blues" was written about (what else?) a jerk she dated and decided to leave. This darker edged song is balanced perfectly by the very optimistic and inspirational, "Don't Give Up On Love," whose title is self-explanatory. While most of the tracks on Too Close For Comfort are relationship centered, the final cut, the Joni Mitchell-influenced "The Angel Song" is about a true-life spiritual experience that was so deep and intense that she includes a whole back story in the liner notes that complement its vivid lyrical images. It's a dramatic coming of age story featuring a miraculous rescue at sea (which happened in the Bahamas when DeNisco was 16 years old) that could literally inspire a movie.
The next single that will be released, is the grooving rocker "Walkin' A Line." This release will be coupled with a Band Tour, most likely in the Spring of 2007. The Gigi DeNisco Band has opened for many Nationals including Boz Scaggs, Stevie Nicks, Steely Dan, Willie Nelson, Keith Urban and many more.
Growing up in Miami Shores, the classically trained pianist listened extensively to her older sister's record collection that included classics by Joni Mitchell and James Taylor, and DeNisco later got into Heart, The Pretenders and Bonnie Raitt. She ditched the piano when she picked up her first guitar around age nine, then played piano again from 15-21 before abandoning it when she quit her day job to start playing in bars and clubs. These days, she balances solo guitar gigs with duo shows that she performs with Fiano or her bassist Matt Coogan; she mostly leads her full band at showcase gigs.
"The cool thing about doing so many gigs is that practice and work happen at the same time for me," says DeNisco, who is currently making plans with her band to get on the road and do dates beyond her local following. "I hone my skills playing some covers while working in original material and seeing how the audiences respond to it. Really, there's nothing better for me than getting up and playing for people. No matter what kind of mood I'm in when I start the show, by the end of every night, I'm sure of why I do this. It's a great release and nothing in the world like it."
