Alistair Griffin
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| Alistair Griffin | ||
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| Background information | ||
| Birth name | Alistair Richard Griffin | |
| Born | November 1, 1977 | |
| Origin | Middlesbrough England | |
| Genre(s) | Pop Rock | |
| Years active | 2000 - present | |
| Label(s) | Universal /UMTV (2003-2004) | |
Alistair Richard Griffin, (born 1 November 1977 in Middlesbrough, England), is an English singer/songwriter and musician. Already an established songwriter, he first became famous as a solo artist through his appearances on the BBC television show Fame Academy 2 in 2003, where he was "spotted" and championed by Robin Gibb of the Bee Gees. He subsequently had two top twenty hit singles and a top twenty album in the UK.
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[edit] Early career
Brought up in Castleton, a small moorland village near Whitby, North Yorkshire, his wide musical influences range from classic rock and 'Britpop', to English and American folk music. He is passionate about football and is a qualified referee. He has also written songs for his home team, Middlesbrough Football Club, and former England manager, Terry Venables.
Alistair Griffin started singing and writing songs whilst still a student at York St John College (now York St John University), playing guitar and busking on the streets of York with a small band. After graduating with a BA(Hons) in English Literature (and following a brief stint working as a milkman around his home town, during which he crashed his milk float), he moved to London to pursue a career as a singer/songwriter.
In 2001, as vocalist with the pop/rock band 'Sugartown', he performed in front of 70,000 people at the Leeds Party in the Park. The following year, he and his sometime songwriting partner, Stuart Hanna (now part of folk duo Megson) formed the band, Pulse, and co-wrote the song 'Fade Away' (having recorded the song on an 8-track in Hanna's bedroom) and entered it for the 2002 Song for Europe competition on Radio Two. The song was shortlisted, and a performance by Pulse was broadcast, but it failed to reach the finals.
Griffin was briefly a member of Ultra and after spending some time working in Germany with DJ Sammy, he auditioned for the boyband, Blue, only narrowly failing to make it to the final line-up. Although signed by music publisher Trevor Horn's company, "Perfect Songs", he was unable to get a solo recording contract and in 2002, he applied to become a contestant on the first series of Fame Academy.
[edit] Fame Academy
Griffin reached the final audition stage on his first attempt, but was not chosen to appear on the show. He re-applied for a place on Fame Academy 2 the following year and was voted through by the public with the highest vote of the preliminary round. Despite harsh criticism every week from ‘Headmaster’ Richard Park who called him "bland" and his voice "nasal", his dogged determination and cheerful disposition behind the scenes, as well as his camarederie and duetting with fellow student James Fox, attracted the attention and the votes of many viewers of the live TV streaming programmes. The vocal coaches criticised both his voice and image, calling them "unoriginal", "unidentifiable" and "boybandish"; however, guest judge, Robin Gibb of the Bee Gees said Griffin had a "unique talent" as a vocalist and songwriter, an "ideal recording voice" with "an engaging vocal tone". His technically-accomplished live performances and proven songwriting ability gradually gained him the support of the public and as the final approached, he was dubbed the "dark horse" of the show by BBC 3 presenter, Claudia Winkleman. [1]
The final showdown, screened live, generated so many angry messages from viewers claiming bias that the BBC were forced to close down their Points of View message boards. Daniel Bedingfield, who duetted with both finalists, later made a public apology to Griffin for his behaviour and his outburst that people should "just vote for Alex".(This incident received considerable press coverage and was the subject of one of the questions in the 2003 Observer Music Monthly Magazine Christmas Quiz) [2]) The actual voting figures have never been publicly released.
[edit] Single and album releases
After coming second, Griffin signed a record deal with UMTV and released his first single, "Bring It On"; a double A-side also featuring 'My Lover's Prayer', a duet with Robin Gibb. Although it received very little airplay, it was voted #1 for 6 consecutive weeks on the music TV channel 'The Box' and reached the top 5 in the UK singles chart. On January 9, 2004, he was therefore able to fulfil one of his lifetime ambitions to appear live on Top of the Pops.
In January 2004, he released his debut album , also titled Bring It On , featuring mainly self-penned songs. This charted at number 12 in the UK album charts. His second single, You and Me (Tonight) reached the top 20 but Griffin parted with both his record company and management soon afterwards.
[edit] A new direction
During 2004, Griffin performed live at over 50 gigs up and down the UK and appeared on numerous television programmes, including Top of the Pops and Liquid News. In March of that year he also competed in the European 'WorldBest' competition in Cannes, singing live with Phil Collins.
The live performances of his own material that he gave throughout that year, singing acoustically and with the backing of a regular 5-piece band, Riccardi, showed a marked difference from the generic 'pop' approach of his record company. After parting from UMTV he abandoned his record company's 'pop style' backing tracks and his former 'boyband' image.
In the autumn, he supported Robin Gibb on his 'Magnet' tour of Germany, opening each concert with an acoustic set of his own songs, playing guitar and accompanied on keyboards by long-time friend and fellow musician, Simon Waggott (Waggo), as well as joining Gibb on stage to duet on 'My Lover's Prayer'. On his return he released an independent recording of his live performances in Germany, which he showcased at a series of sell-out concerts in the North of England.
A former junior tennis champion, he played tennis and also performed with Riccardi in Sir Cliff Richard's pro/celebrity Tennis Tournament in December 2004.
During 2005 Griffin continued to perform live, both solo and with Riccardi, but split with them later that year. He moved back to York and although there were rumours of a new recording deal, nothing materialised. In November he assembled a new backing band and performed his first London gig for over a year at the Bedford, where he showcased several new compositions.
Early in 2006 he announced that he would no longer be pursuing a solo career, and would be concentrating on working and writing with his new band, Albion. Since then he has performed solo only at small local venues. At his Christmas concert in December 2006 he released another independently recorded, three track solo CD; finding Boethius, consisting of one co-written song, "Let Love Speak Its Name", a cover of "Hallelujah" which he regularly sings live, and an acoustic cover of "Love Will Tear Us Apart".
[edit] Songwriting
Although largely ignored by the British music establishment (perhaps due to his appearance on Fame Academy that he now describes as a 'double-edged sword'), several of his compositions have achieved notable chart success. in The Netherlands. "You and Me" appears on the #1 album Impressed released in 2003 by Jim Bakkum, runner-up in the Dutch series of Pop Idol; Do’s ballad “Angel By My Side” (co-written with James and Tom Martin} reached the Dutch top 10 in 2004 and “Hungry For Love” (co-written with Greg Fitzgerald and Tom Nichols) covered by rock band Di-rect, getting to number 3 early in 2005.
In 2002 he co-wrote the football anthem "England Crazy" which was recorded by Rider and Terry Venables. He has also written and co-written songs for albums by Phixx(2004) and Ultra(2006).
He now works as an independent artist and has been writing and recording new material with Robin Gibb, singer/songwriter Richard Chance, Liverpudlian songwriting duo, Chris and Tony Griffiths (ex Britpop band The Real People) and Paul Banks (ex Shed Seven).
[edit] Albion
In April 2006, Griffin announced that he would shortly be forming a new band, Albion, which was launched in July.[3] The initial lineup proved unsuccessful, with James and Tom Martin leaving a few months later to form another indie band, The Station Club. Current (February 2007) members of Albion are Alistair Griffin (guitar and vocals), Walter 'Giz' Gibbon (drums), Paul Banks (ex-Shed Seven) (guitars and keyboard) and Paul 'Foda' Fothergill (bass) . They are writing and recording new songs for their debut album, several of which have been demoed on MySpace [4].
[edit] Trivia
- Alistair is an expert at making lemon curd, which he regularly enters in the annual Danby Show. However, although he has been awarded second and third prize, he has never won.[5]
- After leaving Fame Academy, he shared a luxury flat in Chelsea, London with fellow contestant James Fox. [6]
- In 2003, without his knowledge, Alistair's mother offered a date with him as a prize in a charity raffle for the Whitby Christmas Lights Appeal. Enough money was raised to light the town for the next three years.[7]
- Alistair is notorious for performing his own comedy versions of well known songs in his live concerts. These have included songs by George Formby, Johnny Mathis, Ronan Keating and Robin Gibb
[edit] Hallelujah Mark Viduka
In February 2007 Griffin sang at a charity event at the Riverside Stadium, home of Middlesbrough Football Club. After his performance of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah, he asked the audience if they would like to hear an alternative version, based on Cohen’s song, but with new words dedicated to Boro hero, Australian striker Mark Viduka. Keeping faithfully to Cohen's melody, Griffin's almost plaintive vocals are sung to a simple acoustic backing, forming a contrast to the altered lyrics which reference the particular skills of Viduka and several other popular players in the team, as well as some of their opponents, in a sharply observed and witty commentary.
After hearing the tongue-in-cheek tribute, Middlesbrough manager Gareth Southgate was so taken with it he asked Griffin to make a special recording to play at the following day’s match. It was played to the crowd at half-time and to the players in the dressing room after the game.
In an interview with the Daily Mail, Boro’s Aussie international keeper Mark Schwarzer said:
“It’s a great song. He (Mark Viduka) is already copping some stick about it and I’m going to make sure he gets some more from the Australia camp — I’m going to make sure they get to hear it as well. We played it in the dressing room afterwards and were a bit unsure about it to begin with but the chorus is pretty good. We all sang and I think Mark was a little bit embarrassed by it but I think he enjoyed it” [8]
The incident received global press coverage, most of it positive. (although The Times was uncomplimentary and dubbed Leonard Cohen "the cheesiest of crooners [9]) It was immediately picked up by hundreds of online sports pages and blogs. The Mark Viduka song was added to Griffin’s Myspace fan page the following day and has since clocked up over 64,000 plays by football fans worldwide [10] .
The BBC Sports Review described the song as the "football anthem of the week, year, decade and possibly all time" [11], and the Irish Times called it "a bit on the excellent side". [12] TV and Radio coverage followed. A film of Griffin performing the song with other young Middlesbrough supporters appeared on Sky Sports News, and he also appeared on the BBC's and ITV's regional news programmes. In addition to interviews on local radio stations, Griffin was also interviewed on BBC Radio Five Live The song was also broadcast on several channels in Australia and on the BBC World Service.
Middlesbrough Manager Gareth Southgate embraced the tune as a way of raising money for his chosen charity, Macmillan Cancer Support. Leonard Cohen has now given permission for the song to be released as a charity download at indiestore.com. .[13]
(This is not Griffin's first recording of a football song - in 2002 he recorded his own version of the Boro anthem "Stand Up", which was included in the compilation album Boro Songs - The Sound Of The Riverside.)
[edit] Discography
[edit] Singles
"Bring It On/My Lover's Prayer"CD1 (UMTV) December 2003 (# 5 UK official singles charts)
"Bring It On/A Lover's Prayer" CD2 (Universal) Limited Edition Single, December 2003
"You and Me (Tonight)"(UMTV) March 2004 (# 18 UK official singles chart)
"You and Me (Tonight)" (UMTV) March 2004 (extended edition)
"Mark Viduka" (Indiestore/Digital 7)[14] March 2007 Charity single (download only)
[edit] EP
finding Boethius (Dream Factory) (Released independently December 2006)
- "Let Love Speak Its Name (Griffin/Bell)
- Hallelujah (Leonard Cohen)
- "Love Will Tear Us Apart" (Joy Division)
[edit] Albums
Bring It On (UMTV) January 12 2004 (#12 UK official album chart).
‘Alistair Griffin Live in Germany’ Limited Edition CD (Released independently November 2004).
- You and Me (Tonight)*
- Feeling Alive*
- I Have Lived*
- I Can't Make You Love Me
- Bring It On*(acoustic)
[edit] Compilations
‘Boro Songs - The Sound Of The Riverside’ Middlesbrough Football Club December 2002
10. Stand Up*
‘”Fame Academy” Bee Gees Special’ (Polydor) August 2003
3. To Love Somebody.
‘Fame Academy - The Finalists’ (Polydor) October 2003
- 5. Wherever You Will Go
- 6. Lately
- 7. Truly Madly Deeply
- 8. It Must Be Love
Original Compositions *
(Griffin's hit singles have also appeared in a number of compilation albums including Now That's What I Call Music! 57 (U.K. series) ; I Love Smash Hits; Steve Wright's Sunday Love Songs; and Just For You).
An extended dance version of 'You and Me (Tonight)', which was included on the enhanced single, also appears on the 2004 Floorfillers compilation album under the name 'AG vs Clubstar - You & Me (Tonight) (Clubstar Remix)'.
[edit] External links
[edit] Official websites
- Albion MySpace
- Alistair Griffin online
- Official fansite (Temporarily offline for refurbishment)
[edit] Reviews
- Middlesbrough Evening Gazette 19.10.04 Gig Review
[edit] Other links and information sources
- Fame Academy Final, BBC News report.
- Cultural Foundation Interview In depth interview with Pete Bell of the Cultural Foundation, 19.6.2004
- Perfect Songs Music Publisher
- IMDB TV Appearances
- Fame Academy Supporters Club
- Press interview October 5, 2006
- Press report of Charity Event, 23 February, 2007
- Southgate serenade stirs Viduka's home thoughts, The Guardian, February 26,2007
- Hallelujah Mark Viduka, Sydney Morning Herald Feb 27, 2007
- Fans Flock to Hear Viduka Tribute - Middlesborough Football Club, February 26, 2007
[edit] Media
- Last Dance, unreleased demo,c2000 (Quicktime)
- Kiss and Tell, unreleased demo, c2000 (Quicktime)
- Radio Interview BBC Radio January 2004 (Realplayer)
- Aligriffin.com – comprehensive multimedia archive of live performances, 2004 - 2006, recorded by fans.
- Video clips of live performances Middlesbrough Gazette.
- Alistair Griffin produces tribute song for Middlesbrough starBroadband tv channel (video podcast), March 1, 2007
