Eddie Kowalczyk's Australian Tour, August 2009 Options

[SJN1279]

Eddie just announced from his latest blog that he will be touring Australia in August. Finally something cool for you guys down under! Dates Below!


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Date: Sunday, Aug 9th, 2009
Venue: The Tivoli
City: Brisbane
Country: AU
Notes:
Tickets on sale July 10th

Link:
Learn More


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Date: Wednesday, Aug 12th, 2009
Venue: Octagon Theatre
City: Perth
Country: AU
Notes:
Tickets on sale July 10th

Link:
Learn More


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Date: Saturday, Aug 15th, 2009
Venue: The Forum
City: Melbourne
Country: AU
Notes:
Tickets on sale July 10th

Link:
Learn More


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Date: Tuesday, Aug 18th, 2009
Venue: Norwood Concert Hall
City: Norwood
Country: AU
Notes:
Tickets on sale July 10th

Link:
Learn More


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Date: Wednesday, Aug 19th, 2009
Venue: Enmore Theatre
City: Sydney
Country: AU
Notes:
Tickets on sale July 10th

Link:
Learn More

[Pokey]

Thats pretty good, about 1500, as much as Live got per night last tour at the Palace

[Liveman94]

Thats pretty good, about 1500, as much as Live got per night last tour at the Palace

Got my tix man for the 1st Bris show 11 rows back and its a SELL OUT!!!

Hopefully hear a new song or two....Zion, Dirty water...



Can't Wait!!!

[dangum]

Here are a few articles that have been published in Perth publications:

The Drum Media [Perth Edition]
Thursday 6 August 2009. Issue 148

A-LIVE AND KICKING

Rock-guru Eddie Kowalczyk of Live tells Katie Benson how a smaller stage can save your soul, and your overplayed material.

In 1994, Eddie Kowalczyk fronted one of the world's biggest bands. Live's second album Throwing Copper catapulted the four Pennsylvanian boys into the number one spot in the US charts, filled stadiums and made them a worldwide success. Now, 15 years and four albums later, Kowalczyk is approaching the spotlight alone. Abandoning heavy production, stadium seating and the rest of his band members, Kowalczyk embarked on his solo tour in April of this year. Covering the States, Europe and Australia he insists this tour is a well needed breath of fresh air for the artist, the fans, and the long-serving Live material.

"After 20 years of seeing me in the same sort of way it's been really refreshing for me and for the fans too, because I am able to reinvent those songs," Kowalczyk says. "Of course, Live is an incredible rock band and we do incredible shows, but the wonderful think about this tour is that you get something from me that you can't get sitting miles away in an arena. There's an intimacy that is very much like the lyrics themselves - they're search for that deep connection with people in their hearts and souls."

Intimate is a work that Kowalczyk uses frequently when discussing his new shows. The naked production style on stage assimilates closely to the environment that he initially writes all the material in. As the primary songwriter, Kowalczyk has penned a lot of Live's big hits with just an acoustic guitar, before ultimately taking it in o the band where the "layers" of production were added. "Really the first layer that gets put on my music is when I take it to the rehearsal studio with the band, then production and then the tour. Before you know it, you start to forget where the song started from," says Kowalczyk. "Coming back to his way of doing it, bringing in back to such an intimate place is very regenerative. On this tour I get up there with no script, it's just me and this box with six strings strapped to it. No amplifier, no electric guitar. It's about as broke-down as you can go."

As with the production style, the play list Kowalczyk's performing also strays from the usual Live set. Of course there are the big hits like Lightning Crashes and I Alone, but Kowalczyk is also using this new forum to rediscover old album tracks, and test out new material of his own. "There are rarities or what I like to call little gens that I think connect to this kind of intimate environment well, like Face and Ghost from Distance to Here and Nobody Knows from Five. They weren't singles, but are just incredible songs that are very much in the singer/songwriter style," says Kowalczyk. "Other than that, there is one new songs and sometimes I play some covers."

Spirituality is a constant theme in his lyrics and a big part of who Kowalczyk is an a performed. It is the element that has drawn many of Live's loyal fans to them, but also what has polarized other listeners. In the world of rock'n'roll where wild antics, anger and despondency are standard emotions expressed by performers, Kowalczyk's spiritual search stands out. In the press that went along with 1997's Secret Samadhi he revealed that he was a recent devotee to Adi Da, a guru that he first came into contact via the Internet. Kowalczyk was ridiculed. In spite of this reaction he continues to be open about his spirituality in the media and in his lyrics. "It's who I am regardless of what I do as a singer, songwriter and performer. So it's all one and the same. I can't imagine dividing myself up into one kind of person in their private life, but then who says "oh, I'm not going to talk about that [on stage]", Kowalczyk says. "It's my life, it's what motivates me and what is most interesting about me. Luckily, I'm finding a lot of people who resonate with it."

Who: Eddie Kowalczyk
When and Where: Wednesday 12 (sold-out) and Thursday 13 August, WA Octagon Theatre. Crawley.

[dangum]

Ed Kowalczyk - Live and Solo
X-Press Magazine Issue 1172
30-July-2009

Live frontman Ed Kowalczyk will perform two special solo shows at the Octagon Theatre on August 12 and 13.
BOB GORDON reports.

After years of playing arenas around the world fronting Live, Ed Kowalczyk is revelling in the intimacy of playing solo shows, armed with only his voice and an acoustic guitar.
"This is like being in 1990, making music in a room with a couple of people for a couple of people. I'd sort of become completely separated from that. This has been an incredible sort of leap back into that world. I've rediscovered myself."

Ed (or Eddie, as the tour publicity goes) Kowalczyk's enthusiasm for the simple act of playing solo and acoustic resonates on many levels. While he's always been open and approachable with Live's fans, the logistics of a major rock band being on tour means that aside from a lucky percentage who may meet the band, most see and hear the music from a distance. In touring solo, Kowalczyk is meeting both the shier or timid fans, as well as those who maintain the deepest kinds of connections to his music.

"Yeah, I believe so. Also I've noticed that with this particular approach to the music that it's bringing out the people who are really hyped about the songs, who have had a really long-term relationship with my lyrics. Now for them, they've been able to see my face doing it right up close and experience it in a direct way that you can't get if you're 10, 15 or 100 rows back in an arena, or in a theatre even.

"It's just a whole new experience. It's just me and an acoustic so you can really hear the vocal and the lyrics, so it's just different in that it is a new reflection."
One of the most fascinating aspects for Kowalczyk is the ongoing reveal of how people relate to his music...
"It's been really extraordinary for me the way that people have grown with the lyrics," he says. "And basically, regularly, daily, how much the music still means to them. It somehow even means more now than ever. I mean, when I take a perspective on that, a lot of the music that I liked in my 20s I don't care about that much anymore (laughs). You move through phases of life where inevitably you drop off from things that once meant a lot to you.
"To hear people say that 10 years, or 15 years later, a song still means just as much to them, has been really amazing. It's something that you hope you're doing with your writing, but never really realise when or if you're at that point. So I'm just overwhelmed by that just about everyday.
"One of the tactile things about these shows is the sheer appreciation of the fact that these people have been able to grow with this music and having it mean more in the lives with the more experience that they bring to it. I mean that's what you dream of, it's great."

In the fans' eyes it's like new light shining through old windows. From Kowalczyk's point of view in re-treating these songs, it's like meeting old friends again.
"Absolutely. They really start there for me. Before they really go to the band and they get produced and arranged and added to, subtracted from - whatever happens in the studio and all the layers that go on there - they start in that sphere of me and the guitar. So for me to do that on stage and invite people into that experience, which is so personal to me, people are really appreciating that.

"A lot of people aren't aware that I can do it or am interested in doing it that that way (laughs). For me it's very natural and I've been doing it for years, but a lot of people have had no idea that it could be so compelling done it that way."